Acts 17:29

γένος οὖν ὑπάρχοντες : for ὑπάρχειν, see above on Acts 17:24; is the inference simply that because we are dependent upon God for all things, it is absurd to suppose that the divine nature can be like to the work of men's hands? This is correct so far as it goes, but is not the further thought implied that as men are the offspring of God, they ought not to think that man is the measure of God, or that the divine nature, which no man hath seen at any time, can be represented by the art of man, but rather as conscious of a sonship with a Father of spirits they ought to worship a Father in spirit and in truth? see quotations from Seneca in Lightfoot, Philippians, p. 290: “The whole world is the temple of the immortal gods. Temples are not to be built to God of stones piled on high.…” Fragm. 123 in Lactant. Div. Inst., vi., 25: “God is near thee; He is with thee; He is within,” Ep. Mor., xcv., 47: “Thou shalt not form Him of silver and gold, a true likeness of God cannot be moulded of this material,” Ep. Mor., xxxi., 11. See also the striking parallels from Letters of Pseudo-Heracleitus, Gore, Ephesians, p. 254. For a recent view of the possible acquaintance of Seneca with the Christian teaching of St. Paul see Orr, Some Neglected Factors in Early Christianity, pp. 178 ff. τὸ θεῖον : not “godhead,” but “that which is divine,” R.V. margin, “the divine nature”; probably the word which the Athenians themselves used, Xen., Mem., i., 4, 18, see instances in Grimm, sub v., of its use in Philo and Josephus, who employ it in the neuter of the one God, Grimm thinks, out of regard for Greek usage. χρυσῷ ἢ ἀργ. ἢ λίθῳ : (on the form of the word see Blass and critical notes) including, we may suppose, the chryselephantine statues of Phidias in the Parthenon, and a reference to the silver mines of Laurium, and the marble hewn from Pentelicus, cf. Epist. ad Diognetum, ii., 2. χαράγματι : in apposition to χρύσῳ. χαράσσω, Latin, sculpo, insculpo, only here in N.T. in this sense. Polyb. uses the words of coins stamped (so in Anth.., v., 30) τὸ χαραχθὲν νόμισμα. τέχνης καὶ ἐνθ.: “artis externæ, cogitationis internæ”. ἐνθ.: a rare word (in the plural, thoughts, cf. Matthew 9:4, etc.), but used by Thuc., Eur., and also by Hippocrates. See the remarks of Curtius (Gesammelte Abhandlungen, ii., 535) on the words, as indicating that Paul was acquainted with the phrases of Greek authors. The passage in Wis 13:6 should be carefully noted (see Acts 17:27 above), and also Acts 17:10, in which the writer speaks of gods which are the work of men's hands, gold and silver to show art in, i.e., lit [315], an elaboration of art, ἐμμελέτημα τέχνης. In the words Bethge further sees an intimation that the Apostle had an eye for the forms of beauty represented in the carved statues and idols which met his gaze in Athens; but for a very different view of St. Paul's estimate of art see Renan, Saint Paul, p. 172, Farrar, St. Paul, i., 525, McGiffert, Apostolic Age, p. 260. ἀνθρώπου : stands contrasted with τὸ θεῖον; it is the device of man which forms the material into the idol god, and thus human thought becomes the measure of the divine form; Xenophanes (570 B.C.) had ridiculed the way in which the Thracians represented their gods, with blue eyes and fair complexions, whilst the Æthiopians had represented their gods as flat-nosed and swarthy. Zeno had renewed the protest, but some of the best of the heathen philosophers had spoken in inconsistent language on the subject; St. Paul's plain and direct words were the utterances of a man who had in mind the severe and indignant protests of the Hebrew prophets, cf. Isaiah 44:12. οὐκ ὀφείλομεν : at the same time the use of the 1st person plural again points to the conciliatory tone of the speech, “clemens locutio” (so Bengel, Wendt); or possibly the words may mean that he is referring in a general way to the beliefs of the people, to the crowd and not to the philosophers: πρὸς τοὺς πολλοὺς ὁ λόγος ἦν αὐτῷ, Chrys. But Nestle has lately called attention to the question as to whether we should not translate: “we are not obliged, not bound to think, we are at liberty not to think so,” and thus, instead of a reproof, the words become a plea for freedom of religious thought. The first shade of meaning, he adds, i.e., “clemens locutio,” as above, comes nearer to ὀφειλ. μὴ νομίζειν, the second agrees with the other passage in the N.T., 2 Corinthians 12:14, where the negative particle is connected with ὀφείλειν; see Nestle's note in Expository Times, March, 1898, p. 381.

[315] literal, literally.