The Letter to Diognetus.

        In a Strassburg manuscript of some Greek writings falsely ascribed to Justin that was destroyed in the burning of the cathedral library during the siege of 1870, there stood a Letter to Diognetus. It has never been found in any other manuscript, nor has any reference to it been identified in Christian literature. The text is broken at two points (7:6 and 10: 1), and the final chapters (11 and 12), are evidently from another work altogether, perhaps from a homily of Melito of Sardis or someone belonging to his circle, although some have thought them a fragment from Hippolytus.

        Diognetus was the tutor of Marcus Aurelius, and he may be the individual ostensibly addressed in the opening lines: “Since I perceive, most excellent Diognetus, that you are exceedingly zealous to learn the religion of the Christians.” The ten or twelve short pages of the Letter proper reveal a decidedly rhetorical style, which sometimes seems to be more the concern of the writer than what he has to say. It bristles with antitheses; in short, it is so full of art that it verges on the artificial. The letter reflects the increasing concern of Christian writers with matters of literary style and belongs with such documents as the paschal homily by Melito of Sardis or the Protrepticus by Clement of Alexandria. Its author follows traditional apologetic patterns in attacking pagan idolatry and Jewish sacrifices, but develops more original ideas in describing the mission of Christ and the work of Christians in the world; their relation to the world is analogous to that of soul and body. H.-I. Marrou has convincingly dated the work in the late second century or the early third.