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{{Short description|Theory by Eduard Norden}}
{{more citations needed|date=June 2011}}

The '''Unknown God''' or '''Agnostos Theos''' ({{langx|grc|Ἄγνωστος Θεός}}) is a theory by [[Eduard Norden]] first published in 1913 that proposes, based on the Christian [[Apostle Paul]]'s [[Areopagus sermon|Areopagus speech]] in [[Acts 17]]:23, that in addition to the [[Olympian twelve|twelve main gods]] and the innumerable [[Greek mythology|lesser deities]], ancient [[Greece|Greeks]] worshipped a deity they called "Agnostos Theos"; that is: "Unknown God", which Norden called "Un-Greek".<ref>{{cite book|last=van der Horst|first=Pieter Willem|title=Hellenism, Judaism, Christianity: essays on their interaction|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Tv0t4pqrbZsC&pg=PA187|volume=The Altar of the 'Unknown God' in Athens (Acts 17:23) and the Cults of 'Unknown Gods' in the Graeco-Roman World|year=1998|publisher=Peeters Publishers|isbn=9789042905788|pages=187–220}}</ref> In [[Athens]], there was a [[temple]] specifically dedicated to that god and very often Athenians would swear "in the name of the Unknown God" ({{lang|grc|Νὴ τὸν Ἄγνωστον}}, {{Transliteration|grc|Nē ton Agnōston}}).<ref>Pseudo-Lucian, Philopatris, 9.14</ref> [[Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus)|Apollodorus]],{{Citation needed|date=March 2012}} [[Philostratus]]<ref>Philostratus, ''Vita Apollonii'' 6.3</ref> and [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] wrote about the Unknown God as well.<ref>''Pausanias' Description of Greece'' in 6 vols, Loeb Classic Library, Vol I, Book I.1.4</ref>

== Paul at Athens ==
[[File:V&A - Raphael, St Paul Preaching in Athens (1515).jpg|thumb|280px|[[Saint Paul]] delivering the ''Areopagus Sermon'' in [[Athens]], by [[Raphael]], 1515.]]
According to the book of [[Acts of the Apostles|Acts]], contained in the Christian [[New Testament]], when the Apostle [[Paul of Tarsus|Paul]] visited Athens, he saw an [[altar]] with an [[inscription]] dedicated to that god (possibly connected to the [[Cylon of Athens|Cylonian affair]]),<ref>''[https://books.google.com/books?id=IKsNAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA211 Plutarch's Lives]''</ref> and, when invited to speak to the Athenian elite at the [[Areopagus]], gave the [[Areopagus sermon|following speech]]:

{{blockquote|{{sup|22}}Paul stood in the middle of the [[Areopagus]], and said, "You men of Athens, I perceive that you are very religious in all things. {{sup|23}}For as I passed along, and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription: 'TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.' What therefore you worship in ignorance, this I announce to you. {{sup|24}}The God who made the world and all things in it, he, being Lord of heaven and earth, doesn't dwell in temples made with hands, {{sup|25}}neither is he served by men's hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he himself gives to all life and breath, and all things. {{sup|26}}He made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the surface of the earth, having determined appointed seasons, and the boundaries of their dwellings, {{sup|27}}that they should seek the Lord, if perhaps they might reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. {{sup|28}}'For in him we live, and move, and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'For we are also his offspring.' {{sup|29}}Being then the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold, or silver, or stone, engraved by art and design of man. {{sup|30}}The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked. But now he commands that all people everywhere should repent, {{sup|31}}because he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he has ordained; of which he has given assurance to all men, in that he has raised him from the dead."|source=Acts 17:22-31 ([[World English Bible|WEB]])}}

Because Paul's [[Yahweh|God]] [[Tetragrammaton#Spoken prohibitions|could not be named]], according to the customs of his people, it is possible that Paul's Athenian listeners would have considered his God to be "the unknown god par excellence".<ref>{{cite book|last1=Tomson|first1=Peter J.|last2=Lambers-Petry|first2=Doris|title=The image of the Judaeo-Christians in ancient Jewish and Christian literature|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9bbWbMGekWoC&pg=PA235|year=2003|publisher=Mohr Siebeck|isbn=3-16-148094-5|page=235}}</ref> His listeners may also have understood the introduction of a new god by allusions to [[Aeschylus]]' ''[[Oresteia#The Eumenides|The Eumenides]]''; the irony would have been that just as the Eumenides were not new gods at all but the [[Furies]] in a new form, so was the Christian God not a new god but rather the god the Greeks already worshipped as the Unknown God.<ref>{{cite book|last=Kauppi|first=Lynn Allan|title=Foreign but familiar gods: Greco-Romans read religion in Acts|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9dYTX9CQm04C&pg=PA83|year=2006|publisher=Continuum International Publishing Group|isbn=0-567-08097-8|pages=83–93|chapter=Acts 17.16-34 and Aeschylus' Eumenides}}</ref> His audience would also have recognized the quotes in verse 28 as coming from [[Epimenides]] and [[Aratus]], respectively.

