(NOTE: The electronic text obtained from The Electronic Bible Society was
not completely corrected. EWTN has corrected all discovered errors.)
Transliteration of Greek words: All phonetical except: w = omega; h serves
three puposes: 1. = Eta; 2. = rough breathing, when appearing intially
before a vowel; 3. = in the aspirated letters theta = th, phi = ph, chi =
ch. Accents are given immediately after their corresponding vowels: acute =
' , grave = `, circumflex = ^. The character ' doubles as an apostrophe,
when necessary.
JUSTIN MARTYR
THE SECOND APOLOGY OF JUSTIN FOR THE CHRISTIANS
ADDRESSED TO THE ROMAN SENATE
CHAP. I.--INTRODUCTION.
ROMANS, the things which have recently(1) happened in your city under
Urbicus,(2) and the things which are likewise being everywhere unreasonably
done by the governors, have compelled me to frame this composition for your
sakes, who are men of like passions, and brethren, though ye know it not,
and though ye be unwilling to acknowledge it on account of your glorying in
what you esteem dignities.(3) For everywhere, whoever is corrected by
father, or neighbour, or child, or friend, or brother, or husband, or wife,
for a fault, for being hard to move, for loving pleasure and being hard to
urge to what is right (except those who have been persuaded that the unjust
and intemperate shall be punished in eternal fire, but that the virtuous
and those who lived like Christ shall dwell with God in a state that is
free from suffering,--we mean, those who have become Christians), and the
evil demons, who hate us, and who keep such men as these subject to
themselves, and serving them in the capacity of judges, incite them, as
rulers actuated by evil spirits, to put us to death. But that the cause of
all that has taken place under Urbicus may become quite plain to you, I
will relate what has been done.
CHAP. II.--URBICUS CONDEMNS THE CHRISTIANS TO DEATH.
A certain woman lived with an intemperate(4) husband; she herself, too,
having formerly been intemperate. But when she came to the knowledge of the
teachings of Christ she became sober-minded, and endeavoured to persuade
her husband likewise to be temperate, citing the teaching of Christ, and
assuring him that there shall be punishment in eternal fire inflicted upon
those who do not live temperately and conformably to right reason. But he,
continuing in the same excesses, alienated his wife from him by his
actions. For she, considering it wicked to live any longer as a wife with a
husband who sought in every way means of indulging in pleasure contrary to
the law of nature, and in violation of what is right, wished to be divorced
from him. And when she was overpersuaded by her friends, who advised her
still to continue with him, in the idea that some time or other her husband
might give hope of amendment, she did violence to her own feeling and
remained with him. But when her husband had gone into Alexandria, and was
reported to be conducting himself worse than ever, she--that she might not,
by continuing in matrimonial connection with him, and by sharing his table
and his bed, become a partaker also in his wickednesses and impieties--gave
him what you call a bill of divorce,(5) and was separated from him. But
this noble husband of hers,--while he ought to have been rejoicing that
those actions which formerly she unhesitatingly committed with the servants
and hirelings, when she delighted in drunkenness and every vice, she had
now given up, and desired that he too should give up the same,--when she
had gone from him without his desire, brought an accusation against her,
affirming that she was a Christian. And she presented a paper to thee, the
Emperor,(6) requesting that first she be permitted to arrange her affairs,
and afterwards to make her defence against the accusation, when her affairs
were set in order. And this you granted. And her quondam husband, since he
was now no longer able to prosecute her, directed his assaults against a
man, Ptolemaeus, whom Urbicus punished, and who had been her teacher in the
Christian doctrines. And this he did in the following way. He persuaded a
centurion--who had cast Ptolemaeus into prison, and who was friendly to
himself--to take Ptolemaeus and interrogate him on this sole point: whether
he were a Christian? And Ptolemaeus, being a lover of truth, and not of a
deceitful or false disposition, when he confessed himself to be a
Christian, was bound by the centurion, and for a long time punished in the
prison. And, at last, when the man(1) came to Urbicus, he was asked this
one question only: whether he was a Christian? And again, being conscious
of his duty, and the nobility of it through the teaching of Christ, he
confessed his discipleship in the divine virtue. For he who denies
anything, either denies it because he condemns the thing itself, or he
shrinks from confession because he is conscious of his own unworthiness or
alienation from it; neither of which cases is that of the true Christian.
