Maybe it's like this...
If someone becomes convinced by the usual-mainstream-modern assumption that truth is objectively located in the external world ("truth is out-there"), and our job is just to perceive and recognize this external truth...
Then such a person never has to convince himself of truth.
He feels more confident of some proposition only secondarily, not inwardly; e.g. by re-reading and reciting it, by propagating and defending it in public discourse.
This way of thinking may explain how arguments that cannot really convince, become perpetuated over centuries.
It happens because, when truth is out-there, reasoning does not even need to convince.
Indeed, nobody ever needs personally to be convinced!
So, we get a world (and this is our actual world, and the world of historical past) where everybody claims/ argues and acts-like they believe some-thing... some-thing that - inwardly - literally nobody believes!
The above is Bruce Charlton’s response to a comment I had left on his recent Word Spells post. It reminded me of some of Nikolai Berdyaev’s thoughts on the subject of truth from his Truth and Revelation.
Truth is not something given objectively, but rather a creative achievement. It is creative discovery, rather than the reflected knowledge of an object or of being. Truth ... is the creative transfiguration of reality.
Like Dr. Charlton, Berdyaev objects to the idea of truth as something that is “given objectively.” He aslo rejects the notion that our main task is recognizing and knowing this “truth out there.” For Berdyaev, truth was an internal, inward experience flowing from the spirit.
Truth is not objective, ordinary reality, reflected in the knower and entering into him from outside, but rather the enlightenment, the transfiguration of reality: it is the introduction into the world's data of a quality, which was not there before truth was revealed and known.
Introducing into the world’s data a quality which was not there before the truth was revealed is both creative and participative, underscoring how truth is intricately related to co-creation.
Truth is not conformity with what we call being, but rather the kindling of a light within being. I am in darkness and seek the light; I do not yet know truth but I seek it. By this very fact I affirm the existence of Truth and light, existence in another sense than the existence of the world's realities. My seeking is already the dawning light, and truth is already beginning to reveal itself.
I have known many Christians who more or less defined Christianity as “conformity with being,” yet as Berdyaev (and Dr. Charlton) point out, conformity with being very rarely leads to actual belief, let alone faith.
Instead of conforming with being, Christians should seek to kindle a light within being.
Maybe then we could start really believing in truth rather than simply believing out truth.
Instead of conforming to reality, we should begin thinking about transfiguring it . . .
Starting with ourselves, from within.
If someone becomes convinced by the usual-mainstream-modern assumption that truth is objectively located in the external world ("truth is out-there"), and our job is just to perceive and recognize this external truth...
Then such a person never has to convince himself of truth.
He feels more confident of some proposition only secondarily, not inwardly; e.g. by re-reading and reciting it, by propagating and defending it in public discourse.
This way of thinking may explain how arguments that cannot really convince, become perpetuated over centuries.
It happens because, when truth is out-there, reasoning does not even need to convince.
Indeed, nobody ever needs personally to be convinced!
So, we get a world (and this is our actual world, and the world of historical past) where everybody claims/ argues and acts-like they believe some-thing... some-thing that - inwardly - literally nobody believes!
The above is Bruce Charlton’s response to a comment I had left on his recent Word Spells post. It reminded me of some of Nikolai Berdyaev’s thoughts on the subject of truth from his Truth and Revelation.
Truth is not something given objectively, but rather a creative achievement. It is creative discovery, rather than the reflected knowledge of an object or of being. Truth ... is the creative transfiguration of reality.
Like Dr. Charlton, Berdyaev objects to the idea of truth as something that is “given objectively.” He aslo rejects the notion that our main task is recognizing and knowing this “truth out there.” For Berdyaev, truth was an internal, inward experience flowing from the spirit.
Truth is not objective, ordinary reality, reflected in the knower and entering into him from outside, but rather the enlightenment, the transfiguration of reality: it is the introduction into the world's data of a quality, which was not there before truth was revealed and known.
Introducing into the world’s data a quality which was not there before the truth was revealed is both creative and participative, underscoring how truth is intricately related to co-creation.
Truth is not conformity with what we call being, but rather the kindling of a light within being. I am in darkness and seek the light; I do not yet know truth but I seek it. By this very fact I affirm the existence of Truth and light, existence in another sense than the existence of the world's realities. My seeking is already the dawning light, and truth is already beginning to reveal itself.
I have known many Christians who more or less defined Christianity as “conformity with being,” yet as Berdyaev (and Dr. Charlton) point out, conformity with being very rarely leads to actual belief, let alone faith.
Instead of conforming with being, Christians should seek to kindle a light within being.
Maybe then we could start really believing in truth rather than simply believing out truth.
Instead of conforming to reality, we should begin thinking about transfiguring it . . .
Starting with ourselves, from within.
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