Dialogue with Trypho 5.6 · Sophia Scriptura

Summary: There can be only one uncreated being, the cause of all.

Greek text · Archambault 1:32

Ὅθεν οὐδὲ πολλά ἐστι τὰ ἀγέννητα· εἰ γὰρ διαφορά τις ἦν ἐν αὐτοῖς, οὐκ ἂν εὕροις ἀναζητῶν τὸ αἴτιον τῆς διαφορᾶς, ἀλλʼ, ἐπʼ ἄπειρον ἀεὶ τὴν διάνοιαν πέμπων, ἐπὶ ἑνός ποτε στήσῃ ἀγεννήτου καμὼν καὶ τοῦτο φήσεις ἁπάντων αἴτιον. Ἢ ταῦτα ἔλαθε, φημὶ ἐγώ, Πλάτωνα καὶ Πυθαγόραν, σοφοὺς ἄνδρας, οἳ ὥσπερ τεῖχος ἡμῖν καὶ ἔρεισμα φιλοσοφίας ἐξεγένοντο;

English · Claude translation

“Hence there are not many unbegotten things either; for if there were some difference among them, you would not find the cause of the difference by searching, but, sending your thought on and on to infinity, you would at last grow weary and stop at one unbegotten being, and say that this is the cause of all.” “Did these things escape Plato and Pythagoras,” I said, “wise men, who have become for us like a wall and a buttress of philosophy?”

About this passage

Source

Archambault 1:32 · Georges Archambault, ed., Justin: Dialogue avec Tryphon, 2 vols., Textes et documents pour l'étude historique du christianisme 8, 11 (Paris: Picard, 1909) · Greek text: G. Archambault, Justin: Dialogue avec Tryphon (Paris, 1909), digitized by the Perseus Digital Library and published by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0

Text

As printed in Archambault. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.

Translation

Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-26 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Archambault (1909); made independently of existing English translations.

Compare

Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1 (1885) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)

Cite this passage

Justin, Dial. 5.6 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/justin-dialogue/5/6/).

Plain text

Justin, Dial. 5.6 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/justin-dialogue/5/6/).