WORLD CIVILIZATION

Detailed explanation-1: -Paul had encountered conflict as a result of his preaching in Thessalonica and Berea in northern Greece and had been carried to Athens as a place of safety. According to the Acts of the Apostles, while he was waiting for his companions Silas and Timothy to arrive, Paul was distressed to see Athens full of idols.

Detailed explanation-2: -Paul was deeply influenced by Stoic philosophy, if not directly by Seneca. He borrowed the notions of indifferent things, of what is properly one’s own (oikeiosis), the ideal of freedom from passion, and the paradoxical notion of freedom through slavery, fairly directly from the Stoics.

Detailed explanation-3: -Born only a few years after Jesus, Paul the Apostle was a Pharisaic Jew who was steeped in the philosophical teachings of the Stoics.

Detailed explanation-4: -Paul arrived by sea. Athens, home of Plato’s Academy and Aristotle’s Lyceum, the cradle of Western civilization, and the birthplace of democracy, was past its prime by the time the Apostle visited the city. The Apostle went to the Agora several times, where he was not met by eager listeners.