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Just Another Essay



The Beauty of Truth

Essay Posted September 2, 2008 by James E. Nelson

Humans are attracted to truth like moths to the flame. Truth is beautiful and humans are instinctively attracted to beauty. But let me rephrase that, because it has nothing to do with instinct. Made in the image of God, that divine image draws us to the beauty of truth whenever we come into contact with it.

But truth is not intellectual, it is noetic (that is, having to do with the nous, the Greek word for the inner being). Neither is truth passive. Knowledge is passive, but truth calls to us; it makes demands of us. And those demands offend our desires (ie, passions) which drive us as a result of the fall. So as invariably as we are attracted to the truth, when we finally come in contact with God’s truth, we are repelled by it, it’s demands being utterly repulsive to our own self-will.

I was reminded of this listening to David Cayley interview Univ. of Nottingham professor John Milbank on the radio show Ideas. Milbank is part of a movement that has come to be called Radical Orthodoxy. (The name is drawn from his book of the same name. It is also little "o" orthodoxy that. It is mostly a British Protestant movement.)

But it could have been an interview with an Eastern Orthodox theologian rather than an Anglican professor. Everything in the interview was quite precisely correct and within the mainstream of Big "o" Orthodox thought. Especially notable was Milbank’s claim that the intellect, rational thought, and even the seeming correctness of logical conclusions are deeply influenced by our passions, and therefore cannot be trusted in and of themselves.

And yet Milbank is not trying to restate Eastern Orthodox theology. In fact, I have found no evidence that he is particularly interested in it other than as a theological source to be used. And this reminded me of myself some twenty years ago when I was a Presbyterian who had no knowledge of the Eastern Orthodox church.

Back then I became deeply involved in two movements, one liturgical and one theological, that were actually the precursors to this contemporary “Radical Orthodoxy” movement. The fruit of the liturgical movement can be seen in many of the mainline denominational liturgical resources. Using the services straight from the book, I led a worship service that was remarkably similar to the Western Rite of the Eastern Orthodox church.

That liturgical renewal movement has had profound effects on modern Protestant worship, but the pure form that I followed as a Presbyterian pastor never caught on among most Presbyterians. They have gone on to “better” forms of worship. Similarly, the theological movement called Classical Christianity (the well spring of that movement being Drew School of Religion professor Thomas Oden) came and went, having little lasting effect on Protestant theology as a whole. I suspect that in a couple decades’ time, the same will be said for John Milbank’s spot-on analysis of the weaknesses of intellectualism in relation to theology.

Of course the beauty of truth is no guarantee that anyone is going to find it or stick with it. There are also a lot of clever people out there. And while truth refuses to be held captive by intellectual pursuits, intellectual pursuits often lead to very clever and attractive ideas. For instance, Dispensationalism (the theological system I was taught in Bible College) is very clever but it is not truthful on a couple of levels. First, it doesn't adequately deal with all data of the Bible. Second, it is an intellectual exercise that never speaks to the heart. (In other words, it’s intellectual rather than noetic.) Its cleverness attracts many people who are seekers, but who confuse truth with intellectual pursuit.

And these realities ought to serve as a reminder to Christians of various stripes.

The Orthodox Church claims to be the earthly vessel of the fulness of the truth. Let me be clear that this doesn’t mean Orthodox theology and practice always get it right. Far from it. But this is where the fulness of the truth can be discovered because within Orthodoxy one can find not only the datum (that is, scripture), but also the disciplines, lifestyle, and liturgical patterns that allow the intellectual datum and to be absorbed all the way through to the inner, spiritual person where truth can be discerned, and its fulness can be experienced.

But while the Orthodox Church is the vessel of the fulness of the truth, it doesn’t have a corner on the truth. As is witnessed to from one end of scripture to the other, God is far bigger than his chosen people. As Jesus reminded us, the rain falls on the unjust as well as the just. There is a tendency for Orthodox Christians (and theologians) to ignore other voices, which creates an intellectual and spiritual ghetto. I suspect it is one of the big reasons Western culture is so resistant to Orthodoxy. It’s hard to go live in a ghetto after having experienced the big, big world.

But there is a lesson here for Protestants as well.

Truth is illusive. In every generation various pastors, theologians, and Christians stumble across the truth and are inevitably drawn toward it. But this “true truth” (to borrow a phrase from Francis Schaeffer) must compete with other very good thoughts and ideas that these same people stumble across. So even if it's picked up and cherished, it is frequently set aside or diluted with all these other pretty and clever ideas. Truth is not a trick to be mastered. As easily as it is grasped, it can slip away. Especially when our errant will begins to recognize the high price the truth exacts. (“Take up your cross and follow me ...” “I am crucified with Christ ...” etc.)

And because truth is illusive, it always tempting to be more clever than truthful, or to feed the intellect rather than the whole person. It is always easy to grasp on to the next great idea and let go of the last one, because in the modern world, great ideas are like fashions, passing with the season.

But at the end of the day there is far more reason to be hopeful than discouraged. Truth, after all, is beautiful. And we humans are created to respond to it as openly as God offers it in the first place. Thanks be to God.