The
Second Apology of Justin
Chapter I.-Introduction.
Romans, the things which have recently happened in your city
under Urbicus, 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. 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.
Chapter II.-Urbicus Condemns the Christians
to Death.
A certain woman lived with an intemperate 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, 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, 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 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." 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.
Chapter III.-Justin Accuses Crescens
of Ignorrant Prejudice Against the Christians.
I too, therefore, expect to be plotted against and fixed to
the stake, by some of those I have named, or perhaps by Crescens,
that lover of bravado and boasting; for the man is not worthy
of the name of philosopher who publicly hears 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 questions
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 opinionative man; at least
he does not regard that Socratic and most admirable saying: "But
a man must in no wise be honoured before the truth." But
it is impossible for a Cynic, who makes indifference his end,
to know any good but indifference.
Chapter IV.-Why the Christians Do
Not Kill Themselves.
But lest some one say to us, "Go then all of 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 becuase we are also now very desirous
to deliver you from an unjust prejudice.
Chapter 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 brother),
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.
Chapter 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, ant Master, are not names, but appellations
derived from His good deeds and functions. And Hi; 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 thing; 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.
Chapter 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. 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, hut 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, suffer 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 I 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; or that neither vice nor virtue
is anything; which is contrary to every sound idea, reason, and
sense.
Chapter 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. I or thus
did both all the prophets foretell, and our own teacher Jesus
teach.
Chapter 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, 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.
Chapter 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 I whatever either
lawgivers or philosophers uttered well, they elaborated by finding
and contemplating some part of the Word. Put since they I did
not know the whole of the Word, which is Christ, they often contradicted
themselves. And those who by human birth were more ancient I 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 recognized. I But he
cast out from the state troth Homer 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." 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 Me is a power of the ineffable
Father, not the mere instrument of human reason.
Chapter 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 eves of
a quickly melting tenderness, 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
earthly-minded 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.
Chapter XII.-Christians Proved Innocent
by Their Contempt 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 arc counted fearful, Perceived
that It was impossible that they Could be livings in wickedness
and pleasure. For what sensual or intemperate man, or who that
counts it good to feast on human flesh, 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; "Be ashamed, be ashamed, ye who charge the guiltless
with those deeds which yourselves openly could 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."
Chapter XIII.-How the Word Has Been
in All Men.
For I myself, when I discovered tile wicked keel disguise which
tile 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,
seeing what was related to it. Rut they who contradict themselves
on the more important points appear not to have possessed the
heavenly 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 impacted 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.
Chapter 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 he known to others,
and that these persons may have a fair chalice of being freed
from erroneous notions and ignorance of good, who by their own
fault are become subject to punishment; that so these things may
be 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.
Chapter XV.-Conclusion.
And I despised the wicked and deceitful doctrine of Simon
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 all 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, would for
your own sakes judge justly!
