Aristide's apology, its form and addressee

Samoilov Dmitrii Aleksandrovich ORCID: 0000-0003-1872-9206 Assistant of Department of Foreign History of Voronezh State Pedagogical University 86 Lenin Street, Voronezh, 394043, Russia, Voronezh Region dmitrsamojlo@yandex.ru

In modern antiquity, the study of early Christian apologetics is of increasing interest. The problems of the apologia genre, its audience and functions are actively discussed ^{[5, p. 1-2]}. This circumstance is caused by the relevance of our research.

As you know, many apologists of the II century addressed their writings directly to the rulers of the Roman Empire themselves. However, at the turn of the XX-XXI centuries, the question began to be debated in science (primarily in the West): did the apologists really intend their works for the emperors, and for the pagan audience as a whole? This issue has become particularly relevant with the release of P. L. Bak's research on the form and social addressee of early Christian apologies. After analyzing in detail the apologies addressed to the emperors, the researcher came to the conclusion that these works were never intended for the rulers of the empire, and mentioning them as addressees is just a literary stylization ^{[8, p. 242]}. Also, P. L. Bak argues that even among the external, non-Christian audience, the works in question have not received wide circulation. Hence, the researcher concludes that the apologies were intended primarily for a Christian audience ^{[8, p. 263]}. The same approach to early Christian apologetics is also presented in the collective monograph "Apologetics in the Roman Empire: Pagans, Jews, Christians" ^{[5, p. 8]}. At the same time, some modern authors still claim that apologists could really appeal to an external pagan audience ^{[18, p. 43]}; ^{[19, p. 124]}.  So, what was the real addressee of the apologies? So, perhaps, we will define the problems of our research. But we will make a reservation right away that in the framework of this work we will focus on one of the first apologies of Christianity – the apology of Aristide.

Thus, the object of our work is early Christian apologetics as a socio-cultural phenomenon. The subject is Aristide's apology, its form and social addressee. The methodology of this research is based on the principles of historicism and objectivism, the specific methods that we use in our work are the historical-comparative, historical-genetic and historical-system method. The problems of the social addressee of Aristide 's apology include two questions: 1) which emperor (Adrian or Antoninus Pius) Aristide intended his work; 2) was the emperor the real addressee of this work?

Let's start solving the first question. According to Eusebius, another author, Aristides the Philosopher, "like Codratus, presented to Hadrian the apology of faith" (Eus. Hist. Eccl. IV. 3. 3). In the Chronicle, Eusebius points to the joint submission of the apologies of Codrates and Aristides to Hadrian in 125, during the emperor's stay in Athens, where he was initiated into the Eleusinian mysteries (PG. 19. Col. 557-558). The same indication is found in Hieronymus of Stridon (Hier. De vir. ill. 19) and Paul Orosius (Oros. VII. 13. 2). However, both the dating of the apology and its addressee began to raise doubts at the turn of the XIX-XX centuries.

The fact is that Aristide's apology has been preserved in three versions: in Armenian (only a fragment) and Syriac translations and in Greek as part of the medieval story "About Barlaam and Josaphat". Of these, the Syriac version more accurately reproduces the structure of the original apology, while the Greek greatly reduces the original text, adjusting it to the needs of the story ^{[4, p. 277]}. The Armenian translation is characterized by verbosity and foreign inserts. Thus, when studying the apology of Aristide, the researcher must rely on all three versions. The addressee of the apology is indicated only in the Armenian and Syriac texts. In the Armenian text, the preamble looks like this: "To Emperor Caesar Adrian Aristides, philosopher of Athens" ^{[22, p. 27]}, i.e. the Armenian text confirms the addressee, which is evidenced by the church-historical tradition. But in the Syriac translation, in addition to the preamble, where Hadrian is indicated as the addressee ("The apology that Aristide the philosopher held before King Hadrian in defense of the worship of God"), there is another postscript, where Antoninus Pius is already indicated as the addressee: "(Emperor) Caesar Titus Adrian Antoninus, august and gracious, from Marcian Aristides, the philosopher from Athens" ^{[22, p. 35]}.

