Greetings!  Welcome to Renaissance Woman and another post in my current Bible study on the Whole Armor of God as described in Ephesians 6.

I’ve been focusing on the Helmet of Salvation and, while I have by no means exhausted the subject of salvation, I have decided to let all I’ve learned frizzle (one of my new favorite words) for a bit and move on to another aspect of the Armor.  In last week’s post, I quoted 1 John 2:17; “But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him.”  With this passage in mind, I determined that the Belt of Truth would be my next focus.

I write “Belt of Truth” but the Literal Translation has “girded your loins about with truth”.  The King James has “having your loins girt about with truth”.  The Amplified has “having tightened the belt of truth around your loins” and the New International has “with the belt of truth buckled around your waist”.  My Greek Interlinear Bibles have the word perizosamenoi.  This word means “to gird all around” and “to fasten one’s belt” according to the Strong’s Concordance.  The word is a verb (in the aorist tense which fascinates me [more on that in later posts]) so the passage is describing an action rather than referring to an object e.g. an actual “belt”. 

Perhaps there is nothing to be gleaned by this but it’s something I’m allowing to frizzle as I prepare for further study on this subject.  For the sake of this and future posts, I refer to the “Belt of Truth” but am keeping in mind Jesus says of Himself: “I am the way, the truth, and the life…” (John 14:6).  This is just another brick in the foundation of my belief that the Whole Armor of God is a description of Jesus Christ Himself and each aspect of the Armor is painting a picture of our covenant life in Him.  We gird our waists with the truth that is Jesus Himself.  Earlier in this same gospel Jesus is speaking to Jews who have believed Him and He says: “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed.  And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:31-32).  As I began to think about what it means to gird ourselves with truth who is Jesus Christ, I needed to take some time to think about knowing the truth who is Jesus Christ.

There is a passage in Ephesians I keep going back to as I study.  It’s found in Ephesians 3 and I will begin quoting in verse 14: “For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height-to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

I have been meditating on the words “filled with all the fullness of God” but, as I began to think about knowing the truth who is Jesus Christ, I began to wonder about the word “knowledge.”  During the course of this entire study, I have looked at many passages which contain the word “knowledge”.  I’ll cite two examples.  The first is in Ephesians 4:13: “…till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ…”  The second is in 2 Corinthians 10:5: “…casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God…”  What I wanted to know is, was our English word “knowledge” being used to translate one Greek word or many?  I think “to know, understand, grasp with the mind” whenever I read the word “knowledge” but, if my previous studies have shown me anything, it’s that I am often missing facets of meaning in the scriptures because the same English word is often used to translate different Greek words.

I more than halfway expected it so felt hardly any surprise at all when I looked up the word “knowledge” in the Strong’s Concordance and found it was used to translate four distinct Greek.  Incidentally, it’s the Greek sunesis (G4907), defined as “a mental putting together, the intellect, knowledge, understanding” which most matches my personal definition of knowledge.  I mention this because sunesis doesn’t appear in any of the passages I’ve quoted which means I have already got to question my previous understanding of these passages.

What are these passages saying?  The three I have quoted in this post don’t contain different Greek words per se.  Both Ephesians 3:19 and 2 Corinthians 10:5 have the Greek word gnosis (G1108) which the Strong’s defines as “knowledge, science”. Ephesians 4:13 has epignosis which the Strong’s defines as “recognition, full discernment, acknowledgment.” 

Gnosis is the noun derived from the verb ginosko which means to “experientially know”.  The definition for gnosis in the Strong’s Concordance isn’t extensive but the definition found on Bible Hub helps to add some detail to my mental picture.  The entry on Bible Hub defines gnosis as “functional (working) knowledge gleaned from first-hand (personal) experience, connecting theory to application; ‘application-knowledge’ gained in (by) a direct relationship.  Gnosis (applied-knowledge) is only as accurate (reliable) as the relationship it derives from.”

The prefix epi means on, upon, above, and/or over when used with other words and the Strong’s Concordance also has “superimposition” which means “to put, lay, or stack on top of something else.”  Epignosis then is referring to an experiential knowing that is far and over and above what we can manage on our own and this experiential knowing is sourced in the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is the anointing spoken of in the 1 John 2 passage and is the One who teaches us concerning all things.  Jesus describes the Holy Spirit as “the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you” (John 14:17).  I’ve only begun this portion of my study have already seen something in this passage I have never seen before because the Greek word translated as “knows” (neither sees Him nor knows Him) is ginosko-experientially know-but the Greek word translated “know” (but you know Him) is eido which means “be aware, behold, consider, perceive.”  It is seeing that becomes knowing and I find that so beautiful.

We experientially know the Holy Spirit but we are aware of and perceive Him because He dwells within us.  Jesus again says of Him, “However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.  He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you.”

The Holy Spirit is also the Spirit of Revelation so our gnosis of Jesus is sourced in the Holy Spirit.  However, there appears to be an epignosis-a superimposed experiential knowing-which, while it also is sourced in the Holy Spirit, is deeper than gnosis.  I hope to delve deeper into this in the upcoming weeks but, until then, may we each one know we are filled with the Spirit.  May we be aware of His dwelling within us and may our epignosis of Son of God increase moment by moment.  May we clearly see and know Jesus Christ who is the truth that girds us as we face the day.  

Hallelujah!  Amen.

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

Ephesians 6:14 Interlinear: Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about in truth, and having put on the breastplate of the righteousness, (biblehub.com)

Strong’s Greek: 1108. γνῶσις (gnósis) — a knowing, knowledge (biblehub.com)

The Comparative Study Bible, Zondervan Bible Publishers, The Zondervan Corporation, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1984

Green, Jay P., The Interlinear Bible: Hebrew, Greek, English, 1^st Printing of Larger Print Edition, Authors for Christ, Lafayette, Indiana, 2007

Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, Second College Edition, William Collins+World Publishing Co., Inc., Cleveland • New York, 1974, 1976

Marshall, Alfred, The NIV Interlinear Greek-English New Testament, Regency Reference Library, Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1976

Rodale, J.I. The Synonym Finder, Warner Books, Rodale Press Inc., Emmaus, Pennsylvania, 1978

Strong, James. LL.D., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990