Justin on the Trinity

Listening to: 'Let us break their bonds asunder (Chorus)' by Handel (Sir Colin Davis)

Monday June 1st was the feast of Justin Martyr, and Sunday (tomorrow) is Trinity Sunday. So here are some quotes from Justin on the Trinity. These are great because the doctrine of the Trinity wasn't formalised really until after the Christological controversies which ran on through the likes of Cyril, Athanasius, and on to Chalcedon. So here we have a first century believer explaining his understanding of the three persons from the Bible.

Justin's main point here is to prove to Jewish people and to the gentile authorities that it is right to worship Jesus as God, yet as a distinct person from the Creator. In the process, he speaks of God's Triunity- mentioning the Holy Spirit too. Enjoy.


'The Father of the universe has a Son, who also being the first begotten Word of God, is even God.'
(First Apology, 63)

'But if you knew, Trypho,' continued I, 'who He is that is called at one time the Angel of great counsel, and a Man by Ezekiel, and like the Son of man by Daniel, and a Child by Isaiah, and Christ and God to be worshipped by David, and Christ and a Stone by many, and Wisdom by Solomon, and Joseph and Judah and a Star by Moses, and the East by Zechariah, and the Suffering One and Jacob and Israel by Isaiah again, and a Rod, and Flower, and Corner Stone, and Son of God, you would not have blasphemed Him who has now come, and been born, and suffered, and ascended to heaven; who shall also come again, and then your twelve tribes shall mourn. For if you had understood what has been written by the prophets, you would not have denied that He was God, Son of the only, unbegotten, unutterable God. For Moses says somewhere in Exodus the following: `The Lord spake to Moses, and said to him, I am the Lord, and I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, being their God; and my name I revealed not to them, and I established my covenant with them.' And thus again he says, 'A man wrestled with Jacob,' and asserts it was God; narrating that Jacob said, 'I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.''
(Dialogue with Trypho, CXXVI)

'We will prove that we worship him reasonably; for we have learned that he is the Son of the true God Himself, that he holds a second place, and the Spirit of prophecy a third. For this they accuse us of madness, saying that we attribute to a crucified man a place second to the unchangeable and eternal God, the Creator of all things; but they are ignorant of the Mystery which lies therein'
(First Apology, 13:5-6)