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The lede bypasses entirely the two places were the phrase is used in the Bible, their context, and that Christians associate the phrase with meekness instead of martyrdom. It seems to be ignoring the use of the phrase before World War II. Dimadick (talk) 17:36, 26 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Came here to say the same thing. Is the usage described on this page really the primary meaning? The passages in the Hebrew Bible are quoted twice in the New Testament (Acts and Romans) and that is not even mentioned. I note that the Ethiopian eunuch is not mentioned here and this passage is not quoted there, although it is the one he was reading (as quoted in Acts). I put a globalize tag on it for lack of a better idea. Srnec (talk) 03:16, 9 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Srnec, I did consider this, but if you do a search you will see that Christians do not actually use the phrase "like sheep to slaughter", but instead the related phrase "like a lamb to the slaughter". Now, I don't know enough about biblical languages to say what the etymology of this distinction is, but since they're separate topics that are referred to by separate phrases in English, it seems to make more sense to have separate articles. buidhe (formerly Catrìona) 03:51, 9 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Separate topics? They are the same phrase from the same book(s). The New Testament quotes Isaiah 53 and Psalm 44. The only difference I can see is that the exact phrase "like sheep to the slaughter", which could be plural, is possibly not used in any translation. The very similar phrase "like a sheep to the slaughter" is widely used. But even you aren't that exact. In your response above you wrote "like sheep to slaughter" but the page title is "like sheep to the slaughter". You may be right about the primary topic of this exact title, but then perhaps the intro should not call it a biblical phrase. Perhaps it is a variation on a biblical phrase. Or is it seen as essentially biblical (and just often misquoted)? In any case, I found the lead jarring. Srnec (talk) 00:55, 10 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Srnec, the difference between singular and plural is actually crucial. Opposition to this phrase referring to Holocaust victims is especially harsh because it reduces individual human beings to a mindless herd. I considered other titles for this article, but couldn't come up with anything that would be NPOV and not excessively vague. I've edited the lede according to your suggestion. I suggest that the religious interpretations could be better covered in a separate article, possibly "Like sheep to be slaughtered" (according to Feldman, this is the correct translation of the Hebrew bible phrase) or "like a lamb to the slaughter" (seems to be the common name for Christian interpretations). buidhe (formerly Catrìona) 09:38, 15 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
OK. I am satisfied that this exact phrase is not a Biblical one. I think the lead should state that explicitly. The phrase is inspired by—probably even a simple misquotation in origin—of a phrase that appears twice in the Hebrew Bible (and twice more in the Greek), but this quotation in its Hebrew form is not found in the Bible. I think the lead should make that explicit: the Hebrew phrase in parentheses is not biblical. Srnec (talk) 15:17, 15 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
