Agnosticism, Atheism, Bible Geography, Bible Study, Christianity, Faith, God, Morality, Religion, Salvation, Truth

“Times of Ignorance”

Nate

There’s a passage in the Bible that has long stood out to me. When I was a Christian, I found it comforting; now, I just find it perplexing. In Acts 17 (beginning in verse 16), Paul is visiting Athens. Since it was a hub of philosophy and culture, it had temples and altars to a multitude of different gods, including an altar “to the unknown god.” Paul uses this opportunity to preach to them about the Jewish god — the god that (according to Paul) created everything. Then, in verses 30-31, Paul says this:

The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.

When Paul talks about “the times of ignorance,” he’s obviously talking about all the time before that moment — a time when God “allowed” people to serve “false” gods. But what does he mean when he says that God overlooked that time? I’d be curious to know how other denominations view this passage. When I was a Christian, my view of it tied in with the first three chapters of Romans. Those chapters lay out a case for why both Jews and Gentiles needed Christ. Romans 2:12-16 says this:

For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.

The Old Law was given to the Jews. While the OT didn’t teach the concepts of Heaven and Hell, many Christians believe that keeping the Law is what let Jews go to Heaven, before Christ came. But what provision was there for Gentiles? Romans 2 seems to say that even though Gentiles didn’t have the law, those who lived righteously anyway were a “law to themselves,” which could “excuse them” on that day of judgement. This is still vague… did it mean that the Gentiles had to somehow anticipate the actual Mosaic laws? Or is this just talking about basic morality? I tend to think it’s the latter, since the former would be virtually impossible.

So let’s go back to Acts 17:30. When Paul says that God overlooked these “times of ignorance,” I took that to mean that he judged Gentiles merely on their morality. It seems like this would be a more forgiving scale, since it wouldn’t include any ritualistic precepts that only apply to specific doctrines. In other words, it seems to fit pretty well with Romans 2.

When I was a Christian, this gave me great comfort. After all, it meant that before the time of Christ, salvation was still awarded to many people, even if they weren’t Jewish. The alternative, that all Gentiles were automatically consigned to Hell, is just too horrible to contemplate.

But this also brings up some uncomfortable questions. First of all, Acts 17:30 goes on to say “but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.” This would indicate that Gentiles could no longer simply be judged on a general moral law. Instead, they would be required to become Christians. But how much sense does that make? If Paul really made this speech in Athens, most sources I’ve seen estimate it to have taken place around 50 CE. This is before any books of the New Testament had been written, which means Christianity was solely spreading by word of mouth. How could all Gentiles have been expected to respond to the gospel at this point in time? Even decades later, once some of the writings were circulating, there were also “non-canonical” writings in the mix. How could people have known which were accurate? For centuries, Christians simply didn’t have access to all the canonical books of the Bible, and even if they had, the majority couldn’t have read them. So they would have relied on the testimony of clergy. When disagreements arose surrounding doctrine, how could they have known what to believe? This doesn’t even deal with the very big problem that Christianity, for most of its history, barely spread outside of Europe, the Middle East, and northern Africa. Most of the world knew nothing of it.

If God no longer excused ignorance after Paul’s speech, then millions upon millions of people were consigned to Hell through no fault of their own. If God did still excuse people’s ignorance, then Paul’s speech doesn’t make a lot of sense here.

But there’s another problem as well. If God was able to save people simply based on their morality, then why did he ever do anything different? Let’s say God still overlooked ignorance even after Paul’s speech. If you had been a Gentile living at that time, you would have had a greater chance at salvation if you never heard the gospel. Because if you heard it, but rejected it, you would be accountable to it. If you never heard it, then simply living a moral life would be enough for salvation. This means that those who preached the gospel were actually doing a disservice. Ignorance truly would have been bliss. Why would God have implemented such a flawed and unfair plan?

When I was a Christian, I took it for granted that Christianity was true, so I when I read this passage, I really just focused on the comfort I got from thinking that Gentiles still had an avenue for salvation before Christ came. But I now see this as another red flag about the truth of Christianity. So I’m curious as to how other groups view this. Are there ways of looking at it that aren’t so problematic? Or is this a minor enough passage that most of you never paid much attention to it?

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Published by Nate

77 thoughts on ““Times of Ignorance””

  2. Hi Charity

    Warning, the following is a very sexist joke, but it did come to mind when I was reading your response to SPG. Please see it as the views of some, not all men.

    The preacher was exhorting the Church congregation to ’embrace your cross’. A man in the front row turned looked at his wife and hugged her.

    Please don’t be offended.

    Liked by 3 people

  3. My apologies, Peter, please don’t take it as an insult. I absolutely love the British Isles and the people from there.

    I can’t give an honest assessment of Australia because I’ve never been there and as an American I am left with ridiculous stereotypes…Crocodile Dundee, Outback Steakhouse and the TV persona of the late Steve Irwin. I was a big fan of Darlene Zschech though and saw her at an arena while I lived in Nashville. My favorites were All I Need is You, Worthy is the Lamb and Tell the World that Jesus Lives. I liked most of her music. I also had a massive crush on an Australian man while at Bible school in Dallas. He wanted to “build a relationship” with me, but nothing ever happened.

