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What is Truth?
Have you ever wondered what ‘truth’ is?
Pontius Pilate famously asked the question “what is truth?” He was confronted with a situation that potentially threatened his political career and he did not know how best to manage it. Was his question a genuine enquiry searching for truth or was it a means to avoid the truth of what was before him?
We can only speculate what his motives were in the moment; and we presume to do so based upon a few clues that history has left to us. We have a few ‘facts’ about his life and the Roman culture he lived within and even fewer about his behaviour in specific moments – yet we believe we know him and why he did what he did.
Would we like a couple of incidents to be taken from our life to be recorded as the definitive statement of who we are and why we do things? Possibly - if they make us famous – especially in our ‘celebrity’ hungry culture!
It would appear that Pontius Pilate had been placed in an awkward situation and he wanted to get out of it in the best possibly way. He seemed to be a ‘man on the run’ stuck between a rock and a hard place. But was he running toward or away from the ‘truth’ he questioned? In a way Pontius Pilate characterised all of us when presented with life’s challenges. It could be said that we are all ‘men or women on the run’ – but are we running toward or away from truth?
With the benefit of hindsight we find it easy to make a judgment on Pilates’ behaviour. We ‘back project’, presuming that our twenty-first century cultural values are relevant and appropriate to previous cultures not realising just how vainly insular and self-justifying our culture is. We believe our ‘truths’ are valid to measure all of mankind’s behaviours and motives.
It has been said there are only two things in life that are certain – death and taxes. But could there be a third – our relationship to ‘truth’? Could this be the one thing that determines our behaviour and the eventual outcome of our life?
So, what is truth? Is it a collection of reliable ‘true facts’ about things, people and situations? For much of the twentieth century, scientific fact was worshipped as the measure of the truth of our world. Scientists were considered the custodian of ‘the truth’ about the universe and to be the prophets of a new hope for humanity.
The hope is that through a better understanding of any situation we would be able to control it to our advantage. It is only a matter of education – accumulate more knowledge and become more powerful, as in the adage ‘knowledge is power’. Through education mankind will eventually become masters of the universe and of our own destiny. This belief is fuelled by the underlying belief seeded in the 19th century that man had ‘grown-up’ and was ‘coming-of-age’ to rule the universe. It was only a matter of education.
But, as many scientists would tell you - any ‘fact’ is only reliable until the next theory or discovery either disproves it or evolves it into a new context thus changing its meaning and implications. Thus, in the world of science ‘truth’ is transient. This is at least a little better than in the world of politics and economics where ‘truth’ is a matter of convenience or inconvenience depending on whether it serves the higher purposes of ambition and greed. The ‘media’ takes this even further by using ‘facts’ merely as good material to be massaged into whatever story will sell more copy. Who can you believe and trust now?
Alas, the hopes and expectations that modern science and technology would solve all of humanities problems have worn thin – we have become disillusioned because they have not fulfilled the high expectations. Yes, there have been phenomenal developments and provisions for health and lifestyle as a result of science and technology, and mankind has reached into places far beyond the imagination of previous generations. But has it come any nearer to solving the basic problems of human life on earth? For the chosen few million out of 6 billion souls alive on the earth today, life has become more comfortable and we can easily accumulate ‘stuff’ that make us feel good and satisfy our need to be entertained.
Curiously, even scientific facts have now moved into the realm of ‘entertainment’ for the general public in western capitalist society. The various virtual and terrestrial media streams now available spectacularly present us with increasingly more awesomely, fantastic and inspirational facts as research reaches deeper into the macro and micro dimensions of how the elements of the universe exist and work together. We have grown to hunger for entertaining ‘facts’ like intellectual trinkets, but do we trust them with our lives?
What is truth? It is a brave man who can define it, although we all seem to recognise it when we encounter it in people and situations. When we do experience the ‘truth’ of anything it brings a sense of security and peace. When we can trust a person or rely upon an aspect of a situation it releases us to move into new adventures with a confidence and boldness. But ‘truth’ is so often like a butterfly that flits into peripheral vision that is clearly seen until we focus upon it with a desire to own it.
Descartes (1596-1650) searched for an irrefutable ‘truth’ to be the foundational fact that he could build his systematic understanding of the universe. Today, in ignorance, people joke about his “I think therefore I am” – and consider it such an assigning statement. But for Descartes this was the only thing he could rely upon as all else had failed the test and collapsed under his rigorous scrutiny. Descartes was desperate to find the truth – this was no laughing matter. In contemporary culture, Madonna, sings the beautifully profound song (that’s if you like her singing) about discovering truth in “Live to tell”. I am sure that each of you can identify more examples of people who have creatively given expression to their insights on ‘truth’ that have become meaningful to you.
During my teenage years, like most teenagers trying to come to terms with their place in the world around them, I was searching for ‘truth’, although I wouldn’t have called it that. I came across many religions and philosophies, including humanism - that contained many true facts that were very useful and inspiring. But somehow, when I put all facts together none of the religions and philosophies seemed to ‘ring true’ for me.
In my late teens I had an encounter with ‘truth’ and it changed my life. Since then I have been searching to understand and apply what that means in the life I have been given to live. What was it? The only way I could describe it was that it was like a pure thread of reality that runs through all of time into eternity. It had no beginning or end and there was no way around it. There was no change in it, or escaping from it. It was consistent and authentic in every respect.
I saw that everything we considered to be ‘reality’ was dependent upon it and came from it. It was above and beyond life and under girded everything. What’s more it was ‘personal’! That doesn’t mean that I defined truth, but the encounter with truth defined and measured me. In a sense I am still recovering from that encounter. I saw that truth was a person and a relationship and I just had to engage in that relationship on his terms – otherwise it just wouldn’t work.
Since then I have been wondering about everything I come across as I wander through time and space on life’s journey. In fact, now that I am semi-retired, I still stand in awe and wonder at most things that I encounter, especially people. Alas, I now know much less that I ever did before, being more aware of what I do not know and of the fragility of life. I should have attempted this in my youth when I knew everything and was invincible.
These writings are an attempt to give expression to some of the things I have explored. If I was a professor, or an expert in anything, I would have been able to present some conclusions. As it is, the best I can do is to ask questions and present some propositions as my journey is not over and there is so much more to explore. Hopefully I might begin to understand something before I ‘pop my clogs’. In the meantime I live in wonder-full hope.
By the way… What if ‘truth’ is far more radical and profound than we could ever imagine and more simple and accessible than we could comprehend?
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