Homilies on Acts 38.1–38.5

“Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him … So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace every day.” See: he meets greater trials among the Jews than among the Greeks. At Athens, at any rate, he suffers nothing of the kind; the whole affair went no further than laughter, though he did persuade some; but among the Jews the dangers are many, so much more hostile were they. That is why he says: “Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full of idols.” Naturally he is provoked; for nowhere else could one see so many idols. “So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there.” See, again he reasons with Jews, stopping on every side the mouths of those who say that he abandoned them by turning to the Gentiles. It is a wonder that the philosophers did not at once laugh him to scorn when he spoke so, nor leap away from the preaching, saying, “This is far from philosophy.” It was because he had no pride; and besides, because they did not understand or grasp anything of what was said. For how could they, when some say that God is a body, and others that blessedness is pleasure? “And some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers conversed with him, and some said, ‘What would this babbler wish to say?’ Others, ‘He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign divinities,’ because he was preaching the good news of Jesus and the resurrection.” For they thought that the Resurrection too was some god, since they were used to worshiping female deities as well. “And they took hold of him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, ‘May we know what … For you bring some strange things to our ears; we wish therefore to know what these things mean.’” They brought him to the Areopagus not to learn but to punish him, where the trials for murder were held. See, at any rate, how even when hoping to learn they charge him everywhere with innovation. Theirs was a city of talkers. “Now all the Athenians and the foreigners living there spent their time in nothing else but telling or hearing something newer. So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, ‘Men of Athens, I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar on which was inscribed: To an unknown god. What therefore you worship without knowing it, this I proclaim to you.’” As though praising them, he seems to say nothing harsh. “I see that you are very religious,” he says, that is, very devout. “On which was inscribed: To an unknown god.” What is this? The Athenians, since at various times they had received many gods, some even from abroad, such as the temple of Athena, Pan, and others from elsewhere, were afraid that there might be some other god not yet known to them but worshiped elsewhere; so, for greater safety, no doubt, they set up an altar to him too; and since the god was not known, it was inscribed: “To an unknown god.” This one, then, Paul says, is Christ Jesus, or rather the God of all. “What therefore you worship without knowing it,” he says, “this I proclaim to you.” See how he shows that they had already received him beforehand. I bring in nothing foreign, he says, nothing new. For they were saying this up and down: “What is this new teaching that you speak of? For you bring some strange things to our ears.” So at once he removes their suspicion, and says: “The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth.” Then, so that they might not think him one of the many, he next makes a correction, adding: “does not dwell in temples made with hands, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything.” Do you see how little by little he introduces the philosophy? How he mocks the error of the Greeks? “Since he gives to all life and breath and everything. And he made from one blood every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth.” This is proper to God. See then whether these things cannot also be said of the Son. “Being Lord of heaven and earth,” he says: the very things they thought were gods. And he has made known both the creation and humankind. “Having determined appointed times and the boundaries of their dwelling, that they should seek God, if perhaps they might feel after him and find him, though indeed he is not far from each one of us. For in him we live and move and are, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also his offspring.’” The poet Aratus said this. See him furnishing proofs both from the things they had done and from the things they had said. “Being then God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the divine is like gold or silver or …” “And yet,” one says, “for this very reason we ought to.” Not at all; for we are not like these, nor are our souls. Why did he not take his stand on philosophy at once and say, “God is by nature incorporeal, invisible, and without form”? Because for the time it seemed superfluous to say these things to people who had not yet learned that there is only one God. That is why he leaves those things unsaid and takes his stand on the point in question, and says: “The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, having given assurance to all …” … their mind by saying, “He has fixed a day,” and having frightened them, he then fittingly adds this: “having raised him from the dead.” But let us look at what was said from the beginning. “Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens,” it says, “his spirit was provoked within him.” Provocation here signifies not anger or indignation but rousing and zeal, as elsewhere too: “There arose,” it says, “a provocation between them.”

