The next church father we are going to look at is Justin Martyr. Again, the objective with the church fathers is to view what they are saying, and see whether or not they are extending their teachings from the Bible, or another source.
First of all, who is Justin Martyr? Many do not know much about him. I am very familiar with him coming from a Christian Apologetics background. Justin Martyr was a gentleman who wrote the books "The First Apology" and "The Dialogue with Trypho." Of notable interest to us especially is the 2nd book. Essentially it was a debate that he had against a Jewish man named Trypho. This was an excellent opportunity in my viewpoint to encourage a Jew to become a Christian. What is interesting to note about Justin Martyr, is that while he is utilized as an accurate source among the Christians of today, Matthias Flacius Illyricus, the Lutheran Reformer, discovered a very paganistic side to his writings. It is not a secret to many that he attempted to reconcile a Greek Philosophy with the Bible, with a rather Stoic outlook on the Bible. Obviously, I have a problem with this based off of Rav Shaul's encounters with the Stoics in Acts 17. The Greeks are not looked upon as a very knowledgeable bunch.
But lets continue nonetheless. What are some notable things that Justin Martyr did? One thing of note is the ideology of the Logos that Justin Martyr did. This was where he basically began the separation of God the Father from God the Son as an actual person. This was the first gentleman to do this. "For next to God, we worship and love the Logos who is out of the unbegotten and ineffable God, since also He became man for our sakes, that, becoming a partaker of our sufferings, He might also bring us healing" (Second Apology, 13).
"There is, and that there is said to be, another God and Lord subject to the Maker of all things who is also called an Angel, because He announces to men whatsoever the Maker of all things, above whom there is no other God, wishes to announce to them.... I shall endeavour to persuade you, that He who is said to have appeared to Abraham, and to Jacob, and to Moses, and who is called God, is distinct from Him who made all things, I mean numerically, not in will. (Dialogue with Trypho, 56).
So as we see, Justin Martyr places God the Son below God the Father, while also separating the two. They are not on an equal parallel. And this is where trinitarianism roots from. It is in fact based on a hierarchical sytem based around the ideology of a pagan. And it is in effect promoting paganism.
What is further problematic with this? The Shema in Deuteronomy 6:4 goes into a direct contradiction with the trinity ideology. Lets see what this states " 4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. [a]" No mistake about it. It doesn't state that God has more than one personality. Instead, it says that God has a character of Echad, or Oneness. Remember that Yeshua says "I and the Father are One." John 10:30. Also John 14:7 says that "If you had known me, you would have known my Father also: and from henceforth you Know Him and Have seen him." So not Three in One, but rather Oneness. A better idea to think about this from a Biblical perspective is that God is spirit and may exist in any form that he likes. He has identified himself in the form of 3 different but not separate forms. It is illogical for 3 separate personalities to encompass one being in the sense of having one personality. A person is defined as an individual. Where one individual ends and another begins is associated with the concept of trinity, thus it is contradictory to describe God in the triune sense that trinitarians do (don't get me wrong, I believe in a triune nature of God). But God is infinite, so therefore he can not be 3 different individuals. That is an inaccurate Biblical perspective. Justin Martyr was instrumental to the eventual separation into the trinity that was accepted by Constantine, whom we will talk about later in our discussions.
There were other not so great things that Justin Martyr did. One of the things that Justin Martyr stated was ""The Scriptures are not yours, but ours." Secondly, it is stated by Justin Martyr " "We, too, would observe your circumcision of the flesh, your Sabbath days, and in a word all your festivals, if we were not aware of the reason why they were imposed upon you, namely, because of your sins and hardness of heart." (Dialogue 18,2)." Obviously Supersessionists and most Christians and Catholics alike eat this up. But we've just gone through over and over and over again how the covenant is still with Israel. This I have brought up on numerous occasions within the articles of the site. So since this was not a Biblical motive for Justin Martyr to make this claim, what was his motive? What exactly was going on back then to make Justin Martyr state this claim? The aftermath of the 2nd Jewish Revolt. What happened was that during this revolt that was overthrown by the Roman Emperor Hadrian, the Jews named Bar Kochba as the Messiah. They believed he had come to fulfill the role of Ben David whom some of the Orthodox Jews were looking for even during the time of Yeshua, instead of listening to what Yeshua was trying to tell them. What this caused to happen was the Messianic Jews decided to pull out. Eventually the Orthodox Jews were defeated. The aftermath was that the Orthodox Jews started to speak against Yeshua in the synagogues. I stated earlier that this was a perfect opportunity for Justin Martyr to attempt to help fix the situation between the Jews and the Christians during the time period. However, Martyr's motives were not to seek peace between Jews and Christians, but rather what ended his intent was to separate themselves from the Jews entirely to make them stand out as Roman citizens, instead of what Rav Shaul or anybody else called them to be. Justin Martyr's words and actions were put above what the Biblical writers were trying to lay claims to by himself. This we have also seen from Ignatius and it is quite plausible that he was following suit from Ignatius. Regarding the Eucharist, we see from Justin Martyr "He then speaks of those Gentiles, namely us, who in every place offer sacrifices to Him, i.e., the bread of the Eucharist, and also the cup of the Eucharist, affirming both that we glorify His name, and that you profane it." (Dialogue with Trypho). Once again, we see his politically motivated agenda is to put something unBiblical in the place of something Biblical (the Eucharist is neither mentioned nor taught about in the Bible) in order to alleviate himself and others the responsibility of having to follow Jewish beliefs regarding the Passover. We see that Justin Martyr, henceforth does not follow a Biblically sound doctrine by any means, and he should be avoided as a source who is a strong follower of Yeshua. Though revered as a strong follower of Yeshua, we clearly see that his actions speak otherwise. He is certainly deviating from God's commandments in the Torah, to follow his feast days, and shabbats.
