Hank Smith: 00:03 Hello my friends. Welcome to another episode of followHIM. My name is Hank Smith. I’m here with the incredible John Bytheway. Welcome John.

John Bytheway: 00:10 Good to be back.

Hank Smith: 00:12 Yep, always good to be here. John, in the four gospels we read about Jesus and his 12 apostles. If you’re a first-time reader, you don’t really see what’s coming in the book of Acts, do you? There’s this character that shows up on the scene, kind of a second generation character. I’ve heard it said before that Jesus is the message and Paul is the messenger. Do you think we, as a church, John, do you think we really grasp how big Paul is to the rise of Christianity?

John Bytheway: 00:43 Maybe not. That’s why we’re here. I mean, how many adjectives can you use, apostle to the Gentiles, or how many descriptions, a chosen vessel? And the more I read this, the more I’m just amazed that he was put in place for this exact time. As you said, post gospels, now what? And here comes this amazing Paul.

Hank Smith: 01:05 Yeah, here comes this fuel for the fire, I think I’ve called him before. John, we’re joined this week by an amazing scriptorian, Susan Easton Black. Susan, what do you think about Paul? Do we grasp the gravity of Paul’s life?

Dr. Susan Black: 01:20 Well, I’m not sure that we do, but if you really looked at the book of Acts, you’ve got half of the chapters are literally about him. I mean, Luke just goes, let me tell you about other apostles and now he’s kind of like the apostle to Europe. He moves the message.

Hank Smith: 01:42 It seems that the church goes from local to global when Paul enters the scene. Hey John, why don’t you introduce Susan to our listeners. She’s been here before.

John Bytheway: 01:51 Yes, she has. And my wife had a class from Dr. Black many moons ago at BYU and for so long I’d always thought of Susan as just a walking encyclopedia of knowledge about Joseph Smith, but she has written about so many things and, like you said, scriptorian, great gospel scholar. I have, I think, one of the latest, this is Elder Ballard’s biography and because our listeners know her a little bit, there’s a nice short little paragraph in the back about Susan Easton Black. She is an emeritus professor of Brigham Young University where she taught for more than 30 years. She’s a passed Eliza R. Snow Fellow, Associate Dean of General Education and Honors, Director of Church History in the Religious Study Center. She’s written, edited, and compiled more than 130 books and 300 articles. And I’m just so excited that you’re here again with us. So welcome, we’re really excited to learn from you today.

Dr. Susan Black: 02:52 Hey, thank you. It’s a delight for me to be back, actually.

Hank Smith: 02:56 We love having you here, Susan, and we haven’t had you, I don’t think, since our Doctrine & Covenants here. I would encourage everyone to go back if you want to hear more from Susan’s Doctrine & Covenants episodes. They were just out of this world, fantastic. Let me read a little bit from the manual here, Susan. Then we’ll turn it over to you. Among the Lord’s final words to his apostles was the commandment, go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the son and the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. While the apostles didn’t quite make it to all nations, Acts 16 through 21 does show that Paul and his companions did make remarkable progress in establishing the church. So we’ll hand it over to you, Susan. You want to give us some background on Paul and where he came from, who he is?

Dr. Susan Black: 03:42 Sure. We know that Paul, like John has said, he’s got lots of names such as Saul of Tarsus, Saul, Paul the Apostle, even St. Paul. We know that he comes from a place called Tarsus and it was one of the largest centers of trade there in the Mediterranean coast at the time, actually renowned because it had a university. From this most influential city in Asia Minor, here he comes and he says of himself, he says he’s of the tribe of Benjamin. He describes himself as a Hebrew of Hebrew and as it relates to the law, he is a Pharisee, but we also know that he claims he has Roman citizenship by birth. All along the way, any title you look at him, he’s pretty impressive. And his education actually the same coming there in Jerusalem.

Hank Smith: 04:36 Fantastic. He calls himself a Pharisee.

Dr. Susan Black: 04:39 We see with that kind of background, in spite of it, we know that prior to his conversion, he’s persecuting the Christians and it’s described as beyond major. So what is that? Talk about a mean guy. And then he is actually at the scene with the martyrdom of Stephen and you’re like, what are you doing? But then for him, has an amazing experience on the road to Damascus. I think perhaps we all remember this. He has his vision, he hears the words Saul, why has thou persecuted me and wants to know, hey, by the way, who are you? And he learns it’s Christ. What I think is so impressive is that he has one experience and he never forgets it. I wonder did he write it down? I think many of us become converted because there’s something so amazing that happens in our lives, but as time goes on, it goes from the front burner to the back burner. But in the case of Paul, he’s always out there and never forgets, what a wonderful trait.

