EP 104: What Is Truth?!

There is so much speculation in our culture around truth, especially the mantra "Your Truth, My Truth." For women like you and me who are actively pursuing the 7 Laws of Life Mission, the desire to understand and live according to truth is tremendous.

But what is truth?!

In this episode I share with you Chapter 2: What is Truth? from my new book How Truth Makes You Free! Join me as we explore the ancient and timeless definition of truth, that still has the power to transform our lives!

If you haven't already, go get chapters 1 and 2 of The Mission Driven Life: Discover and Fulfill Your Unique Contribution to the World for FREE: https://www.themissiondrivenmom.com/!

Transcript:

 Welcome back to the podcast. I'm Audrey er, the author of The Mission Driven Life, and the founder of the Mission Driven Mom. I am so grateful to have you join me today. We're gonna do something really special. I've been working on my next book, how Truth Makes You Free, and for those of you that have been here for very long.

Especially, and I just wanna do a little shout out. If you're brand new to this podcast, you might want to go back and go through some of those first podcasts that will just introduce you to everything that we do here. Keep listening, but then you might wanna go back and listen to the some of those early podcasts.

But in the meantime, today, one of the things I introduce early on in the Mission-Driven Life book is the concept of the natural law and of truth that's immutable. And why that's so important and how the seven laws are built on this framework of the natural law and why principles matter so much. In this new book, I talk about how truth makes us free and why it really matters to have this lens through which to view the world.

It's the healthiest lens, it's the most real lens, and being aligned with it helps you to see everything differently. So. I've been working through this, I about, through chapter five that I, I think I like the construction of how it's gonna work, so don't quote me on what I share today, but I think I'm gonna read you most or all of chapter two.

This is the chapter called What Is Truth, the first chapter you would've been introduced to all of these kinds of things, and it's especially been on my mind because the women in the academy, especially in level two, have been talking about this quite a bit the last couple weeks. And talking about, you know, how do we define truth and what's the natural law and how does that coincide with truth?

Definitions really, really matter. For the purposes of our podcast today, we are defining truth, the way we define truth at the mission-driven mom, and that is the natural law, the law of human nature, and its governing first principles and principles and how we can discover those and be set free through living according to true laws to the truth.

That's always true no matter what, and I give some, I'm, I'm talking about truth in the natural law differently than I really ever have. In this book, and that's why I wanna share it with you today. And if you have thoughts or feedback or questions from this podcast, please let us know. You know, you can shout, you can go to the website and, and ask questions, send us your questions or on socials.

But before we get into the content and what I've got for you from chapter two of the book, uh, I would love it if you would give a review to this podcast. It helps others know that. The material here is worth listening to, that you value it, that you think it might help them. And if you leave a review and share it out, then it's the best way for us to share this message of how this natural law has such a huge impact on our lives, how it makes us free, and how we can, how it's a pathway through the seven laws of life mission.

That we, that we take you through in the academy, but which my other book, the Mission-Driven Life talks about. So all of that being said, I'm gonna dive into this and I'm gonna start with a couple. Analogies, I guess you would call them. And hopefully this gets your mind better around what this thing is and why it matters so much and why it's underneath everything.

It's even, that's why the second chapter of the Mission-Driven Life book touches on the natural law, because it's the foundation of everything. It's the lens through which we wanna see the world. So I'm gonna dive in this chapter is what Is truth? And of course quote from Jesus And you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.

The elephant. Six men were born blind in India all their lives. They were told stories about the many amazing things elephants can do from trampling down forest to carrying a princess on their back. Over time, each of these men had developed his own theory about the true nature of elephants. Some believed that they were fearsome.

Others said they must be strong. One even thought they weren't real. One day, these six men were taken to meet a real e elephant in person. Each man stepped forward and reached out to touch the huge animal. An elephant is smooth and solid like a wall. The first one declared. It must be very powerful. The second blind man put his hand on the elephant's limber trunk.

An elephant is like a giant snake. He announced the third, felt the elephant's pointed. Tusk. I was right. He decided this creature is as sharp and deadly as a spear after feeling one of the elephant's four legs. The fourth one said. What we have here is an extremely large cow. The fifth blind man felt the elephant's giant ear.

I believe an elephant is like a huge fan or maybe a magic carpet that can fly over mountains and treetops. He said, as the last blind man gave a tug on the elephant's course tail, his doubts were confirmed. Why? This is nothing more than a piece of old rope. I knew there were no such thing as elephants.

They're just tricking us. He scoffed. The men then began arguing about the true nature of an elephant. Was it a wall, a snake, a spear, a cow, or something else? Entirely? Just then the Raja interrupted their argument and asked, how can each of you be so certain that you are right? Remember, you each only touched one part of the elephant, and you must put all the parts together to know the truth.

