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Quite an awful lot lately, I’ve seen a bunch of questions regarding Tanach grammar popping up in the review queue as off-topic for Hebrew language, most recently Explanation of Kamatz vs. Patach ה הידעה. The reason itself specifies

Questions about the Hebrew language or about history or news of the Jewish people, Jewish individuals, or the State of Israel, except as related to Judaism, are off-topic. If this question does relate to Judaism, please edit it to indicate how.

Notice the part in italics. (Formatting is exactly how it appears in the reason.)

Given how many of these questions keep popping up in the queue, in spite of this qualification, maybe we should emphasize this point a little more bluntly, boldly, clearly, whatever adverb you think is relevant, that questions about Jews/Israel/Hebrew/etc. are not off-topic; questions about Jews/Israel/Hebrew/etc. unrelated to Judaism are off-topic.

I have addressed the general topic previously on here. I feel like there are other meta questions that are similarly relevant, which others can post or edit in. My question is not about the policy itself, but rather how we can emphasize it better so that such questions that are perfectly okay don’t clog up the review queue so often.

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2 Answers 2

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Maybe we should emphasize that the reason for closure has nothing to do with the presence of Jews, etc. and everything to do with the absence of Judaism by making this look explicitly like a special case of the general close reason:

This question does not appear to be about Judaism within the scope defined in the help center. Note that not all questions about the Hebrew language, about history or news of the Jewish people, about Jewish individuals, or about the State of Israel are necessarily about Judaism.

This ought to be more helpful than the general close reason for questions that are about Jews, etc. and not Judaism, clearing up a possible mistaken assumption of the author, while avoiding an implication that these topics create a disqualification.

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    Please check my edit.
    – msh210 Mod
    Commented Oct 18, 2017 at 23:32
  • @msh210 Please check my edit.
    – Isaac Moses Mod
    Commented Oct 19, 2017 at 0:44
  • I think mine matches the current version and yours doesn't. Not that there's a big difference in what's thereby being excluded. Maybe none at all. And not that the proposal needs to match the current version.
    – msh210 Mod
    Commented Oct 19, 2017 at 3:16
  • @msh210 The current production version, I think, is awkward about how the list is structured. I think that my latest edit is the least awkward version so far of this list, structurally. I don't think there's any change in meaning.
    – Isaac Moses Mod
    Commented Oct 19, 2017 at 13:05
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I recommend changing it to:

Questions about the Hebrew language, or about history or news of the Jewish people, Jewish individuals, or the State of Israel, are off-topic, unless they are about Judaism. If this question does relate to Judaism, please edit it to indicate how.

"Except as" may be too confusing.

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  • Maybe a boldface instead of italics?
    – DonielF
    Commented Oct 17, 2017 at 11:53
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    You should consider changing "are about" to "are also about"
    – Double AA Mod
    Commented Oct 17, 2017 at 13:07
  • I prefer the other answer, so the automatic hidden upvoted every author gives his own post should be removed from this one, i.e. subtract 1 from the total score for this post.
    – msh210 Mod
    Commented Oct 17, 2017 at 23:12

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