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Did Peter Deny his Lord? A Conjecture
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 October 2011
Extract
Ferdinand Kattenbusch has said: “I am more convinced than most that in the investigation of the beginnings of Christianity a great many problems are likely to prove insoluble. But we have no right to acquiesce in that conclusion before all means have been exhausted, all possible combinations tried.” Following this suggestion I would here present some observations on Peter's Denial, and would propose an hypothesis.
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- Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1932
References
1 F. Kattenbusch, ‘Die Vorstellung des Petrus und der Charakter der Urgemeindem Jerusalem’, in Festschrift für Karl Müller, Tübingen, 1922, p. 324, n. 1.
2 I may add that the allusions to Peter's denial in early Christian literature give no ground for supposing that there was any other tradition respecting this episode than that which we possess.
3 For instance, B. Weiss, Holtzmann, Loisy, Zahn, Heitmüller, W. Bauer, and others. The chief exception is Spitta, Die Auferstehung Jesu, Göttingen, 1918, p. 18.
4 Johannes Weiss, Das Urchristentum, Göttingen, 1917, p. 12.
5 ‘Die Abschiedsreden Jesu in dem Vierten Evangelium’, Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wssenschaft, VIII, 1907, 142.
6 The only passage which suggests a search for accomplices of Jesus is in the Gospel of Peter (!). “They sought us as malefactors, as having tried to burn the temple” (26). This cannot be regarded as evidence, by reason of the relatively late date of the document and of its purpose to excuse the apostles for concealing themselves.
7 This may be due to the fact that Matthew did not understand how the maid, who was at first at the entrance of the house, should afterwards be inside.
8 Luke may have thought that the words reported could hardly have been spoken by the whole group at once.
9 Luke adds that the Lord turned and looked at Peter. This is a detail which Mark and Matthew would not have omitted if they had found it in their source. It must, therefore, have been added by Luke.
10 Mark has ἐπιβαλὡν ἕκλαιεν. The meaning of ἐπιβαλὠν is obscure. Among suggested explanations are: ‘covering his head (with his cloak) he wept’, or ‘he began to weep’, or ‘remembering he wept’, or ‘retiring into himself he wept.’ It may be that the obscurity of Mark's phrase led Matthew and Luke to replace it by ‘he wept bitterly.’ It is possible also that ἐπιβαλὠν is a corruption of ἐξελθὡν although this is palaeographically unlikely.
11 In the Sinaitic Syriac version the denial is related in a single course, but the author of this version evidently worked the text over in order to remove inconsistencies.
12 Introduction au Nouveau Testament, II, 323 f.
13 Les sources du récit johannique de la passion, Paris, 1910, pp. 82 ff.
14 Das älteste Evangelium, Göttingen, 1901, p. 301.
15 On the variation in the use of άρνία and πρoβὰτια, which is not the same in all manuscripts, see F. Macler, ‘Pais mes brebis’, Revue de Phistoire des religions, XCIV, 1929, 17–29. I do not think that we should attach any importance to this variation, any more than it is right to seek a meaning in Jesus’ use of άγαπâν in his first two questions and φιλεîν only in the third, while φιλεîν is found in all three replies of Peter Peter is said to be grieved because Jesus thrice asked him, φιλεîς με The fourth evangelist does not attach great importance to the exact reproduction of words. Thus in John 8, 7 Jesus says to Nicodemus, “Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again (δεî ῦμâς γεννηθἠναι ἅνωθεν).” This precise phrase does not occur in what precedes, but in vs. 3 Jesus had said ἐὰν μἡ τις γεννηθἠ, οῦ δῦναται ίδεîν τἡν βασιλειαν τoυ θεoυ, and in vs. 5, ἑὰν μἠ τις γεννηθἠ ἐξ υδατoς καì πνεῦματoς, οῦ δυναται εíσελθεîν εíς τἡν βασιλείαν τoυ θεpυ.
16 There are two principal hypotheses for explaining the origin of the legend that the beloved disciple would never die. It may be that for some reason, when this person had reached a very advanced age, he left the district in which he had lived and that thereafter nothing was ever heard of him there. In the absence of any news of his death it may have been imagined that he was living in some mysterious retreat, awaiting the end of the world. This would be comparable in a certain way to Hebrews 7,1–3, where from the fact that Genesis mentions neither the parents nor the death of Melchizedek, it is inferred that he was ‘without father, without mother’, and that he was to abide a priest to all eternity. Or the legend may have had its origin in the words of Jesus in Mark 9, 1, “Verily I say unto you, that there be some of them that stand here which shall not taste of death till they have seen the kingdom of God come with power.” Since it could not be admitted that a saying of Jesus had been proved false by the facts, it may have been thought that somewhere disciples of Jesus were destined to continue alive, and the favorite disciple would not unnaturally be among those so privileged. The second explanation seems to me preferable to the first, for the first is subject to the grave objection that the beloved disciple seems to have been originally an ideal figure.
17 The author, as the sequel shows, means to include the beloved disciple. The reason why the names of the last two disciples are not given may lie in the editor's fixed practice of not indicating clearly the personality of this disciple.
18 The number has evidently some special significance, but it is not worth while to try to guess at it. If we should review all the interpretations that have been proposed (Introduction au Nouveau Testament, II, p. 292, n. 2), we should see how ill advised it is, not to say absurd, to insist on trying to understand somehow or other what the text does not say.
19 ‘Fish’ is in the singular in vs. 18.
20 The rðles assigned to the two disciples are the same here as in the visit to the sepulchre. Peter enters the tomb first, but John alone believes.
21 A third difference is that in the account in John 21 Jesus does not disappear immediately after being recognized. This may be because the introduction of the conversation with Peter caused a change in the ending.
22 Der Schluss des Marcusevangeliums, der Vier-Evangelien-Kanon und die kleina-siatischen Presbyter, Berlin, 1892; Die Berichte über die Auferstehung Jesu, Berlin, 1898. Rohrbach's theory has been accepted by many critics.
23 For example, H. J. Flowers, ‘The Calling of Peter and the Restoration of Peter’, Anglican Theological Review, 1922, pp. 235–239.
24 For example, H. H. Wendt, Das Johannesevangelium, Göttingen, 1900, p. 229.
25 Brandt, Die evangelische Geschichte und der Ursprung des Christentums, Leipzig, 1898, pp. 401 f.; Klöpper, Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Theologie, 1899, p. 357; Wellhausen, Das Evangelium Lucae, Berlin, 1904, pp. 14 f.
26 B. Weiss, Das Johannesevangelium (Meyer's Kommentar, 8th ed.), Göttingen, 1893, p. 627; Beyschlag, Das Leben Jesu, Halle, 1, 1893, p. 323; A. von Harnack, Lukas der Arzt, der Verfasser des dritten Evangeliums und der Apostelgeschichte (Beiträge zur Einleitung in das Neue Testament, I), Leipzig, 1906, p. 158, n. 2.
27 It is not important that Luke says that their net broke, while John says that in spite of the great number of thefishesthe net did not break. The detail has the same significance in both cases.