In the research literature since the time of J. Attempts have been made by Randall Harris to prove that the apology in question was actually addressed not to Adrian, but to Antonin Pius. The argument here boils down to the following points. As Harris notes, the preamble, where Adrian is designated as the addressee, is more of a literary character than an official one ^{[22, p. 8]}. In this preamble, there is no full name of Adrian, all his titles are omitted. On the contrary, the second preamble is more formal: Antonin's name is given in full with the indication of titles, the full name of the author of the apology ("Marcian Aristide") is also given, which to a greater extent could correspond to the norms of addressing the emperor ^{[22, p. 8-9]}. But in this case, how to explain the fact that the entire church-historical tradition resolutely connects the apology of Aristide with the Emperor Hadrian? Here some researchers refer to the fact that neither Eusebius nor Jerome were directly familiar with the text of Aristide, so they could make a mistake about the addressee of the apology ^{[4, p. 46]}; ^{[6, p. 47]}; ^{[17, p. 228]}. The unfamiliarity of Eusebius with the apology Aristide indicates the nature of his message: "And Aristide, her husband is faithful standing firmly in our piety, like Quadratus presented Adrien's apology of faith, saying [it]: stored the same things many to this day ( , ' , ? )" (Eus. Hist. Eccl. IV. 3. 3). As we can see, Eusebius says little about Aristide himself and does not report anything meaningful about his apology: he mentions that it is kept in the Church at his time, but at the same time neither gives it any characteristics, nor quotes from it, which is clearly at odds with his information about other apologists (for example, about the same Codrate) ^{[14, p. 102]}. Jerome's message about Aristide, in turn, depends entirely on Eusebius ^{[14, p. 104]}.

J. R. Harris also gives several arguments in favor of the fact that the apology of Aristide should relate to a fairly early time, to the beginning of the Antonine principate. Firstly, this is indicated by the simplicity of the style, as well as the ideas expressed by the apologist and the religious practices mentioned by him ^{[22; p. 13]}. Secondly, Harris notices Aristide's very friendly tone towards the Jewish creed – a tone that was unthinkable already for the middle of the second century, as can be seen in the works of Justin Martyr. Thirdly, Harris discovers traces of the early apostolic creed in the apology under consideration, in particular in the wording "He (Christ) was crucified by the Jews." This also indicates the early dating of Aristide's work, since in the later creeds we find the wording according to which Christ was crucified "under Pontius Pilate" ^{[22; p. 13-14]}.

Arguments in favor of the hypothesis about Antonin Pius as the addressee of the apology under consideration made a certain impression; this position was shared and is shared by the authors of many solid courses of patrology and early Christian literature ^{[1, p. 237]}; ^{[6, p. 47]}; ^{[9, p. 46]}; ^{[15, p. 272]}. Moreover, in the reconstruction of the text of the apology, undertaken at the beginning of the last century by I. Geffken, the name of Antonin was indicated in the preamble of the work ^{[12, p. 3]}; ^{[10, p. 2]}. However, a number of researchers continue to adhere to Eusebius' version that the addressee of Aristide's apology was the Emperor Adrian ^{[2, p. 221-222]}; ^{[3, p. 186]}; ^{[20, p. 192]}. And it's no coincidence. Let's try to weigh the arguments offered by the proponents of the hypothesis about Antonin Pius as the addressee of the apology. The first thing to pay attention to is that R. Harris and his followers build their conclusions only on the basis of the Syrian translation of this work (and only on the mention of the second addressee, who is indicated in this translation) and ignore the Armenian text. Meanwhile, Hadrian is designated as the addressee in it, and in this regard, the text in question does not contradict either the information of Eusebius or the information of Jerome.

In this regard, R.M. Grant put forward an assumption that "reconciles" the Syrian text with the Armenian one. According to him there were two editions of the apology: 1) a short version corresponding to the preserved Armenian translation and the Greek text was addressed to the Emperor Hadrian and should be dated before the Jewish uprising of 132 (this is evidenced by the benevolent tone towards the Jews); 2) a lengthy version corresponding to the preserved Syriac translation was already addressed to Antonin Pius ^{[13, p. 38-39][11, p. 39]}. R. Grant also points here to the condemnation of homosexuality in the Syriac text of the apology (Aristid. Apol. 17), which was hardly appropriate under Hadrian, given his connection with Antinous. On the contrary, under Antoninus Pius, criticism of Antinous and his deification would have been possible for apologists ^{[13, p. 38]}; ^{[18, p. 46]}. But let us turn to the text of Aristide itself. The quote to which R. Grant refers is as follows: "But the Greeks, the king, who defile themselves with sodomy, connection with mothers, sisters and daughters, turn everything worthy of ridicule in their uncleanness against Christians" (Aristid. Apol. 17; N. Krestnikov lane). As we can see, we are not talking about specific individuals here, the above phrase carries a purely apologetic meaning: Christians are not guilty of committing those flagitia that pagans attribute to them (homosexuality and incest), on the contrary, flagitia designated are widespread among pagans themselves. Thus, there is no way to assert that this passage contains criticism of Antinous and his cult. R. Grant's point of view about two editions, in our opinion, cannot be accepted for one more reason. We have seen that according to the Grant, the second, lengthy version of the apology corresponds to the Syriac text (from the researcher's point of view, it was submitted to Antonin Pius), while the short version corresponds to Greek and Armenian. Meanwhile, as B. Pudron rightly notes, the preserved Armenian fragment is closer not to the Greek text, but to the lengthy Syrian version. At the same time, Adrian is indicated as the addressee in it ^{[19, p. 122]}. Finally, on our own behalf, we add that a benevolent tone towards the Jews is present in both the Greek and the Syriac text of the apology, so here we also cannot talk about two editions. So, there is no reason to single out two editions of the apology with two different addressees.

