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An editorial in The Independent advised readers that “No-one knows what Postmodernism is, so use the word as often as you like”. The first problem we have to overcome is to understand exactly what postmodernism means. A sociologist, Zygmunt Bauman has said,
the main feature ascribed to postmodernity is the permanent and irreducible pluralism of cultures, communal traditions, ideologies, ‘forms of life’ or ‘language games’ … or awareness and recognition of such pluralism. Things which are plural in the postmodern world cannot be arranged in an evolutionary sequence, or be seen as each other’s inferior or superior stages; neither can they be classified as right and wrong solutions to common problems. No knowledge can be assessed outside the context of culture, tradition, language game etc which makes it possible and endows it with meaning.
What Bauman is describing is the breakdown of any universal meaning. Something is true only in the context within which it is spoken, and is only understood by a community with a specific way of understanding what has been spoken. As a result no comparison between any two belief systems is possible, as there is no chance of communication between the two, nor is there one principle at work in both of them.
This is the essence of relativism, a major characteristic of postmodernism. What Bauman described as “the permanent and irreducible pluralism of cultures, communal traditions, or ideologies”. But if we say, with the postmodernists, that these various world views “cannot be classified as right and wrong solutions to common problems or be assessed outside the context of culture, tradition, language game etc which makes it possible and endows it with meaning” then we immediately hit two problems. Firstly if everything is relative and, to quote Bauman again, “no knowledge can be assessed outside the context of culture, tradition, language game etc” then nothing can have any meaning. For surely this implies a kind of nihilism, a point made with characteristic ease by C S Lewis,
If ‘good’ and ‘better’ are terms deriving their sole meaning from the ideology of each people, then of course ideologies cannot be better or worse than one another. Unless the measuring rod is independent of the things measured, we can do no measuring.
![[Photo of Adolf Hitler]](hitler.jpg)
The cause of this rather absurd conclusion that no one way of life is better than another, is understandable enough, and in part issues from a postcolonial guilt — simply, we don’t want to be seen impose our ideology on others or to stand in judgement over their beliefs, but, if we are not willing to accept some scale of goodness, then we would have to accept a conclusion that Nazi ideology is as valid as Christian, or humanitarian ideologies.
Secondly, relativism reduces all ideologies to nonsense. It defies logic to say that the beliefs of a theist and an atheist are equally valid. They both make claims about reality which are mutually exclusive. Either God exists or he does not, there is no middle ground.
While we cling to relativism we are in the dark. If there is nothing to be found at the end of the search for truth then all that remains is what the Irish poet Louis Macneice describes as “the drunkenness of things being various.” Baudrillard defines the postmodern world as a place
“where it has all been done. The extreme limits of these possibilities have been reached. It has destroyed itself. It has deconstructed the entire universe. So all that is left is the pieces. All that remains is to play with the pieces. Playing with the pieces — that is postmodern.”
So what are we to do? Thankfully I don’t think many of us are committed relativists, for while conflict and the potential for oppression are avoided in saying “that’s what you believe to be right and that’s just fine, but as it is I believe something quite different”, as we’ve seen the logical result of that position reduces what both of you believe to nonsense. What’s more it simply feels wrong. Even the most committed postmodernists still feel outrage at genocide in Africa, or rape being used as a weapon of war in Serbia.
The answer, I want to suggest is in an image used by the apostle Paul as he writes to the church in Corinth. He writes,
For God, who said “Let light shine out of darkness” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.
(2 Corinthians 4:6–7)
Paul addresses the exact question here — where does truth come from and how do we understand it? There are three things to note here. Firstly, knowledge comes from God who is the source of truth. He has given us the “light of the knowledge”.
Secondly, we are described as jars of clay. We are imperfect receivers of truth. There is I think a confusion between an awareness of truth and an understanding of it. For a Christian to claim that God is truth and that he has revealed that truth to us, does not imply that Christian’s understanding is comprehensive or perfect. If you meet a Christian who claims that his knowledge is either comprehensive or perfect, please assure him he is wrong. The absoluteness of truth does not imply the absoluteness of our human knowledge. We view objective truth through subjective eyes.
The third, and most important thing to notice is that the knowledge, the light, and the glory of God, is shown in the face of Jesus. A man who claimed to be Truth itself. After his arrest he is brought before Pilate,
“ … you are a king then!” said Pilate
Jesus answered, “You are right in saying I am a king. In fact, for this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me”
“What is truth” Pilate asked, and with this he went out again.
(John 18:37–8)
Jesus assures us that truth is both absolute and knowable.
In contrast, and to conclude, Postmodernism tells us that truth is unknowable. We can peel away layers of meaning but will find nothing. C S Lewis once more presents the problem with this,
You cannot go on ‘explaining away’ forever: you will find that you have explained explanation itself away. You cannot go on ‘seeing through’ things forever. The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it. It is good that the window should be transparent, because the tree or garden beyond it is opaque. How if you saw through the garden too? It is no use trying to see through first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To see through all things is the same as not to see.
The ultimate consequence of this position is abandon any hope of objective truth, and that, I think is contrary to both logic and our very nature as moral beings. If on the other hand, Truth is possible to know, albeit through subjective eyes, then we have to take Jesus seriously. Let’s not have any nonsense about his being a truth, true for me or not for you. His claim to be God is a claim about reality, one that has universal and eternal consequences.
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Last modified: 25th November 2005