They took hold of him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching is, which you are speaking about? For you bring certain strange things to our ears. We want to know therefore what these things mean.” Now all the Athenians and the strangers living there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell or to hear some new thing.
Paul stood in the middle of the Areopagus, and said, “You men of Athens, I perceive that you are very religious in all things. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription: ‘TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.’ What therefore you worship in ignorance, I announce to you. The God who made the world and all things in it, he, being Lord of heaven and earth, doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands. He isn’t served by men’s hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he himself gives to all life and breath, and all things. He made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the surface of the earth, having determined appointed seasons, and the boundaries of their dwellings, that they should seek the Lord, if perhaps they might reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. ‘For in him we live, move, and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also his offspring.’ Being then the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold, or silver, or stone, engraved by art and design of man. The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked. But now he commands that all people everywhere should repent, because he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he has ordained; of which he has given assurance to all men, in that he has raised him from the dead.”
Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked; but others said, “We want to hear you again concerning this.”
Thus Paul went out from among them. But certain men joined with him and believed, among whom also was Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv19, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 34 19. They brought him to Mars’ Street. Though this…
19. They brought him to Mars’ Street. Though this verse a place appointed for judgment, yet Luke doth not mean that Paul was brought before the seat of the judges, that he might plead his cause before the judges of Mars’ Street. But that he was brought thither, where was most commonly a great assembly of people, that the serious disputation might be had before a great and famous audience. And admit we grant that he was brought before the judgment-seat, yet the end doth declare that he was not presented to the judges, but that he had free liberty to speak as before an audience. And that which followeth shortly after, touching the nature and conditions [manners] of the men of Athens, doth sufficiently declare that their curiosity was the cause; that Paul had such audience given him, that he had such a famous place granted him to preach Christ in, that so many came together. For in any other place it had been a crime worthy of death, to speak in the market or in any other public place, having gathered a company of people together; but there, because those who did carry about trifles had liberty granted them to prate, by reason of the immoderate desire they had to hear news, Paul was permitted to intreat of the mysteries of faith, being requested.
Gave themselves to nothing else. The two vices which Luke reciteth do almost go together. For it falleth out seldom that those who are desirous of novelties are not also babblers. For that saying of Horace is most true, “Fly a demander of questions, for the same is also a blab.” And surely we see that curious men are like rent barrels. Furthermore, both vices came of idleness; not only because the philosophers spent whole days in disputing, but because the common sort was too much set upon novelty; neither was there any craftsman so base there, which would not thrust in himself to set in order the status of Grecia. And surely that which Luke saith here is witnessed by all writers, both Greek and Latin, that there was nothing more light, covetous, or froward than that people. Wherefore, there could never be any certain government set down in that city, which was, notwithstanding, the mistress of sciences. Therefore, in principal power, they had, notwithstanding, no long liberty; neither did they ever cease off from attempting things and making many hurly-burlies, until they brought themselves and all Grecia to utter ruin. For when their state was decayed, yet did not they forsake their boldness. Therefore, Cicero doth laugh at their folly, because they did no less fiercely set forth their decrees then, than when they were lords over Grecia. Now, though there were small hope to do any good among curious men, yet Paul did not neglect the opportunity, if, peradventure, he might gain some of a great company to Christ. Neither was this any small praise for the gospel in the most noble place of the city, and, as it were, in a common theater, to refute and openly to reprove all forged and false worshippings, which had reigned there even until this day.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv19, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 27, 29, 30, 31, 32 This was a place called as you would say,…
This was a place called as you would say, Mars hill, where the judges sat which were called Areopagus, upon weighty affairs, which in old time arraigned Socrates, and afterward condemned him of impiety.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv19–34 19 And they took him, and brought him unto…
19 And they took him, and brought him unto Areopagus, saying, May we know what this new doctrine, whereof thou speakest, is?
Ver. 19. Brought him unto Areopagus] A cruel court where Socrates lost his life for the very same crime that St Paul is here charged with; viz. an endeavour to introduce new deities. (Laertius.) That the apostle came off not only with safety, but some success (for Dionysius, one of the judges, was converted), see a sweet providence. Paul wanted a place to preach in; they brought him to Areopagus as a delinquent, where he hath an opportunity of doing God a great deal of good service. So Charles V, emperor, sent the confession of the Protestant Churches to divers princes of Europe to ask their opinions; hereby the gospel was exceedingly spread and propagated; which gave occasion to Luther to deride Pontificiorum stultam sapientiam, the foolish wisdom of the Papists, in a certain epistle to the elector of Saxony. (Scultet. Annal. 274.)
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv19–34 The city of Athens was divided into five wards,…
The city of Athens was divided into five wards, or parts; one of which was called
Areopagus, from the temple of Mars, which stood upon a hill in it: nigh unto which temple, or in some part of it, was their chiefest court kept; and here they judged of all religious affairs: here they condemned Diagoras, Protagoras, and Socrates; and hither they bring Paul, though rather to inquire of him (there being the resort of learned men) concerning his doctrine, than to condemn him for it.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv22, 24, 29, 30, 31, 32 As if the apostle had said, "Ye men of…
As if the apostle had said, "Ye men of Athens have a great number of gods, whom ye ignorantly worship: the God, therefore, whom ye acknowledge not to know, and yet profess to worship, is he that I preach unto you; for as I passed up and down in your city, beholding your altars and images, I found an altar with this inscription, TO THE UNKNOWN GOD."
Here observe, 1. The light of nature discovered: the altar is inscribed, TO A GOD. The true God of the Jews was an unknown and uncertain God to the wisest of the Gentiles.
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Learn, That some discoveries of God may be made even by the light of nature: these heathens who had nothing but the dim light of nature to guide and direct them, do yet own a God, and acknowledge a worship due unto him, by the erection of an altar.
Observe, 2. The darkness of nature declared: the altar, though erected to a God, yet it is to a God unknown.
Thence learn, That natural light, in its most elevated and raised improvements, can make no full and saving discoveries of God. The true God was but an unknown God, even to the wisest of the heathens, to the men of Athens, who were the most famous, in their day, for the severest wisdom and gravity.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv22, 32 We have here St. Paul's sermon at Athens. Divers…
We have here St. Paul's sermon at Athens. Divers sermons we have had, which the apostles preached to the Jews, or such Gentiles as had an acquaintance with and veneration for the Old Testament, and were worshippers of the true and living God; and all they had to do with them was to open and allege that Jesus is the Christ; but here we have a sermon to heathens, that worshipped false gods, and were without the true God in the world, and to them the scope of their discourse was quite different from what it was to the other. In the former case their business was to lead their hearers by prophecies and miracles to the knowledge of the Redeemer, and faith in him; in the latter it was to lead them by the common works of providence to the knowledge of the Creator, and the worship of him. One discourse of this kind we had before to the rude idolaters of Lystra that deified the apostles (Act 14:15); this recorded here is to the more polite and refined idolaters at Athens, and an admirable discourse it is, and every way suited to his auditory and the design he had upon them.
I. He lays down this, as the scope of his discourse, that he aimed to bring them to the knowledge of the only living and true God, as the sole and proper object of their adoration. He is here obliged to lay the foundation, and to instruct them in the first principle of all religion, that there is a God, and that God is but one. When he preached against the gods they worshipped, he had no design to draw them to atheism, but to the service of the true Deity. Socrates, who had exposed the pagan idolatry, was indicted in this very court, and condemned, not only because he did not esteem those to be gods whom the city esteemed to be so, but because he introduced new demons; and this was the charge against Paul. Now he tacitly owns the former part of the charge, but guards against the latter, by declaring that he does not introduce any new gods, but reduce them to the knowledge of one God, the Ancient of days. Now,
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1. He shows them that they needed to be instructed herein; for they had lost the knowledge of the true God that made them, in the worship of false gods that they had made (Deos qui rogat ille facit - He who worships the gods makes them): I perceive that in all things you are too superstitious. The crime he charges upon them is giving that glory to others which is due to God only, that they feared and worshipped demons, spirits that they supposed inhabited the images to which they directed their worship. "It is time for you to be told that there is but one God who are multiplying deities above any of your neighbours, and mingle your idolatries with all your affairs. You are in all things too superstitious - deisidaimonesteroî you easily admit every thing that comes under a show of religion, but it is that which corrupts it more and more; I bring you that which will reform it." Their neighbours praised them for this as a pious people, but Paul condemns them for it. Yet it is observable how he mollifies the charge, does not aggravate it, to provoke them. He uses a word which among them was taken in a good sense: You are every way more than ordinarily religious, so some read it; you are very devout in your way. Or, if it be taken in a bad sense, it is mitigated: "You are as it were (hōs) more superstitious than you need be;" and he says no more than what he himself perceived; theōrō - I see it, I observe it. They charged Paul with setting forth new demons: "Nay," says he, "you have demons enough already; I will not add to the number of them."
2. He shows them that they themselves had given a fair occasion for the declaring of this one true God to them, by setting up an altar, To the unknown God, which intimated an acknowledgment that there was a God who was yet to them an unknown God; and it is sad to think that at Athens, a place which was supposed to have the monopoly of wisdom, the true God was an unknown God, the only God that was unknown. "Now you ought to bed Paul welcome, for this is the God whom he comes to make known to you, the God whom you tacitly complain that you are ignorant of." There, where we are sensible we are defective and come short, just there, the gospel takes us up, and carries us on.
(1.) Various conjectures the learned have concerning this altar dedicated to the unknown God. [1.] Some think the meaning is, To the God whose honour it is to be unknown, and that they intended the God of the Jews, whose name is ineffable, and whose nature is unsearchable. It is probable they had heard from the Jews, and from the writings of the Old Testament, of the God of Israel, who had proved himself to be above all gods, but was a God hiding himself, Isa 45:15. The heathen called the Jews' God, Deus incertus, incertum Mosis Numen - an uncertain God, the uncertain Deity of Moses, and the God without name. Now this God, says Paul, this God, who cannot by searching be found out to perfection, I now declare unto you. [2.] Others think the meaning is, To the God whom it is our unhappiness not to know, which intimates that they would think it their happiness to know him. Some tell us that upon occasion of a plague that raged at Athens, when they had sacrificed to all their gods one after another for the staying of the plague, they were advised to let some sheep go where they pleased, and, where they lay down, to build an altar, tō prosēkonti Theō - to the proper God, or the God to whom that affair of staying the pestilence did belong; and, because they knew not how to call him, they inscribed it, To the unknown God. Others, from some of the best historians of Athens, tell us they had many altars inscribed, To the gods of Asia, Europe, and Africa - To the unknown God: and some of the neighbouring countries used to swear by the God that was unknown at Athens; so Lucian.
(2.) Observe, how modestly Paul mentions this. That he might not be thought a spy, nor one that had intruded himself more than became a stranger into the knowledge of their mysteries, he tells them that he observed it as he passed by, and saw their devotions, or their sacred things. It was public, and he could not forbear seeing it, and it was proper enough to make his remarks upon the religion of the place; and observe how prudently and ingeniously he takes occasion from this to bring in his discourse of the true God. [1.] He tells them that the God he preached to them was one that they did already worship, and therefore he was not a setter forth of new or strange gods: "As you have a dependence upon him, so he has had some kind of homage from you." [2.] He was one whom they ignorantly worshipped, which was a reproach to them, who were famous all the world over for their knowledge. "Now," says he, "I come to take away that reproach, that you may worship him understandingly whom how you worship ignorantly; and it cannot but be acceptable to have your blind devotion turned into a reasonable service, that you may not worship you know not what."
II. He confirms his doctrine of one living and true God, by his works of creation and providence: "The God whom I declare unto you to be the sole object of your devotion, and call you to the worship of, is the God that made the world and governs it; and, by the visible proofs of these, you may be led to this invisible Being, and be convinced of his eternal power and Godhead." The Gentiles in general, and the Athenians particularly, in their devotions were governed, not by their philosophers, many of whom spoke clearly and excellently well of one supreme Numen, of his infinite perfections and universal agency and dominion (witness the writings of Plato, and long after of Cicero); but by their poets, and their idle fictions. Homer's works were the Bible of the pagan theology, or demonology rather, not Plato's; and the philosophers tamely submitted to this, rested in their speculations, disputed them among themselves, and taught them to their scholars, but never made the use they ought to have made of them in opposition to idolatry; so little certainty were they at concerning them, and so little impression did these things make upon them! Nay, they ran themselves into the superstition of their country, and thought they ought to do so. Eamus ad communem errorem - Let us embrace the common error. Now Paul here sets himself, in the first place, to reform the philosophy of the Athenians (he corrects the mistakes of that), and to give them right notions of the one only living and true God, and then to carry the matter further than they ever attempted for the reforming of their worship, and the bringing them off from their polytheism and idolatry. Observe what glorious things Paul here says of that God whom he served, and would have them to serve.
1. He is the God that made the world, and all things therein; the Father almighty, the Creator of heaven and earth. This was admitted by many of the philosophers; but those of Aristotle's school denied it, and maintained "that the world was from eternity, and every thing always was from eternity, and every thing always was what now it is." Those of the school of Epicurus fancied "that the world was made by a fortuitous concourse of atoms, which, having been in perpetual motion, at length accidentally jumped into this frame." Against both these Paul here maintains that God by the operations of an infinite power, according to the contrivance of an infinite wisdom, in the beginning of time made the world and all things therein, the origin of which was owing, not as they fancied to an eternal matter, but to an eternal mind.
2. He is therefore Lord of heaven and earth, that is, he is the rightful owner, proprietor, and possessor, of all the beings, powers, and riches of the upper and lower world, material and immaterial, visible and invisible. This follows from his making heaven and earth. If he created all, without doubt he has the disposing of all: and, where he gives being, he has an indisputable right to give law.
3. He is, in a particular manner, the Creator of men, of all men (Act 17:26): He made of one blood all nations of men. He made the first man, he makes every man, is the former of every man's body and the Father of every man's spirit. He has made the nations of men, not only all men in the nations, but as nations in their political capacity; he is their founder, and disposed them into communities for their mutual preservation and benefit. He made them all of one blood, of one and the same nature; he fashions their heart alike. Descended from one and the same common ancestor, in Adam they are all akin, so they are in Noah, that hereby they might be engaged in mutual affection and assistance, as fellow-creatures and brethren. Have we not all one Father? Hath not one God created us? Mal 2:10. He hath made them to dwell on all the face of the earth, which, as a bountiful benefactor, he has given, with all its fulness, to the children of men. He made them not to live in one place, but to be dispersed over all the earth; one nation therefore ought not to look with contempt upon another, as the Greeks did upon all other nations; for those on all the face of the earth are of the same blood. The Athenians boasted that they sprung out of their own earth, were aborigines, and nothing akin by blood to any other nation, which proud conceit of themselves the apostle here takes down.