  05:44 We could say about his stature, I think it’s so interesting, it’s like his stature doesn’t necessarily match his grandiose missionary experience, and I think I would even look tall compared to Paul. So we know that Joseph Smith back on January 5th, 1841 had a meeting of what’s called the Nauvoo Lyceum, an adult school for instruction, that he began comparing Paul to a man there present named John C. Bennett. He may look like Paul, but obviously not the same integrity. But you’ll recall that Joseph said that Paul was five feet high and that he had very dark hair, a dark complexion, dark skin, large Roman nose, sharp face, small black eyes, round shoulders, and even a whiny voice. But when he got reared up and really going, he said he roared like a lion. So I think what we’re going to find in these chapters, especially as we now move from his first missionary experience there with Barnabas, and we pick him up in chapter 16, as he heads out, he’s roaring like a lion and he’s wanting people to really hear him.

Hank Smith: 07:05 Awesome. When we left off, he got into a bit of a, it says a sharp contention with Barnabas and they decided to part ways.

Dr. Susan Black: 07:15 Right, it’s kind of like you look at your missionary companions, I myself have had a few, and the disagreements can become pretty interesting and apparently this one pretty stormy as they’re trying to decide, not necessarily so where are we going to travel this time? But it’s like who are we going to take with us? Barnabas is big on John Mark, but in the case of Paul he’s saying, no way, he left us last time and he went home, so I’m going to choose Silas.

Hank Smith: 07:47 And he doesn’t even go this time.

Dr. Susan Black: 07:48 Yeah, he doesn’t get to go. My take is as they have this disagreement and they decide to go separate ways, although I’m sure Barnabas and John Mark had probably an amazing mission, we have no idea because Luke now only centers on Paul.

Hank Smith: 08:07 Where do they end up going? Is that where we go next, in 16?

Dr. Susan Black: 08:11 In their first mission, it’s like they’re in a circular route, always ending up back at Antioch. And it’s like you just did a three-day cruise to Mexico and you’re coming out of a port in Long Beach or somewhere and you end up right back there. But now this next one is going to be longer, and then of course the third mission, we’ll talk about today, the longest of all, probably around 3,500 miles of travel.

Hank Smith: 08:41 On foot.

Dr. Susan Black: 08:43 Foot, boat.

Hank Smith: 08:44 I’ve done that in an airplane before.

John Bytheway: 08:47 Or on some dangerous boats, yeah.

Hank Smith: 08:49 Should we jump into chapter 16?

Dr. Susan Black: 08:51 Sure. Chapter 16 as it goes forward, then it just features this amazing ministry of Paul. He has just been in a Jerusalem council in which they’ve discussed I’m sure many things, but the decision was made about circumcision, that no longer do you have to be circumcised to be then part of Christianity. And so Paul’s got a message and he’s anxious to head out and he’s going to head out with Silas and his purpose is to strengthen some of the branches that he had visited earlier on the mission one to share the news from the council that he’s just attended and also to collect donations for the poor there in Jerusalem.

  09:42 So as we pick up in the first verse as he’s heading out, the first person that they encounter that we get a name on will then be Timothy, whose mother is Jewish and his father then is Greek. And the big question is what do we do with Timothy? He’s trusted, he’s a friend, he’s a constant. And yet, for Paul on his ministries going out, he always seems to hit first the synagogues. And at that time in the history of then the known world, especially along the coastline of the Mediterranean, you’ve got pockets of Jewish people all along that coastline. And so the question is, will they accept Timothy as one who’s sharing the same news that Paul wants to share?

John Bytheway: 10:39 Yeah. One of the things that I should have realized is that the Jews had spread out pockets of them, like you said, around the Mediterranean, and he goes to these places that are clearly Greek, in culture anyway, part of the Roman Empire I guess, but they have synagogues there. So now he’s got to take Timothy with him to these synagogues.

Dr. Susan Black: 10:58 Right. So before he does so, and you wonder tradition not to offend the Jewish people, Paul will actually circumcise then Timothy and off they go. You look at the sacrifice Timothy is making to be able to spread the word with Paul about Jesus and the resurrection. But as they go forward, now you’ve got Paul, Silas, and Timothy and they’d made plans to go to Asia Minor, which is Turkey today, and to preach the gospel. But at night Paul has a vision and he sees a man of Macedonia, like a Greek, standing and begging him to go to Macedonia to help the people there.

