Truth

While individuals are unique, truth is does not change from individual to individual.  An individual’s perception of that truth may vary, but the truth does not. I define truth as “that which conforms to reality, both physical, spiritual and moral.” In the classic poem about the five blind men who try to describe an elephant based upon the part they touch, each is adamant about in their own knowledge.  One declares the elephant is like a tree because he has touched the leg, one declares an elephant is like a rope because he has touched the tail, etc.  Each one is logical but is wrong because of incomplete knowledge.

Traditionally thinkers have tried by either empirical data or superior logic to come to know the real nature of the elephant (truth).  The post-modern thinkers do not do this. They deny that the elephant exists at all because no one blind person can know it correctly.  I suggest that because any one man, or collection of men, do not know all truth does not in the least change truth or its existence.

Because truth is infinite, and those who seek to know it are finite, our knowledge of truth is always flawed and incomplete.  We need to know our limitations.

The problem with conservatives, of which I am one, is that since they are certain that they know some of the truth, there is a tendency to act as though they know all of the truth.  I have met few who claim to know all of the truth but many who act as though they know all the truth. They have taken the finite truth they do know and made claims that they are able to understand (or at least describe) infinite truth.  Their belief blinds them to the infinite scope of truth and they fail to remember their own finite and flawed understanding.  There is no problem with building a system or a systematic theology until we insist upon our system being identical with truth. Systems are better for building consistency or an understanding of life than they are for predicting truth.

It ceases to be helpful once one tries to force another to follow.

The problem with post-modern thinkers is not that they feel one cannot know all truth.  The problem is that they have stopped seeking to know any truth.   They have been intimidated by their finite nature.  Holding to relativism is to admit the failure. Relativism says more about the failure of the individual than it does about the nature of truth. To say that any one person cannot know truth is far different than saying that there is no truth.  To say “My perceptions of reality affect me more than reality does,” may be a true statement; however, one’s incomplete perception of reality does not change the fact that there is reality to be known.  One’s perceptions do no change the reality itself.  That five different people had different views of an accident and thus five different ideas of what occurred does not change what actually occurred.  Our goal should not be to give up looking for truth but to learn and describe reality to the greatest extent possible.