All Religions Have a Piece of the Truth?

Note: Last Updated 7/29/2024.

Lesslie Newbigin:

There is an appearance of humility in the protestation that the truth is much greater than any one of us can grasp, but if this is used to invalidate all claims to discern the truth it is in fact an arrogant claim to a kind of knowledge which is superior to the knowledge which is available to fallible human beings. We have to ask, “How do you know that the truth about God is greater than what is revealed to us in Jesus?” When Samartha and others ask us, “What grounds can you show for regarding the Bible as uniquely authoritative when other religions also have their sacred books?” we have to ask in turn, “What is the vantage ground from which you claim to be able to relativize all the absolute claims which these different scriptures make? What higher truth do you have which enables you to reconcile the diametrically opposite statements of the Bible and the Qur’an about Jesus? Or are you in effect advising that it is better not to believe in anything?” When the answer is, “We want the unity of humankind so that we may be saved from disaster,” the answer must be, “We also want that unity, and therefore seek the truth by which alone humankind can become one.” That truth is not a doctrine or a worldview or even a religious experience; it is certainly not to be found by repeating abstract nouns like justice and love; it is the man Jesus Christ in whom God was reconciling the world. The truth is personal, concrete, historical.

(Lesslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, [Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans; Geneva: WCC Publications, 1989], p. 170.)

Timothy Keller:

     Sometimes this point is illustrated with the story of the blind men and the elephant. Several blind men were walking along and came upon an elephant that allowed them to touch and feel it. “This creature is long and flexible like a snake” said the first blind man, holding the elephant’s trunk. “Not at all—it is thick and round like a tree trunk,” said the second blind man, feeling the elephant’s leg. “No, it is large and flat,” said the third blind man, touching the elephant’s side. Each blind man could feel only part of the elephant—none could envision the entire elephant. In the same way, it is argued, the religions of the world each have a grasp on part of the truth about spiritual reality, but none can see the whole elephant or claim to have a comprehensive vision of the truth.

     This illustration backfires on its users. The story is told from the point of view of someone who is not blind. How could you know that each blind man only sees part of the elephant unless you claim to be able to see the whole elephant?

     . . . How could you possibly know that no religion can see the whole truth unless you yourself have the superior, comprehensive knowledge of spiritual reality you just claimed that none of the religions have?

(Timothy Keller, The Reason For God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism, [New York: Dutton, 2008], pp. 8-9.)

Josh D. McDowell, Sean McDowell:

Sometime after my discoveries about the bible and Christianity, I was riding in a cab in London and happened to mention something about Jesus to the driver. Immediately he retorted, “I don’t like to discuss religion, especially Jesus.” I couldn’t help but notice the similarity of his reaction to my own when the young Christian woman told me that Jesus Christ had changed her life. The very name Jesus seems to bother people. It embarrasses them, makes them angry, or makes them want to change the subject. You can talk about God, and people don’t necessarily get upset, but mention Jesus, and people want to stop the conversation. Why don’t the names of Buddha, Muhammad, or Confucius offend people the way the name of Jesus does? 

     I think the reason is that these other religious leaders didn’t claim to be God. That is the big difference between Jesus and the others. It didn’t take long for people who knew Jesus to realize that this carpenter from Nazareth was making astounding claims about himself. It became clear that those claims were identifying him as more than just a prophet or teacher. He was obviously making claims to deity. He was presenting himself as the only avenue to salvation and the only source of forgiveness of sins—things they knew that only God could claim.

     For many people today Jesus’ claim to be the Son of God is just too exclusive. In our pluralistic culture, it is too narrow and smacks of religious bigotry. We don’t want to believe it. Yet the issue is not what we want to believe, but rather, who did Jesus claim to be? And is his claim true?

(Josh D. McDowell, Sean McDowell, More Than a Carpenter, [Crownhill: Authentic, 2011], pp. 9-10.)

καὶ αὐτός ἐστιν πρὸ πάντων καὶ τὰ πάντα ἐν αὐτῷ συνέστηκεν ~ Soli Deo Gloria