[We thank a visitor who clicked this post that has been buried in our 700+ list of articles. This was first posted in 2012;  reposted 2014 & 2015 so why not revisit every year hereafter, since YHWH’s Truth does not change although our knowledge and understanding of it should.  In fact that is what we consider as the true meaning of ‘progressive revelation’ since YHWH’s complete revelation not only reaches us when we are exposed to the original and unadulterated Hebrew Scriptures, but it also gets ‘digested’ only as often as we feed ourselves– i. e., read Torah and ponder its meaning and better yet, seriously study it like the Rabbis do. That revelation to the individual is what is progressive, not the Revelation itself which is complete.  

 

For those in transition, who are still seeking —anything that helps you in your quest for Truth is worth the time and effort for you as well as for us.  In fact, you are our reason for maintaining this website. 

 

This is part of the series “Quid est veritas” or “What is truth?” Here are related posts:

• Pilate: ‘Quid est veritas?’ – Gospel Truth? – 1
• Quid est Veritas”: Gospel Truth? – 2
• “Quid est veritas?” – Gospel Truth – 3
• Quid est Veritas – 4 – Old Truth, New Truth, Half Truths, All Truth and Nothing But . . .
• Revisit: Quid est veritas?’ – 7 – “YHWH is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth.”
• “Superstar” – Confessions of an Idolater

—-Admin1.]

 

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Are mine the same as yours?”

 

What a conundrum.  These are words placed in the mouth of the Roman prelate Pontius Pilate by lyricist Tim Rice in  the musical “Jesus Christ Superstar” (see Pilate: ‘Quid est veritas?’ – Gospel Truth? – 1).

 

Such thought-provoking lyrics asking in effect, is truth relative? If it were so, then anything goes in a world where there are as many opinions on anything and everything, and usually majority decide and rule though sometimes strangely, the loud aggressive minority that make it into the seat of power lord it over the silent majority.

 

“There’s what people want to hear, what people want to believe, and there’s the Truth.”

–Michael White,

author of Scripting Jesus: The Gospels in Rewrite 

(on our MUST READ list).

 

Take the realm of religion for instance.  Each religion we’ve joined and eventually left claimed it has the monopoly of truth, implying everyone else is wrong.   At the time we were in each one, we sincerely believed the same about everyone else (our Messianic teacher’s favorite phrase, “sincerely wrong!”).  And even now that we are no longer into ‘religion’ (institutional church or denominational fellowship), admittedly we’re just as guilty in thinking we’re right and ‘they’re wrong’.  Though this time,  we think we know better, having investigated the source or foundation of each belief system  and ultimately having come to a conclusion about 4 crucial “Truths”:

 

• who is the OneTrue God, 
• what is His Name,
• what is His revelation [His “TRUTH”]
• and where is it to be found.

 

A truth-quest that knocks from door to door, so to speak, is actually quite educational; you get insights, gain wisdom, learn lessons well as opposed to never venturing out from a religion you were born in and never exposing yourself to other beliefs.  Yes we have regrets we had not discovered the TORAH so much earlier, still it’s never too late to start reading and seriously studying it.

 

We do share one ‘truth’ with religionists (as opposed to atheists and agnostics) and that is—we all do believe there is a God, that is a ‘given’.  What He’s like and what He requires of us—is where we go off into different directions.

 

As we have explained over and over in our articles, the “Truth” we hold on to is the TORAH, as in the first five books of the Hebrew Scriptures attributed to Moses as the ‘receiver’ of the Sinai revelation who passed it on to the mixed multitude which passed it on from generation after generation in obedience to Dabariym/Deuteronomy 6.

 

There are speculations as to who eventually recorded YHWH’s utterances amidst the history of the chosen people during their wilderness wandering of 40 years. Admittedly, there are as many questions regarding the authenticity and reliability of the Hebrew Scriptures, just as there are questions regarding New Testament writings. 

