ST. JUSTIN MARTYR
THE DISCOURSE TO THE GREEKS.
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St. Justin Martyr. A Platonist philospher,
converted to Christianity and wrote two well
known treatises defending the faith. For
his staunch adherence to the Christian religion,
he was beheaded in Rome in 165.
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CHAPTER I.--JUSTIN JUSTIFIES HIS DEPARTURE
FROM GREEK CUSTOMS
Do not suppose, ye Greeks, that my separation
from your customs is unreasonable and unthinking;
for I found in them nothing that is holy
or acceptable to God. For the very compositions
of your poets are monuments of madness and
intemperance. For any one who becomes the
scholar of your most eminent instructor,
is more beset by difficulties than all men
besides. For first they say that Agamemnon,
abetting the extravagant lust of his brother,
and his madness and unrestrained desire,
readily gave even his daughter to be sacrificed,
and troubled all Greece that he might rescue
Helen, who had been ravished by the leprous
shepherd. But when in the course of the war
they took captives, Agamemnon was himself
taken captive by Chryseis, and for Briseis'
sake kindled a feud with the son of Thetis.
And Pelides himself, who crossed the river,
overthrew Troy, and subdued Hector, this
your hero became the slave of Polyxena, and
was conquered by a dead Amazon; and putting
off the god-fabricated armour, and donning
the hymeneal robe, he became a sacrifice
of love in the temple of Apollo. And the
Ithacan Ulysses made a virtue of a vice.
And indeed his sailing past the Sirens gave
evidence that he was destitute of worthy
prudence, because he could not depend on
his prudence for stopping his ears. Ajax,
son of Telamon, who bore the shield of sevenfold
ox-hide, went mad when he was defeated in
the contest with Ulysses for the amour. Such
things I have no desire to be instructed
in. Of such virtue I am not covetous, that
I should believe the myths of Homer. For
the whole rhapsody, the beginning and end
both of the Iliad and the Odyssey is--a woman.
CHAPTER II.--THE GREEK THEOGONY EXPOSED.
But since, next to Homer, Hesiod wrote his
Works and Days, who will believe his drivelling
theogony? For they say that Chronos, the
son of Ouranos, in the beginning slew his
father, and possessed himself of his rule;
and that, being seized with a panic lest
he should himself suffer in the same way,
he preferred devouring his children; but
that, by the craft of the Curetes, Jupiter
was conveyed away and kept in secret, and
afterwards bound his father with chains,
and divided the empire; Jupiter receiving,
as the story goes, the air, and Neptune the
deep, and Pluto the portion of Hades. But
Pluto ravished Proserpine; and Ceres sought
her child wandering through the deserts.
And this myth was celebrated in the Eleusinian
fire. Again, Neptune ravished Melanippe when
she was drawing water, besides abusing a
host of Nereids not a few, whose names, were
we to recount them, would cost us a multitude
of words. And as for Jupiter, he was a various
adulterer, with Antiope as a satyr, with
Danae as gold, and with Europa as a bull;
with Leda, moreover, he assumed wings. For
the love of Semele proved both his unchastity
and the jealousy of Semele. And they say
that he carried off the Phrygian Ganymede
to be his cup-bearer. These, then, are the
exploits of the sons of Saturn. And your
illustrious son of Latona [Apollo], who professed
soothsaying, convicted himself of lying.
He pursued Daphne, but did not gain possession
of her; and to Hyacinthus, who loved him,
he did not foretell his death. And I say
nothing of the masculine character of Minerva,
nor of the feminine nature of Bacchus, nor
of the fornicating disposition of Venus.
Read to Jupiter, ye Greeks, the law against
parricides, and the penalty of adultery,
and the ignominy of paederasty. Teach Minerva
and Diana the works of women, and Bacchus
the works of men. What seemliness is there
in a woman's girding herself with armour,
or in a man's decorating himself with cymbals,
and garlands, and female attire, and accompanied
by a herd of bacchanalian women?
CHAPTER III.--FOLLIES OF THE GREEK MYTHOLOGY.
For Hercules, celebrated by his three nights,
sung by the poets for his successful labours,
the son of Jupiter, who slew the lion and
destroyed the many-headed hydra; who put
to death the fierce and mighty boar, and
was able to kill the fleet man-eating birds,
and brought up from Hades the three-headed
dog; who effectually cleansed the huge Augean
building from its dung, and killed the bulls
and the stag whose nostrils breathed fire,
and plucked the golden fruit from the tree,
and slew the poisonous serpent (and for some
reason, which it is not lawful to utter,
killed Achelous, and the guest-slaying Busiris),
and crossed the mountains that he might get
water which gave forth an articulate speech,
as the story goes: he who was able to do
so many and such like and so great deeds
as these, how childishly he was delighted
to be stunned by the cymbals of the satyrs,
and to be conquered by the love of woman,
and to be struck on the hips by the laughing
Lyda! And at last, not being able to put
off the tunic of Nessus, himself kindling
his own funeral pile, so he died. Let Vulcan
lay aside his envy, and not be jealous if
he is hated because he is old and club-footed,
and Mars loved, because young and beautiful.
Since, therefore, ye Greeks, your gods are
convicted of intemperance, and your heroes
are effeminate, as the histories on which
your dramas are founded have declared, such
as the curse of Atreus, the bed of Thyestes
and the taint in the house of Pelops, and
Danaus murdering through hatred and making
AEgyptus childless in the intoxication of
his rage, and the Thyestean banquet spread
by the Furies. And Procne is to this day
flitting about, lamenting; and her sister
of Athens shrills with her tongue cut out.
