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Chapter 3 sets the stage for the subsequent discussion of Eunomius of Cyzicus and his opponents. It outlines the background to his view that ingeneracy, that is, having no cause, is the essential characteristic of God. Two theologians are examined on this issue: Justin Martyr and Dionysius of Alexandria, the latter of whom comes closest to Eunomius' position, though in the context of a late third‐century argument about whether matter is also ingenerate. A second section investigates the background to Eunomius' view, labelled the ‘identity thesis’, that God's essence and God's attributes are identical. It is suggested that Athanasius of Alexandria, though far removed doctrinally from Eunomius, articulated a similar position in a text Eunomius likely knew. One common theme in the two is a concern to avoid construing the attributes of God as essential complements, that is as parts of God's essence. Clearly if God's essence has parts, it is not simple. Some background is given on essential complements, which Eunomius will accuse Basil of maintaining.

Research on Justin Martyr’s gospel text has a long and interesting history. It has yielded a plethora of suggestions for making sense of the puzzling phenomenon that Justin seems to know the ‘canonical’ Gospels, yet very often cites a passage that deviates in one way or another from the text of the Gospels as this has come down to us. The first part of this chapter points out some of the highlights from past and more recent research and offers some methodological comments on the strengths and weaknesses of the various solutions that have been suggested. The second part consists of a detailed analysis of the first cluster of sayings in the First Apology (1Apol. 15.1–8) on the hypothesis that Justin has worked from the Gospel of Matthew, but had reasons to adapt Matthew’s text for theological and apologetic purposes.

This study begins in chapter 1 with an examination of Justin Martyr's understanding of the Spirit. The objective of this analysis is twofold. The first objective is to provide the reader with an example of the pneumatological milieu that existed at the commencement of Irenaeus’ writing. The second is to provide a basis from which to compare and contrast Irenaeus’ pneumatology and Trinitarian logic.Over the last hundred years scholars have debated the degree to which Justin Martyr distinguished the activity and identity of the Word and the Spirit. This chapter shows Justin's regular failure to distinguish the activity of the Spirit from that of the Word, which reveals the presence of a binitarian orientation or logic. On two occasions Justin subordinates his Trinitarian convictions to his binitarian logic producing a binitarian account of the Godhead, a Spirit-Christology predicated upon an angelomorphic understanding of the Word and Spirit, in which he does not distinguish the identities of the Word and Spirit. These occurrences ought to be understood as reflecting the transition of earliest Christian theologies from binitarian to Trinitarian theological accounts, for while Justin's commitment to Trinitarian belief is firm, his logic is not well enough developed to support his convictions.

Much has been written drawing on the sparse data pertaining to the origins of the birkat haminim. This chapter reviews that data and the literature on it, looking first at the inner-Jewish discussions, then at the Christian evidence, and concluding with a synthesis and critique of modern scholarship. It argues that evidence for the origins of the birkat haminim is ambiguous and that unambiguous testimony to its existence dates only from Epiphanius and Jerome in the late fourth century, not from Justin Martyr in the second, the Gospel of John, or Yavneh. Even then, we know only of a few words from the prayer: Christians, minim, and zedim. Retrojection of texts from the geniza or late rabbinic texts is unwarranted.

Four case studies illustrate how ancient narratives of women’s religious practices are less about women’s religions and more about the deployment of gender for various purposes. Livy depicts women as major players in the importation of Bacchic rites to Rome in the second century B.C.E. to feminize and denigrate these foreign rites. A resurrected Christian woman in the apocryphal Acts of Thomas reports back on the torments in hell that await women and men who violate gender norms, thus serving as the guarantor of a divinely authorized gendered ethic. Rabbinic debates about teaching women Torah say much about rabbinic anxieties and fantasies and little if anything about real women studying Torah in antiquity. Justin Martyr’s account of an elite Roman matron whose husband opposed her efforts to live a life of self-disciplined Christian asceticism demonstrates how the Christian life can make everyone, even women—by their nature less rational and ill-suited to self-discipline—the truest exemplars of the righteous philosophical life.