Let us, however, take a closer look at the addressees that the Syriac text gives us (recall that in the Syriac translation of the apology there are two recipients: one is Adrian, which is confirmed by the church–historical tradition and the Armenian translation, the other is Antonin Pius). R. Harris pointed out that it was the appeal to Antonin Pius to a greater extent it had to comply with accepted standards. But is it really that perfect? Let's bring him: "(The Emperor?) (ahd kul) Caesar Titus Adrian Antoninus, august and gracious, from Marcian Aristides, a philosopher from Athens." The first thing that catches your eye is the inconsistency of the name, which stands in the singular, and the titles "august" (seg?d?) and "most gracious" (meraem?n?), indicated in the plural. The second problem is that the addressee is indicated in the nominative case, although it should be in the dative. The third mistake is the expression ad kul, consistent with the name of the emperor. Harris believed that this expression corresponds to the Greek word or the Latin imperator ^{[22, p. 8]}. Although in the Greek language this corresponds rather to the word , used in Christian literature to denote the Most High God, but by no means the emperor ^{[18, p. 44]}. Some authors believe that this expression mistakenly got into this sentence, in the sense it should be adjacent to the previous one ("The apology that Aristide the philosopher held before King Hadrian in defense of the veneration of God (Almighty)") ^{[18, p. 44]}. In general, we tend to agree that the second addressee, given in the Syriac text and containing a number of gross errors, resembles a later interpolation ^{[8, p. 160]}.

It is also necessary to dwell on the church-historical tradition, which testifies to Adrian as the addressee of our apologist. We believe that the neglect of this tradition, which is the supporters of the hypothesis of Antoninus Pius, is absolutely unjustified. Let's assume that Eusebius was not familiar with the text of Aristides. But after all, the provision of an apology to Hadrian is confirmed by other church historians: Jerome (Hier. De vir. ill. 19) and Paul Orosius (Oros. VII. 13. 2). Later Latin martyrologies also emphasize that it was Hadrian who was the emperor to whom Aristide presented his work ^{[14, p. 106-107]}. Let's make one more assumption: let all these testimonies depend entirely on Eusebius and none of the authors of these reports have ever seen the text of Aristide. But we can judge that in the ancient Church (and later) the work in question was widely distributed: this is evidenced, firstly, by Eusebius' direct indication that this apology has been preserved "by many to this day" (Eus. Hist. Eccl. IV. 3. 3), secondly, the fact of the translation of Aristide's work into several languages (Syriac and Armenian). With such prominence of this apology, the version about Antonin Pius as the addressee of the work should have "flashed" in the church-historical tradition. However, we do not see anything like this, the church-historical tradition unanimously defines Adrian as the addressee.

Finally, let us pay attention: R. Harris himself admitted that due to a number of features of the work, its early dating should be recognized. R. Harris, however, suggested the beginning of Antonin's reign (either 138 or 139) as the date of the apology ^{[22, p. 17]}. But because of the same circumstances, it can be attributed to the time of Adrian. Dare I say: it is more logical to insist on such a dating. After all, Harris himself noted that Aristide's tone is quite friendly to the Jews and their creed. But would such a tone have been possible in 138 or 139 after the powerful Jewish uprising led by Bar-Kohba (by the way, the persecutor of Christians: Iust. Apol. I. 31), and even in a text addressed to the emperor? Of course, from our point of view, such an essay could not have appeared before 132, i.e. the beginning of the last Jewish war, therefore, Adrian had to act as the addressee of the apology.

