7. Z L] i 'a4
SELECTIONS FROM JUSTIN MARTYR'S
DIALOGUE WITH TRYPHO
Published in the United States in 1964 by ©
ASSOCIATION PRESS
291 Broadway, New York City, New York The series World Christian Books is sponsored by the Commission on World Mission and Evangelism of the World Council of Churches. This volume, under the same title, was published in Great Britain by the United Society for Christian Literature
(Lutterworth Press, London) in 1963.
Price $1.25
Printed in Great Britain by Page Bros. (Norwich) Limited, Mile Cross Lane, Norwich
WORLD CHRISTIAN BOOKS NO, 49
Third Series Ju $ - \v US 5 M ay " "Yr , $a '
Ft oe Selections from
JUSTIN MARTYR'S DIALOGUE
WITH
TRYPHO, A JEW
translated and edited by
R.P.C. HANSON
BT oN 'ee eae
ASSOCIATION PRESS, NEW YORK
First Series:
{14) ba ws IS PM ang CHRIST? by Stephen
(15) A LETTER oe WISE COUNSEL
GOD by (1) THE
CHRISTIANS'
Stephen Neill
(2) CHRISTIAN GIVING By V. S.
y E. A. Maycock (16) i deaerres LIBERTY by Giovanni Miegge (17) re eg WITH THE GOSPEL Azariah
(3) MARK'S WITNESS TO JESUS
CHRIST by E. Lohse
(4) CHRISTIANITY AND SCIENCE
by D. T. Niles
(18) LIVINGSTONE IN AFRICA by
by Charles E. Raven
(5) THE CHRISTIAN AS CITIZEN
by Fohn C, Bennett
(6) THE CHRISTIAN CHARACTER
Cecil Northcott
(19) CHRIST'S MESSENGERS By C.
F. D. Moule
(20) JAPANESE
WITNESSES
FOR CHRIST edited by Norimichi Ebizawa by Stephen Neill
(7) READING THE BIBLE TODAY
by D. T. Niles
(8) JOHN'S WITNESS
TO JESUS by George Appleton
(9) FROM BRAHMA TO CHRIST
(2r) ONE LORD, ONE CHURCH by JF. Robert Nelson by L. Tilak
(10) BEGINNING
FROM § JERU-
SALEM by John Foster (11) ery AND HIS PEOPLE by Paul Minear
(22) THE PEOPLE OF GOD IN THE
OLD TESTAMENT
By dH. 7.
Kraus
(23) MATTHEW'S
WITNESS TO JESUS CHRIST fw H.
Ridderbos (rz) DID
ESUS RISE FROM THE
DE ? by James Martin (13) cas CROSS IS HEAVEN by A, F. Appasamy
(24) THE PSALMS AS CHRISTIAN
PRAISE by R. B. Y. Scott Second Series:
(25) PAUL TO THE GALATIANS by
(37)
A CHOSEN VESSEL by CG. F. D.
Stephen Neill
(26) LUKE'S WITNESS TO JESUS
Moule
(38) CHURCH
AND PEOPLE IN NEW GUINEA by G. F. Vicedom (39) NEW LIFE IN CHRIST by Paul CHRIST by Reginald H. Fuller
(27) CHRISTIAN PRAYER
by Sister Gertrude, O.M.S.E (28) cp iay eh OF MY WORLD by Dehgani-Tafti (29) ee Ceanietie FAMILY dy Leslie and Winifred Brown
(30) KAGAWA,
JAPANESE PROPHET by Jessie M. Trout
(31) FAITHFUL
WITNESSES
by Edward Rochie Hardy (32) MOSES by Gerhard von Rad
(33) PALESTINE AND THE BIBLE
D. Clasper (40) LAW AND GOSPEL by Wilhelm ndersen
(41) DAILY PRAYER AND PRAISE
compiled by George Appleton
(42) SACRIFICE IN THE BIBLE by
H. Ringgren edited
(43) ZECHARIAH SPEAKS TODAY
by A. A. van Ruler
(44) CHRYSOSTOM AND HIS MES-
SAGE by Stephen Neill by Denis Baly
(34) JOHN
SHINES THROUGH AUGUSTINE by A. P. Carleton,
(45) GOD'S PEOPLE AMONG THE
NATIONS by Lawrence Toombs
(46) MODERN
MAN AND SPIRITUAL LIFE by Max Thurian O.M.B.E.