This chapter discusses participatory union with Christ, examining Pauline Christianity, Jewish Christianity, Johannine Christianity, Ignatius of Antioch, Valentinian Christianity, Justin Martyr, Tatian, Theophilus of Antioch, Irenaeus of Lyons, Hippolytus of Rome, and the early Christian approach to deification. Among Christian authors contemporary with the last New Testament writers, the chapter notes that only Ignatius of Antioch takes up the theme of participatory union. He does not use the terminology of deification but prepares the way for it by speaking of Christ as God. In around 160, Justin Martyr put forward the view that as the people of Christ were the new Israel, the gods were those who were obedient to Christ. Justin's younger contemporary, Irenaeus of Lyons, drew the implications of the conjunction of ‘gods’ with ‘sons’ and claimed that the gods were the baptised.

This chapter considers the work of Justin the Martyr, who broke new ground in his defense of Christianity. He identified with certain elements of his pagan opponents’ position and created bridges between Christianity and Greco-Roman philosophy. At the same time, his arguments erect a sharp division between pagan religion and pagan philosophy, likely a reflection of his Platonist disdain for the poets whose works were filled with stories of the gods behaving in very human fashion. An important part of Justin’s program is based on revealing the likenesses between the highest ideals within Greek philosophy and Christian teaching while eschewing religious polytheism. The chapter also examines the work of Melito of Sardis and Claudius Apolinaris.

Neoplatonism, under Plotinus, Proclus, Porphyry, and Iamblicus, developed and modified ideas about preexistence. Church Fathers were divided on the question of preexistence, but many were its advocates. The case of Justin Martyr and Clement of Alexandria is equivocal. Tertullian was the principal foe and Origen the principal defender of the idea.

This chapter on St. Justin Martyr completes the discussion of the Christians in part 2 of the book. The chapter focuses on five recurrent patterns of speech in Justin’s writings: God, Jesus Christ, Philosophy, the Human Being, Politics and Death: Rome and the Christians, and Judaism.

After a brief summary, Christ's role in creation is explored in the works of six theologians (three from the early Church, three from the modern Church): Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Athanasius, Karl Barth, Jürgen Moltmann, and Wolfhart Pannenberg. It is argued that the ancient writers' concerns to address Greek philosophy did not diminish their assertion of Christ's personal role in creating the world. For the moderns, meanwhile, Moltmann and Pannenberg both develop the doctrine in some interesting ways. But it is Barth who resonates most closely with the central themes of the book. While taking note of the proffered historical backgrounds, he affirms the unique theological vision of the New Testament writers who bore ‘the objective, shattering message of the kingdom of God drawn near’.

This chapter revisits a topic that has received much attention in scholarship: Justin’s role in the emergence of the heresiological tradition. Since Justin is often thought to have authored the earliest known heresy catalogue, the Syntagma against All the Heresies, he is credited with the “invention” of heresiology. This chapter, however, reevaluates Justin’s status as the founder of heresiology by arguing that he likely did not compose the Syntagma against All the Heresies. When he mentions the treatise in 1Apology 26, he uses the language of advertisement, not of authorship. Despite the likelihood that Justin did not compose this earliest known heresy catalogue, he nonetheless plays an important role in the early heresiological tradition by promoting the treatise and making it available to a wide audience. Justin may not be the progenitor of the Christian heresiological tradition, but he certainly lent stability to it by popularizing one particular catalogue over and above others.

This chapter analyzes Christian positions on sacrifice from Paul (ca. 50 CE) to Cyprian of Carthage (mid 3^rd century). This analysis shows that a rejection of animal sacrifice is not present in the earliest Christian texts (Paul and the New Testament Gospels). Furthermore, a sacrificial interpretation of the death of Jesus is not present in these early texts. Christian positions on sacrifice were slow to develop and developed in various directions simultaneously. The early Christian evidence is compared to the evidence from chapter three in order to show that early Christian cultural producers were engaged in the same competition to define the meaning and purpose of sacrifice. Christian debate over animal sacrifice was part of ongoing cultural competition that long predated Christianity.

