100 Reasons to Believe New Testament History
33. Athenian Slang
In Acts 17:18 we read that during Paul’s visit to Athens, “certain philosophers of the Epicureans, and of the Stoicks, encountered [Paul]. And some said, What will this babbler say? Other some, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.”
The scornful remarks regarding Paul’s teachings ring with authenticity, as Professor Hawkings notes:
“Another particularly interesting tidbit is the disdainful Athenian retort in 17:18 by the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers of Paul being a “babbler” (spermalogos). This is an authentic touch of characteristic Athenian social slang.” Professor Craig S. Hawkins, President of “Apologetics Information Ministry” (www.apologeticinfo.org), Internet Essay, The Critical Issue, based on the research of Sir William Ramsey A, “St. Paul the Traveler and Roman Citizen”, reprint, 1979, pp. 241-243
33. Athenian Slang - Notes and References
A. Ramsey remarks, “The different opinions of the philosophers in v. 18 are purposely placed side by side with a touch of gentile sarcasm on their inability, with all their acuteness, to agree in any opinion even about Paul’s meaning. The first opinion is the most interesting. It contains a word of characteristically Athenian slang, Spermologos, and is clearly caught from the very lips of the Athenians. This term was used in two senses – (1) a small bird that picks up seeds for its food, and (2) a worthless fellow of vulgar habits, with the insinuation that he lives at the expense of others, like those disreputable persons who hang around the markets and quays in order to pick up anything that falls from the loads that are carried about. Hence, as a term in social slang, it connotes absolute vulgarity and inability to rise above the most contemptible standard of life, for the spermologos was near the type of the slave and below the level of the free man; and there clings to it the suggestion of picking up refuse and scraps, and in literature plagiarism without the capacity to use it correctly. ” Sir William Ramsey, St. Paul the Traveller and Roman Citizen”, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, 1962