Justin Martyr’s Knowledge of the Gospel of John

Justin Martyr was a Christian apologist writing primarily around 150-160 AD. He refers to the gospels as the “memoirs of the apostles” and once describes them as “the memoirs which… were drawn up by His apostles and those who followed them” (Dialogue with Trypho 103). Many scholars take for granted that Justin does not include the Fourth Gospel in his “memoirs”. [1] That Justin regarded Revelation as the work of “John, one of the apostles of Christ” and resided in Ephesus, the same city in which John resided, while writing his Dialogue only makes this apparent silence all the more surprising. Justin cites the Gospels around 170 times, but by far most of these quotations come from the synoptic Gospels. However, a number of lines of evidence show that Justin did, in fact, know the Fourth Gospel and regarded it as part of his “memoirs”.    

First, in First Apology 1.61.4 Justin quotes from what looks like a variation of John 3:3: 

For Christ also said, “Unless you be born again, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven [Ἂν μὴ ἀναγεννηθῆτε, οὐ μὴ εἰσέλθητε εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τῶν οὐρανῶν].” Now, that it is impossible for those who have once been born to enter into their mothers’ wombs, is manifest to all.

This text is not a verbatim quote of John 3:3. Justin uses the word ἀναγεννηθῆτε (“born again”) instead of John’s ἄνωθεν (“again” or “from above”); οὐ μὴ εἰσέλθητε (“you shall not enter”) is used instead of John’s phrase οὐ δύναται ἰδεῖν (“he cannot see”); Justin’s τὴν βασιλείαν τῶν οὐρανῶν (“kingdom of heaven”) varies from John’s βασιλείαν τοῦ Θεοῦ (“kingdom of God”). In fact, the entirety of the second half of Justin’s phrase, οὐ μὴ εἰσέλθητε εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τῶν οὐρανῶν, matches exactly the second half of Matthew 18:3. Some manuscripts and patristic works read “kingdom of heaven” for John 3:3, so it is possible that Justin could have known the verse in this form. [2] Nevertheless, Justin’s quotation appears close enough to John 3:3 that there was likely some degree of influence from the Fourth Gospel.

   

Second, John’s Christology is an influence on Justin’s theology. Justin speaks of Christ “becoming man” (ἄνθρωπος γέγονεν), “having been made flesh” (σαρκοποιηθείς), and “becoming man according to his [God’s] will” (καὶ τῇ βουλῇ αὐτοῦ γενόμενος ἄνθρωπος). More explicitly, in Dialogue 105.1 Justin says the following:     

For I have already proved that He was the only-begotten of the Father of all things, being begotten in a peculiar manner Word and Power by Him, and having afterwards become man through the Virgin, as we have learned from the memoirs.

Justin’s statement here is loaded with Johannine Christology: Jesus was the “only-begotten”, he was begotten as “Word”, and he afterward “became man”. Moreover, Justin says that Christians have learned this from the memoirs. The implication of this passage is that Justin included the Fourth Gospel in his “memoirs”. 

Third, that Justin calls the Gospels the memoirs drawn up by Jesus’ apostles and those who followed them suggests, at minimum, that Justin knew four Gospels. The most natural reading of this statement is that he refers to Matthew and John in the first half and Mark and Luke in the second half. 

A final argument for Justin’s inclusion of the Fourth Gospel within his “memoirs” is one defended by Charles Hill. [3] Hill argues that Justin’s phrase “the Acts which took place under Pontius Pilate” (ἐκ τῶν ἐπὶ Ποντίου Πιλάτου γενομένων ἄκτων) is used interchangeably with “the memoirs of the apostles”. In support of this he cites two cases in which Justin uses these phrases interchangeably. In First Apology 35 and 38 Justin cites Psalm 22:16 and 18 and tells the emperor that he can read the fulfillment of this prophecy in “the Acts which took place under Pontius Pilate”, but in Dialogue with Trypho 104 he tells Trypho that he can read about this fulfillment in “the memoirs of the apostles”. In another instance, Justin says that Psalm 22:7 was fulfilled in the “Acts” (First Apology 38) but elsewhere says that it was fulfilled in the “memoirs” (Dialogue 101.1-4). 

After establishing the link between Justin’s “memoirs” and “Acts”, Hill proceeds to show how Justin uses John’s Gospel as one of the “Acts”. Of the four examples he gives, here is just one. In First Apology 35:4, Justin says that Isaiah 58:2 was fulfilled when “they tormented him [Jesus], and set him on the judgment-seat [αὐτὸν ἐκάθισαν ἐπὶ βήματος]”. John’s Gospel alone mentions the judgment-seat, and Justin’s wording matches John 19:13 (αὐτὸν ἐκάθισαν ἐπὶ βήματος). In First Apology 35:9 Justin tells the emperor that he can learn about the fulfillment of Isaiah 58:2 in “the Acts which took place under Pontius Pilate.” 

Therefore it is very likely that Justin includes the Fourth Gospel in his “memoirs”, and probably considered it to be the work of an apostle. However, the relative paucity of direct quotes from the Fourth Gospel throughout Justin’s work still deserves explanation. One proposal is that Justin did not quote the Gospel frequently because there were doubts about it’s apostolic status in Rome. Another is that Justin was hesitant to quote it because of its abuse by the Gnostics at this time. Lastly, as Martin Hengel has written, “the Fourth Gospel provided little for practical paraenesis and ethics, which were essential for the life of the church and for apologetics.” [4] Given the relatively poor attestation for any substantially widespread doubt concerning the authority of the Fourth Gospel in Rome, I judge the first proposal to be the weakest. 

References

[1] E.g., J.W. Pryor, “Justin Martyr and the Fourth Gospel.” The Second Century: a Journal of Early Christian Studies 9, issue 3, (1992): 153-169; C. H. Dodd, Historical Tradition in the Fourth Gospel (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1963), 13.

[2] Graham Stanton, Jesus and the Gospel. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 102. 

[3] Charles E. Hill, “Was John’s Gospel Among Justin’s Apostolic Memoirs?” In Justin Martyr and His Worlds, eds. Sara Parvis and Paul Foster. (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2007).

[4] Martin Hengel, The Johannine Question, trans. John Bowden. (Philadelphia: Trinity Press International, 1989), 13. Similarly Stanton, Jesus, 76, adding that Justin’s hesitation to cite the Fourth Gospel extensively “may be related to his strong interest in infancy narratives” and “futurist eschatological sayings”.