This parable is quite helpful in understanding the nature of the kind of truth that can make us free As we consider the different elephants of the different elements of the parable, we begin to see our own narrow perspective, and its part in the big picture of truth I. First, consider the individual blind men.

Each had a lifetime of being told many things about elephants. Each went into his experience of meeting and touching the elephant with his own ideas and presumptions about them. When each touched the elephant for himself, he quote, verified the truth he felt he already had. And when he did this, the conclusions he drew were not wrong.

He had gathered information from others. For many years, and then he had briefly tested what he knew and found it to be true. He had, as we would say in our modern day, his own quote, lived experience from which he embraced, quote his truth. This truth felt very real to him. So when he forcefully shared and defended what he knew, he was not only telling the truth, he was right.

Every one of them was honest. Every one of them was correct. Elephants are like walls and fans and SP and spears, but that's not all elephants are. They are so much more, which is why even though each blind man had some truth as he saw it, none of them had the truth. This is because the truth about elephants is all the things that collective humanity currently knows about what elephants are and what they can do, and all the things yet to be discovered about them.

Although that level of truth may seem daunting, it is also exhilarating. It's a call to the adventure of analysis, testing, and collaboration, to uncovering new ideas and finding out how they can enlighten and aid us. It is the human opportunity of acquiring more knowledge about the nature of the truth and reality and harnessing it to bless ourselves and others.

That is why it's easy for us to see how small-minded and shortsighted these blind men were. Their assumptions and conclusions seem so silly. With our eyesight intact, we gaze at the majestic elephant and marvel. We also know that with their abilities so limited by their lack of sight in an experience, the blind men just don't see the whole truth.

Yet, understanding the parable of the blind men and the elephant can give us some very important insights about our own relationship to truth and how we communicate that with others. Watching these blind men feel so convicted in their estimation of what an elephant is, speaks to, why quote your truth feels so true to you.

It's the culmination of all you've learned and experienced. Of course you think you're right. Of course you're telling the truth and when you share what you believe to be true and right, and I don't believe you, it is because what I've learned and experienced seems to contradict what you're claiming. In this way, we can both be right while we're both also wrong, even though it can be hard to admit that perhaps we're not actually seeing the quote whole elephant.

It is this dynamic component of truth. The fact that it has similar parts that I see and know, but also has a bigger picture that I sometimes don't comprehend that makes it feel so slippery and confusing. Unfortunately, some in our modern culture have used our misunderstandings about truth to overcomplicate it, to try to change the very nature of it, or even to claim that there is no universal objective truth.

Just like the blind man who denied the existence of the elephant altogether. At the map, let's look at another analogy of the nature of truth and how we interact with it to see if we can gain even more clarity about truth. Back in the nineties, my husband and I went on a road trip. We began the journey with a big map of the several states we would be driving through.

Along the way, we wanted to sightsee in different cities. The large map we had started out with didn't contain all the specific streets and lights and turns of every city we planned to stop in. So as soon as we arrived in any new city, we'd stop at the first gas station, fill up the car, and buy a local map.

I have so many fun memories of me in the passenger seat with a large map spread out on the dashboard of some city we had never visited, trying to give my husband directions to the next tourist spot we wanted to see because we were first time visitors, even though our map nearly perfectly reflected the area we wanted to navigate our inexperience with this map, and this city inevitably led to wrong turns, missed exits, and lots of turning around.

We tried to make a game of it and laugh our way through, but as you can imagine, there were definitely frustrations and missed opportunities simply because of our unfamiliarity with the new territory and its map. The way we navigate our lives is much like using a map, except in our own lives we are the mapmakers.

As then Scott Peck explained. We are not born with maps. We have to make them, and the making requires effort. Stephen Covey taught. Each of us has many, many maps in our head. We interpret everything we experience through these mental maps. On my roadmap with my husband, on my road trip with my husband, our success in getting from where we were to where we wanted to go depended on two factors, the accuracy of the map.

My accuracy and following it. Mental maps are like this too. From childhood. We've been building maps or constructions of reality and our place in it. We need them to navigate our lives. We are wholly dependent on them, but what if they're wrong? As Stephen Covey also said, quote, we seldom question their accuracy.

We simply assume that the way we see things is the way they really are or the way they should be, unquote. So what if the map I've been creating in my head all my life, where I think I know exactly who I am, or exactly who my sister is, or exactly how to succeed in business? Or exactly what to do when someone hurts me.

Turns out not to be a fair or honest or correct assessment of real people or businesses or relationships. How would I know? I know because of pain. Pain is the great communicator. It is a gift. It triggers to me that something has gone wrong with my map and it needs revising. I have two choices in that moment.