(35) TO ALL NATIONS by John Foster (36) Ml IS MAN? by Stephen Neill (U.S.A, edition Man IN GOD'S PURPOSE) (47) DIVINE WISDOM by John Goodwin
(48) ee IS LIGHT, GOD IS LOVE
by A. H.Dammers Third Series:
(49) JUSTIN MARTYR'S DIALOGUE
WITH TRYPHO edited by R. P.C.
(50) PAUL TO ae COLOSSIANS 6y Stephen Neill anson
. NOTE Quotations from the Old Testament in this work have all been placed in italics; as they are quotations from the Greek version of the Old Testament, called the Septuagint, sometimes they differ from the English versions, which are based on the Hebrew text; in cases where the differences are marked, the reference has after it in brackets the conventional abbreviation for the Septuagint, thus: (LXX).
Clear quotations from the New Testament have not been put in italics, but the references have been given; in many cases it is impossible to assign an exact New Testament text to Justin's New Testament quotations because he was relying on his memory or on some source which conflated or mixed quotations from the Synoptic gospels; an attempt has been made to indicate where this is the case.
It has proved impossible, in the process of reducing. Justin's 58,000 Greek words to 20,000 English words, to do justice to all the facets of his thought.
All that is attempted here is a presentation in small compass by means of selection of the main course of his argument and the main points of his thought.
The text translated is that presented by E. J. Goodspeed in pp. 90-265 of his Die Altesten Apologeten (Gottingen 1914).
The useful and accurate translation of the Dialogue made by A. Lukyn Williams (London 1930), furnished with valuable notes, has been extensively drawn upon for assistance and comparison, but the translation is entirely my own.
RP.CH. em ee, PY J 2) ote
TABLE OF THE PASSAGES OF THE DIALOGUE
TRANSLATED
Page How THE Discussion wITH TRYPHO BEGAN (Chapters 1-4; 6-9.)
Il.
'THAT THE LAW WAS DESTINED TO BE SUPERSEDED BY ANOTHER
COVENANT (Chapters 10, 11, 19, 20.)
Il.
THe Two ComIncs OF CHrisT (Chapters 30 (3-end), 31-32, 35 (7-end), 46.)
IV.
THe Pre-EXISTENCE AND DivINE NATURE OF CHRIST
(Chapters 54-56 (1-13), 57 (1-3), 61-62.)
THe EARTHLY Lire OF JESUS (Chapters 66, 67 (1-6), 69-71, 78, 87-91, 94-101, 103, 105-108.)
VI.
THE CALLING OF THE GENTILES: THE CHURCH
(Chapters 117, 118 (2b-end), 119, 121, 122.)
VII. Conciusion; Summary; Some Osyecrions MET; THE DrALocuE ENps (Chapters 127, 138, 141-142.)
INTRODUCTION
I Justin who wrote the Dialogue with Trypho was born about A.D. 100 in Neapolis (now Nablus), the ancient Shechem, in Palestine.
He regarded himself as a Samaritan, but he was not a Jew by race; he had not, for instance, been circumcised.
On the other hand, it is quite clear from his works, and especially from the Dialogue, that he was well informed about the Judaism which was contemporary with him.
Almost all the opinions which he attributes to Rabbinic teachers and the statements which he makes about Jews in the Dialogue can be confirmed as accurate from other sources.
It was no doubt because he knew himself to be particularly well-informed about the Jews that he felt qualified to write such a work as the Dialogue.
His spiritual and intellectual pilgrimage towards Christianity is described by himself in this work (caps.2-8).
He does not give the impression of having studied any philosophy very carefully except that of Plato, and even here what he says about Platonism does not necessarily imply a profound knowledge of it. He speaks cavalierly and almost derisively of other philosophies, in this maintaining the tradition of several apologists of the second and third centuries (e.g. Tatian, Hermias, Minucius Felix,
Tertullian).
