Home > Jesus is God in Mark's Gospel
Mark 13:32:
But concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father."Also mentioned in Matthew.
Matthew 24:36:
But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only.
This is often cited by skeptics to challenge the deity of Christ. However, this "mystery" defines the unique, ontological relationship between the Father and the Son while respecting the reality of the Incarnation.
There is an extraordinary hierarchy Jesus establishes in this verse.The Scaled Hierarchy: Jesus places Himself in a specific order:
Humans Angels The Son The Father.
Jesus does not say "a son" or "sons of men," but uses the definite article: The Son.
By placing Himself above the angels, Jesus is claiming a status that is superhuman and unique. In the Jewish worldview, angels were the highest created beings. By standing between the angels and the Father, "The Son" is portrayed as a being of a different order entirely—the Divine Son.
The Early Church Fathers, particularly during the Arian controversy, had to explain how an omniscient God could "not know" something.
Athanasius (Against the Arians): Athanasius argued that the Son "did not know" according to His human nature. He asserted that as the Word (), Jesus knew all things, but as the "Son of Man" who assumed human limitations, He accepted the boundaries of human knowledge. He "knew" as God, but "knew not" as the representative of humanity.
Gregory of Nazianzus: He famously noted that the Son is said not to know "as man," though He knows "as God." This is the doctrine of the Communication of Attributes (Communicatio Idiomatum): what is true of one nature can be attributed to the one Person, even if it only pertains to one of the natures.
A different but complementary line of commentary suggests that "knowing" in this context refers to "making known."
St. Augustine: Augustine argued that in biblical language, God is sometimes said to "know" something when He causes others to know it (e.g., "Now I know that you fear God" in Gen 22:12). Therefore, the Son "does not know" the day in the sense that it is not His mission to reveal it to the disciples. It is not part of the "Son’s office" to communicate the date of the end.
Thomas Aquinas: Aquinas followed this by stating that Christ knew the hour in His divine mind (the Scientia Visionis), but did not have this knowledge "experimentally" as a man, nor was he authorized to dispense this knowledge as the Mediator.
While equal in essence, the Son voluntarily subordinated Himself to the Father’s will in His earthly mission.
Commentators on the Kenosis (Phil 2:7) suggest that Jesus deliberately "veiled" the exercise of His divine attributes. Just as He could be hungry (despite being the Bread of Life) or weary (despite being the Almighty), He could choose to limit His human access to divine information to fully participate in the human experience of faith and dependency on the Father.
In Matthew 22 Jesus gives a parable about the Kingdom of God and about His Coming. That is is like a wedding that a King gives for His Son.
In first-century Jewish wedding customs, the betrothal (erusin) was legally binding, but the bride and groom lived apart for about a year. During this time, the groom's job was to build a bridal chamber (the insula) onto his father's house.
The groom did not have the legal authority to declare when the project was officially complete. It was the exclusive right of the father (paterfamilias) to inspect the chamber and say, "Go, bring your bride."
If someone asked the groom when the wedding would be, the culturally standard, respectful answer was, "Only my father knows." This did not mean the groom was oblivious to the timeline or the blueprints; it meant the right of declaration belonged solely to the father. Jesus uses this exact imagery in John 14:2-3 ("In My Father's house are many mansions... I go to prepare a place for you").
In Semitic thought and biblical idiom, "to know" (yada / ginōskō) frequently means "to make known," "to determine," or "to officially decree."
Jesus is not talking about his own cognitive knowledge. He is talking about declarative knowledge. It is the role of the Father only (not the Son or angels) to declare the day and hour.
Which of these best explain is a mute point as we cannot fully comprehend the idea of God taking on on a human body in the incarnation - albeit without sin.
However, for the Christian, Mark 13:32 is a defense of the True Humanity of Jesus. If Jesus had exercised full omniscience at all times, He would not have been "made like his brothers in every respect" (Hebrews 2:17).
However, the fact that He places "The Son" in a category higher than the angels proves that even in His state of humiliation, He remained the Ontological Son of God.
As many commentators note: He who knows the Father perfectly (Matthew 11:27) cannot be essentially ignorant of the Father's plans; rather, He chooses to wait on the Father's timing.