Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Minimalist · 03-26-2008, 06:31 PM

Quote:

martyrdom is surely a reasonable enough interpretation of that passage?

It's "reasonable" if you are operating from a predetermined notion that it is true.

Otherwise, it could be an old man choking to death on a fish bone.

Still doesn't say anything about "Rome."

Ben C Smith · 03-26-2008, 07:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Who claimed Peter was in Rome? Eusebius? If it was Eusebius, it is probably not true.

:banghead:

You are arguing that Peter was never in Rome, and yet you are unaware of the numerous references to Peter being in Rome that predate Eusebius???

:banghead:

Ben.

aa5874 · 03-26-2008, 07:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ben C Smith

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Who claimed Peter was in Rome? Eusebius? If it was Eusebius, it is probably not true.

:banghead:

You are arguing that Peter was never in Rome, and yet you are unaware of the numerous references to Peter being in Rome that predate Eusebius???

:banghead:

Ben.

Where did I claim that Peter was never in Rome? I asked who claimed Peter was in Rome? Read the question! IF it was Eusebius, it is probably not true!

You know what predates Eusebius? Some think that Eusebius was a forger and I think Eusebius distorted history.

Ben C Smith · 03-26-2008, 07:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Where did I claim that Peter was never in Rome?

You said that if Peter died under Nero then he wrote an epistle from the grave. This is, in fact, a reductio ad absurdum argument (an incompetent one) against Peter having died under Nero:

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Now, if Peter died during Nero, this would signify that all the Gospels were written after his death and Peter's own Epistle was written from the grave.

Ben.

mountainman · 03-26-2008, 07:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Quote:

Originally Posted by 2-J

...

From wiki

Saint_Peter

- Clement of Rome, in his Letter to the Corinthians (Chapter 5), written c. 80-98, speaks of Peter's martyrdom in the following terms: "Let us take the noble examples of our own generation. Through jealousy and envy the greatest and most just pillars of the Church were persecuted, and came even unto death… Peter, through unjust envy, endured not one or two but many labours, and at last, having delivered his testimony, departed unto the place of glory due to him."

a vague reference that might imply martyrdom, or might not. (The word martyr derives from the word for "testimony.")

Still pretty vague - no idea of where Peter or Paul were when they "commanded."

Quote:

- Dionysius of Corinth wrote: "You [Pope Soter] have also, by your very admonition, brought together the planting that was made by Peter and Paul at Rome and at Corinth; for both of them alike planted in our Corinth and taught us; and both alike, teaching similarly in Italy, suffered martyrdom at the same time" (Letter to Pope Soter [A.D. 170], in Eusebius, History of the Church 2:25:8).

Unless this was written by Eusebius - always a possibility - this indicates that by 170 C.E., the legend that Peter and Paul both died in Rome as martyrs was well established. But this is pretty late to be taken as historical reporting.

The idea that Peter was crucified upside down sounds very much like legend.

As someone has already pointed out, this tradition appears earliest sourced in the apocryphal "Acts of Peter". Here are a few comments about this text taken from my articleComparitive Summaries of the Leucian Acts

Quote:

Acts of Peter

Geoff Trowbridge:

The Acts Of Peter (c. 150-200 C.E.) are generally regarded as the first of the apocryphal Acts, though scholars have previously argued for priority of John's or occasionally Paul's Acts. Modern scholarship tends to agree that Paul uses Peter, while Peter and John share a common origin. Authorship has thus been credited to Leucius, the companion of John who is also credited with the Acts of John. The surviving manuscripts are a long Latin text from Vercelli dating to the sixth century which comprises most of the Acts, and an earlier Greek text containing only the martyrdom, from which we derive the tradition that Peter was crucified upside-down. There are also secondary texts which contain parallel stories on the rather unpleasant theme of women welcoming paralysis rather than defiling their bodies with sexual relations. In a Coptic text included with the Nag Hammadi library, the female in question is Peter's daughter. Ironically, despite these encratite views of sex and marriage, much of the Acts of Peter are spent denouncing the gnostic teacher Simon Magus who undoubtedly shared the same views. The Acts of Peter were judged as heretical by Eusebius and the Gelasian Decree. Peter performs many miracles in the Acts, from talking dogs and infants to the resurrection of both people and smoked fish. Rome is the primary setting, and possibly the place of authorship.

M.R. James:

From "The Apocryphal New Testament", Translation and Notes, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1924. Written, probably by a resident in Asia Minor (he does not know much about Rome), not later than A. D. 200, in Greek. The author has read the Acts of John very carefully, and modelled his language upon them. However, he was not so unorthodox as Leucius, though his language about the Person of our Lord (ch. xx) has rather suspicious resemblances to that of the Acts of John. The length of the book as given by the Stichometry of Nicephorus was 2,750 lines-fifty lines less than the canonical Acts. The portions we have may be about the length of St. Mark's Gospel; and about 1,000 lines may be wanting. Such is Zaha's estimate. We have:

1. A short episode in Coptic. - This is preserved separately in an early papyrus manuscript (fourth-fifth century) now at Berlin; the other contents of it are Gnostic writings which have not yet been published. I follow C. Schmidt's rendering of it. It has a title at the end: The Act of Peter. See the separate article The Act of Peter.
2. A large portion in Latin preserved in a single manuscript of the seventh century at Vercelli: often called the Vercelli Acts. It includes the martyrdom.
3. The martyrdom, preserved separately, in two good Greek copies, in Latin, and in many versions-Coptic, Slavonic, Syriac, Armenian, Arabic, Ethiopic.
4. One or two important quotations from lost portions; a small fragment of the original in a papyrus; certain passages-speeches of Peter- transferred by an unscrupulous writer to the Life of St. Abercius of Hierapolis.
5. A Latin paraphrase of the martyrdom, attributed to Linus, Peter's successor in the bishopric of Rome, was made from the Greek, and is occasionally useful.

Robert F. Stoops:

writes (The Anchor Bible Dictionary, v. 5, p. 267): One of the earliest of the apocryphal acts of the apostles, the Acts of Peter reports a miracle contest between Simon Magus and the apostle Peter in Rome. It concludes with Peter's martyrdom. The Acts of Peter was originally composed in Greek during the second half of the 2d century, probably in Asia Minor. The majority of the text has survived only in the Latin translation of the Vercelli manuscript. The concluding chapters are preserved separately as the Martyrdom of Peter in three Greek manuscripts and in Coptic (fragmentary), Syriac, Ethiopic, Arabic, Armenian, and Slavonic versions.

Wikipedia:

One of the earliest of the apocryphal acts of the apostles, the Acts of Peter reports a miracle contest between Simon Magus and the apostle Simon Peter in Rome. The majority of the text has survived only in the Latin translation of the Vercelli manuscript. The Acts of Peter was originally composed in Greek during the second half of the 2nd century, probably in Asia Minor. Consensus amongst academics points to it being based on the Acts of John, and traditionally both that and this work were said to be written by Leucius Charinus, whom Epiphanius identifies as the companion of John. In the text Peter performs miracles such as resurrecting smoked fish, and making dogs talk. The text condemns Simon Magus, a senior figure associated with gnosticism, who appears to have concerned the writer of the text greatly. Some versions give accounts of stories on the theme of a woman/women who prefer paralysis to sex, sometimes, including in a version from the Berlin Codex, the woman is the daughter of Peter. It concludes describing Peter's martyrdom as upside-down crucifixion, a tradition that is first attested in this work. These concluding chapters are preserved separately as the Martyrdom of Peter in three Greek manuscripts and in Coptic (fragmentary), Syriac, Ethiopic, Arabic, Armenian, and Slavonic versions. Because of this, it is sometimes proposed that the martyrdom account was the original text to which the preceding chapters were affixed.

