Thought for Today

Written language, words, speech. Eastern mystics, many Western physicists and postmodern philosophers agree, it is impossible to communicate genuine meaning via written words, and oftentimes regular speech. On what bases do they base their claims?

For Eastern mystics, and often in general, words can be used to pose contradictions that demonstrate how rational thought is a hindrance to realizing the truth. But words fail when it comes to explaining the mystical “truths” one has discovered. While it can be written about, “truth” is discovered through experience, and words can never fully convey what happens during those experiences. In that sense, arguably when it matters most, language fails.

The same view is expressed by Western physicists. They have incredibly detailed and complex mathematical formulas that prove what they have discovered. But again, how to translate those elegant formulas into words that people can understand? What has been discovered so often seems so contradictory that words are not adequate. Again, experience can become the key.

As for postmodern philosophers, we’ve discussed their views in previous entries. For the deconstructionists, a word is just a sign of another symbol (i.e. a word), which is a sign of another symbol, continuing back as a more or less infinite chain. Thus, any word has no specific meaning. Indeed, meaning is not found in the words themselves, but in the white spaces between the words. Any meaning rests with the reader, there is no such thing as authorial intent. Again, written language cannot convey a specific “real” meaning.

Do those positions reflect true reality? No. To cite one example, 2 Timothy 2:15: “Be diligent to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who doesn't need to be ashamed, correctly teaching the word of truth” (CSB17). John 17:17 is another: “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth” (CSB17). Ultimately one must deny that truth exists in any form in order to convince one’s self that God’s Truth does not exist. Even in day to day life for example, the meaning of a car’s instruction manual doesn’t reside with what the reader decides. The point again, is to stay alert, and watch, to be aware of some the ways in which various strains of thought may be coalescing against what God has stated.