And when Urbicus ordered him to be led away to punishment, one Lucius, who
was also himself a Christian, seeing the unreasonable judgment that had
thus been given, said to Urbicus: "What is the ground of this judgment? Why
have you punished this man, not as an adulterer, nor fornicator, nor
murderer, nor thief, nor robber, nor convicted of any crime at all, but who
has only confessed that he is called by the name of Christian? This
judgment of yours, O Urbicus, does not become the Emperor Pius, nor the
philosopher, the son of Caesar, nor the sacred senate."(2) And he said
nothing else in answer to Lucius than this: "You also seem to me to be such
an one." And when Lucius answered, "Most certainly I am," he again ordered
him also to be led away. And he professed his thanks, knowing that he was
delivered from such wicked rulers, and was going to the Father and King of
the heavens. And still a third having come forward, was condemned to be
punished.
CHAP. III.--JUSTIN ACCUSES CRESCENS OF IGNORANT PREJUDICE AGAINST THE
CHRISTIANS.
I too, therefore, expect to be plotted against and fired to the stake,
by some of those I have named, or perhaps by Crescens, that lover of
bravado and boasting;(3) for the man is not worthy of the name of
philosopher who publicly bears witness against us in matters which he does
not understand, saying that the Christians are atheists and impious, and
doing so to win favour with the deluded mob, and to please them. For if he
assails us without having read the teachings of Christ, he is thoroughly
depraved, and far worse than the illiterate, who often refrain from
discussing or bearing false witness about matters they do not understand.
Or, if he has read them and does not understand the majesty that is in
them, or, understanding it, acts thus that he may not be suspected of being
such [a Christian], he is far more base and thoroughly depraved, being
conquered by illiberal and unreasonable opinion and fear. For I would have
you to know that I proposed to him certain questions on this subject, and
interrogated him, and found most convincingly that he, in truth, knows
nothing. And to prove that I speak the truth, I am ready, if these
disputations have not been reported to you, to conduct them again in your
presence. And this would be an act worthy of a prince. But if my quesions
and his answers have been made known to you, you are already aware that he
is acquainted with none of our matters; or, if he is acquainted with them,
but, through fear of those who might hear him, does not dare to speak out,
like Socrates, he proves himself, as I said before, no philosopher, but an
opionative man;(4) at least he does not regard that Socratic and most
admirable saying: "But a man must in no wise be honoured before the
truth."(5) But it is impossible for a Cynic, who makes indifference his
end, to know any good but indifference.
CHAP. IV.-WHY THE CHRISTIANS DO NOT KILL THEMSELVES.
But lest some one say to us, "Go then all or you and kill yourselves,
and pass even now to God, and do not trouble us," I will tell you why we do
not so, but why, when examined, we fearlessly confess. We have been taught
that God did not make the world aimlessly, but for the sake of the human
race; and we have before stated that He takes pleasure in those who imitate
His properties, and is displeased with those that embrace what is worthless
either in word or deed. If, then, we all kill ourselves, we shall become
the cause, as far as in us lies, why no one should be born, or instructed
in the divine doctrines, or even why the human race should not exist; and
we shall, if we so act, be ourselves acting in opposition to the will of
God. But when we are examined, we make no denial, because we are not
conscious of any evil, but count it impious not to speak the truth in all
things, which also we know is pleasing to God, and be cause we are also now
very desirous to deliver you from an unjust prejudice.
CHAP. V.--HOW THE ANGELS TRANSGRESSED.
But if this idea take possession of some one that if we acknowledge God
as our helper, we should not, as we say, be oppressed and persecuted by the
wicked; this, too, I will solve. God, when He had made the whole world, and
subjected things earthly to man, and arranged the heavenly elements for the
increase of fruits and rotation of the seasons, and appointed this divine
law--for these things also He evidently made for man--committed the care of
men and of all things under heaven to angels whom He appointed over them.
But the angels transgressed this appointment. and were captivated by love
of women, and begat children who are those that are called demons; and
besides, they afterwards subdued the human race to themselves, partly by
magical writings, and partly by fears and the punishments they occasioned,
and partly by teaching them to offer sacrifices, and incense, and
libations, of which things they stood in need after they were enslaved by
lustful passions; and among men they sowed murders, wars, adulteries,
intemperate deeds, and all wickedness. Whence also the poets and
mythologists, not knowing that it was the angels and those demons who had
been begotten by them that did these things to men, and women, and cities,
and nations, which they related, ascribed them to god himself, and to those
who were accounted to be his very offspring, and to the offspring of those
who were called his brothers, Neptune and Pluto, and to the children again
of these their offspring. For whatever name each of the angels had given to
himself and his children, by that name they called them.
