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OET OET-RV OET-LV ULT UST BSB BLB AICNT OEB WEB WMB NET LSV FBV TCNT T4T LEB BBE MOF JPS ASV DRA YLT DBY RV WBS KJB BB GNV CB TNT WYC SR-GNT UHB Related Parallel Interlinear Dictionary Search
parallelVerse INT GEN EXO LEV NUM DEU JOS JDG RUTH 1SA 2SA 1KI 2KI 1CH 2CH EZRA NEH EST JOB PSA PRO ECC SNG ISA JER LAM EZE DAN HOS JOEL AMOS OBA YNA MIC NAH HAB ZEP HAG ZEC MAL YHN MARK MAT LUKE ACTs ROM 1COR 2COR GAL EPH PHP COL 1TH 2TH 1TIM 2TIM TIT PHM HEB YAC 1PET 2PET 1YHN 2YHN 3YHN YUD REV
Acts Intro C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7 C8 C9 C10 C11 C12 C13 C14 C15 C16 C17 C18 C19 C20 C21 C22 C23 C24 C25 C26 C27 C28
Acts 17 V1 V2 V3 V4 V5 V6 V7 V8 V9 V10 V11 V12 V13 V14 V15 V16 V17 V18 V19 V20 V21 V22 V23 V24 V25 V26 V27 V28 V29 V30 V31 V32 V34
Note: This view shows ‘verses’ which are not natural language units and hence sometimes only part of a sentence will be visible. This view is only designed for doing comparisons of different translations. Click on the version abbreviation to see the verse in more of its context.
OET (OET-RV) So Paul left at that stage
OET-LV Thus the Paulos came_out from the_midst of_them.
SR-GNT Οὕτως ὁ Παῦλος ἐξῆλθεν ἐκ μέσου αὐτῶν. ‡
(Houtōs ho Paulos exaʸlthen ek mesou autōn.)
Key: yellow:verbs, light-green:nominative/subject, pink:genitive/possessor.
Note: Automatic aligning of the OET-RV to the LV is done by some temporary software, hence the OET-RV alignments are incomplete (and may occasionally be wrong).
ULT So Paul went out from their midst.
UST After they said that, Paul walked away.
BSB At that, Paul left the Areopagus.
BLB Thus Paul went out from their midst.
AICNT So Paul went out from among them.
OEB And so Paul left the Court.
WEB Thus Paul went out from among them.
NET So Paul left the Areopagus.
LSV and so Paul went forth from the midst of them,
FBV So Paul left them.
TCNT So Paul departed from them,
T4T After they said that, Paul left the council meeting.
LEB So Paul went out from the midst of them.
BBE And so Paul went away from among them.
MOF No MOF ACTs book available
ASV Thus Paul went out from among them.
DRA So Paul went out from among them.
YLT and so Paul went forth from the midst of them,
DBY Thus Paul went out of their midst.
RV Thus Paul went out from among them.
WBS So Paul departed from among them.
KJB So Paul departed from among them.
BB So Paul departed from among them.
GNV And so Paul departed from among them.
CB So Paul departed from amonge them.
(So Paul departed from among them.)
TNT So Paul departed from amonge them.
(So Paul departed from among them. )
WYC So Poul wente out of the myddil of hem.
(So Poul went out of the middle of them.)
LUT Also ging Paulus von ihnen.
(So went Paulus from ihnen.)
CLV Sic Paulus exivit de medio eorum.
(So Paulus exivit about medio eorum. )
UGNT οὕτως ὁ Παῦλος ἐξῆλθεν ἐκ μέσου αὐτῶν.
(houtōs ho Paulos exaʸlthen ek mesou autōn.)
SBL-GNT ⸀οὕτως ὁ Παῦλος ἐξῆλθεν ἐκ μέσου αὐτῶν·
(⸀houtōs ho Paulos exaʸlthen ek mesou autōn; )
TC-GNT Καὶ οὕτως ὁ Παῦλος ἐξῆλθεν ἐκ μέσου αὐτῶν.
(Kai houtōs ho Paulos exaʸlthen ek mesou autōn. )
Key for above GNTs: yellow:punctuation differs, red:words differ (from our SR-GNT base).
17:16-34 In this chapter, we see Paul presented as a model witness for Christ, engaging the thinkers of his day and challenging them with the Christian message. Paul quoted writers his audience would be familiar with and showed the relevance of the gospel by dialoguing with them, critiquing their assumptions, and offering Jesus as a constructive alternative (see Col 1:28). Paul reminded these proud intellectuals that there is a living God to whom all human beings are answerable; that they will be judged by him through Jesus, whom God raised from the dead; and that they should therefore repent and put their faith in Jesus.
The Unknown God
When Paul spoke to the Areopagus, the “high council of the city” of Athens (Acts 17:19), he was speaking to people who did not share his faith in the God of Abraham and Moses who had revealed himself “many times and in many ways to [his] ancestors through the prophets” (Heb 1:1). The members of his audience had a very different definition of the divine. A host of divinities inhabited their world, and the common people retained much of their belief in the ancient gods. But many of the cultural elite of Athens no longer believed in the gods in any literal sense. Instead, they held to either a form of materialism (the physical is everything) or pantheism (the divine inhabits everything).
What they all shared in common was the absence of the idea that there is one true God who is Lord of all. Their myths told of the activities of various gods, but they did not have faith that the ultimate reality, God himself, could be known. Instead, they reasoned and discussed “the latest ideas,” hoping for a better understanding of the nature of things.
There were a wide variety of philosophical ideas current in Athens when Paul visited, but two main schools of thought dominated, Stoicism and Epicureanism (Acts 17:18).
Zeno of Citium (334~262 BC) founded Stoicism. Stoics studied nature’s laws and believed in the Logos, a pervasive organizing and sustaining force that gives all things their essential nature and so gives life and reason to humanity. The good life is one in which reason rules, and peace of mind and harmony with nature prevail. Many prominent statesmen were Stoics or influenced by Stoicism, including Cicero, Seneca, and Marcus Aurelius. Stoic ideas proved attractive to some Christians because of the similarities between the Stoic logos and the divine Logos (John 1:1-18), and between the idea of natural law and the law of God.
Those who followed Epicurus (341–270 BC) were empiricists; they relied upon sense experience (as opposed to reason) for knowledge. Epicureans were concerned with natural evidence and were unenthusiastic about mathematics. Their focus was ethics, the study of right behavior; they judged the value of an action or thing in terms of the pleasure or pain it brought. Epicurus saw belief in gods (meddling and powerful beings who terrified ordinary mortals) as a serious threat to tranquility. For him and his followers, neither the gods nor death (which is the end) should be feared.
When Paul spoke in that context, he used their own poets to proclaim things that they could barely comprehend: That the God who made everything is both personal and knowable; that he revealed himself clearly, historically, and definitively in Jesus Christ; that death is not followed by either the cessation of existence or the migration of the soul, but by judgment; and that the proof of all of this is the resurrection of Christ from the dead.
What was foolishness to most of the Greeks of Athens turns out to be the ultimate truth: God is knowable, and can be known through Jesus Christ.
Passages for Further Study
Ps 50:7-15; Isa 42:5-7; Acts 17:16-32; Rom 1:18-32; Col 1:15-23; 2:6-12; 1 Thes 1:9-10; Heb 1:1-4