Paul in Athens

Today's first lectionary reading, and one of my favorites:

Acts 17:15, 22-18:1

After Paul's escorts had taken him to Athens,
they came away with instructions for Silas and Timothy
to join him as soon as possible.

Then Paul stood up at the Areopagus and said:
"You Athenians, I see that in every respect
you are very religious.
For as I walked around looking carefully at your shrines,
I even discovered an altar inscribed, 'To an Unknown God.'
What therefore you unknowingly worship, I proclaim to you.
The God who made the world and all that is in it,
the Lord of heaven and earth,
does not dwell in sanctuaries made by human hands,
nor is he served by human hands because he needs anything.
Rather it is he who gives to everyone life and breath and everything.
He made from one the whole human race
to dwell on the entire surface of the earth,
and he fixed the ordered seasons and the boundaries of their regions,
so that people might seek God,
even perhaps grope for him and find him,
though indeed he is not far from any one of us.
For 'In him we live and move and have our being,'
as even some of your poets have said,
'For we too are his offspring.'
Since therefore we are the offspring of God,
we ought not to think that the divinity is like an image
fashioned from gold, silver, or stone by human art and imagination.
God has overlooked the times of ignorance,
but now he demands that all people everywhere repent
because he has established a day on which he will 'judge the world
with justice' through a man he has appointed,
and he has provided confirmation for all
by raising him from the dead."

When they heard about resurrection of the dead,
some began to scoff, but others said,
"We should like to hear you on this some other time."
And so Paul left them.
But some did join him, and became believers.
Among them were Dionysius,
a member of the Court of the Areopagus,
a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
After this he left Athens and went to Corinth.

It speaks to the Mystery of God, which you brought up in another thread. It also speaks to the paradox of God, that he is unknowable and yet He is within reach. It is simply poetic.

It looks like Paul had them listiening until he brought up the resurresction. I think that blew alot of minds. :spl:

VicarJoe wrote:
"You Athenians, I see that in every respect
you are very religious.
For as I walked around looking carefully at your shrines,
I even discovered an altar inscribed, 'To an Unknown God.'
What therefore you unknowingly worship, I proclaim to you.

He made from one the whole human race
to dwell on the entire surface of the earth,
and he fixed the ordered seasons and the boundaries of their regions,
so that people might seek God,
even perhaps grope for him and find him,
though indeed he is not far from any one of us.

Yes, I've always loved what he does at the temple to an unknown god. It perfectly captures how the early church grew not by razing what was in its way, but by converting it to God. It also suggests that even with their pantheon of many, many gods, the Greeks KNEW there was something more, something beyond their view. Even with dozens of gods, they were still groping after the true God.

But I've never really noticed the second part, where God seems to organize peoples and regions in a way that separates them, so that even as they seek after God, they only see parts of the truth. But what they see is true--they do, as the passage says, "find him" even without the benefit of the revealed word. This comes very close to Lewis' work on the Tao, and it suggests that our emphasis on the natural law has been there from the beginning.

Althoughit might fit in nicely with the notion of evelution. God made the seasons, and as a result different culturals evoled as a result of different climates. Each cultural gropes for God in its own fashion.

Yes, I thought of the Tao. Paul's observation that the Atheans are making the effort to search for God harkens to the Tao.

The impact I see in this reading is Paul introducing the belief that God is above and outside of Nature. That he doesn't reside in the images created by Man. This is a HUGE leap in the understanding (groping for) God. and now, a word from our sponsor