simão cefas

7/28/2019 simo cefas

1/13

Cephas and PeterAuthor(s): Bart D. EhrmanSource: Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 109, No. 3 (Autumn, 1990), pp. 463-474Published by: The Society of Biblical LiteratureStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3267052

Accessed: 12/11/2009 12:12

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless

you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you

may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.

Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=sbl.

Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed

page of such transmission.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of

content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms

of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

The Society of Biblical Literature is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to

Journal of Biblical Literature.

http://www.jstor.org
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3267052?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=sblhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=sblhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/3267052?origin=JSTOR-pdf


2/13

JBL 109/3 (1990) 463-474

CEPHAS AND PETERBART D. EHRMAN

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel, NC 27599-3225

Most ancient authors who discuss the relationship of Cephas and Peterexplicitly identify the two, or at least speak of Peter when referring to NTpassages that name only Cephas. This is not at all surprising, given the un-equivocal statement of John 1:42: "Youare Cephas (which translated means'Peter')."What is surprisingis that other early Christian authors, all of whomalso knew and used the Fourth Gospel, refused to make this identificationand asserted either explicitly or by implication that there were in fact twodifferentpersons, one called Cephas, the other Peter.'This dissenting opinionis striking for both its antiquity and its persistence. How ancient is it?

I. Evidence from the Early ChurchThe idea of two separate persons first occurs in the firsthalf of the second

century in the Epistula Apostolorum.2The author of this pseudepigraphopposes a docetic kind of Christology by penning a letter, ostensibly writtenafter Jesus' resurrection by the eleven remaining disciples, in which herepeatedly affirmsboth the fleshliness of Jesus and the doctrine of the resur-rection of the flesh. Since this author otherwise makes repeated use of theFourth Gospel3 he must have known that "Cephas"and "Peter"refer to thesame person. This makes it all the more striking that in his own delineation

1 The matterhas been given serious consideration by KirsoppLake,"Simon,Cephas, Peter,"HTR 14 (1921)95-97; Maurice Goguel, La Foi a la resurrectionde Jesus dans le Christianismeprimitif (Paris:Leroux, 1933) 272-75; Donald W. Riddle, "The Cephas-Peter Problem, and aPossible Solution,'JBL 59 (1940) 169-80; and Clemens M. Henze, "CephasSeu KephasNon EstSimon Petrus!"Divus Thomas61 (1958) 63-67. Not surprisingly,most modern discussions havechosen to ignore or to slight the possibility. Oscar Cullmann, for example, is content simply todismiss it, without argument, as a "completelyunfounded idea"(Peter:Disciple, Apostle,Martyr,trans. Floyd V. Filson [Philadelphia:Westminster, 1953] 18 n. 7).

2 See the article by H. Duensing in Hennecke-Schneemelcher, New TestamentApocrypha(Philadelphia:Westminster, 1963) 1. 189-227; for other literature on the dating, see Bruce M.Metzger, The Canon of the New Testament:Its Origin, Development, and Significance (Oxford:Clarendon, 1987) 180-82.3 As scattered examples, see the allusion to John 1:13 in Epistula Apostolorum3, the sum-

mary of John 2:1-11 in chap. 5, the quotation of John 10:38 in chap. 17, and of John 13:34 inchap. 18.

