Does this statement contradict the Bible?

[Salvator Mundi]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

 

[Salvator Mundi]

Ah now I remember , that's a Thomas Aquinas statement:

"Because we cannot know what God is, but only what He is not, we cannot consider how He is but only how He is not."

 

[trophy33]

we cannot know what God is, but only what He is not

"God is love" (1J 4:16)
"God is spirit" (J 4:24)

And there are many others positively formulated descriptions.

 

[Maria Billingsley]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

I would certainly say this statement is false. Those who walk in His Spirit know His voice. Jesus Christ of Nazareth is God in the flesh. To say we do not know Him is to say that He does not know us as well. He makes His Home in the believer. We know Him and we know His ways because we love Him.
So I repeat, the statement is pure falsehood.
Blessings.

 

[FameBright]

I would certainly say this statement is false. Those who walk in His Spirit know His voice. Jesus Christ of Nazareth is God in the flesh. To say we do not know Him is to say that He does not know us as well. He makes His Home in the believer. We know Him and we know His ways because we love Him.
So I repeat, the statement is pure falsehood.
Blessings.

I also agree that it is false or why even read the Bible? Obviously, we can learn some things about who or what God is. If the statement is talking about knowing God in His entirety (in the sense of fathom), then that's an obvious fact. I'll never know anyone in their entirety let alone God.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

While I do think that God is in many ways "Hidden," as Pascal has pointed out from Scripture, I don't think it's a contradiction to assert this in the face of what we read in the rest of the Bible. Why do I say this? Because while God in His Eternal, Invisible Being usually remains intangible to us, we are still presented with aspects of His acts in History that a thorough going Apophatic position in theology will fail to take into account. An apophatic theology alone won't answer one of the important questions that Jesus asked Peter:

i.e. "But who do you say I am?"

No, in order to answer this question, we need some positive historical aspects by which to answer. We're not going to address it by attempting to identify Jesus through what what we think He "is not." Obviously, Peter didn't answer Jesus' question by undertaking a solely apophatic set of evaluations, and neither do we.

 

[Akita Suggagaki]

It is not an either/or situation.

Just like with any person, we can not know them, be acquainted with them, or even have them as intimate friends. But how deeply do we know them? Do we know any of them completely? Even they do not know themselves completely.

 

[linux.poet]

I would need the context of Thomas Aquinas' statement to fully understand what he meant and what he was referring to. I don't think he was addressing John 3:16.

 

[eleos1954]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

God’s ways are higher than our ways because His ways are always part of a bigger plan. We see only our small piece of the puzzle; God sees the finished work.

So we have faith and trust and rest in Him. Amen. He has given sufficient information about Himself for our understanding. Not everything we want to know ... rather ... everything we need to know.

 

[BNR32FAN]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

We can know much about God both thru the scriptures and the guidance given by the Holy Spirit. We don’t know everything about Him but can we really say that we know everything about anyone?

 

[com7fy8]

I would say the quote could be irrelevant. Human philosophy can not bring a person to know God. Because God is not theoretical or logical, but personal and love, not known only by how we see things or can mentally explain things >

But we can experience how He is in us in His love . . .

"Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us." (Romans 5:5)

This is talking about how God shares with us His own love beautifully wonderfully pleasant in Heavenly rest, caring, family sharing with joy, sweet and tender and compassionate, generously forgiving, all-loving > Romans 5:5.

And how He personally corrects us strengthens us in appreciating what He values > Hebrews 12:4-14.

And Jesus says, "He who has seen Me has seen the Father," in John 14:9.

So, God is personal, not only something to intellectually know and explain. We can know Him, as well as we can experience Him in us. And our character can affect if and how we are capable of sharing with Him so we know Him, in His love.

"everyone who loves is born of God and knows God." (in 1 John 4:7)

Love is personal, I would say; so from this I would say God . . . our Father . . . is personal. And He is sharing >

"Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world." (1 John 4:17)

In us in His love, He shares with us how He is so we can be "as He is" "in this world".