  11:47 And I guess, what I like about Paul is that although he’d made plans, can you see flight plans, you got a group following you, they’re impressed with what you had to say, and we know where we’re going the next day, and suddenly Paul says, nope, we’re changing the whole scene and we’re heading to Macedonia. Then modern day Greece. Particularly, they’re going to head to Philippi, a main city in Macedonia and it will be there that you get your first European convert. Why do I like it’s a woman, don’t you think that’s the best?

Hank Smith: 12:25 Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black: 12:26 And her name is Lydia. I look at this vision and the Lord knows who’s prepared to receive the gospel, and even though they’re missionaries and they’d made plans to go somewhere else, the Lord kind of stops Paul in his track and says, go where the people are prepared. For Lydia, we know that she was a business woman and she wasn’t just the housewife in the home or a mother or anything else. She is a business woman and obviously has some wealth because what she is a worker of and a seller of is purple dye. And purple dye, if you looked at all the colors, whether you’re looking at a rainbow or you’re just looking at colors generally, it was the most expensive of the time period because it’s made out of shells. Anything purple at that time was always associated with royalty or saintliness. So the next time you guys wear that purple tie, your job is to think of Lydia and our first known convert there in Europe.

Hank Smith: 13:40 I remember in Jesus’ parable of Lazarus and the rich man, there was a certain rich man which was clothed in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day. She is selling the first century Lululemon, right?

Dr. Susan Black: 13:58 That’s true. Could be it. But I think what’s interesting, she not only has the faith to believe Paul and about Jesus and his resurrection and to repent and whatever she needs to do, but she is baptized. And so you get a really strong idea that what’s the missionary’s message at this time, it’s to share news, faith, but baptism needs to be a part of it. And then of course, she invites Paul and Silas, Timothy to stay in her home, all her home, join the church. It becomes a strong branch there in Philippi.

Hank Smith: 14:37 Pretty incredible, Paul’s willingness to follow that vision, that prompting, because you’ve got your plan in place. I’m the kind of guy who likes having a plan in place, right?

Dr. Susan Black: 14:49 Me too.

Hank Smith: 14:50 And we’re going to follow the plan and for him to say, okay, we’re up and moving. The Come, Follow Me manual says, the prophet Joseph Smith declared, no man can preach the gospel without the Holy Ghost. Note instances in which the spirit aided Paul and his companions, what blessings came as they followed the spirit. And then we can ask ourselves, when have you felt the spirit prompting you in your efforts to share the gospel? This reminds me, this whole chapter, Susan, reminds me of the stories President Monson used to tell about the Holy Ghost said, go to the hospital right now.

Dr. Susan Black: 15:21 Yeah, go to the hospital.

Hank Smith: 15:24 Yeah, go to this woman’s house right now. And he would just, it seemed like he’d just turn the wheel and go. He was directed by the spirit.

Dr. Susan Black: 15:32 Good. Then we contrast Lydia with a woman called a damsel, and you always think the damsel in distress, this beauty, but here comes an opposite kind of Lydia, and she possessed a spirit in which she believed she could tell people’s futures, soothsayer. All of a sudden she starts following Paul and his companions around and she’s now crying, can you hear this loud voice, probably an irritant, saying these men are the servants of the most high God, which show us unto the way of salvation. I mean the message is right, but can you imagine, here’s Paul gathering a group and you’ve got this woman out there screaming just like a pest, hey, these men are servants of the most high God. And finally, Paul is grieved. I’d probably say he’s had it, and he turns and he commands that this evil spirit which is in her come out and notice he does it in the name of Jesus Christ.

  16:42 And the scripture tells us in chapter 16:18, and he came out to the same hour. So he’d say, okay Paul, how strong are you and your priesthood? Are you a priesthood man? I go, oh, well, he sees visions, he casts out spirits. But ultimately that action, which is the right action, has what appears to be a very negative experience that will follow, is that Paul and Silas are now taken by the masters of this woman, this damsel. They were making money off of her, “talent”, and they see that she has it no more. And they take Paul and Silas, they take him into the marketplace and take one to the ruler. So it’s a real public thing. And they say that, what they’re doing, they’re troubling our city. They’re teaching customs which are not lawful for us to receive, and the multitude now rises up. The magistrates rend their clothes, meaning they rip them down eight inches. I mean, they’re just showing we’re very upset with what this man’s done.