463


3/13

Journal of Biblical Literatureof the eleven disciples he names Cephas and Peter as two distinct individuals(Epistula Apostolorum 2).Somewhat later in the second century, Clement of Alexandriaexpresses asimilar opinion. In book 5 of his Hypotyposes,a work now lost but cited forus by Eusebius (Hist. eccl. 1.12.2), Clement maintained that Peter was oneof the Twelve, who later became one of the three styloi of the church inJerusalem, whereas Cephas was one of the seventy disciples whom Jesus hadsent out in Luke 10. In construing the relationship of Cephas and Peter inthis way,Clement may well have initiated the tradition that is still preservedin a number of ancient documents that list the names, and sometimes thesalient activities, of the early apostles. Many of these apostolic lists situatePeter among the disciples but Cephas among the seventy; most of themallege that it was Cephas whom Paul opposed in Antioch. The documents inquestion span some eight centuries, and in some cases, but not all, theyevidence clear literaryinterdependence. Thus, in a third-centurylist wronglyascribed to Hippolytus of Rome, Cephas is named as the fifty-first of theseventy apostles.4This is clearly not the same person as Peter, one of theTwelve.Similarly,about a century later,Pseudo-Dorotheus makes Cephas thefifty-first apostle and indicates that he became the bishop of Iconium afterbeing rebuked by the apostle Paul in Antioch? Essentially the same informa-tion is provided at a later date, perhaps as late as the ninth century, in theapostolic list of Pseudo-Epiphanius,6who in addition to naming Simon Peteras one of the Twelve, cites as the forty-fifthof the seventy apostles Cephas,"Peter'snamesake,"who was rebuked by Paulprior to assuming the bishopricof Iconium. It is also worth noting that an appendix to this work cites theopinion of Clement of Alexandria, previously reported in Eusebius, thatCephas, "the namesake of Peter,' was one of the seventy.7Later apostolic lists that perpetuate this tradition are found in the follow-ing sources: (a) The ChroniconPascale, a seventh-century sketch of historyfrom Creation to the twentieth year of the emperor Heraclius (629 CE). HereCephas is called Peter'snamesake and is said to have been confronted by Paulover the matter of Judaizing. (b) The ninth-century Codex SinaiticusSyriacus 10. The list of the seventy apostles in this MSclaims to derive fromnone other than Irenaeus. Here it is stated that Cephas, the fourth of theseventy, was stoned to death in Antioch. (c) The tenth-century list wronglyascribed to the Byzantine hagiographer Symeon Logothetes.1?Cephas is

4 "On the Seventy Apostles"'PG 10, cols. 956-57.5 See Theodore Schermann, ProphetarumVitae Fabulosae: Indices ApostolorumDiscipulo-rumqueDomini Dorotheo,Epiphanio,Hippolyto,AllisqueVindicata(Leipzig:Teubner,1907) 141.6 Ibid., 124.7 Ibid., 128.8 PG 92, col. 521.9 Schermann, ProphetarumVitae Fabulosae,219.10 Ibid., 182.

464


4/13

Ehrman: Cephas and Peternamed as the forty-ninth of the seventy apostles and is said to have laterbecome the bishop of"Koloneias"(d) An anonymous medieval Greek-Syriacindex of the apostles."l This index makes Cephas the fourteenth of theseventy apostles and specifies that Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius hadpreviously shown that this is not "the Great Peter" (6 ptTyaqg&ITpos).It should be noted that certain features of these apostolic lists suggest thatthe distinction between Cephas and Peter was being perpetuated on morethan the literary level, that is, that the tradition existed outside of the liststhemselves. The lists all differ in numerous ways; rarely is Cephas assignedthe same number within a list, and in virtually every case something dif-ferent, great or small, is said about him. These admittedly slight pieces ofevidence are in any case corroborated by the statements of several churchfathers, including Jerome, Augustine, and Chrysostom, who note the tradi-tion of two persons, Peter the disciple and Cephas one of the seventy, onlyin order to discount it. Jerome's comment can be cited as representative:"Sunt qui Cephan, cui hic in faciem Paulus restitisse se scribit, non putantapostolum Petrum, sed alium de septuaginta discipulis isto vocabulo nun-cupatum"(Comm. Gal. 1.2). Probably to be included among these "others"who make such a claim is none other than Eusebius of Caesarea. Here theGreek-Syriac apostolic list mentioned previously serves to alert us to whathas otherwise been generally overlooked. Eusebius not only claims thatClement of Alexandria differentiated between Cephas and Peter; he does soin such a way as to indicate that he himself agrees.12And that is not all. In addition to our earliest availablewitness, the EpistulaApostolorum, there are other sources that distinguish Cephas from Peterwithout, however, making him one of the seventy. Thus, the Egyptian Apo-stolic ChurchOrder,in a waythat is reminiscent of the EpistulaApostolorum,but independently of it, names Cephas as one of the Twelve along withPeter.'3 These two, together with the other disciples, present moral andecclesiastical advice to the church in a series of speeches delivered in turn.All told, Peter delivers four short speeches and Cephas three. While thisdocument itself dates to the late third or early fourth century, A. Harnackhas demonstrated its reliance on earlier sources, including its list of theTwelve which may well date to the second century.'4A different kind of attestation altogether occurs in the Armenian Ecclesi-astical Calendar,which mentions Cephas on March 25 and asserts that this

