Thematic and Historic analysis of Greek and Judeo Christian
Thematic and Historic analysis of Greek and Judeo Christian Religions
The very foundations of Greek thinking and nature differ sharply from that of the Judeo Christian. To the Greek the world was surrounded by deities and man was some how the result of their presence and interaction with nature. To the Jew and Christian, man is the result of creation, the work of God, and even dough man is created in the image of God he is subject to Gods sovereignty in every aspect of his life.
The Greek’s religious background represented a deification of the creature, specially mankind, and a corresponding corruption of the moral sense, giving the sanction of religion to natural and unnatural vices.
The Greek religion was nothing more than an artistic product of the imagination. Its ethical base deformed by moral distortion, completely lacks the true conception of sin and consequently the true conception of holiness. It regards sin, not as a perverseness of will and an offence against their Gods, but as a folly of the understanding and an offence against men.
Homer knows no devil, but rather puts a devilish element into his deities. Their Gods are born, but never die. They are full of envy and wrath; hatred and lust prompting men to crime, and provoke each other to lying, and cruelty, perjury and adultery. Such was their depravity that Plato banished them from his ideal Republic.
By its superstition it betrayed the need of faith. Its polytheism rested on a dim monotheistic background; it subjected all the gods to Jupiter. It had the notion of dependence on higher powers and reverence for divine things. It had the voice of conscience, and a sense, dim, of guilt. It felt the need of reconciliation with deity, and sought that reconciliation by meditation, penance, and sacrifice.
These vague fundamentals of morality and the notion of an “Unknown God” (Acts 17:23) may explain in some circumstances the readiness with which many Greek heathen were willing to hear the gospel.
The Grecian philosophy particularly that of Plato and Aristotle, formed the natural basis of their theology. By the time of the apostles, Greek philosophy had run down into scepticism and refined materialism determining their moral and ethical conduct. Their pursuit of perfection was achieved on a constant search of knowledge.
For all the Athenians and strangers which were there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear some...