Why Does the Author of 1 Peter Sound Like Paul Instead of Peter?

[00:00:01] Why does the author of 1 Peter Sound Like Paul instead of Peter? [00:00:05] By Bart D. Ehrman Read by John Paul Middlesworth why does the Peter of First Peter sound like Paul but not Peter? This is at the heart of the question of why a pseudonymous author who was claiming to be Peter would have written this particular letter. [00:00:22] It's a perplexing matter, in part because nothing much about First Peter sounds like what we would expect from Peter as we know him otherwise from the New Testament. [00:00:30] This will take a few posts to explain. The following is largely taken with edits, including the omission of the footnotes from my longer study Forgery and Counter Forgery, Oxford University Press Apart from the name Peter at the outset of the letter and possibly the reference to Rome Babylon at the end, there is nothing in the book of First Peter to tie it specifically to the Petron tradition. [00:00:56] This makes the book decidedly different from lots of other non authentic writings of the New Testament the Deutero, Pauline epistles, Colossians, Ephesians 2, Thessalonians 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus, whose authors clearly strive to sound like Paul and 2 Peter, which, as we will see in a future post, goes out of its way to claim Petron origins. In the case of 1 Peter, the authorial name is attached simply to provide apostolic credentials. [00:01:23] There's nothing about the book itself that would make anyone think it is Peter's in particular, according to Galatians, Peter was the apostle missionary to Jews. [00:01:35] But this book is not addressed to Jews, Peter's concern, but to Gentiles. [00:01:40] Thus 114 speaks of the passions of your former ignorance, a phrase hard to ascribe to Jews, but standard polemic against Pagans 118 refers to the readers as ransomed from the feudal manner of conduct passed down by their ancestors. [00:01:59] Difficult to ascribe to Jews from a writer who sees Scripture as given by God. [00:02:04] And most decisively the author applies to his readers the Words of Hosea 1:6 and 1:9 formerly you were not the people, but now you are the people of God. [00:02:16] 2:10 the author is speaking to converted pagans. This is not the apostle to the Jews. And so when he speaks of their dispersion in one one he is not referring to the Jewish diaspora. These are Christians who are living away from their true home in heaven temporarily at least, as these are known from the scant references to them in Paul. The only surviving author to mention Peter during his lifetime, for example Galatians 2, nothing indicates that this author held to the ongoing importance and validity of the prescriptions of the law, circumcision, kosher food, regulations, Sabbath observance, Jewish festivals, and so on. [00:02:59] The significance of Scripture for this author is not that it provides guidelines for cultic activities in the community's life together. [00:03:06] The word of the Lord is the Gospel of Christ, not the Jewish Scriptures. [00:03:12] 125 the prophets look forward to Christ and are fulfilled in him and in his new people, the Christians. 112, 26 and 210 Scripture is important chiefly for its high ethical demands. 3812 the author self consciously refers to his addressees in 11 and the closing greetings of 51213 but both passages make the reader think of Paul, not Peter. The missionary sphere is Asia Minor, where Paul established churches, but which is never associated in other traditions with Peter. The two persons mentioned at the end, Silvanus and Mark, are best known as Pauline associates for Silvanus, 2 Corinthians 1:19 1 Thessalonians 1:1, 2 Thessalonians 1:1 and Acts 15:22, 18:5. [00:04:03] For Mark, see Colossians 4:10, 2 Timothy 4:11 and Philemon 24. [00:04:09] The injunction to greet one another with a kiss is almost straight From Paul Romans 6:16 1 Corinthians 16:22 Corinthians 13:12, and it occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. The only possible bit of verisimilitude that might make a reader think of Peter is in 5:1, where the author claims to have been a witness of Christ's sufferings. As widely noted, however, this scarcely sounds like the Peter of the rest of the Christian tradition, at least as it's been handed down to us who fled after Jesus arrest, denied his Lord three times, and was notably absent from the crucifixion. It may be germane that the book of Acts stresses Peter as a witness to Jesus, his death and resurrection in 18232, 315, 532 and and 1039. [00:05:00] Here too, there is no sense that Peter actually observed Jesus suffer so that there is no reason to suspect that that is what the author of 1 Peter 5:1 had in mind either. [00:05:11] But even more important, Peter in these other passages is not said to be uniquely qualified as a witness in every instance. He is simply one of the apostolic band who bear witness to Jesus and the salvation he has brought. [00:05:25] There is nothing about 1 Peter 5:1, then, that would make a reader think of Peter in particular from among the faithful band that bore witness to Christ. And this band includes not just the 12 apostles in Acts. Stephen, too is called a witness, as notably is Paul himself 2215 and 2616. [00:05:47] In view of all these considerations, the older claim of German scholars A. Julicher and E. Fascher remains valid. [00:05:55] One can absolutely insist that if the first word Peter were missing from our letter, nobody would have guessed it might have been authored by Peter. [00:06:05] In fact, as already suggested above, everything in this letter instead sounds like Paul. [00:06:12] I'll continue with these puzzlings in the next.