4. That he is the great benefactor of the whole creation (Act 17:25): He giveth to all life, and breath, and all things. He not only breathed into the first man the breath of life, but still breathes it into every man. He gave us these souls he formed the spirit of man within him. He not only gave us our life and breath, when he brought us into being, but he is continually giving them to us; his providence is a continued creation; he holds our souls in life; every moment our breath goes forth, but he graciously gives it us again the next moment; it is no only his air that we breathe in, but it is in his hand that our breath is, Dan 5:23. He gives to all the children of men their life and breath; for as the meanest of the children of men live upon him, and receive from him, so the greatest, the wisest philosophers and mightiest potentates, cannot live without him. He gives to all, not only to all the children of men, but to the inferior creatures, to all animals, every thing wherein is the breath of life (Gen 6:17); they have their life and breath from him, and where he gives life and breath he gives all things, all other things needful for the support of life. The earth is full of his goodness, Psa 104:24, Psa 104:27.
5. That he is the sovereign disposer of all the affairs of the children of men, according to the counsel of his will (Act 17:26): He hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation. See here, (1.) The sovereignty of God's disposal concerning us: he hath determined every event, horisas, the matter is fixed; the disposals of Providence are incontestable and must not be disputed, unchangeable and cannot be altered. (2.) The wisdom of his disposals; he hath determined what was before appointed. The determinations of the Eternal Mind are not sudden resolves, but the counterparts of an eternal counsel, the copies of divine decrees. He performeth the thing that is appointed for me, Job 23:14. Whatever comes forth from God was before all worlds hid in God. (3.) The things about which his providence is conversant; these are time and place: the times and places of our living in this world are determined and appointed by the God that made us. [1.] He has determined the times that are concerning us. Times to us seem changeable, but God has fixed them. Our times are in his hand, to lengthen or shorten, embitter or sweeten, as he pleases. He has appointed and determined the time of our coming into the world, and the time of our continuance in the world; our time to be born, and our time to die (Ecc 3:1, Ecc 3:2), and all that little that lies between them - the time of all our concernments in this world. Whether they be prosperous times or calamitous times, it is he that has determined them; and on him we must depend, with reference to the times that are yet before us. [2.] He has also determined and appointed the bounds of our habitation. He that appointed the earth to be a habitation for the children of men has appointed to the children of men a distinction of habitations upon the earth, has instituted such a thing as property, to which he has set bounds to keep us from trespassing one upon another. The particular habitations in which our lot is cast, the place of our nativity and of our settlement, are of God's determining and appointing, which is a reason why we should accommodate ourselves to the habitations we are in, and make the best of that which is.
6. That he is not far from every one of us, Act 17:27. He is every where present, not only is at our right hand, but has possessed our reins (Psa 139:13), has his eye upon us at all times, and knows us better than we know ourselves. Idolaters made images of God, that they might have him with them in those images, the absurdity of which the apostle here shows; for he in an infinite Spirit, that is not far from any of us, and never the nearer, but in one sense the further off from us, for our pretending to realize or presentiate him to ourselves by any image. He is nigh unto us, both to receive the homage we render him and to give the mercies we ask of him, wherever we are, though near no altar, image, or temple. The Lord of all, as he is rich (Rom 10:12), so he is nigh (Deu 4:7), to all that call upon him. He that wills us to pray every where, assures us that he is no where far from us; whatever country, nation, or profession we are of, whatever our rank and condition in the world are, be we in a palace or in a cottage, in a crowd or in a corner, in a city or in a desert, in the depths of the sea or afar off upon the sea, this is certain, God is not far from every one of us.
7. That in him we live, and move, and have our being, Act 17:28. We have a necessary and constant dependence upon his providence, as the streams have upon the spring, and the beams upon the sun. (1.) In him we live; that is, the continuance of our lives is owing to him and the constant influence of his providence; he is our life, and the length of our days. It is not only owing to his patience and pity that our forfeited lives are not cut off, but it is owing to his power, and goodness, and fatherly care, that our frail lives are prolonged. There needs not a positive act of his wrath to destroy us; if he suspend the positive acts of his goodness, we die of ourselves. (2.) In him we move; it is by the uninterrupted concourse of his providence that our souls move in their outgoings and operations, that our thoughts run to and fro about a thousand subjects, and our affections run out towards their proper objects. It is likewise by him that our souls move our bodies; we cannot stir a hand, or foot, or a tongue, but by him, who, as he is the first cause, so he is the first mover. (3.) In him we have our being; not only from him we had it at first, but in him we have it still; to his continued care and goodness we owe it, not only that we have a being and are not sunk into nonentity, but that we have our being, have this being, were and still are of such a noble rank of beings, capable of knowing and enjoying God; and are not thrust into the meanness of brutes, nor the misery of devils.
8. That upon the whole matter we are God's offspring; he is our Father that begat us (Deu 32:6, Deu 32:18), and he hath nourished and brought us up as children, Isa 1:2. The confession of an adversary in such a case is always looked upon to be of use as argumentum ad hominem - an argument to the man, and therefore the apostle here quotes a saying of one of the Greek poets, Aratus, a native of Cilicia, Paul's countryman, who, in his Phenomena, in the beginning of his book, speaking of the heathen Jupiter, that is, in the poetical dialect, the supreme God, says this of him, tou gar kai genos esmen - for we are also his offspring. And he might have quoted other poets to the purpose of what he was speaking, that in God we live and move: -
Spiritus intus alit, totamque infusa per artus
Mens agitat molem.
This active mind, infus'd through all the space,
Unites and mingles with the mighty mass.
- Virgil, Aeneid 6
Est Deus in nobis, agitante calescimus illo.
'Tis the Divinity that warms our hearts.
- Ovid, Fast. 6
Jupiter est quodeunque vides,
Quocunque moveris.
Where'er you look, where'er you rove
'The spacious scene is full of Jove.
- Lucan, lib. 2
But he chooses this of Aratus, as having much in a little. By this it appears not only that Paul was himself a scholar, but that human learning is both ornamental and serviceable to a gospel minister, especially for the convincing of those that are without; for it enables him to beat them at their own weapons, and to cut off Goliath's head with his own sword. How can the adversaries of truth be beaten out of their strong-holds by those that do not know them? It may likewise shame God's professing people, who forget their relation to God, and walk contrary to it, that a heathen poet could say of God, We are his offspring, formed by him, formed for him, more the care of his providence than ever any children were the care of their parents; and therefore are obliged to obey his commands, and acquiesce in his disposals, and to be unto him for a name and a praise. Since in him and upon him we live, we ought to live to him; since in him we move, we ought to move towards him; and since in him we have our being, and from him we receive all the supports and comforts of our being, we ought to consecrate our being to him, and to apply to him for a new being, a better being, an eternal well-being.
III. From all these great truths concerning God, he infers the absurdity of their idolatry, as the prophets of old had done. If this be so, 1. Then God cannot be represented by an image. If we are the offspring of God, as we are spirits in flesh, then certainly he who is the Father of our spirits (and they are the principal part of us, and that part of us by which we are denominated God's offspring) is himself a Spirit, and we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device, Act 17:29. We wrong God, and put an affront upon him, if we think so. God honoured man in making his soul after his own likeness; but man dishonours God if he makes him after the likeness of his body. The Godhead is spiritual, infinite, immaterial, incomprehensible, and therefore it is a very false and unjust conception which an image gives us of God, be the matter ever so rich, fold or silver; be the shape ever so curious, and be it ever so well graven by art or man's device, its countenance, posture, or dress, ever so significant, it is a teacher of lies. 2. Then he dwells not in temples made with hands, Act 17:24. He is not invited to any temple men can build for him, nor confined to any. A temple brings him never the nearer to us, nor keeps him ever the longer among us. A temple is convenient for us to come together in to worship God; but God needs not any place of rest or residence, nor the magnificence and splendour of any structure, to add to the glory of his appearance. A pious, upright heart, a temple not made with hands, but by the Spirit of God, is that which he dwells in, and delights to dwell in. See Kg1 8:27; Isa 66:1, Isa 66:2. 3. Then he is not worshipped, therapeuetai, he is not served, or ministered unto, with men's hands, as though he needed any thing, Act 17:25. He that made all, and maintains all, cannot be benefited by any of our services, nor needs them. If we receive and derive all from him, he is all-sufficient, and therefore cannot but be self-sufficient, and independent. What need can God have of our services, or what benefit can he have by them, when he has all perfection in himself, and we have nothing that is good but what we have from him? The philosophers, indeed, were sensible of this truth, that God has no need of us or our services; but the vulgar heathen built temples and offered sacrifices to their gods, with an opinion that they needed houses and food. See Job 35:5-8; Psa 50:8, etc. 4. Then it concerns us all to enquire after God (Act 17:27): That they should seek the Lord, that is, fear and worship him in a right manner. Therefore God has kept the children of men in a constant dependence upon him for life and all the comforts of life, that he might keep them under constant obligations to him. We have plain indications of God's presence among us, his presidency over us, the care of his providence concerning us, and his bounty to us, that we might be put upon enquiring, Where is God our Maker, who giveth songs in the night, who teacheth us more than the beasts of the earth, and maketh us wiser than the fowls of heaven? Job 35:10, Job 35:11. Nothing, one would think, should be more powerful with us to convince us that there is a God, and to engage us to seek his honour and glory in our services, and to seek our happiness in his favour and love, than the consideration of our own nature, especially the noble powers and faculties of our own souls. If we reflect upon these, and contemplate these, we may perceive both our relation and obligation to a God above us. Yet so dark is this discovery, in comparison with that by divine revelation, and so unapt are we to receive it, that those who have no other could but haply feel after God and find him. (1.) It was very uncertain whether they could by this searching find out God; it is but a peradventure: if haply they might. (2.) If they did find out something of God, yet it was but some confused notions of him; they did but feel after him, as men in the dark, or blind men, who lay hold on a thing that comes in their way, but know not whether it be that which they are in quest of or no. It is a very confused notion which this poet of theirs has of the relation between God and man, and very general, that we are his offspring: as was also that of their philosophers. Pythagoras said, Theion genos esti brotoios - Men have a sort of a divine nature. And Heraclitus (apud Lucian) being asked, What are men? answered, Theoi thnētoi - Mortal gods; and, What are the gods? answered, athanatoi anthrōpoi - Immortal men. And Pindar saith (Nemean, Ode 6), En andrōn hen theōn genos - God and man are near a-kin. It is true that by the knowledge of ourselves we may be led to the knowledge of God, but it is a very confused knowledge. This is but feeling after him. We have therefore reason to be thankful that by the gospel of Christ we have notices given us of God much clearer than we could have by the light of nature; we do not now feel after him, but with open face behold, as in a glass, the glory of God.
IV. He proceeds to call them all to repent of their idolatries, and to turn from them, Act 17:30, Act 17:31. This is the practical part of Paul's sermon before the university; having declared God to them (Act 17:23), he properly presses upon them repentance towards God, and would also have taught them faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ, if they had had the patience to hear him. Having shown them the absurdity of their worshipping other gods, he persuades them to go on no longer in that foolish way of worship, but to return from it to the living and true God. Observe,
1. The conduct of God towards the Gentile world before the gospel came among them: The times of this ignorance God winked at. (1.) They were times of great ignorance. Human learning flourished more than ever in the Gentile world just before Christ's time; but in the things of God they were grossly ignorant. Those are ignorant indeed who either know not God or worship him ignorantly; idolatry was owing to ignorance. (2.) These times of ignorance God winked at. Understand it, [1.] As an act of divine justice. God despised or neglected these times of ignorance, and did not send them his gospel, as now he does. It was very provoking to him to see his glory thus given to another; and he detested and hated these times. So some take it. Or rather, [2.] As an act of divine patience and forbearance. He winked at these times; he did not restrain them from these idolatries by sending prophets to them, as he did to Israel; he did not punish them in their idolatries, as he did Israel; but gave them the gifts of his providence, Act 14:16, Act 14:17. These things thou hast done, and I kept silence, Psa 50:21. He did not give them such calls and motives to repentance as he does now. He let them alone. Because they did not improve the light they had, but were willingly ignorant, he did not send them greater lights. Or, he was not quick and severe with them, but was long-suffering towards them, because they did it ignorantly, Ti1 1:13.
2. The charge God gave to the Gentile world by the gospel, which he now sent among them: He now commandeth all men every where to repent - to change their mind and their way, to be ashamed of their folly and to act more wisely, to break off the worship of idols and bind themselves to the worship of the true God. Nay, it is to turn with sorrow and shame from every sin, and with cheerfulness and resolution to every duty. (1.) This is God's command. It had been a great favour if he had only told us that there was room left for repentance, and we might be admitted to it; but he goes further, he interposes his own authority for our good, and has made that our duty which is our privilege. (2.) It is his command to all men, every where, - to men, and not to angels, that need it not, - to men, and not to devils, that are excluded the benefit of it, - to all men in all places; all men have made work for repentance, and have cause enough to repent, and all men are invited to repent, and shall have the benefit of it. The apostles are commissioned to preach this every where. The prophets were sent to command the Jews to repent; but the apostles were sent to preach repentance and remission of sins to all nations. (3.) Now in gospel times it is more earnestly commanded, because more encouraged than it had been formerly. Now the way of remission is more opened than it had been, and the promise more fully confirmed; and therefore now he expects we should all repent. "Now repent; now at length, now in time, repent; for you have too long gone on in sin. Now in time repent, for it will be too late shortly."
