The Latin ‘verax’ and ‘verus’ would severally represent ἀληθής and ἀληθινός, and in the main reproduce the distinctions existing between them; indeed, the Vulgate does commonly by aid of these indicate whether of the two stands in the original; but we having lost, or nearly lost, ‘very’ (vrai) as an adjective, retaining it only as an adverb, have ‘true’ alone whereby to render them both. It follows that the difference between the two disappears in our Version: and this by no fault of our Translators— unless, indeed, they erred in not recovering ‘very,’ which was Wiclif’s common translation of ‘verus’ (thus
It will be seen from this last remark that it does not of necessity follow, that whatever may be contrasted with the ἀληθινός must thereby be concluded to have no substantial existence, to be altogether false and fraudulent. Inferior and subordinate realizations, partial and imperfect anticipations, of the truth, may be set over against the truth in its highest form, in its ripest and completest development; and then to this last alone the title ἀληθινός will be vouchsafed. Kahnis has said well (Abendmahl, p. 119): ‘Ἀληθής schliesst das Unwahre und Unwirkliche, ἀληθινός das seiner Idee nicht Entsprechende auf. Das Mass des ἀληθής ist die Wirklichkeit, das des ἀληθινός die Idee. Bei ἀληθής entspricht die Idee der Sache, bei ἀληθινός die Sache der Idee.’ Thus Xenophon affirms of Cyrus (Anab. i. 9. 17), that he commanded ἀληθινὸν στράτευμα, an army indeed, an army deserving the name; but he would not have altogether refused this name of ‘army’ to inferior hosts; and Plato (Tim. 25 a), calling the sea beyond the Straits of Hercules, πέλαγος ὄντως, ἀληθινὸς πόντος, would say that it alone realized to the full the idea of the great ocean deep; cf. Rep. i. 347 d: ὁ τῷ ὄντι ἀληθινὸς ἄρχων; and again vi. 499 c: ἀληθινῆς φιλοσοφίας ἀληθινὸς ἔρως. We should frequently miss the exact force of the word, we might find ourselves entangled in serious embarrassments, if we understood ἀληθινός as necessarily the true opposed to the false. Rather it is very often the substantial as opposed to the shadowy and outlinear; as Origen (in Joan. tom. ii. § 4) has well expressed it: ἀληθινός, πρὸς ἀντιδιαστολὴν σκιᾶς καὶ τύπου καὶ εἰκόνος. Thus at
So, too, when the Baptist announces, “The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ” (
To sum up then, as briefly as possible, the differences between these two words, we may affirm of the ἀληθής, that he fulfils the promise of his lips, but the ἀληθινός the wider promise of his name. Whatever that name imports, taken in its highest, deepest, widest sense, whatever according to that he ought to be, that he is to the full. This, let me further add, holds equally good of things as of persons; πιστοί and ἀληθινοί are therefore at
1 This F. Spanheim (Dub. Evang. 106) has well put: ‘Ἀλήθεια in Scripturâ Sacrâ interdum sumitur ethice, et opponitur falsitati et mendacio; interdum mystice, et opponitur typis et umbris, ut εἰκών illis respondens, quae veritas alio modo etiam σῶμα vocatur a Spiritu S. opposita τῇ σκιᾷ’. Cf. Deyling, Obss. Sac. vol. iii. p. 317; vol. iv. pp. 548, 627; and Delitzsch: ‘Es ist Beiname dessen was seinem Namen und Begriffe im vollsten, tiefsten, uneingeschränktesten Sinne entspricht, dessen was das was es heisst nicht blos relativ ist, sondern absolut; nicht blos materiell, sondern geistig und geistlich; nicht blos zeitlich, sondern ewig; nicht blos bildlich, d. h. vorbildlich, abbildlich, nachbildlich, sondern gegenbildlich und urbildlich.’
2 Lampe (in loc.): ‘Innuitur ergo hic oppositio tum luminarium naturalium, qualia fuere lux creationis, lux Israëlitarum in aegypto, lux columnae in deserto, lux gemmarum in pectorali, quae non nisi umbrae fuere hujus verae lucis; tum eorum, qui falso se esse lumen hominum gloriantur, quales sigillatim fuere Sol et Luna Ecclesiae Judaicae, qui cum ortu hujus Lucis obscurandi,
3 Lampe: ‘Christus est Vitis vera,... et quâ talis proeponi, quin et opponi, potest omnibus aliis qui etiam sub hoc symbolo in scriptis propheticis pinguntur.’
[The following Strong's numbers apply to this section:G227,G228.]
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