The concept of Honesty depends on questions being asked and answers being given truthfully. While transparency implies redundancy or irrelevance of questions being asked, since nothing is hidden, everything is in the open. Given the omniscience nature of God, who knows the end from the beginning, knows everything, and that nothing is hidden from His gaze. Why would God ask His creations questions about any given situation or circumstances, since He knows everything. Unless one is dealing with a deity that does not know everything. Jesus Christ reassure us about the Most High God knowing everything, to the extent that every single hair on our head is numbered:The exact phrase combining those concepts spans a few key passages in the Gospels, as well as an Old Testament idiom.
1. Luke 21:18
Jesus explicitly links the preservation of a hair on your head to ultimate spiritual protection:
“But not a hair of your head will perish.”
2. Matthew 10:29–30 (and Luke 12:6–7)
Jesus addresses God’s complete awareness of every single hair falling or existing:
“Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.” Demons and or evil spirits inhabit the realm of the dead. Since Jesus Christ said in John 14:6; that He is the way, the truth, and Life, all entities separated from Christ are dead. In the book of Job 26:6, we have an expression about the truth, and circumstances and situation in the Kingdom of God concerning the realm of the dead being transparent before God. While the exact phrase “transparent before him” is a modern phrasing or paraphrase of the idea, the underlying Hebrew text uses imagery describing the realm of the dead as completely uncovered and exposed to God’s sight.
Here is how major translations render Job 26:6:
- New International Version (NIV): “The realm of the dead is naked before God; Destruction lies uncovered.”
- Good News Translation (GNT): “The world of the dead lies open to God; no covering shields it from his sight.”
- English Standard Version (ESV): “Sheol is naked before God, and Abaddon has no covering.”
- New Living Translation (NLT): “The underworld is naked in God’s presence. The place of destruction is uncovered.”
Context:
In this chapter, Job is describing the majesty and absolute authority of God. His point is that even Sheol (the Hebrew term for the realm of the dead) and Abaddon (the place of destruction/decay), which are hidden and mysterious to human eyes, are completely transparent and fully exposed to God.
James 2:19;
- New International Version (NIV): “You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.”
- English Standard Version (ESV): “You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!”
- King James Version (KJV): “Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.”
Context of the passage: In this chapter, James is making the point that intellectual belief alone is not enough to save someone. He points out that even demons acknowledge the reality and power of God with fear, but their belief does not lead to allegiance or righteous action.
John 14:17.
In this passage, Jesus is comforting His disciples during the Last Supper and promising to send the Holy Spirit (the “Spirit of truth”).
Different Bible translations phrase the concept similarly:
- English Standard Version (ESV): “…even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.”
- New International Version (NIV): “…the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.”
- King James Version (KJV): “Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.”
Context of the passage: Jesus is explaining to His followers that while the physical world (people detached from God) cannot perceive or understand the Holy Spirit because spiritual truths require spiritual discernment, those who follow Christ already experience His presence.
Related Passage: A similar theme regarding the world not knowing God/Jesus appears earlier in the same gospel:
- John 1:10: “He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.”
Other inhabitants and or potential inhabitants of the realm of the dead include corrupt people who wrong others without care, such as ill treating widows and orphans, and are referenced in scriptures as devouring God’s people. The text “those who devour my people” appears in Psalm 14:4 and Psalm 53:4 in the Bible. Both passages use the phrase “eat up my people as they eat bread” or “devour my people like bread” to describe corrupt people who wrong others without care.
Psalm 14:4-6; Do all these evildoers know nothing? They devour my people as though eating bread; they never call on the Lord. But there they are, overwhelmed with dread, for God is present in the company of the righteous. You evildoers frustrate the plans of the poor, but the Lord is their refuge.
Psalm 53:4-5; Do all these evildoers know nothing? They devour my people as though eating bread; they never call on God. But there they are, overwhelmed with dread, where there was nothing to dread. God scattered the bones of those who attacked you; you put them to shame, for God despised them.
Verse Details
- Found in Psalm 14:4 (and repeated almost word-for-word in Psalm 53:4).
- Part of a song by David about human choices and God.
Key Meanings
- Evildoers: People who do bad things and ignore God.
- Like bread: Doing harm as easily and naturally as eating a daily meal.
- No call on God: Refusing to pray or look to God for right living.
In short, demons, evil spirits, and evil doers, all have one thing in common, they all dread the Lord, plus the truth that evil doers are going to end up in the same place as demons and evil spirits, that is in the realm of the dead, separated from God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, God the Father/the One in whose Hands lies Life and death. There is no contradiction between the text found in the book of James, and what is elsewhere in the scriptures. James talked about demons believing in one God, this does not mean that the demons know God. What you believe, you do not know, while what you know, you do not believe. When an adult individual with a child, is asked whether or not he/she has a child, he/she does not answer with the phrase ‘I believe, I have a child’, therefore what you know, you do not believe. Knowledge is entirely different from belief, knowledge is backed up by facts/truth, and evidences, while belief operate in the realm of abstraction. Therefore there is consistency in the scriptures, entities may believe that there is one God, and at the same time, do not know the True God and cannot see Him, according to Jesus Christ.