Ignore the pain and hope it goes away, or listen to it and see what it can teach me about how I'm perceiving reality wrongly. At any moment, I can choose to get out my map and be open to reworking it to more accurately reflect the territory of life like pec taught quote. The more effort we make to appreciate and perceive reality, the larger and more accurate our maps will be.

And if our maps are to be accurate, we have to continually revise them. He goes on to explain that many people have necessity generate maps throughout adolescence, but in adulthood they rarely, if ever significantly improve their mental maps. Others get stuck in middle age when things didn't go according to plan.

Rather than looking inward and realigning with what's real and true, they throw their heads in the air and emotionally give up. What then do mental maps have to do with the truth? In the same way that we are all, in some sense, the blind men trying to see the elephant clearly. We are also the map makers trying to draw our own maps as nearly as we can to the actual territory, just as there is the reality of the elephant.

There is the reality of the city streets and lights, neither of which we can change, but both of which we can learn to see and interact with properly. Scott Peck said it best, quote, the third technique of dealing with the pain of problem solving, which must continually be employed. If our lives are to be healthy and our spirits are to grow, is dedication to the truth or truth is reality.

The more clearly we see the reality of the world, the better equipped we are to deal with the world. The less clearly we see the reality of the world, the less able we will be to determine correct courses of action and make wise decisions unquote. Now, of course, we're going to get this wrong. We'll never know all there is to know about EL elephants, and we'll never get our mental map perfectly accurate.

What we can do though is have the humility to admit that we don't get to make it up for ourselves. That there is a reality outside of you and me, that if we wanna thrive in life, we must come to understand and comply with more closely. We can behave just as an airline pilot does. It is estimated that pilots are off course 90% of the time due to weather, air occurrence, or other factors that require constant small course corrections to stay on track.

This is very much like our journey to become acquainted with and live within the truth. It is a very real way. In a very real way, we are discovering more about the elephant or correcting or adding to our map. We are gaining insight into the nature of reality and striving to align ourselves with new discoveries.

Luckily, much of the territory has already been clearly mapped out by others. It now becomes our job to test and accept the veracity of their work using the tools and skills. I'll go over later and get busy following it. As with a plane or boat or car, getting on the right road as quickly as possible and following the shortest route is always the best shortcut to our desired destination.

The resolution of painful problems and increased personal growth, the law. The analogies of the elephant in the map to the nature of truth are helpful perspectives. They remind us that the truth is much bigger than our own individual experience or knowledge, but that it has a vital relationship to our own daily living.

These metaphors make sense of the sometimes confusing situations where many people are being truthful and can even be right while they are also wrong, because their understanding of truth is limited and different from others. Most importantly, these constructions show us that truth is still very real and very much en force in the world and in our personal lives.

Whether we see and understand and honor it or not, it is something we can spend a lifetime pursuing. Anxiously looking for ways to see more of the elephant or correct our map. It is by doing this, that we can continually engage in our own personal growth. Because truth is so much larger than our present knowledge and understanding, it holds the information we need to correct our perceptions, decisions, and behaviors in order to overcome the persistent problems we face.

The question then remains if the truth is like an elephant and like a map, that we are trying to become acquainted with an honor, what exactly is the truth? I told you that there is a framework for properly understanding the truth, which will seem new, but is actually very old. I was introduced to it 25 years ago, and my life has never been the same.

By the time I learned about it, I'd been through a 12 year public school education and spent three years at university, lived abroad, had married and had three children. I. Through a series of providential events, I was guided to a little college where I took extension courses simply for my own enrichment.

While there, I was introduced to the greatest works in Western history, literature, philosophy, and science. I've studied these books ever since through my classical liberal arts bachelor's and master's degrees, and up to today, while still in my undergraduate work, I was assigned John Locke's second essay on civil government.

Written in 1689. In this essay, locks Locke invites the reader to imagine a time in history when there are no governments of any kind, no societies, no social structure whatsoever. He called this a quote, state of nature. Then he asked some questions I had never thought of before, which made me start thinking very differently about myself and the world.

He brought up questions like, in the state of nature, what would the laws be? How would people know how to behave, what would be right or wrong? Think about that for a minute. If you stripped away all the social rules and norms and expectations, if there were no government to enforce anything, if you were left entirely on your own to determine your behavior without reference to any other human being, how would you act?

Lot gave an answer I had never heard, but I have since Learned was not new to him at all, but has been discussed since the beginning of human history. He said this quote. Consider what a state all mankind are naturally in. This is a state of perfect freedom to order their actions and dispose of their possessions and persons as they think fit within the bounds of the law of nature, without asking leave or permission, or depending upon the will of any other person.

