Introducing the Athenians to God

I have a few commentaries on Acts and have read many more. Some are, of course, better than others. Each of them share a common deficiency -- how should we understand Paul's comments to the Aeropagus (Acts 17). I recently came across what I believe to be the very best commentary on this short speech. It is from Bruce Winter. Here are the opening paragraphs:

When an early twentieth-century Archbishop of Canterbury heard that Anglicans and Methodists had joined together in a service of Holy Communion in East Africa, he declared, ‘It was highly pleasing to Almighty God, but never to be done again.’ Luke’s succinct summary of Paul’s Areopagus address has sometimes been similarly judged. As such, it is seen as a one-off, valiant attempt at philosophical discussion concerned with Providence (de Providentia) and The Nature of the Gods (de natura Deorum) in the sophisticated field of apologetics in the late Roman Republican and early Empire.

It is acknowledged that Paul’s speech was sufficient for some of those who heard to believe and to identify with him and his gospel message. Among them was a distinguished Athenian, Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus Council, and a woman, Damaris. The former would have been a leading citizen of Athens because of his membership of its very ancient and distinguished ruling body. The woman had rank and status, and presumably was a patroness because the description of ‘others who were with them both’. In view of his rank as an Areopagite, Dionysius would also have had clients accompanying him.

However, the Areopagus address is regarded in some Christian circles as a well-meaning, innovative experiment, ‘highly pleasing to Almighty God’—after all it resulted in the conversion of the two distinguished Athenians and their entourage—but it was ‘never to be done again’. Therefore, it has to be concluded that today Acts 17 provides no paradigm for Christian apologetics which are an essential prerequisite to evangelism.

Those who believe that this address was, in effect, a failure, support their contention by arguing that Paul himself subsequently resolved never again to attempt this approach in his ministry. They argue that, of his evangelistic endeavours at his next port of call, Paul ‘determined to know nothing but Jesus Christ and Him crucified’ (1 Cor. 2:2) in that culturally sophisticated city of Corinth.

It is concluded that even though there were converts on the day, Paul himself put the Areopagus style of evangelism behind him. He expected that others would never attempt to imitate his Athenian foray into the field of apologetics. This view of Acts 17 provides no paradigm for contemporary presentations of the Christian gospel. If that is the case it also has to be concluded that the address was recorded in Scripture simply as an interesting museum piece in the intellectual heartland of Athens and Greek culture.

You can read the rest here.