If one would have thousands of sheets of paper, would he/she be powerful? Not really, since anyone can get those. However, what if I had thousands of sheets of paper with heads on them? Now the consideration is different. Money certainly is power, since it allows you to let others act, which is the basis of power. And yes when we look at Monarchies or tyrannies or democracies, they all depend on money for their power. With no money they can't make people act and thus their laws will be worth less than toilet paper. But now, imagine you are in the Philippines. What can one do with thousands of paper heads? One peso, that is the currency there, is €0,016, so thousands of sheets of those is barely worth €50. Here we can see how important the situation and usage is while determining power. And this can all be said about knowledge too.

I think knowledge does give power so yes, however it depends, like many things, on what knowledge you have and your time and environment.

Let's take a neanderthal, living in the stone age for comparison.

Imagine it learning how to read and teach himself all about Lao tzu and Oppenheimer. Using a tremendous amount of time to analyze world wars and where they lost. Learning all the ways one could make a bomb or poison gas. Would he be better at killing a gazelle than his rivalling neighbor? Certainly not, right? Because he can't apply his knowledge to his situation, and thus can't make it useful.

Further still, he would be way worse than his neighbor since he spent all his time sharpening his spear. So when knowledge can be applied, it is useful ergo powerful.

Now, how does one define useful? Well, when is money useful? If you are running from a lion, the last thing you would wish for is to have millions in cash weighing you down. Money gets its usage out of exchange, and in exchange for solutions. You are cold, Money can get you a blanket. You are hungry, Money can get you food.

The same is true for knowledge, it is useful when it offers a solution. Why would anyone want to know that E=mc^2? Well it provides solutions for engineers that want to build the most effective particle accelerator, but not for john the potato farmer. So, the same knowledge differs in power depending on your situation and time.

A logical following question would be: when is knowledge the most powerful? When you are the only one with lots of it and can use it to solve all kinds of problems. Lots of people have had this in the form of a patent. They provide a solution to a problem and use money to ensure they are the only ones that can use their knowledge. -So, knowledge can be even more powerful than money, also since people will pay for your solution- So the most powerful knowledge would be, that which ensures you are the only one with a solution for everyone. And this concludes my piece.