RELATIVISM
One principle
that today's intellectuals most passionately disseminate is vulgar
relativism. For them it is certain that
there is no truth, only opinion: my opinion, your opinion. They abandon the defense of the intellect;
those who surrender the domain of the intellect make straight the road to
fascism. Totalitarianism is the
will-to-power unchecked by any regard for truth. To surrender the claims of truth upon humans
is to surrender Earth to thugs. Vulgar
relativism is an invisible gas, odorless, deadly, that is now polluting every free
society on earth. It is a gas that
attacks the central nervous system of moral striving. "There is no such thing as truth,"
they teach even the little ones.
"Truth is bondage. Believe what seems right to you. There are many truths as there are (many)
individuals. Follow your feelings. Do as you please. Get in touch with yourself.” Those who speak
in this way prepare the jail of the twenty-first century. They do the work of tyrants.
Relativism
says this: “truth is what you perceive it to be, and what is true for you may
be false for somebody else.” In our
present society, you’re perfectly free to believe whatever you like, but the
one thing you may not do is to deny its antithesis. You can say, “I believe that this is
true.” But you cannot say with impunity
that that which opposes it is false. We
have a whole generation of Christians who have been brainwashed by the spirit
of relativism so they’re completely hesitant to say, “I deny that error over
there.” We don’t have heresy trials
anymore because, in relativism, there is no such thing as heresy.
R.C. Sproul
Feed My Sheep, ed. Don Kistler,
Soli Deo Gloria Ministries, 2002, p. 144.
Public-opinion
research points to a deepening paradox in society: the combination of
commitment to religion with a deepening moral relativism. For example, while 91 percent of the American
people consider religion very important in their lives, 63 percent reject the
concept of absolutes.
Don E. Eberly
Restoring the Good Society, Baker,
1994, p. 38.
When (we
interpret Scripture by focusing) on our inner voice, we risk losing the
original voice of Scripture, the historic anchor that has given the church its
foundation and faith, and the uniqueness of a moment of historical revelation
without parallel to anything we may experience.
And evaluating our own experience risks confusing what is subjectively
true for me with what is objectively true.
Truth (does not) reside in my own temporal experience (but rather in the
correct interpretation of the Scriptures.)
Gary Burge
Interpreting the Gospel of John,
Baker, 1992.
Truth is now
simply a matter of etiquette: it has no authority, no sense of rightness,
because it is no longer anchored in anything absolute. If it persuades, it does so only because our
experience has given it its persuasive power, but tomorrow our experience might
be different.
David Wells
We live in
the climate of postmodernism. Western
society encourages sin in an enormous extent and resists definition of, or
clarity about, sin. Postmodernist
philosophy is fiercely antinomian, that is, opposed to law. Right and wrong are judged on the basis of
subjective human feelings. The result is
a slide into an abyss of lawlessness.
The consequences of lawlessness are seen in the alarming increase in
family break-up, divorce, crime and overcrowded prisons.
Erroll
Hulse
Who Are the Puritans? Evangelical Press, p.
172.
Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become
fashions.
G.K. Chesterton
Christian
civility does not commit us to a relativistic perspective. Being civil doesn't
mean that we cannot criticize what goes on around us. Civility doesn't require
us to approve of what other people believe and do. It is one thing to insist
that other people have the right to express their basic convictions; it is
another thing to say that they are right in doing so. Civility requires us to
live by the first of these principles. But it does not commit us to the second
formula. To say that all beliefs and values deserve to be treated as if they
were on a par is to endorse relativism – a perspective that is incompatible
with Christian faith and practice. Christian civility does not mean refusing to
make judgments about what is good and true. For one thing, it really isn’t
possible to be completely nonjudgmental. Even telling someone else that she is
being judgmental is a rather judgmental thing to do!
Richard J. Mouw
Uncommon Decency, IVP, 1992, p. 20-21.
Beneath all the rhetoric about relevance lies a
profoundly disturbing possibility – that people may base their lives upon an
illusion, upon a blatant lie. The attractiveness of a belief is all too often
inversely proportional to its truth… To allow “relevance” to
be given greater weight than truth is a mark of intellectual shallowness and
moral irresponsibility.
Alister McGrath
Understanding Doctrine: Its Relevance and
Purpose for Today, Zondervan,
1990, p. 11-12. www.zondervan.org.
When we move
from the physical to the spiritual realm, fixed laws still exist. We cannot exist without laws in the moral and
the spiritual dimension of life any more than we can do so in the physical
dimension. Our Creator built morality
into life. Just as there are physical
laws, so there are spiritual laws….The same God who controls the physical world
by fixed laws controls the moral and spiritual world.
John MacArthur
You Can Trust the Bible, Moody Press, 1988,
p. 5-6.
Relativism no
longer means: your claim to truth is no more valid than mine; but now means:
you may not claim to speak the truth.
John Piper
Brothers, We Are Not Professionals, Bethlehem
Baptist Church, 2002, p. 159.