CHAP. VI.--NAMES OF GOD AND OF CHRIST, THEIR MEANING AND POWER.
But to the Father of all, who is unbegotten, there is no name given.
For by whatever name He be called, He has as His elder the person who gives
Him the name. But these words, Father, and God, and Creator, and Lord, and
Master, are not names, but appellations derived from His good deeds and
functions. And His Son, who alone is properly called Son, the Word, who
also was with Him and was begotten before the works, when at first He
created and arranged all things by Him, is called Christ, in reference to
His being anointed and God's ordering all things through Him; this name
itself also containing an unknown significance; as also the appellation
"God" is not a name, but an opinion implanted in the nature of men of a
thing that can hardly be explained. But "Jesus," His name as man and
Saviour, has also significance. For He was made man also, as we before
said, having been conceived according to the will of God the Father, for
the sake of believing men, and for the destruction of the demons. And now
you can learn this from what is under your own observation. For numberless
demoniacs throughout the whole world, and in your city, many of our
Christian men exorcising them in the name of Jesus Christ, who was
crucified under Pontius Pilate, have healed and do heal, rendering helpless
and driving the possessing devils out of the men, though they could not be
cured by all the other exorcists, and those who used incantations and
drugs.
CHAP. VII.--THE WORLD PRESERVED FOR THE SAKE OF CHRISTIANS. MAN'S
RESPONSIBILITY.
Wherefore God delays causing the confusion and destruction of the whole
world, by which the wicked angels and demons and men shall cease to exist,
because of the seed of the Christians, who know that they are the cause of
preservation in nature.(1) Since, if it were not so, it would not have been
possible for you to do these things, and to be impelled by evil spirits;
but the fire of judgment would descend and utterly dissolve all things,
even as formerly the flood left no one but him only with his family who is
by us called Noah, and by you Deucalion, from whom again such vast numbers
have sprung, some of them evil and others good. For so we say that there
will be the conflagration, but not as the Stoics, according to their
doctrine of all things being changed into one another, which seems most
degrading. But neither do we affirm that it is by fate that men do what
they do, or suffer what they suffer, but that each man by free choice acts
rightly or sins; and that it is by the influence of the wicked demons that
earnest men, such as Socrates and the like, suflcr persecution and are in
bonds, while Sardanapalus, Epicurus, and the like, seem to be blessed in
abundance and glory. The Stoics, not observing this, maintained that all
things take place according to the necessity of fate. But since God in the
beginning made the race of angels and men with free-will, they will justly
suffer in eternal fire the punishment of whatever sins they have committed.
And this is the nature of all that is made, to be capable of vice and
virtue. For neither would any of them be praiseworthy unless there were
power to turn to both [virtue and vice]. And this also is shown by those
men everywhere who have made laws and philosophized according to right
reason, by their prescribing to do some things and refrain from others.
Even the Stoic philosophers, in their doctrine of morals, steadily honour
the same things, so that it is evident that they are not very felicitous in
what they say about principles and incorporeal things. For if they say that
human actions come to pass by fate, they will maintain either that God is
nothing else than the things which are ever turning, and altering, and
dissolving into the same things, and will appear to have had a
comprehension only of things that are destructible, and to have looked on
God Himself as emerging both in part and in whole in every wickedness;(1)
or that neither vice nor virtue is anything; which is contrary to every
sound idea, reason, and sense.
CHAP. VIII.--ALL HAVE BEEN HATED IN WHOM THE WORD HAS DWELT.
And those of the Stoic school--since, so far as their moral teaching
went, they were admirable, as were also the poets in some particulars, on
account of the seed of reason [the Logos] implanted in every race of men--
were, we know, hated and put to death,--Heraclitus for instance, and, among
those of our own time, Musonius and others. For, as we intimated, the
devils have always effected, that all those who anyhow live a reasonable
and earnest life and shun vice, be hated. And it is nothing wonderful; if
the devils are proved to cause those to be much worse hated who live not
according to a part only of the word diffused [among men], but by the
knowledge and contemplation of the whole Word, which is Christ. And they,
having been shut up in eternal fire, shall suffer their just punishment and
penalty. For if they are even now overthrown by men through the name of
Jesus Christ, this is an intimation of the punishment in eternal fire which
is to be inflicted on themselves and those who serve them. For thus did
both all the prophets foretell, and our own teacher Jesus teach.(2)
CHAP. IX.--ETERNAL PUNISHMENT NOT A MERE THREAT.