 

Ultimately our belief and trust in the TORAH boils down to one piece of evidence:  the continuing existence and survival of Israel for almost 6 millennia, the reborn nation and the remnant people who are back in the land called Israel today all in fulfillment of prophecy.  We figure that if the nation of Israel fails, falls, is wiped out or is assimilated and disappears (no longer distinct in its scriptural and prophetic identity), then we cease from believing in the Hebrew Scriptures and the God of the Torah.

 

This is what YHWH says,

He who appoints the sun to shine by day,

Who decrees the moon and stars by night . . .

“Only if these decrees vanish from my sight,”

declares YHWH,

“will Israel ever cease being a nation before me.” 

(Jeremiah 31:35-6).  

 

Nothing else testifies as well and as consistently for divinely-revealed Truth and for the Source whose Name is revealed as YHWH, the God of Israel and ultimately the God of the nations.  Without Israel’s presence in the world today, and the history of antisemitism and the continuing threat to its existence and survival as a distinct nation, chosen to be a ‘light to the gentiles’—yes, the Hebrew Scriptures would be suspect, just like the “New Testament”.

 

 Ernest Van Den Haag has so eloquently noted in The Jewish Mystique: 

 

Few are the nations whose recorded history goes back so far and is so complete as that of the Jews; their written history starts with the creation of the world; Genesis.  And it includes the wanderings, the battles politics, family trees and family skeletons, social policies, economics, the successes and failures, and above all the moral history of this people which believed itself chosen by God for a special destiny, and which—because of that belief—suffered a remarkable fate.

 

What were they chosen for?  Certainly the Jews have been “chosen,” if only for suffering and for survival as an identifiable and continuous group. . . . The languages of these civilizations [S6K: Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece and Rome] are, at best, preserved only in academic spirits; but Hebrew is still chanted and spoken.  It is today once more the language of a country, of the state of Israel—a state which already twice defeated the surrounding Arab tribes, including, this time, Egypt for good measure.  Conquered, their capital laid waste, their temple burned banned from their land, dispersed through history and scattered over the world without king or country, everywhere persecuted declared enemies of mankind and murderers of God—the Jews remain.  And remain Jews.  They still believe themselves the Chosen People, even though, contemplating their long history, one may well ask, “Chosen for what?”

 

As I am writing, the Jews merrily celebrate their 5730th year [S6K: we are now in year 5777].  For most of these 5730 years, they lived in circumstances so adverse as to defy the imagination.  They survived; most of their tormentors did not.  Still, even with the patience of Job, they may well begin to suspect that they were chosen for suffering.  Nor has their suffering ended.  Nazism is gone and Hitler is dead.  But so are six million Jews.

 

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Postscript S6K:  If there is truth in the Hebrew Scriptures, then the evidence of that truth  —Israel—continues to validate the pronouncements and prophecies declared from the mouth of YHWH through His mouthpieces, the prophets of Israel.  Of the TNK [Torah, Neviim and Ketuvim], the “N” and “K” as history and inspired writings look back to the initial revelation in the TORAH.  And so should we who have embraced both Israel and its Scriptures as divinely handed down Truth.  And as such, it then becomes the OBJECTIVE and ABSOLUTE TRUTH that we choose to live by, as the remnant of Israel do, in or out of the Land.  

 

TORAH is the standard we measure all other ‘truths’ by.

 

If you and I have to guess how long is a yard and we both claim it’s from our elbow to our wrist, depending on our body size we will most likely not measure perfectly, but if we both go to the universally agreed upon standard of measurement and see how our limb lengths compare to the objective and absolute standard of a ‘yard’, then that settles it.

 

This works the same with the Word of YHWH. [Read: Debariym/Deuteronomy 18:15-22 which primes us to recognize His TRUTH from man-made truth].

 

Now back to the title of this post — in a world “without God everything is permitted”,  the quote is attributed to the Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky in The Brothers Karamazov, where characters struggle with the same moral and ethical questions, faith, doubt, belief and unbelief.  Without the standards set in YHWH’s TORAH governing human relationships that is beneficial to all concerned, then humans pretty much decide for themselves how they will live with one another.

