What is the Truth? How do you Define it?

by Amazing 68 Replies latest jw friends

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  quietlyleaving

  Jeff

  I'm not sure what we mean by intellectual honesty here but in the spirit of intellectual honesty I'm going to come out and say I'm probably more of an atheist than an existentialist but admit that I don't understand fully what existentialistism means in practice.

  I love science - my next 2 summer courses will be to do with Darwin's thinking on natural selection and "how the universe works". I'm very excited and looking forward to a change from cultural studies which was very challenging for me personally but worth it.

  ql
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  AllTimeJeff

  QL

  I am looking forward to that too. I hope you enjoy your studies on Darwin. This discussion on "truth" border on my views of spirituality. I do think there is an observable component to people in that many seem to work better with a belief in a higher power, or some kind of faith. It's a quality of life component that I think needs to be honored in all of us.

  Here might be a good working definition of existentialism.

  Existentialism is a term that has been applied to the work of a number of nineteenth and twentieth century philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, [ 1 ] [ 2 ] took the human subject — not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual [ 3 ] [ 4 ] and his or her conditions of existence — as a starting point for philosophical thought. Existential philosophy is the "explicit conceptual manifestation of an existential attitude" [ 5 ] that begins with a sense of disorientation and confusion in the face of an apparently meaningless or absurd world. [ 6 ] [ 7 ] Many existentialists have also regarded traditional systematic or academic philosophy, in both style and content, as too abstract and remote from concrete human experience. [ 8 ] [ 9 ] ....... Although there are some common tendencies amongst "existentialist" thinkers, there are major differences and disagreements among them (most notably the divide between atheistic existentialists like Sartre and theistic existentialists like Tillich); not all of them accept the validity of the term as applied to their own work.[ 10 ]

  What I think needs to happen is that this "spiritual need" if you will (please work with me on the semantics, I don't mean that phrase in the JW/Christian way) needs to seperate from the auspices of the religions and be returned to the individual.

  I personally believe that atheists and agnostics are more spiritually developed then many who go to church, for a variety of reasons. I don't think spirituality needs to have at its core the worship of "god". However, if that works for the individual, then be my guest.

  As far as intellectual honesty, I was primarily praising Amazing (that rhymed!) for acknowledging the current limit of his beliefs and not insisting he had more proof then he has. That makes talking about this much easier.
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  quietlyleaving

  thanks for explaining Jeff - in reading the excerpt it looks to me like existentialism is part of our romantic philosophical inheritance - a very significant feature of this is to value seeing cencepts as fragments in order that people be oriented towards developing their own spirituality and destiny. So it makes sense that some of the philosophers mentioned in the extract resist being categorised.
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  Narkissos

  Hello jgnat,

  I have been away for a couple of days and I just found your reply now -- I'm glad to see you around too! :)

  If I may interpret in my own way, do you suggest that the search for an objective, external truth can be an "easy out" and hinder people from fully living, sensing, being?

  My post above was deliberately in Nietzschean style -- partly as a provocation (waiting for you to pick it up ;)), partly because I felt this particular approach was sorely missing in the discussion. As such it implies a reversal of values.

  Nietzsche (especially in The Genealogy of Morals) was arguably the first to point out that the notion of "truth" (also, and perhaps even more clearly in the scientific field) is corollary to submission or obedience -- the ultimate expression of the ascetic ideal, hencethe opposite of creative will. Elsewhere he makes room for a parsimonious approach of relative truths (you can only deal with three or four of such truths in a lifetime), which belong to the first, "camel" stage of man -- when man bows down as the camel to be loaded with as many burdensome, heavy "truths" as he can bear (Zarathustra, Prologue). The next stages being the lion who rejects the loads in the solitude of the wilderness, and the child who starts, again, to "play," "laugh" and "dance," in blessed forgetfulness of "truth".

  I for one do not buy into the notion of wordless "truth". A rock, or a mountain, aside from (or prior to) their conceptualisation as "rock" or "mountain," is not a truth, just a rock/mountain. Truth implies a correspondance, an adequation, between language and something which stands outside the reach of language. Hence an impossibility. What we really have in the search for "objective, external truth" (especially in the scientific realm, but also in the religious or philosophical ones) is a certain type of language: humble, meek, self-conscious, modest, showing an awareness of limits which is also a delusion. The use of paradox or dialectics, even self-contradiction, even the (wordy) praise of silence, is just language erasing itself -- ultimately as writing, as I have just done by writing rock/mountain. It's an artificial trick of language deluding itself.

