Julius Africanus

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(c. 160-c. 240; the full name is Sextus Iulius Africanus, GreekSextos Ioulios Aphrikanos).

Julius Africanus is the father ofChristian chronography. Little is known of his life and little remains of his works. He is important chiefly because of his influence onEusebius, on all the later writers ofChurch history among the Fathers, and on the whole Greekschool of chroniclers. His name says that he was an African;Suidas calls him "a Libyanphilosopher". Gelzer ("S. Julius Africanus", pp. 4, 5) thinks he was of Roman descent. Heknew Greek (in which language he wrote), Latin, and Hebrew. He was at one time a soldier and had been apagan; he wrote all his works as aChristian.Tillemontdeduced that he was apriest from the fact that he addresses thepriestOrigen (in his letter to him) as "dear brother" ("Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire ecclésiastique", III, Paris, 1693, 254). Gelzer (op. cit., 9) points out that a friendlyChristian layman could quite well use such a form. The statement that Julius Africanus was abishop does not appear till the fourth century. It is probably anerror. He went to Alexandria to study, attracted by the fame of itscatecheticalschool, possibly about the year 215 (Eusebius,Church History VI.31). All the dates of his life are uncertain. One tradition places him under theEmperor Gordianus (238-244; Gelzer, p. 7), another mentions him underAlexander Severus (222-235; id., p. 6). He appears to have known Abgar VIII, theChristian King ofEdessa (176-213); in his Chronography he calls him a "holy man" (Gelzer, p. 3).Eusebius, in hischronicle (ad a. Abr., 2239, ed. Schoene, II,Berlin, 1875, 178), says that underAlexander Severus the city ofEmmaus in Palestine was restored and called Nikopolis under the direction of "Julius Africanus the writer of the Chronicle". It appears that he lived there for a time (Bardenhewer, "Patrologie", Freiburg, 1894, p. 173). He shows in his Chronicle that he knows the topography of Palestine (Gelzer, p. 10). He seems to have been in Greece; he went toRome about the year 221 (id., 11). Bardenhewer (op. cit., p. 173) puts his death at about 237. Preuschen (in Harnack, "Gesch. der altchristlichen Litteratur", p. 507) says that he died "after 221" and adds "underGordianus 238-244?". Harnack ("Realenc. für prot. Theol. u. Kirche", Leipzig, 1901, IX, 627) says, "after 240".

The works of S. Julius Africanus are: (1) The "Chronicle" (Gk.Chronographiai) in five books, covering the time from the Creation (B.C. 5499 in his calculation) to the third year of Eliogabalus (A.D. 221). Gelzer thinks he wrote this work between 212 and 221 (op. cit., 12). It is an attempt to combine the account in theBible and the secular (Roman and Greek) history known to the author, with special regard tochronology. From the third book the order is strictly chronological. Julius uses as sources first theBible, then Greek, Roman, and Jewish historians, especially Justus ofTiberias, who depends onJosephus. He is also influenced by the"Stromata" ofClement of Alexandria (Gelzer, 19-24). As the firstChristian attempt at a universal history, and as the source of all laterChristian chronography, this work is of great importance.Eusebius made it the foundation of hischronicle. It is the source of all later Byzantine writing of history, so that for centuries theChristian world accepted the dates and epochs calculated by Julius. Only fragments of this work are now extant.

(2) The "Embroideries" (Gk.kestoi; compare the title of Clem. Alex.:stromata), also called "Puzzles" (Gk.paradoxa), is a kind of encyclopedia ofsciences — mathematics, botany, medicine, etc. — full of all manner of curious anecdotes and illustrations. It has been thought that the author of this work was apagan, Sextus Africanus, different from theChristian Julius Africanus. This is directly contradicted byEusebius in his"Chronicle" (Church History VI.31): "Africanus (the author of the 'Chronographia'), writer of the composed Embroideries" (Gk.ho ton epigegrammenon keston syggrapheus). Gelzer (2-3) has shown that the author of the kestoi was aChristian (he quotesPsalm 33:9) and that there is no reason todoubtEusebius's statement. This work, too, constantly quoted and much esteemed by theGreekFathers, survives only in a few fragments about agriculture andwar (Gelzer, 13-16). It had originally twenty-four books. It is from the kestoi, in which the author discourses of magic, divination and medicine, that the opinion arose that he was a physician.

