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Pilate's Question
What is truth, and how do I recognize it?
Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor who ultimately gave in to the demands of the religious leaders to have Jesus crucified, gave voice to a question that is on the lips of many today in our postmodern society: What is truth, and how do we recognize it? In a world that offers us a smorgasbord of different religious options and life philosophies, many wonder whether absolute truth even exists.
What is truth? Pilate meant this as a rhetorical question, and Jesus did not give him an answer. However, there are other moments in the movie in which Jesus addresses the subject of truth. In one flashback scene, he said, “I am the way, the truth and the life.” It seems that Jesus is claiming that truth is embodied in a person, namely, himself. Jesus is saying, “If you are looking for the way to God, I am the way to God; if you are looking for the truth about God, I am the truth about God; if you are looking for a life that is in communion with God, that life is found in a relationship with me.” All of Jesus’ teachings are true, because he is truth itself.
How do I recognize truth when I see it? Pilate asked this question not of Jesus, but of his wife, Claudia. Claudia’s response is that our ability to discern truth depends more upon the openness of our heart and mind to really hear the truth, than on our intellectual capacity to understand it. If our hearts are not open to receiving the truth, we will never recognize it when we see it.
Blaise Pascal, the French philosopher and mathematician, makes a similar point with respect to truth about God when he writes, “God has given us evidence sufficiently clear to convince those with an open heart and mind, yet evidence sufficiently vague so as not to compel those whose hearts and minds are closed.”
Claudia was open to the truth and compelled to act on it. Remember, she had a dream that warned her to stay away from this Jewish prophet. She recognized this as the truth and she pleaded with her husband to let Jesus live. Sadly, Pilate’s heart was ultimately closed to the truth. Though he knew that Jesus was innocent, saying, “I find no fault in Him,” in the end he was more committed to avoiding an uprising than to living in the truth.
Jesus often finished his teachings by saying, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” He was really saying, “If you want to understand the truth of my teaching, be sure you are truly open to hearing what I am saying. Listen with the right attitude.”
How about you? Is your heart open to the truth of Jesus?
Related Reading: Is Jesus really who he says he is?