  17:53 And they commanded that Paul and Silas be beaten. Do you think that Paul had a reason to wonder, should I have just let this woman keep ranting and raving? I didn’t know it was going to lead to beating. And then of course it leads to their imprisonment and being put in stocks, but then comes the most amazing part. You’d say, if I had been beaten and put in stocks, what do you think I’d be doing at midnight? I think I’d still be bawling my eyes out, right?

Hank Smith: 18:31 Me too. Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black: 18:33 Yeah. Okay. But for Paul and Silas, they’re praying, they’re singing praises to God, and they’re singing loud enough so all the prisoners can hear, any other prisoner can hear them. And suddenly there’s this great earthquake, you’ll find in verse 26, the foundations of the prison are shaking, the doors are open, all their bands are loose, and you go, we could get out of here. The keeper of the prison, he awakes from his sleep with all the commotion, he sees the prison door is open, suddenly he draws his sword. He’s about to take his own life and he’s supposing, hey, the prisoners have fled. I know what happens in a case like that, I’m going to be beaten. I’m going to go through what Paul and Silas have gone through. And then Paul cries out with a loud voice, do thyself no harm for we are all here. That’s just an amazing line.

Hank Smith: 19:29 Yeah, what a beautiful story.

Dr. Susan Black: 19:31 So then you get this jailer then falls down before Paul and Silas, says, sirs, what must I do to be saved? He then becomes another person that they can teach the gospel to. You just wonder what are all the different places that we can teach the gospel? The most unlikely. They said, believe on Jesus Christ, I shall be saved in thy house, and then of course they need to be baptized. But the jailer will take Paul and Silas to the magistrates and the magistrates hear all that has happened and they say to them, go in peace. And Paul says, no way. He wants justice.

  20:12 So you realize you’re looking at the scale of mercy and justice, but he wants justice. He says, they’ve beaten us openly, they’ve condemned us before all these people in the marketplace and announced that basically we are Romans. And you cast us into prison and now you want us to just leave privily, meaning just get out of here quietly, and they go, no way. And at this point you see Paul and Silas then returning to the house of Lydia. And don’t you think the jailers and the magistrates and everybody, there’s not going to be anyone that’s going to want to mess with those guys, and so suddenly the church grows really big, becomes one of the strongest branches there in Philippi during the early days of the church.

Hank Smith: 21:04 What a great story.

Dr. Susan Black: 21:06 I think it is one of the great stories.

John Bytheway: 21:09 Can we just talk a little bit about why they silenced this woman? Because what she was saying was true, but why would they want her to be silenced? And I think I’ve heard Elder McConkie talk about the answer, but might be interesting for our listeners to know why they would want somebody who is saying the truth to be silenced.

Dr. Susan Black: 21:30 Evil can’t testify. Testimony that’s edifying, that’s lasting, that pierces the heart, you’re not going to get it from a soothsayer.

Hank Smith: 21:40 Yeah, I think so too, Susan. It’s the commotion that this woman is causing, this evil spirit within this woman is causing that would just be so, would be so, I don’t know, as a teacher that’s really hard to teach when you got someone screaming at you.

Dr. Susan Black: 21:59 Yes. I like how in this chapter it’s kind of like, well, I don’t know if you’d call it a chiasmus, but it starts with Lydia and it comes back to Lydia. And then in between you get the damsel, the soothsayer, and you get the jailing experience and the drama of it all and then eventually back and you get this amazingly strong branch.

  22:26 I think it’s interesting with Paul, after he’s had just on that road to Damascus and then he becomes this vigilant person, you’ve got people saying, well, isn’t this the guy that used to be the following? In other words, I think sometimes we don’t give the people the benefit of the doubt that their hearts have been changed, they are a changed person, and they’ve moved in the direction. But maybe the best from church history that might come out of this is, remember when we talked about that Paul and Silas are dead set they’re heading into the southwest part of Asia Minor? You remember the story of Wilford Woodruff? He’s over there in England thinking all is good and the Lord tells him to get over there to Herefordshire. So he drops everything he heads over and 36 days after he had arrived in England, he’s already baptized 600 people including two spies from the Church of England, a constable that came to arrest him.

