Justin’s Hortatory Address to the Greeks

Justin’s Hortatory Address to the Greeks is an early Christian apologetic work attributed to Justin Martyr (c. 100-165 AD), addressing pagan Greek readers and urging them to consider the claims of Christianity. The attribution is sometimes contested by modern patristic scholarship, with some scholars assigning the work to a slightly later writer working in the Justinian tradition.

The Address presents arguments aimed at the educated Greek pagan audience of the second century Mediterranean world. It draws on large knowledge of Greek philosophy, mythology, and literature to argue that the Christian tradition fulfills what was best in the Greek intellectual inheritance while correcting its various errors. The argument was a common one in second and third century Christian apologetics, with various other writers including Clement of Alexandria and Origen developing similar positions at greater length.

The work belongs to the sizable body of early Christian apologetic literature that survives from the second century and is essential reading for the intellectual history of early Christianity.