The ninth commandment: truth and a good name

This week's questions

Which is the ninth commandment? The ninth commandment is, Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.

Question 76

What is required in the ninth commandment? The ninth commandment requireth the maintaining and promoting of truth between man and man, and of our own and our neighbour's good name, especially in witness bearing.

Question 77

What is forbidden in the ninth commandment? The ninth commandment forbiddeth whatsoever is prejudicial to truth, or injurious to our own, or our neighbour's, good name.

Question 78

The eighth commandment guarded our neighbour's goods (last week); the ninth guards what we say about him. The tenth, next week, goes deeper still, to what the heart desires.

Truth, and a neighbour's good name

The commandment's words come from the courtroom. In Israel no one could be condemned on a single witness, and a witness proved false was to suffer what he had plotted against his brother (Deuteronomy 19:15-19): one false word could cost a neighbour his life. The first proof text of Question 77 joins the court to every ordinary conversation:

These are the things you must do: Speak truth to one another, render true and sound judgments in your gates,

Zechariah 8:16

Proverbs adds that an honest witness does not deceive (Proverbs 14:5) and that "A truthful witness saves lives" (14:25). Paul carries the call into the whole life of the church: "each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one another" (Ephesians 4:25), and that truth is to be spoken in love (Ephesians 4:15).

The commandment is rooted in God himself. He is the God "who cannot lie" (Titus 1:2); Jesus calls himself the truth (John 14:6); the devil is "a liar and the father of lies" (John 8:44). So the Heidelberg Catechism tells us to avoid all lying and deceit ‘as being the proper works of the devil’ Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 112.

Question 77 sets a good name beside the truth. "A good name is more desirable than great riches" (Proverbs 22:1), and Demetrius, in another proof text, "has received a good testimony from everyone, and from the truth itself" (3 John 12). The Heidelberg Catechism shows how we guard another's name: we ‘join in condemning no one unheard and rashly’, and ‘so far as I can, defend and promote my neighbor's good name’ Q. 112. The Larger Catechism asks of us ‘a ready receiving of a good report, and unwillingness to admit of an evil report’ about our neighbours Larger Catechism, Q. 144, for love "believes all things" (1 Corinthians 13:7).

The proof texts of Question 78 show the other side. David's eldest brother Eliab, hearing him ask about Goliath, claimed to know his pride and the wickedness of his heart (1 Samuel 17:28). The law forbids going about spreading slander (Leviticus 19:16), and the one who may dwell on God's holy hill "has no slander on his tongue" (Psalm 15:3). Among the sins forbidden, the Larger Catechism names ‘raising false rumors’, ‘flattering’ and ‘vainglorious boasting’, and also ‘undue silence in a just cause’ Q. 145. We can wrong the truth by keeping quiet, and today we handle our neighbour's name with our thumbs as well: what we post, share and forward.

Matthew Henry, the English pastor, writes on James 3, "No man can tame the tongue without Divine grace and assistance" Matthew Henry. Before this commandment we do not trust our own strength; we ask for grace.

A lie to save a life?

Christians have long differed on one hard question: may a lie be told to save an innocent life? The Hebrew midwives let the boys live and told Pharaoh that Hebrew women give birth before the midwife arrives, and "God was good to the midwives" (Exodus 1:15-21). Rahab hid the spies and said they had gone (Joshua 2:1-7), and the New Testament praises her faith and her deeds (Hebrews 11:31; James 2:25).

Augustine, bishop of Hippo in North Africa, sorted lies into kinds of differing gravity, yet held that no lie may be told, not even to save another's life; later, in Against Lying, he judged that the midwives and Rahab were rewarded for their mercy, not for their lie Augustine, On Lying. Many other Christians, Reformed believers among them, have held that no truth is owed to a murderer hunting the innocent; many who hid Jews in the Second World War acted on that conviction. Both views come from love of the truth and of the neighbour, and neither allows a lie told for our own gain. What is truth? takes up the larger question.

To ponder this week

Whose good name can I guard this week, and what have I passed on that I did not know to be true? Before you repeat or forward something about another person, ask whether it is true, and whether you would say it with them in the room. Say one good word about someone who is not there. Learn Questions 76 to 78 by heart.

Practice