3. The great reason to enforce this command, taken from the judgment to come. God commands us to repent, because he hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness (Act 17:31), and has now under the gospel made a clearer discovery of a state of retribution in the other world than ever before. Observe, (1.) The God that made the world will judge it; he that gave the children of men their being and faculties will call them to an account for the use they have made of them, and recompense them accordingly, whether the body served the soul in serving God or the soul was a drudge to the body in making provision for the flesh; and every man shall receive according to the things done in the body, Co2 5:10. The God that now governs the world will judge it, will reward the faithful friends of his government and punish the rebels. (2.) There is a day appointed for this general review of all that men have done in time, and a final determination of their state for eternity. The day is fixed in the counsel of God, and cannot be altered; but it is his there, and cannot be known. A day of decision, a day of recompence, a day that will put a final period to all the days of time. (3.) The world will be judged in righteousness; for God is not unrighteous, who taketh vengeance; far be it from him that he should do iniquity. His knowledge of all men's characters and actions is infallibly true, and therefore his sentence upon them incontestably just. And, as there will be no appeal from it, so there will be no exception against it. (4.) God will judge the world by that man whom he hath ordained, who can be no other than the Lord Jesus, to whom all judgment is committed. By him God made the world, by him he redeemed it, by him he governs it, and by him he will judge it. (5.) God's raising Christ from the dead is the great proof of his being appointed and ordained the Judge of quick and dead. His doing him that honour evidenced his designing him this honour. His raising him from the dead was the beginning of his exaltation, his judging the world will be the perfection of it; and he that begins will make an end. God hath given assurance unto all men, sufficient ground for their faith to build upon, both that there is a judgment to come and that Christ will be their judge; the matter is not left doubtful, but is of unquestionable certainty. Let all his enemies be assured of it, and tremble before him; let all his friends be assured of it, and triumph in him. (6.) The consideration of the judgment to come, and of the great hand Christ will have in that judgment, should engage us all to repent of our sins and turn from them to God. This is the only way to make the Judge our friend in that day, which will be a terrible day to all who live and die impenitent; but true penitents will then lift up their heads with joy, knowing that their redemption draws nigh.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv19–33 And they took him,.... Not that they laid hands…
And they took him,.... Not that they laid hands on him, and carried him away by violence, as a derider of their gods, and an introducer of new ones, in order to punish him; but they invited him to go with them, and they took him along with them in a friendly manner, and had him to a more convenient place for preaching and disputation, and where were many learned men to hear and judge of his doctrine; and this appears from their desire to hear what his doctrine was, and from his quiet departure, after he had ended his discourse:
and brought him unto Areopagus. The Arabic version seems to understand this of a person, rendering it, "and brought him to the most skilful, and the judge of the doctors"; to be heard and examined before him, about the doctrine he preached, who was most capable of judging concerning it; and this might be Dionysius, who is called the Areopagite, and was converted by the apostle, Act 17:34. The Ethiopic version renders it, "they brought him to the house of their god"; to one of their idols' temple, the temple of Mars, which is not much amiss; for we are told (g), that Areopagus was a street in Athens, in which was the temple of Mars, from whence it had its name; but the Syriac version renders it best of all, "they brought him to the house of judgment, or "court of judicature", which is called Areopagus"; and so it is called "Martium judicium", or Mars's "court of judicature", by Apuleius (h), and "Martis curia", or the "court of Mars", by Juvenal (i), for it was a court where causes were tried, and the most ancient one with the Athenians, being instituted by Cerops, their first king; and is thought to be near as ancient, if not fully as ancient, yea, as more ancient than the sanhedrim, or the court of seventy elders, appointed by Moses among the Jews. It was called Areopagus, because Ares, or Mars, was the first that was judged there (k). The case was this, Alcippe, the daughter of Mars, being ravished by Habirrhothius, the son of Neptune, and caught by Mars in the very fact, was killed by him; upon which Neptune arraigned Mars for the murder, and tried him in this place, by a jury of twelve deities, by whom he was acquitted (l). Hither Paul was brought, not to be tried in a legal manner; for it does not appear that any charge was exhibited against him, or any legal process carried on, only an inquiry was made about his doctrine, and that only to gratify their curiosity:
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saying, may we know what this new doctrine, whereof thou speakest, is? for they had never heard of Jesus, nor of salvation by him, nor of the resurrection of the dead; these were all new things to them, and therefore they were the more curious to ask after them, new things being what they were fond of: wherefore they call his doctrine new, not so much by way of reproach, as suggesting it to be a reason why they inquired after it, and why they desired him to give them some account of it; and that it should be a new doctrine with them, or if they reproached it with the charge of novelty, it need not be wondered at in them, when the Jews charged and reproached the doctrine of Christ in like manner, Mar 1:27.
(g) Alex. ab Alex. Genial. Dier. l. 3. c. 5. (h) Milesiarum 10. (i) Satyr. 5. (k) Pausaniae Attica, p. 52. (l) Apellodorus de deorum origine, l. 3, p. 193.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv19, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34 The Areopagus, or hill of Mars, (dedicated to Mars,…
The Areopagus, or hill of Mars, (dedicated to Mars, the heathen God of war,) was the place where the Athenians held their supreme court of judicature. But it does not appear he was carried thither as a criminal. The original number of its Judges was twelve; but afterward it increased to three hundred. These were generally men of the greatest families in Athens, and were famed for justice and integrity.
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Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv19–34 Verse 19. They took him, and brought him unto…
Verse 19. They took him, and brought him unto Areopagus] The Areopagus was a hill not far from the Acropolis, already described, where the supreme court of justice was held; one of the most sacred and reputable courts that had ever existed in the Gentile world. It had its name, αρειος παγος, Areopagus, or the Hill of Mars, or Ares, from the circumstance, according to poetic fiction, of Mars being tried there, by a court of twelve gods, for the murder of Halirrhothius, son of Neptune: the meaning of which is, that Ares, a Thessalian prince, having slain Halirrhothius, the son of a neighbouring prince, for having violated his daughter Alcippe, was here tried by twelve judges, by whom he was honourably acquitted: in the Athenian laws the death of the ravisher was the regular forfeiture for his crime. The justice administered in this court was so strict and impartial, that, it was generally allowed, both the plaintiff and defendant departed satisfied with the decision. "Innocence, when summoned before it, appeared without apprehension; and the guilty, convicted and condemned, retired with out daring to murmur." The place in which the judges sat was uncovered; and they held their sittings by night, to the end that nothing might distract their minds from the great business on which they were to decide; and that the sight of the accused might not affect them either with pity or aversion. In reference to this, all pleaders were strictly forbidden to use any means whatever to excite either pity or aversion, or to affect the passions; every thing being confined to simple relation, or statement of facts. When the two parties were produced before the court, they were placed between the bleeding members of victims slain on the occasion, and were obliged to take an oath, accompanied by horrible imprecations on themselves and families, that they would testify nothing but truth. These parties called to witness the eumenides, or furies, the punishers of the perjured in the infernal world; and, to make the greater impression on the mind of the party swearing, the temple dedicated to these infernal deities was contiguous to the court, so that they appeared as if witnessing the oaths and recording the appeal made to themselves. When the case was fully heard, the judges gave their decision by throwing down their flint pebbles, on two boards or tables, one of which was for the condemnation, the other for the acquittal, of the person in question.
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Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv19, 22, 23, 24, 27, 29, 30, 33 Act 17:19-21. And — The crowd increasing to a…
Act 17:19-21. And — The crowd increasing to a greater number than could conveniently hear him, in the place where they then were; they took and brought him unto Areopagus — Or, the hill of Mars, dedicated to Mars, the heathen god of war, the place where the Athenians held their supreme court of judicature, of which the original number of judges was twelve, but it was afterward increased to three hundred, who were generally men of the greatest families in Athens, and were famed for justice and integrity. Paul, however, was certainly not carried thither to be tried as a criminal, but to be heard discoursing concerning his new doctrine: for they said, May we know what this new doctrine is? For thou bringest certain strange things to our ears — Exceedingly different from what we have ever received from any of those many professors, of various learning, which this city has produced: we would know, therefore, what these things mean — And wish to hear them from thine own mouth, rather than by the uncertain report of others. This course, it must be observed, the Athenians took with Paul, not from the love of truth, but from mere curiosity: for, as the historian proceeds to observe, all the Athenians, and strangers sojourning there — And catching their distemper; spent their time in nothing else but either to tell — To others; or to hear — For themselves; some new thing — Greek, τι καινοτερον, literally, some newer thing. New things quickly grew cheap, and they wanted those that were newer still. The apostle, therefore, “being thus called to declare the new doctrine whereof he spake, to an assembly consisting of senators, philosophers, rhetoricians, and statesmen, willingly embraced the opportunity; and, in a most eloquent discourse, prepared his illustrious auditors for receiving that doctrine which appeared to them so strange, by showing them the absurdity of the commonly-received idolatry, and by speaking on that delicate subject with an address, and temper, and strength of reasoning, which would have done honour to the greatest orators of Greece or Rome.” — Macknight.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv19–34 And brought him unto Areopagus - Margin, or “Mars’…
And brought him unto Areopagus - Margin, or “Mars’ hill.” This was the place or court in which the Areopagites, the celebrated supreme judges of Athens, assembled. It was on a hill almost in the middle of the city; but nothing now remains by which we can determine the form or construction of the tribunal. The hill is almost entirely a mass of stone, and is not easily accessible, its sides being steep and abrupt. On many accounts this was the most celebrated tribunal in the world. Its decisions were distinguished for justice and correctness; nor was there any court in Greece in which so much confidence was placed. This court took cognizance of murders, impieties, and immoralities; they punished vices of all kinds, including idleness; they rewarded the virtuous; they were especially attentive to blasphemies against the gods, and to the performance of the sacred mysteries of religion. It was, therefore, with the greatest propriety that Paul was brought before this tribunal, as being regarded as a setter forth of strange gods, and as being supposed to wish to Introduce a new mode of worship. See Potter’s “Antiquities of Greece,” book 1, chapter 19; and Travels of Anacharsis, vol. i. 136, 185; ii. 292-295.
May we know - We would know. This seems to have been a respectful inquiry; and it does not appear that Paul was brought there for the sake of trial. There are no accusations; no witnesses; none of the forms of trial. They seem to have resorted thither because it was the place where the subject of religion was usually discussed, and because it was a place of confluence for the citizens, and judges, and wise men of Athens, and of foreigners. The design seems to have been, not to try him, but fairly to canvass the claims of his doctrines. See Act 17:21. It was just an instance of the inquisitive spirit of the people of Athens, willing to hear before they condemned, and to examine before they approved.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv19, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 34 To the Areopagus. In this place sat the Athenian…
To the Areopagus. In this place sat the Athenian judges: but some think that by this word may be here signified, some large hall or court, joining to the Areopagus, where all sorts of people met. (Witham) --- The Areopagus was the supreme and most famous tribunal of all Greece, before which all great causes were tried. The persons who composed it were much renowned for their wisdom. Cicero, and many other Romans, were ambitious of the honour of being an Areopagite; but the power of Athens being now much diminished, this court had sunk in importance, and was now not much more than the shadow of a great name. (Calmet)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv19, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34 they took him, and brought him to Areopagus--"the hill…
they took him, and brought him to Areopagus--"the hill where the most awful court of judicature had sat from time immemorial to pass sentence on the greatest criminals, and to decide on the most solemn questions connected with religion. No place in Athens was so suitable for a discourse on the mysteries of religion" [HOWSON]. The apostle, however, was not here on his trial, but to expound more fully what he had thrown out in broken conversations in the Agora.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 34 19. Took him—Not violence, but guidance.
19. Took him—Not violence, but guidance.
Areopagus—Capriciously rendered by our translators Mars’ hill, in Act_17:22. The term is compounded of Αρειον, belonging to Mars, and παγος, hill, and the place was so named because, according to mythology, on that height the god Mars, having slain the son of Neptune, pleaded his case before the twelve great gods. Here the most ancient and reverend court known in Greece, consisting of the weightiest characters of the state, held its solemn sessions by night alone. Among its duties was the sacred one of judging the lawfulness of any religious rite or dogma. Paul was not arraigned before the court, but only invited by Athenian curiosity to speak in the place. Yet certainly one of the Areopagite judges was present, and, perhaps, others, in their judicial seats.
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May we know—Literally, can we know, a most respectful form of request.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 34 19. And they took him] Better, took hold of…
19. And they took him] Better, took hold of him. (As R. V.) But there is no need to suppose that any violence was used or intended. The same verb is used often of taking by the hand to aid or protect (so Mar_8:23; Act_23:19), and is the word by which the action of Barnabas is described (Act_9:27) when “he took Paul and brought him to the apostles.” Moreover the whole context shews that the action of the crowd was in no sense that of an arrest, for we read (Act_17:33) when his speech was done “Paul departed from among them,” evidently having been under no kind of restraint.
and brought him unto Areopagus] More clearly expressed if we read “the Areopagus.” This place, the name of which is translated “Mars’ hill” below in the text and here in the margin of the A.V., was an eminence to the west of the Acropolis at Athens. It was famous in classic literature as the meeting-place of the Athenian council of Areopagus which took its name from the place where it met. To this hill of Mars (Ares) the philosophers led St Paul, probably at a time when it was unoccupied (though some suppose that the court was sitting), that they might the better hear him away from the bustle of the market-place, and that he might more conveniently address a larger audience.
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May we know] The verb here rendered “may” = literally “are we able.” But there is no doubt that its force is well given by the A.V. For the literal force “to be able” often merged itself in that of “to wish” or “to be willing.” Cp. Luk_11:7, where the verb is translated “I cannot (= I am not able to) rise and give thee,” but the sense is “I don’t wish to rise,” for after importunity he does arise and do all that is asked. The Stoics and Epicureans were not likely to doubt their own ability to understand all that St Paul might say to them.
what this new doctrine, whereof thou speakest, is] Better (with R. V.), “what this new doctrine is which is spoken by thee.” The sense conveyed by the verb (λαλεῖν) is often in N. T. that of announcing or publishing, and the word is not unfrequently used of messages spoken by God or by his prophets (cp. Luk_1:45; Luk_1:55; Luk_1:70; Luk_24:25; Act_3:21; Act_3:24; Jas_5:10). The Apostle was not speaking to the Athenians about the doctrine, his words were the doctrine.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 34 (19) They took him, and brought him unto Areopagus.—The…
(19) They took him, and brought him unto Areopagus.—The name may stand either for the Hill of Mars, simply as a locality, or for the Court which sat there, and was known as the Court of the Areopagus, and which, as the oldest and most revered tribunal in Athens, owing its origin to Athena, and connected with the story of Orestes and the worship of the propitiated Erinnyes (the Avengers) as the Eumenides (the Gentle Ones), still continued to exercise jurisdiction in all matters connected with the religion of the state, and numbered among its members men of the highest official rank. It had originally consisted only of those who had filled the office of Archon and were over sixty years of age. Its supreme authority had been in some measure limited by Pericles, and it was as the organ of the party who opposed the ideas of freedom and progress of which he was the representative, that Æschylus wrote the tragedy of the Eumenides, in which the divine authority of the Court was impressed upon men’s minds. Here, however, the narrative that follows presents no trace of a formal trial, and hence it has been questioned whether the Apostle was brought before the Court of the Areopagus. Unless, however, there had been some intention of a trial, there seems no reason for their taking him to the Areopagus rather than to the Pnyx or elsewhere; and the mention of a member of the Court as converted by St. Paul’s preaching, makes it probable that the Court was actually sitting at the time. The most natural explanation of the apparent difficulty is, that as the charge of bringing in “strange deities” was one which came under the jurisdiction of the Areopagus Court, the crowd who seized on St. Paul hurried him there, not presenting a formal indictment, but calling for a preliminary inquiry, that his speech accordingly, though of the nature of an apologia, was not an answer to a distinct accusation, and that having heard it, the Court looked on the matter as calling for no special action, and passed to the order of the day.
May we know . . .?—The form of the question, courteous in semblance, but with a slight touch of sarcasm, is eminently characteristic in itself, and shows also that there was no formal accusation, though the words that followed suggested the thought that there possibly might be materials for one. What had been said was “strange” enough to require an explanation.
