Much of life is a matter of perspective.
I’ve been meaning to reply to some comments made in my journal and made in
response to comments I’ve made in other peoples’ journals, but I’ve not had
the opportunity to do so. It’s ironic that today I experienced an excellent
illustration of a point I wanted to make about truth.
The postmodern view of life is that there really is no such thing as truth.
‘What’s true for me might not be true for you’. In 1984, Orwell does a
fantastic job imagining the consequences of such a deconstruction of language
(in this case, the word “truth”).
I believe there is a single such thing as truth. It’s objective, and
irrefutable in as much as it can be known. It doesn’t change. It’s both
fact, and value (distinguishing it from trivia – factual but not terribly
meaningful).
The truth is, the sun rose twice today – once in the east, and once in the
west (it hasn’t set yet the second time as I write this). Well, okay, not
exactly. But I did, in fact, observe that happening before my very own eyes.
The problem is, my perspective is skewed a bit. I suspect very few of you
experienced two sunrises today. Only a handful of people in the world saw
the sun rise in the west. But does that mean it didn’t happen?
Even an amateur modern day astronomy student understands, we think, what
really happened – the truth. The sun doesn’t rise at all. That is simply a
statement of our own perspective. Our perspective might not accurately
represent the truth, though it may be valuable and meaningful to us. I
really did see the sun rise in the west… this afternoon.
The key to understanding the danger in postmodern thought is assuming that
perspective makes truth. It doesn’t. I didn’t make the sun rise in the west
and neither did anyone else. My observation was simply a different view of
the very same truth that applies to all of us. The important thing is, I was
looking at the truth. I could have invented a lie – the sun doesn’t exist,
or I didn’t see it at all, or the sun really did rise in the west. But
instead, I looked at the truth, though from a different angle than everyone
else.
No human experience is without perspective. Sometimes our understanding is
closer to reality, and sometimes very far from it. Sometimes we think we
have a very accurate picture, only to discover later that we did not. And
with each learning experience, we have the opportunity to align our views
more closely with the truth. The question is, will we?
As I watch the sun set for the second time today, I hope I correctly discern
truth from perspective. At least today’s experience made sense to me. And
if you know the truth, it’ll make sense to you, too…
V-
The problem with “truth” is, people tend to believe that their *perspective* is *truth*. Your perspective was that the sun rose twice, but in actuality, it didn’t “rise” at all. The earth moved, and your position on the earth (or above it 😉 moved.
Some people begin to believe that their perspective is the only perspective, and will do nearly anything to get other people to see their perspective, to convince others that their perspective is indeed truth. It may be. But it may not.
If, like that blind man examining the elephant, I insist that the truth is that I’m examining a tree trunk, I’d be wrong. From my perspective it’s a tree trunk, but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s really an elephant.
I’d probably have to spend a little longer reading it, but I *think* I agree with everything you said…
I also don’t see anytihng long with persuasion. Violence, on the other hand, is a pretty bad deal for everyone.
Here’s another point to ponder. What do we do when an entire society has a perspective that is not aligned with truth (slavery, for example)? It’s interesting the difference in religious ‘dictates’. Muslims, for example, routinely violently defend Islam and are (depending on your interpretation of the text) commanded to do so. Christians, on the other hand, are given strangely different instructions like: slaves obey your masters, render unto Caesar, etc.
So where is the moral high ground? Though I wouldn’t begrudge anyone for defending themselves, if we all defended ourselves based on our perspectives, the world would be a violent place. Maybe Christ knew just how ignorant we humans really are 😉 (recall he rebuked Peter for trying to come to his aid…)
V-