Overview
About this work
St Justin Martyr’s First Apology is a reasoned defense of Christians, written as a petition to Roman rulers. Justin asks that Christians be judged by their actions rather than condemned merely for their name. He explains worship of the one God, presents Jesus Christ as the divine Logos—God’s eternal Word and Reason—and shows how Christian faith calls believers to holiness, truth, and love of neighbor. The work remains especially important because it joins public defense, theological teaching, and one of the earliest detailed accounts of Christian baptism, the Eucharist, and Sunday worship.
Setting
Historical context
St Justin wrote the First Apology in Greek during the reign of Antoninus Pius, probably around AD 150–155, and addressed it to the emperor, members of his household, the Senate, and the Roman people. Writing as a Christian teacher who presented the faith as the true philosophy, Justin challenged accusations that Christians were atheists, immoral, or disloyal. He asked Roman authorities to investigate conduct fairly instead of punishing the Christian name. The surviving Greek depends chiefly on a much later manuscript tradition; this edition uses Gerhard Rauschen’s 1911 Greek text as the single basis for display, concordance, and Modern English.
Structure
Contents
The work opens with a plea for justice and answers charges of atheism, immorality, and disloyalty. Justin then explains Christian worship and moral life, argues for the resurrection, and compares Christian teaching with ideas familiar to Greek and Roman readers. A long central section appeals to the Hebrew prophets as witnesses to Christ’s birth, ministry, suffering, resurrection, and worldwide proclamation. The closing chapters describe baptism, the Eucharist, care for people in need, and the Sunday gathering. Chapter 68 ends the petition, followed in the manuscript tradition by a separate rescript attributed to Emperor Hadrian.
Text & source details
Editions
- Edition
- Original Greek
- Reader label
- Ancient Greek
- Publication
- Gerhard Rauschen (ed.), S. Iustini Apologiae Duae (Bonn: Petri Hanstein, 1911); digital transcription used for this concordance from Mallioch/justin-martyr-texts.
- Date
- 1911
- Rights
- The underlying 1911 printed edition is public domain in the United States. Digital transcription provenance is attributed to Mallioch/justin-martyr-texts.
- Edition
- Voices of the Fathers Modern English
- Reader label
- Modern English — VOTF
- Translator
- Voices of the Fathers editorial project
- Publication
- Voices of the Fathers
- Date
- 2026
- Rights
- Voices of the Fathers Modern English is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0), to the extent copyright and related rights subsist in the translation and associated editorial material. Commercial reuse requires separate permission from Voices of the Fathers. The underlying ancient text and identified public-domain source editions retain their respective status.
- Edition
- Marcus Dods (1867)
- Reader label
- English — Dods (1867)
- Translator
- Marcus Dods
- Publication
- The Writings of Justin Martyr and Athenagoras, Ante-Nicene Christian Library, vol. II (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1867); later republished in Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. I (1885).
- Date
- 1867
- Rights
- Public domain in the United States.
Text and edition sources
Justin Martyr, First Apology, Voices of the Fathers Modern English, Voices of the Fathers, 2026, CC BY-NC 4.0.
Applies to: Modern English — VOTF CC BY-NC 4.0 applies to the project-created translation/editorial contribution to the extent copyright and related rights subsist. Source websiteFirst Apology, Voices of the Fathers Modern English, Voices of the Fathers, 2026, CC BY-NC 4.0.
Applies to: Modern English — VOTF Source websiteGerhard Rauschen (ed.), S. Iustini Apologiae Duae, Florilegium Patristicum 2 (Bonn: Petri Hanstein, 1911).
Applies to: Modern English — VOTF The underlying 1911 printed edition is public domain in the United States. Source websiteMarcus Dods, trans., “The First Apology of Justin,” in The Writings of Justin Martyr and Athenagoras, Ante-Nicene Christian Library, vol. II (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1867); republished in Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. I (1885).
Applies to: English — Dods (1867) Source websiteOverview research
Denis Minns and Paul Parvis (eds. and trans.), Justin, Philosopher and Martyr: Apologies, Oxford Early Christian Texts (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009).
Source websiteJustin Martyr, First Apology, Marcus Dods translation, Ante-Nicene Fathers tradition.
Historical translation text is public domain in the United States. Source websiteOrthodox Church in America, “Martyr Justin the Philosopher and Those with Him at Rome.”
Source websiteOrthodox Church in America, The Orthodox Faith, vol. 3, Church History, “Second Century: Church Order and Liturgy.”
Source websiteUwe Michael Lang, “The Eucharist in the Early Church,” in The Roman Mass: From Early Christian Origins to Tridentine Reform (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022), 37–77.
Source website