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The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv19–34 Took held of for took, A.V.; the Areopagus for…
Took held of for took, A.V.; the Areopagus for Areopagus, A.V.; teaching is for doctrine is, A..V; which is spoken by thee for whereof thou speakest, A.V. Took hold of him. The word ejpilabesqai means simply to "take hold of" the hand, the hair, a garment, etc. The context alone decides whether this taking held is friendly or hostile. (for the former sense, see Mat_14:31; Mar_8:23; Luk_9:47 Luk_14:4; Act_9:27 Act_23:19, etc.; for the latter, Luk_23:26; Act_16:19 Act_18:17 Act_21:30, Act_21:33) Here the sense is well expressed by Grotius (quoted by Meyer): "Taking him gently by the hand." The Areopagas. Mars" Hill, close to the Agora ("the market") on the north, was so called from the legend that Mars was tried there before the gods for the murder of a son of Neptune. It is (says Lewin) a bare, rugged rock, approached at the southeastern corner by steps, of which sixteen still remain perfect. Its area at the top measures sixty paces by twenty-four, within which a quadrangle, sixteen paces square, is excavated and leveled for the court. The judges seem to have sat on benches tier above tier on the rising rock on the north side of the quadrangle. There were also seats on the east and west sides, and on the south on either side of the stairs. The Areopagus (the upper court) was the most august of all the courts at Athens. Socrates was tried and condemned before it for impiety. On the present occasion, there is no appearance of judicial proceedings, but they seem to have adjourned to the Areopagus from the Agora, as to a convenient place for quiet discussion.
Vers. 19-21. The passion for something new.
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Demosthenes said, in one of his speeches, "Tell me, is it all you care for, to go about up and down the market, asking each other, "Is there any news? The restless inquisitiveness of the Athenian character had all along been proverbial. It did not alone distinguish the Athenians, though it gained a peculiar prominence in their case. It has returned upon man in such power, now that telegraphs and newspapers bind the nations together, that it may profitably be made the subject of Christian meditation.
I IT SOMETIMES COMES TO BE A DISEASE, A mental disease. A restlessness that we see illustrated in some children, who tire at once of their toys and crave for something new. We see it in the world of fashion, in which garments are speedily set aside, and the last new color, or shape, or material is eagerly sought. It is equally shown in the passion for the newest books, the last newspaper, the freshest opinion, the present excitement. It even afflicts Christian people, who in a crowd run after the newest revivalist, and cry for the latest novelty in doctrine or in Church method. It is a kind of feverish delirium, which palls the appetite, vitiates the taste, and makes patient continuance in well-doing impossible. It needs to be treated as a disease, and its influence in a family, in social life, and in the Church needs to be carefully checked. It is not progress that is usually sought, because true progress ever goes slowly; it is mere novelty that is sought. We may generally say that "the old is better.
II IT IS ONE OF THE SIGNS OF OVERDONE CIVILIZATION. It is a marked feature of a nation that is struggling up into civilization, that all its members must be workers, and none can be kept in idleness. To such a nation mere news is the amusement of its resting leisure hours; it cannot be the sober business of its days. But when nations have long reached the high levels of civilization, wealth has increased, multitudes can live in idleness, and, having nothing better to do, they may run after the latest stranger in art, or science, or music, or politics, or religion, and gathering round him say, "May we know what this new doctrine is, whereof thou speakest?" This is well illustrated in the case of the Athenians, who were surfeited with art and philosophy and superstitious religion. A city full of wealthy idlers, no doubt of good taste and cultured minds, who had nothing better to do than to run after the last new thing. The antidote for this evil is the preaching of the responsibility resting on every man to be a worker, and a worker for the general welfare. Nobody has any right to food and life save as they work, in some good way, for it. Workers soon get interest enough to stop their yearning for "something new." Illustrate how these things may be applied to Church life. Church work is the great remedy for the hindering passion for novelty.
III YET IT IS AN INDICATION OF THE UNIVERSAL ASPIRATION FOR IMMORTALITY. There is good in it; the evil of it lies
(1) in the forms it takes, and
(2) in the excessive degrees of its exercise.
That something in us all which cannot rest, which must seek for something more; which rises up above all bondages and limitations; which is as
An infant crying in the night, An infant crying for the light;
is but the aspiration of souls made in the image of God, who cry for permanence, for holiness, for rest, for God, and "can find no rest until they find rest in him." We must seek after something new, on and on, until we find God. And Scripture inspires us to such seeking; for it assures us that "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath the heart of man conceived, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him." And though, in measure, these have been revealed unto us by the Spirit, yet again we are led on by the Word; for "it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. R.T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv21, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars hill.
Act_17:21-31
Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars hill.
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Novelty attractive
Yes, the people gathered in crowds round the statue, and looked at it again and again. It was not the finest work of art in the city, nor the most intrinsically attractive. Why, then, did the citizens of Verona stand in such clusters around the effigy of Dante on that summers evening? Do you guess the reason? It was a fete in honour of the poet. No, you are mistaken; it was but an ordinary evening, and there was nothing peculiar in the date or the events of the day. You shall not be kept in suspense; the reason was very simple; the statue was new; it had, in fact, only been unveiled the day before. Every one passes Dante now, having other things to think of; the citizens are well used to his solemn visage, and scarcely care that he stands among them. Is not this the way of men? (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Novelties and how to regard them
Did you not say that there was a green rose in this place? There are many lovely flowers here, but I had rather see the green rose than anything else. So said a visitor as he stood in a garden where palms, and aloes, and all manner of rare plants, from many lands, were to be seen in perfection; and we should not be surprised if our reader, in like case, were to make the same observation. Yet, when the green rose was seen, it was at once denounced as nothing at all desirable, not a tenth as beautiful as a red or white rose. Just so, there are many folks in this world who must see that which is special, outré, unusual; yet, when they see this freak of nature, or of grace, they turn back to the more usual order of good things with considerable relief, for they feel that the old is better. It is a pity when a man, especially a preacher, is merely a green rose, with a name for being something remarkable, but with no special excellence with which to maintain a reputation. He attracts only for a moment, but sustains no permanent attention, for there is hardly as much about him as there is in the ordinary unpretending teacher of the gospel. Those wanderers who are always running all over the world after green roses, are by no means so wise as those who are content with the perfume and colour of that flower which grows over their own porch, whether it be red or white. The affectation of the unusual is a trick of the charlatan; the craving after it is the weakness of the shallow-minded. Yet, be it noted, that we do not wish to depreciate the green rose. You see we have almost fallen into that unfairness, but the fault was not intentional. We are glad to have seen it, for as a green rose it has charms of its own. Yet this eagerness to see it, this passing over of lovelier objects, this crying up of one beauty above another, inevitably leads to an undervaluing of that which has obtained undeserved prominence. Your foolish partiality has made your favourite a target for excessive criticism; but we will not yield to the temptation. God has made the green rose, and He makes nothing amiss. Your remarkable friend has his excellencies, and God be thanked for them. Your eccentric preacher has his own adaptations for usefulness. Because you cry him up, we are not going to cry him down. Let each rose display its own colour, and let each man be himself, and let the Lord be glorified in all. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Paul at Athens
I. The audience.
1. Jews. The place where he made his first public appearance as a teacher was the synagogue; and his first audience was composed of Jews and devout persons. This was in accordance with the usual apostolic custom of visiting the Jewish place of worship first, and making it the starting point for more extended labours. Nothing is said about the nature or result of his intercourse with his brethren, save that he disputed with them. He would remind them of their splendid opportunities of bearing witness for God in the pagan city.
2. Common people. Leaving the synagogue, and coming to the Agora or market place, the apostle had to mingle with a different class, and the subject of discussion would also be different. The Agora of Athens must not be associated with what is called the market place of a modern town. It was, indeed, the centre of public life, where business was transacted, where busy men moved to and fro, and idlers loitered about. But it was more than that, it was a space decorated with architectural beauties, an attractive place of resort for all classes of the community eager to listen to instruction or hear the news. It was a place where orators and statesmen, poets and artists used to meet for encouragement and stimulus in their several callings. The appearance of a foreigner among such a people, especially if he seemed sociable and talkative, would soon attract a crowd expecting to hear something new. The daily visits of the apostle to the Agora would afford him ample opportunities of proclaiming new truths in the idol city.
3. Philosophers. The philosophers who encountered him were the Epicureans and the Stoics, both of whom had their schools in the vicinity of the Agora.
(1) Epicureans. This sect took its name from Epicurus, who opened a school for the teaching of his philosophy in a garden in Athens; hence his followers were sometimes styled the Philosophers of the Garden. Epicurus taught that the chief end of man was the attainment of pleasure or happiness; and the way to gain it was the removal of every cause of pain or anxiety. A sound body and a tranquil mind constituted the ideal of Epicurean bliss. The main business of life was to raise the mind above cares. Such was the original aim of this school of philosophy; but its later disciples allowed grossest ideas to enter, and pleasure degenerated into the gratification of the appetites. There was no Creator, and no moral government. There were indeed deities, but they lived in undisturbed tranquillity: serene above the turmoil of the world, careless of mankind. The attainment of bliss like theirs was the main business of mans life on earth.
(2) Stoics. The other sect that encountered Paul was the Stoics, so named because Zeno its founder held his meetings inn building called the Stoa or porch. This system of philosophy is regarded as a nearer approximation to Christianity than the Epicurean, inasmuch as it seems to possess a glimmering of the Divine Fatherhood, and forestalls the Christian truth that goodness is indispensable to happiness. But while it recognises God as the Author of all, it does so in a Pantheistic sense, as if God were everything and everything God. The God of the Stoic is not a distinct personality, but an all-pervading spirit, inseparable from the works of his hands. And not only so, but he, and all his works, are under a pre-ordained decree amounting almost, if not altogether, to fatalism. Everything, indeed, is the result of Fate, and freedom of will consists in bowing to Fate. The man who yields most completely to this iron law is the perfect man. The aim of this system was to produce a passionless conformity to Fate. The pursuit of this end engendered apathy or indifference to everything alike pleasurable and painful. Such was the array of diversified opinion that Paul had to combat, and he nobly vindicated his trust as a Christian teacher in the face of pagan enlightenment. His experience of men, and his knowledge of philosophy, gave him special fitness to discharge the mission that Providence had laid upon him.
4. Public meeting on Mars hill. To speak on this venerated spot was a distinction reserved for the foremost orators, and Pauls promotion to that distinction showed the profound impression he had made. The summit of Mars hill was associated in the Athenian mind with solemn and venerable scenes. There sat the most august of assemblies, to dispense justice and confer on religion. The Areopagite court was the supreme tribunal of Athens on social, political, and religious questions. The judges sat in the open air, and their seat on the summit of the rock was reached by a flight of steps. Somewhere on this reserved and hallowed eminence the apostle took his stand; and whether he was there on his defence, as some suppose, or simply for convenience in addressing a large assembly, no spot could have been more suitable for a discussion on the mysteries of religion.
II. The discourse. It was no easy task adequately to address the assemblage that gathered to hear him. What theme could be chosen to suit all and benefit all? Their motives were manifold and their tastes diverse. There were the scoffing Jew and the wisdom-loving Greek, the refined Athenian and the rude provincial, the sceptical philosopher and the unsophisticated stranger, the contented Epicurean and the passionless Stoic. We will now listen to the apostle as he attempts to lift his heathen audience out of their ignorance into the knowledge of the true God, and Jesus Christ whom He hath sent.
1. Creator. He begins by setting forth the unknown God as the Creator of the world. God made the world and all things therein. This was an idea entirely new to the speculative minds or the ancient world, and the prominence here given to it shows that, in Pauls estimation, it lay at the foundation of every true system of religion. It was idle to talk of worship if the Being worshipped was not raised above the worshippers by such qualities and attributes as inspired reverence and trust. So that Pauls statement of the fundamental principle of Theism dealt a fatal stab at the views of ancient philosophy on the origin of the world. There could be no compromise between positions so radically at variance; and while philosophies change with the changing generations, the Christian position remains the same as stated from apostolic lips eighteen centuries ago--God made the world and all things therein.
2. Governor. Advancing a step, the apostle announces the unknown God as the Governor of the world: He hath made all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times appointed and the bounds of their habitation. Here too there was a sharp contrast between revealed truth and the tenets of the schools. Chance, or Fate, said ancient philosophy, appoints to each nation and race its time and place in the world. No, said Paul, there is one presiding Deity, who not only set the world in motion, and gave everything in it life, but who keeps it going and sustains all life, assigning to each man and nation the sphere they are to fill and the length of their stay. The all-controlling providence of God, indeed, follows from the fact of creation. How grand the conception! God marshalling the nations of the earth one after another on the stage of time, appointing their seasons, their work, and the bounds of their habitation, and then withdrawing them when their work is done!
3. Judge. The apostle further declares the unknown God to be the Judge of all men. He hath appointed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness. Here is another aspect of the Divine character and work, which carries our thoughts forward to the close of the present constitution of things, just as the reference to creation recalled their beginning.
4. Father. This is another aspect in which the unknown God is set forth. In Him we live, and move, and have our being, as certain also of your own poets have said, For we also are His offspring. If the ideas of creation, superintendence, and responsibility were unknown to the ancients, much less was the Divine Fatherhood. The quotation referred to does not prove that they recognised God as Father save in the Stoical sense. Cleanthes, one of the poets, quoted from, was a Stoic, and Paul, in citing him, not only showed his acquaintance with Greek literature, but his willingness to take up common ground with his hearers whenever that was possible. In doing so, he doubtless gained for himself a more respectful hearing. He adopted the language of the Stoics, but put upon it a Christian meaning. Taking our position, then, in the world as Gods children, we can view everything in a different light, no longer repelled by the unapproachable majesty of a Great Creator, but drawn by His parental love. The works of His hand also will have an additional interest for us.
5. Is God knowable? This is the question to which the whole argument was leading up, and the answer is in the affirmative. The main purpose of Pauls reasoning was to show the Athenians that He whom they styled the unknown God could be known if they sought Him aright. Though the Divine Being was for a long time pleased to draw a veil over His character and modes of working, it was not intended that He should for ever remain unknown. Indeed, all the arrangements of His providence were such as to lead men to the knowledge of Him.
III. The application. The apostle did not content himself with laying down great general principles. Like a practical man, he applied them. And in order to insure success it will be observed that throughout this masterly exposition there is an evident desire to carry his hearers along with him, so that they might be without excuse if they continued ignorant of God. Having thus laid down a few broad principles, he goes on to apply them to the religion and life of the people.
1. Idolatry. The first application is to idol worship, in which the Athenians prided themselves. It required no small courage and tact to assail with effect such a deep-rooted custom in its very hot bed. The inference was irresistible. The invisible Godhead cannot be represented in visible symbols; and even though it could, every such effort is here condemned because it is a dishonour to God. Besides, we do not need it any more than a child needs the help of an image to love its parents; and we ought not to attempt it, because we have a personal God and Father, who is near to every soul that seeks Him. Moreover all such externals are not only not helps to spiritual worship, but may become a positive hindrance.
2. Repentance. The next application which the apostle makes of his subject is to repentance, or the need of an inward change, which was never contemplated by the ancient religions. Their whole history was an acknowledgment of impotence to effect such a change, or satisfy the burdened heart.
