Martin Luther, the great reformer of the Catholic church, on his way to defend his views in a public debate was distressed by his critics. According to Bainton, in his biography of Martin Luther, his critics questioned: “Are you alone wise and all the ages in error?”1. Once Luther arrived at the debate with John Eck, a professor from the University of Ingolstadt2, he found himself in the dangerous position not only of criticizing the Catholic church, but of unintentionally agreeing with certain ideas of the Bohemian Hussites. The Hussites, followers of John Hus, had recently “invaded and ravaged the Saxon lands” and John Hus was “burned for heresy”3 by the Catholic church. In response both to these negative historical associations and to other complaints about his ideas Luther stated:
“… I want to believe freely and be a slave to the authority of no one, whether council, university, or pope. I will confidently confess what appears to me to be true, whether it has been asserted by a Catholic or a heretic, whether it has been approved or reproved by a council.”4
Luther distanced himself from recent history and the comfort of long held beliefs, instead choosing to stand with truth, regardless of it’s source or association. Luther’s opponents sought to dismantle his arguments with their temporal context; the historical, cultural, and other non-essential context of the ideas, which don’t determine their truth. Luther, disregarding these complaints, sought to hold onto truth on the basis of its essential context, the foundation upon which the truth of an idea is established. This difference between viewing ideas within either their temporal or essential contexts is important in providing an avenue for evaluating ideas without bias, presenting ideas with empathy, and learning to recognize our own blind spots in understanding ideas.
Luther recognized that truth was not deemed truth because of who approved of or declared it, but by its essential context. What is an ideas essential context? An idea is deemed true based solely on the supporting ideas from which it is inferred. For example, the fact that “[some] roses are red”, is essentially dependent on the scientific facts that underscore how we understand colors and flowers. Physics tells us how light interacts with a rose’s petals, and chemistry and biology tell us how we perceive that light. These scientific facts determine the truth of whether or not a rose is red, whether or not the light that a roses petals reflect is deemed red. The truth is not dependent on who said it, where or when it was said or discovered, or to whom it was said. As stated above, these other things that may attach themselves to an idea I’ll call the ‘temporal context’. These things are temporal in that they do not travel with the idea as its essential foundation, they are limited to the changing contexts in which an idea is presented over time. In Luther’s case the truth he sought was not determined as truth by who approved of or stated it that day, that was its temporal context. Rather, the truth Luther sought was determined true by its essential context, which in the case of Christian theology is an accurate interpretation of the Bible.
By separating ideas from their temporal context we can interact with an idea on its own merits, apart from individual perspectives, biases, as well as emotional and historical associations. For instance, if we remove temporal context from “roses are red” then all of the emotional and cultural notions of romance, due to the poem beginning with this line, fall away, leaving us with bare scientific reasoning. The fact “roses are red” (ignoring those that aren’t) is true because of what science tells us about how light works and interacts with a rose petal. Poetry, romance and culture do not determine the color of a rose’s petals. For Luther, the theological truth that he sought transcended who approved of it, or declared it true. The Pope’s authority to make theological statements was supposed to be backed by what the Bible said. However Luther argued, from the Bible, that the Pope made declarations that contradicted the Bible and thus were not valid or true. For Luther, the fact that the Pope was seen as an authority didn’t matter, that is temporal context, rather the essential context of the Bible was what determined theological truth. As Luther demonstrates by separating truth from it’s temporal context a great freedom can be found, we are no longer enslaved to other’s opinions, cultural notions, or other non-essential ideologies. On the other hand, the essential context of an idea provides a firm and fixed foundation of truth that can’t be ignored or breached (assuming that foundation itself is true). So Luther found freedom from blindly following the Pope, but his assertions could always be checked by the Bible. When Luther was criticized he sought to be contradicted directly from the Bible, not from the Pope’s words. An experts opinion is convenient when we ourselves aren’t experts, but if we want more assurance of the truth of an idea it is the idea’s essential context that we should understand and rely on.
