OF THE HOLY JUSTIN, PHILOSOPHER AND MARTYR

 power, which is absurd for what is in time is corruptible. But if, being able long ago to prevent so great an evil, he did not prevent it, he would b

 form, but ignorance of God which has spoken the falsehood which is a third form of the greatest evil, resulting for them from the voluntary disobedie

 For, he says, ignorance is often given to men for their good at any rate we see in many cases that it often happens that things known are despised mo

 the religions of the earth differ from the religion that holds the true doctrine simply by falsehood, but from each other in the differences of falseh

 the creator and God ordained the day, on which he makes an abolition of all the evils in the world arising from unbelief and disobedience to God, acco

 to God, the creator of the world, they name the parts of the world, and without the act of creating, they attribute to God the name of creator, so tha

 and in actuality which is absurd. He who remains the same, therefore, has nothing temporal. He makes the world, therefore, always ordering it, and th

 become significant and affirmative of God that all the works of God are temporal with him, it is clear that he absurdly supposed that nothing temporal

 of each other? For 'He has not so much made as He makes' is not a negation of 'to have made', but rather an affirmation of 'He has made'. But clearly,

 the sun in its substance, or according to one act of creation He made its substance and according to another act of creation its motion, and having ma

 Is not God, in respect to the powers He has but according to which He does not act, corruptible according to the judgment of the one who answered? But

 or the denial to be true, how did the respondent posit both for the generation of the world, both the affirmation and the denial, saying it is both cr

 makes different things. Let us not consider God in human terms. For not as we, who previously are one way and later change into another, are said to m

 will. How then is the will the same as the essence, when that which is willed and the will are one thing and another, just as the sensible and sensati

 by essence. But if it is essence, he who wills does not exist, but if it is added to the essence, it is necessarily one thing and another for that wh

 makes of themselves, in the same way also God, being ungenerated, ungeneratedly makes all things, not becoming but co-existing, and by the infinity of

 can. But let us not consider God's creating in a human way. For not as we, who previously are one way, and later changing into another, are said to cr

 of milk, but nature in no way makes substance all at once. How then is the respondent not using an inappropriate example, the working of nature, to re

 For first the simple, but later the composite. Just as God is beyond reproach for the weakness of power, because he did not make more worlds, but havi

 having come to its manifestation, how is it not that in the work of God all the parts of time exist? Fourth Christian question to the Greeks. If it is

 of the known ones of the world he dogmatized its ungeneratedness, nor did he establish this through proof, but only according to his own authority did

 It is clear from this, that the world is not a relative term to the creator insofar as it is an image, nor to the paradigm insofar as it is a creation

 is, he ought also to say that the creation is uncreated, since its creator is uncreated for they necessarily follow one another, the uncreated with t

 kinds, of which it is a common feature for one to be spoken of sometimes in potentiality for what they are called, and sometimes in actuality, while o

 Fifth Christian question to the Hellenes. If heaven is uncreated and God is uncreated and God dwells in heaven, how is God not insulted dwelling in th

 and having made it and to say that the world, without interval, eternally co-exists with God, the world which received its existence from the Creat

 

