They say, “The LORD does not see; the God of Jacob pays no heed.”
Parallel translations
- WEB They say, “Yah will not see, neither will Jacob’s God consider.”
- KJV Yet they say, The LORD shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.
- NKJV Yet they say, “The Lord does not see, Nor does the God of Jacob understand.”
- NASB They have said, “The Lord does not see, Nor does the God of Jacob perceive.”
- NLT “The Lord isn’t looking,” they say, “and besides, the God of Israel doesn’t care.”
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The wicked say that the LORD does not see and the God of Jacob does not notice. Their evil flows from a practical denial of God's awareness.
Overview
The oppressors comfort themselves with the lie that God is blind to their deeds. This functional atheism, denying that God sees and cares, lies at the root of much injustice. The very next verses refute it: the God who made the eye certainly sees all (v.9; Psalm 10:11-14).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Ps 10:11–13He says to himself, “God has forgotten; He hides His face and never sees.”
- Luke 18:3–4And there was a widow in that town who kept appealing to him, ‘Give me justice against my adversary.’
- Zeph 1:12And at that time I will search Jerusalem with lamps and punish the men settled in complacency, who say to themselves, ‘The LORD will do nothing, either good or bad.’
- Isa 29:15Woe to those who dig deep to hide their plans from the LORD. In darkness they do their works and say, “Who sees us, and who will know?”
- Ps 59:7See what they spew from their mouths—sharp words from their lips: “For who can hear us?”
- Job 22:12–13Is not God as high as the heavens? Look at the highest stars, how lofty they are!
- Ezek 8:12“Son of man,” He said to me, “do you see what the elders of the house of Israel are doing in the darkness, each at the shrine of his own idol? For they are saying, ‘The LORD does not see us; the LORD has forsaken the land.’”
- Ezek 9:9He replied, “The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceedingly great. The land is full of bloodshed, and the city is full of perversity. For they say, ‘The LORD has forsaken the land; the LORD does not see.’
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.
How Psalms 94:7 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.