See how it is so arranged that he stays there even against his will, waiting for them. What then is “was provoked”? Instead of “was roused”; for the gift is far from anger and indignation. He could not bear it, but was wasting away. “So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews,” it says, “and the devout persons.” See him again reasoning with Jews. By “devout persons” he means the proselytes. For the Jews had been scattered everywhere from the coming of Christ, partly because that law was then being dissolved, partly to teach people godliness. But they gained nothing; they only got witnesses of their own calamities. “And some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers,” it says, “conversed with him.” The Athenians no longer used their own laws, since they had already come under the Romans. And why did these men want to converse with him? Since they saw others too reasoning, … and the man held in esteem. And see, at once … “For the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit.” “He seems,” it says, “to be a proclaimer of foreign divinities”; for they called their gods divinities … for the cities were full of idols. “And they took hold of him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying …” Why did they drag him to the Areopagus? To terrify him … “What is this new teaching spoken by you? …” “Now all the Athenians and the foreigners living there spent their time in nothing else but telling or hearing something newer.” Here he points out that, being always occupied in this, in talking and hearing, they thought strange the things they had never heard. “So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, ‘Men of Athens, I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship.’” He did not say “the idols” simply, but prepares the way for his speech. That is why he says, “I see that you are very religious,” because of the … “The God,” he says, “who made the world and everything in it.” He uttered one word, by which he overturned the doctrines of the philosophers. For the Epicureans say that everything is spontaneous and made up of atoms; the Stoics say that God is a body, and speak of a conflagration; but he says that the world and everything in it are the work of God. Do you see the brevity, and in the brevity the clarity? … Consider what seemed strange to them: that God made the world. What even some ordinary people now know, the Athenians did not know, nor the wise among the Athenians. If he made it, clearly he is also Lord. See what he says is the distinguishing mark of God: the power to create, which the Son also has. For the prophets too everywhere say that to create belongs to God; not as the philosophers say, that the maker is one and the lord another, supposing an uncreated matter. Here at last he has stated his own position and established it, and overthrows theirs. “He does not dwell,” he says, “in temples made with hands.” He does dwell in temples, but not in such as these, but in human souls. See, he has done away with bodily worship. What then? Did he dwell in the temple in Jerusalem? Certainly not; he worked there. How then was he served by human hands among the Jews? Not by hands, but by the mind; and those things he did not require as though he needed them. “Shall I eat,” he says, “the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats?” Then, having said, “nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything” (since even this was not enough, to say that he needs nothing, as he had declared; for the divine is …, but something else must be added as well), he adds: “since he himself gives to all life and breath and everything.” He shows two marks of deity: that he himself needs nothing, and that he supplies everything to all. Bring forward here all that Plato philosophized, all that Epicurus did, and … it is nonsense beside these words. “Giving,” he says, “life and breath.” See, he makes him the creator of the soul as well … See again how he overthrows the doctrine about matter. Having said, “And he made from one blood every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth”: these words are better than theirs, and an indictment both of the atoms and of matter. Here he shows that the divine is not local, nor is the human soul. And what those men say, that is not to be a creator. And in saying that God is not served by human hands, he hints that he is served by thought and mind. “This one,” he says, “is Lord of heaven and earth.” So not the local demons. “The God who made the world and everything in it.” Having first shown how heaven came to be, he then declared that he does not dwell in temples made with hands; as if he said: if he is God, clearly he made everything; and if he did not make it, he is not God. “Gods who did not make the heaven and the earth,” it says, “[let them perish] …” He introduces (though he did not yet say the great things, for it was not yet the time, but he was speaking as to children) creation, lordship, and freedom from need.

And in saying that he made every nation of mankind from one blood, he has made known the cause of all good things. What equals this sublime word? For it is wonderful that he made so many from one; but that he holds them all together is still far more wonderful. “Giving,” it says, “to all breath and life.” What is “having determined appointed times and the boundaries of their dwelling, that they should seek God, if perhaps they might feel after him and find him”? That no one was compelled, he says, to go about and seek God; or, if not this, that he determined that they should seek God. But he did not determine this for all time, but for “appointed times.” He says this to show that not even now did they seek and find him, although he was so plainly there to be found, as though he were something to be felt in their very midst. For heaven was not here and not elsewhere; nor was it at this time and not at another. So it was possible to find him at every time and within every boundary. So he arranged the seeking that it should be hindered neither by place nor by time. And this very thing especially helped them, if they had been willing: that heaven is everywhere, that it has stood at every time. That is why he spoke thus: “though indeed he is not far from each one of us,” but near to all. What he says is this: not only did he give life and breath and everything, but, what is the chief of all, he led us to the knowledge of himself, giving us the things by which we can find him and apprehend him. But we did not want to seek him, though he was before our feet. “Not far,” he says, “from each one of us.” Wonderful! He says he is near to all who are anywhere in the world. What is greater than this? See how he also overthrows the local gods. Why do I say “far”? He is so near that without him we do not live: “For in him we live and move and are.” As by a bodily example he says something like this: just as it is impossible not to know the air, which is poured out everywhere and is not far from each one of us, or rather is even within us, so too with the Creator of all. See how he says that everything is his: his providence, he says, and his holding all together, our being from him, our acting, our not perishing. And he did not say “through him,” as of a body and an example, but what was closer: “in him.” That poet said nothing equal when he said, “For we are also his