Doctrine of God (Part 12): Omniscience

Now as spirit, as self-conscious mind, God possesses all of the attributes of personhood – intellectual attributes, emotional attributes, volitional attributes – but to an infinite degree. We now want to turn to a study of some of those personal attributes that God has.

C. 3. Omniscience

The first of God’s personal attributes is his intellectual attributes. That is to say, God’s omniscience. The omniscience of God is his attribute of being all-knowing. The word “omniscience” comes from the Latin words omni (which means “all”) plus scientia (which means “knowledge”). Omni-scientia – God has all knowledge. That is what it is to be omniscient. Let’s first look at some of the scriptural data about this attribute of omniscience.

To begin, I want to read Psalm 139:1-6 as a wonderful exposition of the omniscience of God. The psalmist writes:

O Lord, thou hast searched me and known me!
Thou knowest when I sit down and when I rise up;
    thou discernest my thoughts from afar.
Thou searchest out my path and my lying down,
    and art acquainted with all my ways.
Even before a word is on my tongue,
    lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether.
Thou dost beset me behind and before,
    and layest thy hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
    it is high, I cannot attain it.

Here the psalmist gives a wonderful poetic account of God’s omniscience. Let’s look specifically at some of the things that God knows in virtue of being omniscient.

First of all, God knows everything that happens. God knows everything that is going on. Job 28:24 says, “he looks to the ends of the earth, and sees everything under the heavens.” Here it portrays God as surveying the Earth and he sees everything that is going on. He is aware of everything. Turning over to Job 31:4 the author asks, “Does he not see my ways, and number all my steps?” Of course the answer is yes, God knows every step that he takes and sees all of his ways. God knows everything that is going on. Turn a couple chapters more to Job 34:21-22: “For his eyes are upon the ways of a man, and he sees all his steps. There is no gloom or deep darkness where evildoers may hide themselves.” Here there is nothing that is undisclosed to God. He sees everything that is happening.

This same truth can be found in Proverbs 15:3: “The eyes of the Lord are in every place, keeping watch on the evil and the good.” This is an expression as it were of the omnipresence of God as well.

Finally, this same truth is taught in the New Testament in Matthew 10:29-30. Here Jesus is speaking and asks, “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground without your Father’s will. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered.” Jesus is emphasizing here that God knows the tiniest details about you – even the number of hairs on your head are known to God. So God knows all things that happen in the world.

Second, Not only that, but God knows the secret thoughts of every individual. He not only sees what is happening everywhere in the world, but he knows the secret thoughts of every person. That is to say, God reads your mind. 1 Chronicles 28:9. This is David’s instruction to Solomon.

And you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father, and serve him with a whole heart and with a willing mind; for the Lord searches all hearts, and understands every plan and thought.

So God searches the hearts and he understands every person’s thoughts.

Similarly, in Psalm 44:21 says that God knows “the secrets of the heart.”

Then in Jeremiah 17:9-10:

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately corrupt; who can understand it? [Then here comes the answer from God.] “I the Lord search the mind and try the heart, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings.”

So God searches and knows people’s hearts. Again, this same truth is reaffirmed in the New Testament. For example, in the book of Hebrews 4:13 it says, “And before him no creature is hidden, but all are open and laid bare to the eyes of him with whom we have to do.” So there are no secrets from God. He knows the depths of your heart and your inner motives. As the author of Hebrews said, it is as though you are naked and laid bare to the eyes of God even in your innermost thoughts.

Thirdly, even more remarkably perhaps, the Scriptures affirm that God knows the future. We’ve already seen this affirmed in Psalm 139. Let’s go back and look at that again, verse 4 in particular: “Even before a word is on my tongue, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether.” So even before you speak the words that you speak, God already knows them before you utter them.

Also in Psalm 139:14b-16,

Thou knowest me right well;
    my frame was not hidden from thee,
when I was being made in secret,
    intricately wrought in the depths of the earth.
Thy eyes beheld my unformed substance;
    in thy book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
    when as yet there was none of them.