  There is an interesting expression in Johannine writings: poiein tèn alètheian, "to make the truth" (John 3:21; 1 John 1:6). It is paradoxical (hence artificial) as the truth (alètheia, lit. "unforgetfulness," an etymology very important to Heidegger among others), by all common standards, is precisely what is notmade (up). Now if the truth is to be made -- inseparably through language and action, through language as action and action as language (poiein is the etymology for our word poetry) then we open ourselves to a more positive understanding of "truth" -- which is no longer opposable to myth.
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  jgnat

  Nice to see you right back, Narkissos. As usual, you have given me enough to chew on for months. It would be inadequate to give a Mc-Reply in the style of McDonald's famous service. Yet here I am, responding.

  I'm not so sure that the Nietzschean suggestion that truth and creativity are opposed, or that creativity is "good" and the codified truth is therefore "bad". My gut suggests that balance is needed.

  Fascinating idea that we create truth through our use of the word and by deed. That will take a few months to chew over.

  I'm leaning towards a few human truths that may be instinct. We see these few things as right and just because that is what we are. The implication, however, is that our truth is not universal, and might be harmful to other species.
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  AGuest

  May you have peace! I know this topic was posted some time ago is so may be considered "dead" by some, but I would like to respond, if I may. Thank you!

  Many people associate the Truth with an abstract concept of "what is true" and so when they see the word "truth" they tend to go where many Bible scholars/translators went when defiing the Greek word ?λ?θεια (aletheia), found at John 14:6:

  1) objectively

  a) what is true in any matter under consideration

  (1) truly, in truth, according to truth

  (2) of a truth, in reality, in fact, certainly

  b) what is true in things appertaining to God and the duties of man, moral and religious truth

  (1) in the greatest latitude

  (2) the true notions of God which are open to human reason without his supernatural intervention

  c) the truth as taught in the Christian religion, respecting God and the execution of his purposes through Christ, and respecting the duties of man,

  opposing alike to the superstitions of the Gentiles and the inventions of the Jews, and the corrupt opinions and precepts of false teachers even among

  Christians

  2) subjectively

  (a) truth as a personal excellence

  (1) that candour of mind which is free from affection, pretence, simulation, falsehood, deceit

  I have learned, however that such abstracts and the Truth are not the same thing. Not at all No more than Wisdom is an abstract of concept of wise thinking/decision/judgment, or God an abstract concept of love. To the contrary TRUE Wisdom is a person, a literal being, as is TRUE Love. As is the Truth. As is Death. Truthfully. You know that I know this is not always easy for some to grasp (although I've been absent awhile I have been coming here for some time and posteing such truths and so know how many received it... or didn't). The difficulty exists for those who do not know him. As you know, I don't mean know OF him... which is what religion teaches... but actually know him. Literally. Actually. In reality. Face... to face. Truthfully. While I do rejoice for those who have come to know OF him... and so bear witness to their faith in him, it soars for those who have actually come to know him... face to face... and so bear witness not to their faith in him (for faith is the assured expectation of the thing hoped for and once that thing is realized faith is no longer necessary), but to actually knowing him. Their faith is in what he has already done for them and certain expectation of the future benefits that will bring - that particular "assured expectation."

  What do I, then, define as the Truth? He is the Holy One of Israel, JAHESHUA MISCHAJAH, Son and Chosen/Anointed One (Christ) of the MOST Holy One of Israel, JAH of Armies. Here's the thing: IF one can exercise enough faith (i.e., the size of a mustard seed) to HEAR him, then in time one can also come to SEE him. The latter takes a bit more time as we all exist in darkness and he is the Light, so one would have to draw close TO the Light in order to see him. One does that by following his voice, which he uses to guide anyone who wishes "into ALL truth." As you follow his voice, you come to know things such as love, faith, wisdom, truth, etc. NOT love, faith, wisdom, truth, etc., as the world knows it and teaches it (i.e., per the above interpretation and some of those posted here) but as these REALLY are: the real "reality."

  See, because we are made of flesh, with its blood, physical beings, we tend to believe that all their is, all that is "real," all that is "true," etc., MUST be related to, perceived by, and understood pursuant TO the flesh, the physical body. But we are also MUCH more than that. That is one TRUTH that he, the Truth, helped me understand and know. Had I continued listening to those who only know the flesh, I would, like them, still be enslaved TO the flesh... and unable to "enter" into an entirely different realm, another "space" if you will, and see what is entirely beyond this most of perceive as the only "reality."

