7 gifts of the Holy Spirit: (3) Knowledge

Working our way up the list of gifts of the Holy Spirit, the next one to cultivate in the natural order of things and in consistency with the Holy Scripture is “Knowledge.” If one has cultivated one’s receptivity to the first gift, “Fear of the Lord,” and then the second gift, “Piety,” one must now obtain the specific knowledge that serving God requires. Thus “Knowledge” refers to the facts and “know how” of both life itself and faith. In the previous commentary in this series I noted that one can have a great deal of Piety without actually knowing how to serve God. For example, there have been in history many people devoted to God, who had the gifts of both “Fear of the Lord” and “Piety,” but never learned their Catechism or possess any particular knowledge of the teachings of God. This is not recommended, of course, but throughout human history, especially in spiritually impoverished places, that was and is a fact of life for many people. In fact, that is the road that most who live in for example an atheist country eventually feel the stirrings of a calling to God, even if there is no Bible or Qur’an, or spiritual resources to be found. The foundation of all faith, and the desire for faith, is the “Fear of the Lord” and “Piety.” From that point on the person naturally seeks the next gift, “Knowledge.”

You can witness this sequence when you read the part of Exodus that describes the Israelites’ arrival at Sinai, the Great Theophany (appearance of God) and the giving of the Ten Commandments. The Israelites obviously already had “Fear of the Lord” and “Piety,” or they would never have followed Moses. But now they were about to receive “Knowledge,” which is The Law. The people feared God, knew God (as they saw him work miracles through Moses to get them to this point in their Exodus) and they had piety in the form of desiring to worship and serve God. Thus they now receive “the facts” from God, which is how to worship him, how to serve and obey him, and also how to live properly and how to treat each other. The gift of “Knowledge” is thus shown to be knowledge of the facts of both life and faith.

I want to point out an example of how each gift is not a one-time thing, and indeed, instead is constantly revisited and reinforced. One starts out with a certain level of “Fear of the Lord,” but if one works at cultivating one’s faith, one finds that one receives more and more of this gift, in more mature and comprehending, faith affirming forms, often throughout one’s life. Here is an obvious example. As I pointed out the Israelites obviously had “Fear of the Lord” and “Piety” when they first believed and followed Moses, or else they would not have followed him. After they left Egypt they witnessed miracles (parting of the Red Sea, the manna falling from heaven to be eaten, quail arriving when they hungered for meat, the water from the rock) they expressed their piety by consecrating their first born, and they fought and won their first battle with God’s help through Moses and Joshua. So they had a certain level of “Fear of the Lord,” but to be honest, they really saw the kind of open ended nurturing side of his power and majesty. People were quick to complain, as they did to Moses, when they didn’t like the food, for example. So you could say that this was “entry level” “Fear of the Lord.” And that is fine, because that is like being a child, who first learns about God’s love. But there comes a point where one must understand the extent of God’s all knowing and his might. This occurred during the Great Theophany.

Exodus 19:9
The Lord also told him, “I am coming to you in a dense cloud, so that when the people hear me speaking with you, they may always have faith in you also.”

[God understands, of course, that humans need to see in order to believe, so by planning the Great Theophany God knew that people would never forget the might of God who stands behind Moses.]

The Lord goes on to tell Moses to instruct the people how to prepare themselves to meet him, including telling them to wash their garments, sanctify themselves, not have intercourse, and to not go up the mountain or even touch its base, less they be put to death. The people are thus gaining Knowledge of how to comport themselves when God appears (and thus later in his places of worship) and at the same time, becoming more mature in their understanding of the gift of “Fear of the Lord.”

Exodus 19:16
On the morning of the third day there were peals of thunder and lightning, and a heavy cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast, so that all the people in the camp trembled. But Moses led the people out of the camp to meet God, and they stationed themselves at the foot of the mountain. Mount Sinai was all wrapped in smoke, for the Lord came down upon it in fire. The smoke rose from it as though from a furnace, and the whole mountain trembled violently. The trumpet blast grew louder and louder, while Moses was speaking and God answering him with thunder.

There is an interesting subtlety that amplifies not only the relationship between Moses and God (the likes of which was never seen again, nor will it be) but also how the people learned to respect God in a way they had not previously done so. God summons Moses to the top of the mountain and then tells Moses to repeat to the people that they should not “break through toward the Lord in order to see him; otherwise may of them will be struck down. The priests too must sanctify themselves” and Moses basically replies that God already told him that! But Moses goes back down and reiterates, coming back, as God instructed, with Aaron. It is OK to see a little humor when you read this, because reading between the lines you can tell that Moses is saying something like “Um, don’t worry, they got that message.” And sure enough we read Exodus 20:18-21.

When the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the trumpet blast and the mountain smoking, they all feared and trembled. So they took up a position much farther away and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but let not God speak to us, or we shall die.” Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid, for God has come to you only to test ou and put his fear upon you, lest you sin.” Still the people remained at a distance, while Moses approached the cloud where God was.