And God is pleasing. His love has Heaven's own beauty and pleasant rest (Matthew 11:29) caressing us . . . while we are being pleasing to Him in this love which is like Jesus so pleasing to our Father >

"rather let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God." (1 Peter 3:4)

We ourselves are pleased while we are being pleasing to our Father in His love's "gentle and quiet spirit".

So, as much as our character is like Jesus . . . we experience sharing with Him >

"But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him." (1 Corinthians 6:17)

If each of us in Jesus is "one spirit with Him", we do not only know Him by means of knowledge, but we can actually feel Him in union with us in our spirit; and God is the most beautifully wonderful, most perfectly pleasing Being. As much as we grow in Jesus so pleasing to our Father, we also experience how pleasing Jesus is, in us.

A problem is how we can be affected by noisy stuff of anger and arguing and complaining and boredom and loneliness and unforgiveness and other anti-love things which are noisy, not His love's "gentle and quiet spirit" so precious to Him. Plus, we can isolate ourselves from Jesus' own brothers and sisters so we are not enjoying such sweet and pleasant and joyous sharing with Him in His family caring and sharing love. Therefore, in order to know God and love, this comes in family sharing not only with God but with one another >

"Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice. And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you." (Ephesians 4:31-32)

So, yes we can forgive "even as God" . . . by how God in us shares with us how He is tender and generously forgiving so we forgive generously and tenderly with Him. We know Him by sharing like this with Him > not as isolated individuals but as family.

But certain theologians can be isolated in their intellectual approach to knowing God, not appreciating how God is about family and us knowing Him as family, ministering this to one another >

"As each one has received a gift, minister it to one another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God." (1 Peter 4:10)

God's grace includes the effect of His love in our character so we grow in Jesus together. All we do in this love can spread the effect of God's own love through prayer, example, speaking His word, doing His good works. This is in tender and personal sharing with God in us working our wills so intimately and personally >

"for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure." (Philippians 2:13)

So, there is this personal submission of our wills to God working in us, included. Without personal submission to God, there is no knowing Him >

"Therefore submit to God." (in James 4:7) And discover.

 

[Soyeong]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Yes. Note who is being spoken about. God denied that their way was His way, so he was not speaking about people that He taught to walk in His way, which is the way to know Him. For example, in Genesis 18:19, God knew Abraham that he would teach his children and those of His household to walk in His way by doing righteousness and justice that the Lord may bring to him all that He has promised. In Exodus 33:13, Moses wanted God to be gracious to him by teaching him to walk in His way that he and Israel might know Him, in 1 Kings 2:1-3, God taught how to walk in His way through His law, and in Matthew 7:23, Jesus said that he would tell those who are workers of lawlessness to depart from him because he never knew them, so knowing God and Jesus is the goal of the law, which is eternal life (John 17:3).

 

[BibleLinguist]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

This is an important question, and it has an equally important answer: The Bible is clear about who God is.

If we were unable to know who God is, God would be unfair to hold us accountable for keeping the first commandment. We are commanded to have "no other Gods before Me." If we cannot know who the "Me" is, we cannot keep this commandment.

But God is clear. Yahweh (Hebrew: yod-heh-vav-heh, i.e. YHWH) is God's name (see Deuteronomy 6:4), and among many titles He is called our Father (Isaiah 9:6; John 20:17), our Creator (Isaiah 43:15), our Savior (Hosea 13:4), and our Keeper (Psalm 121:5). We know who God is.

What we perhaps cannot know with certainty has more to do with God's nature. Jesus, however, told us that God is a spirit (John 4:24) and that a spirit does not have flesh and bones (Luke 24:39), as Jesus did. Beyond what is revealed, we ought not seek to know.

 

[Aviel]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

FALSE..

In fact..

Jesus said.

"If you've seen ME, you've SEEN The Father".

Jesus said..

"I and my Father are ONE".

 

[ViaCrucis]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

You're close, but we can know WHO God is, because we have Jesus Christ (John 1:18). It's the WHAT that is unknowable.

