Truth lite, or the real thing?

The Dee Pirkei Avot Project (details here) has recently completed the first perek of Avot. For the uninitiated, the Project sends out each week a single side of A4 on which, in agreeably large print, you will find the text of a mishnah from Avot, a brief discussion or explanation of it and three questions that are more or less closely related to that mishnah. 

Sometimes the questions can be uncomfortable to answer publicly since they can force a person to make an appraisal of a facet of his or her personality that might preferably be concealed.

In Avot 1:18 Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel says: “The world stands on three things: on justice, on truth and on peace”, citing a verse from Zechariah in support of this proposition. Most people treat this teaching within the context of the administration of justice. After all, much of the first perek of Avot is devoted to that topic and the three things featured in this mishnah—justice, truth and peace—relate to either the functioning of the court system or the objective it seeks to achieve. One of the Dee Project questions goes beyond this, asking:

“When in your life do you sometimes choose to focus on some details because it’s easier than accepting the whole truth, the אֶמֶת?”

This question may not be demanded as a way of understanding Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel’s teaching since it personalises concepts which he lists in the abstract and focuses on how we react to them in the real world. However, it is demanded of us all as we approach the Days of Awe and ask ourselves whether we acknowledge two versions of truth: the genuine and absolute truth and ‘truth lite’, a convenience product that is easy to apply, wipes our conduct clean and leaves no nasty marks behind.