If a certain moral ajititude ia a conriition for recfiving the truth, BO also, when received, it has profoimd moral efl^ecU. It makes fret- (Jn &^«). The recognition of the tnith and c<)nformity to It brings man's being into the state meant for it ; the discords and contrwJictions involved in a state of sin are removed. This freedom is described from another point of view as holiness
In 1 John the tnith In action and thought and character la contrasted with viciousness in conduct and hollow self-com- placency (1 Jn 10 8 24 3i»). But even in such pa-^sages the truth is not to be thought of merely as a quality, the prc8<nre or absence of which in human characters may be noted. Rather It is the same trulli wliieh is elsewhere reganled as an object of knowledge, considt-red here in its practical consetniences. The unity of thought, the prevalence of the same dominant Ideas, thrtiughout the Johannine GoHi)eI and Epp., are decisive for this view. And indeinJ we cun sometimes mark the more absolute and the more concrete meanings of truth iMusing, as It wore, the one Into the other, ns in 1 Jn 2*. where it Is implied that the commandments of Christ funjish the norm for truth of life. Again, where we ol)8cr\*e similarity with OT lang-uage, — as in Jn l'* i7 (cf. npy Joined with nyt; ud n;v2^ Pi 40" SSio
etc., in LXX lAiot ««j aXv.6.), and *«ji'/» ty,* i^.r.Out*, 1 Jn I8(cf. Neh 933 etc.),— though the fonn of expression has doubtless been derived thence, other considerations must also be lM)me in mind in determining the meaning. Indeed in the former of these examples the substitution of x^f'f '•J'" '^"f employed by LXX shoula worn us to do this, as Cremcr points out.
iii. 'AXr.dttif, whicli occurs but ft times in the rcmainderof NT, ia common in the Johannine writings, and adds materially to the prominence of the idea of truth in them. It is unquestion- ably used sometimes in the Gosj>el and First Ep. to signify that a thing trulv corresponds to the idea of the name given to it (Jn ly 423 tjiit 151. 1 Jn 2»), Some writers try to bring all the applications of it under this head. Thus Jn T^ — Irri* a.x.r.Oi*<i: i T(^«c fu — is explained by Bp. We^tcott aa meaning 'one who completely satisfies the conception of a sender . . . God is described as true, not merely in so far as He gave a true message, but as one who really sent a messenger; a real Father, as it were, sending a real Son.' [He lu— etXzi/tif.i jMt>:2.'af— he renders * a heart which fulfils the ideal ollice of the heart'}. But such a thought seems in many cases too far-fetched. In particular, when applied to persons, it is more natural to take aXtiOt»c( to mean Mull of the quality of ac.\y.Ouai,' Where it is an epithet of x^i.ffif (Jn 8i6) or of fjMprufl.et (l^^), it is a little more diUlcult to decide between the two views of its force, chiefly because they so nearly apjiroximate. Judgment or testimony, which fulfils the idea expressed by the term, must be judgment or testimony wliich has the qualit.v of, and corresponds with, truth. Yet the latter explanation is to be preferred as the simpler. This seems to be the force of the word in all the 10 places in wliich it occurs in the Apocalypse f37- 14 610 16^ 1(1'"" il»2. w. u 215 2i:«), in whichitis generally combined with other adjectives— «>-<«;, h.xxiot, wto^is —and used to describe God or Christ, or the Divine ways, words, judgments. ' AXr.Ottit in this use of the word differs from ir(irr« only in having a somewhat larger meaning. On the other hand, at 1 Jn 5-", in the concluding words of the verse, eZr^t irrt* o ctXr.dttis H»ef, 'the true God,' has the same meaning aa at 1 Th 1^ (see above, 2 iv.), viz. as distinguished from false gods ; and this may therefore be the meaning of u.ky,bt*t>t in the two preceding cases in the same verse, though the other shade of meaning would seem natural, especially In the second of them.
Whereas, then, in OT * truth' is mainly thought of as a quality inherent in God or iu men, especi- ally the (luality of Btojulfastness or fitlclity, it ia used commonly in NT in a more detached and larger sense for the real, that which indeed is, and whicli it is the prosier function of the mind of man to occupy itseli with and to apprehend. At the same time, this 'tnith' does not ai>pcal solely to the intellect. That it may be received, the moral dispositions of men must correspond with it ; and its reception will further take ellect upon char- acter. In conforming himself to it in his life lies man's only secvirity for well-being. The associa- tions which the word had acquired through OT usage hcljied to secure for the conception those elements to which this deep moral and religious significance is due.
It appears, further, that the knowledge of the truth iu its fulness has been rendered possible only tiirough Divine revelation. The idea of revelation was no new one ; but it is a point of great imiiort- ance, not onl}' that the contents of revelation should have been greatly' extended, but that what before was known simply as the Will of Uod, 01 as Toraii (Instruction), should now be called bj the name which denoted agreement between state- ment and fact in common matters, or between a mental image and an external object, the opposite of illusion, fancy, or mere ojiiniun. We have seen the beginnings of such a use of llie term in a few instances in the later books of OT and in the Apocrypha, and Greek modes of thought may in a measure have facilitated it. The .signilitjince of the uKage in NT lies in tlie actual application of it to tlie Christian revelation »nd in its freipieney. rinally, after the idea has been abstnuted and nnide comprehensive, it is once again connected with persons. The source of it, in this fuller meaning of the term, ia found in the Divine nature, in the Father, in Christ, in the Holy Spirit.