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Justin Martyr's Two Apologies
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 March 2011
Extract
It is still an open question whether Justin Martyr wrote two Apologies or only one, and whether the two Apologies which have come down to us under his name in no more than two manuscripts, one the Parisinus Regius 450, the other a Claromontanus, which is only a copy of the first, are composed of the fragments of the one (or two) which he wrote. The evidence is, indeed, at first sight rather bewildering. On the one hand we have the testimony of Eusebius, who refers in his Ecclesiastical History two Apologies, and gives ample quotations from a text very similar to that which has been preserved in the said manuscripts; on the other, not only does Eusebius himself maintain in one instance that the Second Apology was handed in to the emperors Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius, whereas he says elsewhere that it was addressed to the successor of Antoninus Pius, called Antoninus Verus (i.e. to Marcus Aurelius), but he also gives the first place to the Apology which in the Parisinus Regius 450 appears as the second and which in its first chapter shows that it was addressed to Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, and regards that which comes first in the Parisinus Regius 450 as the second. As to the internal evidence, there appears to be a break in both Apologies, in the First Apology after chapter lv and in the Second after chapter xii, after which the argument seems to trail off so that the respective remainders seem to be no more than collections of—sometimes very valuable—fragments.
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References
page 1 note 1 Euseb., H. E., iv. 11, 11; 16, 1; 18, 1/2.
page 1 note 2 Ibid., iv. 16, 1.
page 1 note 3 Ibid., iv. 18, 2.
page 1 note 4 A. Harnack, Geschichte der altchristl. Literatur ii. i (1897) 274 ff. Harnack is right in maintaining that the change of order of the two Apologies is unassailable, but not that the same is true of the thesis that the two formed originally one unit.
page 1 note 5 G. Krueger, Handbuch der Kirchengeschichte, 2nd ed. (1923), i. 67.
page 2 note 1 K. Mueller and H. v. Campenhausen, Kirchengeschichte, 3rd ed. (1938ñ), i. 178 n. 1.
page 2 note 2 Lebreton, J. and Zeiller, Jacques, L'Église Primitive (1946), i. 432 n. 5.Google Scholar
page 2 note 3 Op. cit., ii. 1, 275.
page 2 note 4 Cf. Zuntz, G. in Vigiliae Christianae, vi. (1952) 196.Google Scholar
page 2 note 5 H. E., iv. 16, 1.
page 2 note 6 Justin, ii. Apology, iii.
page 2 note 7 Justin, Dialogue, esp. 120 fin.
page 2 note 8 Quoted by G. Krueger, op. cit., 67.
page 3 note 1 Tatian, Ad Graecos, xix. 1.
page 3 note 2 H. Scott-Holland in Murray, Dictionary of Christian Biography (1912), 619a.
page 3 note 3 This remark refers to the spurious Oratio ad Graecos which is also preserved amongst Justin's writings in the Parisinus Regius 450.
page 3 note 4 H. E. iv. 12. A. Harnack, op. cit., 275, makes much of the fact that Eusebius does not mention the Second Apology in this context, but there is no reason why he should have done so.
page 3 note 5 H. E., iv. 16, 3.
page 4 note 1 H. E., iv. 11, 11.
page 4 note 2 Ibid., 18, 2.
page 4 note 3 Ibid., 16, 1.
page 4 note 4 L. Friedlaender, Sittengeschichte Roms, 9/10th ed. (1919ñ21) i, 54 f.
page 4 note 5 Cf. Seneca's Consolatio ad Polybium. Polybius was secretary of state ab epistulis under Claudius.
page 5 note 1 In B. Brissonius, De Verborum Significatione, ed. J. G. Heineccius (1743) 723b, special reference is made to Justin's use of βιβλδιον in the correct technical sense. The use of ββλιον in the sense of petition addressed to the prefect of Egypt has come to the fore on several papyri, cf. Liddell-Scott s.v., showing that it was so used from the second to the fourth centuries A.D.
page 6 note 1 H.E., iv. 11, 11.
page 6 note 2 J. C. T. Otto, Justini Opera, 2nd ed. (1847/9), i. i, 200 n. 11 suspects that the τις in § 9 should read ‘Crates’; and it would indeed be fitting in an invective upon the Cynic Crescens to quote his volcanic predecessor.
page 6 note 2 H.E., iv. 11, ii; 18, 2.
page 7 note 1 i. Apol., lviii.
page 7 note 2 i. Apol., lxviii.
page 7 note 3 L. Friedlaender and M. Bang, Sittengeschkhle Roms, 9/10th ed. iv (1921), 41
page 8 note 1 That is the gist of the criticism contained in Aelius Lampridius's remark in Vita Commodi, xiii.
page 8 note 2 Dig. Just., xiv. 2, 9.
page 9 note 1 The importance of L. Munatius Felix's tenure of the governorship of Egypt for the date of Justin's First Apology has been pointed out by J. Lebreton-Jacques Zeiller, op. cit., i. 432 n. 6. Cf. the list of prefects of Egypt in O. W. Reinmuth, ‘The Prefects of Egypt’, Klio, Beiheft 34 (1936), 134 ff., supported lately by a papyrus in P. Collomp, Papyrus Strasbourg (1948), 25, nr. 146.
page 9 note 2 i. Apol., xxix.
page 10 note 1 H.E., iv. 12.
page 10 note 2 Bruns, Fontes Iuris Romani 7th ed. (1909), 257 = C.I.L., ii. 1423.
page 10 note 3 Cf. Bruns, op. cit., 254f. nrs. 80ñ82; 275, nr. 98.
page 10 note 4 Cf. ibid., iii. and Julius Capitolinus, Vita Veri, i. 6.
page 11 note 1 Spartianus, Vita Hadriani, xxiv. 1.
page 11 note 2 Julius Capitolinus, Vita Pii, iv. 5.
page 11 note 3 H. E., iv. 12.
page 11 note 4 The type of documents which the source of Julius Capitolinus is most likely to have used, the commentarii of the Roman emperors, has been described by H. Bresslau, ‘Die Commentarii der roemischen Kaiser und die Registerbuecher der Paepste’, Zeitschr. d. Savigny-Stiftung, rom. Abt. vi (1885), 242 ff.
page 12 note 1 Vita Marci, v. 1.
page 12 note 2 Bryant, E. E., The Reign of Antoninus Pius (1895), 60.Google Scholar
page 12 note 3 Already A. Harnack, op. cit., ii. 1, 279, had come to this conclusion, which he calls ‘absolutely certain’.