  23:33 If you remember that the Lord is in charge and the Lord has prepared the people and that the Holy Ghost, if you’re in tune, in the case of Paul it directs him by vision and then directs him to stop that woman trying to testify of him because it’s not a legitimate testimony, and then the earthquake, everything. It’s kind of like we are in the hands of the Lord and he will guide us, we just have to have the courage like a Paul to go forward and to be beaten and to sing at the end of the day. Not everybody can do that, but perhaps we should.

Hank Smith: 24:16 There’s a great story told by, I bet both of you will recognize this, told by Elder Uchtdorf, he talks about having faith, being humble, diligent, and enduring. He says, “this truth is illustrated in the experience of two young missionaries serving in Europe, in an area where there had been few convert baptisms. I suppose it would’ve been understandable for them to think that what they did wouldn’t make much of a difference. But these two missionaries had faith and they were committed. They had the attitude that if no one listened to their message, it would not be because they had not given their best effort. One day they had the feeling to approach the residents of a well-kept four-story apartment building. They started on the first floor and knocked on each door presenting their saving message of Jesus Christ and the restoration of his church.

  25:03 No one on the first floor would listen. How easy it would’ve been to say we tried, let’s stop right here, let’s go to another building. But these two missionaries had faith and they were willing to work. So they knocked on every door on the second floor. Again, no one would listen. The third floor was the same and so is the fourth. That is until they knocked on the last door of the fourth floor. When that door opened, a young girl smiled at them and asked them to wait while she spoke with her mother, her mother was only 36 years old, had recently lost her husband and was in no mood to talk with Mormon missionaries. She told her daughter to send them away, but the daughter pleaded with her. These young men were so nice, she said, and it will only take a few minutes.

  25:43 The mother agreed, the missionaries delivered their message and handed a book for the mother to read, the Book of Mormon. After they left, the mother decided she would read at least a few pages. She finished the entire book within a few days. Not long after, this wonderful single parent family entered the waters of baptism. When the small family attended their local branch in Germany, a young deacon noticed the beauty of one of the daughters and thought to himself, these missionaries are doing a great job. That young deacon’s name was Dieter Uchtdorf, and the charming young woman, the one who had pleaded with her mother to listen to the missionaries, has the beautiful name of Harriet. She’s loved by all who meet her as she accompanies me in my travels, she has blessed the lives of many people through her love for the gospel and her sparkling personality. She truly is the sunshine of my life. He says, how grateful I am for two missionaries who did not stop on the first floor.” What a great story.

John Bytheway: 26:46 I just like what you said, Susan, about the Lord directing the work. And this is the impression we’ve had over and over is, and it’s in the manual, that the book of Acts of the apostles is more like the Acts of Jesus Christ through the apostles and he’s directing them and he’s directing them where to go. Having people appear to Paul in dreams and everything, he knows where these initial, these pioneers are in starting the gospel. It’s fun to see that he’s still very actively directing missionary work after he’s gone.

Hank Smith: 27:18 So Susan, what happens next on this missionary journey?

Dr. Susan Black: 27:21 Well, as we move on to chapter 17, we find that it starts with Paul and his companions being in Thessalonica. And of course, as he arrives, where does he want to speak? He’s heading into a synagogue of the Jewish people. So he speaks there for three Sabbaths. He speaks from the scriptures, but he has an amazing message to add. And the message is Jesus Christ had died but he’s been resurrected. Well, his message didn’t fall on dead ears, but it fell on ears of people that wouldn’t believe it, and literally set the city in an uproar. And people began to say, this is contrary to the decrees of Caesar because Paul is saying there’s another king and it is Jesus who is resurrected. And although there are some believers and Paul will send letters back to them, we now have in Thessalonica one and two, right? But Paul and Silas need to escape from this community, by night they head on to Berea, and once again, where do they go? It’s kind of like they never figure it out. They always go to the synagogue.

  28:46 In other words, it’s the first place to let everybody know they’re trying to tell the Jewish people, we’ve got a message here, and it is dramatically different in the next town. They received their words and they all had this readiness of mind, and the reason was they had been searching the scriptures daily. Sometimes you think, do we just read it every day even though it’s a couple of verses or a few minutes here or there? But if you want to see the dramatic difference between two places where Paul’s teaching in a synagogue and then the second place they believed, and you’d say, who believes? And it’s the Jewish people they spoke to, honorable women, the Greeks, and men not a few. But when the Jews of Thessalonia received knowledge that, hey, we know where Paul and Silas have gone, they come there to stir up the people saying, wait a minute, you’re forgetting, at this point you see Paul heading away from his companions and he heads to Athens.