    I did like your joke, but I’m a weirdo. I didn’t like “yo mama” jokes until I became one.

    Liked by 1 person

  4. @Peter

    NICE! My in-laws are going to Hobart next month! Very nice place. I myself and hoping to go Tasmania and then subsequently go and visit south pole, but not this year unfortunately.

    Liked by 1 person

  6. @SPG:
    You said: “I have a question for all of you. what motivates you guys to ‘generally spend an inordinate amount of time talking about a God you don’t believe in to convince those who do believe that we’re foolish.'”

    I hope you don’t mind if I take a stab at this even though I’m a believer.

    I don’t think most atheist individuals and communities have a primary goal of deconverting people. Just a little time spent in the blogosphere or real world will show that its very difficult to change someone’s mind. Even when there is unequivocal scientific data, it can be difficult to change someone’s mind. For example, anti-vacciners and Young Earth Creationists.

    Therefore, blogs and communities must primarily serve other purposes. Probably the most important purpose is solidarity. It’s important to find like-minding folks or at least sympathizers as we are all human and need this deep social fulfillment. Another reason is the virtue of truth seeking. It is an examination of one’s deepest thoughts and putting them in the public domain to receive feedback. Deconverting people may just be ancillary to these in most communities.

    I suppose I should mention that there exists some blogs and communities, both religious and non-religious, that consider themselves superior. They think they are smarter, wiser, and have higher morals. This self-apportioned superiority is used to justify ridicule and hatred. But, this is the wrong way. Don’t even those who disagree with us deserve dignity? We can live together in disagreement and still give each dignity without thinking ourselves superior and justifying such abuses.

    Regretfully, I suspect that the website or TV program you are quoting is trying to insult atheists. They are basically saying, “You guys are obsessive because you know religion is winning.” This is really disappointing because I know that its not the case at all. My atheist and agnostic friends are well-meaning, serious, and committed to thinking things through, certainly not obsessive rationalizers. They are usually immersed in cultures and subcultures with widespread belief in God and disinterest in thinking about truth; so naturally, these are things to talk about at opportune times. So, there are reasons to keep the discussion alive, for solidarity, for truth, and maybe to changes minds and hearts.

    Liked by 3 people

  8. The topic of this post brings up what I believe to be the core defect in Protestant Christianity: Sola Scriptura; that the Christian Faith is based entirely on the unquestioned authority, inerrancy, and divine inspiration of a book, or more correctly, a collection of 27 books (the New Testament).

    From Infidels.org:

    Diversity of Early Christianity

    Bart D. Ehrman provides the following points as summary of his introductory chapter on the New Testament and early Christian writings:

    1. Early Christianity was extremely diverse. It was not the unified monolith that modern people sometimes assume.
    2. This diversity was manifest in a wide range of writings, only some of which have come down to us in the New Testament.
    3. The New Testament canon was formed by proto-orthodox Christians who wanted to show that their views were grounded in the writings of Jesus’ own apostles.
    4. Whether these writings actually represent the views of Jesus’ own apostles, however, was in some instances debated for decades, even centuries.[107]

    Gary: Christians have very, very weak evidence to support their claim that the 27 books of the NT are the inspired word of the Creator God. But yet, their entire belief system rises or falls on this one claim.

    Liked by 1 person

  9. Hi Powell, you did well identifying Hobart, hardly a well known international location.

    Although we are a long way from the Antarctic, the Australian, French and Chinese Antarctic Expeditions leave for Antarctica from Hobart.

    The first picture is the Australian Antarctic Supply vessel, looking up to our local Mountain.
    http://images.aad.gov.au/img.py/98e.jpg?width=640&height=428

    This second picture shows the Chinese supply vessel looking towards the other side of the River Derwent.

    Liked by 2 people

  10. Arch, I came across a comment in DiarMaid MacCulloch’s history of Christianity

    It is a peculiarity of the Orthodox tradition of public worship that it contains hymns of hate, directed towards named individuals who are defined as heretical, all the way from Arius, through Miaphysites, Dyophysites, and Iconoclasts. Take, for instance, these lines from the fifth sticheron (hymn) for Great Vespers on the Sunday after the feast of the Ascension. In celebration of the first Council of Nicaea, the liturgy describes with relish (and one malevolent theological pun) the wretched end of Nicaea’s arch villain in fatal diarrhoea on the privy:

    Arius fell into the precipice of sin,
    Having shut his eyes so as not to see the light,
    And he was ripped asunder
    by a divine book so that along with his entrails
    he forcibly emptied out
    all his essence [ousia!] and his soul,
    and was named another Judas
    both for his ideas and the manner of his death.

    Hardly the hymn for peaceful devotions.

