Holy Art Thou, All-Knowing!

Closed-mindedness is probably the leading cause of almost all the existential problems in our world. The belief that God is all-knowing has the power to keep us open-minded. What follows is an explanation of this conviction.

The trisagion ends with three affirmations about God. This limitation is perhaps due to the importance of the number three and also due to the number of persons in the Holy Trinity. If this could be expanded with more affirmations, one of them is that God is all-knowing (omniscient). 

The idea that God is all-knowing can be found all over the Bible. Here are a few of them:

• Even before a word is on my tongue,behold, O LORD, you know it altogether. Psalm 139:4 
• Great is our Lord and mighty in power;his understanding has no limit. Psalm 147:5 
• The eyes of the Lord are in every place, keeping watch on the evil and the good. Proverbs 15:3. 
• Even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Matthew 10:30 
• Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! Romans 11:33. 
• And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account. Hebrews 4:13 
• God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything.  1 John 3:19-20 

What do we mean when we affirm that God is all-knowing? The western Christian world has often seen this affirmation as an objective description of God, which has led to several logical problems. If God knows everything, why can't God manage the world better? If we have free will, how can God know what we are going to choose? If God knew that Adam was going to disobey God, why didn't God prevent Adam's disobedience. These are just a few examples of such logical problems.

The Eastern Christian world has not seen this affirmation as an objective description of God. Like the other affirmations about God, this is also seen as a kataphatic statement. Although it appears to be about God, really it is not about God, but about all the beings other than God. That God is all-knowing means that God alone is all-knowing, and therefore, no being other than God is all-knowing. In our everyday speech, we often say "God knows" to mean no one knows. Thus the statement "God is all-knowing" means that no one is all-knowing. It also means that God is the source of all knowledge. "For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding." (Pro 2:6). James adds that those who lack wisdom have only to ask for it and God will give it abundantly and generously. (James 1:5)

  

The affirmation that God alone is all-knowing implies that no human being can ever claim or hope to have the custody of absolute knowledge. Our knowledge will always remain relative-- it keeps changing as we gain more knowledge. We can never claim to be sophists (wise people) as Socrates' contemporaries did; we can only claim to be philosophers (lovers of wisdom). We can never claim to be the custodians of truth; we can only become seekers of truth.

About God we can know nothing. No affirmative statement can be true about God. The affirmative statements made about God are really negative statements about what is not God. About the world and things in the world we can have partial and relative knowledge; never complete or absolute knowledge.

If all of us, human beings, realize this, we will be willing to cooperate better and learn from one another; we will stop fighting with one another for our beliefs about God. The only true faith anyone can hold is that God alone knows the absolute and ultimate truth.

Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that deals with the question of how we gain knowledge. It tries to find out where we get knowledge from and how we gain knowledge.  How well we receive a new piece of knowledge depends very much on the receptivity of our mind. The parable of the sower illustrates this. We may gain knowledge by direct experience or by indirect experience. Indirect experience refers to the experience of others communicated to us. Once we receive a piece of information, we process it by relating it to other pieces of information we already have. We always gain new knowledge by relating it to the knowledge we already have. Thus our knowledge is relative. Imagine two children watching a lion. This animal might create two different impressions upon their mind depending upon what animal they have already seen. For the child who has already seen an elephant, the lion appears to be a small animal. For the child who has seen only smaller animals like a dog and a cat, the lion appears a big animal. When you speak to an audience your words create slightly different impressions on each one of them.

The Relevance of this Affirmation

We can have two different approaches toward knowledge: we may claim God to be all-knowing or claim ourselves to be all-knowing. If we claim God to be all-knowing, we will always keep our mind open willing to learn new things, but if we claim ourselves to be all-knowing, we will keep our mind closed, unwilling to learn anything new. If we believe that God alone is all-knowing, we will not claim to be in custody of absolute truth. Such an openness will make us willing to listen to others and learn from them.

St. Paul makes this distinction when he says, "Those who think they know something do not yet know as they ought to know" (I Cor 8:1-3).  Here Paul is talking about those who claim to be all-knowing. Unless they turn around and claim that God alone is all-knowing, they truly know nothing. This idea is reflected in the proverb, "Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." (Proverbs. 1:7)

There are two kinds of special fruits in the Garden of Eden: of life and of death. The fruit of death is the knowledge of good and evil. It is a superficial knowledge that is quick to judge. The fruit of life is wisdom. It is a deeper knowledge that hands over the judgment to God. Adam decides what is good and what is evil for himself too quickly. He should have let God make that decision.

