8. They troubled the crowd and the city officials when they heard these things.
9. When they had taken a bail payment from Jason and the rest, they released them.
10. The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews.
11. These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with all eagerness, daily examining the Scriptures, to find out if these things were so.
12. Therefore many of them believed, including honorable Greek women and many Greek men.
13. But when the Jews of Thessalonica learned that the word of God was preached by Paul at Berea, they came there also, stirring up the crowds.
14. The brothers immediately sent Paul away to the sea. But Silas and Timothy remained there.
15. Those who escorted Paul brought him to Athens and departed with instructions for Silas and Timothy to come to him quickly.
16. While Paul waited for them in Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full of idols.
17. Therefore he disputed in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace daily with those who happened to there.
18. Then some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him. And some said, “What will this babbler say?” Others said, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods,” because he preached Jesus and the resurrection to them.
19. They took hold of him and led him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new doctrine is of which you speak?
20. For you are bringing strange things to our ears. Therefore we want to know what these things mean.”
21. For all the Athenians and foreigners who lived there spent their time in nothing else, but either telling or hearing something new.
22. Then Paul stood in the middle of the Areopagus, and said: “Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious.