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The First Apology
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Chapter 8: Christians Declare Their Belief in God.
And do you think that it is for your benefit we have been saying these things? For it is within our power, when we are questioned, to deny that we are Christians; but we would not live by telling a lie. Driven by the desire for eternal and pure life, we seek the place that is with God, the Father and Creator of all, and hurry to confess our faith, persuaded and convinced as we are that those who have shown God through their actions that they followed Him and loved to be with Him where there is no sin to cause disturbance, can achieve these things. This, in short, is what we expect and have learned from Christ, and teach. Similarly, Plato used to say that Rhadamanthus and Minos would punish the wicked who came before them; and we say that the same thing will be done, but by Christ, and upon the wicked in the same bodies reunited with their spirits, which are now to face everlasting punishment, and not only, as Plato said, for a period of a thousand years. And if anyone says that this is unbelievable or impossible, this mistake of ours is one that concerns only ourselves, and no one else, as long as you cannot prove we are causing any harm.
Hear the Scriptures cited in The First Apology
The First Apology quotes or alludes to these Bible chapters more than any others. Each link opens the free audio Bible, where the chapter is read aloud alongside the text, cross-references, and what other early Christian writers said about it.
- Hear Isaiah 52 (audio Bible) — cited 3 times in this work
- Hear Matthew 5 (audio Bible) — cited 3 times in this work
- Hear Genesis 6 (audio Bible) — cited 2 times in this work
- Hear Genesis 49 (audio Bible) — cited 2 times in this work
- Hear Numbers 21 (audio Bible) — cited 2 times in this work
- Hear Psalms 22 (audio Bible) — cited 2 times in this work
- Hear Isaiah 65 (audio Bible) — cited 2 times in this work
- Hear Matthew 19 (audio Bible) — cited 2 times in this work
- Hear Genesis 14 (audio Bible)
- Hear Genesis 18 (audio Bible)
- Hear Genesis 32 (audio Bible)
- Hear Exodus 3 (audio Bible)