Our civilization denied God, and it claimed that man can be omniscient. We sat on the seat of God and made quick judgments-- we ate the fruit of death. Humanity has been in the valley of the shadow of death since the last century. We had two world wars, and we stayed on the edge of a third world war that could wipe out all traces of life from our planet. Unless we humbly admit that God alone is omniscient, we cannot overcome death.

In the Book of Job, we see Job's friends placing themselves on the seat of God, and passing judgment on Job. Job, however, surrenders himself to the wisdom of God. 

Paul distinguishes between the wisdom of God and the wisdom of this world. The wisdom of this world is foolishness in God's sight. (I Cor. 3:19-20). These are the same options Adam had. Every human being has to face these options. Wisdom of the world assumes that we are/can become all-knowing. But the wisdom of God assumes that God alone is all-knowing.

Paul further advises to “Turn away from godless chatter and the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge, which some have professed and in so doing have wandered from the faith” (1 Timothy 6:20-21). Faith includes the belief that God alone is all-knowing. In the presence of such a faith, how can there be godless chatter and opposing ideas?  James thinks that the true wisdom from above is gentle, peaceful, pure, honest, and impartial; but the wisdom from below expresses itself as strife, confusion, envy, and evil. (James 3: 13- 18)

  

Conclusion

The affirmation that God is all-knowing means that no human individual or community can ever claim or hope to be all-knowing. If we are willing to accept this, we will be open-minded, and we will be able to learn from others, and cooperate with each other better. Those who are not willing to accept this will have a closed mind, and they will not be able to learn from others, and cooperate with others.

 

Who am I?

“Who am I?” might be the one most significant question we ask ourselves. I describe it the most significant because our very existence is based on this one question. I don’t think we can ever get an absolute answer to this question; only a relative answer is all that we can hope for. The question “who am I” may be understood better by a more specific question such as “How am I related to the rest of the world?” One’s answer to this question is based on and limited by his/her world view.

When I was a child, my world consisted of my family, relatives, friends, the neighborhood, the church, and the school. As I grew older, my world grew larger and larger, and my view of the world also grew larger. I answered the question “Who am I?” as I grew up based on my growing view of the world. Let me illustrate further in some detail.

Let me imagine that I am seven years old. I am walking along the street, and someone asks me, “Who are you?” Immediately I answer, “I am a son of Kunnathu Daniel Sir”. Kunnathu is the name of my family, and my father, a school teacher, was known as Daniel Sir in that place. As a child I saw myself as a part of my family, and my own identity was through my father and my family.

I am 12 years old, and a classmate of mine asks me, “Who are you?” I answer, “I am a Christian.” My world was growing beyond my family. I became aware of various faith-based communities, and I identified myself as a part of the faith community in which I was born and brought up.

I am 22 years old, and I am attending a conference which had participants from all over India. Someone asks me, “Who are you?” I answer, “I am a Malayalee”. I saw myself as a part of a large language-based community living in Kerala.

I am 28, and I am in Ethiopia. Someone asks me, “Who are you?” I answer, “I am an Indian”. I saw myself as one of the people of India.

I am 36, and I ask myself, “Who am I?” I answer, “I am a human being.” I saw myself as a human being beyond all races and creeds that separate human race.

I am 44, and I ask myself “Who am I?” I answer, “I am a living being”. I identified myself with all living beings.

Today I ask the same question to myself, and I answer, “I am one with all that exists”.

What precedes is an example of how someone answers the question of “who am I” based on the expanding world-view. I include within my circle whatever I identify with, and exclude the rest of the world. When I call myself an Indian, my circle includes all those who are Indians, and excludes all those who are not Indians. When I call myself a human being, my circle includes all human beings, and excludes all other beings. My circle expanded further to include all living beings, thus excluding all the nonliving beings. Today my circle includes all that exists, and there is nothing outside my circle.

How does our View of the World Expand?

This leads to a question: how does our view expand? How does our circle get larger? I can’t speak for all people; I can only speak from my own experience. I believe the expansion of my view has been a natural growth. I think it is the nature of human mind to expand its world-view with the passage of time if it is allowed to expand. This implies that if someone’s mind does not expand its world-view with the passage of time, it means that his/her mind is not allowed to expand. Human mind does not expand its world-view unless it has the freedom to expand.

