But those people never proclaim something divine. There are facts in my world but truth is relative. I make a distinction btwn something that is a fact and something that is the truth…
I should be more specific, what are you meaning exactly when you say truth?
Truth is the essence of existence – what really is. Facts are “snapshots” of the truth, different views of the truth but these are not the truth itself. In some sense truth is unknowable, except darkly through perception and conception, because when we have a concept of it we have merely taken a snapshot, but have left the reality behind. The snapshot is a representation of the truth, but not the truth itself. We can’t go substituting the snapshot - the idea - for the truth, but have to realize our conceptions are subject to falsification by the mere fact that they are conceptions and not the reality.
Incidentally, I also think having a “concept” of God is a big mistake. If God is infinite Being, any concept we hold of God is akin to an idol. Best to divest ourselves of all concepts of God and let God “show” Himself to us. If God is Living Being, concepts won’t capture what He is.
Truth is being – it
is what is. We find the truth by participating in Being, not by thinking about Being. Jesus didn’t claim to “know” the truth, but He claimed to be one with it – I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. We find the truth by due diligence - honestly, sincerely and unfailingly searching for it and always questioning what we think. Our thoughts may be subject to all kinds of misconceptions, prejudices and tainted perspectives, but always searching will lead you “closer” to it.
As to your comments about God, an example out of Exodus might lend a different light to the God of the Old Testament:
When the Israelites saw that Moses was taking a long time on Mt. Sinai, they built the golden effigy. God “expressed” anger and said, “…my wrath shall blaze out against them and devour them…”
Moses pleaded with God and He relented. One reading of this is that God “changed” his mind because Moses talked him into doing so. God comes across as the temperamental tyrant and Moses as the calm, caring human.
There are different interpretations possible. Given God’s respect for human free will and that He has relinquished His control over human actions, perhaps what God was doing was putting Moses into the position of “having to stand up for his own people,” bringing Moses to a new dimension of his love for his people, bringing about a growth in Moses. God “acted” in a certain way to “form” Moses into the committed leader he needed to be to continue the journey. You can’t form a person by merely telling him how to act, arranging circumstances is much more effective. You don’t develop virtues like courage and perseverance by reading about them and talking about them – handling life situations that demand those virtues is the only way.
Understanding this story from the point of view of what God was trying to bring about by his “action” means that Moses’ “response” to the situation is the important element here, not God’s anger. By reading this as “what a tyrant God is” one would be missing the real meaning behind it.
That is why I think the Bible has to be read as a very long novel with characters that “act” in certain ways, sometimes to bring about ends that are not clear if taken out of context. Sometimes the plot gets twisted and it is not clear why the protagonist acts in such seemingly wicked ways. Perhaps He is “acting” in the sense of playing a part to bring about a different end than we can understand. Don’t take the “part He is playing” seriously, there may be a different motive behind it.
If human existence is the means that God is using to form humanity to be ready for “eternal” existence – a whole new kind of being – then he has to work with our self-determination and all that implies in order to form us or train us to be ready to assume that form of life.
Merely appearing and “telling” us what to do may not bring about the depth of formation that is required. Often it is better to form us “without” our knowledge. He may have to “act” in a certain ways – hidden ways – even by manipulating circumstances, that humans may or may not understand but that might bring about an important change in humanity. His real nature may not be accurately or adequately depicted but perhaps there is a reason for that, too.
In retrospect, how God treated human beings 3000 years ago seems archaic, but He may have been dealing with quite a different form of humanity. Perhaps, too, He may have had to deal harshly because something very precious growing in the heart of humanity needed to be nurtured and not lost. How can we know?
I think having an unfailing desire to know the truth is the first important step on the journey.