Hank Smith: 29:57 Yeah. Are they just trying to get out of Dodge?

Dr. Susan Black: 29:59 I think they’re trying to get out of Dodge.

Hank Smith: 30:02 Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black: 30:02 And sometimes you just have to do that. They head out and when they say they’re going to Athens, well, Athens is one of the wonders of the ancient world. And although at the time of Paul, it’s in a state of decline. I remember formerly it was considered the intellectual capital, the philosophical wisdom, architectural splendor of any of the ancient cities. As they head there or as Paul heads there, he sends word to Silas and Timothy, hey, at all speed, come and join me. And you’d say, well, where’s Paul going to speak? You guys want to take a guess? He’s going to the synagogues, right?

John Bytheway: 30:49 Always does.

Dr. Susan Black: 30:52 Always hits the synagogues first. But then he speaks in the marketplace daily. And the chief men of Athens, they gather in that marketplace every day to hear the debates, to conduct business, to learn something new. So Paul’s message is new. I think anytime you’ve got something new to say and especially if you’re hearing it from a man who sounds like he’s whining, but suddenly he’s roaring like a lion, you’d probably want to listen to him. And his new message now attracts listeners. Some say, what will this babbler say? Others say, he seemeth to be setting forth something about a strange god. As it goes forward, people are upset. As they become more and more upset what he is saying that contradicts with their beliefs, they now take Paul up to the famous Mars Hill, where he is going to appear before a chief judicial council.

  31:56 In other words, you’d say, can a man be offended for the word? And I go, this is it. These Greeks now take Paul up to Mars Hill. He’s sitting before the chief judicial council. They want to know what is this new doctrine whereof thou speaketh? And Paul then in verse 22, he’s standing in the midst of Mars Hill. And I’ve been at Mars Hill, there’s too much graffiti, too much trash. I’m like, are you kidding me? This is Mars Hill, I’ve come from a long ways to see this. But he’s standing in the midst of Mars Hill, and I like the line, he says, ye men of Athens, he knows who he is talking to, I perceive that in all things you’re too superstitious. But then he indicates, I found an altar with this inscription to the unknown God. As the Greeks were believing in many gods from Zeus to others, they wanted to make sure they didn’t offend any God or leave anybody out, so they’d built an altar to this unknown God.

  33:10 And then Paul goes on to give an amazing treatise about, I want to tell you about the God that you people don’t know about, ye men of Athens. And he shares about the true nature of God, a man’s responsibility to God, the resurrection of Jesus Christ, all doctrines that are contrary to the tenants of Greek philosophies and religion. So there we have it. But when they heard of this resurrection of the dead, some of those men of Athens, they mocked, and others said, we will hear thee again of this matter. And then you get Paul departs from them. But in his departure, we know that he leaves at least one convert that was part of that judicial council that he was speaking before. This man, do you remember his name?

John Bytheway: 34:10 Dionysius.

Dr. Susan Black: 34:12 Yeah, Dionysius.

Hank Smith: 34:13 Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black: 34:14 Tradition suggests, and it’s always tradition, that this one convert kind of like the Alma the Younger, right? This one convert, he becomes a bishop in Athens, and even today when you go up there, you can see that they’ve got a small building in memory of him.

John Bytheway: 34:35 I love that he would go to the synagogue first and that is the pattern. And we know that there, what would he be doing? He’d probably be, as a Pharisee, he knew the law, he knew the scriptures, probably showing them through Isaiah and the Psalms and the prophecies that this Jesus is the Messiah, he is the Christ. You know how we sometimes say, I want to be an instrument in the hands of the Lord. Paul’s like a Swiss Army Knife, because he can go anywhere.

Hank Smith: 35:03 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 35:03 And he can do anything.

Dr. Susan Black: 35:06 He’s got the right heritage credentials, yeah.

John Bytheway: 35:09 Yeah, he can leave the synagogue. And he’s not going to open Isaiah on Mars Hill. He’s not going to go to the Psalms. But he’s going to talk about, he talks the Epicureans, the Stoics are there, he knows what they believe. He knows what their philosophies are, because he grew up in Tarsus. And as you said, there’s a university there, so Paul was just amazingly fitted for all of this. And then I love the phrase that they were spent their time either to tell or hear some new thing, and I put in my margin, maybe they’ve got too much time on their hands. You must have a high standard of [inaudible 00:35:45].