the religions of the earth differ from the religion that holds the true doctrine simply by falsehood, but from each other in the differences of falsehood? But if this is so, then it is not, according to the argument of the respondent, that knowledge of God comes to the souls here, but rather ignorance, if indeed the religions do not differ from each other by the universal knowledge of God that is in them, but rather by the specific knowledge that has come to them here. If, therefore, it is possible for humans, even being here, to know God, no greatest evil happens to them from being here. For to those who are ignorant, as has been said, ignorance of God occurs from their own unbelieving nature. Weaving together two mutually destructive statements, the respondent placed in his response the "If it is possible for humans, being here, to know God, no greatest evil happens to them;" and the "To those who are ignorant, from their own unbelieving nature occurs ignorance of God." And the greatest evil, which he cast out through the first statement, this he introduced through the second statement; if it is a very great evil to be impious with a twofold impiety toward the truly existing God, on the one hand, to deprive him of his essential glory, and on the other, to falsely honor with his glory those who are not gods; which has left no excess of any wickedness unsurpassed. But the statement, that because it is possible for humans who are here to know God, no greatest evil happens to them, this is not a refutation of the greatest evil, but an intensification, because even in what is possible, humans fail from their own voluntary unbelief, and, being able to be pious according to the simple piety that saves humans, they prefer to it the twofold impiety; not to call which a very great evil is among the most absurd things. But if someone even concedes, which is absurd, that the things here are a very great evil, and that it is better for things here not to be than to be, if on the one hand he says that the Creator made the things here evil through weakness, he is foolish, asserting that the power of God does not comprehend all things. But if, being able to make the things here good, he permitted others to make them evil, this too is an accusation against God; for he who is able to stop it, but overlooks it, more truly does it himself. If, according to what was said above, it happens to those who are ignorant of God to be ignorant of God from their own unbelieving nature, which is confessedly a very great evil, how does the respondent now concede this according to the absurd concession? But if not this but another greatest evil he concedes according to the absurd concession, yet that greatest evil is not according to us but according to the Manichaeans. For according to us, all things here are good, as having the greatest of good beings as their Creator, and there is no greatest evil in them in substance, nor in the activity of what is in substance, but according to the voluntary choice of humans, preferring falsehood to the truth according to the aforementioned twofold impiety. which the one of the world, correcting