And that no one may say what is said by those who are deemed
philosophers, that our assertions that the wicked are punished in eternal
fire are big words and bugbears, and that we wish men to live virtuously
through fear, and not because such a life is good and pleasant; I will
briefly reply to this, that if this be not so, God does not exist; or, if
He exists, He cares not for men and neither virtue nor vice is anything,
and, as we said before, lawgivers unjustly punish those who transgress good
commandments. But since these are not unjust, and their Father teaches them
by the word to do the same things as Him self, they who agree with them are
not unjust. And if one object that the laws of men are diverse, and say
that with some, one thing is considered good, another evil, while with
others what seemed bad to the former is esteemed good, and what seemed good
is esteemed bad, let him listen to what we say to this. We know that the
wicked angels appointed laws conformable to their own wickedness, in which
the men who are like them delight; and the right Reason,(3) when He came,
proved that not all opinions nor all doctrines are good, but that some are
evil, while others are good. Wherefore, I will declare the same and similar
things to such men as these, and, if need be, they shall be spoken of more
at large. But at present I return to the subject.
CHAP. X.--CHRIST COMPARED WITH SOCRATES.
Our doctrines, then, appear to be greater than all human teaching;
because Christ, who appeared for our sakes, became the whole rational
being, both body, and reason, and soul. For whatever either lawgivers or
philosophers uttered well, they elaborated by finding and contemplating
some part of the Word. But since they did not know the whole of the Word,
which is Christ, they often contradicted themselves. And those who by human
birth were more ancient than Christ, when they attempted to consider and
prove things by reason, were brought before the tribunals as impious
persons and busybodies. And Socrates, who was more zealous in this
direction than all of them, was accused of the very same crimes as
ourselves. For they said that he was introducing new divinities, and did
not consider those to be gods whom the state recognised. But he cast out
from the state both Homer[4] and the rest of the poets, and taught men to
reject the wicked demons and those who did the things which the poets
related; and he exhorted them to become acquainted with the God who was to
them unknown, by means of the investigation of reason, saying, "That it is
neither easy to find the Father and Maker of all, nor, having found Him, is
it safe to declare Him to all."[5] But these things our Christ did through
His own power. For no one trusted in Socrates so as to die for this
doctrine, but in Christ, who was partially known even by Socrates (for He
was and is the Word who is in every man, and who foretold the things that
were to come to pass both through the prophets and in His own person when
He was made of like passions, and taught these things), not only
philosophers and scholars believed, but also artisans and people entirely
uneducated, despising both glory, and fear, and death; since He is a power
of the ineffable Father, and not the mere instrument of human reason.(1)
CHAP. XI.--HOW CHRISTIANS VIEW DEATH.
But neither should we be put to death, nor would wicked men and devils
be more powerful than we, were not death a debt due by every man that is
born. Wherefore we give thanks when we pay this debt. And we judge it right
and opportune to tell here, for the sake of Crescens and those who rave as
he does, what is related by Xenophon. Hercules, says Xenophon, coming to a
place where three ways met, found Virtue and Vice, who appeared to him in
the form of women: Vice, in a luxurious dress, and with a seductive
expression rendered blooming by such ornaments, and her eyes of a quickly
melting tenderness,(2) said to Hercules that if he would follow her, she
would always enable him to pass his life in pleasure and adorned with the
most graceful ornaments, such as were then upon her own person; and Virtue,
who was of squalid look and dress, said, But if you obey me, you shall
adorn yourself not with ornament nor beauty that passes away and perishes,
but with everlasting and precious graces. And we are persuaded that every
one who flees those things that seem to be good, and follows hard after
what are reckoned difficult and strange, enters into blessedness. For Vice,
when by imitation of what is incorruptible (for what is really
incorruptible she neither has nor can produce) she has thrown around her
own actions, as a disguise, the properties of Virtue, and qualities which
are really excellent, leads captive earthlyminded men, attaching to Virtue
her own evil properties. But those who understood the excellences which
belong to that which is real, are also uncorrupt in virtue. And this every
sensible person ought to think both of Christians and of the athletes, and
of those who did what the poets relate of the so-called gods, concluding as
much from our contempt of death, even when it could be escaped.(3)
CHAP. XII.--CHRISTIANS PROVED INNOCENT BY THEIR CONTENIPT OF DEATH.