Here the psalmist affirms that even as you were being formed in the womb and had not yet been born, all of the days of your life were already written in God’s book. All of the days that you would live – from the day of your birth to the day of your death – God knows them. They are in his book, so to speak.

So God knows the future. This knowledge of the future was thought by Jewish prophets to be one of the distinguishing marks of the true God of Israel from the false gods of Israel’s neighbors. In contrast to the God of Israel, the true God, the pagan gods could not foretell the future. They did not know the future. This exposed them as false deities. Look at Isaiah 41:21-24. Here is the challenge that Yahweh, the Lord God of Israel, issues to these pagan pretenders.

Set forth your case, says the Lord;
    bring your proofs, says the King of Jacob.
Let them bring them, and tell us what is to happen.
Tell us the former things, what they are,
    that we may consider them,
that we may know their outcome;
    or declare to us the things to come.
Tell us what is to come hereafter,
    that we may know that you are gods;
do good, or do harm,
    that we may be dismayed and terrified.
Behold, you are nothing,
    and your work is nought;
    an abomination is he who chooses you.

Here God makes his deity to stand or fall on his foreknowledge of the future. The God of Israel knows the future, and therefore is the true God. The gods of Israel’s neighbors cannot foretell the future and therefore are false gods. So God makes his deity stand or fall upon his ability to foretell the future.

Also look over at Isaiah 46:9b-10 where God says: “I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose.’”

So the God of Israel, the God of the Old Testament, is a God who completely knows the future, even the very words that you are going to speak before you speak them. That is why the God of the Bible is a God of prophecy. Over and over again we find prophecies of highly contingent events that could not have been predicted by the causal factors that were present at the time the predictions were given.

This, of course, then carries on into the New Testament where you have Jesus, the Son of God, exercising his role as a prophet in predicting not only his Second Coming and the signs of the end times but also highly contingent events like Peter’s denying him three times before the cock crows twice, or Judas’ betrayal of him. The Bible, I think, is clear in affirming God’s foreknowledge of the future.

The fourth point under the scriptural data is that God knows what would happen under different circumstances. God not only knows everything that is happening, everything that has happened, and will happen, but he also knows even what would happen under different circumstances.

One of the classic passages illustrating this is found in 1 Samuel 23:1-13. This is the story of David at Keilah.

When Abiathar the son of Ahimelech fled to David to Keilah, he came down with an ephod in his hand. [This is a sort of divining device to inquire of the Lord.] Now it was told Saul that David had come to Keilah. And Saul said, “God has given him into my hand; for he has shut himself in by entering a town that has gates and bars.” And Saul summoned all the people to war, to go down to Keilah, to besiege David and his men.

David knew that Saul was plotting evil against him; and he said to Abiathar the priest, “Bring the ephod here.” Then said David, “O Lord, the God of Israel, thy servant has surely heard that Saul seeks to come to Keilah, to destroy the city on my account. Will the men of Keilah surrender me into his hand? Will Saul come down, as thy servant has heard? O Lord, the God of Israel, I beseech thee, tell thy servant.” And the Lord said, “He will come down.” Then said David, “Will the men of Keilah surrender me and my men into the hand of Saul?” And the Lord said, “They will surrender you.”

Then David and his men, who were about six hundred, arose and departed from Keilah, and they went wherever they could go. When Saul was told that David had escaped from Keilah, he gave up the expedition.

So what the ephod said did not, in fact, come to pass. Saul did not come down to Keilah, and so the men of Keilah did not surrender David over to Saul. The ephod was probably a device that yielded either just a “yes” or “no” answer and so answered in such a way that it told David what would happen if David were to remain in the city. If he were to remain there then Saul would come down. And if he were to come down and attack the city the men of Keilah would surrender David over to Saul. This is an example of where God knew not only what will happen (namely, Saul will not come down), but he knew what would happen under different circumstances.

In a case like this the conditions or the circumstances did not eventuate so that the subjunctive conditional that is involved here – If David were to remain at Keilah, Saul would come down – has a false antecedent. David did not remain at Keilah. These types of subjunctive conditionals are often called counterfactuals. A counterfactual is a subjunctive conditional statement with a false antecedent like “If I were you, I would apply to study at Kennesaw State” or something like that. I am not you! But if I were you, that is what I would do. That is a counterfactual statement.

