I will admit that I tried to title this blogpost with a title that would promote people into checking this post out; however, also while I was studying though the book of Acts these past few weeks and paying attention to the surroundings of Paul's journeys, i came across this tidbit of information. Most Preachers seem to gloss over the Greek Mythos and history of the events in the New Testament and that is something that has caught my attention these past few months. From Jesus's road trip with the Disciples to Caesarea Philippi, to the end of the New Testament there are a lot of references. In the Book of Acts, Paul is constantly coming across Worshippers of the Greek Myths and Gods.
That brings us to today's blog. In Acts 16;12-40, we see Paul's first trip to the city of Philippi. Phillippi is a city in Macedonia and a separate city from Delphi. The connection between the two places that I found comes from verse 16: As we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners much gain by fortune-telling."
The first thing that I want to point out is that she was a slave and her owners used her to make money. The reason that they could make money off of her comes from the spirit of Divination. I want to point out that I believe that this is a good translation and it points out that she was doing this because of a demon inside of her. Now for the Delphi part. In the Greek, the word for divination is Python. Python is the region where Delphi is located. In Greek Mythology, Python was the dragon spirit that gaurded Delphi and was defeated by Apollo causing Python and the Oracle to be subject to Apollo, and also, that it is why there was a temple to Apollo there. Also, it is said that it was Python who declared that Socrates was the wisest man in Greece. So this girl in Acts would have been seen as one who was connected to the Oracle at Delphi.
Now we come to the actions of the slave girl and Paul which occur in verses 17-18: She followed Paul and us, crying out, “These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation.”And this she kept doing for many days. Paul, having become greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, “I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” And it came out that very hour.
A lot of Preachers miss why the words that she said was a bad thing, and to be honest this went on for days before Paul had had enough. The danger in what she said was that she was using the message of Paul and Silas to exult them. When Preachers are being exalted, they start receiving the praise that is due to God and to god alone. Also by doing this she was equating God with the worship of demons. Paul casted out this demon and that caused a big commotion that ended with Paul and Silas being beaten and jailed.
There are a couple of reasons that struck a cord with me. The first is that people seem to look at Greek Mythology as Comic Book characters, instead of a false religion. The second is that this shows how false religions are powered by demons.
Deuteronomy 32:17 They sacrificed to demons that were not God,to gods they had never known,"
1 Corinthians 10:19-20 "What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything?No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons."
I could go on with the Bible quotes and I recommend everyone to look this up for themselves. I am not saying that we can't enjoy Greek Myths, but to realize that these are talking about demon powered beliefs and those same demons are active today empowering false beliefs.
No comments:
Post a Comment