 

Here are two excellent discussions featured in one of our favorite Jewish website links, Aish.com.  There is much to learn from the custodians of the Torah, please go to the many links we have recommended on the lower right of our page.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[Highlights and reformatting added.—Admin1]

 

What about the jihadists who blow up planes, trains and buildings – all in the name of religion?

Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf:

“I believe today that my conduct is in accordance of the will of the Almighty creator. In standing guard against the Jew, I am defending the handiwork of the Lord.”

 

Do you agree with Hitler or not? Cannot you say unequivocally that he was wrong?

 

Reality is what is. You have to decide if you want to teach your children truth, or if you want to immobilize them with cushy phrases of political correctness. This does not condone any disrespect toward other people.  We teach that all human beings are inestimably valuable and deserve to be loved and respected.  But we do not teach that all beliefs have equal value.  We are firm in the perception of reality as defined by the Torah.  It has served our people well over the generations, all the way back to the momentous event at Mount Sinai which changed the face of human history forever.

 

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Morality: Who Needs God? – 

by Rabbi Nechemia Coopersmith

If there is an absolute standard of morality, then there must be a God. Disagree? Consider the alternative.

 

 God’s existence has direct bearing on how we view morality.  As Dostoyevsky so famously put it, “Without God, everything is permitted.”

 

 

Random acts of cruelty may not be your cup of tea,

but who says your standards are for everyone?

The consequences of moral relativism are far-reaching. Since all moral issues are subjective, right and wrong are reduced to matters of opinion and personal taste.   Without a binding, objective standard of morality that sticks whether one likes it or not, a person can do whatever he feels like by choosing to label any behavior he personally enjoys as “good.”  Adultery, embezzlement, and random acts of cruelty may not be your cup of tea — but why should that stop someone from taking pleasure in them if that is what they enjoy.  Is having an intimate relationship with a 12-year-old objectively wrong just because you don’t like it?

 

Perhaps murder makes a serial killer feel powerful and alive.  A moral relativist can say he finds murder disgusting, but that does not make it wrong — only distasteful.  Hannibal, the Cannibal, is entitled to his own preferences even if they are unusual and repugnant to most.

 

Popularity has nothing to do with determining absolute morality; it just makes it commonplace, like the color navy.

 

“But this killer is hurting others!”  True.  But in a world where everything is subjective, hurting an innocent person is merely distasteful to some, like eating chocolate ice cream with lasagna. Just because we may not like it doesn’t make it evil.  Evil?  By whose standard?  No one’s subjective opinion is more authoritative than another’s.

 

INCONSISTENT VALUES

 

Although many people may profess to subscribe to moral relativism, it is very rare to find a consistent moral relativist. Just about everyone believes in some absolute truths. That absolute truth may only be that it is wrong to hurt others, or that there are no absolutes. The point is that just about everyone is convinced that there is some form of absolute truth, whatever that truth may be. Most of us, it seems, are not moral relativists. Bertrand Russell wrote:

 

I cannot see how to refute the arguments for the subjectivity of ethical values but I find myself incapable of believing that all that is wrong with wanton cruelty is that I don’t like it.

 

Not too many of us believe that killing an innocent person is just a matter of taste that can change according to whim.  Most of us think it is an act that is intrinsically wrong, regardless of what anyone thinks.  According to this view, the standard of morality is an unchangeable reality that transcends humanity, not subject to our approval.

 

THE INFINITE SOURCE

 

An absolute standard of morality can only stem from an infinite source. Why is that?

 

When we describe murder as being immoral, we do not mean it is wrong just for now, with the possibility of it becoming “right” some time in the future.  Absolute means unchangeable, not unchanging.

 

What’s the difference?

 

My dislike for olives is unchanging.  I’ll never start liking them.  That doesn’t mean it is impossible for my taste to change, even though it’s highly unlikely.  Since it could change, it is not absolute.  It is changeable.

 

The term “absolute” means without the ability to change. It is utterly permanent, unchangeable.

 

Think of something absolute. Take for example an icon of permanence and stability –- the Rock of Gibraltar. “Get a piece of the rock” — it lasts forever!  But does it really?  Is it absolute?  No. It is undergoing change every second. It is getting older, it is eroding.

 

The nature of absolute is a bit tricky to grasp because we find ourselves running into the same problem of our finite selves attempting to perceive the infinite, a topic we have discussed in a previous article in this series.

 

Everything that exists within time undergoes change. That’s what time is — a measurement of change. In Hebrew, shanah means “year,” sharing the same root shinah, “change.”

 

If everything in the finite universe is undergoing change, where can we find the quality of absolute?

 

If everything in the finite universe is undergoing change — since it exists within time — where can we find the quality of absolute?

 

Its source cannot be in time, which is constantly undergoing change. It must be beyond time, in the infinite dimension. Only God, the infinite being that exists beyond time, is absolute and unchangeable.

 

 ‘I am God, I do not change.’   (Malachi 3:6)

 

Therefore an absolute standard of morality can exist only if it stems from an infinite dimension — a realm that is eternal, beyond time, with no beginning and no end.

 

THE DEATH OF EDUCATION

 

In addition to the demise of morality, moral relativism inevitably leads to the death of education and genuine open-mindedness. The thirst for real learning comes from the recognition that the truth is out there waiting to be discovered — and I am all the more impoverished with its absence.

 

Professor Alan Bloom writes in his book “The Closing of the American Mind,”

 

It is the rarest of occurrences to find a youngster

who has been infused by this [liberal arts] education

with a longing to know all about China or the Romans

or the Jews.

 

All to the contrary.

There is an indifference to such things,

for relativism has extinguished the real motive

of education, the search for the good life…

…out there in the rest of the world

is a drab diversity that teaches only

that values are relative,

whereas here we can create all the life-styles we want.

Our openness means we do not need others.

Thus what is advertised as a great opening

is a great closing.

No longer is there a hope

that there are great wise men

in other places and times

who can reveal the truth about life…

 

If everything is relative, then it makes no difference what anyone thinks.  Ideas no longer matter.  With no absolute standard of right and wrong or truth and falsehood, the pursuit of wisdom becomes nonsensical.  

 

What are we searching for?  If no idea is more valid than another, there is no purpose in re-evaluating one’s belief system and being open to exploring new concepts — since there is no possibility of ever being wrong.

 

A common argument often heard for supporting relativism is that in the world at large we see a plethora of differing positions on a wide range of moral issues. Try to find one issue all cultures universally agree to! 

 

Professor Bloom addresses this contention:

 

History and the study of cultures do not teach or prove

that values or cultures are relative …

the fact that there have been different opinions

about good and bad in different times and places

in no way proves that none is true or superior to others.

To say that it does so prove is as absurd as to say

that the diversity of points of view

expressed in a college bull session

proves there is no truth …

the natural reaction is

to try to resolve the difference,

to examine the claims and reasons

for each opinion.

 

Only the unhistorical and inhuman belief that opinions are held for no reason would prevent the undertaking of such an exciting activity.

 

THE NATURE OF DEBATE

 

The plethora of disagreements demonstrates exactly the opposite point. If everything is relative, what on earth are we arguing about?

 

Imagine walking down the street and you hear a ferocious argument taking place behind a door. People are yelling at each other in a fit of rage. You ask a bystander what the commotion is all about. He tells you this is a Ben & Jerry’s ice cream store and they’re fighting over what is the best flavor of ice cream. Impossible.

 

Heated debates occur only because

we believe there are right and wrong positions.

 

Real debates and disagreements occur only because we believe there are right and wrong positions, not mere preferences of flavors.  Think of a time you experienced moral outrage. The force behind that anger is the conviction that your position is the correct one. Matters of preference, like music and interior design, do not provoke moral outrage.

 

What provokes our moral outrage? Injustice? Cruelty? Oppression? There is the sense that an absolute standard of morality is being violated, an objective standard that transcends humanity, that stems from an infinite and absolute Being.