Submissions

Author Guidelines

1. Each manuscript submitted to the Wrocław Theological Review should take into account the following standards. If the text does not meet the requirements of the instruction below, it will be removed to the archive and the author will be asked to correct the text and submit it again. Only when the article meets the required guidelines can it be reviewed.
2. Only articles which meet the criterion of a high scientific standard and are original, i.e. which have not yet been published, may be published in a journal.
3. The manuscripts may not be submitted at the same time to another journal or a co-author and multi-author monograph (e.g. to increase the likelihood of publication). They may also not be made available online in the same or another language. Texts published or to be published in another periodical will not be accepted for publication. The author will be asked, in the process of submitting the manuscript, to declare that the submitted text has not yet been published and has not been submitted for review in another scientific journal.
4. Wrocław Theological Review accepts articles in Polish, English, German, French, Italian and Spanish.
5. An author may submit more than one article but should be aware that only one article from the same author can be qualified for one issue of a journal. The editors allow for the possibility of publishing one article and one book review by the same author in one issue.
6. The maximum length of the manuscript to be deposited is:
   – for a scientific article and a review: 100,000 characters with spaces, including footnotes;
   – for a paper, book review or a report from a conference, symposium or scientific convention: 25,000 characters with spaces.
7. The article to be published should be carefully checked by the author for language and editorial consistency. The text should be prepared in Microsoft Word format (DOC or DOCX) using Times New Roman font:
   – with a size of 12 points and a 1.5 line spacing for the main text;
   – with a size of 10 points and 1 line spacing for footnotes.
8. The article to be submitted should have a clear structure, typical of scientific texts, with a clearly marked introduction, development in subsequent paragraphs and conclusion.
9. Quotations longer than 250 characters with spaces should form a separate paragraph and be in smaller print (10 points). The graphic symbol opening and closing the quote should be omitted.
10. The editors require the final bibliography to be drawn up in alphabetical order and in a continuous system (without categorisation).
11. Use only footnotes at the bottom of the page. Footnotes in the text or footnotes at the end of the text are not allowed. Use Arabic numerals in the footnotes.
12. In Wrocław Theological Review, from issue (2024) 2 onwards, we follow the "Notes and Bibliography" system as defined in The Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition). For more details and examples, see:
    https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide/citation-guide-1.html
13. Text formatting should be kept to a minimum.
14. The authors are asked to transliterate words written in an alphabet other than the Latin (Hebrew, Greek, Aramaic, Coptic, etc.) according to the formulas proposed in the paper:
    – The SBL Handbook of Style (2^nd ed.; Atlanta GA: SBL Press, 2014), § 5.1–9 for foreign authors;
    – volumes from the series: New Bible Commentary for Polish authors.
15. If the submitted manuscript contains material difficult to edit (including tables or graphics) and font other than Times New Roman (e.g. Hebrew, Greek, Syrian, Coptic, etc.), the author is asked to additionally send the text in PDF format.
16. The author is obliged to provide all required data:
    – the title of the manuscript and its translation into English;
    – abstract in the original language of the text and in English (please do not include abstracts in other languages) of up to 300 words;
    – keywords in the original language of the text and in English;
    – bibliography;
    – a biographical note up to 100 words long.
    The metadata of the article being entered as well as the article being submitted shall include all the aforementioned data except the biographical note. The author enters the biographical note at the time of registration and then, when submitting subsequent texts, should edit and make changes if necessary.
17. Due to current publication standards, an individual ORCID (Open Researcher and Contributor ID) is required.
18. The title of the article should be worded accordingly. It is a kind of “showcase” not only of the text but also of the periodical. It is the properly selected title that may attract a potential reader to reach for the article. Therefore, the title should be an attractive and adequate representation of the main idea guiding the author. This means that it must contain enough words to adequately reflect the content and purpose of the work. It should include as much information as possible and encourage reading.
19. The article should be preceded by an abstract as it attracts the reader’s attention, and because many databases or search engines only feature the title and the abstract. To this end, the abstract should:
    – range between 200-300 words;
    – specify the research problem and the aim of the article without, however, summarising it;
    – inform the reader about the content of an article by means of meta-language that includes such phrases and expressions as: “the article aims to”; “the research topic is”; “the first part of the article deals with”; “the second part presents”; “the third part proposes”; “the conclusion section summarises the main findings”, etc;
    – be characterised by simple language so as to invite the reader to familiarise themselves with the whole text;
    – bring up the article’s novelty and clarify its contribution to science;
    – briefly specify the research method adopted; and
    – include all keywords from the text body and the title.
20. The keywords should be carefully chosen. The editorial staff of the journal expects the author to select the expressions most representative of the content of the work. They should include all relevant terms from the title and abstract of the work. It should be taken into account that a keyword may in fact consist of several words (e.g. “Pope Francis,” “contextual theology,” etc.), although it should be as short as possible. The number of keywords adopted in the Wrocław Theological Review ranges from 5 to 10, with a higher number increasing the chances of finding the text in search engines or databases.
21. The author should make every effort to prevent the reviewer from recognising his identity. To this end, he should take appropriate steps with regard to both the content of the text (it is forbidden to sign the text either at the beginning or at the end; references to his previous publications which would allow the identity of the author to be identified should be avoided) and the properties (so-called metadata) of the file. These guidelines are described in the “Ensuring a blind review” window, which appears when the manuscript is submitted (step 2 in the text submission process).
22. The editors of the Wrocław Theological Review require the authors to disclose the contribution of all those who contributed to the work deposited. The author of the publication should be aware of the obligation to disclose who is the author of the publication idea, the rationale, method, plan, etc. The main responsibility for disclosing the full information lies with the author.
    The editorial team implements a policy against ghostwriting, guest authorship and gift authorship:
    – ghostwriting. A ghost author is someone who has been omitted from the list of authors, even though he qualified for authorship (e.g., he analysed statistical data). Ghostwriting occurs when someone has made a significant contribution to the publication and his contribution has not been disclosed; in other words, he has neither been marked as a co-author nor mentioned in the acknowledgements attached to the text;
    – guest authorship. A guest author is someone who has been included on the list of authors, although he does not meet the criteria of authorship. Guest authorship means that someone who has had little or no involvement in the creation of a publication (e.g. has not engaged in research or writing at all) is assigned authorship or co-authorship;
    – gift authorship. A gift author is someone added to the publication in exchange for adding the actual author to the publication of the gift author (so-called mutual reinforcement).
    In order to prevent all the abovementioned cases of ghostwriting and guest authorship, the editors of the Wrocław Theological Review ask the authors to read the content of relevant statements when depositing the manuscript.
    The Editorial Board informs that the detected cases of dishonesty will have consequences, including taking appropriate legal action, informing the relevant actors, i.e. the institutions employing authors, academic societies, associations etc.
23. The author is also obliged to disclose the sources of financing of publications coming from academic institutions and societies, ministerial funds, etc. This requirement is dictated by the principle of transparency of funding.
24. The author of the article will receive opinions and comments from reviewers by e-mail, which he should read carefully and then refer to them. This means either introducing amendments suggested by the reviewers or providing an explanation as to whether it is appropriate to depart from them. The corrected manuscript should be sent back to the Editorial Office using the editorial panel available after logging into the editorial system of the Wrocław Theological Review.
25. The author of the article is liable under copyright and publishing rights (reprinting illustrations, tables, photos, quotations from other sources).