11 Ibid., 174.12 In Hist. eccl. 1.12, Eusebius states that he has seen no catalogue of the seventy apostles,although he has heard, from a variety of sources, that among them were certain individualsknown from other contexts: Barnabas,Sosthenes, Cephas, Matthias,and Thaddeus. He gives noindication that he doubts any of these identifications.13 See Theodore Schermann, Die AllgemeineKirchenordnungFruhchristlicheLiturgienundKirchen Uberlieferung,Erster Teil (Paderborn:Ferdinand Schoningh, 1914).14 Adolf von Harnack, Lehre der Zwolf Apostel (TU 2; Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1884) 193-241.

465


5/13

Journal of Biblical Literatureapostle was in fact a disciple of the apostle Paul (!).15 omewhat more difficultto construe is the interesting reference in the Pseudo-Cyprian tractate Derebaptismate(late thirdcentury) to the earlier work known as the PraedicatioPauli (De rebaptismate 17). In an effort to discredit this apparently Gnosticwork, the author cites several of its aberrant traditions, including its reportthat Paul and Peter came to be acquainted with one another in Rome, onlyafter the Apostolic Conference in Jerusalem, in which Paul and the otherevangelists met and decided how to proceed with the Christian mission.Since the passage clearly refers to either Acts 15 or Galatians 2, and sinceboth chapters mention the role of Peterand/orCephas in this conference, theconclusion seems to be unavoidable that in the view of the Praedicatio Pauliit was only Cephas who attended the conference, while Peter was unknownto Paul until nearer the end of his life in Rome.To sum up the evidence from the early church: From the early second cen-tury on, a number of sources maintain that Cephas and Peter were twodifferent persons. Some of these sources claim that both belonged to theTwelve,others place Peter among the Twelve and Cephas among the seventy,yet others leave the matter unresolved. A natural question that now arises ishow or why this tradition came into being.

II. Explanations for the TraditionWe have already shown that it cannot be argued, as one might be inclinedto do otherwise, that this tradition derives simply from the ignorance ofChristians who did not realize that Kephasand Petrosare translationalequiv-alents.'6 All of the sources we have discussed, beginning with the EpistulaApostolorum, are fully cognizant of the Fourth Gospel, in which the iden-tification of Cephas and Peter is made unequivocally.The most common view concerning the origin of this tradition is that itderives from an apologetic concern, namely, to show that the person whomPaul opposed in Antioch was not the other great apostle of the early church,Peter, but an apostle of much lower standing, Cephas, one of the seventy.17There is a good deal to be said for this view, given the circumstance thatseveralof our sources state explicitly that Paul did in fact confront this other-wise unknown person in Antioch. At the same time, none of the sources thatdraws this distinction actually makes anything of it-that is, none of themuses it for any explicit apologetic ends. Furthermore, it should be noted thatin several of the representatives of this view, including our earliest, the

15 J. B. Lightfoot, Saint Paul'sEpistle to the Galatians (London: Macmillan, 1890) 30.16 That they are not precise equivalents is well known. For details concerning the probablederivation of the two epithets, see Cullmann, Peter,17-20.17 In addition to the more recent commentaries, see, e.g., Lightfoot, Galatians, 128-30.

