To the editor:

An infamous man once asked, "What is truth?" That man was Pontius Pilate. He was replying to Jesus' statement that Jesus had come to testify to the truth.

More recently, on an episode of "Viewpoint," Ted Koppel made the statement that news reporters were not in the business of reporting the truth but were instead in the business of reporting the facts. Perhaps Koppel should read the dictionary. A fact is something that actually exists or has occurred, something asserted to be true or have happened, reality or actuality. In other words, truth.

Koppel and his friends in the news media should take a lesson from the Bible. Buy the truth and do no sell it. Get wisdom, discipline and understanding. Instead, they have taken a very broad interpretation of the second part of the meaning fact (something asserted to be true or have happened) and have spun it to mean anything asserted is true.

If your are going to set yourself up as a reporter of facts, you need to make sure your facts are indeed the truth, not just assertions of truth, because you have staked your reputation as a reporter on those assertions. Koppel and his colleagues have lost their wisdom and have instead become unwitting accomplices of Satan.

Let me say to Koppel and his friends, take a lesson from the Bible and stop reporting facts as you see them. Start reporting the truth as we all see it, for there is only one truth.

MARK K. SLINKARD

Cape Girardeau