Cohortatio ad Graecos / De monarchia / Oratio ad Graecos 9783110872255, 0899257089, 3110121352, 9783110121353

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PSEUDO-IUSTINUS COHORTATIO AD GRAECOS • DE MONARCHIA ORATIO AD GRAECOS

w G DE

PATRISTISCHE T E X T E UND STUDIEN IM A U F T R A G DER

PATRISTISCHEN

KOMMISSION

DER A K A D E M I E N D E R W I S S E N S C H A F T E N IN D E R B U N D E S R E P U B L I K

HERAUSGEGEBEN

DEUTSCHLAND

VON

K. A L A N D U N D E. M Ü H L E N B E R G

B A N D 32

WALTER DE GRUYTER • BERLIN • NEW YORK 1990

PSEUDO-IUSTINUS COHORTATIO AD G R A E C O S DE M O N A R C H I A O R A T I O AD G R A E C O S

E D I T E D BY

MIROSLAV

MARCOVICH

WALTER DE GRUYTER • BERLIN • NEW YORK

1990

Published with the support of the University of Illinois/USA

Printed on acid free paper (ageing-resistant — pH 7, neutral)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Cohortatio ad Graecos ; De monarchia ; Oratio ad Graecos. (Patristische Texte und Studien ; Bd. 32) Latin text; pref. in English. 1. Apologetics —Early church, ca. 30-600. I. Justin, Martyr, Saint. II. Marcovich, Miroslav. III. Title: Corhortatio ad Graecos. IV. Title: De monarchia. V. Title: Oratio ad Graecos. VI. Series. BT1115.C64 1990 239'.3 90-2866 ISBN 0-89925-708-9 (U.S.)

Deutsche Bibliothek Cataloguing in Publication Data

Iustinus: Cohortatio ad Graecos. De monarchia [u. a.] / Pseudo-Iustinus. Ed. by Miroslav Marcovich. — Berlin ; New York : de Gruyter, 1990 (Patristische Texte und Studien ; Bd. 32) ISBN 3-11-012135-2 NE: Marcovich, Miroslav [Hrsg.]; Iustinus: [Sammlung]; G T

ISSN 0553-4003 © Copyright 1990 by Walter de Gruyter & Co., D-1000 Berlin 30 All rights reserved, including those of translation book may be reproduced or transmitted in any mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any without permission in writing

into foreign languages. N o part of this form or by any means, electronic or information storage and retrieval system, from the publisher.

Printed in Germany Typesetting and printing: Arthur Collignon G m b H , Berlin Binding: Liideritz & Bauer, Berlin

GUILIELMO R. SCHOEDEL DDD

PREFACE The three Apologies attributed to Justin Martyr which are collected in this volume — Cohortatio ad Graecos, De monarchia, and Oratio ad Graecos — have in common the fact that they have been composed somewhere in the third century A. D. to be pretty soon included into the Corpus Iustini, where Eusebius found the first two of them before A. D. 311/12. All three are rich in Apologetic lore, and are not void of theological speculation. What is more significant, they extensively quote from Greek poetry and prose, and may serve as an important source for our knowledge of the JudeoChristian Greek Pseudepigrapha Veteris Testamenti. • Nevertheless, none of these treatises has found a critical edition so far. For their text is very lacunose and corrupt, and the rhetorical style of their authors is rather precarious. As a consequence, the editor had to walk the tight rope between the tolerability of an auctor barbarus and the intolerability of a librarius stupidus. But the result is, I hope, rewarding. My gratitude to Professor K U R T A L A N D and the Patristische ¡Commission for including this volume into the PTS-Series is sincere and lasting. Urbana, October 1989

M.M.