The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges everyone, and which teaches all mankind who will consult it. That all being equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, liberty or possessions. The law of nature hath brought men to know that it is no less their duty to love others than themselves.

There's a lot here, so let's break it down for a minute. The first thing that struck me when I read Lock was this brand new idea to me that before society and before government, there's some kind of law that human beings didn't create, but which we somehow know and feel obliged to obey. Law takes for granted that this is universally understood and is the foundation for human thriving individually and societally.

CS Lewis and many, many others agree with him in his seminal work, mere Christianity. Lewis begins by demonstrating how we all intuitively know this law. He describes how it is active in our daily interactions all the time, and we not only know it and believe it and defer to it often, we fully expect other people to know it, believe it, and behave accordingly.

He explains, quote, everyone has heard people quarreling. People say things like this. How do you like it if anyone did the same to you? That's my seat. I was there first. Come on, you promised. Quar means trying to show that the other person is in the wrong and there would be no sense in trying to do that unless you and he had some sort of agreement as to what right and wrong are unquote Lysander.

Spooner in natural law or the Science of Justice demonstrated that even small children know this law. Quote, children learn. Or no, the fundamental principles of natural law at a very early age. Thus, they very early understand that one child must not without just cause strike or otherwise hurt another, that one child must not assume any arbitrary control or domination over another.

That one child must not either by force deceit or stealth obtain possession of anything that belongs to another. That if one child commits any of these wrongs against another, it is not only the right of the injured child to resist and if need be punished the wrongdoer and compel him to make reparation, but that it is also the right and the moral duty of all other children and all other persons to assist the injured party in defending his rights.

And redressing his wrongs. These are the fundamental principles of natural law, which govern the most important transactions of man with man. Their childish plays even could not be carried on without a constant regard to them, and it is equally I impossible for persons of any age to live together in peace on any other conditions, unquote.

Think about it. You're a natural lost, whether you realized it before now or not, you expect people, no matter their background, culture, religion, or race, to be honest, to not touch your stuff, to honor their parents, and to do or not do a whole myriad of things. Of course, you would have no right to expect people to know and do or not do these behaviors if knowing.

Them if knowing them were dependent on society to teach them or government to enforce them. This is the argument Lewis makes when he discusses World War ii quote, what was the sense in saying the enemy were in the wrong unless right is a real thing, but the Nazis at bottom knew as well as we did and ought to have practiced if they had had no notion of what we mean by right then.

Though we might have still had to fight them, we could no more have blamed them for that than for the color of their hair. Here's what we know so far. There is some kind of universal standard for how human beings ought to behave, which we hold each other to, but which we also feel we ought to live up to ourselves.

In Lewis's words, we feel it pressing on us. What are we to do about this? According to Mortimer Adler quote, the first principle of the natural law is to seek the good, which brings us back to Locke's second point quote. Natural law teaches all mankind who consulted that all being equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life.

Health, liberty, or possessions, the law of nature have brought men to know that it is no less their duty to love others than themselves, unquote. Locke is telling us that not only does this natural law exist and we actually do understand it well and defer to it often, it will also teach us the proper way to understand human interaction and how to live well.

In other words, as Adler stated, it enables us to know and seek the good Locke argues that natural law will demonstrate when we listen closely to it that all people are equal and independent, that because of this we shouldn't harm each other in any way. Not only should we restrain ourselves from hurtful behavior, he explains, but we should extend goodwill to all humankind by loving ourselves and others.

When I first read this section from Locke, I was intrigued. I. I thought Jesus was the first one to teach that we ought to love others as we love ourselves, and that Locke was probably just letting his religious ideas color his philosophical writings. But the more I studied the natural law, the more I found this idea in many sacred books, ancient writings and cultures, I realized that Locke was not making a religious argument at all.

This was not a spiritual mandate, but a component of the natural law. This really changed my perspective on what is genuinely religious and what is somehow intuitively human. All my life, I'd been told that these kinds of ideas, ideas, like loving your neighbor were what religious people believed in practiced.

But I've come to see that, like Locke was saying, these ideas are bigger than even religious lines or practices. Throughout this book, so far, I've been promising you that you can know the truth and the truth can make you free. What do I mean by the truth then? I mean, the natural law. The natural law is the truth that's bigger than governments, than history, than society, than religion, than culture.

It is the link that's common to all humankind. It is what we intuitively know. It is the standard we already hold ourselves to other ourselves and others to. It is the law which human beings feel pressing on them, but which they can choose to obey or disobey. Later on, we'll talk about how we know this natural law and how we can understand and live more in harmony with it.

