die Wahrheit – truth
IPA: [ˈvaːɐ̯haɪ̯t]
Meaning: Truthfulness; the agreement of a statement with the matter on which it is made; correctness[1]
Etymology: Nominalisation from wahr. Middle High German and Old High German wār, from a word with the meaning with the meaning of “favour, (to demonstrate) friendliness, literally meaning “trustworthy”.[2]
Johannes 14,6 Jesus spricht zu ihm: Ich bin der Weg und die Wahrheit und das Leben. Niemand kommt zum Vater, als nur durch mich.
John 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
At the last youth fellowship, the topic that was discussed was about truth.
We started with a survey of things that we agreed or disagreed with. They were statements that we had to agree or disagree. Were they (to us, as individuals) true or false?
There were a few thought-provoking ones. I have misplaced the original paper, but I think one of the questions was about whether we believed that the truth is relative; that there are other true religions apart from Christianity.
(I say “Christianity” but I really mean something more limited than the whole broad spectrum, as not all denominations are what I would consider as “true” Christianity.)
Then, we moved on to a group activity. There was a worksheet, and one question was this: What is truth?
The first verse that came to my mind was actually John 17:17.
Johannes 17,17 Heilige sie durch die Wahrheit: dein Wort ist Wahrheit.
John 17:17 Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.
My answer was “The word of God.”
When we came together to discuss the answers, it turns out that the answer that the leader had in mind was John 14:6, for he said that the answer is Jesus.
He didn’t mention the verse reference at first, so someone else spoke up, and mistakenly said John 1:1.
Johannes 1,1 Im Anfang war das Wort, und das Wort war bei Gott, und das Wort war Gott.
John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Then, I realised that the answer that I gave, too, was actually pointing to the same thing. It’s not that there are two different answers, for Jesus is the Word of God.
Normally we think of the word of God as being the Bible, but that is the written word.
Christ is the living Word.
It’s the connections that I draw from what I thought was familiar that make reading the Bible very rewarding.
It’s as someone said (about mastery of things in general), that it’s when you end up back at the beginning, but you are seeing things for the first time.
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