I think that words have meaning. And the meaning can be true, but pronunciation is not part of the true part. It is only the color of the arrow pointing at truth.
I pronounce oil differently than my cousin in Texas, and I pronounce car differently than my uncle in New Jersey. And to use pre-Modern English (~1500) era spelling ideas we would spell those words differently and probably use different alphabets. And spelling became a standard thing in English around 1750 when Johnson’s dictionary became so celebrated and a primary reference.
So there is slippage in spelling and pronunciation.