Actes 17:24

24 Le Dieu qui a fait le monde et tout ce qui s'y trouve, étant le Seigneur du ciel et de la terre, n'habite point dans des temples faits de main d'homme;

Actes 17:24 Meaning and Commentary

Acts 17:24

God that made the world, and all things therein
In this account of the divine Being, as the Creator of the world, and all things in it, as the apostle agrees with Moses, and the rest of the sacred Scriptures; so he condemns both the notion of the Epicurean philosophers, who denied that the world was made by God, but said that it owed its being to a fortuitous concourse of atoms; and the notion of the Peripatetics, or Aristotelians, who asserted the eternity of the world; and some of both sects were doubtless present.

Seeing that he is the Lord of heaven and earth;
as appears by his being the Creator of both; hence he supports them in their being, and governs all creatures in them by his providence.

Dwelleth not in temples made with hands;
such as were the idol temples at Athens; nor in any other edifices built by man, so as to be there fixed and limited; no, not in the temple at Jerusalem: but he dwells in temples that are not made with hands, as in the temple of Christ's human nature, in which the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily, and in the hearts of his people, who are the temples of the Holy Ghost. This strikes at a notion of the Athenians, as if God was limited, and circumscribed, and included within the bounds of a shrine, or temple, though it is not at all contrary to his promises, or the hopes of his own people, of his presence in places appointed for divine worship, but is expressive of the infinity and immensity of God.

Actes 17:24 In-Context

22 Paul, debout au milieu de l'Aréopage, dit: Hommes Athéniens, je vous trouve à tous égards extrêmement religieux.
23 Car, en parcourant votre ville et en considérant les objets de votre dévotion, j'ai même découvert un autel avec cette inscription: A un dieu inconnu! Ce que vous révérez sans le connaître, c'est ce que je vous annonce.
24 Le Dieu qui a fait le monde et tout ce qui s'y trouve, étant le Seigneur du ciel et de la terre, n'habite point dans des temples faits de main d'homme;
25 il n'est point servi par des mains humaines, comme s'il avait besoin de quoi que ce soit, lui qui donne à tous la vie, la respiration, et toutes choses.
26 Il a fait que tous les hommes, sortis d'un seul sang, habitassent sur toute la surface de la terre, ayant déterminé la durée des temps et les bornes de leur demeure;
The Louis Segond 1910 is in the public domain.