To the unknown God (ayvect@ Ges). The article is want- ing. Render, as Rev., toan unknown God. The origin of these
Ca. XVIL] THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 543
altars, of which there were several in Athens, is a matter of conjecture. Hackett’s remarks on this point are sensible, and are borne out by the following words: “whom therefore,” ete. “The most rational explanation is unquestionably that of those who suppose these altars to have had their origin in the feel- ing of uncertainty, inherent, after all, in the minds of the hea- then, whether their acknowledgment of the superior powers was sufficiently full and comprehensive; in their distinct conscious- ness of the limitation and imperfection of their religious views, and their consequent desire to avoid the anger of any still un- acknowledged god who might be unknown to them. That no deity might punish them for neglecting his worship, or remain uninvoked in asking for blessings, they not only erected altars to all the gods named or known among them, but, distrustful still lest they might not comprehend fully the extent of their subjection and dependence, they erected them also to any other god or power that might exist, although as yet unrevealed to them. . . . Under these circumstances an allusion to one of these altars by the apostle would be equivalent to his saying to the Athenians thus: ‘ You are correct in acknowledging a divine existence beyond any which the ordinary rites of your worship recognize ; there is such an existence. You are correct in con- fessing that this Being is unknown to you; you have no just conceptions of his nature and perfections.’”
Ignorantly (ayvoodvtes). Rather, wnconsciously : not know- ing. There isa kind of play on the words wnknown, knowing not. Jgnorantly conveys more rebuke than Paul intended.
Declare I (catayyéAdw). Compare xatayyeneds, setter-forth, in ver. 18. Here, again, there is a play upon the words. Paul takes up their noun, setter-forth, and gives it back to them as a verb. “ You say I am a setter-forth of strange gods: I now se¢ forth unto you (Rev.) the true God.”
24. God. With the article: ‘‘ the God.”
The world (tov xkécpov). Originally, order, and hence the order of the world ; the ordered universe. So in classical Greek.
544 WORD STUDIES IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. [Cu. XVII
In the Septuagint, never the world, but the ordered total of the heavenly bodies ; the host of heaven (Deut. iv. 19; xvii. 3; Isa. xxiv. 21; xl. 26). Compare, also, Prov. xvii. 6, and see note on Jas. iii. 6. In the apocryphal books, of the universe, and mainly in the relation between God and it arising out of the creation. Thus, the hing of the world (2 Mace. vii. 9); the creator or founder of the world (2 Mace. vii. 23); the great potentate of the world (2 Macc. xii. 15). In the New Testa- ment: 1. In the classical and physical sense, the wniverse (John xvii. 5; xxi. 25; Rom. i. 20; Eph. i. 4, ete.). 2. As the order of things of which man ts the centre (Matt. xiii. 38; Mark xvi. 15; Luke ix. 255 John xvi. 215 Eph- ii. 12; 1 Tim. vi. 7). 3. Humanity as it manifests itself in and through this order (Matt. xviii. 7; 2 Pet. ii. 5; iti. 6; Rom. iii. 19). Then, as sin has entered and disturbed the order of things, and made a breach between the heavenly and the earthly order, which are one in the divine ideal—4. The order of things which is alien- ated from God, as manifested in and by the human race: hu- manity as alienated from God, and acting in opposition to him (Sohn in 10 sxe xv 218) 10s Gor... 21 1 ol: if. 15, etc.), The word is used here in the classical sense of the visible creation, which would appeal to the Athenians. Stanley, speaking of the name by which the Deity is known in the patri- archal age, the plural lohim, notes that Abraham, in per- ceiving that all the “'lohim worshipped by the numerous clans of his race meant one God, anticipated the declaration of Paul in this passage (“ Jewish Church,” i, 25). Paul’s statement strikes at the belief of the Epicureans, that the world was made by ‘a fortuitous concourse of atoms,” and of the Stoies, who denied the creation of the world by God, holding either that God animated the world, or that the world itself was God.