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They should be treated as fiction. Look at how the issue is framed in the text, without regard to what we know of history, and make this clear in the entries. That should be acceptable.
Stories don't tell us monsters exist; we knew that already. They show us that monsters can be trademarked and milked for years.
^ Uh... Just a hunch, but calling religious texts "fiction" might lead to... unpleasantness.
Tharkun, could you post a link to the draft, please?
- Fly, robin, fly! - ...I'm trying!
We treat religious texts in a similar manner as mythology. They are written to convey stories and contain narrative tropes, plot tropes, and characterization tropes. We are not making a statement as to whether the things depicted in them are real (or allegorical).
If our refusal to treat the Bible as literal truth offends some people, I can live with that. If we did, however, it would fall under the same restrictions as documentary works, meaning we could not use tropes to describe the portrayal of real people, places, and events.
Edited by Fighteer "It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
^^ Not necessarily. We just have to treat them like they're stories with tropes and characters and writers, assuming that everything in the work is true as far as the work is concerned and just not making a statement one way or another about how "true" it may or may not be.
^ Ninja'd by Fighteer!
Edited by WarJay77 Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Generally, examples from The Bible are indeed put under literature. Because that's what it is, a book of fiction. Sometimes there is a folder for mythology and religion (usually lumped together).
The examples for the draft in question are problematic because they are not concrete. It's just a piece of advise from priests or prophets or religious leafers, but not a character who was a slaver/slave owner and treated slaves decently — which is what this trope is.
(to all above) : Hey, no arguments here. Just pointing out that "mythology" and "fiction" aren't one and the same. And since blah blah freedom of religious expression blah blah ROCEJ etc etc, we shouldn't needlessly tread on people's toes.
Edit: Thanks for the link!
Edited by RoundRobin - Fly, robin, fly! - ...I'm trying!
I've seen a lot of Biblical examples get put in the Literature section but, from what I can tell, the proper section is the Mythology & Religion section.
^ I agree that Mythology & Religion is the appropriate section to list these examples. And, as was said in this comment
, you should list the source (e.g. "as said in [religious text X]") and limit the example to what's actually written in the text.
Speaking as a Christian:
The historical accuracy of religious stories is highly up for debate because of the nature of religious institutions with human biases picking and choosing the narrative so it can be troped just like fiction.
Especially when it's events from 2000+ years ago.
Just pointing out that we also trope nonfiction books under literature. So putting The Bible there is by no means making a strong statement about the veracity of it or other religious texts.
"It's just a show; I should really just relax"
Wow. This got a bit derailed, didn't it?
After re-reading the thread, I can see that it's my fault for trying to be quippy instead of concise. My apologies for this mess. I'll try to explain myself properly this time.
1. The comment about "fiction" was me pointing out a poorly chosen word. By implying that religious works are works of fiction, one is likely to ruffle some feathers. "Literature" is a better term to describe religious texts; they are, after all, you know, texts. Words on pages.
2. Off the above, if religious texts are treated as Literature, then they can be troped just like any other book. And since biographies are tropable, religious texts should be treated no differently regardless of their veracity, historical accuracy, or a troper's (lack of?) belief in them.
3. However, since there appears to be a separate category titled "Mythology and Religion", then tropes found in religious texts should, in my opinion, be placed under that namespace. (Is it a namespace?)
TL;DR: IMO, religious texts should be troped like other literary works; however, describing them as "fiction" might offend people. Edited by RoundRobin - Fly, robin, fly! - ...I'm trying!
And calling religious texts anything but fiction might offend atheists.
You can't win this one.
I'm late to the party but I believe examples from the Bible should be listed under "Mythology and Religion".
Agreed.
I happen to be religious, and therefore I do believe that certain holy texts are factually accurate (or at least, parts of them are). However, I also realize that a majority of people in today's societies do not agree and consider them to be fiction. I believe Tv Tropes, as a website, should take a neutral stance in this.
Putting religious material into a folder covering both Myth and Religion seems to be the best compromise to my mind (since one man's religion is another man's myth). As others have said, you're never going to make everyone happy in this situation, and that solution, I believe, at least minimizes the issue.
Edited by DarkHunter
Agreed with the above poster.
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Yeah, what Dark Hunter said, pretty much.
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I am probably poking a hornets' nest here, but when do examples from religious literature such as Bible or hagiographies infringe on Real Life? I am asking because I am working on a NRLEP draft describing "benevolent" slavers and slave owners and several tropers attempted to add examples under "Religion and Mythology" folder, even though they could be feasibly seen as historically accurate. And if everything described by religious texts is not Real Life, is there an option to ban Religion and Mythology examples for a given trope? Because I really don't want people praising possibly-historical slave owners.