Quote:

You have two competing hypotheses -

1) Peter traveled to Rome, was crucified there in a symbolic manner, and, unlike most victims of crucifixion, was buried in an identifiable grave - or -

2) The church at Rome decided to increase its prestige and authority by creating legends (divinely inspired, no doubt) of Peter being designated by Jesus to continue his tradition, traveling to Rome, and leaving his mortal remains there; and Paul also being transported to Rome.

Of course, there is a third hypothesis, that Peter never existed at all, so the church felt free to make up whatever stories they wanted.

Comments:

1) IMO a pagan seditious polemicists wrote "The Acts of Peter" (324-354 CE)

2) Damasius, the first christian Pontifex Maximus (365 CE) promoted the traditions of Peter in Rome, after his fight to death with competing bishops for theb tax-free business of the christian bullshit, leaving hundreds dead in the streets of Rome. Damasus also renovated the "christian catacombs".

3) Fiction (312-324 CE) is the simpler explanation, occasioning 1 and then 2.

Best wishes,

Pete Brown

aa5874 · 03-26-2008, 09:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Where did I claim that Peter was never in Rome?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ben C Smith

You said that if Peter died under Nero then he wrote an epistle from the grave. This is, in fact, a reductio ad absurdum argument (an incompetent one) against Peter having died under Nero:

WHERE DID I CLAIM PETER WAS NEVER IN ROME?

Ben C Smith · 03-26-2008, 10:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

WHERE DID I CLAIM PETER WAS NEVER IN ROME?

You claimed that the twelve, which group includes Peter, are not even real historical figures:

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

I now conclude, without reasonable doubt, that the NT and its main characters, Jesus of Nazareth, son of God and Messiah, the twelve disciples and Paul are all fictitious figures....

Also:

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

I think Saul/Paul was an invention like Peter/Cephas.

When Andrew Criddle wrote that Peter was probably executed in Rome, you claimed:

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

There is no extant source outside the early church that can corroborate anything about "Peter".

And now you are claiming that Peter could not have died under Nero.

You did all this apparently without having even read any of the sources on Peter that predate Eusebius.

Ben.

Solitary Man · 03-26-2008, 10:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

1) IMO

Which, as we all know, is worthless. Why do you drudge on?

mountainman · 03-26-2008, 11:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ben C Smith

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

WHERE DID I CLAIM PETER WAS NEVER IN ROME?

You claimed that the twelve, which group includes Peter, are not even real historical figures

We have a Nag Hammadi text entitled "The Acts of Peter and the Twelve Apostles", so perhaps Peter was a lone ranger? In the text of this the author however writes there were only eleven apostles (including Peter) altogether. So the numbers 11, 12 an 13 appear to be all optional mathematics.

Best wishes

Pete Brown

2-J · 03-27-2008, 03:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Minimalist

Quote:

martyrdom is surely a reasonable enough interpretation of that passage?

It's "reasonable" if you are operating from a predetermined notion that it is true.

Otherwise, it could be an old man choking to death on a fish bone.

As we have seen, some argue there are links with 'testimony' and 'martyrdom' in Greek (I don't have the Greek to decide for myself, but I listen to the views with interest).

Quote:

Originally Posted by Minimalist

Still doesn't say anything about "Rome."

As I said

Quote:

Originally Posted by 2-J

And no, it doesn't refer to Rome, but the quotes as a whole are meant to constitute evidence that Peter was martryed in Rome. Not every one is evidence for both things.

The idea of Peter having made it to Rome seems possible if we consider the early christian writers as authentic sources. Then there seems to be a consensus established that Peter was in Rome, and martyred, a tradition established by second half of the second century, roughly within 100 years of the alleged events themselves.

If we supplement this with the idea that there was a continuous Christian community in Rome (if the 'conventional' conception of 1st century christianity is true, then this isn't unreasonable, we have Romans the epistle itself after all) from very early on, then maybe the simplest explanation is that they would have stayed true to his memory (as opposed to someone being able to, later, introduce the idea from outside).

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