The Sixth Epistle – The Epistle on On-Chain Transparency
By Eric · Updated October 17, 2026
Satire and commentary: names and likenesses are used for parody, and nothing here is a statement of fact about real people. Sourced facts are in the sections below.
The Sixth Epistle – The Epistle on On-Chain Transparency “All records were in the light.”
1:1 I have seen it: The ledgers of banks were closed, The budgets of nations manipulated, And the powerful hid their numbers in the shadows.
1:2 But ₿ was different— Every transaction was revealed, Numbers, timestamps, addresses, and hashes Made visible to the entire world.
“True trust arises From systems that have nothing to hide.”
On-Chain Transparency 1:2
1:3 I opened the ledger, And I could see a transaction from ten years ago, Even Satoshi’s wallet Remained open for all to behold to this day.
1:4 No one could conceal ₿, All was recorded on the chain, The records were never deleted, Never altered, Stacked with honesty upon time.
1:5 Therefore I proclaim— “₿ is not only about censorship resistance, It is transparency itself, a gospel of light.” “The law demands faith, But the blockchain builds trust through proof.”
In plain words: what this means
The scripture is satire, and this chapter says Bitcoin is transparent. That is true, and it is also the reason Bitcoin is not as private as people think. Checked against bitcoin.org on October 17, 2026.
What bitcoin.org says
It is public. "All Bitcoin transactions are public, traceable, and permanently stored in the Bitcoin network."
Anyone can look. "Anyone can see the balance and all transactions of any address."
It is not anonymous. The page says Bitcoin is "often perceived as an anonymous payment network," but is "probably the most transparent payment network in the world." It can "provide acceptable levels of privacy when used correctly" (bitcoin.org: Protect your privacy).
Simple habits that help
Use a new address for each payment. The page calls this "probably the most important advice".
Do not post your address on public websites unless you want everyone to see it.
Hide your IP address with a tool like Tor, because transaction relays can be logged.
What the chapter gets half right
"Nothing to hide" is poetic. In practice transparency is a trade: the ledger can be audited by anyone, and anyone can also study your payments. The same page warns that data that is hard to trace today may become easy to trace later.