Pontius Pilate asked a timeless question as he looked Jesus in the eye. He asked, “What is truth?”
What a great question. Jesus could have simply responded to Pilate that he should just read the Bible. The problem is that the Bible had not been written yet. Well, half of it had been written. The rest of it, the part many Christians call “the truth” had not been written yet. In fact, most New Testment events had not been performed yet.
So, I guess Jesus could have looked at Pilate and said, “Well Pontius my friend, I would tell you to read the Bible, but it hasn’t been completed yet, so I guess you’re out of luck. There is no truth yet because there is no complete Bible yet. Sorry Pilate, but if you manage to live a few more centuries, then we’ll have an agreed upon Bible. Then you can read it, and if you read it honestly, you will know the truth.”
Of course I am being ridiculous with my fake conversation between Pilate and Jesus. But I use it to make the point that the Bible and truth (Truth) are not synonymous. There has always been truth, but the completed Bible (if it is indeed completed) is a relatively new addition to the story of God and the truth. Even if you hold to the 6000 year old history of the world, the completed Bible hasn’t even been around for a third of that time period. Truth cannot be solely contained in the Bible unless truth itself did not exist until either the first or fourth centuries (depending on how you want to measure it).
This series of posts entitled “asterisks” flows from a rather pleasant conversation I have been having in response to this blog post with Don Prather. The title asterisks comes from a general agreement Don and I have that God’s word is truth. I agreed with Don, but with certain asterisks. They are listed below.
(a) Truth (and God’s word) is not limited to the Bible
(b) Different people have different threshholds of truth they must “meet” in order to be saved from…
(c) Truth is a process as well as content. But the process is more important.
Each of these asterisks will get its own post. All are welcome to join in on this conversation. Feel free to invite your friends and bloggies to jump in as well. I look forward to the conversation.
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Most of my conversations about truth, God’s word and the Bible have been great and respectful. Some, however, have degraded into name-calling and blaming. All are invited to converse here, but disrespect is not welcomed. Please keep it honest and friendly.
Emergent Church of Christ 