    Liked by 1 person

  11. Hi Charity, actually I am from Australia. This is my home town:

    Hi Peter, I recognised the photo, but I had an advantage, having visited three times in the last 10 years (I’m from Sydney). I’ve been to all but one of Australia’s capital cities, and I think I like Hobart the best. We have always stayed at Battery Point/Salamanca, which maybe helps explain that.

    Liked by 1 person

  12. Gary, the funny thing is that Christians are so use to interpreting the Bible based on pre-conceived views that they miss what is plainly before their eyes. Book after book of the New Testament hints at this division. Galatians, 1 and 2 Corinthians and 1 John make open reference to the divisions.

    Liked by 1 person

  13. Charity, I visited Canada once and thought that culturally it was very similar to Australia.

    Though Monty Python had a different slant

    Like

  14. I should add, I had not watched again the whole video until after I posted it. I did not remember how politically incorrect it was. Still it does show how society values have changed in the last 45 years.

    Like

  15. Below is a link to a very interesting article which discusses the discrepancies between the Paul in the Book of Acts and the Paul in the (genuine) Pauline epistles:

    http://www.rejectionofpascalswager.net/lukepaul.html

    As a Christian I never once noticed these glaring discrepancies. I would bet that most Christians miss them. We miss them because our indoctrinated brains cannot contemplate for one millisecond the presence of contradictions in “God’s Inerrant, Holy Word”.

    Liked by 1 person

  16. I just watched the “Aussie” video. The only thing I understood was that everyone in Australia is named “Bruce”, that “real” Australian men don’t like gays (“poofters”), and that the English think all Australians are morons.

    I for one could care less what the English think of you or anyone else, but I do have a question: Why in god’s name don’t you Australians learn to speak proper English so we Americans can understand what the hell you are saying??

    Liked by 1 person

  17. Like in America the Australian accent does vary over the country and tends to be stronger in the Northern part. In the South where I am, it can at times be more like a mild English Accent.

    The Monty Python team decided to take off the most extreme form of the accent.

    Like

  18. UnkleE I spent 12 years living in Sydney before returning to my home town. I always Sydney too busy for me and too hot and humid. I prefer the quieter pace of life in tranquil Hobart and more temperate weather.

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  19. heads up everyone, it appears that sept 23, 2015 is the new date set for the beginning of the end. I saw it on jim bakker show and some other Christian program. so I googled it.

    oh no. I read it on the internet so it must be true.

    Like

  20. @SPG

    You know, I have a bet with my good friend (he was one of my best-men for my wedding) that if financial market collapse in September, I will start going to church with him. I also told him that, if nothing happened in Sept, his faith will still not falter, so why am I entering such an asymmetrical agreement – to prove to him I live consistently with my life, while he is obviously not. He’s a lawyer by the way, seriously I can’t understand why someone who qualified for Mensa during his teens is totally bamboozled by this shit – then again I remembered I was the one who fed him this bullshit so………

    Obviously somebody told him about the blood moon bullshit, unfortunately Greek exit already seems to be happening, and market is not collapsing, I think we will need N.Korea to throw a nuclear bomb for US stocks to drop 5%, and then rebound again.

    Liked by 1 person

  21. lol, powell. I watch way too much Christian t.v., and I have heard that on sept 23, anything could happen, from the stock market crash to an asteroid hitting the earth, to CERN opening another dimension a.k.a. “the pits of hell.
    one of the kooks is even saying that it coincides with the pope visiting the white house and aliens will arrive and there will be a “false flag” rapture…HUH?

    so, they are all rushing to sell their “blood moon ” prophecy books and their survivalist food and gear because it’s right around the corner. so crazy. they fear monger for profit.

    but , I just found this on the internet: http://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/blood-moon.html
    “Another End-of-the-world Prophecy?
    Some people believe that the tetrad has special significance because the eclipses coincide with important Jewish festivals. The two April lunar eclipses in 2014 and 2015 occurred at the same time as Passover, while the October and September eclipses occur during the Feast of Tabernacle. This, they suggest, is connected to a biblical prophecy of the end of times.
    The fact is, eight of the tetrads since the first century have coincided with Jewish holidays without the world going under, so there is no reason to believe that the 2014-2015 tetrad will end the world this time either.”

    so, I’m not too alarmed, however, I’d rally love to see the aliens arrive to visit the pope, now that would be cool.

    Liked by 1 person

  22. Haha yeah I read about those. Even when I was a Christian I rolled my eyes when one of the guest pastors came in to preach about this shit.

    Nonetheless, I am waiting for a financial market crash – we’re kinda overdue on it, but the degree is never going to be as big as the 2007 one. I would love to see a crash where I live though, stock prices and property prices are getting ridiculously high – first world problem of staying in a popular city.

    Liked by 1 person

  23. SPG, I got just one thing to say. If anyone should know these people who believe the end times are here, put us in contact. I want to inherit their property before that date. They will not be needing them beyond said date

    Liked by 1 person

  25. Peter my problem with that is if the rapture doesn’t happen, as it will not, I can’t get the car. I want this people to put their faith in their mouths, so to speak. The world is ending on such a date, let them transfer all they have to me effective said date

    Liked by 1 person

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