A Practical Commentary on Holy Scripture/XCV. The Council of Jerusalem (about A. D. 50)
is, which thou speakest of?" And Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said:
“Ye men of Athens, passing and seeing your idols, I found an altar[1] on which was written: To the unknown God. What, therefore, you worship without knowing it, this I preach to you — God who made the world and all things therein. He, being Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; neither is He served with men’s hands, as if He needed anything, seeing it is He who giveth to all life and breath and all things. He hath made of one, all mankind to dwell upon the whole face of the earth, that they should seek God, if happily they may feel after Him and find Him, although He be not far from every one of us: for in Him we live and move and be: as some also of your own poets said: ‘For we are also His offspring.’ Being, therefore[2], the offspring of God, we must not suppose the divinity to be like gold and silver, or stone, the graving of art and device of man. And God, indeed, having winked at[3] the times of ignorance, now declareth unto men that they should everywhere do penance [4]. Because He hath appointed a day wherein He will judge the world in equity by the Man whom He hath appointed, giving faith to all by raising Him up from the dead.” St. Paul wished to teach them more about our Lord, but he was interrupted and could proceed no further.
The result was that only a few of them believed. Among these few was Dionysius the Areopagite[5], one of the most learned men of his time. After Paul had preached the Gospel at Athens, he went to Corinth.
There he preached first to the Jews, but they would not hear him, but rather blasphemed and contradicted all he said. Then Paul, filled with a holy indignation, spoke to them: “Your blood be upon your own heads; I am clean. From henceforth I will go to the Gentiles.” He then preached to the pagans of Corinth, many of whom were converted. Having remained in Corinth a year and six months, teaching and preaching, he returned to Antioch via Caesarea and Jerusalem.
COMMENTARY.
The necessity of revelation. Athens was the most cultured city of the ancient pagan world. All arts and sciences flourished there to a high degree, but in religious matters there reigned the grossest superstition and most senseless idolatry, the inhabitants paying divine honour to images made by themselves. This shows us that even those among the pagans of the old world who were most advanced in civilization had fallen very far short of the knowledge of the True God, and that, in spite of their progress in art and science, they would never have arrived at knowing God, had He not, in an extraordinary and supernatural way, revealed Himself in Jesus Christ. Without this supernatural revelation, the world would have sunk deeper and deeper into the abyss of superstition, impiety, and immorality.
Sorrow for the sins of others. “The spirit of Paul was stirred within him” when he saw that Athens was wholly given over to idolatry. His feeling of grief proceeded from his love both of God and of his neighbour (see the holy anger of Moses. Old Test. XXXVII). “Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted!” At this moment there are many millions of heathens who do not know God. Let us pray for their conversion.
The causes of unbelief. Most of those who heard St. Paul’s words at Athens remained in their unbelief. They had neither the will to believe, nor any earnest desire to know the truth. They invited the apostle to speak, out of a mere spirit of curiosity (Acts 17, 21); but as soon as he entered on the great doctrines of the Resurrection and the Judgment, they refused to listen to him any more. Some of them, instead of examining his words, simply mocked at them, while the rest put him off with the excuse that they would hear him some other time. Frivolity, superficiality and religious indifference were then, as they are now, the principal causes of unbelief.
In his discourse to the Athenians St. Paul taught them 1. about God; 2. about men; 3. about Jesus Christ.
1. “God”, he said, “dwelleth not in temples”, in the sense that He can be shut in a temple. He is an infinite, immeasurable Spirit, to whom no limits of space can be allotted. He is “the Lord of heaven and earth” !
“He is not served with men’s hands, as though He needed anything.” He is infinitely perfect of Himself, so that He needs nothing and depends on nothing.
“He is not far from every one of us”, being near to each person, “for in Him we live and move and be.” He is in us, and about us, and everywhere present.
He “hath made the world and all things therein”. He “giveth to all life and breath and all things”. Without Him we could not be, nor live, nor move; for our being, our life, and our movement depend entirely on Him, who is the First Cause of all things.
He is indulgent and patient, and did not at once punish the errors of the pagans, but invited them to do penance. He is, however, just, and will one day “judge the world in equity”.
2. St. Paul proclaims the origin, dignity, and end of man.
Man, he says, was created by God, and in such a way that all men were made from one, that is, from Adam, and that all men are, therefore, brethren.
Man is far above all other visible creatures. He is, so to speak, “the offspring of God”, having an immortal soul made to the image of God.
God is the end of man, for He created him “that he should seek Him”. Man, therefore, is made to know God, to love God, and to be happy for ever with God in heaven.
3. Of our Lord Jesus Christ St. Paul says that God “raised Him up from the dead”, and that thereby He hath “given faith to all”.
- ↑ An altar. This altar had been dedicated to “the unknown God”, because many among the pagans had a suspicion that over and above their own gods there was another God whom they did not know.
- ↑ Being, therefore. The purport of St. Paul’s words is this: Even pagan poets have proclaimed that mankind is sprung of a divine race, being near to God, and like to Him. If man be like unto God, then senseless and lifeless objects made by man cannot be like unto Him, for these are much lower than man himself, and it follows that the “devices of men” made of gold and silver and stone could not be gods, as was taught by the pagans.
- ↑ Winked at. i. e. has tolerated the long continued ignorance of the true God.
- ↑ Do penance. And be converted to Him, the Only True God. To move the Athenians to do penance, the apostle put before them the judgment of the world, which God will hold by “One Man”, i. e. Jesus Christ, whom He raised from the dead.
- ↑ Dionysius the Areopagite, Who later on was made bishop, and died a martyr’s death.