Paul Before the Areopagus
I want to shift gears a bit and take a look at the “twins” which comprise the Creation Project and that drive it through the instrumentality of the covenants. Those twins being Eschatology and Teleology which I spoke about in the first volume. A good place to start is Paul’s defense at Mars Hill in Acts 17. He is addressing pagan Greeks who have no familiarity with the Scriptures. There would have been fruitless to attempt to introduce these scholars to the concept of a Jewish Messiah, or to impress them with a recital of OT prophetic expectation. What these Greeks needed was a direct challenge to their worldview. Paul begins his address by checking their metaphysics. That is to say, he notices that there is an openness to religious/superstitious phenomena. He is not speaking to a group of atheist materialists.[1] Whether Epicureans or Stoics or something else, if Paul was going to refer to gods and such he would not be despised on that account. These people worshiped (Acts 17:23). Since they acknowledged there may be an unknown god to whom worship is due, they are covering themselves with an altar to “the Unknown God” (Acts 17:23). This positions him to introduce the one true God to the Athenians (Acts 17:24f.).
When I say “introduce” what I mean is closer to “remind” because as Paul says in Romans 1:18-23 God Himself is an inescapable fact, but sin and pride obscure the truth. F. F. Bruce has said that “parallels to Paul’s argument can be adduced from Greek literature and philosophy.”[2] Anyhow, Yahweh God is brought into the conversation front and center as the creator of both heaven and earth and everything in it (Acts 17:24). That kicks the whole pantheon to the curb in a single verse! The real God does not depend on His creatures for anything (Acts 17:25), which distinguishes Him from the general run of gods the Greeks would have been familiar with. Moreover, God is the Lord of all living things and of all men throughout history (Acts 17:25-26). Paul also slipped into his description the fact, insulting to Greco-Roman ears, that all men are of one race (Acts 17:26).
Paul’s next pronouncement is interesting for a number of reasons. He avers that God’s placement of humans; His “determination” (horizo) and “preappointment” (protasso) of them, had to do with the hope of their searching for Him. As he puts it, “so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us…” (Acts 17:27). This is a hard verse to comprehend. If God wanted people to find Him, why did He make them “grope after” (pselaphao) Him? I believe the answer must be joined to Paul’s proclamation of salvation in Jesus and should not be extended throughout time. The Athenians were “groping” after the Divine and now they can find Him.
What comes next is a surprise. Paul the apostle quotes well known Greek writers to further his argument. Not because he agreed with their philosophy, but because the truth about the world creeps in even when the reality of the Creator is suppressed. Cornelius Van Til explored this area perhaps more than anyone else[3], and to my mind it is foundational to the articulation of Theology. Sin has caused blindness in the unsaved to the program of God. Scripture lights the way ahead (Psa. 119:105). The Spirit of God opens the spiritual eyes. Through what is often called ”common grace” but is better referred to general revelation those estranged from God can yet perceive snatches of reality. Hence, the Apostle to the Gentiles finds vestiges of God’s truth in pagan writers and uses them to build a bridge to the pagan audience. He has started by claiming that there is one God and that He is supremely in control of everything, and that everything is His creation (we might, for sake of ease, think of Plato’s forms, although the apostle’s doctrine brings them into this world). He has then quoted two of their scholars (the philosopher Epimenides of Crete[4] and Aratus, a poet) to show that his teaching is partially known via general revelation.[5]
Paul concludes the first part of his argument by showing that his God cannot be represented by human innovation and artifice (Acts 17:29). Then in two verses he comes to the point:
Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.” – Acts 17:30-31.
Paul had been requested to defend his teaching about “Jesus and the resurrection” (Acts 17:18-21) before the Areopagus. He bears down now on the great event that has brought him to Athens. In light of this event a change of outlook (metanoia) is demanded. A day of reckoning has been appointed, and one Man (Jesus) has been chosen to judge the world. That Jesus is the Appointed One has been proven by His being raised from the dead.
Now Paul may have wanted to say more but this seems to be as far as he got. It may be noted here that by referring to Jesus as “ordained” (horizo) Paul has included the concept of Him being God’s anointed. Paul has moved from creation to judgment in a few verses. Since God is controlling history, this means that the world is on a teleological (purposeful) and eschatological trajectory.
[1] This is not to say that what the apostle declares is without real value for speaking to atheists.
[2] F. F. Bruce, The Book of the Acts, 357.
[3] See especially Cornelius Van Til, A Survey of Christian Epistemology, Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 1980. This work really needs to be republished.
[4] Paul also quotes from Epimenides in Titus 1:12. In fact he cites the same quatrain!
[5] See also Acts 14:15-17.
