THE QUESTION OF TRUTH IN RELIGION

Abstract

Religions typically make claims to state truths about the nature of the universe and of human destiny. Even religious traditions which stress praxis more than theoretical assent, like some versions of Buddhism, cannot avoid making specific truth-claims - about the way to overcome sorrow, about the fact that it can be overcome and about the causal structure of reality, for example. The issue of truth, however difficult it is to deal with in religion, is a central one. If one is not careful, however, a stress on issues of truth can lead to unhelpful arguments and polemical defensiveness. This has led some recent Christian thinkers to take the view that there is not just one set of truths, which some part of the Christian tradition has go right. Rather, truth in religion is itself plural. There are many truths, or many ways of understanding truth. This seems at first sight a much more tolerant view than one which says that only my tradition has the truth.