Saint Justin was a layman and the first great Christian philosopher who wrote books of sizable length. His own writing gives details of his life. According to his account his pagan parents were of Greek origin. He was given a liberal education and devoted himself particularly to rhetoric, poetry, and history. He then moved on to the study of philosophy, and he studied the system of the Stoics, then gave it up because it taught him nothing of God.

    He applied to the school of Pythagoras but was told that a preliminary knowledge of music, geometry, and astronomy would be required. He came into contact with a respected Platonist, however, who led him to the science of God.

    One day, while wandering near the seashore, reflecting upon one of Plato's maxims, he saw an impressive-looking old man, whom he engaged in a discussion about the maxim. The man told him of a philosophy nobler and more fulfilling than any he had yet studied-- one that had been revealed by God to the Hebrew prophets and culminated in Jesus Christ.

    Justin was inspired to study the Scriptures and to learn about Christianity. He found that while the teachings of Plato are not identical to Christianity, they led him to embrace the teachings of Jesus. He is said to have become converted by his reading and by observing the heroism of martyrs. He became a Christian at the age of 30 and was baptized at Ephesus or Alexandria, both cities that he visited.

    In his teaching as well as his writing, he described the faith of the Christians and what took place at their meetings, an approach that most early Christians avoided in order to protect their rites from profanation. He tried to show that faith was compatible with rational thought.

    He traveled much and held disputations with pagans, heretics, and Jews. At a time when Christians were continually subjected to persecution by the civil authorities, his first open defense of Christianity was addressed to the Emperor Antonius Pius, along with the emperor's three adopted sons. His second great public defense, written about the year 161 was addressed to the Roman Senate itself.

    Justin did not believe that everything he learned before becoming a Christian must necessarily be untrue. "Those who have been inspired by the creative word of God, see through this a measure of the truth," he wrote. "We are taught that Christ, the first-born of God, is the word of which the whole human race partakes, so that those who before him lived according to reason may be called Christian, even though accounted atheists." Justin wanted to embrace people like the Greek Socrates and the Jewish father Abraham into the fold of Christianity.

    At last he came to Rome, where he opened a Christian school, with Tatian as one of his students. At some point he presented his Apology to the emperor Marcus Aurelius. He argued in public with a Cynic named Crescens, whom he accused of ignorance and misrepresentation. It is believed that it was through the machinations of Crescens' followers that Justin was arrested.

    He was brought before Rusticus, the prefect of Rome, and records of his trial still exist. He stated his beliefs openly. When asked to sacrifice to idols, Justin replied, "No right-minded man forsakes truth for falsehood." He was sentenced to be scourged and beheaded. Six other Christians, including a woman, died with him (Bentley, White).