Hank Smith: 35:44 Just sit around. Yeah.

John Bytheway: 35:45 They can just go down to the agora and just gab about stuff. So maybe they’re not growing their own food anymore. They’ve got servants or something. But I put in my margin some of the things which must have been different from all of the pantheon of Greek gods that they had and all the different things that, different theories about which god created this or that, or which god created man. Verse 24, God made the world and all things therein. I wonder if that was a contrast with what they had heard. God is the creator. Verse 25, he giveth to all life and breath and all things. Oh, it’s God. This God that I’m talking about is the sustainer.

  36:26 Verse 26, hath made of one blood. I think the NIV says, made of one man, Adam, all nations. That wasn’t according to some of the Greek myths. Some of them created this and some created that. And he’s determined the times before appointed and their bounds of their habitation. Oh, God placed us here. And he knew where and when he placed us. And verse 27, that they should seek the Lord, if happily they might feel after him and find him, though he’d be not far from every one of us. I mean, when you read Greek mythology in high school, the gods seemed kind of indifferent to lowly mortals.

Dr. Susan Black: 37:05 Right.

John Bytheway: 37:05 And he’s saying this God is accessible, and I love what the JST adds, if they are willing to find him, for he is not far from every one of us. So God is accessible. And then verse 28, we also are his offspring. Whoa, God is our father. Verse 30, that at times of this ignorance God winked at, now he commandeth all men everywhere to repent. Oh, God cares about what we do. He’s our ruler. Verse 31, God hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man, he mentioned Adam, who’s this man? This man that he has raised from the dead. Paul doesn’t even mention crucifixion here with the Greeks. Verse 32, when they had heard of the resurrection, some mocked, which is just foolishness to the Greeks. I don’t know, it’s just fun to look at how he would talk to a Greek audience as opposed to what he probably would’ve said in the synagogue.

Hank Smith: 38:03 Yeah. Fantastic. Let’s look at a few of these phrases before we move on. I like how he starts with them, he says, you’re very religious people. He kind of pays them a compliment in verse 22. The King James says, in all things, you’re too superstitious, but I think that’s better translated as you are very religious.

John Bytheway: 38:22 Yeah. Footnote 22A says Greek most religious, so too superstitious. Yeah, that sounds a little strange, but you’re most religious. You’re trying to be so careful, like Susan said, we better cover all our bases, let’s make an altar to the unknown god, since we may not have got the name right or something.

Dr. Susan Black: 38:40 Right.

Hank Smith: 38:43 Right. And he doesn’t come in saying, you’re wrong. Right? You’re wrong about everything you believe. He says, I saw an altar to the unknown god, you’re worshiping him, but you just don’t know who he is. So let me tell you who he is. I just like that strategy of, I don’t know, is it how to win friends and influence people. Don’t come in and tell people how wrong they are. Come in and maybe start with some commonalities. Paul makes an interesting comment in verse 24, he says that he is the Lord of heaven and earth and he dwells not in temples made with hands.

  39:16 To a Latter-day Saint, that might sound curious, but remember these people, they have the idea that you can only worship God in a temple, that you can only worship Athena in Athena’s temple, you can only worship Zeus in Zeus’s temple. And remember, Paul loves and reveres the temple in Jerusalem. So I don’t think Paul here is saying, you don’t need temples at all, because he is still returning to the temple for feasts and things. I think what he’s saying is this idea that you can only worship God in a temple that’s dedicated to that specific God, that’s not the way it works. We don’t build a temple to kind of imprison God there.

John Bytheway: 40:01 Yeah, I think that’s a good question to throw out there because we say this is the house of the Lord. We know he visits there. We know he visits there. We know he’s been to places, but he’s not confined. That’s the word I like to think in my mind, he’s not confined to temples made with hands. And so that helps me to make sense of it.

Hank Smith: 40:21 As Latter-day Saints, we don’t build temples to find God, we build temples to enter into covenants with God, right?

John Bytheway: 40:29 Well put.

Hank Smith: 40:30 And then to me that sounds different than what the Greeks were doing.

John Bytheway: 40:32 Yeah. And we’ll see as we go on that they’re making little statues and everything and basically idols. And that’s another thing. He’s not confined to the form of an idol, perhaps we could say too.

