On "The First Apology" and "The Second Apology" by Justin Martyr ***

The last complete works by Justin Martyr on my list to read, the First Apology I actually listened to on Librivox. The reading was enough to keep me engaged, which is more than I can say for many such recordings (I think only the stories of H. Beam Piper have previously been very compelling--and those like listening to old sci-fi radio shows, they were so good). Part of my engagement here likely had to do with my interest in the subject, so I'm not how well the listening my translate to others.

As for the text itself, it falls in line with Justin's second apology. What struck me of particular interest in this particular apology were Justin's angeology (his idea that demons are the pagan gods), his concepts about the Holy Spririt (contradictory--worshipping it in chapter 6 but seeming to claim it more like a power of God elsewhere), early worship practices, and his ideas about eternal punishment. One sees, to some extent, how by Justin's time many of the doctrines of the later Christian church were already forged--and different to some extent from New Testament writings.

The much shorter "Second Apology" I read on my phone over the course of a few days. It too includes some interesting ideas about angels and eternal punishment. Both apologies focus much on trying to get the Roman rulers to not afflict Christians with punishment for their mere declaration of belief. They can be read here.

On "Dialogue with Trypho" by Justin Martyr ***

This second-century religious text does a good job of showing Martyr's background in the study of philosophy and some of the arguments for and against Jesus as Messiah in terms of Jewish versus Christian views. It's not likely to be the most engaging reading to someone not interested in the issues and how they played out at the time, and it's often quite repetitive. You also get a lot more of the Christian views than the Jewish, for obvious reasons. In fact, I'd say the work is to actually fairly antisemitic. Repeatedly, Justin claims that the Old Testament law was put upon the Jewish people because of their unique stubbornness and innate bad nature, as if somehow other peoples are superior to this particular set of peoples.

One of the most surprising things about the work to me was the number of arguments that Justin makes from scripture with regard to the Messiah's identity. The number of typologies and prophecies that he pulls out and argues by is incredible. They are the same arguments generally made today by Christians. But it's interesting to me to see that these arguments were already formed in the second century, as if very little has been added since then. A translation may be read here.