For now, I just wanna ensure that you see that the natural law is the whole elephant, and it is the city map. Once we've been turned onto its reality, we see it working all around us. Just as in the examples Lewis and Spooner gave of average people interacting in everyday situations. When we look inside, we know that there are certain things we feel we ought to do and things we feel we shouldn't do.

This oddness in our nature exists precisely because there is a real right and wrong that exists independent of you and I and society. We know there is a natural law because we know we ought to seek the good, and this means there is a good which we need to gain clarity about and strive to live. In fact, William Blackstone, author of the Commentaries on the Laws of England in seven, published in 1775, which was the most influential law book in the United States for over 100 years, explained that it is because of this natural law that we even make human laws at all.

He believed like lock taught the natural law came first. Then we formed societies and tried to write our preexisting ideas of right and wrong into human laws that we could enforce. Blackstone elaborated, quote, this law of nature being coval, meaning of the same age and origin with mankind and dictated by God himself is of course superior in obligation to any other.

It is binding over all the glow. Countries and at all times, no human laws are of any validity if contrary to this and of such a and such of them as are valid, derive all their force and all their authority from this original. This means that there is something inside us that helps us judge whether or not a manmade law is good and whether or not we should obey it.

We'll talk later about how bad laws can become society wide. As many authors have explained it throughout history, it is written on our hearts by the very finger of God. For this reason, depending on how closely a manmade law conforms to the natural law, it is more or less in force in our minds. For example, we know that murder is wrong.

We don't know this because our government said it was wrong. Our government made it against our laws because we already know it is wrong. This is the case with many laws that need almost no persuasion or compulsion to enforce with the general population because we all want them to be laws and we all know them to be right, freedom of speech theft, et cetera.

In fact, there are some things that even though we do not encourage government to enforce them, we still know are wrong, like adultery and lying, et cetera. This matters because as we'll see later, you make little laws for yourself and those you lead all the time. The better you understand the natural law and how it works, the more easily it will be to comply to it yourself and then help others to comply as well.

The more you see the world through this lens, the more expansive your vision becomes of what's possible for you and others in your life. This leads to the ability to overcome your personal challenges and live more at peace with yourself than others. Like Li Sanders, Spooner taught quote, the natural law is the science of peace and the only science of peace, since it is the science which alone can tell us on which con what on what conditions.

Mankind can live in peace with each other as we proceed. I hope you will begin to see this promise is truly achievable. The natural law framework is liberating and thrilling, but don't just take my word for it. And the authors I've quoted so far, here are a few other men and women throughout history that believed in and taught about the natural law framework.

Safa appeal to the universal law and insist on its greater equity and justice. Aristotle urge that the principles of equity are permanent and changeless, and that the universal law does not change either. For it is the law of nature, or as written laws often do change. Zeno, all things are ordered by providence and that the end of life was to live in accordance with this order.

Lucious, he showed the highest good toward which all were aiming showed the way a straight and narrow path, Cicero. True law is right reason in accordance with nature. It is applied universally and is unchanging and everlasting. Marcus Aurelius, what is thy art to be good. And how is this accomplished?

Well, except by general principles, some about the nature of the universe and others about the proper constitution of man St. Augustine. The natural law is nothing else than the rational creature's participation in the eternal law. St. Thomas Aquinas. Every human law has just so much of the nature of law as it is derived from the law of nature.

George Wilhelm, Friedrich Hagel. The laws of nature are simply what they are and are valid as they are. Emmanuel Kant innate, right? Is that right, which belongs to everyone by nature, independent of all juridical acts of experience. Thomas Hobbes. The laws of nature are qualities that dispose meant to peace and to obedience.

Thomas Reed, the natural law is written by the very finger of God on the hearts of men. Alexander Hamilton, good and wise men in all ages have supposed that the deity has constituted an eternal and immutable law, which is indispensably obligatory upon all mankind prior to any human institution whatsoever.

Abigail Adams to be good, to be good and do good is the whole duty of man Frederick Basted. Each of us certainly gets from nature, from God, the right to defend his person, his liberty, and his property. Charlotte Mason. My endeavor in this and the following volumes of the series will be to sketch out roughly a method of education, which as resting upon a basis of natural law, may look without presumption to inherit the divine blessing.

Earl Nightingale. The prisons and the streets where the lonely walk are filled with people who try to make new laws just for themselves. We may avoid the laws of man, but there are greater laws that cannot be broken. All of these witnesses and there are thousands more are powerful evidence of the reality of the natural law.

As I studied, it was amazing to see how universally men and women of different times, cultures and religious traditions believed in and discussed the natural law. Of course, my husband and I had seen firsthand its transformative power in our own lives. I had spent years teaching what I knew to others, and it was empowering them to overcome their problems as well.