Even though an idea’s temporal context may not determine its truth it still holds immense value when interacting with it. For example, in Luther’s case the ideas that he put forward that agreed with John Hus’ ideas were negatively correlated in society at the time due to the recent actions of the Hussites. This meant that Luther’s ideas were difficult for most of that society to accept not because of their truth or falseness, but because of that negative temporal context. Luther’s quote above was, in part, his attempt to separate the fundamental truths of his ideas from the historical context of the Hussite’s. Understanding an audience’s temporal context ahead of time can grant empathy allowing ideas to be presented compassionately by taking into account how the temporal context may affect their reception. This can soften the presentation of ideas without forsaking their foundational truth. Understanding the temporal context of an audience allows for more than just empathy and compassion though, it can also help in presenting ideas in a way that can be understood. This is demonstrated when US presidents visiting other countries choose to use culturally appropriate greetings instead of always defaulting to a handshake to greet and show respect. Likewise, returning to our love poem, if a rose is not endemic to a given region then telling someone that roses are red might be rather meaningless since they wouldn’t know what a rose was to begin with. Temporal context has great value when trying to convey ideas, both to do so compassionately, but also simply to be able to convey ideas in a way that can be understood within a region or culture.
Turning this around we can consider how our own personal temporal context affects how we interact with and receive ideas. On their own, apart from any temporal context, ideas are sterile, being impersonal, and rigid truths determined by further sterile premises. But when an idea is presented to us, even without temporal context, our own context may affect how receptive we are to an idea, or whether we even understand an idea. If someone is in need of cash, upon seeing an ad for the lotto they might be more likely to buy a ticket. Alternatively, the same exact situation for someone else may deter them from buying a lotto ticket. In either case the odds of winning the lotto are the same, but their personal perspective of their current lack of funds, not the lack of funds itself, lends a lot to the decision to buy a lotto ticket. Likewise, if an idea has a potential positive benefit for us that is unrelated to whether the idea is true or false we may accept the idea simply because of those positive benefits, even if we know the idea is dubious. Conversely, negative correlations that we have with ideas may cause us to disregard them even though they may be fundamentally true. Some cultures may turn away from genuinely helpful and scientifically validated medicine because of past attempts by the same institutions to take advantage of those cultures (cf. The Tuskegee Syphilis Study). This isn’t entirely a bad thing, there is far too much knowledge to be gained to be able to independently validate every idea we are presented, and temporal context can help us know whether the source of the idea is trustworthy or not. However, regardless the trustworthiness of an idea’s source it may be more to our benefit to validate the idea ourselves when the idea is significant to us, rather than to outright accept or reject it. In order to accurately interact with ideas it is important to recognize when our acceptance, rejection, or general view of an idea is shaped, in whole or in part, by our own temporal context.
Temporal context is important, not for determining an idea’s truth, but in knowing how to convey, apply, or interpret an idea. Without considering this temporal context, without thinking about how an idea might be interpreted culturally, or what emotions it might prompt because of the experiences personally or culturally associated with that idea we risk either alienating, offending, or potentially blinding others to the truth of those ideas. Worse, if we don’t examine our own internal reception of ideas we may dismiss or accept them not based on their essential context, but based on our own temporal context. Our blind spots may prevent us from granting a fair hearing to new and foreign ideas. It may be that ideas we’ve already rejected may even need re-examining if we realize they weren’t evaluated based on essential context but on their temporal context. We can and should be devoted to seeking truth, and while understanding the fundamental truth of an idea isn’t always easy or straight forward, the temporal context can’t be ignored. When presenting ideas to others, we should seek to present the truth, while also considering our audiences temporal context in order to present the truth graciously and accurately for that audience. When receiving and interacting with ideas, we must examine our own temporal context, so that we don’t dismiss what is really true, or accept what isn’t true.
When two people discuss ideas, they bring to the table not only the fundamental truth’s but the entire weight of their personal and cultural temporal context. Oftentimes it is the temporal context that causes disagreements, not the fundamental truths. By recognizing this in others and ourselves we can discuss ideas with more empathy and civility, and hopefully receive ideas with a more open mind as well. Even when we can’t come to an agreement, by understanding the influence of temporal context we can potentially agree, compassionately, to not agree.
References:
1. Bainton, Roland. Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther. Illustrated, Abingdon Press, 2013. p. 79
2. Ibid., p. 96
3. Ibid., p. 105
4. Ibid., p. 109