NOTES for Act 17:1-34
You probably noticed at once how sharply the Athenians cooled toward Paul when he began to speak about the resurrection. Greek philosophers were indeed prepared to acknowledge the existence of one good God and had a concept of the Logos as a kind of mediator between the One and the human mind. But the ideas that the Logos was a man and that the human body would rise were completely alien to them. Did Paul not know this? He was, after all, a broadly educated man familiar with Hellenistic philosophy. This means that he consciously runs the risk of being neither understood nor accepted—so important to him is the message of the incarnation of the Son of God, the Resurrection from the dead, and the victory over death. Without this there can be no Christianity; without this, preaching is meaningless. No compromise is possible here.