Episode Details

Readings

• Acts 17:16–31
• Psalm 66:8–20
• 1 Peter 3:13–22
• John 14:15–21

Homily Transcript

There is only one extant example of a theatre trilogy from the Ancient Greeks: the Oresteia of Aeschylus. Now, the plays of Aeschylus are certainly a worth topic (although, tragically, only seven of his nearly one hundred plays survived into the modern era), but it is a topic for another time. Here, I wish to pull just one line, spoken by Apollo himself, in The Eumenides (or, The Furies), the third play in the Oresteia cycle:

But when the thirsty dust sucks up a man’s blood / once shed in death, he shall arise no more. / No chant nor charm for this my Sire hath wrought.

The Oresteia cycle is still performed today, but, more relevant to our purposes here, the cycle was also performed in Paul’s day — and yet more relevant, it was performed in Athens, and yet more relevant still, it was performed right on the other side of the Acropolis from the Areopagus (in the Theatre of Dionysus, which was also where it premiered).

Let me be clear: Paul stood and declared αναστησις αυτου εκ νεκρων — the resurrection of the dead — in the same place — the exact same place, in terms of the location within the play — where Greek actors would stand and declare, in the person of the god Apollo, ουτισ εστ᾽ αναστασις — there is no resurrection. Paul even used the same word; his educated Greek audience would not have missed this. Further, Scripture names two groups: the Epicureans and the Stoics; both of these schools denied the immortality of the soul (the psyche). We could even say that God used the foolish things of the world (i.e., a claim one could return from the real of the dead) to shame the wise. There is even an additional layer in that the common Greek people (some of whom were undoubtedly listening) did not agree with the Epicureans or the Stoics, and held, instead, the classical belief in the realm of the dead as a sort of shadowy limbo; similarly, the elites in Greek society were more likely to be Platonists, who also did not agree with the Epicureans ot the Stoics, because the Platonists did affirm a form of immorality of the soul.

It must be noted that when Apollo speaks of his sire, he is, of course, speaking of Zeus, the chief god and his father. Paul is saying to these educated Greeks that what the chief god of the Greek pantheon did not (or could not) do, God the Father did. Further, Paul is very heavily implying that others, too, may be raised from the dead (that is part of why some mocked him, as the next verse after our reading clearly states). Some of you may be familiar with Greek myth and will undoubtedly be wondering about Alcestis, Heracles, Odysseus, Orpheus (and, I suppose, Asclepius, but we will leave his case for another time); two points: 1) educated Greeks believe these myths to be illustrative or symbolic instead of literal and 2) anyone who returned from Hades in Greek mythology did so only temporarily — they would die again. Contrast the words of Christ: “[E]veryone who lives and believes in Me shall never die.” We will get to Baptism shortly, on the topic of death.

Even if Paul did not know all of this (and much more), God is very clear: “When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour. For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.“, and let us not forget that Paul was well educated, or, in the words of Festus: “Paul, you are out of your mind; your great learning is driving you out of your mind.”, and Paul had just twice quoted Greek poetry. God knew precisely what He was doing, and the mass conv