DCHindley

That is correct, the Pseudo-Clementine literature does sort of use Simon as a pseudonym for Paul.

What I find interesting is that wherever Peter goes, there is Simon as well. I almost get the feeling that the Simon who is an arch-foe of Peter in the Clementines was developed to explain away stories about Peter that depicted him as a magus (I am not talking about a street magician, but a practitioner of magical arts, which folks took very seriously in those days).

However, I doubt the Simon of _Acts_, who while clearly portrayed as a magus was just as clearly an amateur one, could be anything more than the seed from which sprouted the highly developed Simon myth of the Clementines, where he is a disciple of John the Baptist and Dositheus, has a gnostic theology, etc.

In the mythical world of the Pseudo-Clementines, James is also a super-secretive Ebionite (to explain why no one had heard of the Pseudo Clementine traditions prior to their publication), and Peter is a take-off of Philo of Alexandria (which betrays the date of this literature - mid 2nd century CE - when Christian apologists were trying to make a case that Judaism, and by extension Christianity, practiced a kind of philosophical tradition).

DCH

yalla

DCHindley
I'd be interested in you elaborating on this bit if you wouldn't mind.

"Peter is a take-off of Philo of Alexandria (which betrays the date of this literature - mid 2nd century CE - when Christian apologists were trying to make a case that Judaism, and by extension Christianity, practiced a kind of philosophical tradition)."
cheers
yalla