Perhaps Justin Martyr would have done well to listen to Trypho's statement in his Dialogue with Trypho. Trypho states, "“(You Christians) spurn the commands…and then try to convince us (Torah-observant Jews) that you know God, when you fail to do those things that every God-fearing person would do. If, therefore, you can give a satisfactory reply to these charges and can show us on what you place your hopes, even though you refuse to obey the Law, we will listen to you most willingly, and then we can go on and examine in the same manner our other differences.”18
Justin Martyr fails to give an adequate explanation to this. He instead insists that the Torah was "obsolete." This is his given interpretation, nothing from the Bible declares this. He actually even has to concede "“Yes, Trypho, “I conceded, there are some Christians who…desire to observe as many of the Mosaic precepts as possible—precepts which we think were instituted because of your hardness of heart—while at the same time they place their hope in Christ…”20 when Trypho asks him if it were possible to follow the Torah and Yeshua. Not only some Christians, but there were entire Messianic groups who did the same. (Nazarenes, Ebionites, Pseudoclementines just to name a few).
When actually reading through Justin Martyr's books and looking at the strategy that Christians today utilize in debating, we can see a similarity. The overall theme that we see from Christians in Apologetics is those who will put down people who do not share their belief systems in order to make themselves look superior. Justin Martyr demonstrates this same attitude through his writings. Christians are not far off from this example. And thats the problem. We have to understand the background of whats going on, and why Martyr is doing this. His example should not be followed. It is neither healthy as a perspective to utilize in debating and evangelizing nor rewarding. When I followed the footsteps of Justin Martyr, I was responsible for the conversion of 0 people. The constant complaint I hear from Christians who are in Apologetics is that they always get angry Atheists or other religious people who come they feel forced to minister to when they correspond with them. Instead of helping the cause out, they demonstrate a prideful spirit. Apologetics has a place, but it does NOT serve the place of which Christians have placed it. Yeshua was gentle, yet honest when speaking to people, not harsh in tone. He did not belittle people, but rather was understanding. He would certainly ask the Pharisees "have you not read" "Have you not heard". It is also a true claim that Yeshua was utilizing this language for the purpose of demonstrating to the Pharisees that they were on the wrong path. But was it utilized to belittle pharisees? This goes against the nature of being humble in spirit that Yeshua was talking about. So the answer is indubitably no. If God is slow to anger, then so must Yeshua be. And likewise, so must we be. Remember these words when debating ALWAYS. 14Keep reminding them of these things. Warn them before God against quarreling about words; it is of no value, and only ruins those who listen. 15Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth. 16Avoid godless chatter, because those who indulge in it will become more and more ungodly. 17Their teaching will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus. I don't know about everyone else, but I'm sick of my teaaching spreading like gangrene. Its time for us to stop approaching discussions in the way that we do, and turn away from debating. Its time we handle things according to 1 Peter 3:15 "15But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect," So we must give an answer for why we believe, but NOT DEBATE. We must be gentle. We must be polite. We can not go around with a haughty spirit and put down people because we believe they are inferior to us and expect people who are from different religious backgrounds to listen to us. We have seen that Martyr's intentions were not to attempt to convert Jews. Why would Christians go around utilizing the same strategy when witnessing to other people? We will continue to have no new converts to the kingdom of heaven this way. Instead of patronizing people who don't want to hear the word of God, (we need not base this on our own voices), rather do the opposite and listen to what the Bible says. Dust your feet off and move on to another place.
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