Aristo of Pella

SECOND century. According to Maximus the Confessor in the seventh century, Aristo wrote a “Dialogue between Jason and Papiscus concerning Christ,” in which proofs from the OT (version of Aquila) adduced by the Jewish Christian Jason led to a request for baptism from the Jew Papiscus. Celsus, Clement of Alexandria, Jerome, and apparently Tertullian knew the work which, dated about 140, might make Aristo the earliest known Apologist against Judaism. Eusebius found in Aristo information about the defeat of Bar-Kochba and of the exclusion of Jews from Jerusalem by Hadrian.