But here we come to the most important question: and was Adrian the real addressee of Aristide's work? And in general, who was Aristide addressing: a Christian or a non-Christian audience? P.L. Buck admits that if Aristide had addressed the emperor, he could have done it in two ways: 1) presenting his work as a private petition (libellus) addressed to Hadrian; 2) presenting his work as a scholarly or literary work (like the "Natural History" of Pliny the Elder, the speeches of Dion Chrysostom about the royal power, the "Onomasticon" of Pollux, etc.) ^{[8, p. 153]}.

The first option is rightly rejected by the Lhc, leading to several justifications. First of all, the inscription of the apology containing an appeal to the emperor, both in the Armenian text and in the Syrian, hardly corresponded to the norm of official petitions. Thus, in the inscription to the Armenian translation of the apology we read: "To Emperor Caesar Adrian Aristides, philosopher of Athens." We see that this address is unusually short: instead of the full name of the emperor (Titus Aelius Hadrian), only the cognomen Hadrian is left, and the title Augustus is also omitted. As P.L. Bak notes: "Not only is the inscription indecently short, but also when compared with the imperial addressees found in other petitions, it becomes obvious that the title of the Armenian text in its current state is disrespectful to the emperor" ^{[8, p. 155]}. As for the Syrian text, there, as we remember, two addressees are given: 1) "The apology that Aristides the philosopher held before King Hadrian in defense of the veneration of God"; 2) "Caesar Titus Hadrian Antoninus, august and gracious, from Marcian Aristides, the philosopher from Athens." In the first title we also see the incomplete name of the emperor, moreover, the emperor is awarded the title "tsar" (), which is not recorded in any official document of this era ^{[8, p. 156]}. The second appeal is closer in structure to official petitions, but, nevertheless, contains a number of errors (we cited them above: inconsistency of the singular name and the plural titles; nominative case instead of the dative in relation to the addressee; attribution of the word "Almighty" to the Emperor) ^{[8, p. 159-160]}.  Further, Buck points out that Aristide's apology "in no way defines a complaint or dispute on which the emperor is required to make a decision" ^{[8, p. 161]}. Aristide's petition has no subject as such. We would like to strengthen this remark of the Bac by the fact that the whole apology of Aristide, in principle, in its spirit does not give the impression of a petition or petition. You should carefully look at its content. At the beginning, the apologist talks about his ideas about God (Aristid. Apol. 1) and further asserts that there are four types of worship of God: barbaric, Greek, Jewish and Christian (Arisitid. Apol. 2). In the first three, the author finds a number of absurdities (Aristid. Apol. 3-14) and finally deduces Christianity as a doctrine devoid of any shortcomings, therefore, as true worship of God (Aristid. Apol. 15-17). That is, the author's task is to show the superiority of the Christian faith over all other religions and at the same time demonstrate that the vile rumors circulating about Christians among pagans are groundless (Aristid. Apol. 17). Aristide does not speak anywhere about the persecution or any oppression of Christians and does not ask the emperor to stop these very persecutions (such requests will be characteristic of apologetics of the middle and second half of the II century). Aristide's goal is to convince the emperor of the purity and truth of the Christian doctrine. Thus, this work should be characterized not as an official appeal to the princeps, but as a protreptic work ^{[18, p. 43]}. So, Aristide's work could not be presented as an official petition. We find this conclusion, which P.L. Bak comes to, convincing and fully share it. But the researcher herself is considering a second possibility for Aristide to provide an apology to the emperor: according to her, the apology could be presented as a scientific work.

Indeed, the authors of many works of ancient literature of the I-III centuries designated emperors as addressees of their works.  Among such texts, we can mention the "Nine Books of memorable Deeds and Sayings" of Valerius Maximus, addressed to Tiberius, and the "Natural History" of Pliny the Elder, addressed to Titus, and speeches on the royal power of Dion Chrysostom, presented to Trajan, and a treatise on the military art of Polyenus, intended for Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, and a treatise "On the fate of" Alexander of Aphrodisia, addressed to Septimius Severus and Caracalla. F. Millar emphasized that such works were created for instructive purposes and could represent a practical guide to action for the emperor ^{[16, p. 497-498]}. Moreover, this researcher noted that "the same may apply to Christian apologies of the second century, which cannot be fully understood if they are not compared with those exhortatory or instructive works that were so often addressed to the emperors during this period." "At least in their form they follow this tradition, and we must admit the possibility that some of them could really have been sent or even read to the emperors," concludes F. Millar ^{[16, p. 498]}.

