Passage

Hebrews 4.13

"And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." (Hebrews 4:13, NASB95)

Hebrews 4:13 is the New Testament's most graphic statement of divine omniscience and the closing argument of a five-verse unit (4:11-13) about the living, penetrating Word of God. The verb behind "laid bare" is tetrachelismena, a perfect-passive participle with sacrificial and anatomical force: the throat of the victim drawn back and exposed, or the wrestler's neck locked open. The verse is a load-bearing text for the apologetic case on divine attributes, the doctrine of God's exhaustive knowledge of every creature, and the moral seriousness of stand-before-God language.

Immediate context (±2 verses)

ASV (ASV)

"11. Let us therefore give diligence to enter into that rest, that no man fall after the same example of disobedience. 12. For the word of God is living, and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and quick to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart."

"13. And there is no creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and laid open before the eyes of him with whom we have to do."

"14. Having then a great high priest, who hath passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. 15. For we have not a high priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but one that hath been in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." (Hebrews 4:11-15, ASV)

WEB (WEB)

"11. Let us therefore give diligence to enter into that rest, lest anyone fall after the same example of disobedience. 12. For the word of God is living and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and is able to discern the thoughts and intentions of the heart."

"13. There is no creature that is hidden from his sight, but all things are naked and laid open before the eyes of him to whom we must give an account."

"14. Having then a great high priest, who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold tightly to our confession. 15. For we don’t have a high priest who can’t be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but one who has been in all points tempted like we are, yet without sin." (Hebrews 4:11-15, WEB)

KJV (KJV)

"11. Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief. ^{unbelief: or, disobedience} 12. For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart."

"13. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do."

"14. Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. 15. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." (Hebrews 4:11-15, KJV)

YLT (YLT)

"11. May we be diligent, then, to enter into that rest, that no one in the same example of the unbelief may fall, 12. for the reckoning of God is living, and working, and sharp above every two-edged sword, and piercing unto the dividing asunder both of soul and spirit, of joints also and marrow, and a discerner of thoughts and intents of the heart;"

"13. and there is not a created thing not manifest before Him, but all things [are] naked and open to His eyes, with whom is our reckoning."

"14. Having, then, a great chief priest passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, may we hold fast the profession, 15. for we have not a chief priest unable to sympathise with our infirmities, but [one] tempted in all things in like manner, apart from sin;" (Hebrews 4:11-15, YLT)

Setting

Speaker: the author of Hebrews (traditional Pauline attribution disputed; possibly Apollos, Barnabas, or another in the Pauline orbit)
Audience: Jewish-Christian believers tempted to drift back to Levitical Judaism; the immediate paragraph (Heb 4:1-13) warns against repeating Israel's wilderness unbelief and promises a still-available "rest"
Location: unknown; possibly Rome, given the closing greeting "those from Italy" (13:24)
Time period: before AD 70 (the temple still standing per chapters 9-10); most date the letter in the 60s

Theological reading

The anatomical metaphor. The two adjectives in v. 13 do narrative work. Gymna (naked, stripped) is straightforward. Tetrachelismena (laid bare) is from trachelos (neck, throat) and was used both of a sacrificial victim, the neck pulled back exposing the throat for the knife, and of a wrestler, the throat held open in submission. The image is violent and total: nothing about a creature is hidden, nothing held in reserve, nothing in shadow. The flow from v. 12 (the Word is "sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit") to v. 13 (creatures are "naked and laid bare") is a sustained sacrificial-court metaphor: the Word cuts, the creature is exposed.

Divine omniscience as the ground of accountability. The clause "to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do" (Greek pros hon hemin ho logos) is judicial language. Logos here carries the courtroom sense "account" or "reckoning"; YLT renders it "with whom is our reckoning." The verse functions in the letter as the warrant for the warning of 4:11: "give diligence to enter into that rest, lest anyone fall after the same example of disobedience." Omniscience is not abstract doctrine but the basis for moral seriousness. There is no covering, no compartment, no curated self-presentation that escapes divine sight.

