human: thus not infallible
There is not a person on earth who has been right about everything in their entire lives. If this were true it would imply that they know everything which of course is not a reach of human capability. Yet people in certain positions in society are put on pedestals of truth and whatever is uttered from their mouth is taken at truth.
Here are a couple examples. (I will probably write about more groups in the future).
Teachers
A group that has been put into a place of assumed truth is the teachers, especially at a college level. (They even get their own title: Professor). Unfortunately these teachers are human beings that incorporate their own ideas and concepts into their lecture. This is not a bad thing in most cases because teachers in specific fields have expertise within that field. The problem is that students, or learners are then subjected to that opinion without seeing the other points of view or alternatives. One in a learning position is the most susceptible to falsehood simply because their objective is to absorb knowledge and have little or no prior understanding to argue with the teacher’s point of view on a subject.
Now just so I don’t get emails from all my old teachers I want to add something to this. In my experience, teachers are some of the greatest sources of understanding topics and much of my knowledge comes from teachers. But, like in any other group they are still not infallible. What they know is the best of their knowledge but knowledge is limited so what they speak is only the beginning of the journey.
Preachers
Scholars have spent all of human time seeking the truth about what is in text of faith and whether that faith is even valid. This alone shows the unlikelihood that your personal preacher knows the truth about your particular faith or even if that faith is entirely true in the first place. What he or she knows and believes is most likely a slight alteration of what they were taught themselves. When listening to a preacher it is good to absorb the words said because in many cases it is insightful but that cannot be the end of the journey. To find what is most true you must look past just that one source or several sources who influence each-other and instead find alternatives to that point and then make an assessment for yourself what is most likely truth.
In traveling to many churches, (at this point only limited to within the U.S.) I have found that particularly in the Christian faith, even from church to church, that the interpretation of the the same text is very different. The only way to find what is really the truth, or closest to it is to listen, question, ponder, and then decide what is your truth.