Postmodern Christians who dismiss the veracity of propositional truth like to cite John 14:26 where Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” “Jesus is the truth,” they say, “not doctrinal statements. Jesus is the only truth that matters.”
This way of interpreting Jesus’ statement presumes that Jesus is saying He is identical to the truth, such that to speak of the truth is to speak of Jesus. Linguists call this the “is of identity.” An example of this use of “is” would be the statement, “Barack Obama is the president of the United States.” There is an identity relationship between the man Barack Obama and the office of the president of the United States. Clearly that’s not the kind of “is” Jesus is referring to. When Jesus says he is the truth, he is not making an identity statement such that “Jesus = the truth,” otherwise, “to say that ‘2+2=4’ is true is to say that ‘2+2=4’ is Jesus. In other words, Jesus is claiming to be a mathematical statement.”[1]
Jesus’ use of is is what we call the “is of predication.” This is when you predicate a property of someone or something. For example, when we say “grass is green,” we aren’t saying that grass and green are identical, but that green can be predicated of the grass. Jesus is truth in the sense that He can be described as being true. There is no falsehood in Him. He embodies everything that is true. For that to be true (no pun intended), propositional truth must exist since you cannot predicate truth to Jesus unless there are truths that exist in the first place.
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[1]Richard B. Davis and W. Paul Franks, “On Jesus, Derrida, and Dawkins,” in Philosophia Christi, Vol. 16, Number 1, 2014, 185-191, 189.
Thinking to Believe 
December 18, 2014 at 4:21 pm
Jesus is the ultimate source of truth (Alpha and Omega).
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December 18, 2014 at 5:52 pm
apoloJetics:
By saying that “Jesus is the ultimate source of truth” is not saying anything to anybody at all really. How can anybody know what you are talking about? No, that is not what Jesus meant by saying he was the truth; I do not even know what you are talking about.
Furthermore when you use discriptives like “ultimate” you have to be prepared to define and explain what the “ultimate” you are talking about means, what the “ultimate” is and how would you know that what you define, is the absolute without any references, for everybody, everywhere? Who is going to accept your statement. Perhaps only you is a good bet.
I picked out three chocolate bars, one was Dark Chocolate, one was
Hazelnut Chocolate and the other was Milk Chocolate. I tasted all three and the Milk Chocolate bar was by far the ultimate in taste for me. It’s like good, better, best. My wife on the other hand tasted all three bars too and the Dark Chocolate was the ultimate taste for her.
There is a moment in the Bible when Jesus was brought before Pilate and the Truth is mentioned; it goes like this:
John 18:33 Then Pilate entered the Praetorium again, called Jesus, and said to Him, “Are You the King of the Jews?”
34 Jesus answered him, “Are you speaking for yourself about this, or did others tell you this concerning Me?”
35 Pilate answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered You to me. What have You done?”
36 Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now My kingdom is not from here.”
37 Pilate therefore said to Him, “Are You a king then?”
Jesus answered, “You say rightly that I am a king. For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.”
38 Pilate said to Him, “What is truth?” And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews, and said to them, “I find no fault in Him at all.”
Now I ask you, was Jesus talking about himself being the ultimate source of truth? Well he didn’t use the term ultimate source of truth so what do you suppose he meant by truth and what do you suppose Pilate meant when he said in retort, “What is truth?”
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December 19, 2014 at 4:03 pm
By “ultimate” I mean that which cannot be exceeded. No, I don’t refer to the taste of chocolate on the tongue, rather, the oxygen which is vital to life. We all need it. I do believe in absolutes; perhaps I need to elaborate to make it more clear. At the same time, “truth” is a profound word that cannot be explained from me to you in a pat answer.
If it did come in a packaged, universally understood answer, surely Jesus would have satisfied Pilate’s longing with a clear answer. Even to his own disciples, Jesus’ answers left them scratching their heads. It wasn’t until after the crucifixion that the disciples even saw the reason for the cross.
John 1:1 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 The same was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men.
5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.”
“All things were made by him,” refers to Jesus as the source of anything “that was made.” How would you interpret the strange saying in v. 5 “the light shineth in darkness and the darkness comprehended it not?” I take it to mean that some will comprehend the truth of Jesus and others will not comprehend. It is not a matter of Jesus being unclear but a matter of our sinful blindness that prevents truth.
Perhaps the key is what Pilate missed when Jesus said He bore “witness to the truth.” Truth can be verified by examining other assumptions which claim to be true. We can verify Jesus’ claims by studying the O.T. prophets. We can verify the doctrine of the church against the Bible. We can verify that God is logical and consistent because universal laws are logical and consistent.
Pilate’s question “What is truth?” reveals Pilate’s condition of being blind to (not comprehending) the truth. The significant truth unfolding before Pilate was Christ’s atoning work, a truth that laid the foundation for the church.
C.S. Lewis does a better job than I to illustrate an ultimate source:
“I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.” – C.S. Lewis
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January 13, 2015 at 10:30 pm
“…propositional truth must exist since you cannot predicate truth to Jesus unless there are truths that exist in the first place.”
This is a false statement and the convoluted way it is predicated uses grammar to obfuscate the statement.
In the sentence “The child threw the ball,” the subject is “the child” and the predicate is “threw the ball.”
Saying that “threw the ball” is predicated on “the boy” in the context of your statement: “For that to be true………….. propositional truth must exist since you cannot predicate truth to Jesus unless there are truths that exist in the first place.”
Which is the same thing as saying: ” the proposition “threw the ball” must exist since you cannot predicate “threw the ball” unless “threw the ball” existed in the first place; however, “threw the ball”, in this instance, did not exist before the boy threw the ball therefore Jesus was true, not because he was true without being true but he was true by “being” true, just as the ball was thrown because the boy “threw”(being the action of the boy) the ball. That the ball existed means nothing by itself for it is the throwing the ball that is predicated on the boy(the Subject). They may exist apart but truth is not predicated to Jesus until he manifests the truth and that is why Jesus could say I am the truth, by manifesting the truth, not by standing in front of you without manifesting; i.e., without speaking, acting or demonstrating the truth, just as the boy did not throw the ball before he manifested the action which could only exist when or after he “threw the ball”, not before he threw the ball. Throwing the ball did not exist until the boy manifested the action and in the same Jesus was not the truth without “being” the manifestation of the truth until he manifested the truth.
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January 13, 2015 at 10:36 pm
Jesus said He bore “witness to the truth”; in other words that is “being” the truth, manifesting truth. Jesus was not the embodiment of truth.
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March 7, 2015 at 5:24 pm
Is this an issue of truth, or context? It seems the article is directed toward stances that claim truth to be relative and perception based. In other words self refuting claims about truth not existing. Context is key to understanding each other, and if someone types, who is Truth? many people would know, Jesus was implied. Without faith that Jesus was both true, as in without sin, then Christianity is broken. Being asked to define ultimate, and contrasting it with types of chocolate is an attempt to intentionally confuse the context about truth with preference, and induce Relativism as Ultimate or Supreme Reality. God controls reality not mans idealism or word play. Hence He as in God will make Jesus’ enemies His footstool.
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March 9, 2015 at 5:24 pm
Another thought or position I hold as a truth is a curiosity hinged on, Heb 4:15 For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin It would stand to reason that the embodiment of Truth would not be capable of sin and or even bothered by the desires involved in any temptation. This would cause Christ to not have come in the flesh, which was and is a doctrine involved with :
John 1:7 For many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist.
Christ is spoken by John as the Logos or the Word of God, become flesh, in my opinion His truthfulness had to be derived from His free will and obedience to His Father, God because He is human.
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