Acts 17:24Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

The Epicureans asserted that everything came to be of itself and was composed of atoms. The Stoics said that everything is bodily and composed of fiery substance. But he says that “the world and everything in it” is the work of God.

Do you see what brevity, and what clarity in that brevity? And see what seemed strange to them: that God made the world.

What everyone knows now, the Athenians did not know, nor did the wisest among the Athenians. But if He made it, then it is clear that He is Lord.

Notice what he says is the distinctive property of the Godhead: creation, which also belongs to the Son.

The prophets everywhere say that to create is proper to God. They do not speak like these heretics, who acknowledge another being as creator, and not the Lord, while supposing matter to be uncreated.

Here he expressed and confirmed his thought, and in a certain way he also overthrew their teaching.

“He does not dwell,” he says, “in temples made with hands.” God does dwell in temples, but not in such temples. He dwells in the human soul.

See how he overthrows sensory worship of God. How so? Did God not dwell in the temple of Jerusalem? No, but He only acted there.

“He,” he says, “being Lord of heaven and earth.” Therefore there are no separate gods.

“The God who made the world and everything in it.” Having first said how heaven came to be, he then explained that God does not dwell in places made with hands.

It is as though he said: If He is God, then He plainly made all things. But if He did not make them, then He is not God.

The gods who did not make heaven and earth, he says, must be rejected.

Thus he taught a doctrine far higher than that of the philosophers. He had not yet spoken of the most important matter, because the time had not yet come.

He was speaking with them as with children. He taught about creation, about God’s lordship, and about the fact that He needs nothing.

“The God who made the world and everything in it, He, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands, nor is He served by human hands” (Acts 17:24-25).

Since he knew that such instruction suited them, he chose this path. Taking into account who those receiving his instruction were, and being guided by the Holy Spirit, he gave the teaching.

So that you may be assured that the cause was the difference among persons and the coarseness of his hearers, listen to how he no longer follows this path in the Epistle to the Colossians.

There he speaks with them otherwise and says, “For by Him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him” (Col 1:16).

And John, the son of thunder, proclaimed thus: “All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made” (Jn 1:3).

But Moses did not teach in this way, and rightly so. It would not have been prudent to give solid food to those who still needed to be fed with milk.

Teachers who receive children from their parents teach them the first elements of learning. Those who receive children from these teachers communicate to them more complete knowledge.

So also did blessed Moses, the teacher of the nations, and the son of thunder. Moses received the human race at the very beginning and taught his hearers the first elements.

The others, receiving it from Moses, handed on the more perfect teaching. Now we have learned the reason for Moses’ condescension, and that, by inspiration of the Spirit, he set forth everything in adaptation to his hearers.

At the same time, by these same words, “In the beginning God created heaven and earth,” he uproots all heresies that spring up in the Church like tares.

If a Manichaean comes to you, asserting that matter existed beforehand, or Marcion, or Valentinus, or any of the pagans, say to them, “In the beginning God created heaven and earth.”

But he does not believe Scripture? Then turn away from him as from someone frenzied and senseless.

If someone does not believe the Creator of the universe and, as it were, accuses the truth of falsehood, what forgiveness could he ever deserve?

These people bear a feigned appearance and put on a mask of meekness. Beneath sheep’s clothing they hide the wolf.

But do not be deceived. Rather, hate such a man all the more for this very reason: before you, a fellow servant like himself, he pretends to be meek.

Yet against the Master of all, God, he has raised war, and he does not perceive that he is going against his own salvation.

Let us hold fast to the unshakable foundation and return again to the beginning: “In the beginning God created heaven and earth.”

See how the divine nature is revealed even in the very manner of creation. It creates contrary to human custom.

First it spreads out heaven, and only afterward lays the earth beneath. First comes the roof, and then the foundation.

Who has seen, who has heard anything like this? In human constructions this never happens. But when God commands, all things yield and obey His will.

Let us not, then, examine the works of God with our human mind. Rather, looking at what has been created, let us marvel at the Craftsman.

“For His invisible things,” says Scripture, “from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood through the things that are made” (Rom 1:20).

He wished to fill the Jewish mind, fattened on coarse symbols, with immaterial images, and to draw it out of matter.

But God saw that it was unfit for His dwelling, since this mind was attached to matter. It was incompatible with God's Providence, and wholly sympathized with what naturally dwelt with it.

Not knowing this, the Jew, who knows only how to feed his conceit with arrogance under false piety, is justly deprived even of the figure. By his evil intent he estranges himself from the truth.

The Church, having become holy through the knowledge of God, has been established for His glory. This is the true sanctuary, raised not by the hands of craftsmen and adorned not by the art of enchanters, but by the will of God Himself.

Yet by Church we mean not the building, but the assembly of the elect.

Paignion theo is found in Plato.

In the Apostle's judgment, the remedy for such error is the pursuit of repentance. But if he had wished from the beginning to destroy idol worship, the pagans would not have listened to him.