offspring”; but he said it of Zeus, while this man takes it of the Creator, not meaning the same one as the poet (God forbid!), but fitting to the Creator the words properly said of him; since he also spoke of the altar as his, not as belonging to the one they worshiped. For some things are said and done toward him, but the Greeks do not know that they are toward him, and refer them to another. For tell me, of whom could “To an unknown god” properly be said: of the Creator, or of the demon? Clearly of the Creator, even if they did not know the one and knew the other. Likewise, would “he has made all things” properly fit God, or Zeus, a vile, despicable man and a sorcerer? So Paul did not say “For we are also his offspring” in the same sense as that man (God forbid!), but with another meaning. For he said that we are God’s offspring, that is, his own, very near to him; or, as one might say, his neighbors who dwell beside him. For lest they say again, “You bring strange things to our ears” (for nothing is so repugnant to people), he brings the poet into the middle. And he did not say, “You ought not to think that the divine is like gold or silver, you vile and utterly vile men,” but more humbly: “We ought not,” he says, “to think this,” but something above this. What then is above this? God. But not even this (for it is a name of activity); yet for the time, this. However, we do not say that the divine is like this; for who would say so? See how he introduced the incorporeal; for when the mind suspects a body, it also supposes extension. “Being then God’s offspring, we ought not to think,” he says, “that the divine is like gold or silver or stone.” But someone might say, “We do not think this; why then does he say these things?” But his word was addressed to the many; he spoke rightly. For if we are not like these things in our soul, much more God. Meanwhile he leads them away from the suspicion. And not only is the divine unlike a thing engraved by art, but it does not fall under any other human supposition either; for either art or the mind invented it. That is why he spoke thus. For if what human art or thought has found is God, then the essence of God is even in stone. How then, if we live in him, do we not find him? The charge is double: that they did not find him, and that they found such gods as these. Nowhere is the mind trustworthy by itself. But when he had shaken their soul by showing them to be without excuse, see what he adds: “The times of ignorance God overlooked; but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.” What then? Is none of these punished? None of those willing to repent. He speaks of these, not of those who have departed, but of those to whom he gives the command. He does not demand an account from you, he says. He did not say, “He disregarded it”; he did not say, “He permitted it”; but, “You were ignorant.” “Overlooked”: that is, he does not exact punishment as from those who deserve punishment. “You were ignorant.” And he does not say, “You did wrong willingly”; but he showed this by what went before. In saying “everywhere to repent,” he hints here at the whole world.

See how he leads them away from the local gods. “Because he has fixed a day,” he says, “on which he will judge the world in righteousness.” See, again he said “the world,” meaning human beings by it. “By a man whom he has appointed, having raised him from the dead.” See how he has again made the passion known by mentioning the resurrection. That the judgment is true is clear from the resurrection, for each confirms the other; and that he spoke all things in truth is clear from his having risen. And that they offered this assurance to all, his rising from the dead, this too is now clear. These things were said to the Athenians; but it would be fitting to say them to us as well: that all people everywhere must repent, that he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world. See how he introduces him as judge, as providing for the world, loving humankind, ready to pardon, powerful and wise, and in short having all the marks of the Creator. What has been said gave proof of his rising from the dead. Let us then repent; for we must certainly be judged. If Christ did not rise, we are not judged; but if he rose, we are certainly judged. “For to this end he also died,” it says, “that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living”; and again, “For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive according to what he has done.” Do not think that these are mere words. See, he has also brought in the doctrine of the resurrection of all; for the world is judged in no other way. And “having raised him from the dead” is said of the body; for this is what was dead, this is what had fallen. Among the Greeks, as the doctrine of creation is rejected, so too is that of judgment. But these are the inventions of children and of drunken men. But let us, who know these things exactly, do something useful, and be eager to become intimate with Christ. How long shall we be at enmity with him? How long shall we be ill-disposed toward him? “God forbid,” someone says; “why do you say this?” I would not wish to say it, if you were not doing these things; but as it is, what is gained by keeping silent in words, when the facts cry out so loudly and with all openness? How then shall we love him? I have said ten thousand things ten thousand times, and I will say them now too. I think I have found one way, very great and wonderful: besides reckoning up the things God has done for all in common, which are so many that no one can count them, and giving him thanks for all of them, let us all also consider the things that have been done for each of us, and reckon them up every day. Since then these things have great power, let each of us reckon up within himself and search out carefully whether he ever fell into dangers and escaped the hands of his adversaries, and let him keep God’s benefits written down as in a book: for example, whether he once set out on a journey at an untimely hour and escaped danger; whether he once fell in with wicked men and got the better of them; whether he once fell into sickness and recovered when everyone had given him up. For this has great power to bring us close to God. For if that Mordecai, when the good deeds he had done came to the king’s remembrance, found them standing him in such good stead that he came back again to that splendor, much more shall we, if we remember, and make an exact examination of these two things: how we have sinned against God, and what good he has done to us. So we shall be thankful, and give up everything. But no one makes any remembrance of any of these things; but just as we say of our sins, “We are sinners,” without examining them one by one, so too of God’s benefits we say, “God has done us good,” without examining them one by one; we do not say where, and how many, and at what time. But from now on let us use great exactness. If anyone can recall even the things of long ago, let him reckon them all up exactly, as one who will find a great treasure. This is useful to us also against despair. For when we see that he has often protected us, we shall not despair, nor think ourselves cast off; but we shall receive a great pledge of his care for us, when we consider that though we sinned we are not punished, but even enjoy his protection.

