OT-HISTORY.filter - rwp ridicule:

rwp@Acts:17:16 @{Now while Paul waited for them in Athens} (\En de tais Athnais ekdechomenou autous tou Paulou\). Genitive absolute with present middle participle of \ekdechomai\, old verb to receive, but only with the sense of looking out for, expecting found here and elsewhere in N.T We know that Timothy did come to Paul in Athens (1Thessalonians:3:1,6|) from Thessalonica and was sent back to them from Athens. If Silas also came to Athens, he was also sent away, possibly to Philippi, for that church was deeply interested in Paul. At any rate both Timothy and Silas came from Macedonia to Corinth with messages and relief for Paul (Acts:18:5; strkjv@2Corinthians:11:8f.|). Before they came and after they left, Paul felt lonely in Athens (1Thessalonians:3:1|), the first time on this tour or the first that he has been completely without fellow workers. Athens had been captured by Sulla B.C. 86. After various changes Achaia, of which Corinth is the capital, is a separate province from Macedonia and A.D. 44 was restored by Claudius to the Senate with the Proconsul at Corinth. Paul is probably here about A.D. 50. Politically Athens is no longer of importance when Paul comes though it is still the university seat of the world with all its rich environment and traditions. Rackham grows eloquent over Paul the Jew of Tarsus being in the city of Pericles and Demosthenes, Socrates and Plato and Aristotle, Sophocles and Euripides. In its Agora Socrates had taught, here was the Academy of Plato, the Lyceum of Aristotle, the Porch of Zeno, the Garden of Epicurus. Here men still talked about philosophy, poetry, politics, religion, anything and everything. It was the art centre of the world. The Parthenon, the most beautiful of temples, crowned the Acropolis. Was Paul insensible to all this cultural environment? It is hard to think so for he was a university man of Tarsus and he makes a number of allusions to Greek writers. Probably it had not been in Paul's original plan to evangelize Athens, difficult as all university seats are, but he cannot be idle though here apparently by chance because driven out of Macedonia. {Was provoked} (\parxuneto\). Imperfect passive of \paroxun\, old verb to sharpen, to stimulate, to irritate (from \para, oxus\), from \paroxusmos\ (Acts:15:39|), common in old Greek, but in N.T. only here and strkjv@1Corinthians:13:5|. It was a continual challenge to Paul's spirit when he beheld (\therountos\, genitive of present participle agreeing with \autou\ (his), though late MSS. have locative \therounti\ agreeing with \en auti\). {The city full of idols} (\kateidlon ousan tn polin\). Note the participle \ousan\ not preserved in the English (either the city being full of idols or that the city was full of idols, sort of indirect discourse). Paul, like any stranger was looking at the sights as he walked around. This adjective \kateidlon\ (perfective use of \kata\ and \eidlon\ is found nowhere else, but it is formed after the analogy of \katampelos, katadendron\), full of idols. Xenophon (_de Republ. Ath_.) calls the city \hol bomos, hol thuma theois kai anathma\ (all altar, all sacrifice and offering to the gods). These statues were beautiful, but Paul was not deceived by the mere art for art's sake. The idolatry and sensualism of it all glared at him (Romans:1:18-32|). Renan ridicules Paul's ignorance in taking these statues for idols, but Paul knew paganism better than Renan. The superstition of this centre of Greek culture was depressing to Paul. One has only to recall how superstitious cults today flourish in the atmosphere of Boston and Los Angeles to understand conditions in Athens. Pausanias says that Athens had more images than all the rest of Greece put together. Pliny states that in the time of Nero Athens had over 30,000 public statues besides countless private ones in the homes. Petronius sneers that it was easier to find a god than a man in Athens. Every gateway or porch had its protecting god. They lined the street from the Piraeus and caught the eye at every place of prominence on wall or in the agora.

