Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans, and of the Stoics, encountered him. And some said, What will this babbler say? Others, He seems to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.
All Commentaries on Acts 17:18 Go To Acts 17
John Chrysostom
AD 407
It is a wonder the philosophers did not laugh him to scorn, speaking in the way he did. And some said, What does this babbler mean to say? insolently, on the instant: — this is far from philosophy. Other some said, He seems to be a setter forth of strange gods, from the preaching, because he had no arrogance. They did not understand, nor comprehend the subjects he was speaking of— how should they? affirming as they did, some of them, that God is a body; others, that pleasure is the (true) happiness. Of strange gods, because he preached unto them Jesus and the Resurrection: for in fact they supposed Anastasis (the Resurrection) to be some deity, being accustomed to worship female divinities also. And having taken him, they brought him to the Areopagus