TABLE O F C O N T E N T S Preface

VII

Cohortatio ad Graecos Introduction Text

3 23

De monarchia Introduction Text

81 85

Oratio ad Graecos Introduction Text

103 109

Ambrosii Hypomnemata (English Translation)

123

Index locorum Index nominum Index verborum potiorum

133 137 141

COHORTATIO AD GRAECOS

INTRODUCTION 1. T H E A U T H O R

Both content and style of the Cohortatio cry aloud against the authorship of Justin Martyr. The first to realize this was J. Hiilsemann (f 1661),1 followed by L. E. Du Pin (1690),2 and particularly by Casimir Oudin (1722), 3 and Willy Gaul (1902).4 Ch. Ashton (1768),5 and especially J. Donaldson (1866)6 and E. Schiirer (1878),7 have pointed out that the author of the Cohortatio, in his chapter 9, copies from the Chronicle of Julius Africanus (ap. Euseb. Praep. ev. 10.10.8 and 15 — 18). Since this Chronicle ends with the year A. D. 221 (or 217), it follows that our Cohortatio must be posterior to this date. 8 In his turn, Gaul (p. 26 ff.) drew the attention of scholars to the fact that Eusebius, in his Church History (4.18.4), mentions the Cohortatio among the works attributed to Justin Martyr. 9 Since Eusebius' work has been

' In his Patrologia, edited by J. A. Scherzer (Leipzig, 1670), p. 983. Nouvelle bibliothèque des auteurs ecclésiastiques (Paris, 1686 ff.). 3 Commentarius de scriptoribus ecclesiasticis antiquis (Lipsiae, 1722), I, p. 187 ff. 4 Die Abfassungsverhältnisse der pseudojustinischen Cohortatio ad Graecos (Potsdam, 1902), pp. 44—63. — Among the efforts to attribute the Cohortatio to Justin Martyr, the one made by Carl Semisch, Justin der Märtyrer (2 vols., Breslau, 1840; 1842), 1, pp. 105—45, may be mentioned. Semisch himself later retracted this contention, Protestantische RealEn^yklopädie 7 (1857), p. 185f. 5 lustini Apologiae pro Christianis, Graece et Latine. Ed. Carolus Ashton (Cantabrigiae, 1768), p. 294. 6 A critical history of Christian literature and doctrine, Vol.2: The Apologists (London, 1866), p. 96 ff. 2

7

8

9

"J. Africanus als Quelle der Pseudo-Justinischen Cohort, ad Graecos" Zeitschrift für Kirchen-Geschichte 2 (1878) 3 1 9 - 3 3 1 . Gaul's effort (o.e., pp. 7 3 - 1 1 0 ) to date the Cohortatio between A . D . 200 and 220 ("als Terminus a quo das Datum der Abfassung der Stromateis des Clemens AI., als Terminus ad quem das des Abschlusses der Chronographien des Julius Africanus," p. 109) is not convincing. Euseb. Hist. eccl. 4.18.4 Kai aOôiç STepov npàç "EAArjva; EÎÇ F|PÂÇ ÊXR|XU6EV aCrroü CTÛyypamja, ô Kai â-rréypaiyev "EAeyxov... (Jerome, De viris illustr. 23; Photius, Bibl. cod. 125 [p. 95 a 1 Bekker]; Suda, s. v. 448 'IOIÎCTTÏVOS, are dependent on Eusebius). Elenchos seems to be another title for the Cohortatio ad Graecos, as is witnessed by Photius, Bibl. cod. 232 (p. 290 a 34 Bekker), ô 'EAATIVIKÖS "EXEYXOS: Photius is referring to Cohortatio c. 23, as excerpted by Stephanus called Gobar (Vlth century), in his Florilegium (cod. 232).