Let me too tell something that I heard from someone. There was once a boy, and it happened that he was in the country with his mother, not yet fifteen years old. Then, when some unhealthy air set in, a fever fell on both of them; for it was autumn. The mother managed to get back into the city; but the boy, though the physicians there told him to stay, and thinking that he would quench the heat of the fever all the more if he took nothing at all, out of a boy’s untimely obstinacy took nothing. When he reached the city, his tongue was paralyzed, and he was speechless for a long time, uttering nothing articulate; he read, and went to his teachers for a long time, but his sounds were vague and without meaning. So all his hopes were cut off, and his mother was full of grief; the physicians devised many things, and many others many other things, but no one prevailed, until the God who loves humankind healed the bond of his tongue; and then he recovered, and God brought him back to his former fluency and clearness. His mother related too that when he was a very small child he had an affliction of the nose, which they call …, and his mother prayed that he might die, and his father cursed him (for he happened still to be alive), and again everything was in perplexity. But he at once coughed, and with the force of his breath expelled that creature from his nostrils with the mucus, and all the trouble was ended. When this was over, a sharp and sticky discharge constantly flowing down on his eyes produced so much rheum, and so thick, that it became like a partition over the pupil, and, what was terrible, threatened blindness; and everyone said it would happen. But by the grace of God he was quickly freed from this affliction too. These things I heard; but what I know myself I will tell you. Once there arose in our city a suspicion of usurpers (I was then still a youth); and while all the soldiers were posted around the city outside, they were searching, in earnest, for books of sorcery and magic. And the man who had written the book threw it, as it was, into the river, and was caught; and when it was demanded of him he could not hand it over, but was led around the whole city in chains; and when the proofs mounted up, he paid the penalty. Then I, … a martyr’s shrine, … along the river with another person. He, seeing the book floating on the surface, at first thought it was a piece of linen; but coming near, he knew it was a book, and went down and picked it up. And I was arguing that the find should be shared, and we were laughing. “But let us see,” he says, “what it is.” He opens part of the page, and finds … a soldier passing by. Then he took it inside his clothing and went off, and he was frozen with fear. For who would have believed that we had picked it up secretly from the river, when everyone, even those beyond suspicion, was being seized? And we did not dare to throw it away, lest we be seen; and to tear it up was again an equal fear. At any rate God granted it: we threw it away, and so at last we were freed from the dangers of that time. And I could tell ten thousand things, if I wished to list them all. I have told these for your sake, so that if anyone has, if not such things, then others, he may remember them continually: for example, if a stone was ever thrown and was about to come at you, and did not come at you, keep this ever in memory. These things create for us a great friendship with God. For if, remembering men who …, we are pained when we cannot repay them, much more in the case of God. This is useful elsewhere too. When, then, we want not to be distressed, let us say: “If we have received good things from the Lord, shall we not bear evil things?” And Paul for this reason told the things from which he had been delivered, so as to remind them too. See how Jacob also had all these things in mind; that is why he said, “The angel who delivers me from my youth.” And let us consider not only that he delivered us, but also how and in what circumstances. See, at any rate, how he too remembers the benefits one by one: “With my staff,” he says, “I crossed this Jordan.” And the Jews always remember even what happened in the days of their forefathers, turning over the events in Egypt. So much more should we remember our own, and what has happened to us: how many times we have fallen into injuries and calamities, and if God had not held his hand over us, we would long ago have perished. Considering these things, all of us, and reckoning them up each day, let us give thanks to God continually, and let us all together send up glory to him, and not cease glorifying him, so that we may receive a great reward for our gratitude, by the grace and compassion of his only-begotten Son, with whom, together with the Holy Spirit, be glory, might, honor, now and always and to the ages of ages. Amen.