| | naeus.

[Footnote: D. 72 a passage ostensibly from Ezra, but probably an
apocryphal addition, perhaps from Preaching of Peter; same quotation
in Lactantius.]

It is impossible not to be struck with the amount of matter that
Justin has transferred to his pages bodily. He has quoted nine
Psalms entire, and a tenth with the statement (twice repeated)
that it is given entire, though really he has only quoted twenty-
three verses. The later chapters of Isaiah are also given with
extraordinary fulness. These longer passages are generally quoted
accurately. If Justin's text differs from the received text of the
LXX, it is frequently found that he has some extant authority for
his reading. The way in which Credner has drawn out these
varieties of reading, and the results which he obtained as to the
relations and comparative value of the different MSS., form
perhaps the most interesting feature of his work. The more marked
divergences in Justin may be referred to two causes; (1) quotation
from memory, in which he indulges freely, especially in the
shorter passages, and more in the Apology than in the Dialogue
with Tryphon; (2) in Messianic passages the use of a Targum, not
immediately by Justin himself but in some previous document from
which he quotes, in order to introduce a more distinctly Christian
interpretation; the coincidences between Justin and other
Christian writers show that the text of the LXX had been thus
modified in a Christian sense, generally through a closer
comparison with and nearer return to the Hebrew, before his time.
The instances of free quotation are not perhaps quite fully given
in the above list, but it will be seen that though they form a
marked phenomenon, still more marked is the amount of exactness.
Any long, not Messianic, passage, it appears to be the rule with
Justin to quote exactly. Among the passages quoted freely there
seem to be none of greater length than four verses.

The exactness is especially remarkable in the plain historical
narratives of the Pentateuch and the Psalms, though it is also
evident that Justin had the MS. before him, and referred to it
frequently throughout the quotations from the latter part of
Isaiah. Through following the arrangement of Credner we have
failed to notice the cases of combination; these however are
collected by Dr. Westcott (On the Canon, p. 156). The most
remarkable instance is in Apol. i. 52, where six different