We had found the truth. And it was making us free. There was just one problem. I was beginning to feel a strong mandate, a call to share this message with as many people as possible. It became one of the greatest desires of my life to help others to fill the clarity and hope that are generated from seeing the world through this framework.

I want everyone to know that they come from a rich tradition, which can lift and enable them to be more than they are, and to overcome life's challenges in new ways. By this time, I had spent over 20 years studying the evidence of natural law from the ancient philosophers, from the Christian theologians, from the Scottish enlightenment thinkers, from the American founders.

I had read all about the decline of the natural law framework with the disillusion of liberal education in the United States from the late 19th to the early 20th centuries, and I knew about the attempts of Robert Hutchins and Mortimer Adler to restored at the University of Chicago as they did battle with John Dewey and the progressives.

There was a lot I could explain to people about the history and loss of this framework, and because of my own personal experiences with it and the impact this application was having on me and my students, I couldn't stop thinking about what could happen in the world if more of us were thinking, speaking and living within the truth of the natural law.

I also knew though that there are plenty of high level thinkers, writers, philosophers, politicians, attorneys and professors in our modern day who either disbelieve the concept of the natural law and actually speak against it, or are largely or entirely ignorant of it all together. If I was going to come, if I was going to come out more openly, vocally, and enthusiastically in favor of the natural law, teaching people that it is not only real, not only is it at the objective truth we are missing or ignoring, but it has the power to liberate us in small and big ways.

I was going to have to prove it. In order to do this, I needed one more vital piece of evidence. Up to this point, virtually all of my research had produced evidence for natural law within the Western tradition. Although these evidences were abundant, I needed to be able to show definitively that this is not just a Western phenomenon or construction, that it is truly the nature of reality because people everywhere have felt its veracity, have taught its merits, and have built their cultures on its foundation.

I had studied worldviews and I had read at least part of the religious writings of the major world traditions. I found threads there that I felt aligned with the natural law framework, but I was an outsider looking in. I had also studied and taught what CS Lewis had written about the natural law and other cultures.

I. CS Lewis knew as I did that the denial of natural law rested on the claim that different societies and history have had dramatically different moral systems and believed radically different things. Our classrooms are full of textbooks, professing this exact idea to this claim. Lewis declared simply that this is not true.

He went on to explain that when you compare the moral teaching of ancient cultures, for example, the Egyptian, Babylonian, Hindu, Chinese, Greek, and Roman peoples quote, what will really strike you will be how very like they are to each other and to our own. Of course, being one of the best read men of the 20th century.

He went through thousands of books and spent a good amount of time in the encyclopedia of religion and ethics trying to get to the bottom of this issue. He then wrote the Abolition of Man and provided an extensive appendix proving the harmony of worldwide understanding of the natural law throughout time.

This is really compelling evidence to be sure, and I absolutely believe Lewis Andrus his research I. I wanted more than one voice to prove such a critical element of the natural law as the claim that it is universal across cultures, that it is the proper method for understanding reality and truth for all people in all places all the time.

And I wanted a voice from outside the Western worldview. Then I found the Natural Law Institute, the Natural Law Institute. In 1942, Dean Roscoe pound of Harvard Law School gave a speech at Notre Dame titled The Revival of Natural Law. As a Catholic school, Notre Dame felt the mandate for perpetuating the rich American natural law tradition in all its colleges, but especially in its law school.

Inspired by pound's lecture. The university instituted a great books program of reading in its law school, reintroducing its students to a true liberal arts approach to learning the dominant educational approach in the United States since its inception, which in the previous 50 years or so had been quickly losing ground.

The level to which their students were wholly acquainted with the natural law soon became apparent, but the discussions were lively and stimulating. A spark was lit as Edward F. Barrett explained quote, there was an increasing awareness that the ancient teaching has a living perce to present day pro problems.

Public symposiums were instituted where lawyers and judges were invited to join law students in an intensive examination of the meaning of the natural law doctrine and its specific applications. By 1947, the faculty, students, and alumni were anxious to drive deeper into the whole law school curriculum, the natural law doctrine unquote.

From this desire, the Natural Law Institute was born, its first session was convened on December 12th to 13th, 1947, funded by the Alumni Club with over 600 judges, lawyers, and law students from all over the United States in attendance at this event. Archbishop O'Hara most pointedly expressed the long range objective of the institute.

Someone must challenge the false philosophies that have taken hold of our law schools and our courts. If we let it go longer, there will be no liberty to defend. They began this project at Earnest and for the next five years, they met annually in person studying and discussing great works in the natural law tradition, and hearing lectures of world renowned leaders and scholars on the various aspects and applications of the natural law.

