When what someone says can be interpreted in multiple ways, we are in danger of coming to an understanding which is different to their intended message.
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This malleable way of communicating can be cunningly used against us when the communicator absolves himself of any responsibility for how his words are received, taking cover under the umbrella of equivocation.
This ambiguous communication technique is used everywhere: in sales, in advertisements, in the promotion of ideas, ideologies, in tourism, in religion, and in politics. It is our responsibility to figure out, using all the tools at our disposal (repeated questioning, research, etc.), whether we have correctly understood what has been transmitted to us. And after making sure we understand the message correctly, to analyse it and make decisions accordingly.
Can I choose whichever meaning I prefer?
Ambiguous communication can be very convenient for the listener, because they can choose their preferred meaning. And when the chosen meaning coincides with someone’s deep desire, most of the time reason is set aside, and their choice is based purely on passion.
King Cresus of Lydia (a kingdom in present-day Turkey) gives us a famous example of this situation. The eastern border of his powerful kingdom was the Halys River, beyond which stretched the mighty Persian Empire, ruled by Cyrus. According to Herodotus, Cresus consulted the oracles of Delphi, who told him that if he “crossed the river Halys, he would destroy a great kingdom.” Blinded by this unclear promise, Cresus crossed the river and attacked Persia. He was unsuccessful, arousing the wrath of Cyrus, who entered Lydia with his armies and conquered the capital of Sardis. Thus, in 547 BC, the words of the oracle were fulfilled: a great kingdom was destroyed. It was Cresus’ own kingdom.[1]
Ambiguous messages must be interpreted correctly so as not to hurt us
If the authorities announce, for example, that an unvaccinated child has died of measles, those who oppose vaccination will emphasise that the child died of pulmonary complications, refusing to see or understand that, in reality, “complications” were caused by measles, which could have been kept away by a simple measles vaccination.
Can I choose to understand a statement in a certain way, or exploit it’s ambiguity for what I want? Of course I can, but the negative consequences that affect me or my loved ones will not be kind to me.
When evil is cunning
Misunderstandings can be deliberately used to deceive, to hide the truth, and to make the receiver of information believe otherwise, while the transmitter of information takes refuge in ambiguous expressions. For example, a cigarette company has been sued for misleading smokers, launching and presenting “light” cigarettes as less harmful than others. A company spokesman said the phrase “light” actually referred to the flavour, not the contents, of the cigarette. Obviously, smokers did not think it referred to the aroma, but to the fact that light cigarettes would contain less tar and nicotine[2], i.e. they would present fewer health risks.
Obviously, advertising, designed to give a favourable impression of a product, cannot cancel all the scientific documentation linking smoking to various cancers. Such a presentation should be evaluated as objectively as possible. Scientific and non-partisan information on the subject must also be included in the analysis.
Another situation which arises from the malleability of meaning in an expression is encountered in the religious field when the word “soul” in the Bible is interpreted by most people, including biblical teachers , as “an independent spiritual substance, independent of the body, which gives man life, individuality, and personality, and which is of divine origin and with eternal essence”.
It is amazing how this meaning is attributed to the word “soul”, presented as immortal or eternal, while never in Holy Scripture are the words translated as “soul” accompanied by the attributes immortal or eternal[3]. On the contrary, in the book of Ezekiel, from the Old Testament, in chapter 18 and verse 4, the prophet says, “The soul that sinned, it will die.”
These words from Ezekiel are in perfect harmony with the meaning of the word “soul” in Scripture, because by “soul” the Bible simply describes the living human[4], in flesh and blood (who one day dies), or the deep inner thought of man (that perishes with the deceased)[5], or often, life itself.
Failure to recognise the biblical meaning attributed to the word “soul” leads to erroneous conclusions, which, from a Christian point of view, can affect not only earthly physical life, but eternal life (because a whole theology develops around this notion of the soul which imposes religious practices and beliefs on man which either distance him or bring him closer to the divine will, revealed in Scripture). In this case, too, there is a need for the objective, scientific, non-partisan analysis of the word “soul”, i.e. extraction of the meaning of the word only from the Bible, directly from the source.
Thus, the message we hear carries with it a meaning that can be honestly conveyed and understood. At the same time, there are many reasons why it can also be wrongly transmitted, or misunderstood. When we are on the receiving end of a message, it is our duty to make every effort to ensure that we have correctly understood what has been said to us, and after we have ensured that we have understood correctly, we have all the prerequisites to decide how to apply this information to our lives.
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Footnotes[1]„Clyde E. Fant, Mitchell G. Reddish, A guide to biblical sites in Greece and Turkey, Oxford University Press, 2003, p. 304, 305.”[2]„Nancy Cavender, Howard Kahane, Logic and Contemporary Rhetoric: The Use of Reason in Everyday Life, Wadsworth, 2010, p. 81.”[3]„In the Old Testament, the word translated «soul» is the Hebrew term nephesh and occurs over 750 times, and in the New Testament there are over 100 occurrences of the Greek term psyche, translated «soul.» The over 850 occurrences of these words are never accompanied by the attribute eternal / eternal / immortal etc.”[4]„See Genesis 2:7 – «Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.» Genesis 12:5 – “He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Harran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.””.[5]„Vezi Psalms 42:1 – «As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.» Proverbs 23:7 – «for he is the kind of person who is always thinking about the cost. „Eat and drink,” he says to you, but his heart is not with you.»”