== Archaeology ==
[[File:Altare del dio ignoto, 110-90 ac ca, dall'area sudorientale del palatino verso il velabro.jpg|thumb|Altar to an unknown god]]

There is an altar, perhaps dedicated to the Unknown God,{{cn|date=September 2025}} which was unearthed in 1820 on the [[Palatine Hill]] of Rome. It contains a Latin inscription:

{{poemquote|{{lang|la|SEI·DEO·SEI·DEIVAE·SAC
G·SEXTIVS·C·F·CALVINVSPR
DE·SENATI·SENTENTIA
RESTITVIT|italics=no}}}}

This could be translated into English as: "Whether sacred [[Si deus si dea|to god or to goddess]], [[Gaius Sextius Calvinus]], son of Gaius, praetor, restored this on a vote of the senate."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Dillon |first1=Matthew |title=Ancient Rome: A Sourcebook |last2=Garland |first2=Lynda |author2-link=Lynda Garland |publisher=Routledge |year=2013 |isbn= |page=132}}</ref>

The altar is currently exhibited in the Palatine Museum.<ref>{{cite book |last=Lanciani |first=Rodolfo |url=https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Roma/Rome/_Texts/Lanciani/LANPAC/2*.html#image72 |title=Pagan and Christian Rome |publisher=Houghton, Mifflin and Company |year=1892 |place=Boston and New York}}</ref>

== In Ancient Egypt ==
The idea of an unknown god, however, seems to predate the Greeks. For in Ancient Egypt, [[Amun#Early history|Amun]] was an unknowable god, not only in the sense of his name being unknown, but also his identity or essence.

== In Neoplatonism ==
For Plotinus, the first principle of reality is "[[Neoplatonism#The One|the One]]", an utterly simple, ineffable, unknowable subsistence which is both the creative source of the Universe<ref name="Brenk 2016">{{cite book |last=Brenk |first=Frederick |date=January 2016 |title="Theism" and Related Categories in the Study of Ancient Religions |chapter=Pagan Monotheism and Pagan Cult |chapter-url=https://classicalstudies.org/annual-meeting/147/abstract/pagan-monotheism-and-pagan-cult |publisher=[[Society for Classical Studies]] ([[University of Pennsylvania]]) |series=SCS/AIA Annual Meeting |location=[[Philadelphia]] |volume=75 |issue=4 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170506035740/https://classicalstudies.org/annual-meeting/147/abstract/pagan-monotheism-and-pagan-cult |archive-date=6 May 2017 |url-status=live |access-date=14 October 2020 |quote=Historical authors generally refer to "the divine" (''to theion'') or "the supernatural" (''to daimonion'') rather than simply "God." [...] The [[Stoicism|Stoics]], believed in a God identifiable with the ''[[logos]]'' or ''hegemonikon'' (reason or leading principle) of the universe and downgraded the [[Ancient Greek religion|traditional gods]], who even disappear during the conflagration (''[[ekpyrosis]]''). Yet, the Stoics apparently did not practice a cult to this God. [[Middle Platonism|Middle]] and Later Platonists, who spoke of a supreme God, in philosophical discourse, generally speak of this God, not the gods, as responsible for the creation and providence of the universe. They, too, however, do not seem to have directly practiced a religious cult to their God.}}</ref> and the teleological end of all existing things.

==See also==
* {{lang|la|[[Si deus si dea]]}}
* {{lang|la|[[Unmoved mover|Primum Movens]]}}
* {{lang|la|[[Dii involuti]]}}
* [[General revelation]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
{{commons category|Unknown god}}
*{{cite web|url=http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/sbe32/sbe3215.htm| title=Vedic Hymn To the Unknown God}} Translated by Max Mueller
{{Greek religion}}

[[Category:1913 introductions]]
[[Category:Theories]]
[[Category:Greek deities]]
[[Category:Names of God]]
[[Category:New Testament words and phrases]]
[[Category:Christianity in Roman Athens]]
[[Category:Christianity and Hellenistic religion]]
[[Category:Deities of classical antiquity]]
[[Category:Christian terminology]]
[[Category:Paul the Apostle]]
[[Category:Acts of the Apostles]]
[[Category:Conceptions of God]]