γῆς θρησκεῖαι τῆς μὲν τὸν ἀληθῆ λόγον πρεσβευούσης θρη σκείας ἁπλῶς τῷ ψεύδει, ἀλλήλων δὲ ταῖς διαφοραῖς τοῦ ψεύ δους διαφέρουσιν; Ἀλλ' εἰ τοῦτο οὕτως ἔχει, οὐκ ἄρα κατὰ τὸν λόγον τοῦ ἀποκριναμένου παραγίνεται ταῖς ἐνταῦθα ψυχαῖς γνῶσις θεοῦ, ἀλλὰ μᾶλλον ἡ ἄγνοια, εἴγε μὴ τῇ καθόλου γνώσει τοῦ θεοῦ οὔσῃ ἐν αὐταῖς ἀλλήλων διαφέρουσιν αἱ θρησκεῖαι, τῇ εἰδικῇ δὲ μᾶλλον τῇ ἐνταῦθα παραγενομένῃ αὐταῖς. Eἰ τοίνυν δυνατὸν καὶ ἐνταῦθα τοὺς ἀνθρώπους ὄντας γινώσκειν τὸν θεόν, οὐδὲν αὐτοῖς μέγιστον κακὸν συμβαίνει ἐκ τοῦ ἐνταῦθα εἶναι. Τοῖς ἀγνοοῦσι γάρ, καθὼς εἴρηται, ἐκ τῆς οἰκείας ἀπίστου φύσεως τὸ ἀγνοεῖν τὸν θεὸν συμβαίνει. ∆ύο φωνὰς ἀλλήλων ἀναιρετικὰς συμπλέξας ὁ ἀποκρινά μενος ἔθηκεν ἐν τῇ ἑαυτοῦ ἀποκρίσει τὸ Eἰ δυνατὸν τοὺς ἀν θρώπους ἐνταῦθα ὄντας γινώσκειν τὸν θεόν, οὐδὲν αὐτοῖς μέ γιστον συμβαίνει κακόν· καὶ τὸ Τοῖς ἀγνοοῦσιν ἐκ τῆς οἰκείας ἀπίστου φύσεως συμβαίνει τὸ ἀγνοεῖν τὸν θεόν. Καὶ τὸ μέ γιστον κακόν, ὃ ἐξέβαλε διὰ τῆς πρώτης φωνῆς, τοῦτο διὰ τῆς δευτέρας εἰσήγαγε φωνῆς· εἰ μέγιστόν ἐστι κακὸν τὸ κατὰ διπλῆν ἀσεβείαν ἀσεβεῖν εἰς τὸν ὄντως ὄντα θεόν, αὐτὸν μὲν ἀποστερεῖν τῆς κατ' οὐσίαν δόξης, τοὺς δὲ οὐκ ὄντας θεοὺς τῇ ἐκείνου δόξῃ ψευδῶς τιμᾶν· ὅπερ ὑπερβολὴν οὐδὲ μιᾶς ἀπολέλοιπε κακίας. Τὸ δέ, διὰ τὸ δυνατὸν εἶναι ἀνθρώποις ἐνταῦθα οὖσι γινώσκειν τὸν θεόν, μηδὲν αὐτοῖς μέγιστον συμ βαίνειν κακόν, τοῦτο οὐκ ἔστι τοῦ μεγίστου κακοῦ ἀναίρεσις ἀλλ' ἐπίτασις, ὅτι καὶ ἐν τῷ δυνατῷ ἀδυνατοῦσιν οἱ ἄνθρω ποι ἐκ τῆς οἰκείας ἑκουσίου ἀπιστίας, καί, δυνάμενοι κατὰ ἁπλῆν εὐσέβειαν σωστικὴν ἀνθρώπων εὐσεβεῖν, προτιμῶσι ταύτης τὴν διπλῆν ἀσέβειαν· ἣν μὴ λέγειν μέγιστον κακὸν τῶν ἀτοπωτάτων ἐστίν. Eἰ δέ τις καὶ συγχωρήσει, ὅπερ ἄτοπον, μέγιστον εἶναι κακὸν τὰ ἐνταῦθα, καὶ κάλλιον ὑπάρχειν τὸ μὴ εἶναι τὰ τῇδε τοῦ εἶναι, εἰ μὲν λέγει κακὰ πεποιηκέναι τὰ τῇδε τὸν δη μιουργὸν δι' ἀσθένειαν, ἀνοηταίνει, τὴν τοῦ θεοῦ δύναμιν φάσκων μὴ καταλαμβάνειν πάντα. Eἰ δέ, δυνάμενος ποιῆσαι καλὰ τὰ τῇδε, συνεχώρησεν ἑτέροις κακὰ ποιεῖν, καὶ τοῦτό ἐστι κατηγόρημα τοῦ θεοῦ· ὁ γὰρ δυνάμενος μὲν παῦσαι, πε ριορῶν δέ, ἀληθέστερον αὐτὸς δρᾷ. Eἰ κατὰ τὰ ἐν τοῖς ἀνω τέρω εἰρημένα συμβαίνει τοῖς ἀγνοοῦσι τὸν θεὸν τὸ ἀγνοεῖν τὸν θεὸν ἐκ τῆς οἰκείας ἀπίστου φύσεως, ὅπερ ἐστὶ μέγιστον ὁμολογούμενον κακόν, πῶς νῦν τοῦτο κατὰ τὴν ἄτοπον συγχωρεῖ συγχώρησιν ὁ ἀποκρινάμενος; Ἀλλ' εἰ μὴ τοῦτο ἀλλ' ἕτερον μέγιστον κακὸν κατὰ τὴν ἄτοπον συγχωρεῖ συγχώρησιν, ἀλλ' οὐ καθ' ἡμᾶς ἐστιν ἐκεῖνο τὸ μέγιστον κακὸν ἀλλὰ κατὰ τοὺς Μανιχαίους. Καθ' ἡμᾶς γὰρ καλὰ τὰ τῇδε πάντα, ὡς τὸν μέγιστον τῶν ἀγαθῶν ἔχοντα δημιουργόν, καὶ μέγιστον κακὸν κατ' οὐσίαν οὐδέν ἐστιν ἐν αὐτοῖς, οὔτε κατὰ τὴν ἐνέργειαν τοῦ κατ' οὐσίαν, ἀλλὰ κατὰ τὴν ἑκούσιον προαίρεσιν τῶν ἀν θρώπων, τὸ ψεῦδος προτιμῶσαν τῆς ἀληθείας κατὰ τὴν προ ειρημένην διπλῆν ἀσέβειαν. Ἣν διορθούμενος ὁ τοῦ κόσμου