Where's the boundary line with the "verse-identification" tag?

Question

So there's this question: Is there a verse about "big" and "small" lies being the same in God's kingdom?.

So far the question seems to be relatively safe. There is 1 VTC and 3 up/down votes. I've made an edit to the question to make it more straightforward and answerable.

Are topic-based bible query questions OK? Is that what the verse-identification tag is for? Do you think this question falls under that category? Do you guys have any other general issues with this question?

She doesn't seem to be asking for doctrine or asking if X is a sin, but is mechanically asking "Is a passage about XYZ in the text of the bible?" That is a yes or no question, answerable, objective, and I think great. There are lots of idioms that Christians grow up with that they think are in the bible but are actually not in the bible but are simply extrapolated from it. I saw this question as one that wanted to verify if the big vs small lies idea was actually written in the bible or not.

Did she show a lot of research effort? I don't know. I know that if you try to Google/Biblegateway an answer to this you will not get the answer right away (and what other research test do we have?). I feel like that would be the case for most topical bible text searches.

I understand this is a grey area. I ere to the side of "let it be", others may not. Whatevs. Sound off.

Answer 1

My test is simple:

• If a question is asking about a single verse with enough information to identify it, it should be allowed (but not encouraged per se). If we are going to allow "simple questions" in other areas, I don't think verse search should be an exception. At minimum, if people really don't like these, they should be closed as "too basic" or "no research effort", not "verse search".

• If it is asking about a topic (e.g. potentially multiple verses), it is not a good question, but often can be rephrased what is the Biblical basis for X. If someone is trying to prove a point (which seems to be the main concern) or circumvent pastoral advice guidelines, then it should be closed.

Answer 2

verse-identification is a cancer and should not be allowed to metastasize. Other sites have struggled with similar tags with poor results. Gaming has disallowed the similar game-id tag, and SFF routinely has arguments over their story-id tag.

Here's the thing, Google is already super good at this kind of thing. You type in a few words about a topic, and it comes up with a list of sources, and within the first few you've got basically everything and odds are you've found the verse/verses that you're looking for.

Generally, I think that questions that are asking us to either prove something doesn't exist OR simply provide a link to the fact that it does exist are not very good questions and should probably be heavily discouraged.

Lastly if we are going to allow these at all, the bar should be very high. There should be evidence of significant research effort, and at least some small test of notability.

To address the question that spawned this one, there is little research effort shown, thought it does hold up to a minimum notability bar (the idea that little white lies are ok is fairly common).

Basically it comes down to this. These questions aren't generally great (and a quick perusal of the tag shows that they are consistently meh in quality), and certainly shouldn't be encouraged. I'd advocate for their banning, but if we do allow them, we need a better criteria than "I heard this, is it a thing?"

Answer 3

Of course, some verse identification questions are problematic. Many are so simple that a quick Google search reveals the desired information. As wax eagle says:

Google is already super good at this kind of thing. You type in a few words about a topic, and it comes up with a list of sources, and within the first few you've got basically everything and odds are you've found the verse/verses that you're looking for.

However, there are many verse identification questions that are more complex, and are not easily answered in the way wax eagle describes.

Let's take a few examples:

1. Where in the Bible is the Golden Rule?
   • This one is obviously problematic. Demonstrates no research effort; should be closed on this basis.
2. Where in the Bible was a prophet attacked by a bear?
   • Also easy. A Google search turns this up in the top several hits. It should be closed; no research effort.
3. Is Jesus quoted anywhere in the New Testament outside of the Gospels and Revelation?
   • Not so easy. This search and this one both contain links to this WP article, but to a novice, the blurbs may not be obvious enough.
4. Where is the mentioning of people still living from the time of Christ in New Testament?
   • Rather difficult. Without closer wording, search #1 and search #2 do not provide the answer.
5. Do any passages show Jesus eating meat other than fish?
   • Difficult. No Bible sites appear that include the information given in our answers when I perform search #1 and search #2.

Some of these are obviously terrible, while others are more debatable, and perhaps even helpful (note that #5 in my list is not currently closed, despite a close attempt in March).

The key difference is that some demonstrate research effort, and others don't.

So what's the point?

We should close questions because they show no research effort, not because they are "verse identification" questions.

I propose that if you feel that a verse identification question, or any other question, fails to demonstrate sufficient research effort, leave a comment saying:

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it shows no research effort.

If others agree, they'll vote to close. If not, they won't. Enforcing a "no verse identification policy" and ignoring other considerations undermines the usefulness of the site, because not all verse identification questions are created equal.

Answer 4

I think this is the first question since allowing some of these questions became broadly accepted by the community: Where is the verse about people sinning because they know God will forgive them?

I think that it's very broad (there are lots of verses about deliberately sinning, and lots of other ones about people who are worse than others), and the OP didn't give very specific wording, or what exactly they searched for. This is exactly the same problem we see for other verse identification questions.

People mis-remember not just the wording of verses but the content of verses too. Finding the closest verse to an idea still results in a subjective judgement, which I think is demonstrated by two highly upvoted answers which present verses I personally don't think are what the OP was talking about.

I would like to propose that for these questions to be acceptable the question must specify the exact wording searched for (and preferably give several alternatives they tried), as well as tell us what passages those searches suggested and why they are wrong. Without telling us those passages all these questions will do is duplicate the work of a search engine.