Paul in Athens
TRANSLATION
(16) While Paul waited in Athens, he was greatly distressed to see that the city was filled with idols. (17) He reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and other devout persons, and daily in the marketplace he talked with those who happened to be there. (18) Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers met and conversed with Paul. Some said, “What is this babbler trying to say?” Others commented, “He seems to be advocating foreign gods,” because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. (19) Then they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know about this new teaching that you are proclaiming? (20) You are introducing strange ideas to our ears, and we’d like to know what these things mean.” (21) The Athenians and foreigners who lived there spent their time doing nothing but talking about and listening to the latest ideas.
(22) So Paul, standing in the middle of the Areopagus, addressed them: “People of Athens, I see that in every way you are very religious, (23) for as I walked around and observed the objects of your worship, I found an altar with this inscription: ‘To an unknown god.’ The one you worship as ‘unknown’ is the one I am proclaiming to you. (24) The God who created the world and everything in it is Lord of heaven and earth. He does not live in temples made by human hands, (25) nor is he served by human hands as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else, (26) and from one man he made all human beings and nations that exist on the face of the earth, having determined their appointed seasons and the boundaries of their dwelling places. (27) God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out to him and find him, although he is not far from every one of us, (28) for ‘in him we live, and move, and have our being.’ As one of your own poets has said, ‘We are his offspring.’ (29) Since we are his offspring, we ought not to think that God is made of gold, silver, or stone, an image fashioned by human design and skill. (30) In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, (31) for he has established a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all humanity by raising him from the dead.”
(32) When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, but others said, “We will hear you again concerning this.” (33) So Paul left the gathering. (34) Now some joined him and believed. Among these was Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
OBSERVATIONS
In describing Paul’s brief visit to Athens including the message he gave in the Areopagus, Luke employed several repetitions that help us grasp this segment’s significance. Apart from proper names, “Athenians/Athens” (in vss. 16, 21, & 22), “Paul” (vss. 16, 18, 22, & 33), “Areopagus/Areopagite” (in vss. 19, 22, & 34), and “God/gods (vss. 23, 24, 27, 29, & 30), other repeated terms included “worship” (both in vs. 23), “unknown” (also both in vs. 23), “human hands” (vss. 24 & 25), “man” (vss. 26 & 31), and “offspring” (vss. 28 & 29).
OUTLINE
I. While Paul waited in Athens, he was distressed to see the city filled with idols. (16)
II. Paul was invited to share his message in the Areopagus. (17-21)
III. Paul gave a forceful apologetic of his faith to all who were listening. (22-31)
IV. While some mocked, others accepted his words and believed the Gospel. (32-34)
IDEA STATEMENT
In his address to the Athenians in the Areopagus, Paul sought to convey the Gospel in terms which his pagan audience could understand.
APPLICATION
Paul fashioned the message he gave to the Athenians in the Areopagus to be more palatable to a skeptical audience that knew nothing of the Hebrew Scriptures. First, he complimented them on their religiosity and then used an inscription found on one of their altars, “to the unknown god,” to establish rapport with them in presenting the truth about the God of the Bible. He also used two quotations from Greek literature to demonstrate that what he was about to share was not entirely foreign to their culture. The first, “…in him we live and move and have our being,” came from Epimenides, a well-known poet. The second was lifted from a hymn written by the Cilician poet Aratus, “…for we are indeed his offspring.” While both lines were originally directed to the praise to Zeus, the chief god in the Greek pantheon, Paul skillfully demonstrated how they applied to the one true God of the Hebrew Scriptures.
While the mixed response Paul received that day was understandable, some have concluded that the apostle subsequently decided that adapting his message to a pagan audience did not fit comfortably with his calling to preach the Gospel. In writing to the church at Corinth, his next stop along the way, Paul reflected on his experience in Athens, comparing it with his ministry in Corinth: “And when I came to you, I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.” Never again do we find Paul deliberately couching the truth of the Gospel in such “culturally sensitive” terms.