rwp@Acts:17:18 @{And certain also of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him} (\tines de kai tn Epikourin kai Stikn philosophn suneballon auti\). Imperfect active of \sunball\, old verb, in the N.T. only by Luke, to bring or put together in one's mind (Luke:2:19|), to meet together (Acts:20:14|), to bring together aid (18:27|), to confer or converse or dispute as here and already strkjv@4:15| which see. These professional philosophers were always ready for an argument and so they frequented the agora for that purpose. Luke uses one article and so groups the two sects together in their attitude toward Paul, but they were very different in fact. Both sects were eager for argument and both had disdain for Paul, but they were the two rival practical philosophies of the day, succeeding the more abstruse theories of Plato and Aristotle. Socrates had turned men's thought inward (\Gnthi Seauton\, Know Thyself) away from the mere study of physics. Plato followed with a profound development of the inner self (metaphysics). Aristotle with his cyclopaedic grasp sought to unify and relate both physics and metaphysics. Both Zeno and Epicurus (340-272 B.C.) took a more practical turn in all this intellectual turmoil and raised the issues of everyday life. Zeno (360-260 B.C.) taught in the \Stoa\ (Porch) and so his teaching was called Stoicism. He advanced many noble ideas that found their chief illustration in the Roman philosophers (Seneca, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius). He taught self-mastery and hardness with an austerity that ministered to pride or suicide in case of failure, a distinctly selfish and unloving view of life and with a pantheistic philosophy. Epicurus considered practical atheism the true view of the universe and denied a future life and claimed pleasure as the chief thing to be gotten out of life. He did not deny the existence of gods, but regarded them as unconcerned with the life of men. The Stoics called Epicurus an atheist. Lucretius and Horace give the Epicurean view of life in their great poems. This low view of life led to sensualism and does today, for both Stoicism and Epicureanism are widely influential with people now. "Eat and drink for tomorrow we die," they preached. Paul had doubtless become acquainted with both of these philosophies for they were widely prevalent over the world. Here he confronts them in their very home. He is challenged by past-masters in the art of appealing to the senses, men as skilled in their dialectic as the Pharisaic rabbis with whom Paul had been trained and whose subtleties he had learned how to expose. But, so far as we know, this is a new experience for Paul to have a public dispute with these philosophical experts who had a natural contempt for all Jews and for rabbis in particular, though they found Paul a new type at any rate and so with some interest in him. "In Epicureanism, it was man's sensual nature which arrayed itself against the claims of the gospel; in Stoicism it was his self-righteousness and pride of intellect" (Hackett). Knowling calls the Stoic the Pharisee of philosophy and the Epicurean the Sadducee of philosophy. Socrates in this very agora used to try to interest the passers-by in some desire for better things. That was 450 years before Paul is challenged by these superficial sophistical Epicureans and Stoics. It is doubtful if Paul had ever met a more difficult situation. {What would this babbler say?} (\Ti an theloi ho spermologos houtos legein?\). The word for "babbler" means "seed-picker" or picker up of seeds (\sperma\, seed, \leg\, to collect) like a bird in the agora hopping about after chance seeds. Plutarch applies the word to crows that pick up grain in the fields. Demosthenes called Aeschines a \spermologos\. Eustathius uses it of a man hanging around in the markets picking up scraps of food that fell from the carts and so also of mere rhetoricians and plagiarists who picked up scraps of wisdom from others. Ramsay considers it here a piece of Athenian slang used to describe the picture of Paul seen by these philosophers who use it, for not all of them had it ("some," \tines\). Note the use of \an\ and the present active optative \theloi\, conclusion of a fourth-class condition in a rhetorical question (Robertson, _Grammar_, p. 1021). It means, What would this picker up of seeds wish to say, if he should get off an idea? It is a contemptuous tone of supreme ridicule and doubtless Paul heard this comment. Probably the Epicureans made this sneer that Paul was a charlatan or quack. {Other some} (\hoi de\). But others, in contrast with the "some" just before. Perhaps the Stoics take this more serious view of Paul. {He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods} (\zenn daimonin dokei kataggeleus einai\). This view is put cautiously by \dokei\ (seems). \Kataggeleus\ does not occur in the old Greek, though in ecclesiastical writers, but Deissmann (_Light from the Ancient East_, p. 99) gives an example of the word "on a marble stele recording a decree of the Mitylenaens in honour of the Emperor Augustus," where it is the herald of the games. Here alone in the N.T. \Daimonion\ is used in the old Greek sense of deity or divinity whether good or bad, not in the N.T. sense of demons. Both this word and \kataggeleus\ are used from the Athenian standpoint. \Xenos\ is an old word for a guest-friend (Latin _hospes_) and then host (Romans:16:23|), then for foreigner or stranger (Matthew:25:31; strkjv@Acts:17:21|), new and so strange as here and strkjv@Hebrews:13:9; strkjv@1Peter:4:12|, and then aliens (Ephesians:2:12|). This view of Paul is the first count against Socrates: Socrates does wrong, introducing new deities (\adikei Skrats, kaina daimonia eisphern\, Xen. _Mem_. I). On this charge the Athenians voted the hemlock for their greatest citizen. What will they do to Paul? This Athens was more sceptical and more tolerant than the old Athens. But Roman law did not allow the introduction of a new religion (_religio illicita_). Paul was walking on thin ice though he was the real master philosopher and these Epicureans and Stoics were quacks. Paul had the only true philosophy of the universe and life with Jesus Christ as the centre (Colossians:1:12-20|), the greatest of all philosophers as Ramsay justly terms him. But these men are mocking him. {Because he preached Jesus and the resurrection} (\hoti ton Isoun kai tn anastasin euggelizato\). Reason for the view just stated. Imperfect middle indicative of \euaggeliz\, to "gospelize." Apparently these critics considered \anastasis\ (Resurrection) another deity on a par with Jesus. The Athenians worshipped all sorts of abstract truths and virtues and they misunderstood Paul on this subject. They will leave him as soon as he mentions the resurrection (verse 32|). It is objected that Luke would not use the word in this sense here for his readers would not under stand him. But Luke is describing the misapprehension of this group of philosophers and this interpretation fits in precisely.