In summarizing the ideas and conclusions from that first session, which perfectly aligned with my own research and experience, Barrett stated the following, the natural law is not an ideal. It is a reality. This institute will encourage the widest search for universal standards relevant to the solution of contemporary problems.

The editors of the institute are interested in exploring with all the resources of scholarship and modern science. The full extent of the contribution natural law can make to the solution of today's problems. We believe natural law can be made to serve practical ends. The doctrines and beliefs of the ancient civilizations here represented a continuity and adherence and a devotion to a code of life that is fixed and permanent and stable for, to us all the for to us, all the natural law belongs.

It is our birthright as children of God is that it is our inheritance as Americans or upon the republic. Upon it, the Republic was founded. You can imagine my excitement when I found this institute. Not only was the conference held in person for five years all the way through the 1950s and sixties, the institute continued to collaborate and publish scholarly articles about the nature and application of the natural law.

Most interesting of all for me though. Was the subject matter of the fifth in-person gathering, restating what I've been discussing here. The editor of that year's conference explained that those who promote the natural law philosophy claim that it is written on the hearts of mankind and is therefore not a specifically western or Christian idea, but the possession of all men for all time and everywhere, whether Jew or gentile, black or white, yellow, red, or brown, unquote.

Wanting to test this claim and prove its veracity, the exact proof I had been seeking for years. The institute extended quote, complete academic freedom to its lecturers subjecting the grandeur of the concept of the universality of the natural law to the candid criticism of scholarship. For this purpose, five non-Christian scholars of international reputation were chosen who then dug deep into their own culture, religion, and historical traditions to explore what elements of natural law they could find there, if any.

This was precisely what I had been looking for. This would I hoped be the evidence that demonstrated definitively that the natural law is truly objective and universal, making it the most reliable source of truth available to all of us. The conclusions of the conference were unanimous. The natural law is objective, real, and universal in every case.

The presenters cited evidence from their culture, their history, and their greatest writings and traditions to affirm that there had always been, and currently was a law of nature that governs human behavior. Not only that. The examples and as of aspects of the natural law and principles within it were similar and in some cases identical.

Here are some quotes from the various presenters to show the uniformity of their ideas. The Jewish tradition, rabbi Solomon Freeh, DD President, central Conference of American Rabbis, author, and other credentials. The scattered Jewish communities maintained law and order because the law was accepted as common to them from nature and nature's God.

The sources of true social order are always the same in a sprawling, modern metropolis as in a tiny medieval ghetto During these centuries, the divine natural law meant order and meant culture to the extent that it meant order it immense self-control, control through conscience. Muslim tradition, Khalifa Abdul Hakeem, PhD Director, Institute of Islamic culture, author of Islamic Ideology and other works.

It is one of the most essential elements in the analysis of the concept of natural law, that it is universal and objective is rooted in the nature of things and in the nature of humanity. Religion is essentially a comprehension of the natural law and living in obedience to that law for only thereby shall man be true to himself, and only by being true to himself shall he be true to his God.

And just to the rest of his creatures and his creation. The Koran laid down the principle that right religion is nothing but natural law, rightly understood. Hindu tradition, Ms. Sunder, educational Liaison Officer, embassy of India, office of High, commissioner for India, author and other credentials. Dharma is the Hindu ideal of life.

Call duty by some, by others, righteousness, by still others. The performance of virtues in this sym symposium, Dharma may be called no better than natural law. It is the God given. God-given law of one's own being, and no transgression from dharma or natural law is permissible without serious consequences to the transgressor.

Dharma is right action. It is conformity with the truth of things. Natural law, according to the Hindu, is identical in all faiths and is common to all mankind, unquote. Buddhist tradition, dissects T Suzuki, professor of Japanese culture, professor of Buddhist, philosophy, author, and other credentials. Quote, whatever we may argue about politics or economics.

The moral laws being more fundamental. We cannot disregard them and live at peace with our neighbors. If we want to live at all, we have to observe them. By all means, we follow the laws called by Buddhist, the karmic relationships. One such law is that good deeds increase happiness. Cosmic, as well as individual offenders punish themselves.

A deed, good or bad, brings its own results. Chinese tradition who she author of, history of Chinese philosophy and other works, ambassador of China, president National Peking University, and other credentials, Wong Yang ing. From four who lived 1472 to 1528, taught that there is in every man the innate and intuitive knowledge, which is the moral conscience of man, which knows right to be right and wrong, to be wrong.

