Saints
Paul and Augustine
Part
Three (i):
Paul and Justin Martyr
“When [Justin] contrasts the life that they led in paganism with their Christian life (I Apol., xiv), he expresses the same feeling of deliverance and
exaltation as did
newadvent.org
James A. Kelhoffer
has recognised certain similarities between the thinking of Sts. Paul and Justin,
in “The Apostle Paul and Justin
Martyr on the Miraculous: A Comparison of Appeals to Authority”: http://uu.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:385562/FULLTEXT01.pdf
At the very beginning of this article, he writes:
THE SUBJECT OF
MIRACLES has too often been
ignored or overlooked in scholarly discussions of early Christian ity.1 This article
focuses on the writings of Paul and Justin Martyr, in part because these
authors exemplify points of both continuity and development from the writings
of the NT to the early patristic literature.2 Although these
authors employ different genres,3 there is no reason
to suspect that either author’s choice(s) of genre has necessarily limited what
he wished to write concerning the miraculous. Part of what is to be offered here
is a subtle argument that Paul and Justin did, in fact, have true, then,
whether explicitly or implicitly, it is an oversimplification to interpret Paul
solely as a herald of the word of the gospel, or Justin only as a
rationally-minded apologist.
The analysis to follow builds upon a seminal essay by Paul Achtemeier,5 as well as more
recent analyses by Ramsay MacMullen,6 Bernd Kollmann,7 Stefan Schreiber,8 and others,9
and focuses on three questions: In what ways do Paul and Justin Martyr
refer to miraculous phenomena? What common assumptions do these authors hold
about the performing of miracles, especially with regard to appeals to
authority? To what ends, or with what goals, do Paul and Justin refer, usually
in passing, to the miraculous? ....
[End of quote]
Some further comparisons can be found in Thomas V. Mirus’ article, “Church
Fathers: St. Justin Martyr”: https://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/articles.cfm?id=645
The Dialogue,
by far Justin’s longest work, can be divided roughly into three parts. In the
first, Justin shows the temporary and symbolic nature of the old Law. In the
second, he shows how adoration of Christ as God is consistent with monotheism.
In the third, he proves that Christians, not Jews, are the new Israel and the
recipients of the promises of God’s covenant.
Some of the
points touched on again and again throughout the Dialogue are as
follows: Justin contrasts physical circumcision (which he says was to set the
Jews apart for suffering!) with circumcision of the heart, which is an
attribute of Christians. He finds in the Jewish prophecies two advents of
Christ, the first dishonorable and the second glorious, and points out
symbolism of the Cross in the Old Testament. He echoes the teaching of St. Paul
that the Jewish Law was given as a burden because of the hardness of hearts. He
finds many names given to the Son of God in the Old Testament: Angel, Wisdom,
Day, East, Sword, Stone, Rod, Jacob, Israel.
Justin gives
a detailed exegesis of Psalm 22 (“My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?”),
showing how it applies to Christ and why Christ quoted it on the Cross.
As St. Paul
parallels Christ with Adam, St. Justin parallels Mary with Eve (according to
Quasten he is the first Christian writer to do so):
[Christ]
became man by the Virgin, in order that the disobedience which proceeded from
the serpent might receive its destruction in the same manner in which it
derived its origin. For Eve, who was a virgin and undefiled, having conceived
the word of the serpent, brought forth disobedience and death. But the Virgin
Mary received faith and joy, when the angel Gabriel announced the good tidings
to her that the Spirit of the Lord would come upon her, and the power of the
Highest would overshadow her: wherefore also the Holy Thing begotten of her is
the Son of God; and she replied, ‘Be it unto me according to thy word.’
[End of
quotes]
And Robert M. Haddad tells of this, in “The
Appropriateness of the Apologetical Arguments of Justin Martyr”:
Ever since Apostolic
times, Apologetics has been a part of the life and
mission of the Church. Luke-Acts was an attempt to
provide an apologia to whoever
Theophilus might have been. .... We read in Acts 28:23
how St. Paul, while in Rome, received people “... at his lodgings
in great numbers. From morning until evening he explained
the matter to
them, testifying to the kingdom of God and trying to convince them about
Jesus both from the Law of Moses and from thee
prophets”. Justin inherited this spirit,
at a time when those who knew the apostles
were now advanced in years and new men with new thoughts needed to rise to
engage with a Graeco-Roman world both more aware of and hostile towards
Christianity. ....