3. Jesus and the resurrection. One practical question still remained. How were they to find favour with this just and holy God? The answer to this question brings us to the climax of this trenchant appeal. There was only one way of return to God, and that not through images of silver and gold, but through Him who is the brightness of the Fathers glory and the express image of His Person. If they must have an image of the invisible God, they had it in the person of His Incarnate Son, who was dead and is alive again, and clothed with judicial authority.
IV. The result. It has often been pointed out that the saving impression made by Paul on this occasion was disappointingly small. Nor need this excite surprise, when we reflect on the peculiar character of the discourse, and especially the sensuous habits of the Greek mind, its philosophic culture and pride of intellect. The haughty cultured Greek would not readily yield himself to the teaching of a rude barbarian. It is seldom that we are able to see the results of our work for Christ in this world, and no doubt the great apostle never saw on earth the fruits of that days work.
1. Some mocked. The philosophic mind of Athens would not bend to the simplicity of the gospel.
2. Others procrastinated. They had a passing glimpse of the falseness and hollowness of the present, and they thought the matter worthy of more serious consideration.
3. A few believed. We know the names of only two--Dionysius, a judge of the Areopagite court, and a woman named Damaris, of whom we are told nothing. (D. Merson, B. D.)
Pauls sermon on Mars hill
He declares to them God--
I. In relation to the universe in general. As--
1. The Creator of the universe: God that made the world, etc. This would strike at once against the Epicureanism which regarded the universe as springing from a fortuitous concourse of atoms--the work of chance: and against the Stoicism, which regarded the universe as existing from eternity.
2. The Ruler of the universe: He is Lord of heaven and earth. The universe is not like a great machine built to manage itself, it is an order of things kept in being and harmony by the unremitting agency of the Creator.
3. The Life of the universe: He giveth to all life, and breath, and all things (cf. verse 28)
. The deductions which the apostle draws from this are irresistible.
(1) That God is unlocalised. He dwelleth not in temples made with hands.
(2) That God is independent. Neither is worshipped with mens hands as though He needed anything. The heathens thought their gods needed their services.
II. In relation to mankind in particular.
1. He gave to all mankind a unity of nature. Made of one blood all nations of men. There are immense diversities subsisting between the European, the Mongolian, the Hottentot races that have led many scientists to conclude that they have descended from various stocks. Without touching on arguments of a scientific kind, we ground our belief chiefly--
(1) On mental resemblances. The faculties of thinking, loving, hating, fearing, hoping, worshipping, self-commending, self-condemning, are common to the race.
(2) On Scriptural statements. There is not a single passage in the Bible to suggest a doubt as to the homogeneity of the race, and the descent from one pair. The most brilliant names in science have maintained the unity of the race: Buffon, Linnaeus, Soemmering, and Cuvier, in natural history; Blumenbach, Muller, and Wagner, in anatomy; Pritchard, Latham, Pickering, among ethnologists; Adeling, W. von Humboldt, and Bunsen, among philologists; and Alexander yon Humboldt, at whose feet all science had laid down its treasures,
2. He appointed to all mankind their boundary in life. And hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation. There is a boundary for every man in relation to--
(1) The place of his existence. The sphere which individuals occupy is a sphere which God has appointed. Every man has an orbit of his own, and that orbit is appointed by Him. The same with nations. Nations have their geographic boundary, and these have been drawn by heaven. Though they may proximately grow out of the diversity of mens organisations, customs, laws, habits, still God hath made them.
(2) Time. Men and nations have their day, and the length of that day even to the minute is determined. There is no room for chance in human history.
3. He requires from all mankind the recognition of His existence. That they should seek the Lord, etc.
(1) Mans distance from God. This distance is moral, and is to be overcome by effort on mans part. That they should seek the Lord.
(2) Gods nearness to man. This utterance is so pregnant as to require a separate discourse.
4. He is the Father of all mankind. We are all His offspring.
5. He demands repentance from all (Act_17:30). (D. Thomas, D. D.)
Pauls sermon On Mars hill
I. God the Creator. Paul shows this unknown Deity to be the God that made the world, etc. He was unlike the other gods in these respects--
1. There was no limit to His power. For none of the gods did the Athenians claim the power of universal creation. One could do one thing, and another something else, but this God was the maker of the world and all things in it.
2. There was no limit to His dominion. Being Lord of heaven and earth. Other deities were supreme only in certain localities, or under certain localities, or under certain circumstances, but this God was everywhere, and always Master.
3. There was no limit to His dwelling place. Dwelleth not in temples made with hands. The whole universe was His sanctuary.
II. God the Giver.
1. His independency. Neither is served by mens hands, etc. Other deities, according to their notions, were hungry, and needed to be fed, and were therefore brought costly offerings of food and drink.
2. His outgiving. Seeing He Himself giveth, etc. God was the Giver, instead of being the Receiver--like the other deities that were worshipped. The Creator could not be dependent upon the creature.
III. God the Father. For we are also His offspring.
1. The brotherhood of men. To the Athenians this was no palatable thought. Proud of their culture and intellectual superiority, they superciliously divided the world into Greeks and barbarians. Paul set forth this doctrine by showing--
(1) The unity of the nations. He made of one every nation of men. They were not sprung from different sources, but from one source. They were not made of different blood, but of one blood. Having but one Father, the human race is one family.
(2) The cause of the creation of nations. That they should seek God, etc. God created men that they might adore Him. He blessed them with life that they might bless Him. He hungers for their love as a father hungers for the love of his children.
2. The Fatherhood of God.
(1) The fact. For we are also His offspring. To a heathen audience Paul does not quote from the Scriptures, but from one of their own authorities. Truth from any source is truth, and it is best to use that which will find the quickest acceptance.
(2) The obligation. We ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, etc. God who made living, seeing, breathing, speaking men, how could He Himself be like those lifeless, sightless, breathless, speechless idols?
IV. God the judge.
1. The time of repentance. The times of ignorance are gone by. God cannot overlook sin any longer on the plea that one does not know.
2. The day of judgment. That day is surely coming. Men then will be judged according to the deeds done in the body. It will be a day of terror to the wicked--a day of rejoicing for the righteous.
3. The Judge. The world once judged Christ--the time is coming when Christ will judge the world. Christ is the Saviour now--the Judge by and by.
4. The people to be judged. They were in the audience before Paul--they are in the audience of every minister of the gospel now. How did those act who were before Paul?
(1) Some mocked. Some now mock at the preacher, or at sacred things, knowing their sacredness.
(2) Others did, as the majority of hearers do now--they put off deciding for the salvation of their souls.
(3) But there were a few who closed with the offer of salvation. In every revival there are a few who get ready for the day of judgment. But who shall be able to characterise the folly of those who continue to walk in the way of destruction? (M. C. Hazard.)
Some new thing.--
Some new thing
A manifest physical, intellectual, and moral weakness was strangely blended with an intense eagerness for novelty. We ordinarily associate a desire for new things with progress, but here that desire is associated with that which is the reverse of progress. This warrants the statement that a desire for something new is not necessarily indicative of progress. Indeed, it may be indicative of regress. It may not be an earnest desire for something better, but a mere restless, uneasy craving for change. To seek the new simply because it is the new, and apart from any consideration of its intrinsic worth, is to go backward rather than forward. I would not disparage legitimate desire for progress. Only an ignorant bigot will assert that that which is new is not true, and that which is true is not new. Some new things are true, and some old things are false. Let reverent investigation go on. Let it be accorded the widest liberty. To hinder it were intellectual and moral treason. But the contention now is that progress and restlessness are not synonymous terms. It is not the seeking of some new thing which is wrong, but the doing nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear some new thing. Indeed, so far from being good, it is evil. It indicates a fevered condition of the system--an unhealthy and morbid state. It begets instability of character and purpose. It leads to superficial ideas and modes of thinking. It withdraws attention from the tried and settled, and directs it to the flotsam and jetsam of daily happenings, the real importance of which is hardly ever discerned till time has them in their true perspective. Much occurred before our time which is of inestimable importance. Men need today, not less of the new, but more of the old, a wiser perception of its relative worth. More seriously, this craving for something new often dupes men into the acceptance of old errors. As a matter of fact, most new things are comparatively worthless, not all, but most. Originality is rare. What we call originality is usually eccentricity, and eccentricity nearly always means a screw loose in the intellectual or moral machinery. If an alleged new thing proves to be really good, the presumption is that it is not as new as it was supposed to be. But it not infrequently happens that the so-called new idea is an old error. We are told almost daily that modern thought has shown a belief in miracles to be unreasonable, and yet there is hardly a modern objection to miracles which was not anticipated by Celsus, who lived in the second century. Conversely, the presumption is that the old and established ideas are true. Not always, I grant. I would not fall into the opposite error. I would not question the reality or the value of the many great achievements of the present age. But it is a fair presumption that the old is the true. This was so of Athens in the time of Paul. The past was glorious, but the Athenians of St. Pauls day, with all their passion for hearing or telling some new thing, added nothing to the stock of the worlds knowledge. For all that we owe to Athens, we go centuries back of those babblers. All history teaches us that progress is as likely to consist in getting back to old standards as in creating new ones. There is real ground for the apprehension that we may become a volatile people, lacking in stability and weight of character. We see this in literature, in the demand for new books, and in the neglect of old ones of tried value. Robert Elsmere is a case in point. The book is simply a dressing up, in popular narrative style, of the stalest and shallowest rationalistic objections to Christianity. Great was the commotion which it excited! Dire were the prophecies of the ruin which it would accomplish in the Church! We see it in science, in the haste with which new theories are accepted and promulgated as facts. Indeed, no matter how wild a theory is, there are always multitudes who are ready to seize it, and to proclaim that all existing institutions must be reorganised in harmony with it. We see this same craving for new things in everyday life, in the restless moving of people from place to place, in the frequency of business changes, in the small talk of society, in the rage of speculation. It seems to be the great object in life of many people to devise something novel, something weve never had before, the utility of the thing devised being usually a secondary consideration. And we see it especially in religion. Many people do not like the old ideas and doctrines which, after all that can be said, are those that are fairly deducible from Holy Scripture and the faithful preaching of which has wrought such glorious moral and religious changes in the world. They want something new, and the minister who gratifies them is sure to have a large, though unsubstantial following. Multitudes are hurried hither and thither by their craving for change. Their religious convictions are those of the last book they have read or the last person they have talked with. Suffer me in conclusion to make two additional remarks.
1. A disposition to undervalue established ideas or institutions is a sign of a weak mind. A misconception is prevalent at this point. There are some, particularly among the young, who say that they will not accept anything which they have not personally investigated and found to be true; and they pride themselves upon that position, and deem it an evidence of intellectual strength and independence. As a matter of fact, it is simply an evidence of intellectual conceit or moral debility. Has the world learned nothing in all these thousands of years? Has it proved nothing to be true? Does the endorsement of ages create no favourable presumption? A sensible man will no more refuse to become a Christian because he has not had time to investigate for himself the history and claims of Christianity, than he will refuse to become a citizen of the country in which he was born and reared until he has satisfied himself by years of study that the institutions of that country are better than the institutions of other countries. He who declines to avail himself of an electric car, because he has not yet learned what electricity is, is not a wise man, but a fool.
2. In this restless age we need a progressive conservatism, a willingness to accept the new when it is the true, but a holding fast to the old, which has demonstrated its right to be. This gospel which we preach, and in which lies the hope of the race, is not a new gospel. And we love it because it is old, because time has not been able to weaken it or exposure to tarnish it--because all the attacks of earth and hell have not been able to overthrow it. (A. J. Brown.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv19, 22, 32 19–21. Brought him unto the Areopagus. The Greek term…
19–21. Brought him unto the Areopagus. The Greek term for Mars' hill (verse 22). The hill was a place of assembly. There the supreme court of Athens met. There the courts that sat concerning religious matters convened. The associations had something to do, probably, with Paul being taken here to speak, though the meeting was informal and not official. The hill is about fifty feet high, and was then surrounded by the most glorious works of art in Athens.
To tell or hear some new thing. Demosthenes himself speaks of this propensity of the Athenians (Philipp. 1:43). It was in harmony with the spirit of the city that he should be called on to speak to gratify the curiosity of the populace.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v22 Act_17:22. Too superstitions.—Somewhat superstitious (R.V.); better, more god-fearing, more…
CRITICAL REMARKS
Act_17:22. Too superstitions.—Somewhat superstitious (R.V.); better, more god-fearing, more religious (sc., than others)—i.e., unusually religious; though the word has both senses. Your devotions should be objects of devotion, as temples, images, altars, and the like.
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Act_17:23. To the (or, an) unknown God.—Not a singular for a plural as Jerome (ad. Tit., i. 12) asserts: “Inscriptio aræ non ita erat ut Paulus asseruit: ignoto Deo; sed ita: Diis Asiæ et Europæ et Africæ, Diis ignotis et peregrinis. Verum quia Paulus non pluribus Diis ignotis indigebat sed uno tantum ignoto Deo, singulari verbo usus est.” The accuracy of Paul’s statement is confirmed by the testimony of Pausanias, I. i. 4, and Philostratus, Apoll., vi.
2. who both report the existence at Athens of altars to unknown divinities. Whom … Him.—Rather, what … this.
Act_17:26. Blood.—Omitted by the best authorities. Times before appointed, προτεταγμένους, should be times appointed, προστεταγμένους.
Act_17:28. The quotation, For we are also His offspring, is verbally taken from Aratus, a native of Tarsus, B.C. 270, who composed astronomical poems, and in one of the only two extant, the Phœnomena, wrote τοῦ γὰρ καὶ γένος ἐσμέν; though substantially, also, it is contained in the words ἐκ σοῦ (Διὸς) γὰρ γένος ἐσμέν of Cleanthes of Assos in Troas, B.C. 300. Other traces of Paul’s acquaintance with Greek poetry may be found in 1Co_15:33; Tit_1:12.
Act_17:31. Because, διότι. Better, inasmuch as, καθότι Giving the reason why the heathen are required to repent. The world means “the inhabited earth.” That man should be “the” or “a man”—viz., Jesus, of whose appointment to the office of judge God had given assurance, or confirmation—lit., offered faith, or a sufficient ground for faith (“Quia res erat vix credibilis argumentum adfert eximium”—Grotius), unto all men by raising Him from the dead.
Act_17:32. Some mocked.—Perhaps Epicureans. Others, perhaps Stoics (Grotius) or Platonists (Zöckler), said—whether seriously (Calvin, Grotius, Alford) or only courteously, as a polite refusal (De Wette, Meyer), remains uncertain—we will hear thee again of this matter, or less happily person.
Act_17:34. Dionysius, the Areopagite.—Obviously a man of note, though nothing further in known concerning him—at least with certainty. According to tradition he became the first bishop of Athens (Euseb, H. E., iii. 4, iv. 23) and suffered martyrdom under Domitian (Nicephorus, H. E., iii. 11). Damaris.—Conjecturally regarded by Chrysostom to have been the wife of Dionysius, and by Stier unnecessarily supposed to have been a courtesan.