4

Cohortatio ad Graecos

published in A. D. 311/12, it follows that the Cohortatio must be anterior to this date. Judging by the fact that the atmosphere of the Cohortatio is peaceful, without any hint at the persecutions of the Christians, and that its tone is purely academic, Adolf Harnack (1882; 1904)10 suggested that the treatise may well reflect the period of relative freedom from persecutions — between A. D. 225 and 302. In his turn, Aimé Puech (1898; 1912)11 tried to limit this period to 260 — 302 by pointing out that the way the author of the Cohortatio makes use of the Oracula Sibjllina and the Hermetic literature draws him closer to the age of Lactantius than to that of, say, Clement of Alexandria. This seems to be the communis opinio today about the approximate date of the treatise, shared by Johannes Geffcken (1907),12 Otto Bardenhewer (1913),13 and many others. I have nothing to add to this dating. *

About the person of the author we know nothing. Evidently, he possesses a solid rhetorical education (he opens his Exhortation with the opening sentence of Demosthenes' De corona). He seems to display a predilection for exposing subtle contradictions within a philosophical system reminding us of Scepticism (cf. cc. 23.2 and 25.1 —2 for Plato; c. 5.3 for Aristotle). He proves to be a man of vast reading, but his knowledge of Greek philosophy is only skin deep (at c. 3.2, even if 'HpccKÀerroç ô METOCTTÔVTIOÇ is due to a lacunose text of Aetius, the author should have known better by correcting the error). He quotes extensively from Homer (cc. 2; 5; 17; 24—25; 28); from Orphic poetry (cc. 15 and 17); from Oracula Sibjllina (cc. 11; 16; 24; 37), and Adespota Tragica (c. 18). Among the historians, he quotes from Diodorus (cc. 9 and 28) and from Julius Africanus (cc. 9 and 12). As for the philosophical sources, he copies from Ps. Aristotle De mundo (c. 5); Ps. Plutarch ( = Aetius' Placita: cc. 3; 4; 5; 7); Ps. Pythagoras (c. 19), and Corpus Hermeticum (c. 38). But the lion's share belongs to Plato (throughout the treatise), attesting to the author's Middle Platonic background.

10

11

12 13

Die Überlieferung der griechischen Apologeten (T. U. I. 1—2, Leipzig, 1882), p. 157 n. 130 ("Eine nähere Zeitbestimmung für die Cohortatio als 225 — 300 zu geben, scheint mir nicht möglich"); Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur bis Eusebius, II.2: Die Chronologie (Leipzig, 1904), pp. 1 5 1 - 5 8 and 5 4 5 - 5 8 , esp. pp. 153; 157f. "Sur le Aôyos TrapaiveTiKÖs," in Mélanges Henri Weil (Paris, 1898), pp. 395 — 406, esp. p. 402 f.; Les apologistes grecs du II' siècle de notre ère (Paris, 1912), pp. 232 — 50, esp. p. 233 f. Zwei griechische Apologeten (Leipzig, 1907), pp. 267 — 72, esp. p.268. Geschichte der altkirchlichen Literatur, I (2nd ed., Freiburg im Breisgau, 1913), pp. 232 — 36, esp. p.234.