The natural law is what every man's innate and intuitive moral conscience perceived to be. To be the truth and the law, which it is his duty to extend and apply to all things in all events. Moti who lived four 70 to 3 91 BC repeatedly said, the will of God is to love all the people in the world without distinction and to benefit all the people in the world.

Without distinction, how do I know what the will of God is? How do I know that the will of God is to love all people without distinction? Because God fathers all people without distinction and feeds all people without distinction. Universal truth and writer are agreeable to our mind. Just as tasty meals are pleasing to our taste.

For those who work in accordance with the universal laws of nature, there is nothing they cannot accomplish. That's Han Fe 2 33 BC unquote. At the end of the conference, international columnist, author and lecturer, George e Slosky, summarized it this way, quote, we all come to this, that. We, that there is a divine intelligence, that there is a divine law, that there is a rhythm in life that cannot be broken.

That this rhythm, that that perfection of form and manner and substance in nature, if you please come somehow, perhaps far beyond our understanding from the creator who gave us not only the sun and the stars in the moon, but also a law of life that is good and that in that goodness is the.

Greatness of hope and contentment and security for all human beings, of all faiths, of all creeds, of all nations. And in that spirit, in that spirit of goodness, which can be called natural law, we have demonstrated even in our differences that we are all brothers under the fatherhood of God. I hope I have not belabored the point, but it Oh, unquote.

I hope that I have not belabored the point, but it is vital that you be convinced that not only is the natural law not my idea, not only is it not a new idea, and not only is it not a Western idea, it is true at all times in all cultures in the past, in the present and in the future. It is the way of seeing the world and of understanding truth in the correct way, the way that best aligns with reality.

As such, it is the best map we can pattern our own mental maps after, and it is the whole elephant. I. Happily, I've been able to teach this framework of the natural law to tens of thousands of people, and one result I have seen time and again, is that when people come to this, see this framework clearly and embrace it as a way of approaching their lives and problems, they truly begin to blossom.

They repeatedly report that they thinking clears up. They can see through the confusion in their personal lives and the culture, and they no longer feel oppressed and overwhelmed by their challenges. They know there are answers, and as they practice the skills you'll learn in this book, they gain the confidence that they can find and apply those answers.

Listen to how a few women answered these questions. What difference has the natural law framework of seeing the world made in your life? How are you different? How are your circumstances different? Lindsay H. This is the key to a happy life, but it doesn't sound appealing at first. It is much more comfortable to blame others, but that is a recipe for being stuck.

I feel more confident in explaining why I believe something is right or wrong. It has helped me to clarify my values and beliefs. I feel happier and less blown around by winds of popular opinion. Natasha Stringham, life changing. I no longer have to wonder what is true versus false. I can do the work and figure out for myself what is truth.

It's absolutely liberating and exciting. I'm different because whenever I read any book, article, or any piece of information, I know how to discern the truth of the information. I'm different because I'm no longer confused about all the ideas and information out there. I know how to detect the truth, and it's so freeing.

Sarah Horlocker. I am more courageous. I feel like a warrior in the world on the side of light that is destined to win. I can identify laws, lies, propaganda, and misinformation, and it doesn't confuse control or scare me as it used to. Karen Bates. I teach my children with more purpose. I read, watch, observe, and listen, more receptively seeking truth and all around me.

I have created a more healthy self, a more loving home, and a nonprofit that supports others in gaining the truth that will set them free, unquote. Later we'll talk about how understanding and living in harmony with the natural law not only helps us overcome our persistent problems, it produces the brutal beautiful fruits of increased faith, happiness, and personal virtue.

For now, with our newfound knowledge about the nature of reality and truth, let's look closer at how the natural law works and how its truths actually make us free. That's the end of chapter two, so I hope you enjoyed that. Uh, it was a little long, but hopefully you have a better understanding of why I'm so passionate about this.

All of the mountains of evidence that are all around us in history and in our, in our world, in our culture, and in our personal lives, and deep down inside of our hearts as well. I hope that if this information was helpful and valuable to you, you'll pass it along to someone who you think might benefit from it.

In the meantime, thank you so much for joining the podcast. If you liked this chapter, I have a, a free offer for you in the description, or if you go to the mission-driven mom.com, I'd love to give you the first free cha, the first two chapters of my other book, the Mission-Driven Life for Free. So. Click on that link, or go to the mission driven mom.com and scroll down to the bottom and claim your free chapters.

You can have those first two chapters of that book for free and get a sense of why we're doing what we're doing here at the Mission Driven Mom. Why the Natural Law matters so much, why those Seven Laws of Life Mission. Layer on top of this natural law and create the roadmap for us to follow, to be more of who we could be and to begin reaching our potential to discover and fulfill our own unique contribution to the world.

Thank you so much for joining me, and I'll see you next time.