God, in His Essence, is unknowable. To this the Christian Church historically has engaged in what is called Apophatic Theology, or theology by negation; we can say what God is not; rather than make certain positive claims about what God is. This does not eliminate making positive statements about God, such as "God is love". What it really means is that we can only make positive claims about God insofar as He has revealed it to us.

The Eastern Orthodox, following in the tradition of the 14th century theologian of Gregory Palamas makes a fundamental distinction between God in His Essence (Greek ousia) and God in His Energies (energeia). Here "Energies" is simply a more direct borrowing of the Greek word energeia, meaning "works" "activity"; i.e. what God does. We can know God through what He does, we can see and experience His work, His grace, in the Incarnation, in Christ's suffering, and resurrection, in the Sacraments, in God's work of redeeming and saving us, the love He shows us, the love which is sanctifying us, etc.

But God, in His Essence, remains something unknowable; Deity is something I cannot comprehend in my finite mind, I can only know in that way in which Deity comes down, revealed, in the Incarnate Person of Jesus and the grace and love of God through the Gospel, in the Sacraments, in the Church, the ways in which God makes contact with each of us in our lives as love and grace and kindness.

In my own Lutheran tradition we speak of God in His Hiddenness (Deus Absconditus) and God in His Revelation (Deus Revelatus). This is coupled with and rather inseparable from the idea that God is Hidden when He is "naked", i.e. His bare Deity, His Divine Majesty and Glory. Whereas God clothed in the Person, in the Passion--the suffering--of Jesus Christ our Lord is known, revealed.

I can know God in Christ, "If you have seen Me you have seen the Father", God the Son in taking on our flesh, and Jesus as the God-Man can make God known. In this way I can know the Father the way Jesus does, as Father. So St. Paul can say in a couple places that we have, by our adoption as sons, received the Spirit and can say "Abba! Father!".

I can know God. Not in His Divine Glory and Majesty, not in His Unapproachable Light (1 Timothy 6:16), I cannot climb the mountain and see God, "For no one can see Me and live" (Exodus 33:20); but in His Self-giving of Himself through Jesus Christ our Lord, in whom and by whom we have received all good gifts, including the Holy Spirit, by Whom we have access by grace through faith to God in Christ.

The Unknowable is made known, not in fire, glory, and smoke; but in the simple, humble, and weak flesh of Jesus Christ.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[SavedByGrace3]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Jesus is the exact image of the Father. He came that we might know the Father. When we see Jesus we see the Father. So in that context, I believe He succeeded and can know Him.

 

[Aviel]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

Do you want to know what God is like?


A.) Jesus said... "If you've SEEN Me... you've SEEN The Father"

AA.) Jesus said.. "I and my FATHER... are ONE"

 

[Simon_Templar]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

There are two types of theology. Cataphatic and Apophatic.

Cataphatic theology uses positive statements to talk about what God is, like "God is Love". These statements are true and they tell us truths about God. However, we must always also be aware that they are limited by analogy. In other words, we are talking about God using our own finite minds and finite experiences. This means that what we say, and the understanding that we derive from it will always be limited.
God is infinite, and as such, it is impossible for us to comprehend him or his nature.

We can depend upon statements like God is Love, God is good, God is eternal. But those things are really very limited and they don't come close to allowing us to comprehend God or his nature.

Apophatic theology relies on talking about what God is not. Here we make distinctions between God and our experiences etc. So we can say that God is love, but he is not love in the sense that humans experience love with need, because God has no need. He is not love in the sense of passion, where we are driven by love and it makes us suffer, because God does not suffer passions.

This is why Christianity necessarily involves a mystical element. We can know God by direct relationship, but we cannot know God by intellectual comprehension.

Think about it like this.
An infant who cannot speak or comprehend speak, with extremely limited mental development, cannot know their parents. In a certain sense their parents are an absolute unknowable mystery to them, completely beyond their comprehension. They also know almost nothing ABOUT their parents.