But P.L. Buck resolutely rejects this assumption. She claims that Aristide's apology, if it had really been presented to the emperor, would have caused him "nothing but irritation" ^{[8, p. 165]}. Firstly, according to P.L. Buck, four chapters out of seventeen in the apology are devoted to the defense of the Christian faith and the Christian way of life: in fact, this is an "exaggerated and boastful" depiction of one's religion. Adrian would hardly have tolerated such a thing, because "his law actually made Christianity a criminal offense" ^{[8, p. 165]}. Secondly, Aristide's apology would not have seemed of any interest to the emperor: the facts about pagan mythology in it are trivial, while the mythology itself is criticized. Thirdly, Hadrian was hardly sympathetic to the information reported by Aristide about the Jewish religion, given the emperor's very uncomplimentary attitude towards Jews ^{[8, p. 165]}.

We believe that in this case, the vulnerability of the Lhc's argumentation, built on assumptions and containing a number of subjective assessments, is visible to the naked eye. Moreover, sometimes the researcher makes the grossest mistakes. Let us point out here at least that Adrian did not accept any law declaring Christianity a crime. A rescript on Christians addressed to the governor of Asia Minucius Fundanus (Eus. Hist. eccl. IV. 9) belongs to the time of his reign. The designated rescript explicitly prohibits the governor from conducting trials of Christians at the request of the crowd. There are two interpretations of this rescript in science: according to one, this prescription was completely tolerant of Christians ^{[21, p. 67]}, according to the other, it did not abolish persecution, but imposed certain restrictions on them ^{[7, p. 37]}. Nevertheless, whichever of these interpretations we prefer, this rescript cannot be considered as an anti-Christian law. Finally, we point out the fact that, in principle, we have no information about any persecution of the Church under Adrian. As for Adrian's attitude to Judaism, the sources do record his negative attitude, but only in connection with the last Jewish war (Eus. Hist. Eccl. IV. 6. 3-4; Dio Cass. LXIX. 12. 1-2). Meanwhile, the apology of Aristides, according to the Chronicle of Eusebius, was presented to Hadrian in 125 together with the apology of Codratus, seven years before the war (PG. 19. Col. 557-558).

It should be noted that when covering the issue of the addressee of Aristide's apology, in any case, it is necessary to consider not only its form, but also its content. Are there any moments in the text of the apology being studied that would indicate to us that the author clearly intended his text: a) not to a Christian; b) to the emperor himself, indicated in the preamble of the work? We would note several circumstances that emphasize that the addressee of the apology is definitely not a Christian. Firstly, it is striking that the author does not write about Christians anywhere in the first person, in relation to Christians he often uses the pronouns "they", "them", "they" (Aristid. Apol. 15-17), that is, our apologist is clearly trying to distance himself from the subject of his presentation. We believe this is a conscious technique used by the author in order to give the reader the impression of an objective assessment of the Christian doctrine. Aristide expresses this desire directly in chapter 16, where the apologist urges the reader to study the Writings of Christians in order to make sure that his words about them are not his own inventions ("I did not bring this from myself and did not express it as their defender") (Aristid. Apol. 16. 5).

Secondly, let's take a closer look at the composition of Aristide's composition. At the very beginning, the author presents his own thoughts about God. It is important to note the apologist's desire to rationalize this topic: he deduces the existence of God not from prophetic revelations, but from observations on the structure of the world: "I, the king, entered the world by God's providence and, contemplating the sky, earth and sea, sun, moon, etc., was surprised at their structure. Seeing the world and everything in it, as it moves by necessity, I realized that the moving and holding cause is God" (Aristid. Apol. 1). Thus, already in the first chapter, the apologist defines his understanding of the Deity not as religious, but rather as philosophical.

