18 6Then certain Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him. And some said, “What does this 7babbler want to say?”

Others said, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods,” because he preached to them pJesus and the resurrection.

19 And they took him and brought him to the 8Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new doctrine is of which you speak? 20 For you are bringing some strange things to our ears. Therefore we want to know what these things mean.” 21 For all the Athenians and the foreigners who were there spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing.

Addressing the Areopagus

22 Then Paul stood in the midst of the 9Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious; 23 for as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription:

TO THE UNKNOWN GOD

Therefore, the One whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you: 24 qGod, who made the world and everything in it, since He is rLord of heaven and earth, sdoes not dwell in temples made with hands. 25 Nor is He worshiped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He tgives to all life, breath, and all things. 26 And He has made from one 1blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and uthe boundaries of their dwellings, 27 vso that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, wthough He is not far from each one of us; 28 for xin Him we live and move and have our being, yas also some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also His offspring.’ 29 Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, zwe ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man’s devising. 30 Truly, athese times of ignorance God overlooked, but bnow commands all men everywhere to repent, 31 because He has appointed a day on which cHe will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by draising Him from the dead.”

32 And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, while others said, “We will hear you again on this matter.” 33 So Paul departed from among them. 34 However, some men joined him and believed, among them Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.