For I myself, too, when I was delighting in the doctrines of Plato, and
heard the Christians slandered, and saw them fearless of death, and of all
other things which are counted fearful, perceived that it was impossible
that they could be living in wickedness and pleasure. For what sensual or
intemperate man, or who that counts it good to feast on human flesh,[4]
could welcome death that he might be deprived of his enjoyments, and would
not rather continue always the present life, and attempt to escape the
observation of the rulers; and much less would he denounce himself when the
consequence would be death? This also the wicked demons have now caused to
be done by evil men. For having put some to death on account of the
accusations falsely brought against us, they also dragged to the torture
our domestics, either children or weak women, and by dreadful torments
forced them to admit those fabulous actions which they themselves openly
perpetrate; about which we are the less concerned, because none of these
actions are really ours, and we have the unbegotten and ineffable God as
witness both of our thoughts and deeds. For why did we not even publicly
profess that these were the things which we esteemed good, and prove that
these are the divine philosophy, saying that the mysteries of Saturn are
performed when we slay a man, and' that when we drink our fill of blood, as
it is said we do, we are doing what you do before that idol you honour, and
on which you sprinkle the blood not only of irrational animals, but also of
men, making a libation of the blood of the slain by the hand of the most
illustrious and noble man among you? And imitating Jupiter and the other
gods in sodomy and shameless intercourse with woman, might we not bring as
our apology the writings of Epicurus and the poets? But because we persuade
men to avoid such instruction, and all who practise them and imitate such
examples, as now in this discourse we have striven to persuade you, we are
assailed in every kind of way. But we are not concerned, since we know that
God is a just observer of all. But would that even now some one would mount
a lofty rostrum, and shout with a loud voice,(5) "Be ashamed, be ashamed,
ye who charge the guiltless with those deeds which yourselves openly
commit, and ascribe things which apply to yourselves and to your gods to
those who have not even the slightest sympathy with them. Be ye converted;
become wise."
CHAP. XIII.-HOW THE WORD HAS BEEN IN ALL MEN .
For I myself, when I discovered the wicked disguise which the evil
spirits had thrown around the divine doctrines of the Christians, to turn
aside others from joining them, laughed both at those who framed these
falsehoods, and at the disguise itself, and at popular opinion; and I
confess that I both boast and with all my strength strive to be found a
Christian; not because the teachings of Plato are different from those of
Christ, but because they are not in all respects similar, as neither are
those of the others, Stoics, and poets, and historians. For each man spoke
well in proportion to the share he had of the spermatic word,(1) seeing
what was related to it. But they who contradict themselves on the more
important points appear not to have possessed the heavenly(2) wisdom, and
the knowledge which cannot be spoken against. Whatever things were rightly
said among all men, are the property of us Christians. For next to God, we
worship and love the Word who is from the unbegotten and ineffable God,
since also He became man for our sakes, that, becoming a partaker of our
sufferings, He might also bring us healing. For all the writers were able
to see realities darkly through the sowing of the implanted word that was
in them. For the seed and imitation imparted according to capacity is one
thing, and quite another is the thing itself, of which there is the
participation and imitation according to the grace which is from Him.
CHAP. XIV.--JUSTIN PRAYS THAT THIS APPEAL BE PUBLISHED.
And we therefore pray you to publish this little book, appending what
you think right, that our opinions may be known to others, and that these
persons may have a fair chance of being freed from erroneous notions and
ignorance of good, who by their own fault are become subject to punishment;
that so these things maybe published to men, because it is in the nature of
man to know good and evil; and by their condemning us, whom they do not
understand, for actions which they say are wicked, and by delighting in the
gods who did such things, and even now require similar actions from men,
and by inflicting on us death or bonds or some other such punishment, as if
we were guilty of these things, they condemn themselves, so that there is
no need of other judges.
CHAP. XV.--CONCLUSION.
And I despised the wicked and deceitful doctrine of Simon(3) of my own
nation. And if you give this book your authority, we will expose him before
all, that, if possible, they may be converted. For this end alone did we
compose this treatise. And our doctrines are not shameful, according to a
sober judgment, but are indeed more lofty than all human philosophy; and if
not so, they are at least unlike the doctrines of the Sotadists and
Philaenidians, and Dancers, and Epicureans and such other teachings of the
poets, which ali are allowed to acquaint themselves with, both as acted and
as written. And henceforth we shall be silent, having done as much as we
could, and having added the prayer that all men everywhere may be counted
worthy of the truth. And would that you also, in a manner becoming piety
and philosophy,(4) would for your own sakes judge justly!
Taken from "The Early Church Fathers and Other Works" originally published
by Wm. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. in English in Edinburgh, Scotland beginning in
1867. (ANF 1, Roberts and Donaldson.) The digital version is by The
Electronic Bible Society, P.O. Box 701356, Dallas, TX 75370, 214-407-WORD.
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