The Highway Forums General Discussion Open Forum The Holy Spirit and His role in the interpretation of Scripture

And they shall not teach every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know Me, from the least to the greatest” (v. 11). These words point a contrast from the general spiritual ignorance which obtained among the Jews: cf. Isa. 1:3, etc. “The words in the 11th verse are not to be understood absolutely, but comparatively. They intimate, that under that covenant there shall be a striking contrast to the ignorance which characterized the great body of those who were under the Old Covenant; that the revelation of the Divine will shall be far more extensive and clear under the new than under the old economy; and that there shall be a correspondingly enlarged communication of the enlightened influences of the Holy Spirit. They probably also are intended to suggest the idea, that that kind of knowledge which is the peculiar glory of the New Covenant, is a kind of knowledge which cannot be communicated by brother teaching brother, but comes directly from Him – the great Teacher, whose grand characteristic is this, that whom He teaches, He makes apt to learn” (John Brown).

“And they shall not teach every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying Know the Lord.” During the Mosaic economy, and particularly in the last century before Christ, there was an external teaching of the Law, which the people trusted and rested in without any regard for God’s teaching by the inward circumcision of the heart. Such teaching had degenerated into rival schools and sects, such as the Pharisees, Sadduccees, Herodians, Essenes, etc., and they made void the Word of God through their traditions (Mark 7:13). It was against such the last of Israel’s prophets had announced. “The Lord will cut off . . . the master and the scholar out of the tabernacles of David” (Mal 2:12). Or, our verse probably has more direct reference to the general knowledge God which obtained during the Mosaic economy, when He revealed Himself under types and shadows, and was known through “parables and dark sayings.” These were not supplanted by the full blaze of the Gospel’s light.

“For all shall know Me, from the least to the greatest.” God is now known in the full revelation which He has made of Himself in the person of His incarnate Son: John 1:18. As we are told in 1 John 5:20, “And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know Him that is true”: “know Him” in the sense that we recognize, own, and practically obey Him as God. This spiritual, experimental, vital, saving knowledge of God is now communicated unto all of His elect. As the Saviour announced, “They shall be all taught of God” (John 5:45): taught His will and all the mysteries of godliness, which by the Word are revealed. This “Knowledge” of God cannot be imparted by any external teaching alone, but is the result of the Spirit’s operations, though He frequently, yea generally, uses the oral and written ministry of God’s servants as His instruments therein. (emphasis mine)