Finally, Cullen I. K. Story, writing of “The Cross as Ultimate in the Writings of
Justin Martyr, has this to say (Introduction, p. 18):
While it is
true that his seaside friend had led Justin to know God, the Ultimate Reality, still
that merely marked the beginning of Justin's Christian experience. From his extensive
works it is clear that in a way similar to the apostle Paul (Gal. 2:19-20;
6:14; I Cor. I :23-24; 2:2) Justin found life and its meaning to be centered in
the crucifixion of Jesus. Biblical tradition, he affirmed, not only points to
the ultimate truth that Gad is, but to the Cross as the ultimate truth
that Gad becomes, i.e., the tradition points to a crucified Christ. ....
Part
Three (ii):
Justin Martyr and Saint Augustine
“As
St. Justin Martyr notes, free will has to exist for God’s rewards and
punishments
to
be Just. St. Augustine reaffirms this, and applies this principle, explaining
that
those
actions done to us that we do not will, cannot be imputed to us as sins”.
Sts. Justin and
Augustine are commonly compared and contrasted.
For example, there
is John Mark Reynolds’ “Justin Martyr: Not Just Dead, Just Not Augustine”:
... Justin lacks Augustine’s rhetorical skill, but this can be a benefit.
Augustine has left us countless memorable passages, but Justin provided the framework
for arguments that Augustine will flesh out. Augustine’s rhetoric is from a
very particular period of time, while Justin writes with a spare style that is
never beautiful, but is always clear. Oddly, he is sometimes less dated than
Augustine. ....
[End of quote]
Michael M.
Christensen will trace the doctrine of “Original Sin from Justin Martyr to Augustine”:
In an article, “Justin Martyr: Convert from
Heathendom”, at:
Justin
understood, after his conversion, that these questions and this deep
unsatisfied longing for something he knew not what, was the work of Christ in
his soul. It is doubtful that God ever brings anyone to salvation and the
knowledge of Christ without creating in him a deep longing, an unsatisfied
thirst, a hunger for something which one does not have. Augustine, three
centuries later, put it this way in his Confessions: "My soul can find no
rest until it rest in Thee." This longing, finally, is born out of the
knowledge of sin and the hopelessness and emptiness of one's life brought about
by the hopelessness of sin. Salvation is by faith in Christ; but only the empty
sinner needs Christ; only the thirsty sinner drinks at The Fountain of Living
Waters; only the hungry sinner eats The Bread of Life; only the laboring and
heavy laden come to Christ to find rest for their souls. It is the general rule
of the Holy Spirit to bring to faith in Christ by sovereignly showing the
sinner the need for Christ.
That Justin
had this deep longing is not strange. That it was a part of his life for ever
so many years before peace came is a remarkable providence of God.
[End
of quote]
the following “Conclusion” is reached:
Conclusion
Admittedly, free will is a bit of a mystery.
We don’t fully grasp what it is, or how it works. It puzzles theists and
atheists alike. But we can be sure that it exists, in part because it is
necessary for God’s Justice, and in part because we cannot coherently speak of
it not existing (any more than we can coherently speak of a self-caused
universe arising without God).
As St. Justin Martyr notes, free will has
to exist for God’s rewards and punishments to be Just. St. Augustine
reaffirms this, and applies this principle, explaining that those actions done
to us that we do not will, cannot be imputed to us as sins. What matters is not
what happens to us, but what we will. Thus, it is wrong to condemn the virgins
of Rome as fornicators when they were raped. It would be infinitely more wrong
to send them to Hell for being raped.
All of this, in addition to being logically
necessary, is self-evident. That is, each of us experiences free will, even if
we choose to deny it. It’s for this reason that even those, like Luther or
Calvin, who set out to deny free will (at least as pertains to issues tied to
salvation) cannot help but speak as if it exists. Because it does. And we can
observe it does.
No comments:
Post a Comment