  I say to you, however, that his words recorded at Romans 8:32, "You will know the TRUTH and the TRUTH will set you free," are some of the truest words ever spoken. Unfortunately, many stop there, however; many more even misstate his words as "Tell the truth for the truth will set you free," or some like version. If only they would read a little further, at Romans 8:36, and get the sense of the words recorded there:

  "Therefore, if the SON sets you free, you will truly BE free."

  What does this mean? It means that because you will be set free from the confines of your FLESH, your PHYSICAL being, you WILL be like spirit beings... truly FREE... and so able to "go in and out" between the spirit and physical realms. Flesh and blood cannot enter into the kingdom of the heavens. But SPIRIT can. Thus, when the CHRIST, the TRUTH, sets you FREE... you are SO free... that you can and will see, hear, and know the truth, the REALITY... of ALL there is, physical AND spiritual. Because I know HIM... I am no longer bound to that which is physical because HE set me free. As a result, I see things, hear things, know things that people ask about all the time. Things that seem SO mysterious and complicated to us in the flesh, but are TRULY quite simple, quite elementary. Things that, if you saw or hear them, would make you go "Duh!" over and over again!

  We are not the sum total of our flesh, dear one - we are much more. MUCH more. And this life and world is NOT all there is. There is more. MUCH more. And anyone of us can see and hear it. All one has to do is know... the Truth. And half the battle of that is already won for us because he already knows each and every one of us.

  Someone said earlier that truth is "what we search for" or something to that effect. The truth, however, is that what is really searched for in this context is understanding. What we understand becomes "truth" to us... and so changes as our understanding changes. And so, in this context, truth is very individual to each of us, as the responses show. The Truth, however, the REAL Truth, does not change. He is constant, always the same.

  Again, I bid you peace!

  A slave of Christ,

  SA
• 

  OUTLAW

  Shelby!!..

  Hey Girl!..Nice to have you home..

  Where have you been?

  ...........................OUTLAW
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  AGuest

  Peace to you and thank you for the very kind welcome! I am glad to be "home" - LOLOLOLOL!

  I've spent the past year overseeing the off-campus student, faculty, and staff housing program at a California State University about 2.5 hours from my home - . I lived onsite and came home on weekends. I loved the job but had to work 12-16 hour days as, unfortunately, my initial immediate supervisor did not get along with the University's Executive Director and was asked to leave right after I started, and then wasn't replaced until about 8 months later - . I resigned as of July 31st for a number of reasons including my health (diabetes got way out of control). I am "between jobs" right now and have decided to take a couple/few months off. Kinda like a mini-sabbatical, if you will - .

  I haven't come here (in case that's what you're asking about, too - ) for some time due, in most part, to not having sufficient technology - although my work computer was fast, I couldn't visit during work hours. My home computer (which I am on now) is over 10 years old, and so SOOOOoooo slow that sometimes I get frustrated, and my laptop didn't have sufficient connectivity when I was out of town. And, well, time flew by. Also, it got a bit confusing for me when the forum changes were taking place and other sites were starting up, and... and... and... I guess I just got a little overwhelmed with the changes here and in my life .

  So, I took a bit of a break, which I find is always a good thing - helps me keep a proper perspective... and proper level of love... when I do visit. Sometimes things can get a bit "testy" here (or, at least, it used to) and I sometimes found myself fearful that I might allow myself to take things personally, you know, let the ridicule get to me so that I would be personally offended (which there is no need for as what I share is not mine, so) and perhaps "sin with my lips" (i.e., hastily "return evil for evil" or "call down evil" on someome )... or even blaspheme (i.e., take credit for, forget to give credit to, or try to fool the Holy Spirit)). As you and many others here know, I am just as imperfect as anyone else and so could get caught up in any of such things as easy as the next person if I let myself. So, since my occupation was requiring so much attention, I just put a bit more energy into that and have been letting my Lord continue teaching me what TRUE love is. Of course, I have not mastered it (who has), but I am leaps and bounds beyond where I was.

  Anyway, that's "where" I've been. What's up with you, and how the heck are you and yours, dear one? Perhaps you should respond in a different thread (or via a PM), though, so that Amazing's thread can stay on topic? Dear Amazing, please forgive me for "hijacking" your thread. It was not my intention, truly! Perhaps since it is an older thread you can overlook it. If so, thank you! If not, please feel free to ask a moderator to delete it. Either way, I apologize for the intrustion.

  The greatest of love and peace to you both!

  Your servant and a slave of Christ,

  SA
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  OUTLAW

  Shelby..I`ll pm you..

  That will keep "amazing`s" thread on track..

  .....................OUTLAW