These Truths Are Not Self-Evident...

There are all different types of Christians out there. For example there are these guys. They are the Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry (CARM). They tell you the answers, and you'd better agree with them. After all, eternity is a long time to be wrong.

Among their many fascinating articles is this gem. It is a list of 100 Truths About Jesus. Each truth is a pithy saying I'm sure the author wants you to take as "fact" supported by hyperlinked Biblical quotes.

Nothing shocking. But what strikes me as I read it is that these "truths" are anything but self-evident. Rather, they are so impenetrable they are nearly useless.

For example, what does it mean that, "Jesus abides forever - Heb. 7:24"? Where does he "abide?" Can I visit? To abide means to continue or to stay... what is he continuing? If he is staying forever does that mean he is never going? Or maybe they mean abide as in "tolerate". In which case what does Jesus tolerate? This is the kind of lovely koan-esque language that religions love to employ and it is wonderful for meditation and theology, but it is more poetry than apologetics where precise definitions are necessary.

One problem with this list of propositions (and it is true of the entire site) is that it assumes an incredible degree of pre-assimilated context. There is a near cultish use of insider vocabulary used without explanation as if the meaning is plain to any observer. What do these things mean:

• The fruit of righteousness comes through Jesus Christ - Phil. 1:11
• Jesus is the Rock - 1 Cor. 10:4
• Jesus is our only mediator between God and ourselves - 1 Tim. 2:5

Even if most readers have enough context to approach these propositions at a basic level of understanding what are they supposed to gain from them? Jesus is the Rock. Okay. Glad I know that now. Hmm. I guess that clears up my confusion about... nothing.

For these propositions to have any value the reader would have to be in a conversation where the assertion that Jesus is the Rock had any meaning. The writers on this site are clearly involved in such a conversation. They see themselves countering all sorts of cultural tendencies they deplore, but they don't give any hint of that here. Answers without questions are useless. (Interestingly the reverse is not always true).

Furthermore, the apparent simplicity (even if it is opaque simplicity) of these propositions belies an enormous amount of interpretation that has already gone into them. Consider number 100 on their list:

• Jesus came to proclaim freedom for believers - Luke 4:18

The citation they give is Jesus reading from the scroll of Isaiah in a synagogue in his hometown in Luke. The actual verse reads in the NRSV:

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free,"

First of all, Jesus is not making a personal announcement here, he is reading scripture aloud in the context of something like a worship service. He does, later in the passage, tell the crowd that "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing." So it is not unreasonable to assume that he intends these words from Isaiah as a kind of proclamation, but where does Isaiah mention freedom for "believers"? Freedom could reasonably be applied to two groups in the passage: captives and the oppressed. It mentions nothing at all about whether these groups contain any believers.

So how does the author get to his proposition from the supporting text? Interpretation, duh. The author is assuming that Jesus means something specific by "freedom" and that this "freedom" corresponds with what the author already knows and believes, partly on the basis of other scripture passages, belongs specifically to a group called "believers". I happen to disagree with the author in this case, but I don't think there is anything nefarious about such an interpretive move. I have a feeling, however, that the people at CARM wouldn't want to admit that such debatable interpretation underlies all of their arguments.

Fiction, Myth, Lie, Truth

I think that Mythbusters is a great show. The only thing I don't like about it is that it's title is a grave misuse of the word "myth". The word has come to be synonymous with "lie", and I think that this has become so pervasive that it has made it harder to talk about religion - particularly comparative religion, because there is this (false) sense that "myth" and "truth" are mutually exclusive. That isn't how I use the word, and it got me thinking about some other related words that I want to work on defining - defining how I use them at least.


These are all where I am now, not things I'm trying to lay down for all time.



Story

A story is a recounting of events from a particular point of view. Stories are not singular, are infinitely interconnected, and never end - we only stop telling them at one point or another. Stories also come from a storyteller, and are received by an audience. Both of these things change the story with each telling. Apart from storyteller and recipient, there is no story.


Fiction

"Fiction" is another word sometimes used as a synonym for lie. This belies what every moderately literate person knows - that one can find truths in fiction, perhaps even more readily than in non-fiction. For me, fiction is story which may not conform to consensual reality but which is told with the consent of the audience. What that means is that fiction may not conform to things we generally agree are real - it might have Elves or monsterse or faster-than-light travel, it always has made-up characters, and so on. I use the term consensual reality because what is fiction in one culture might be truth in another. Sorry objectivists - deal with it. So, to put it more simply, fiction is a lie told with our consent.



Myth

A myth is a story through which a group of people make meaning. If no one finds it meaningful, then it cannot be a myth. If only one person finds it meaningful, it cannot be a myth. If it is merely an account of widely agreed-upon events, or a recording of some kind, it cannot be a myth. Included in my list of myths are the Bible, Capitalism, American History, the Enuma Elish, Dianetics, Socialism, etc. These are all stories through which people make meaning, and none of them are mere historical records.


How a myth functions is a topic for another post - or ten.



Lie

A lie is a story told which does not conform to consensual reality without the consent of the audience. It is presenting what is not meaningful as meaningful, or presenting what is factually false as what is factually true. Lies are about having power over other people while protecting yourself. The storyteller and the audience are not connected by trust, but are instead engaged in combat, though they may not know it.



Fact

Facts are a lot more rare than we think they are. A fact is something that every observer would agree upon given full access to any information they need to make the distinction. It is something that, having every question answered, every person interviewed, every measurement taken, every person would agree is true, short of severe mental illness perhaps. Given this, evolution is not a fact. Consciousness is not a fact. The "law" of supply and demand are not facts. Gravity is a fact. The speed of light is a fact.


The concept of "Fact" necessarily ignores philosophical stances which would make all of our experience a dream or an illusion, or which are entirely deterministic. It presupposes that there is a shared material world which we experience, and that we can make decisions which are not fully determined.



Truth

Truth is God's truth alone (did I just accidentally reference Calvin? Maybe I did...). Every statement about truth I take to be in part a statement about hope or trust, because it is a limited human being claiming some kind of knowledge which is not limited. Truth is as knowable as God is knowable. Truth-claims are theological, God-claims in the way that I view the world.

Truth is not just something which conforms to someone's presentation of facts, but it is transformative. Truth changes you and makes you better - or it is not truth. You are the test of your truth, and I am the test of my truth.

Gandhi, to theists, would say "God is Truth", and to atheists, he would say "Truth is God". I remember reading that in his autobiography and really liking it.