While God was in that form, where people saw his power and feared to even approach as close as they were originally allowed to, it is then that God told Moses to tell the people “You have seen for yourselves that I have spoke to you from heaven. Do not make anything to rank with me; neither gods of silver nor gods of gold shall you make for yourselves.” God who is all knowing obviously knows all there is to know about human nature. He forbad the making and worship of idols while the Great Theophany was still in plain sight of the Israelites. The point of having “Fear of the Lord” before receiving “Knowledge” is not to make the person frightened of being harmed. The point is that humans should be under no delusion about God’s might and all knowing. When humans do not comprehend and respectfully fear God’s might, they are easily prone to sin because they think that both God and the impact of their sin is weak. Humans make idols, for example, because they forget or they truly do not understand how powerful and in control God is, not in the sense of punishing them directly for an act of idolatry (“smiting”) but because they think that the supernatural power can be so trifled with that it can be put into an object. This is one of the main reasons that humans must have “Fear of the Lord,” because otherwise they do not comprehend the reality of his might and the impact of their sin upon the collective lot of humankind in the long run.

A child’s development in his or her faith likewise follows the same path as does, less obviously, a convert’s development. Both first learn to believe there is a God, and to fear God, in the sense I have previously explained which is that they do not want to be estranged from him just as they would fear a parent not being there for them. So a child first hears about the all knowing and all powerful God from his or her parents or religious instructors. This is then followed by a desire to be “grown up” and to make God happy, if one is a child. The first step then is the gaining of “Knowledge” in the form of folding one’s hands to pray, learning what a prayer is and how to say one and if they are Catholic, for example, making the sign of the Cross. The convert likewise moves quickly from “Piety,” the desire to worship and serve, to observing and then participating in Church ritual, Bible study and other endeavors that adds to one’s knowledge about God and how to worship and serve God. One cannot distinguish between the gaining of faith knowledge and the gaining of life knowledge since much of learning how to live joyous, gratifying and decent lives is from following the rules that God has given, and following the examples of the prophets and other holy people, including lay people. This is all part of the Holy Spirit’s gift of “Knowledge.”

Just as in the Old Testament we can see that the giving of the Law by God to Moses and the Israelites was the bestowing of “Knowledge,” the Sermon on the Mount by Jesus in the New Testament is another example. During the Sermon on the Mount Jesus taught them the Beatitudes, how to glorify God the Father through their own good deeds, that Jesus is fulfilling the Law, not abolishing it, how important it is to control one’s anger, how to be faithful in marriage, avoid divorce and the seriousness of oaths, how to replace righteous retaliation when one is wronged with “turning the other cheek,” how to love one’s enemies, the importance of almsgiving and prayer, the saying of “The Lord’s Prayer,” how to fast, the difference between earthly and heavenly treasure, how to depend on God and how to ask him for good things in prayer, to not be a hypocrite in judging, to not cast what is holy to the profane, to “Do to others whatever you would have them do to you. This is the law and the prophets,” how easy it is to do bad and risk losing heaven, how to beware of false prophets, how to be a true disciple to him, and an analogy how those who hear him and obey will be like houses with firm foundations.

Matthew 7:28-29
When Jesus finished these words, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.

The thousands who listened to Jesus at the Sermon on the Mount therefore recognized that he spoke “with authority.” This is what the scripture means when it says that “Knowledge” is a gift from God. Just as no human, no matter how intelligent or “visionary” could have created the Law (to say nothing of delivering it during the Great Theophany), no human who did not have authority from God could have taught what Jesus taught. It is easy to try to diminish what Jesus said from a world weary and cynical perspective of this century, but you must understand that the people who were there did an instant comparison of Jesus to the wisest of their scribes and were “astonished.” True “Knowledge” comes from God, including both the secular and the spiritual.

St. Paul wrote in Romans 7:14 “We know that the law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold into slavery to sin” and in 7:25 “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Therefore, I myself, with my mind, serve the law of God but, with my flesh, the law of sin.” This is another way of understanding that true “Knowledge” is a gift of God through the Holy Spirit. St. Paul understood that true “Knowledge,” as in the law, is spiritual and that due to the bondage of the body, humans follow a “law” of sin. Temptation prevents human beings from developing true “Knowledge” if they try to do it without the foundation of the Law and the Knowledge that God has provided. When moderns, especially atheists, speculate that they can develop codes and laws based on “Knowledge” but not God, they are dead wrong. First of all, temptation will always skew one’s perception of what is truly good and healthy for humans (we will discuss the gift of “Wisdom” as the seventh gift). No matter how noble one thinks that one is, one is always creating knowledge and law that is self serving at some level, either consciously or unconsciously. The second reason this is wrong is because obviously God has already placed the groundwork of human ethics through his Law and his revelations to the authentic prophets; whether an atheist admits it or not he or she would already be “plagiarizing” what God has already provided to humans. Genuine knowledge, and one of its manifestations, law is, as St. Paul points out “spiritual.”