He certainly regarded himself as a philosopher however; Trypho's greeting to him, "Hullo, philosopher!" was a quite appropriate one.
He is recorded as having spent the last part of his life from at latest 150 onwards teaching as a Christian philosopher, wearing the conventional philosopher's cloak, in a hired lodging in Rome.
Two more of his works survive, both of them written before the Dialogue: the First Apology, a defence of Christianity addressed to the Emperor Antoninus Pius, and published probably between 150 and 154, and the Second Apology, which is a mere brief appendix to the first, and may have appeared two years later than it. His Dialogue probably appeared about 161.
One of Justin's pupils, Tatian, wrote an apology himself, in which he referred in tones of the warmest admiration to Justin.
Justin was martyred in Rome at some point between 163 and
167, for professing Christianity.
It was doubtless on the information of a rival philosopher, a pagan, called Crescens, to whom he refers in his Second Apology, that he was arrested.
Tatian also mentions in his apology Crescens' hostility to Justin. An account of the martyrdom of Justin and his companions, which is generally reckoned to be trustworthy, has come down to us'. Among those who are strictly to be described as early Christian apologists
(i.e. excluding Tertullian, who was much more than an apologist) none has left us more works than Justin.
Christian posterity paid him the compliment not only of preserving his two most important works, but of forging several others in his name.
II If the Dialogue with Trypho was written about 160 and the actual discussion with Trypho took place during or shortly after the Jewish war which ended in 135, it is unlikely that it represents precisely the actual words, or even the actual course, of the discussion.
But there is no reason to think that some discussion did not take place between Justin and a Jew. Trypho's arguments are not simply the answers of one who is there to give the principal character cues for his speeches. He argues as a Jew of his day would have argued, though there are parts of the Dialogue where he appears to have been virtually forgotten.
It is difficult to believe, too, that a Jewish antagonist could have remained calm in face of the unfair accusations which Justin makes against the whole Jewish race in the latter part of the Dialogue.
There was a well-known Rabbi Tarphon who flourished between 90 and 130 a.p., and who was known as a particularly bitter opponent of Jewish Christians.
It is not impossible that he may have been the person who had the original argument with Justin. If so, Justin must have considerably sweetened
Tarphon's replies in the Dialogue.
But this alteration of a dialogue in the process of presenting it for publication was not unknown in the ancient world, and would have been regarded as quite a normal and legitimate device.
The Dialogue is not very tidily arranged.
There is a good de. of repetition, and during the last few chapters Justin appears to have thought of a number of miscellaneous objections and points which 7A translation of it is included in the volume Faithful Witnesses in the World Christian Books Series.
he should have included earlier.
But there is a general pattern visible which, it is hoped, the headings under which the material translated has been divided will make clear.
Once Justin's premises have been accepted, the argument is reasonably orderly and reasonably cogent.
The style begins by being fresh and vigorous and true to life, but as the argument develops it alters and becomes looser and more hurried and tends to lapse into a string of untidily arranged clauses.
It is as if Justin felt that he must hastily push on with his task, as the time during which he would be at liberty to write might be very short. il Justin's argument in the Dialogue with Trypho was not a new one.
The main lines of his case are as follows: Christ was the embodiment in human fo ivine being who had existed-from of old-wi God the Father; his activity can be discerned in innumerable passages in the Old Testament; every move and every word of his earthly career had been predicted in detail in the Old Testament; and these predictions, taken together. with..the...effect. which the Christian
Church was having upon the minds and bodies of men and women throughout the contemporary Roman Empire, constituted irresistible evidence for the truth of Christianity...These were also the main lines of the case of every Christian who wrote a defence of Christianity in the second and third centuries; even of men who were very much greater theologians than Justin, like Tertullian and Origen. Justin differs from the other apologists strictly so called
(i.e. excluding Tertullian and Origen) by paying much more attention to the actual details of Jesus' earthly life and by keeping well in view the life and practice of the Church, and in particular the sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion.