Yet they are capable of having an intimate relationship with their parents because love transcends intellect and knowledge in that sense. They can have perfect trust in their parents. They can have communion with their parents. All transcending their capacity to know in the traditional sense.

 

[Stephen3141]

Your post is about "knowing", and what that may mean.

You need to define what you mean by "fathom".

The Bible, and Christ in the Gospels, uses language that includes the Greek
concepts of "knowing".

Regardless of what you may think may be "known", Christians should use
the concept definitions that the biblical authors use. These are the concept
definitions that are important to core Christian doctrines.

Questions about what may be fully comprehended, are often mere speculations, that
do not deal with core Christian doctrines.

 

[SavedByGrace3]

"You cannot know (in the sense fathom) who God is , you can only know who He is not. "

I concluded this from Isaiah 55:9-
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Thank you for the thread.
I think to understand the meaning of Is 55:9, one has to read the context of the passage. Is he saying we cannot know God at all? Or is he saying we cannot understand him according to our human ethical and religious standards of what is good and bad, right and wrong, victory or defeat.

Consider:
Isaiah 55:7-13 KJV
7 Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
10 For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: (God does good things)
11 So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it. (the things He does are victorious and come to pass)
12 For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. (His actions result in good things)
13 Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree: and it shall be to the LORD for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off. (Here is the contrast. It is in this context that we cannot judge God by fallen human standards)

I think sometimes people read: "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts" in a negative way. They take it to mean that God's thoughts could be evil thoughts and God's ways might be wrong ways... .and we cannot "judge" Him or even "know" or comprehend Him because His values are so much different than ours. I don't see this at all. Nowhere in the passage does it say anything about evil ways or bad thoughts. To the contrary, he is saying that where we, as humans, might think and do bad things, God does not. His thoughts and ways result in things like trees clapping, food being produced, joy, peace, and singing. He is saying the exact opposite of how the passage is commonly understood. Instead of bad thoughts and evil ways, His ways are good and produce good things.
The standard commentary continues, and reasons that God may do bad and evil, and that would not seem to make sense since He is a "good and loving God." How could he do evil? Therefore, they resolve the issue by concluding that we, as mere humans, are incapable of actually knowing or understanding Him and His evil thoughts and ways.
Many years ago, I resolved that we are perfectly capable of knowing and understanding God, howbeit, by faith. We can know Him. First of all, Jesus came to show us the Father that we might know the Father. Did He fail? Of course not. He successfully and perfectly revealed the Father by His words and works. Second, we are fully capable of understanding God, His thoughts, and why He does things. A thought is a thought, regardless of whose mind it passes through. There is nothing about God or the understanding of God that transcends our ability to see, perspective, and comprehend Him. Words are words, thoughts are thoughts, concepts are concepts... and we can both grasp and understand all of these.

John 17:3 KJV
3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

Hebrews 8:11 KJV
11 And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest.

1 John 5:20 KJV
20 And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.

John 14:7-11 KJV
7 If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.
8 Philip saith unto him, Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us.
9 Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?

Hebrews 1:2-3 KJV
2 Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds;
3 Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;

Matthew 5:8 KJV
8 Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.

Jeremiah 24:7 KJV
7 And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.

So not only can we "know" Him experientially, but we can perceive, comprehend, and understand Him.
Now, needless to say, as far a the mass volume of His knowledge and omniscience, we cannot receive or contain it all! But those things we can know and the individual elements about and of Him, there is no indication that these components are somehow incomprehensible to us.
I am a retired systems engineer. As a systems analyst, I broke down complex systems into their most minor components, encoded them, and created algorithms to duplicate the logic of those systems. Simply put, this is how we can comprehend and understand God. There is no individual component of God that is beyond our ability to perceive, receive, understand, and record.

The idea that we cannot perceive, receive, and comprehend God is a religious and pious-sounding thing. But it does not have an actual practical application in our faith and, in fact, is detrimental and counterproductive to our faith and growth.