Next , Aristide lists the main attributes of God:"He is not born, not created, beginningless and infinite, immortal, perfect and incomprehensible. Because He is perfect, He has no lack and does not tolerate the need for anything; on the contrary, everything has a need for Him. He is beginningless, for everything that has a beginning has an end, and everything that has an end is destroyed. He has no name, for the name is a common property of created beings. It has neither coloring nor appearance, since the one who owns them thereby joins the category of created objects. There is no difference between masculine and feminine in Him, since the one in whom it is, is subject to passions. The sky does not embrace Him, but He contains the sky and everything visible and invisible. He has no opponent, because there is no one who is stronger than Him. Envy and anger do not possess Him, because there is nothing that could resist Him. Mistakes and ignorance are alien to His nature, which is all perfect wisdom and knowledge. They contain everything. And He does not need a sacrifice or a libation or anything visible, but everything has a need in Him" (Aristid. Apol. 1; N. Krestnikov Lane). It seems to us remarkable that Aristide does not refer to Scripture anywhere in this passage, although such a subject of reasoning requires this, especially from a pious Christian. He tries to substantiate every attribute attributed by him to God speculatively. R. M. Grant, commenting on this fragment, also emphasizes the influence of middle Platonism on Aristide's understanding of God: in particular, the use of the method of apophatic theology brings the author closer to this philosophical school [13 p. 37]. That is, the apologist again declares his position to a greater extent as philosophical, he has not yet emphasized its Christian specificity.

Next, Aristide undertakes a kind of research. According to him, there are four ways of worshiping God: barbaric, Greek, Jewish and Christian (Aristid. Apol. 2). Which one is true? (Aristid. Apol. 3. 1) As a criterion for comparison, apparently, Aristide offers the understanding of the Deity that he indicated at the beginning. God has no beginning and He is above all material things, while the barbarians either worship natural elements as gods, which are changeable and themselves exist for some reason; or the first people who were born and died (Aristid. Apol. 4-7). It is the same with the Greeks: they introduced many male and female gods, filled with all kinds of passions (Aristid. Apol. 8:2). The Jews have come closer to a true understanding of the Deity and "worship God, not his creatures," nevertheless, "and they have deviated from true knowledge, and although in their thoughts they thought they were serving God, in their deeds it turned out that their ministry refers to angels" (Aristid. Apol. 14). And only Christians found the truth, "as far as can be judged from their writings, they came much closer to it and to correct knowledge than all other peoples" (Aristid. Apol. 15).

Thus, Aristide does not give us, as P.L. Buck claimed, an "exaggerated" representation of Christianity. To understand the superiority of the Christian religion over the rest, the apologist brings his reader gradually: starting with the philosophical definition of the Deity and demonstrating which people have come closer to such an understanding. We believe that the very course of Aristide's reasoning shows that the apologist sees an educated pagan rather than a Christian as his reader (or listener). This conclusion can be supported by the fact that in earlier Christian literary works (first of all, in the epistles of the apostles, the epistles of the Apostle Paul, the epistles of the apostolic men), which are addressed to both individual Christians and Christian communities, we do not find any philosophical maxims. Moreover, it is unlikely that the first Christians felt any reverence for philosophy itself, pagan philosophy (recall the words of the Apostle Paul: "the wisdom of this world is madness before God": 1 Cor. 3. 19 and "see, brethren, that no one carries you away with philosophy and empty seduction, according to human tradition according to the elements of the world, and not according to Christ": Col. 2. 8). The philosophical rationalization in the arguments about God, which we find in Aristide, an attempt to evaluate existing religious beliefs, including Christianity, not from the point of view of Scripture, but from the point of view of philosophy, can be explained by the fact that Aristide was not addressing Christians. Finally, let's take a closer look at what the author of the work in question calls for. Several times he emphasizes that one should familiarize oneself with the Christian Scriptures, with what Christians teach (Aristid. Apol. 16. 3; 16. 5). That is, clearly Aristide is turning his essay to a reader who is not familiar with Christianity at the moment. Could the Emperor Hadrian himself be such a reader?

In the text, Adrian's name is mentioned in the preamble (in the Armenian fragment of the apology and in the Syriac translation). Further along the text, Aristide often refers to him: in almost every chapter we find the vocative case of the word . We believe that such a frequent appeal clearly indicates that the author clearly defines his addressee. Moreover, since there was a tradition of presenting scientific or philosophical works to the emperors in the ancient literature of the time under consideration, as we saw above, there is no reason to exclude the apologist under study from this tradition.

Thus, we come to the conclusion that the apology of Aristides was written around 125 according to the chronology of Eusebius, and its direct addressee was an enlightened pagan, not alien to philosophical culture. It is quite possible that such a pagan was the Emperor Hadrian himself, indicated in the preamble of the work. At the same time, it should be noted that this work was not an individual petition (libellus), it was written in the form of a protreptic composition and in this form could really be handed over to the emperor.