Benny Nalkara, CMI

The Areopagus sermon delivered by Apostle Paul in Athens (Acts 17:16–34), at the Areopagus, and recounted in is the most dramatic and fully-reported speech of the missionary career of Saint Paul. People from all walks of life stopped and listened to him preaching and he gained a unique opportunity to address the highest assembly of Greeks in Athens. While Paul was waiting for his companions Silas and Timothy to arrive, Paul was distressed to see Athens full of idols and “his spirit was provoked within him (17:16). So Paul went to the synagogue and the Agora on a number of occasions and argued in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the market place every day with those who chanced to be there. There were people from different groups including the Stoic and Epicurean philosophers. He preached to them about the resurrection of Jesus. Some Greeks then took him to a meeting at the Areopagus, the high court in Athens, to explain himself. The Areopagus literally meant “the rock of Ares” in the city and was a centre of temples, cultural facilities, and a high court. There, Paul made a speech appealing to the cultural and religious sensitivity of the Athenians.

Paul’s speech was full of respect to the Athenian culture, religious belief and practices. His first utterance was an appreciation for their religious tradition: “Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious (17:22). He mentioned about their worship ‘to an unknown god.’ Legend tells that during a plague, Epimenides of Crete counselled the Athenians to send a flock of sheep on the Areopagus and erect altars to unnamed gods where the sheep stopped. He recognises the reality of the Athenians’ spirituality and reveals the inconsistency of their idol worship and uses the altar to highlight the potential of a more genuine relationship with God. While Paul acknowledges the Athenians’ search for God, he implies that their search has been unsuccessful or incomplete (v23). Paul explained to them that “the God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by man, nor is he served by human hands, and the humans should seek God, in the hope that they might feel after him and find him(vv24-25). Paul stressed that this God is not far from each one of us, for ‘in him we live and move and have our being’; as even some of your poets have said, ‘For we are indeed his offspring’ (v28).

His remarkable familiarity with the Athenian philosophical traditions is also very well reflected in the speech. The saying “in him we live and move and have our being” is based on an earlier saying of Epimenides of Knossos from the six century BCE and the quote “for we are indeed his offspring” is from the Aratus of Soli, a third century BCE poets from Cilicia. Paul undermines the deep logic of the city’s idolatry (v29) by arguing that idols can’t produce offspring. Paul presented a positive and welcoming attitude of God saying that “the times of ignorance God overlooked,” (v30) and appealing to the Athenians for repentance. And finally, we find Paul highlighting the resurrection of Jesus as the basis of the righteousness of God revealed in Jesus Christ. This might have led some of his audience to become suspicious and hence the apparent failure of the attempt of Paul. But, we find people like Dionysius, Damaris and others to get converted.

The Areopagus speech of Paul remains before us as a perfect example of witnessing to the Gospel in a cross-cultural setting. Paul reminds us that the cultural sensitivity in preaching to people from different backgrounds is a must in our missionary endeavours. He takes a respectful and reconciliatory approach; he does not simply conform to their world-view and beliefs, rather he seeks to confront, correct and transform the Athenian’s understanding of God. Paul’s approach and response teach us that an ideal missionary must be alert to God’s guidance and ready to adapt quickly to unexpected situations.

Paul’s approach in Areopagus is an example of contextualisation. It reminds us of our responsibility and privilege as Christians to exegete the context, discern what is appropriate, discover points of connection, take the spirituality of the people seriously and communicate with the least-possible barriers to understanding. A contextual approach is not only important for sharing the gospel, but also for how the gospel is ‘worked out.’ The gospel does not exist in one language group or cultural system, it will never sit neatly in any group without provoking change and transformation. The task of mission in every culture is to carefully discern both the essential elements of the gospel that cannot be shaken, as well as the unnecessary elements that can be negotiated or modified and at the same time seeking transformation without compromising the truth of the Gospel.

Paul’s Areopagus speech gives us training on how to watch effectively, listen deeply and act prudently in a conflicting situation. It reminds us that the segmentation of knowledge, with its splintered approach to truth and consequent fragmentation of meaning, keeps people today from coming to an interior unity. By imposing an ideology, we may attain an artificial uniformity and untruthful discipline in the process but never the agapeic unity and conciliating transformation.