I have often embarrassed myself by asking a question that produced smirks or giggles from others. Asking a dumb question can have that effect. It’s also part of human nature. We humans can do idiotic things (think the Darwin Awards) and ask stupid questions. Some folks believe there is no such thing as a stupid question. It may be funny, ironic, or, at the very least, thought-provoking. 

As Easter approaches, I am reminded of a question asked during Christ’s Passion that must rank at the top of all ironic (or even stupid) questions ever asked.

Let me set the scene. Jesus Christ is brought before Pilate. Charged with claiming to be a king and the Messiah, Pilate, as the Roman Prefect of Judaea, was the only one who could order a death sentence.  But Pilate struggles with what to do with Jesus. He questions him. Jesus affirms he is a king, but states his kingdom is not of this world. He has come to testify to the truth.  Almost rhetorically, a frustrated Pilate responds to Jesus with a question, “What is truth?”

What Pilate did not know is that Jesus had, just a few days before, claimed to BE “The Truth.”  So here is Pilate, the representative of the world’s most powerful army and government at that time, standing before the One who is Truth personified, and Pilate asks, “What is truth?”  If Pilate only knew…

Some call Pilate’s question just a rhetorical response; others describe it as snide or stupid.  I call it ironic. Not waiting for a response from Jesus, the self-serving Pilate went out to the Jews, saying he found no fault in Jesus. To Pilate, the only truth was what served his own needs and those of Rome.  

Pilate’s question and subsequent actions reflected a Roman culture saturated with the concept of relative truth. Pilate’s interrogatory revealed the arrogance of a totalitarian leader, the absence of faith beyond oneself, and the limits of one’s knowledge when anchored in a sea of relativity.

I am reminded of the same arrogance displayed by the White Witch in C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. Aslan, the Lion, the Christ figure, willingly sacrifices his life to save one of the Pevensie children, Edmund. The White Witch, the satanic ruler of Narnia, thinks she has won. But as Aslan later explains, 

“Though the White Witch knew the Deep Magic, there is a magic deeper still which she did not know. Her knowledge goes back to the dawn of time. But if she could have looked a little further back, into the stillness and darkness before Time dawned, she would have read there a different incantation. She would have known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor’s stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward.”

Aslan knew the truth, the absolute truth that governed the world in which he lived. While Pilate only saw the limits of Rome’s earthly rule, Jesus knew the truth that ruled eternity. 

“Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth.” (John 17:17).

“You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” (John 8:32).

“I have come into the world, to testify to the truth; everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” (John 18:37). 

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.” (John 14:6).

Yet today, we live in a world that questions self-evident truths, promotes relativistic philosophies, and seeks escape from reality. Have we become so self-centered that we don’t even recognize truth anymore…even if it is standing before us?

Abdu Murray, author of “Saving Truth, Finding Meaning & Clarity in a Post-Truth World,” believes Americans have not lost the ability to discern truth, they have just gotten better at ignoring it. “Our problem with truth isn’t so much that we don’t understand it; it’s that we don’t like it.”

And like Pilate, we turn and walk away from the truth, even when it is staring us in the face. As long as we reject absolute truth, we reveal our unlimited capacity to believe in the absurd. Put another way, when people stop believing in God, they don’t believe in nothing, they believe in anything.

Hopefully, this Easter will find us believing in and celebrating the One who is the Truth!