League of Inveterate Poets

Posted By Foolish Sage on September 26, 2009

This is one of a series of posts that will interact with the new book by John Franke, Manifold Witness: The Plurality of Truth. John Franke is The Lester and Kay Clemens Professor of Missional Theology at Biblical Seminary in Hatfield, PA. He is the author of several previous books, including Beyond Foundationalism (with Stanley Grenz) and The Character of Theology.

Chapter two is titled “Plurality and Truth.” Franke challenges us to take a hard cold stare at just how diverse our world is. Religion is in now way immune from that diversity; no matter what you believe or how firmly your believe it, there are any number of people in the world who would reject your belief.

He next turns to an increasingly popular way of dealing with the cognitive and spiritual dissonance such diversity causes us: cultural relativism. This is the idea that “truth is simply what a particular culture, community, or individual takes it to be.” One way of expressing this is the oft-ridiculed dictum, “There is no absolute truth except that there is no absolute truth.” But more seriously, cultural relativists believe that relativity of truth is not just an observation but is inherent in the very fabric of existence. Recently many have linked cultural relativism with the emerging concept of postmodernity. Franke notes that the precise meaning of “postmodern” is difficult to pin down, but its most important feature for this discussion is the insight that “all human knowledge involves interpretation.” There are no uninterpreted facts.

Is postmodernism therefore inherently antithetical to the Christian faith? Franke argues that the asserting the interpretive nature of human thought does not necessitate the rejection of any concept of ultimate truth. He grants that there are atheistic postmodern philosophers who do maintain radical relativism (there is no capital T Truth), but with Westphal maintains that such an assertion is not a necessary conclusion of their observation of the relativism of small t truth (i.e., human perception), but instead is a product of placing their analysis in their atheistic context. The Christian can affirm both small t truth (that all human knowledge is finite and subjective) and at the same time capital T Truth (that God is the comprehensive knower of ultimate truth). The Christian believes that because God has revealed himself in Jesus Christ, it is possible to “know something about reality, even if we cannot know it exhaustively or perfectly.

This involves the paradox that while there is an immeasurable gulf between what we know and what God knows, Christian faith maintains that God has found a way to provide substantial and sufficient connections between the two. However, Franke implores the Christian to maintain a humble stance even in the face of such revelation, for “all human knowledge of God, and therefore ultimate truth, is the result of God’s accommodation.”

This “creature/creator distinction” as it has been called is one underpinning of what Franke calls “the plurality of truth.” But he goes farther to assert that such a pluralistic truth is actually inherent in the very nature of God. The Christian doctrine of the Trinity means that “God is a plurality-in-unity and a unity-in-plurality.” If God is ultimate truth, then it follows that “truth is characterized by plurality.” Franke believes this inherent plurality not only explains but necessitates the diverse expressions of Christianity we have seen as it has grown up in various locations and cultures. He bemoans, however, that all too often the practice has been for certain expressions of the Church to actively suppress other expressions.

Franke also wants us to reject the tendency to blame the increasing challenges to truth in the church all on one side of things. He places the blame equally on both extreme ends: the far left for embracing radical relativism but also the far right for absolutizing its grasp on truth. He concludes, “Instead, truth is a reality to which we must continually aspire through the commitment of our entire being to the love of the triune God revealed in Jesus Christ through the power of the Spirit.” He calls for Christians to exhibit a “bold humility”: bold in the confidence that God has made known his will for creation and has shown his intention to reconcile the world to himself in and through Jesus Christ; and humility in our knowledge of our own limitations, dependence upon God, and the great diversity of those who make up the Church along with us.

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• John Franke’s Manifold Witness: Chapter 1 (foolishsage.com)

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