Note.—On the historic credibility of Paul’s visit to Athens and oration before the Areopagus.
I. The usual objections to the narrative on the ground of miracle narrations are in this case awanting, as the apostle is not credited with having performed so much as one wonder in the capital of Achaia.
II. The special difficulties set forth by the Tübingen critics (Baur, Zeller, Overbeck, Hausrath, and others) are so unreasonable that they can hardly claim a refutation. Weizsäcker, indeed, without offering any reasons, dismisses the story of Paul at Athens, as of “no historical value,” and looks upon the speech before the Areopagus as simply “the author’s conception of Paul’s manner of preaching to the heathen.” By those who give reasons it is alleged:
1. That the narrative is so obviously full of purpose and reflection that it must have been manufactured in order to bring out as strongly as possible the contrast between Christianity and Heathenism.
2. That the apostle could not have introduced his mention of the resurrection in so sudden and objectionable a manner as is represented, and in fact in a way so admirably fitted to make the worst possible impression upon his hearers.
3. That the apostle should have alluded to the Athenians’ characteristic irony as well as to their peculiar curiosity.
4. That there was no altar to an unknown God in Athens, but only “to the gods unknown.”
5. That if Paul had been brought before the Areopagus, he must have undergone a judicial trial—which he did not.
6. That the glory of Paul’s “hearing” before the Areopagus, or highest Greek tribunal, was simply invented as a parallel to the account given of Stephen’s appearance before the highest Jewish court.
7. That the last section of the oration breaks off so suddenly as to show that the composer has been without accurate information about what actually occurred. So far as these and other similar difficulties require explanation, that is furnished either in the “Critical Remarks” or under the “Homiletical Analysis”; but their purely arbitrary and subjective character shows the straits to which the opponents of the credibility are reduced.
III. The sufficient answer to all that can be urged against Luke’s narrative is that it bears on its surface evident marks of its truthfulness.
1. The Pauline conceptions and expressions it contains, which are too numerous to have been invented. Compare, eg., Act_17:27 with Rom_1:19-20; Act_17:26 with Rom_5:12; 1Co_15:45; Act_17:30, “times of ignorance,” with Rom_3:25; Act_17:31, “the judgment of the world through Christ,” with 2Co_5:10.
2. The exact acquaintance which it shows with the thoughts and manners of the Athenians, as these are borne witness to by classical writers—as, e.g., with
(1) the habit of the Athenians to ask after new things;
(2) the devotion of the Athenians to idolatry;
(3) the existence in Athens of a worship of unknown gods; and
(4) the belief which prevailed in Athens of the superior origin of their progenitors (see on these points the “Critical Remarks” and “Homiletical Analysis”)—an acquaintance much more easily explained by supposing Luke’s narrative to have proceeded from an eye and ear witness such as Paul, than from a second century fabulist.
3. The possibility of Luke obtaining accurate information about the whole Athenian visit, either from Paul himself or from Dionysius and Damaris, all of whom may have preserved written notes of what took place.
4. The difficulty of discovering how a second century writer could have manufactured the incident and far less the discourse. The suggestion that these were freely constructed out of Paul’s first epistle to the Thessalonians is totally inadequate as a solution of the problem.
HOMILETICAL ANALYSIS.—Act_17:22-34
Paul on Areopagus; or, Preaching to Philosophers
I. The courteous exordium.—
1. A respectful salutation. “Ye men of Athens,” the style of address with which their renowned orators had made them familiar. Had Paul been defending himself before judges he would probably have said: ἄνδρες δικασταί.
2. A complimentary ascription. Possible that he characterised his hearers as “too” or “somewhat superstitious” (R.V.), but more likely that he called them more religious—i.e., more occupied with and devoted to religion than others (see “Critical Remarks”). As a mere matter of good taste he could hardly have expected to gain their ears by reproaching them as superstitious; the course of his subsequent remarks shows he regarded their devotion to religion as something in itself good, which only needed to be instructed and guided to become better.
3. A pleasing intimation. That he had been wandering through their streets, closely observing, not their devotions (A.V.), but the objects of their devotion, such as their temples, images, altars, and the like, and in particular that he had noted one altar more remarkable than the rest, on account of its inscription, which ran: “To the (or to an) unknown God” (see “Critical Remarks”).
4. A startling declaration. That he, whom they had just denounced as a babbler, was prepared to acquaint them with the true personality and character of that divinity they were ignorantly worshipping. What with all their wisdom they had not been able to attain to (1Co_1:21), a just knowledge of the true God, he was ready and willing to impart. By no means a modest pretension; yet splendidly fulfilled.
II. The weighty sermon.—Three main divisions.
1. The relation of God to the world (Act_17:24-25). The Supreme Being was exhibited in five different aspects.
(1) As Creator of the world. A truth denied by both sects of the philosophers who listened to the apostle, but frequently affirmed by the apostle (Act_14:15; Rom_11:36; 2Co_5:18; Eph_3:9), and other New-Testament writers (Heb_3:4; Rev_4:11).
(2) As Lord of heaven and earth (Mat_11:25; compare Gen_14:22); the absolute ownership of the universe flowing of necessity from God’s relationship to it as Creator (Rom_10:12).
(3) As filling immensity with His presence, and therefore as incapable of being confined like idols in temples made with hands (compare Act_7:49). That the heathen failed to distinguish between the Deity and His image, see Act_19:26.
(4) As self-sufficient and therefore as independent of His creatures. Incapable of being profited by any service that might be rendered by man’s hands, God was equally removed above the necessity of requiring such service (Psa_50:9-13). In both respects He transcended the divinities they worshipped, who not only inhabited and were confined to their shrines, but were supposed to be in need of and to be benefited by the sacrifices laid upon their altars (compare Iliad, i. 37).
(5) As the source of life and blessing to His dependent creatures. “Seeing He Himself giveth to all life and for the continuance of the same breath, and all things they require (compare Act_14:17; Psa_104:14-15; Psa_104:27-28; Psa_145:15-16; Mat_5:45; 1Ti_6:17).
2. The dignity and destiny of man (Act_17:26-29).
(1) As forming a divinely constituted brotherhood, all nations, or every nation, of men having been made of one blood, or simply of one (stock, or blood must be supplied), for to dwell on all the face of the earth. A magnificent conception, abundantly asserted in Scripture (Gen_1:26-27; Deu_4:32; Psa_86:9; Mal_2:10), and confirmed by the best science, which must have struck at the pride of Paul’s hearers, who regarded themselves as the flower and cream of humanity, while all others were designed to be their slaves (Aristotle, Pol., I. ii. 6); which still opposes itself like an immovable rock or impregnable fortress to all modern theories which deny man’s descent from a common stock, and on the ground of that (supposed) fact to establish the original, radical, and essential superiority of civilised to savage, or of white to black races; and which warrants the hope and expectation that a day is yet coming when this transcendent truth will receive universal recognition, and when the Scottish poet’s dream will be realised—
“When man to man the world o’er,
Shall brithers be and a’ that.”—Burns.
(2) As guided in all their movements by an invisible hand. That of Him who had called them into existence, and who, so far from being indifferent to and unobservant of their fortunes, had “determined their appointed seasons and the bounds of their habitations”—i.e., fixed the periods of their rising, flourishing, and decaying, “and the limits of their territory” (Deu_32:8), beyond which they could no more pass than could the waves of the sea overstep the sand barriers by which their fury was restrained (compare Job_12:23). The truth thus announced was well adapted to humble his hearers, whose city’s greatness had already passed its meridian, and whose territory was year by year becoming narrower, and to remind them of the wisdom of listening to a message from Him who so manifestly held them in His hand (Psa_22:28; Dan_4:25).
(3) As designed to come to a true knowledge of God and of their obligations to Him. That they did not possess such a knowledge originally, in themselves and on the platform of creation (1Th_4:5), was a clear testimony to their fallen and sinful character and condition (1Co_1:21). Nevertheless it was God’s will and desire that they should grope about after Him, like blind men feeling their way in the dark, in the hope of finding Him who was not beyond their reach by being at a distance from them, but was near to every individual composing them,
“Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than hands and feet.”—Tennyson.
for “in Him we live and move and have our being,” or live and move (or are moving), and are—i.e., every moment depend on Him for life, activity, and being. And that this was no self-invented dogma, but an old and acknowledged truth which their own gifted seers had discerned, he demonstrated to them by citing in its support the similar sentiment of one of their own poets (Aratus, a Cilician poet, B.C. 270), who wrote: “For we are also His offspring,” clearly showing he regarded man as dependent on the Deity for life, activity, and existence.
(4) As convicted of unreason in thinking that the Godhead could be like to gold, or silver, or stone graven by art and device of man. The argument was irresistible. Was man the offspring of God? Then God could in no sense be the handiwork of man. Was man God’s child? Then God must at least be possessed of a nature resembling man’s, and if like man’s then unlike that of molten or graven idols.
3. The doctrine of Christ and His salvation (Act_17:30-31). This third main division of discourse, entered upon, was not finished. So far as it had proceeded it had announced four things.
(1) A new dispensation on the part of God. Whereas God had winked at or overlooked the past ages of ignorance, left them alone without either gracious revelation or stern rebuke, suffering men to go their own ways (Act_14:16), He had now interposed with a word of command that men everywhere should repent—i.e., change their minds, about God and His holiness, about themselves and their sin, about the present world and the next.
(2) A new duty published to men, not in one nation; but in all nations to obey this command instantly, thoroughly, permanently, honestly, cheerfully.
(3) A new argument for the enforcement of that duty. Binding upon men everywhere and at all times without further reasoning, this duty was rendered the more imperative and urgent by the fact of an impending judgment day, on which all would be arraigned at God’s tribunal and reckoned with for their performance or neglect of that duty, the judge already appointed being that man whom he had come to proclaim.
(4) A new certificate provided both for the fact of the judgment day, and for the certainty that Christ would be the judge—viz., His resurrection from the dead. If that was true, as Paul was prepared to show, then Christ could be no other than God’s Son, and if God’s Son sent into the world to redeem men, it was inconceivable that there should not be a day of judgment, at, and on which, He would adjudicate upon the final destinies of men, according as they had repented and believed the gospel, or died in unbelief and sin.
III. The disappointing result.
1. The preacher was abruptly interrupted. Never before had either Stoic or Epicurean listened to sentiments so sublime, or to an orator more worthy of attention. Yet at the mention of the resurrection of the dead—a doctrine which both denied—they felt it impossible to longer remain silent or allow the speaker to proceed. Did they do so, they might seem to grant that such a thing as a resurrection was possible, while according to their philosophy it was not; if, however, on the other hand, it was possible, then the whole contention of the speaker would require to be admitted.
2. The teaching of the sermon was variously regarded.
(1) Some mocked. At the resurrection chiefly, but also at the other tenets of Paul’s gospel concerning God and concerning man. “The Greek was more irrational than the savage, when religion was philosophised about. He laughed when he heard of the resurrection of the dead, for the doctrine was not a fashionable one; but when he was told that our souls would one day pass into cows, oxen, donkeys, etc., he was less opposed to it, for this idea did not seem so new or strange to him, the Pythagoreans having taught it” (Michaelis).
(2) Some procrastinated—deferred coming to a conclusion on the momentous themes which had been submitted to their judgment—saying like Felix (Act_24:25), “We will hear thee concerning this yet again.”
(3) Some believed—credited Paul’s teaching as true, and embraced with their hearts the gospel it contained. Among those who thus received the truth, besides others unnamed, were Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris, of neither of whom is anything certain known, though Eusebius (Hist., iii. 4, iv. 23), and other writers report that Dionysius afterwards became bishop of the Church at Athens, and that Damaris was his wife (Chrysostom), for neither of which statements however exist solid grounds of belief.
3. The preacher was obliged shortly after to leave the city. How long he stayed within its precincts after the incident just recorded is unknown; only this much can be told as certain, that no tidings survive of his having ever again preached the gospel in or visited the brilliant but idol-loving metropolis of Greece. That none of his epistles speak of a Christian Church at Athens does not prove that his work there was absolutely fruitless, or that he did not leave behind him a believing community.
Learn.—
1. That advocates of Christianity should both maintain a respectful bearing towards and cherish a charitable view of those whose confidence and conversion they seek.
2. That preachers of the gospel cannot take too comprehensive a view or firm a grasp of the truth they recommend to others.
3. That the ablest and most eloquent discourse will not succeed in converting all who listen to it.
HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS
Act_17:22. Superstition.—Define the meaning of the original adjective, and then state the sense in which the word “superstition” is employed now. It is the preponderance of terror in the religious life.
I. Its causes.—
1. Erroneous views of the attributes of God.
2. Ignorance of the nature of personal religion.
3. Crude conceptions of the works and laws of nature.
4. A desire to have systems of religion and worship of human invention.
II. Its forms.—
1. Idolatry.
2. Corrupted Christianity.
3. Pietistic errors.
4. Popular illusions. Witchcraft, astrology, fortune-telling, warnings.
III. Its evils.—
1. It degrades human nature.
2. It saps the foundations of morality.
3. It lessens the sum of human enjoyment.
4. It hinders the progress of the Gospel.—G. Brooks.
Act_17:22-31. The Areopagus Oration; or, a Sermon for Philosophers.
I. The doctrines it proclaimed.—
1. The personality, self-existence, omnipotence, and unity of God.
2. The reality, universality, and efficiency of Divine providence.
3. The spirituality and non-externality of Divine worship.
4. The unity and brotherhood of the human race.
5. The possibility of a true natural religion.
6. The dignity and dependence of man.
7. The absurdity of idols and idol-worship.
8. The essential graciousness of God’s dealings with the race of man.
9. The duty of immediate and universal repentance.
10. The certainty of a day of judgment.
11. The exaltation of Jesus Christ to the office of supreme Judges
12. The reality of a future life.
II. The errors it corrected.—
1. Atheism, or the dogma that there is no God.
2. Pantheism, or the theory that the all is God.
3. Materialism, or the notion that the world is eternal.
4. Fatalism, or the superstition that no intelligence presides over the universe, but all things come to pass either by necessity or chance.
5. Polytheism, or the fancy that there are, or can be, many gods.
6. Ritualism, or the imagination that God can be honoured by purely external performances.
7. Evolutionism (in its extreme form), or the hypothesis that man is a product of force and matter.
8. Indifferentism, or the creed that man should seek after nothing and no one higher than himself.
9. Optimism, or the delusion that this is the best possible world, and man has no sin of which to repent.
10. Unitarianism, or the tenet that Christ was an ordinary member of the race.
11. Annihilationism, or the belief that after death is nothing.
12. Universalism, or the sentiment that all will be saved.
III. The lessons it taught.—
1. The duty of renouncing idolatry and worshipping only God.
2. The obligation to cultivate a spirit of love towards others.
3. The necessity of repentance and reformation.
4. The wisdom of preparing for the great assize.
Act_17:22-34. The Great Sermon on Mars’ Hill.