rwp@John:7:26 @{They say nothing unto him} (\ouden autoi legousin\). But only make sneering comments about him (7:16|) in spite of his speaking "openly" (\parrsii\, for which word see strkjv@7:13; strkjv@18:20|) before all. lt was sarcasm about the leaders, though an element of surprise on the part of "these shrewd townsmen" (Bernard) may have existed also. {Can it be that the rulers indeed know} (\m pote alths egnsin hoi archontes\). Negative answer expected by \m pote\ and yet there is ridicule of the rulers in the form of the question. See a like use of \m pote\ in strkjv@Luke:3:15|, though nowhere else in John. \Egnsan\ (second aorist ingressive active indicative of \ginsk\) may refer to the examination of Jesus by these rulers in strkjv@5:19ff.| and means, "Did they come to know or find out" (and so hold now)? {That this is the Christ} (\hoti houtos estin ho Christos\). The Messiah of Jewish hope.

rwp@Luke:4:15 @{And he taught} (\kai autos edidasken\). Luke is fond of this mode of transition so that it is not certain that he means to emphasize "he himself" as distinct from the rumour about him. It is the imperfect tense, descriptive of the habit of Jesus. The synagogues were an open door to Jesus before the hostility of the Pharisees was aroused. {Being glorified} (\doxazomenos\). Present passive participle, durative action like the imperfect \edidasken\. General admiration of Jesus everywhere. He was the wonder teacher of his time. Even the rabbis had not yet learned how to ridicule and oppose Jesus.

rwp@Matthew:12:31 @{But the blasphemy against the Spirit} (\h de tou pneumatos blasphmia\). Objective genitive. This is the unpardonable sin. In 32| we have \kata tou pneumatos tou hagiou\ to make it plainer. What is the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit? These Pharisees had already committed it. They had attributed the works of the Holy Spirit by whose power Jesus wrought his miracles (12:28|) to the devil. That sin was without excuse and would not be forgiven in their age or in the coming one (12:32|). People often ask if they can commit the unpardonable sin. Probably some do who ridicule the manifest work of God's Spirit in men's lives and attribute the Spirit's work to the devil.