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Dialogue with Trypho / Chapter 58

Dialogue with Trypho 58

1 verses • Goodspeed Greek (Die ältesten Apologeten, 1914)

Translator's Introduction

What This Chapter Is About

Justin extends the proof from Genesis 18 to Jacob's visions in Genesis 28 and 31. The figure who appeared to Jacob is identified scripturally as both an Angel and as God — the same configuration as the Mamre theophany. Justin reads Jacob's ladder-vision and the wrestling at Peniel as further appearances of the pre-existent Logos. The figure who speaks to Jacob 'I am the God of Bethel' (Gen 31:13) is, on Justin's reading, the same 'other God and Lord' he established in §56.

What Makes This Chapter Remarkable

Dial. 58 is the Christological deployment of exactly the same Genesis 31:13 LXX text that Philo had exegeted at On Dreams §230 (TCR /philo-somn/1/230). Where Philo identified the speaker as 'the second god,' Justin identifies the speaker as the pre-existent Christ. The exegetical configurations are isomorphic; only the historical-identification of the figure differs. This is the load-bearing example of the pre-Nicene Tier S corroboration argument: pre-Christian Hellenistic Judaism and the earliest Christian apologists are reading the same Genesis passages with the same hermeneutical framework.

Translation Friction

Trypho will resist the Christological identification but not (yet) the underlying framework. The chapter's argument depends entirely on the framework being granted: there is an 'Angel-God' figure distinct from God-the-Maker; the question Justin still has to answer is whether that figure is Jesus.

Connections

Genesis 28:10-22 (Jacob's ladder); Genesis 31:11-13 (the Angel of God who says 'I am the God of Bethel'); Genesis 32:24-30 (the wrestling at Peniel); Philo, On Dreams §230 (the speaker at Gen 31:13 identified as δεύτερος θεός — the same passage Justin is exegeting, with the Logos-doctrine framework intact); Philo, On the Cherubim §28 (the Logos between divine Powers — the framework Justin's 'Angel-God' inherits); Hosea 12:4 ('he wrestled with the angel and prevailed' — a prophetic gloss on Genesis 32 Justin will lean on); Genesis 35:9-13 (God appearing to Jacob a second time).

Dialogue with Trypho 58:1

ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐκ τῶν ὁράσεων τῶν φανέντων τῷ Ἰακὼβ ἀναγκαζόμενοι ὁμολογεῖτε, ὅτι λέγεται καὶ καλεῖται ἕτερος ὁ ὀφθεὶς θεός τε καὶ ἄγγελος καὶ κύριος καὶ ἄνθρωπος ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ ποιητοῦ τῶν ὅλων.

Even from Jacob's visions, you have to concede this: the one who appeared is called another — God and Angel and Lord and Man — distinct from the God who is Maker of all things.

REF But from the visions which appeared to Jacob, you yourselves are compelled to admit that another One is said to be — and is called — God, and Angel, and Lord, and Man, distinct from the God who is Maker of all things. (Schaff, ANF I, p. 225, paraphrased)

Notes & Key Terms 2 terms

Key Terms

ὁ ὀφθείς ho ophtheis
"the one who appeared" — aorist passive participle of ὁράω ('to see'); the one who became visible

The technical participle Septuagintal theophany-language uses (Gen 12:7, 17:1, 18:1, 26:2, 31:13, etc.). Philo uses the same participle at Somn. I.§230. The 'one who appeared' is a stable phrase for the visible-revealing divine figure — what philosophical Greek would call the Logos and what Justin will identify with Christ.

ποιητὴς τῶν ὅλων poiētēs tōn holōn
"Maker of all things" — the Creator of the whole, the supreme God in his cosmogonic aspect

Justin's preferred designation for the Father / supreme God, parallel to Philo's ὁ ὤν ('the One Who Is'). The distinction Justin draws — 'other than the Maker of all things' — preserves monotheism while creating the conceptual space for the Logos as a numerically distinct divine figure subordinate to the Maker. Pre-Nicene Christology runs on this distinction; the Arian-Nicene controversy is the eventual decision about how to read the 'subordinate' relation.

Translator Notes

  1. Goodspeed, p. 159 (Dial. 58.1); Schaff, ANF I, p. 225. Justin extends the §56 argument from Genesis 18 (Mamre) to Genesis 28 (Bethel) and Genesis 32 (Peniel). The Logos-figure is named with four titles in one breath: God, Angel, Lord, Man. The four-title cluster echoes Philo's habit of stacking titles for the Logos at Confusion of Tongues §146 — ἀρχή, ὄνομα θεοῦ, λόγος, ὁ κατ' εἰκόνα ἄνθρωπος, ὁρῶν Ἰσραήλ. The titulary methodology is shared; the Christological identification is the Christian innovation.
  2. The chapter directly engages Genesis 31:11-13 LXX — the Angel of God who says ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ θεὸς ὁ ὀφθείς σοι ἐν τόπῳ θεοῦ ('I am the God who appeared to thee in the place of God'). Philo had read precisely this verse at On Dreams §230 (TCR /philo-somn/1/230) and reached the binitarian conclusion: ὁ δὲ δεύτερος θεὸς ἐν δευτέρᾳ τάξει κατονομάζηται ('the second god is named in second rank'). Justin's reading here is structurally identical: there is θεός distinct from ὁ ποιητὴς τῶν ὅλων ('the Maker of all things'). The conceptual continuity Philo → Justin is exact.
  3. ἄνθρωπος ('man') in Justin's four-title cluster is consequential. Where Philo's titles for the Logos remained at the threshold of personification but did not predicate a literal humanity, Justin adds 'Man' to the list — and the proof he is building toward is that this 'Man' is the Christ born of a virgin. The genealogical move from Philonic title-stacking to Christian Christology happens at exactly this point: ἄνθρωπος is the bridge from a divine-mediator figure to a specific human person.
  4. Cross-reference Philo, On the Cherubim §28 (TCR /philo-cher/1/28): Philo locates the Logos between the two divine Powers (creative + kingly) and identifies it with the flaming sword of Gen 3:24. Justin's 'Angel and God' configuration here is the same in-between figure — one whose identity is precisely his betweenness.
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