Justin and the “Memoirs of the Apostles”

Last updated on: October 17, 2012 at 8:01 pm by Michael F. Bird

Justin and the “Memoirs of the Apostles” 2012-10-17T20:01:02-04:00 Michael F. Bird

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Over at Unsettled Christianity, Joel Watts has a post about Justin Martyr and his references to the Gospels as “memoirs of the apostles,” in relation to Xenophon’s Memorabilia.

I’ve been working on this topic in my own research of late, and here’ what I’ve surmized.

Justin was acquainted with the Socratic tradition. He explicitly cites Plato and Xenophon,[1] and he could well have known Xenophon’s Memoirs of Socrates[2] and Plato’s “Socratic Dialogues” as they were highly esteemed among the philosophers that he debated with. Hardly unexpected given that many biographies were disseminated widely, not just in the Socratic tradition, but Pythagorean memoirs too, as circulated by the prominent historian Alexander Polyhistor in the middle of the first century in Rome. The philosopher Favorinus of Arelate (d. ca. 160), friend to Emperor Antoninus Pius, published his own “memoirs” around the same time that Justin was in Rome.[3] By using the term apomnemoneumata, Justin is the first, as far as we can tell, to liken the Gospels to the biographical tradition.[4] His attempt to approximate the Gospels to another known literary genre is without doubt our best clue to what type of literature that the Gospels were received as by their early readers. That is not to say that the Gospels are exactly modeled on any particular type of the biographical tradition, but the Gospels belonged to the same literary family.[5] I suggest that Justin’s equating the Gospels with the biographical memoirs of great philosophers is an apologetic ploy, designed to show that Christianity was a genuine philosophy, and that Christian accounts of Jesus contained cultural sophistication, but without sophistry.[6]

[1] Cf. Justin, 2 Apol. 10.5 (Plato’s Apology for Socrates); 10.8 (Socrates had some knowledge of Christ); 11.2-3 (Xenophon’s story of Herakles at the crossroads).

[2] Koester (Ancient Christian Gospels, 38-39) points out that the Latin designation for Xenophon’s biography of Socrates as Memorabilia,was not used until Johann Lenklau’s 1569 edition of Xenophon. Even so, the Greek title for the work, “First Book of Xenophon’s Memoirs of Socrates” was extant in some manuscripts and such a title, or a source like it, is probably what influenced Justin.

[3] David L. Dungan, A History of the Synoptic Problem: The Canon, the Text, the Composition, and the Interpretation of the Gospels (ABRL; New York: Doubleday, 1999), 31-32.

[4] Koester (Ancient Christian Gospels, 37-40) is of the opinion that Justin regarded the written Gospels as a more reliable account of Jesus’ words and deeds than extant oral traditions about Jesus. Indeed, in Koester’s perception, Justin sought to “replace” the oral Gospel with the written Gospels. Several problems count against that proposal: (1) Justin nowhere delineates a distinction between oral and written accounts of Jesus, so any attempt to regarded him as implicitly supplanting a continuing oral tradition with written texts is a category mistake. Justin does not even appear to differentiate authorized and unauthorized accounts of Jesus, and cites “other” Jesus traditions in isolated instances (see Dial. Tryph. 47.5; 78.5; 88.3). Justin argues, in fact, that the traditions of sayings and deeds of Jesus found in the “memoirs” are based on what Christ taught and transmitted to his followers (1 Apol. 4.7; 6.2; 8.3; 65.5; 66.1-3 [note the repeated use of paradidomi for “handing over” traditions); (2) Justin appears to know the Papian tradition of Mark’s association with Peter in composing his Gospel and yet speak no ill of the tradents of the tradition (Dial. Tryph. 106.3); (3) Koester does not think that Justin’s designation of the Gospels as “memoirs” was influenced by the Graeco-Roman biographical tradition, but derives instead from a view of the Gospels as based on ancient memory, as in Papias. In which case, it is surely odd that Justin is somehow critical of oral tradition, while using a key term from oral tradition, i.e., “memory,” to designate the Gospels; and (4) Thus Koester’s view is truly peculiar that Justin coined the term “memoirs” from Papias, but with a view to eclipsing the “living voice” esteemed by Papias, and likewise strange is the claim that Justin made appeals to “remembering” with an anti-Gnostic intention, perhaps aware of similar appeals to remembering in Apoc. Jas. 2.1-15, but Justin was unlikely to be unaware of the use “memoirs” by the Second Sophist. Would Justin have been more likely to have encountered the Apocryphon of James than Xenophon’s biography of Socrates? It is far more likely that Justin’s use of “memoirs” was influenced by both the general tradition, known also to Papias, that the Gospels were based on apostolic memory, and also by the Socratic biographical tradition (so also Dungan, History of the Synoptic Problem, 33; Hengel, Four Gospels and the One Gospel of Jesus Christ, 212 n. 13).

[5] Note the words of Martin Hengel (Acts and the History of Earliest Christianity [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1980], 29): “The ancient reader will probably have been well aware of the differences in style and education, say, between Mark and Xenophon; but he will also have noticed what the gospels had in common with the literature of biographical ‘reminiscences’ ‒ and unlike the majority of German New Testament scholars today, he did not mind at all regarding the evangelists as authors of biographical reminiscences of Jesus which went back to the disciples of Jesus themselves.”

[6] Justin calls Christianity “philosophy safe and simple” (Dial. Tryph. 8.1), he extols Christians as those “who have lived in accordance with the Divine Reason” (1 Apol. 46), and regards Jesus as a great philosophical teacher by drawing attention to the brevity rather than bombastic nature of Jesus’ teaching (Dial. Tryph. 18.1; 1 Apol. 14.4). See Stanton, Jesus and Gospel, 103-5; Dungan, History of the Synoptic Problem, 32.

Uncategorized

Previous Post

October 15, 2012

New Review of The Apostle Paul: Four Views

Next Post

October 18, 2012 Systematic Theology as a Biblical Discipline

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Bible Lands Blogosphere Book Review Calvinism Colleges & Universities Ecclesiology Emerging Adulthood Evangelicalism Foreign Affairs Gospel of John Greco-Roman World Humor Just War N. T. Wright Old Testament Resurrection Terrorism Theological Education Travel Uncategorized Writing

Select a Month September 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 January 2011

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

True or False: The armor of God includes the belt of truth and the breastplate of fortitude.

Select your answer to see how you score.

FALSE TRUE

Books by This Author Books by Mike Bird

See All Titles »