When he persuaded them that there is one God, he then added to his judgment that salvation had been granted to us through Christ.

Yet he called Him man rather than God. He began to speak about what He did in the flesh, and described those divine deeds from which He seemed to be more than man.

By His perfection alone death was conquered, and the dead were brought forth from the tombs. Their faith gradually grew, so that they believed He is God, although recently He had seemed to be man.

What does it matter in what order someone comes to faith? Perfection is not sought in first principles, but from beginnings one comes to what is perfect.

They thought that God was limited by this temple, as the necessary and sufficient container of His being. The other speaks against the still cruder notions of the pagans.

They thought that a god is a statue, which must be well made, securely placed, reliably covered, and protected from the action of the elements, and which exists nowhere except in a temple.

Since the Apostle Paul spoke about God with the feeble idols in view, to which the Greeks wrongly ascribed the glory of God, everything he says about God must be understood comparatively, with the comparison added: unlike the idols.

Thus God does not dwell in temples made with hands as idols do. They cannot be anywhere except in the shrine built for them and in the place assigned to them within the shrine.

But God can dwell in a temple, as all-good and almighty.

The sectarian who asserts that God, as omnipresent, cannot and does not dwell in temples flatteringly exalts His boundlessness. Yet he abases His goodness and almightiness.

Precisely by His goodness and almightiness, the Lord, as it were, goes forth from His boundlessness and appears to limited men in definite places.

He appears in the paradise of delight (Gen 3:8), under the oak of Mamre (Gen 18), in the bush (Ex 3:4), and in the pillar of cloud (Ex 14:24).

Therefore God does not live in a temple as an idol does, which cannot move anywhere from the shrine. But He lives in the temple according to His all-good will, for the good and salvation of those who believe in Him and come to Him.

At last the Apostle turned to the preaching of the Lord who had called him to apostolic service. To Him he had dedicated all his genius and his whole life.

"Therefore," he said, "overlooking the times of ignorance, God now commands all men everywhere to repent. For He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained, giving assurance to all by raising Him from the dead."

Yet the Apostle says that the God he preaches, the Creator of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands.

Amid the many sacrificial altars on which countless sacrifices were offered, the Apostle says that the God he preaches does not require the service of human hands, such as the offering of sacrifices and the like.

"How? Did God not dwell in the temple at Jerusalem? No, He only acted there. Did He not receive service from human hands among the Jews? Not from hands, but from the soul. And He required this not because He needed it" (Chrysostom).

On the contrary, He Himself gives to all, properly, to all people according to the context, life and breath.

The first word denotes life in itself as vital power, as livingness. The second denotes the continuation of life through breathing, since vital power acts through breath.

"And all things" means everything necessary for life.

How far this apostolic teaching about God rises not only above paganism in general, but also above every pagan philosophy. Pagan philosophy could never rise to the idea of the free Creator of the world.

"Do you see," says Saint John Chrysostom, "how little by little he teaches philosophy and laughs at pagan error? Lest they should think that God is one of many, he adds in refutation: He does not dwell in temples made with hands."

According to blessed Theophylact's explanation, when the Apostle Paul says, "He Himself gives to all life and breath and everything," he directs his speech chiefly against the Epicureans.

"The Epicureans said that everything exists without divine Providence. And so Paul proves the Providence of God."

"He uttered one word and overthrew all the teachings of the philosophers. The Epicureans asserted that everything came to be by itself and was formed from atoms.

The Stoics asserted that everything is bodily and formed from a fiery substance. But he says that the world and everything in it is God's work.

Do you see what brevity, and in that brevity what clarity? And consider what seemed fearful to them. It was that God created the world.

What everyone now knows, the Athenians did not know, nor even the wisest of the Athenians. If He created, then it is evident that He is Lord.

"He does not dwell in temples made with hands," he says. God does dwell in temples, but not in such temples. He dwells in the human soul.

See how he overthrows sensible service. Then, having said, "He is not served by human hands," he adds: "He Himself gives to all life and breath and everything."

He points to two distinguishing properties of the Godhead: to need nothing, and to give all things to all.

Compare with this what Plato or Epicurus said about God, and all of it will prove to be empty talk by comparison.

"Giving," he says, "life and breath." Here, in relation to the soul, he affirms that God is its Creator, not its begetter.

And by the words, "He is not served by human hands," it is expressed that God receives service by the soul and the mind."

Speaking of the inward unlimitedness of the Godhead, Saint Paul opposes the pagan view that sacrifices offered to the gods gave them pleasure in themselves.

He observes that the God whom he preaches does not require the service of human hands, because He has no need of anything.

On the contrary, the creature owes everything to the Creator and always needs Him. In teaching about God as Creator, the Apostle Paul speaks of the whole universe as the work of this Creator.

In setting forth the teaching on Providence, he dwells only on animate creatures. In presenting the conclusion from the teaching on Providence, he limits himself to the truth that God does not need the service of human hands.