Introduction

5

Much of this reading — particularly the poetry 14 — derives from Hellenistic anthologies, to the extent that the author was successful in producing yet another patchwork (aTpco|jaTEÏç) of relevant and less relevant pieces of poetry and prose. In addition to the Septuagint, he had some direct reading from Plato, Diodorus and Julius Africanus. He also read some of Philo, and much of Justin Martyr. In brief, to quote only Aimé Puech, "L'auteur de la Cohortatio a plus fortement subi l'influence de la rhétorique [que Justin]; il est plus docteur et moins apôtre ..." 15 The opinions of modem scholarship about the value and originality of our author are rather on the negative side. The harshest verdict was pronounced by Geffcken, who saw in the Cohortatio only, "ein merkwürdiges Gemisch widerspruchsvoller Bestandteile;" "Vollends als eigentliche apologetische Schrift ist die Cohortatio ohne jede Originalität;" "Der Autor ist und bleibt ein konfuser Mensch, im Grossen wie auch im Kleinen ..." 16 Puech showed much more understanding for our author, but even he produced this judgment: "Écrite avec une facilité qui reste d'ailleurs banale, passablement ordonnée dans l'ensemble, mais d'une ordonnance plutôt extérieure et qui ne provient pas d'une logique rigoureuse, la Cohortatio est moins intéressante par elle-même, que par ce qu'elle laisse entrevoir du milieu et du temps où elle fut probablement composée."17 I am in strong disagreement with such verdicts. In my view, scholars have simply missed the whole point of the Cohortatio. Certainly, our author looks like an epigone when compared to the Pleiad of the great apologists of the second century. But he does not lack originality. It is reflected in a well-conceived and successfully developed design, providing the necessary unity for the entire treatise. This design reads: the religious truth cannot be discovered by man, it can only be revealed by God. As a special gift, God has conveyed this truth through the Holy Ghost to Moses and the prophets. Thanks to God's providence, Greek poets and philosophers have learned this truth from the prophets. The source of inspiration for our author seems to be in part 1 Cor. 2:12—13 'H|aeTç 5è où TÔ TTVEUHOC TOÛ K6CJ|JOU gAaßopiev, àXKà TO TTVEOUCC TÔ ÈK TOÛ 0ÊOO, ïva eîSoopev xà ÙTTÔ TOU 9EO0 XCCPICROÉVTA F|HTv* (13) Â Kai ÀaÀoû|i£v OÙK év 8I8OCKTOÏÇ àv6pcoTrivr|5 aoçias Aôyoïç, CCÂX èv SlSctKTOÏÇ TTVEUHOCTOS, TTVEUiaOCTlKOÏÇ TTVEU|iOtTlKÔt CTUyKpÎVOVTEÇ. *

14

15 16 17

Compare Nicole Zeegers-Vander Vorst, Les citations des poètes grecs cheç les apologistes Chrétiens du II' siècle (Université de Louvain, Recueil de travaux d'histoire et de philologie, 4 e Série, Fascicule 47), Louvain, 1972. Mélanges Henri Weil (Paris, 1898), p. 398. Zwei griechische Apologeten, pp.267; 271 (bis). Les apologistes grecs, p. 249.

6

Cohortatio ad Graecos

Here are some of the main characteristics of the Cohortatio. (a) The unity of structure. At first sight, the author seems to contradict himself. He w h o has criticized Aristotle for being inconsistent (c. 5.3), himself falls in the same trap. For in chapters 2 —7, he rejects the testimony of Greek poets and philosophers as being false, while in chapters 14—34 he accepts their testimony as revealing the religious truth. This apparent contradiction is best reflected by Geffcken's statement, " D a ß dies alles nur ein Konglomerat ist, scheint mir klar. Wir unterscheiden ... deutlich zwei Teile: einen ziemlich stark "orientalischen", voll Abneigung gegen die griechische Kultur, und einen gemäßigt hellenischen, der in diametralem Widerspruch namentlich zu der im ersten Teile geäußerten Auffassung Homers steht; beide Teile sind durch die Kapitel aus der Trugliteratur (15 — 18) äußerlich und schwach genug verbunden. Der Autor ist und bleibt ein konfuser Mensch, im Grossen wie auch im Kleinen ..." (p. 271). The apparent contradiction disappears the very moment we pay attention to the key-idea of the treatise, which — like a guiding thread — is being repeated five times for the benefit of the reader (3.1; 5.1; 7.2; 8.2; 11.1): "The true religion cannot be discovered by man's speculation, it can only be revealed to man by God: God did so through the Holy G h o s t " (e. g., 8.2 Oute y a p cpuaei oute avOpooTrivq Iwoia outgo laeyaAa Kai 6sTa yivcbaKEiv ävöpcb-TTois 8uvaT6v, aKXa Ttj övcoöev etti tous ayious avSpas TT|ViKC(ÜTa koteAQouctt) Scopea). And the idea of the Holy Ghost as the God's conveyer of the truth to man is repeated four times throughout the treatise (8.2; 10.2; 32.1; 35.1). Accordingly, the criticism of the theology of Greek poets and philosophers is here not only as a concession to the traditional literary genre — for no Christian apology since Aristides could be without such a criticism, — but primarily as a negative example of "the human exercise in futility," of the dvöpcoTrivr) ao