Poythress Truth, Theology, and Perspective

An Approach to Understanding Biblical Doctrine
1. Auflage 2022
ISBN: 978-1-4335-8027-7
Verlag: Crossway
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 160 Seiten

Study Systematic Theology through the Lens of Truth  There are many themes that flow through and unite the entirety of Scripture, and in his latest ebook, scholar Vern S. Poythress explores the relationship between God and truth.  In Truth, Theology, and Perspective, Poythress explains how truth informs and confirms what the Bible teaches. In addition to a theology of objective truth, he explains how it is interwoven through each of the major topics in systematic theology, such as revelation, the Bible, man, Christ, salvation, and eschatology. This perspective highlights how the interconnectedness and harmony of Scripture is an extension of God's own truthfulness and how this attribute is manifested in all of creation, prompting us to greater worship and gratitude to God. - For Those Interested in Systematic Theology: Particularly college students, seminarians, and pastors  - Written by Vern S. Poythress: Author of many works on biblical interpretation, science, and history including In the Beginning Was the Word; Redeeming Science; and Inerrancy and Worldview - New Perspective: Major topics in systematic theology studied through the lens of truth

Vern S. Poythress (PhD, Harvard University; ThD, University of Stellenbosch) is Distinguished Professor of New Testament, Biblical Interpretation, and Systematic Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he has taught for four decades. In addition to earning six academic degrees, he is the author of numerous books and articles on biblical interpretation, language, and science.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Poythress, Vern S.

Leseproben

1

The Existence of God

Does God exist? The Bible says that he does (Genesis 1 and many other passages). The created world testifies that he exists (Rom. 1:18–23; Ps. 19:1–6). Even unbelievers know God (Rom. 1:21) but suppress this knowledge (v. 18). The miracles and fulfilled prophecies in the Bible confirm his existence. We can also consider an approach that confirms the existence of God by starting with the theme of truth.

What is truth? Truth is what God knows.1 There is a close relation between the truth and God. So inspecting the idea of truth can actually confirm the existence of the true God, the one who knows all truth.

Truth Exists

Let us consider the claim that truth does not exist. This is an unusual claim, but something like it can be heard from some postmodernists, skeptics, and mystics.

But if truth does not exist, then it is true that truth does not exist. So, there is something that is true. Hence, the assumption that truth does not exist is self-refuting.

Truth exists. Not believing that it exists is self-defeating.

Attributes of Truth

Let us consider a particular example of a truth: 2 + 2 = 4. This is true everywhere, throughout the universe. It is true at all times. Its truth does not change over time.2

So truth has three key attributes: omnipresence (everywhere present), everlastingness (through all times), and unchangeability (immutability). Unchangeability is actually stronger than the mere fact of no change. We are saying not only that truth does not change but that it could not change. These three features of truth are attributes of God. God is omnipresent, everlasting, and unchangeable. (See table 1.1.)

Table 1.1: Attributes of God and Attributes of Truth

God’s Attributes

Attributes of Truth

omnipresence

omnipresence

everlastingness

everlastingness

unchangeability

unchangeability

Truth as Eternal

We can make a further, more refined point about everlastingness. God is not subject to time or captured by time. He is superior to time. So we may say that he is eternal.3 The new heavens and the new earth, together with those who are redeemed in Christ, exist in the future without end, which means that they are everlasting. But they are still subject to time. God is different: he is superior to time; he is eternal. In addition, the truth that 2 + 2 = 4 seems to be different. It is specified by God. As such, it is not subject to change with the passing of time.

Tensed Truths

In some ways, mathematical truths like 2 + 2 = 4 are special, because they do not need to specify any one moment in time. Suppose, then, that we consider a truth that does have a time frame: Jesus Christ suffered under Pontius Pilate.4 The name Pontius Pilate fixes the time frame as the first century. There is also an implicit geographical frame, namely the location of Jerusalem, where Pontius Pilate was ruling. The verb “suffered” accordingly is in the past tense, to indicate that the time at which the event occurred preceded the time in which we are now living.

There is a sense in which we might say that the truth about Jesus Christ suffering is not an “eternal” truth, but a tensed truth, a truth about a particular event. But notice that the truth about the event can be distinguished from the event itself. The event itself happened in the first century in Jerusalem, and is never to be repeated. We cannot see it directly before our eyes. But we can talk about whether it happened. (It did.) The affirmation that it happened is an affirmation that continues to be true, through all future times.

What about past times? What about the times before Jesus Christ came into the world? At those earlier times, the event of Christ’s crucifixion had not yet happened. But it was planned by God already:

. . . you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you. (1 Pet. 1:18–20)

. . . who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began. (2 Tim. 1:9)

. . . for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. (Acts 4:27–28)

Let us consider Acts 4:27–28 in more detail. The immediately preceding verses, Acts 4:25–26, cite Psalm 2, written a thousand years earlier, to confirm that the suffering and death of Christ were already planned by God. So a thousand years earlier it was already infallibly true, according to the plan of God, that Christ would suffer under Pontius Pilate when the time came for the events to take place. The truth about what took place was already true in God’s sovereign plan. The truth is distinct from the events that it describes.

What about other, less significant truths? Second Kings 22:1 says that “Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign.” No passage of the Bible indicates explicitly that this coronation of an eight-year-old was planned beforehand before God. But the Bible does give us a general principle, that God has planned all of history, including its details: “[God] works all things according to the counsel of his will” (Eph. 1:11; see Ps. 139:16). So the same principle holds for minor truths. Every truth is omnipresent, eternal, and unchangeable.

We see impressive illustrations of the unchangeable nature of truth when God fulfills his prophetic word. Consider, for example, the special prophecy in 1 Kings 13:2 about Jeroboam’s altar: “Behold, a son shall be born to the house of David, Josiah by name, and he shall sacrifice on you [the altar] the priests of the high places who make offerings on you, and human bones shall be burned on you.” This prophecy was proclaimed by an unnamed prophet in the presence of Jeroboam (v. 1), the first king in the northern kingdom of Israel, after the split between the northern and southern kingdoms (12:20). It was fulfilled hundreds of years later: “And as Josiah turned, he saw the tombs there on the mount. And he sent and took the bones out of the tombs and burned them on the altar . . .” (2 Kings 23:16). This truth about the judgment on Jeroboam remains true forever.

We could multiply cases like this. The prophet Micah predicted that Jesus the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem (Mic. 5:2). The prediction took place in the eighth century BC (1:1), hundreds of years before Jesus was born in Bethlehem (Matt. 2:1–6). Predictions like these confirm that God has an unchanging plan. The truths about this plan do not change. They cannot change.

Other Attributes of Truth

Other characteristics of truth match characteristics traditionally associated with God:

Truth is true. Likewise God is true.

Truth is invisible, though the things about which it speaks may be visible.

Truth is immaterial. That is, it is not a material thing like an orange, made out of atoms and with a particular location in space. Some truths are truths about material things. But the truths themselves can be distinguished from the things about which they speak.

Now let us consider two attributes of God together: transcendence and immanence. Do truths display both transcendence and immanence? It is easier to see that they do if we consider truths that apply to more than one case. For example, it is true that 2 + 2 = 4. This truth applies to many instances, in which 2 apples plus 2 apples equals 4 apples, or 2 oranges plus 2 oranges equals 4 oranges. Truths that apply to more than one case transcend the world about which they speak. They transcend the particular cases. At the same time, truth is immanent, in the sense that it has bearing on particular cases. Transcendence and immanence are both attributes of truth. They are also attributes of God.

What about truths that are...