Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars' hill, and said, You men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious.
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Clement Of Alexandria
AD 215
Eeded anything, seeing He giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; and hath made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek God, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him; though He be not far from every one of us: for in Him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we also are His offspring.".
For in walking about, and beholding the objects of your worship, I found an altar on which was inscribed, To the Unknown God. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you."
Over-religious. God, he takes notice how nice and exact they pretended to be, in not omitting to pay some kind of homage to any god, or gods of all other nations, whom they might not know. For some interpreters think, that by this altar they designed to worship every god of any nation, who was not come to their knowledge: or to worship that great God hinted at in the writings of Plato: or as others conjecture, that God of the Jews, of whom they might have heard such wonders, and whose name the Jews themselves said to be unknown and ineffable. However, from this inscription St. Paul takes an occasion, with wonderful dexterity, with sublime reflections, and with that solid eloquence, of which he was master, and which he employed, as often as it was necessary, to inform them, and instruct them, concerning the works of the one true God, of whom they had little knowledge, by their own fault: that this one true God made the world, and all things in it: that from one man he raised all mankind...
(f) for the cities were full of gods (δαιμόνων, al. εἰδώλων): (h) this is why he says δεισιδαιμονεστέρους . For as I passed by and viewed the objects of your worship — he does not say simply τοὺς δαίμονας (the demons, or deities), but paves the way for his discourse: I beheld an altar, etc.
he puts it by way of encomium: (the word) does not seem to mean anything offensive— δεισιδαιμονεστέρους, that is, εὐλαβεστέρους, more religiously disposed. For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with his inscription, To an Unknown God. What therefore ye ignorantly worship, this declare I unto you.