The justifications of Christianity by Justin in the mid‐second century are marked by his positive evaluation of Platonism and other philosophical schools, his disowning of gnosticism and Marcion and other heretics, and his demonstration of the importance of the Old Testament for Christians. His literal millenarianism is part of a continuing debate with rabbinic exegesis, which he considered as pettifogging and often trivial. Justin wrote against a background of persecution of Christians, and his valuable description of Christian worship is designed to refute accusations of black magic.

Justin Marytyr, Hegesippus, Epiphanius, Eusebius and other patristic writings of the 2nd to 5th centuries ce indicate the continuing relevance of all the Jewish legal societies, including the Essenes, through to the Bar Kokhba Revolt (132-35 ce). These societies were joined by others that became important at the time of the First Revolt (the ‘Galileans’, or Zealots), Boethusians and Hemerobaptists (disciples of John the Baptist), but Christian authors tidied these up into a ‘seven school’ model of Judaism. Both Justin and Epiphanius indicate the loose use of the term Perushim, ‘separated ones’, possibly in some cases meaning Essenes. This raises the question of how accurate the equation is between rabbinic Perushim and the Pharisees of the New Testament and Josephus.

The earliest converts to Christianity were expected to accept circumcision; but in his sharply worded letter to the Galatians, Paul disdained the practice as spiritually worthless. Justin Martyr and John Chrysostom extended the Christian critique, further laying the foundation for nearly two millennia of Christian rejection. Roman authorities legislated against circumcision of non-Jews, particularly slaves. In contrast, early rabbinic texts passionately defended the practice, arguing that it is a purifying experience pleasing to the Lord.

The guide presents all sixty dialogues that survive entirely or in fragmentary state until the end of the sixth century, arranged in chronological order so as to emphasize changes and transformations over time. The treatment of each dialogue is structured into standardized headings (author, full title, original language, date of composition, modern editions and translations, summary, discussion of scholarship, and a selected bibliography for further study). The incorporation of Greek and Syriac dialogues shows the pervasiveness of the dialogue form in late antiquity beyond the language boundary; dialogues that feature a Christian and a Jew as the main speakers, up to now mostly studied in relation to other instances of adversus Iudaeos literature such as homiletics or treatises, are here related to Christian dialogues more broadly.

This chapter surveys the context of Irenaeus' theological activity by reviewing all the Christian teachers and communities in Rome during the first two centuries, paying special attention to how those who came to be regarded as heretics separated themselves from the larger Christian fellowship. It examines the details of Irenaeus' interventions in Rome, regards the Quartodeciman Controversy and the disciples of Valentinus, and demonstrates how through Irenaeus' work the initially fractionated communities in Rome coalesced into a united body, with a clear understanding of the structure and framework of Orthodoxy. It concludes by tracing his work to his background in Asia Minor, as a disciple of Polycarp of Smyrna, and the key theological ideas that he inherited from Polycarp and the circles around John the Evangelist; it suggests a timeline for his life and works.

This chapter examines the work of Tatian (Tatianus), whose apologetic document has many of the same goals as that of his mentor, Justin the Martyr, except that Tatian’s final product is shorter and blunter, and vehemently argues that the “men of Greece” possess no originality and their very claim to being philosophers is manifestly false. Tatian’s style is surely more acidic than his mentor’s, but it is inaccurate to depict Justin as a “negotiator,” while designating Tatian as the combative confrontationist with the aim of presenting a general condemnation of Greek culture.

This chapter examines Christian growth and conversion in the early church period. Due to the lack of textual, inscriptional, and archaeological evidence, the second and third centuries are perhaps the most difficult period to account for the spread of Christianity and the nature of conversion. Nevertheless, historians have proposed and debated the many external and internal factors that contributed to Christian growth to the point where, by the mid-fourth century, Christians constituted a majority population in the Roman Empire. Following a general discussion of reasons for Christian growth and expansion, the chapter turns to the varied conversion experiences in the lives of Justin Martyr, Tatian, Gregory Thaumaturgus, and Cyprian of Carthage and concludes with an analysis of the much-debated conversion of Emperor Constantine.