[goto11]

Totally unrelated to the matter of hand, but I find it amazing that SE now have forums like "Christianity", "Judaism" etc. where people can upvote and downvote religious questions and answers, and select the "accepted" answer about what Gods opinion is about this and that.

Edit: I didn't mean to imply that the answers are actually Gods opinion! Just found it fascinating that a site specifically designed for technical questions have grown to encompass questions about what Jesus meant with a certain phrase.

[skissane]

It is totally possible to ask (or even answer) a question about a religion without believing in it.

"What are the differences between Shi'a and Sunni belief?" is a totally valid question even if you are an atheist or a Hindu. The answer to "What does the Catholic Church teach about abortion?" is totally independent of your own personal views on the topic.

One doesn't have to be a believer in a religion to be able to answer factual questions about it. Sometimes, an atheist, or a follower of a competing religion, may actually know more about a religion's teachings and history than many of the people who actually believe in it do, and so may actually be able to give more accurate answers about it than some of its own members can.

[PeterisP]

Theology and interpretation of scriptures is one of the classic domains of academia (the four domains being theology, law, medicine and philosophy - with the latter including everything from physics to sociology) with extensive research, so it makes all sense for having a forum where solid, objective research based answers are possible. And you don't even have to be a theist to study theology and provide analysis on what the scriptures and associated practice (e.g. Torah vs Talmud distinction in Judaism) has to say on particular situations or behavior.

[viraptor]

> and select the "accepted" answer about what Gods opinion is about this and that.

You're misrepresenting the idea behind those sites. The questions there don't ask about god's option. They (usually) ask about customs, about text interpretations, about rules of given church / denomination, about texts relating to a given situation, and many other things. (Of course there are some exceptions) You don't have to believe in them to respect people's choice to engage with religion and look for a way to live their life.

For example recent questions in christianity right now: "Does the Bible explain why God chose Israel?", "What kind of food is Jesus referring to at Luke 22:16?", "What does modern scholarship conclude about the shape of the cross and the method of crucifixion?". Those aren't even questions about beliefs.

[goto11]

Current top question "Where does a baby's soul come from?". Actually I really want to know the answer to that now!

I also like this question: "Do angels possess 1) a body, soul and spirit, 2) a soul and spirit or 3) just a spirit?" - it even have multiple answers. (Sadly none of them accepted.)

[gecko]

I can’t speak to the Christian one, but the Jewish one isn’t about what God says. Orthodox Judaism (which is what Mi Yodea is focused on) has a massive reference work called the Talmud, which is basically a hardcopy wiki that contains all of the decisions and thoughts the rabbis had on how to interpret stuff over a 1000 year period or so. That document in turn is itself very difficult to interpret due to the volume of contractions, initialisms, and self-reference, and because it’s what amounts to a hardcopy wiki, it’s also not well organized. Mi Yodea is mostly about how to read and interpret that document. So yeah, if I squint very hard, it’s about what God wants, I guess, but it’s really about what the rabbis thought about things when they wrote the Talmud, and what current “best practice” is based on their thoughts.

[jsgo]

Don’t think that’s the specific purpose. Seems more geared to “who did what,” “what is meant by this passage,” etc.

That may seem to be “accepted answer about what God’s opinion is” but I’d imagine the intent is to aggregate what is online for interpretations. To be fair, their format is probably well suited to it. Multiple opinions given with rank based on similarity to what others interpret it to be, but multiple interpretations, should they exist, should be listed there.