Genre
Apologeticus has the typical concerns of other apologetic works of his time, though it is presented in a much more complex manner. According to Wright, the text is constantly shifting “from the philosophical mode to the rhetorical and even juridical”. Drawing from his training in literature and law, Tertullian demonstrates his talents as a Latinist and a rhetorician in an attempt to defend his newfound Christian faith. Tertullian's modern editor Otto Bardenhewer further contends that Apologeticus is calm in tone, "a model of judicial discussion". Unlike previous apologists of Christianity, whose appeals for tolerance were made in the name of reason and humanity, Tertullian, influenced by his legal training, spoke as a jurist convinced of the injustice of the laws under which the Christians were persecuted.
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