Hank Smith: 40:44 Yeah, that’s from verse 29, we ought not to think that God is like unto a gold or silver or stone. That’s not God. It always surprises my students when I explain in the ancient world the statue is God. It’s not an image of God, the statue is God. Like someone can come to your village and steal your God and take it to their village and you got to go steal your God back. It’s kind of a hard thing to comprehend, but once they do, these verses start to make more sense.

Dr. Susan Black: 41:12 One thought I’ve had is that Rome is ruling the known world, and Rome has made a conscious decision that people can worship basically what they might, right? And so try and imagine all of the gods that are worshiped in the Roman world. There’s just got to be, there’s plethora. There’s just no end to the number of gods, but nowhere is it seen more than in Greek mythology. And that’s the one that has survived even to today, as you look at movies and things about Zeus and Pegasus, and we know those names where we may not know all the names of the various gods throughout the part of Africa that was part of the Roman Empire.

Hank Smith: 42:04 Yeah, the Greek gods are still, if you, I’ve read Percy Jackson to my kids and we know our Greek gods because of those books.

John Bytheway: 42:13 Look at the days of the week, who are we still acknowledging in the days of the week. We’re mentioning the sun and the moon and Mercury and Saturn, Saturday. But what I think is kind of, can you imagine this challenge for Paul because every region of the world has their own gods. And here’s Paul that comes out and says, well, actually Israel’s God is the God of the whole world.

Dr. Susan Black: 42:42 When you look at the various goddesses, even you could look at Palmyra was a Syrian goddess. We think of Palmyra, New York, we think Joseph Smith, you can find them literally still existing all over the world, although not perhaps clearly defined as they were during the time of Rome.

Hank Smith: 43:03 Athens wasn’t on Paul’s itinerary, it doesn’t seem like. He just took advantage of the chance to teach since he had been kind of run out of town. So he’s like, well, since I’m here, I might as well give a big speech here up on Mars Hill. He doesn’t come back, right?

Dr. Susan Black: 43:19 He’s not going back. In fact, as we move on to chapter 18, we move on to Corinth and he’s going to be there about 18 months. So Athens was just kind of a stopgap. It’s a stop on your tour where you get off, you see, and you come back. It doesn’t seem like he faced any great punishment there. So we are now moving on to a new town, and it will be here that we see Paul begins to work his trade. And you’d say, well, did he pick up stuff at Lydia’s house? Did he learn how to make purple dye? And you go, I don’t think so, unless he’s now going to start using it in his tents, right?

Hank Smith: 44:06 Right.

Dr. Susan Black: 44:09 But he becomes a tent maker. Yep. He makes two great friends there, Priscilla and her companion, who I think it’s interesting that you’d say both of them had lately come from Italy, and they were then commanded by the Emperor Claudius who commanded all Jews were to depart from Rome. And you go, wait a minute, I thought there could be Jews everywhere. We could have pockets of them all around the Mediterranean, the known world, but suddenly the Jews are being kicked out of Rome. So here Paul comes again and you’d say, well, where does he go to teach? And he always goes to the synagogue.

Hank Smith: 44:56 He goes to the synagogue.

John Bytheway: 44:57 Sure. Yeah.

Dr. Susan Black: 45:00 And it was kind of like that with early missionaries in the church. It used to be in any small town, as missionaries would go from place to place they’d always speak at the schoolhouse because the schoolhouse on Sunday, that’s where the churches met. Maybe the Presbyterians are there for one hour, and then here come the Congregationalists and others. But in the case of Paul, he’s showing up at the synagogue, and at this point he speaks and speaks, it says every Sabbath. And then finally, as they continue to oppose him, Paul has had it.

Hank Smith: 45:37 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 45:37 Yeah, I’m done.

Dr. Susan Black: 45:41 It’s like, I’ve been beaten, I’ve been put in prison, I’ve been taken before the council up on Mars Hill. Now I come to you. I think everything’s going to be good. I’m making my own living as a tent maker. And suddenly he sees them saying, he’s blaspheming. He shakes his raiment, which means your blood be on your own heads. He goes, I’m clean. And then he says, from henceforth, I will go unto the Gentiles. Meaning, hey you Jewish people, you’re no longer my top priority. I may still show up in synagogues on occasion, but I’m spreading my wings. I’m going to give other people a chance. I don’t think they’re going to treat me like you’ve been treating me.

Hank Smith: 46:30 That’s interesting. I can’t do this anymore. I cannot argue with Jews about Jesus anymore.

John Bytheway: 46:42 Please join us for part two of this podcast.