I. The wise men (of Athens) charged with superstition (Act_17:22-23).
II. The nature of God and the method of His worship established by natural arguments (Act_17:24-25).
III. The stupidity of men who, though created that they might recognise their Maker, nevertheless walk in darkness (Act_17:26-28).
IV. The absurdity of supposing that God could resemble idols (Act_17:29).
V. The doctrine of Christ and the resurrection of the dead (Act_17:30-31).—From Calvin.
Paul at Athens! A more striking picture than Luther in Rome or Calvin in Paris. Note—
I. The sensations with which the apostle tarries in the city of the Athenians.—
1. He does not shut his eyes to the monuments of the most ingenious art.
2. He does not permit himself to be captivated by their sensuous beauty.
3. A deep feeling of compassion for the error of the human spirit remains as the keynote of his innermost feelings.
II. The testimony which he there bears.—Three great truths opposed to three great falsehoods.
1. Creation out of nothing as opposed to Naturalism.
2. The personality of God as opposed to Pantheism.
3. The nature of sin as opposed to Antinomianism and Rationalism.
III. The result.—
1. Not very consolatory. Prejudices too deeply rooted thwarted the apostolic word.
2. Yet not without comfort. A single convert already weighs heavily in the balance of the kingdom of God.—From Krummacher.
Act_17:23. “To the (or an) unknown God.”—The Athenian altar a significant testimony to three things—
I. The insufficiency of human wisdom.—If any people under heaven could have attained to a knowledge of God by philosophy those people were the Athenians.
II. The unsearchableness of the Divine nature.—After all man can learn from creation, providence, and revelation about the supreme being, he must still acknowledge that he knows only in part, and exclaim with Zophar (Job_11:7) and with Elihu (Job_37:23) that the infinite and eternal One can never be fully understood by man.
III. The incomparable glory of Christ.—“That which can be known of God” is by the gospel more clearly and fully revealed than by either creation or providence. The central figure of the gospel records was the image of the invisible God, the brightness of His Father’s glory, and the express image of His person.
Ignorant Worshippers of God.—Such were the Athenians, the philosophers amongst them no less than the vulgar herd. Both alike were ignorant—
I. Of God’s exalted nature.—As a personal intelligence and spiritual essence. Epicureans and Stoics, indeed, spoke of God or of gods. Yet neither in one system nor the other was there room for God, the Epicureans being practically Atheists and the Stoics Pantheists. Paul’s argument that God must be a personal intelligence rested on two premises:
(1) that molten or carved images could not be God, seeing they lacked mind; and
(2) that God must resemble man, if man is God’s offspring.
II. Of God’s real character.—As
1. The maker of the universe. According to the Epicureans and Stoics matter existed from eternity. The Hebrews held that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
2. The governor of the nations. The Greek philosophers had no true conception of the moral and spiritual rule of the Divine being. This idea, which was known to the Hebrews, received its proper and complete development under Christianity.
5. The preserver of His creatures. “He Himself giveth to all life and breath and all things.” Opposed to the Epicureans and Stoics, who equally believed that the gods, if any existed, were indifferent to men.
4. The judge of men. Neither of the philosophic schools had the smallest idea of a future judgment. Whatever evil they dreaded was present. Immortality found a place in neither of their creeds. Paul’s sermon opened up to them a new thought.
III. Of God’s gracious purpose.—That men should seek after Him and find Him. How did God propose to carry out this?
1. By His providential goodness. “Giving to all life,” etc. (Act_17:25). “Filling their mouths with food and gladness” (Act_14:17). “The goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance” (Rom_2:4).
2. By His governmental restraints. Leading men and nations to see that they had to do with a higher power than themselves, that they might seek after and find Him (Act_17:27).
3. By His longsuffering treatment of them. “The times of this ignorance God winked at” (Act_17:30). “Account the longsuffering of our God salvation” (2Pe_3:15).
4. By His announcement of a new commandment. That men should repent. That men must change their minds. That men can no longer be allowed to go on in sin. Whatever doubt may have existed previously as to man’s duty, now there can be none.
5. By public certification of a future assize. Through Christ’s resurrection from the dead, which showed both who Christ was and to what dignity and power He had been exalted.
Act_17:23-31. God’s Three Great Books about Himself.
I. The book of the world.—In two parts.
1. Nature (Act_17:24-25).
2. History (Act_17:26).
II. The book of the heart.—Also in two parts.
1. Reason (Act_17:27).
2. Conscience (Act_17:28).
III. The book of Scripture.—Again in two parts,
1. Law (Act_17:30).
2. Gospel (Act_17:31).—Gerok.
Act_17:26. Made of One; or, the Unity of the Race.
I. One in origin.—Created by God.
II. One in nature.—One blood and one spirit.
III. One in character.—All equally fallen, sunk in sin, and under condemnation.
IV. One in salvability.—All included in the offers and provisions of the gospel; none, at least, while alive, beyond the reach of grace.
V. One in responsibility.—All alike will be held accountable to God not only for their actions and words, but for their treatment of His gospel.
Act_17:27. Seeking after God.
I. It is God’s desire that men should seek after Him.—He had so constructed the world in which men live, and arranged men’s environment in the same, that they should feel themselves impelled to do this.
II. Men’s interest should lead them to seek after God.—It being inconceivable that men should be capable of attaining happiness apart from God, without a knowledge of His character or without the enjoyment of His favour.
III. Those who seek after God have the greatest possible encouragement.—
1. That if they seek in earnest they are sure to find. And
2. That God is so near to them that seeking should be easy.
Act_17:29. God’s Offspring; or, the Dignity of Man.
I. The sublime truth announced.—That man is God’s offspring.
1. Anticipated by heathen poets. The best pre-Christian and extra-Jewish thought had some dim apprehension of man’s true origin.
2. Revealed by inspired Scripture. In the Old Testament (Gen_1:26; Num_16:22; Mal_2:10). In the New Testament (Mat_5:48; Heb_12:9).
3. Confirmed by modern science. Indirectly at least; first, through its failure to explain man’s mental and moral nature through evolution; and second, through the circumstance that, however eager to establish a paternity for man among the lower animals, it has never been able to more than set forth an unproved hypothesis.
II. The consoling inferences implied.—
1. That God must be a personal intelligence. Neither a senseless image, nor a blind force, nor impersonal matter, but a living personality.
2. That God must be the father of men. Not simply their creator and Lord, their preserver and judge, but their all-wise and loving parent, who regards them with pity and affection.
3. That men, as God’s children, must be brethren. Not members of different races, but children of the same parent, and therefore members of the same family.
Act_17:30. Repentance of Sin.
I. An imperative duty.—Commanded by God.
II. A universal necessity.—Required by all.
III. An immediate obligation.—Admitting of no delay.
IV. A saving grace.—Without which none can stand in the day of judgment.
Act_17:30-31. Past and Present. The Cross of Christ, the dividing line between these.
I. The past.—
1. Times of ignorance. Before the meridian light of gospel-day had come.
2. Times of wickedness. Else repentance would have been unnecessary.
3. Times of forbearance. Otherwise the nations must have been cut off.
II. The present.—
1. Times of illumination. The full light of Divine revelation now shines.
2. Times of commandment. Mankind everywhere enjoined to repent—change their minds and amend their sinful lives.
3. Times of responsibility. Whereas the past dispensation closed with a transcendent discovery of Divine mercy in the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ (the first advent), the present age will terminate in a sublime exercise of judgment, at the glorious appearing of the Son of man (the second coming).
Act_17:31. The World’s Assize; or, the Great Day of Judgment.
I. The fact announced.—God will judge the world.
II. The day fixed.—He hath appointed a day.
III. The judge designated.—That man whom He hath ordained, or set apart for this work.
IV. The standard indicated.—In righteousness. Every verdict will accord with equity and truth.
V. The proof given.—The resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Act_17:31. The Doctrine of a Future Judgment as a Doctrine of Reason.—
1. The character of God requires it.
2. The analogy of the laws of nature indicates it.
3. There are facts in our own experience that foreshadow it. Incipient strivings toward retribution in the present state.
4. There is a general expectation of it among men.
5. Our history would be incomplete without it. Let it not be imagined that by rejecting the claims of revelation we shall escape the doctrine of a future judgment.—G. Brooks.
Act_17:32-34. Man’s Treatment of the Gospel.
I. Derision.—“Some mocked.”
II. Delay.—“We will hear thee again of this matter.”
III. Decision.—“Certain men clave unto him and believed.”
Chap. Act_7:2-58 with Act_17:22-34; or, Stephen and Paul, the Two Apologies of Christianity towards Judaism and towards Heathenism.
I. Both agree in some of their principal expressions.
II. Stephen’s was delivered before the Sanhedrim, whose office it was to protect customs and morals in Jerusalem; Paul’s before the Areopagus, which performed the like service in Athens.
III. Stephen was accused of destroying the old religion, Paul of introducing a new one.
IV. Stephen told his countrymen that the temple worship must cease, Paul the Athenians that God dwelt not in temples made with hands.
V. Stephen extolled the beneficence of God to Israel in His dealings with them as a people, Paul the revelation given by God to men in nature.
VI. Stephen, through the warmth of his eloquence, called forth a storm of violence against him; Paul’s oration took a turn which, in an unexpected fashion, broke up the assembly.—From Holtzmann, who looks on these resemblances as unfavourable to the historicity; whereas, rightly viewed, they confirm it, being fully and satisfactorily explained by remembering that most likely Paul heard Stephen’s defence.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain On vv19, 22, 23, 26 19. They now lead Paul up to the summit…
19. They now lead Paul up to the summit of the Areopagus, that he may stand before that grave assembly of philosophers, orators, poets, statesmen, warriors and sages, recognized by the people as the legitimate custodians of all truth and proper arbiters of every new doctrine, or new religion which might be introduced. When I was there I climbed Mars’ Hill, that I might stand in the footprints of Paul when he addressed the most cultured congregation ever assembled beneath the skies.
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv22, 31, 32 Act 17:22 - Act 17:34.
Acts
PAUL AT ATHENS
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Act 17:22 - Act 17:34.
‘I am become all things to all men,’ said Paul, and his address at Athens strikingly exemplifies that principle of his action. Contrast it with his speech in the synagogue of Pisidian Antioch, which appeals entirely to the Old Testament, and is saturated with Jewish ideas, or with the remonstrance to the rude Lycaonian peasants {Act 14:15, etc.}, which, while handling some of the same thoughts as at Athens, does so in a remarkably different manner. There he appealed to God’s gifts of ‘rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons,’ the things most close to his hearers’ experience; here, speaking to educated ‘philosophers,’ he quotes Greek poetry, and sets forth a reasoned declaration of the nature of the Godhead and the relations of a philosophy of history and an argument against idolatry. The glories of Greek art were around him; the statues of Pallas Athene and many more fair creations looked down on the little Jew who dared to proclaim their nullity as representations of the Godhead.
Paul’s flexibility of mind and power of adapting himself to every circumstance were never more strikingly shown than in that great address to the quick-witted Athenians. It falls into three parts: the conciliatory prelude {Act 17:22 - Act 17:23}; the declaration of the Unknown God {Act 17:24 - Act 17:29}; and the proclamation of the God-ordained Man {Act 17:30 - Act 17:31}.
I. We have, first, the conciliatory prelude.
It is always a mistake for the apostle of a new truth to begin by running a tilt at old errors. It is common sense to seek to find some point in the present beliefs of his hearers to which his message may attach itself. An orator who flatters for the sake of securing favour for himself is despicable; a missionary who recognises the truth which lies under the system which he seeks to overthrow, is wise.
It is incredible that Paul should have begun his speech to so critical an audience by charging them with excessive superstition, as the Authorised Version makes him do. Nor does the modified translation of the Revised Version seem to be precisely what is meant. Paul is not blaming the Athenians, but recording a fact which he had noticed, and from which he desired to start. Ramsay’s translation gives the truer notion of his meaning-’more than others respectful of what is divine.’ ‘Superstition’ necessarily conveys a sense of blame, but the word in the original does not.
We can see Paul as a stranger wandering through the city, and noting with keen eyes every token of the all-pervading idolatry. He does not tell his hearers that his spirit burned within him when he saw the city full of idols; but he smothers all that, and speaks only of the inscription which he had noticed on one, probably obscure and forgotten, altar: ‘To the Unknown God.’ Scholars have given themselves a great deal of trouble to show from other authors that there were such altars. But Paul is as good an ‘authority’ as these, and we may take his word that he did see such an inscription. Whether it had the full significance which he reads into it or not, it crystallised in an express avowal that sense of Something behind and above the ‘gods many’ of Greek religion, which found expression in the words of their noblest thinkers and poets, and lay like a nightmare on them.
To charge an Athenian audience, proud of their knowledge, with ignorance, was a hazardous and audacious undertaking; to make them charge themselves was more than an oratorical device. It appealed to the deepest consciousness even of the popular mind. Even with this prelude, the claims of this wandering Jew to pose as the instructor of Epicureans and Stoics, and to possess a knowledge of the Divine which they lacked, were daring. But how calmly and confidently Paul makes them, and with what easy and conciliatory adoption of their own terminology, if we adopt the reading of Act 17:23 in Revised Version {‘What ye worship . . . this,’ etc.}, which puts forward the abstract conception of divinity rather than the personal God.
The spirit in which Paul approached his difficult audience teaches all Christian missionaries and controversialists a needed and neglected lesson. We should accentuate points of resemblance rather than of difference, to begin with. We should not run a tilt against even errors, and so provoke to their defence, but rather find in creeds and practices an ignorant groping after, and so a door of entrance for, the truth which we seek to recommend.
II. The declaration of the Unknown God has been prepared for, and now follows, and with it is bound up a polemic against idolatry.
Conciliation is not to be carried so far as to hide the antagonism between the truth and error. We may give non-Christian systems of religion credit for all the good in them, but we are not to blink their contrariety to the true religion. Conciliation and controversy are both needful; and he is the best Christian teacher who has mastered the secret of the due proportion between them.
Every word of Paul’s proclamation strikes full and square at some counter belief of his hearers. He begins with creation, which he declares to have been the act of one personal God, and neither of a multitude of deities, as some of his hearers held, nor of an impersonal blind power, as others believed, nor the result of chance, nor eternal, as others maintained. He boldly proclaims there, below the shadow of the Parthenon, that there is but one God,-the universal Lord, because the universal Creator. Many consequences from that fact, no doubt, crowded into Paul’s mind; but he swiftly turns to its bearing on the pomp of temples which were the glory of Athens, and the multitude of sacrifices which he had beheld on their altars. The true conception of God as the Creator and Lord of all things cuts up by the roots the pagan notions of temples as dwelling-places of a god and of sacrifices as ministering to his needs. With one crushing blow Paul pulverises the fair fanes around him, and declares that sacrifice, as practised there, contradicted the plain truth as to God’s nature. To suppose that man can give anything to Him, or that He needs anything, is absurd. All heathen worship reverses the parts of God and man, and loses sight of the fact that He is the giver continually and of everything. Life in its origination, the continuance thereof {breath}, and all which enriches it, are from Him. Then true worship will not be giving to, but thankfully accepting from and using for, Him, His manifold gifts.
