Time Saving Truth from Falsehood and Envy, by François Lemoyne
Who hasn’t been fascinated by the search for truth?
Theology teaches us that the various truths which exist have, in the final analysis, their source in God. Yet, let us try, in the first place, to know what the truth is.
The notion of truth, or of the true, is constantly used in our daily life: it constitutes a reference without which a person could not live, at least in the realm of the practical. Numerous examples prove this – such as the veracity of the necessary information for taking a trip.
What is the truth?
Each one of us knows more or less spontaneously where the truth is found. It is the meeting of two elements: an intelligence and an object. If the intelligence has a representation of the object which corresponds to reality, then the representation is true. For example, if I think that the apple is red and it really is, then my intelligence a true representation of reality. Thus does St. Thomas pronounce the following definition of truth: Veritas est adaequatio intellectus et rei (Truth is the equalization of the intellect to the thing). This relation produces the knowledge of this such as they are.
"The Treachery of Images", which shows a pipe that looks as though it is a model for a tobacco store advertisement. Magritte painted below the pipe "This is not a pipe", which seems a contradiction, but is actually true: the painting is not a pipe, it is an image of a pipe.
One could, in this manner, judge of the veracity of a work of art, for example, by observing whether there exists a similitude, an adequation, between that which the artist conceived in his mind and that which he realized externally.
In other words, truth is a connection that requires a reference point: reality. In function of its conformity to this referential, a representation is true or not.
Yet, if the truth is found principally in the intelligence, it exists also in the object, since it is the origin of the intellectual representation. To which we can attach another definition of truth: quod est – that which is.
This object, which is at the origin of this truth, must be intelligible: it must be able to be grasped by the intelligence. I can’t enunciate a truth about something which doesn’t make it to my intelligence in one manner or another.
There exists therefore the truth of the intelligence, which is the conformity to the object, source of the representation, and the truth of the object, which is its conformity with its species, further along, its conformity with the Mind of God.
What happens in the mind when a person says the truth?
Truth and Remorse, by Botticelli
As soon as the person has the representation of some thing in his mind, he comes to know the essence of the thing. Then can it judge whether this representation is conformed to reality or not: it makes a judgment in which it confirms or denies the validity of this representation – that’s where one comes to know the truth.
Since an intelligence and an object, which is the reference point, are necessary for the establishment of a truth, how could God be the truth? What object, then, could serve as a reference for Him?
Truth is found in God in its highest degree:
Here we have to consider again the two foundations for the truth (intelligence and object).
As for intelligence, since God is omniscient, He knows things exactly as they are. What is more, He knows Himself perfectly, for His Intellect/Intelligence and His Being are wholly one.
Then we come to the object: God is perfectly conform to the idea of the divinity – we could say that He is conform to His nature, a condition for the truth of an object. Not only does He realize perfectly this idea, but He even constitutes it. There exists in God one conformity between intelligence and being, and equally, one identity: God is the First Truth (Veritas prima).
Whereas no creature perfectly realizes the type of his species, God in Himself realizes perfectly the totality of the “potentialities” of His nature. He is the source of all being and of all intelligence (the two elements necessary for the making of a truth). Thus does He remain the source of all truth.
Is the Truth eternal?
Pilate to the Christ : "What is Truth ?"
Certain truths, such as those of mathematics, seem to be eternal. Nevertheless, that a truth may be eternal, the intelligence that conceives that truth must be eternal, an attribute solely attributable to the divine intelligence. Some truths, therefore, are eternal, to be sure, but only in God.
One of the biggest questions posed today is whether there could be many truths. This question, which has different implications in the religious sphere and in the philosophic realm, has a simple response in the beginning: if the same object is apprehended by several intelligences, then would there exist several truths about that thing, e.g., if many persons were to be have a different idea about the same board. This does not, however, imply the least relativism: a single object might show itself differently in different intelligences, so long as those truths do not contradict one another.
Is truth unchangeable? What was true at the time of Socrates, for example, would it remain true today? A truth can vary in two manners: that of the object and that of the intelligence. That is, an opinion (about the object) can develop and the object itself can change.
But in God, these great truths are eternal…
Author: Mr. Rev. Jean-François Billot
Translation : Jonathan Arrington
