Can God Read Minds?

God knows all and sees all. That, at least, is what most Bible readers—and scholars—assume, and numerous biblical passages certainly appear to support the idea. The writer of Psalm 139, for instance, praises the omniscient God who watched him grow in the womb:

My frame was not concealed from You

when I was shaped in a hidden place,

knit together in the recesses of the earth.

Your eyes saw my unformed limbs;

they were recorded in Your book;

in due time they were formed,

to the very last one of them.

(Psalm 139:15–16)¹

It’s not a great leap from the womb to an even more hidden place, the mind. In Psalm 94 we read: “The Lord knows the thoughts of man” (Psalm 94:11). And another psalm tells us “He [God] knows what is concealed in the heart” (Psalm 44:22).