This reminds me of what Jesus taught about the human mind in the parable of the sower.
"A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path, and birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky ground, where it had little soil. It sprang up at once because the soil was not deep, and when the sun rose it was scorched, and it withered for lack of roots. Some seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it. But some seed fell on rich soil, and produced fruit, a hundred or sixty or thirtyfold. Whoever has ears ought to hear."

The seed represents a piece of knowledge that causes an expansion of a world-view. A seed hides within it the life of a tree or a plant from which it came. When it falls on the soil, it starts sprouting, giving birth to a similar tree or plant. A human civilization is like a tree, and the artistic and literary works it leaves behind are its seeds. Within those seeds will be the wisdom that served as the foundation of a civilization. Any enlightening idea or piece of information is a seed that can expand one’s world-view.

The path represents people who are denied any new knowledge or opportunity to grow or expand. Those who are in slavery are denied the rights to know and grow. Those who are in a totalitarian regime are denied the freedom to know the truth. Those who are born and brought up in faith communities that claim to have the absolute truth in its custody are denied the freedom to know the truth. All these people are like the path that is denied the right to receive seeds and be fruitful. Unfortunately, a large number of people in the world belong to this category.

But there are many other people who are allowed to receive knowledge. The seeds indeed fall in their minds. But they all do not become fruitful. Rocky ground stands for closed minds. They claim to have all knowledge, and do not welcome any new knowledge at all. They close their own minds from learning anything new and expanding their view of the world. Those who believe that they are in custody of absolute truth belong to this group. If they already know the truth, why would they listen to the others? This group is often called fundamentalists.

Fortunately, there are many people in the world with open mind. They are willing to learn and grow. They do not claim to have the custody of absolute truth. However, not all of them become fruitful. Thorny field represents those open-minded people who do not become fruitful. Their mind shelters so many unwanted and unimportant things which do not let the seed grow and become fruitful. They care so much for comfort, wealth, and popularity that their mind will not have any space left for the seed to grow.

Rich soil represents the minds of people who live a fruitful life. They are not denied the seeds like many unfortunate people in the world. Their minds are not closed to new knowledge as they do not claim to have custody of absolute truth. Their minds are not filled with unwanted and unnecessary things, and they are focused on what is really important in life. The expansion of one’s world-view happens naturally if his/her mind is allowed to expand.

One with All that Exists

Coming back to my present world-view, I identify myself with all that exists. Beyond a human being, and beyond a living being, I see myself as a being. It means that I include all beings within my circle. I do not claim to know what it means to be a being. I do not have an absolute answer to the question of who I am. I only know that I am one with all that exists. This may be called a functional knowledge that helps me to function in my day-to-day life and be fruitful.

The world as known to us is a process within space and time. Nothing stays without change. Whatever changeless existence upon which the changing world exists has to be beyond time and space. Let us call it The Infinite. The finite process which we call the world exists within The Infinite. Being a part of the world, the human being is also a part of the process. Seen from the view of the finite world, there is an unbridgeable gap between the world and The Infinite. However, seen from the view of The Infinite, no such gap exists.

Within this framework of thought, I am one with The Infinite because nothing can stay outside The Infinite. Being a part of the process called world, I have the advantage and potential of change and growth. Thus every new day brings new possibilities to me. Every new second opens a new world before my eyes, and life remains an exciting adventure from moment to moment.

When I was a three-year old child, my mother taught me a little song.
I am a child of God,
And the Kingdom of God is mine!
I didn’t understand what it meant then, but recently I realized that this little song has become the foundation of my life. It answered the question of what I am.

When my mother taught me this little song she wanted my mind to expand beyond my little family, and to see the world as my family with God as my real parent and her as my foster parent. She wanted me to understand that the real source of the love that was flowing through her was God.

What is the implication of saying that I am a child of God? God is what really exists beyond the appearances that I perceive with my little mind and with my five senses. God is the absolute being beyond all the relative beings that appear to me. God is all-knowing, all-powerful, and immortal. On the other hand I see myself as a being who knows very little, with very little power at my disposal, and a being with birth and death. Along with the world, I exist within the limits of time and space. God, however, is infinite, without any limits of time and space. When I call myself a child of God, I mean that I am one with God in my essence although God is infinite and I am finite.

This is the faith upon which I build my life. I will always look forward with hope of new possibilities every moment of my life. My life will be governed by love that springs from my heart, and not by external laws that restrain me.