(3) Two letters of Julius are known, one toOrigen, in which he disputes the authenticity of the story of Susanna, pointing out that the play upon words in the Greek text (prinos, an oak-tree, andprio, to saw asunder;schinos, a mastic-tree andschizo, to cleave:Daniel 13:54-55, 58-59) would not exist in Hebrew or Aramaic. From his address in this letter (Kyrié mou kai huié) he seems to have been an old man when he wrote it.Origen answered it. Both letters are included inOrigen's works (e.g., ed. of De la Rue, I, Paris, 1733, 10). This letter is the only one of Julius's works that is completely extant. His criticism has won for him high respect among modern writers. J. G. Rosenmüller (Historia Interpretationis, III, 161) considers that these few lines contain moretrueexegesis than is to be found in allOrigen's works. Gelzer (p. 17) points out that the "Chronography" and especially the kestoi show that Julius does not deserve hisreputation as a critic. The other letter is addressed to a certain Aristides. In it he proposes what is still the favourite explanation of the two pedigrees of our Lord (Matthew 1:2-19;Luke 3:23-38), namely that St. Joseph's two fathers, Jacob (Matthew 1:16) and Heli (Luke 3:23), were half-brothers of the same mother, that Heli died without children, and Jacob took his wife to raise up seed to his brother according to theLevitical law (Deuteronomy 25:5-6). Of this letter a fragment is preserved byEusebius (Church History I.7), another fragment is contained in an epitome ofEusebius's "Quæstiones de differ. Evang.", published byA. Mai ("Nova Patrum bibliotheca", IV, Rome, 1852). Julius also translatedTertullian's "Apologeticum" into Greek (Harnack in "Texte und Untersuchungen", VIII, 4).

Later Syrian writers mention works that have disappeared. Dionysius Bar-Salibi speaks of a commentary on the Gospels (Assemani, "Bibliotheca Orientalis", II, Rome, 1721, 158), Ebed-Jesu of commentaries on theNew Testament (Hebediesu, "Catalogus librorum chaldæorum", Rome, 1633, p. 15). Spurious works are the Acts ofSt. Symphorosa (Ruinart, "Acta primorum martyrum", Ratisbon, 1859, 70), a Latin version of Abdias's "History of the Apostles" ("Historiæ apostolicæ, auctore Abdia", Cologne, 1576, which asserts throughout, even in the title, that it was translated from the Hebrew by Julius Africanus) and an astonishing semi-pagan "Interpretation of the things that happened in Persia through the Incarnation of our Lord and God and Saviour, Jesus Christ" (ed. by Ignaz von der Hardt in J. C. von Aretin's "Beiträge zur Gesch. u. Litter.", II,Munich, 104, 52-69).St. Jerome in his "de Viris illustribus" (no. 63) includes: "Julius Africanus, of whom five booksde temporibus [=the Chronography] are extant, accepted a mission for the restoration of the city ofEmmaus, afterwards called Nicopolis, under theEmperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, who succeeded Macrinus. There is a letter toOrigen about the question of Susanna in which he says that this fable is not in the Hebrew, nor doesapo tou prinou prisai kai apo tou schisou schisai agree with Hebrew etymology; against whomOrigen wrote a learned letter. There exists also another letter of his to Aristides in which he discusses at length the disagreement which seems to be in the genealogy of the Saviour in Matthew and Luke." Except for the wrong date (M. Aurelius) this account, taken fromEusebius, represents very fairly what we know of Africanus.

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