So Paul declares the one God as Creator and Sustainer of all. He goes on to sketch in broad outline what we may call a philosophy of history. The declaration of the unity of mankind was a wholly strange message to proud Athenians, who believed themselves to be a race apart, not only from the ‘barbarians,’ whom all Greeks regarded as made of other clay than they, but from the rest of the Greek world. It flatly contradicted one of their most cherished prerogatives. Not only does Paul claim one origin for all men, but he regards all nations as equally cared for by the one God. His hearers believed that each people had its own patron deities, and that the wars of nations were the wars of their gods, who won for them territory, and presided over their national fortunes. To all that way of thinking the Apostle opposes the conception, which naturally follows from his fundamental declaration of the one Creator, of His providential guidance of all nations in regard to their place in the world and the epochs of their history.
But he rises still higher when he declares the divine purpose in all the tangled web of history-the variety of conditions of nations, their rise and fall, their glory and decay, their planting in their lands and their rooting out,-to be to lead all men to ‘seek God.’ That is the deepest meaning of history. The whole course of human affairs is God’s drawing men to Himself. Not only in Judea, nor only by special revelation, but by the gifts bestowed, and the schooling brought to bear on every nation, He would stir men up to seek for Him.
But that great purpose has not been realised. There is a tragic ‘if haply’ inevitable; and men may refuse to yield to the impulses towards God. They are the more likely to do so, inasmuch as to find Him they must ‘feel after Him,’ and that is hard. The tendrils of a plant turn to the far-off light, but men’s spirits do not thus grope after God. Something has come in the way which frustrates the divine purpose, and makes men blind and unwilling to seek Him.
Paul docs not at once draw the two plain inferences, that there must be something more than the nations have had, if they are to find God, even His seeking them in some new fashion; and that the power which neutralises God’s design in creation and providence is sin. He has a word to say about both these, but for the moment he contents himself with pointing to the fact, attested by his hearers’ consciousness, and by many a saying of thinkers and poets, that the failure to find God does not arise from His hiding Himself in some remote obscurity. Men are plunged, as it were, in the ocean of God, encompassed by Him as an atmosphere, and-highest thought of all, and not strange to Greek thought of the nobler sort-kindred with Him as both drawing life from Him and being in His image. Whence, then, but from their own fault, could men have failed to find God? If He is ‘unknown,’ it is not because He has shrouded Himself in darkness, but because they do not love the light. One swift glance at the folly of idolatry, as demonstrated by this thought of man’s being the offspring of God, leads naturally to the properly Christian conclusion of the address.
III. It is probable that this part of it was prematurely ended by the mockery of some and the impatience of others, who had had enough of Paul and his talk, and who, when they said, ‘We will hear thee again,’ meant, ‘We will not hear you now.’ But, even in the compass permitted him, he gives much of his message.
We can but briefly note the course of thought. He comes back to his former word ‘ignorance,’ bitter pill as it was for the Athenian cultured class to swallow. He has shown them how their religion ignores or contradicts the true conceptions of God and man. But he no sooner brings the charge than he proclaims God’s forbearance. And he no sooner proclaims God’s forbearance than he rises to the full height of his mission as God’s ambassador, and speaks in authoritative tones, as bearing His ‘commands.’
Now the hint in the previous part is made more plain. The demand for repentance implies sin. Then the ‘ignorance’ was not inevitable or innocent. There was an element of guilt in men’s not feeling after God, and sin is universal, for ‘all men everywhere’ are summoned to repent. Philosophers and artists, and cultivated triflers, and sincere worshippers of Pallas and Zeus, and all ‘barbarian’ people, are alike here. That would grate on Athenian pride, as it grates now on ours. The reason for repentance would be as strange to the hearers as the command was-a universal judgment, of which the principle was to be rigid righteousness, and the Judge, not Minos or Rhadamanthus, but ‘a Man’ ordained for that function.
What raving nonsense that would appear to men who had largely lost the belief in a life beyond the grave! The universal Judge a man! No wonder that the quick Athenian sense of the ridiculous began to rise against this Jew fanatic, bringing his dreams among cultured people like them! And the proof which he alleged as evidence to all men that it is so, would sound even more ridiculous than the assertion meant to be proved. ‘A man has been raised from the dead; and this anonymous Man, whom nobody ever heard of before, and who is no doubt one of the speaker’s countrymen, is to judge us, Stoics, Epicureans, polished people, and we are to be herded to His bar in company with Boeotians and barbarians! The man is mad.’
So the assembly broke up in inextinguishable laughter, and Paul silently ‘departed from among them,’ having never named the name of Jesus to them. He never more earnestly tried to adapt his teaching to his audience; he never was more unsuccessful in his attempt by all means to gain some. Was it a remembrance of that scene in Athens that made him write to the Corinthians that his message was ‘to the Greeks foolishness’?
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On vv19–34 19-21. Notwithstanding the contempt with which Paul was regarded…
19-21. Notwithstanding the contempt with which Paul was regarded by some of his hearers, he succeeded in arresting the serious attention of a few. (19) " And they took him and led him to the Areopagus, saying, Can we know what this new doctrine is, of which you speak? (20) For you are bringing some strange things to our ears. We wish to know, therefore, what these things mean. (21) For all the Athenians, and the strangers dwelling there, spent their time in nothing else than telling or hearing something new. " The Areopagus was a rocky eminence, ascended by a flight of stone steps cut in the solid rock, on the summit of which were seats in the open air, where the judges, called Areopagites, held court for the trial of criminals, and of grave religious questions. The informal character of the proceedings on this occasion shows that it was not this court which had summoned Paul, but that those who were interested in hearing him selected this as a suitable place for the purpose. This is further evident from the note of explanation here appended by Luke, that the Athenians and strangers dwelling there, spent their time in nothing else than telling and hearing something new. It was more from curiosity, therefore, that they desired to hear him, than because they really expected to be benefited by what they would hear.
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv19, 26, 28, 29, 30, 31 Mars’ hill.
Areopagus
Mars’ hill.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv22, 29 The first part of Paul’s speech:
The first part of Paul’s speech:
v. 22. Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars Hill and said, Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious.
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v. 23. For as I passed by and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, To the Unknown God. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you.
v. 24. God, that made the world and all things therein, seeing that He is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands,
v. 25. neither is worshiped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, seeing He giveth to all life and breath and all things;
v. 26. and hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation,
v. 27. that they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him, though He be not far from every one of us;
v. 28. for in Him we live, and move, and have our being, as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also His offspring.
Paul had been placed by those men that conducted him and now stood in the midst of the Council, or Court, of Areopagus. "The Areopagus was, in ancient times, a judicial council of Athens which held its meetings on the ’hill of Mars,’ a little west of the Acropolis, which is in full view from its summit. On the top of this hill can still be seen the rock benches on which the Areopagites sat in the open air, and the two great rocks on which the accused prisoners sat. But it is not certain that Paul was officially tried before this ancient court. He may have been taken to this place as the most appropriate spot at which to address quietly an interested audience, or this may have been merely an informal inquiry made by the members of the court concerning his teaching. Yet from all the evidence available it seems certain that this council had the right to pass upon the qualifications of all lecturers either in the university or in the city, and the official arrest of this unauthorized lecturer is by no means impossible. " But whether the council heard Paul formally or informally, whether he spoke on the hill adjoining the Acropolis or in one of the great halls near the forum (Stoa Basileios), where the people had a better opportunity of hearing him, his address before this select company of the world’s foremost wise men was an uncompromising stand for repentance and faith. He addresses the assembly in the customary manner as "Men of Athens. " That they were a very religious people (literally, demon-fearing in a very high degree) he had observed, so it appeared to him to be; they carried their religious relevance very far. For as he was wandering through the streets of their city and making it a point to consider with attentive interest their objects of religious veneration, the temples, groves, altars, statues which they considered sacred, he had found also an altar with the inscription: To an Unknown God; an epigraph since found on at least one altar, and referred to occasionally in ancient writings. There can be no doubt, on the basis of Rom 1:18-20, for which many parallels from secular sources may be adduced, that many heathen felt the insufficiency and the inadequacy of their religion. Their natural knowledge of God led them to doubt, and often to condemn, the idolatry as practiced by their own people, and should have prompted them to search so long until they had found the revelation of the true God; for there never was a time in the history of the world in which the worship of the God of heaven was not proclaimed somewhere. The altars to the unknown God seem to have been a semiconscious admission of the vanity and emptiness of idolatry. The Athenians thus worshiped what they knew not; they acknowledged with relevance a divine existence which was nameless to them. But what they thus worshiped devoutly, without knowing it, Paul proclaimed to them.
After this short introduction, Paul set forth the true God to them, that they might both know His name and knowingly relevance Him. The God that made the world, the created universe, and everything it contains, He, natural Lord as He is of heaven and earth, does not make His dwelling in temples made by the hands of men. Paul deliberately contrasts the true God with the idols whose dwelling was in temples made with hands, and whose statue often filled only a small niche of such a temple. The true God is also not served or worshiped with gifts or sacrifices made by the hands of men, as though He did not possess perfection and a full measure of everything, but was still in need of something. It is rather, on the contrary, He Himself who gives life and breath to all men, and all things which they are in need of. To attempt to dispense to the Giver of all good gifts what He Himself has always possessed is obviously a foolish proceeding, since the very life of men, as well as their continued existence, depends upon Him alone. And this almighty Creator made out of one, by making Adam the father of the entire human race, every race of people for the purpose of dwelling on the entire face, in every part, of the earth. There is no need of theory and guess-work, of false philosophy; Adam is, by the will of God, the ancestor of the entire human race. And this same God has also fixed, determined, the times that were appointed beforehand and the boundaries of the abodes of men. By His will and arrangement there are periods during which nations may retain possession of the territory which they have occupied, and there are points of time when they shall be dispossessed. Thus God, who has created all men, also controls the history of all nations. And the purpose which God has in thus manifesting His almighty power and providence is that men should seek the Lord, if by any means their minds might grasp some of His essence and they might thus find Him. They should be induced to obtain the very knowledge of God which Paul is here trying to impart to them. It may be a groping, as that of a blind man, and with all efforts it would result in only partial recognition of the essence of God; but it would lead onward, and should then be supplemented by the knowledge of revelation. For He, the Creator, is not far from every single human being, His personal presence is with every one of His creatures, not with any idea of pantheism, but with a personal relationship which shows His tender care for every single life. It is in Him that all men live, and move, and exist, are personal beings. If it were not for God who sustains us, we could not give evidence of life, it would be impossible for us to move, we could, indeed, not even exist. The knowledge which Paul thus advanced might be gained even by a contemplation of the works of God, as passages from the Greek poets tended to show, which Paul briefly quotes: For we His offspring are. The words are found in the poems of Aratus and of Cleanthes, and were familiar to all that knew anything of Greek poetry. That Paul here applied words from a heathen poem to the true God should give all the less offense since the poets were undoubtedly voicing the natural knowledge of God, which they had strengthened by a careful observation of the world and its government. Thus Paul, basing his remarks upon the natural knowledge of a divine being which is found in the hearts of men even after the fall of man, had given his hearers some idea of the true God and of their relation to Him in creation and preservation. The same arguments may well be applied under similar circumstances to this day.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv19, 22, 24, 26, 28, 30, 32 General Information:
General Information:
Here the words "They" and "we" refer to the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers. (See: Exclusive and Inclusive "We")
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General Information:
The words "him," "He" and "you" refer to Paul. (See: Acts 17:18)
They took ... brought him
This does not mean they arrested Paul. The philosophers invited Paul to speak formally to their leaders.
to the Areopagus
The "Areopagus" was the place where the leaders met. AT: "to the leaders that met on the Areopagus" (See: Metonymy)
the Areopagus, saying
Here the leaders on the Areopagus are speaking. This can stated as a new sentence. AT: "the Areopagus. The leaders said to Paul"
Areopagus
This is a prominent rock outcropping or hill in Athens upon which the supreme court of Athens may have met. (See: How to Translate Names)
For you bring some strange things to our ears
Paul's teachings about Jesus and the resurrection are spoken of as an object that a person can bring to another person. Here "ears" refers to what they hear. AT: "For you teachings some things that we have never heard before" (See: Metaphor and Metonymy)
Now ... something new
This word is used here to mark a break in the main story line. Here Luke tells background information about the people who lived in Athens and their interest in new teachings. (See: Background Information)
Now all the Athenians and the strangers living there
The word "all" is a generalization referring to many. AT: "Now many of the Athenians and the strangers living there" or "Now many of the Athenians and the strangers living there" (See: Hyperbole and Generalization)
all the Athenians
"Athenians" are people from Athens, a city near the coast below Macedonia (present day Greece). (See: How to Translate Names)
the strangers
"the foreigners"
spent their time in nothing but either telling or listening
Here "time" is spoken of as if it were an object that a person could spend. AT: "used their time doing nothing but either telling or listening" or "were always doing nothing but telling or listening" (See: Metaphor)
spent their time in nothing but either telling or listening
The phrase "spent their time in nothing" is an exaggeration. AT: "did not do much but tell or listen" or "spent much of their time telling or listening" (See: Hyperbole and Generalization)
telling or listening about something new
"discussing new philosophical ideas" or "talking about what was new to them"
translationWords
Paul
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv22, 30, 32, 34 17:22-31 Paul’s remarkable sermon in Athens reveals his versatility…
17:22-31 Paul’s remarkable sermon in Athens reveals his versatility in preaching the Good News (Rom 11:14; 1 Cor 9:19-23; 10:33; cp. Acts 16:3; 17:2-3; 21:20-26). While Paul’s Greek audience did not know the Scriptures or have a tradition of monotheism as the Jews did, they did have a rich intellectual heritage. So Paul established a point of contact on the basis of an Athenian inscription to an Unknown God. He then explained God’s nature as the Creator (17:22-29), followed by God’s purpose as the Redeemer (17:30-31). • As he did elsewhere in his own writings (see 1 Cor 15:33; Titus 1:12), Paul made use of the Greek poets. There are several points of connection in this sermon with the Hymn to Zeus by Cleanthes (about 315–240 BC). Paul was probably quoting Epimenides, who had declared about God, “In him we live and move and exist” (Epimenides, Cretica, about 600 BC). Paul also cited Aratus, a Stoic poet from Cilicia (about 315–240 BC), who had commented, “We are his offspring” (Aratus, Phaenomena 5). These allusions to their own poets established connections with his audience. Paul was then able to present the singular nature of God (Acts 17:29), and he stressed the coming judgment through Jesus Christ, whom God had raised from the dead. This message, while touching on Greek culture and philosophy, had a clear focus on Christ that presented the challenge of Christ to a cultured and intellectual but idolatrous people.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.