For what need is there of speaking of the
goad of OEdipus, and the murder of Laius,
and the marrying his mother, and the mutual
slaughter of those who were at once his brothers
and his sons?
CHAPTER IV.--SHAMELESS PRACTICES OF THE GREEKS.
And your public assemblies I have come to
hate. For there are excessive banquetings,
and subtle flutes which provoke to lustful
movements, and useless and luxurious anointings,
and crowning with garlands. With such a mass
of evils do you banish shame; and ye fill
your minds with them, and are carried away
by intemperance, and indulge as a common
practice in wicked and insane fornication.
And this further I would say to you, why
are you, being a Greek, indignant at your
son when he imitates Jupiter, and rises against
you and defrauds you of your own wife? Why
do you count him your enemy, and yet worship
one that is like him? And why do you blame
your wife for living in unchastity, and yet
honour Venus with shrines? If indeed these
things had been related by others, they would
have seemed to be mere slanderous accusations,
and not truth. But now your own poets sing
these things, and your histories noisily
publish them.
CHAPTER V.--CLOSING APPEAL.
Henceforth, ye Greeks, come and partake of
incomparable wisdom, and be instructed by
the Divine Word, and acquaint yourselves
with the King immortal; and do not recognise
those men as heroes who slaughter whole nations.
For our own Ruler, the Divine Word, who even
now constantly aids us, does not desire strength
of body and beauty of feature, nor yet the
high spirit of earth's nobility, but a pure
soul, fortified by holiness, and the watchwords
of our King, holy actions, for through the
Word power passes into the soul. O trumpet
of peace to the soul that is at war! O weapon
that puttest to flight terrible passions!
O instruction that quenches the innate fire
of the soul! The Word exercises an influence
which does not make poets: it does not equip
philosophers nor skilled orators, but by
its instruction it makes mortals immortal,
mortals gods; and from the earth transports
them to the realms above Olympus. Come, be
taught; become as I am, for I, too, was as
ye are. These have conquered me--the divinity
of the instruction, and the power of the
Word: for as a skilled serpent-charmer lures
the terrible reptile from his den and causes
it to flee, so the Word drives the fearful
passions of our sensual nature from the very
recesses of the soul; first driving forth
lust, through which every ill is begotten--hatreds,
strife, envy, emulations, anger, and such
like. Lust being once banished, the soul
becomes calm and serene. And being set free
from the ills in which it was sunk up to
the neck, it returns to Him who made it.
For it is fit that it be restored to that
state whence it departed, whence every soul
was or is.
Biography:
Justin came from a Greek-speaking non-Jewish
family living in Flavia Neapolis (Shechem)
in Samaria. 1 He wrote of how he searched
for truth, attaching himself to a succession
of philosophical schools: Stoicism, Aristotelianism,
Pythagorianism and Platonism. 2 Finally (in
about AD 130)3 he met an old man while walking
on the seashore at Ephesus who pointed out
some of the weaknesses in his Platonic system.
He showed Justin how the Old Testament predicted
the coming of Christ; but it was seeing the
courage of the Christian martyrs that finally
convinced him. 4 Still wearing his philosopher's
cloak5 he dedicated the rest of his life
to defending orthodox Christianity against
its philosophical opponents. 6
During the reign of Antoninus Pius (AD 138-161)
Justin ministered in Rome, founding a school
that attracted a wide variety of students,
including Tatian from Nisibis in Assyria,
Irenaeus from Smyrna and Theophilus from
near the Euphrates. 7 There he vigorously
opposed the Cynic philosopher Crescens, 8
the Gnostic Valentinians, the Marcionites9
and the Jews. 10 Justin earned his surname
when he perished during the persecution of
Christians by Marcus Aurelius (121-180) in
about AD 165.11
Most scholars agree that Justin was verbose,
confused, inconsistent and often not convincing
in his arguments. Nevertheless, he is an
important figure in the history of the Church.
For him Christianity was "theoretically,
the true philosophy, 12 and, practically,
a new law of holy living and dying. 13 The
former is chiefly the position of the Apologies,
the latter that of the Dialogue."14
In recent years the traditional view that
Justin's theology was dominated by his philosophical
background has been questioned. As we shall
see, his view of creation was very much influenced
by Platonism. He used philosophy as a tool
to spread orthodox Christianity, rather than
translate Christianity into an academic philosophical
system. 15
Justin used allegory extensively in his writings,
but it was the Palestinian allegory of the
Rabbis rather than the Alexandrian allegory
of Philo. 16 Given that Justin was born in
Samaria this it is not really surprising.
For Justin, the key to understanding the
Old Testament was Christ and his Christocentric
interpretation meant that the meaning of
the original writers was considered unimportant.
17 There appears to be some dispute as to
how much of his hermeneutic Justin derived
from his study of the New Testament's use
of the Old Testament. W. H. C. Frend states
that there "is no evidence that he was
influenced by any of the writers of the NT."18
William Shotwell, on the other hand, argues
at length that Justin was heavily dependent
on the New Testament writers. 19 However,
Shotwell also states that the New Testament
writers were not interested in the historical
background of the Old Testament passages
they used, 20 and the validity of such a
statement is extremely doubtful. In balance
I think that it is most likely that Justin
formulated his method of interpretation from
a variety of sources: the New Testament,
his Christian predecessors, Palestinian Jewish
exegesis, and Stoic allegory.
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