In presenting his Old Testament proof-texts — which constitute, after all, the great bulk of the material of the Dialogue — Justin was drawing upon a great stock of proof-texts against the Jews which were widely current in the early Church and which had been used by several authors before Justin's day (some of them writers of the New Testament), and which were to be used by many writers of Christian argument after Justin's day. Indeed the use of the prooftext (a practice itself borrowed from the Jews, perhaps directly from the Qumran Covenanters who used the literature of the Dead Sea
Scrolls) was the normal Christian method of interpreting the Scriptures until Origen's genius popularized the commentary, a literary form which he had borrowed from the Gnostics.
We do not know where Justin got his doctrine of the Person of Christ.
For him, as for all the apologists proper, Christ is a divine being, now different in number from the Father, ie. enjoying a separate individual existence as a divine being; but he clearly believes
(as did Irenaeus and Tertullian after him) that Christ originally was the reason or wisdom of God, or a power of God, residing unseparated with God's being and not yet enjoying individual existence.
When God created the world and wished to communicate with it, with men, and particularly with God's chosen race, the Jews, this reason or wisdom or power became a separate, individual being.
It was consciously put forth by God, but without in any sense dividing God or making Him less than before. Jesus Christ was this divine being become incarnate by being born as a man through the Blessed
Virgin Mary. Did Justin learn this doctrine from the Fourth Gospel? We must not assume unreflectingly that he did.
In the first place, it is far from certain that Justin accepted the Fourth Gospel as being on a level with the other three. When he wrote, this Gospel had not yet won full recognition as worthy to be ranked with the other three; his references to it are fewer and obscurer than his references to the first three; and though he often in both Dialogue and Apology refers to the "memoirs of the apostles", he never uses this phrase of a quotation which can be traced to the Fourth Gospel.
In the second place, Justin's Christology is not exactly the Christology of the Fourth Gospel.
Justin thinks of a Word or Reason (Logos) who was first si es the being of God the Father and then, for purposes of creation, became a separate individual divine being.
This is not the teaching of the Fourth Gospel. The most we can say is that Justin and the early apologists derived their Christology from circles and sources which were speculating about the concept of a divine Word or Reason (Logos), but that Justin's thought on ee oi took a different line from that followed by the Fourth ospel.
IV _In interpreting the Bible Justin uses the methods of his own time.
These are methods that we cannot rightly use now.
Justin
assumes that any verse—any half-verse—can legitimately be torn from its context and divorced from its historical background, and he applies such verses directly, often by the most far-fetched interpretation, to Christ or the Church.
Moreover, he believes that the Septuagint version is absolutely accurate, and sometimes prefers it to the original Hebrew.
Even by the critical standards of his own day, he ought to have known better than this. He assumes, too, that all the sins of the people of Israel, which they themselves had so honestly chronicled in their own Scriptures, could be directly attributed to the Jews of the first century a.D. We have to admit that this unchristian view was often taken by the Christian Church when it persecuted the Jews in later times.
In Justin's defence, however, it must be said that his attitude to the Old Testament was almost exactly the same as that of the Jews of his day. It was indeed from Judaism that Christians had inherited their attitude to the Scriptures.
This accounts for Trypho's apparent helplessness before Justin's sometimes quite unfair attack.
And it is because of this, too, that the Dialogue is so valuable historically.
It gives us an incomparable picture of Christians and Jews interpreting the Bible early in the history of the Christian Church.
Justin's treatment of the New Testament is also very instructive and interesting.
He clearly values it highly—such of it as he knows— as first-rate historical information about Jesus and his apostles.
But he does not regard it as Holy Scripture on a level with the Jewish Scriptures, nor as inspired, as his often-repeated phrase, "the memoirs of the apostles", shows.
What we cannot agree with in Trypho's objections is his inability to see that the Messiah might deliberately allow himself to be crucified, and that this might be according to the will of God.
Here Justin wins our sympathy, rather than in his elaborate attempts to twist the Old Testament into a series of oracular predictions about the earthly life of Christ.
He accepted whole-heartedly that the cross was at the centre of the Christian faith, that salvation means faith in the crucified and risen Jesus, who really was man, with the weaknesses and limitations of men.
And the title by which he is known, Justin Martyr, reminds us that he, with many other
Christians of his day, was ready to prove the reality of his faith by giving his life for it.