The apologetic significance. Hebrews 4:13 is one of the canonical proof-texts for the classical divine attribute of omniscience (exhaustive divine knowledge of all creaturely states past, present, and future, including counterfactuals on classical theist and Molinist construals). The Open Theist alternative, that God knows only what can in principle be known and so does not exhaustively know future free creaturely choices, must argue that all things are open refers to present and past states, not future ones. Classical exegesis reads the verse with Psalms 139.1-12 and 1 Samuel 16.7 as canonical witnesses to exhaustive divine knowledge. The verse also supports the information-transparency argument in ris3n's Argument from the Demand to Be Witnessed cluster: creatures are made for, and known by, a Witness whose knowledge of them is total.

Patristic and Reformation reception. Chrysostom uses the verse to argue that no creature can plead ignorance or accident before God; the Word that judges is the same Word that searches. Calvin reads 4:12-13 as the terror and consolation hinge of the chapter: terror to the disobedient, consolation to those who flee to the high priest of v. 14-15. The two halves cannot be separated in pastoral application: exposure before God is unendurable apart from the great high priest who has passed through the heavens.

Key words

G3056 - logos, logos (Strong's G3056), used twice in this unit; first of the living and active Word (v. 12), then of the account / reckoning before whom we stand (v. 13)
G2937 - ktisis, ktisis (Strong's G2937), creature / created thing; "no creature is hidden from His sight"
G4314 - pros, pros (Strong's G4314), the preposition that frames the face-to-face accountability of "with whom we have to do"
G1492 - oida, oida (Strong's G1492), the see-and-know verb cluster; conceptual companion for the omniscience claim

Theological themes

Exhaustive divine knowledge. No creature is hidden; the negation is unqualified.
Word as sword and as judge. The flow from v. 12 to v. 13 keeps Word and Judge tied: the same Word that searches will give the verdict.
Sacrificial-anatomical exposure. Tetrachelismena frames the creature's standing before God as a victim's throat exposed, a wrestler's throat pinned: total, involuntary, unanswerable.
Accountability vocabulary. Logos in v. 13 carries the "account" sense; the verse anchors stand-before-God language across the New Testament.
Bridge to Christ as high priest. The pastoral consolation arrives in v. 14: exposure before God is bearable only because there is a great high priest who has passed through the heavens.

Cross-references

Psalms 139.1-12, the Old Testament's most extended treatment of inescapable divine knowledge
1 Samuel 16.7, "man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart"
Romans 2.16, "God will judge the secrets of men through Christ Jesus"
1 Corinthians 4.5, "the things hidden in the darkness... the motives of men's hearts"
Hebrews 4.12, the immediate-context companion: the Word as living and active

Quoted in

Why these four translations

ris3n chose ASV, WEB, KJV, and YLT for two reasons together. They are the most literal English translations available (formal-equivalence: word-for-word renderings that preserve the Hebrew and Greek grammar rather than smoothing it into modern dynamic-equivalence idiom). And they are in the public domain in the United States, which means fair-use quotation at any length requires no publisher license. Modern licensed translations (NASB95, ESV, NIV) restrict volume of quotation under their copyright terms, so they are not used at stub-level coverage here. NASB95 appears only on hand-curated rich passage hubs under Lockman Foundation's fair-use allowance.

The four:

ASV (American Standard Version, 1901). The basis of the modern critical-text English tradition.
WEB (World English Bible, contemporary). Public-domain revision in the ASV line, in current English.
KJV (King James Version, 1611). Reformation-era, Textus Receptus base.
YLT (Young's Literal Translation, Robert Young, 1862). Hyper-literal preservation of Hebrew and Greek grammar; useful for word-study work even where English reads stiff.

See Bibles for the full per-translation history, translators, textual basis, strengths, and weaknesses.