Unfortunately, we native English speakers don’t have a very good handle on the subjunctive mood. We often misstate it or speak ungrammatically. Very often people will use the simple past-tense: “If I was you, then I would do this.” That is completely incorrect. “If I was you” meant that if at some time in the past I was you then this is what I would do. Or if I said, “If I was rich, I would buy a Mercedes.” That means if at some time in the past I was once rich then I would buy a Mercedes. That is not what is meant. Rather, the correct use of the subjunctive mood involves the use of the word “were.” “If I were rich, I would buy a Mercedes.” “If I were you, I would study at Kennesaw State.”

So the easiest way to remember how to use these subjunctive conditionals would be to say “If it were the case that . . . then it would be the case that something else.” That is the easiest way to express these. “If it were the case that (something) then it would be the case that (something else).” So if it were the case that I were you then it would be the case that I would study at KSU, or something of that sort.

However, not all of these subjunctive conditionals have false antecedents. Sometimes the antecedent might turn out to be true. So let’s look for an example of this in the New Testament, in John 21:6. This is the story of the miraculous catch of fish where the disciples had fished all night and had caught nothing. Then Jesus comes to them and in John 21:6, “He said to them, 'Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.' So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in, for the quantity of fish.” What did Jesus know here? He knew that if they were to cast the net on the right side of the boat then they would have a great catch. So he tells them, do it – cast it on the right side and you’ll get a great catch. Because he knew if they were to do that then they would catch these fish. In this case, they obeyed his command, so it is not a counterfactual. It turns out that the antecedent of this is true. If you were to cast the net on the right side of the boat then you would catch the fish. They do cast it on the right side of the boat, and they do catch the fish.

Here you would have a subjunctive conditional that isn’t a counterfactual strictly speaking because it has a true antecedent. Sometimes we call these deliberative conditionals, not counterfactual conditions, because we often use these in decision making. For example, “If I were to pull out into traffic now, I would make it.” Or, “If I were to ask the boss for a raise, he would tear my head off.” We use these kinds of subjunctive conditionals in deliberation about what to do. Sometimes they may then have true antecedents if we think that the consequents would be good to bring about. If I were to quit smoking, my breath would smell better, and so I decide to quit smoking. The antecedent then is true.

The point is that there are these true subjunctive conditionals. Scripture gives examples of where God evidently knows the truth of these. He knew what would happen under these different circumstances. That needs to be included in the scriptural data concerning God’s being all-knowing, however we in the end understand it.

Finally, the fifth point is God cannot learn anything. In Romans 11:33-36, Paul gives a doxology to God in which he refers to the excellence of God’s knowledge. Paul exclaims,

O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!

“For who has known the mind of the Lord,
or who has been his counselor?”
“Or who has given a gift to him
that he might be repaid?”

For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory for ever. Amen.

Here Paul extols the unsearchable depths of God’s understanding and knowledge.

Similarly, in the Old Testament in the book of Job we have God’s understanding extolled. Job 21:22 asks, “Will any teach God knowledge, seeing that he judges those that are on high?” The obvious implied answer is no. No one can teach God knowledge because God already has knowledge that is perfect. In Job 37:16 it refers to God as the one who is perfect in knowledge and therefore cannot be instructed or learn anything.

Psalm 147:5 is the final verse that we want to look at. It says, “Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his understanding is beyond measure.” God’s understanding is infinite. It cannot be compassed. It is beyond measure.

The scriptural data on God’s omniscience is astonishing in the greatness of God’s intellectual powers. God knows all things, everything that happens. God knows the secret thoughts of every individual. God even knows the future. God knows what people would freely do under different circumstances. God has immeasurable, perfect knowledge such that he cannot learn anything because he is perfect in knowledge.

I think we’ve already begun to see how provocative and interesting this attribute of God can be. Indeed, the omniscience of God is one of the most discussed of the attributes of God. When we meet together next time we will begin to unfold the richness of this doctrine.