466


6/13

Ehrman: Cephas and PeterEpistulaApostolorum,Cephas is not one of the seventy at all but is a memberof Jesus' original twelve disciples.For these reasons, a simpler explanation for the tradition should perhapsbe considered at greater length: it may have derived from a close reading ofthe NT documents themselves, particularlythose in which "Cephas" s mostfrequently named-the writings of the apostle Paul. We ourselves would dowell to engage in a careful reading of Paul on this point, particularly whenwe bear in mind that Paul is the only author from the early church of whomwe can saywith some certainty that he actually knew Cephas (Gal 1:18;2:9).What is strikingis that, although he also mentions Peter (Gal 2:7-8), he givesabsolutely no indication that they are the same person. Quite to the contrary,if one were to read Paul without prejudging the issue in light of John 1:42and the overwhelming consensus of Christian opinion through the ages, onewould be hardpressed indeed to show that when Paul said Cephas, he reallymeant Peter.

III. Cephas and Peter in PaulWhereas Paul mentions Cephas by name eight times in his letters, (1 Cor1:12;3:22; 9:5; 15:5; Gal 1:18;2:9, 11,14), he mentions Peter only twice (Gal2:7, 8). What is initially intriguing, and what has been most frequentlyobserved in this connection, is that when he does mention Peter in Gal 2:7-8he names Cephas in the same breath-and in such a way as to provide noindication that he is referring to the same person:

7Whenthey [those"ofrepute"] aw that I had been entrustedwith thegospel to the uncircumcised,ust as Peter had been entrustedwith thegospelto the circumcised8(forhe whoworked hroughPeterfor the mis-sion to the circumcisedworkedthroughme also for the Gentiles),9andwhentheyperceived hegracethatwasgiventome,JamesandCephasandJohn,who were reputed o be pillars,gaveto me andBarnabashe righthandof fellowship.. "

Since Peter is mentioned in vv. 7 and 8, one would naturally expect himto be named first in the list of v. 9, or at least to be called by the same name.While Paul may have had other reasons for naming James first, it is verydifficult to see why he would suddenly call Peter by a different name withoutgiving anyindication to his reader thathe had in mind the same person. EarlyChristian scribes, of course, recognized this problem and rectified it bychanging the text of v. 9.18 Paul'smodus operandi here has proved to be aninsoluble conundrum for commentators, resulting in explanations of Paul'sinterchange of names that are as numerous as they are ingenious.09Indeed,

18 "Cephas"asbeen changed o "Peter"n P46,D, F,G,629, 1175,a, b, r,andseveralotherwitnesses.19See the positionsenumerated yHans DieterBetz,GalatiansHermeneia; hiladelphia:Fortress, 979)96-97.

467


7/13

Journal of Biblical Literatureit is safe to say that most commentators have simply overlooked, or ratherchosen to ignore, what should seem rather obvious: whoever did not knowthat Kephas s a rough Aramaicequivalent of Petros,and who further did notrealize that traditionally Cephas and Peter were identified as the sameperson, would never on the basis of this passage be led to make the identifica-tion themselves. Tothe contrary,any sensible reader would assume that theywere different persons.

Among recent scholars, the most popular explanation for Paul'suse of thename "Peter"n Gal 2:7, 8 but "Cephas" n 2:9 is the view that was proposedindependently by Cullmann and Erich Dinkler and developed subsequentlyby both Dinkler and Gunther Klein20According to this view, Paulcites somekind of officially transcribed document of the Jerusalem Conference in Gal2:7-8. This document used the name "Peter"with reference to the greatmissionary to the circumcision. But when Paul reverts back to his ownlanguage, he uses the name he prefers, "Cephas."It is not surprising that such an idea occurred to no one for nineteenhundred years.There is almost nothing in the text to suggest it and virtuallyeverything to discount it. The passage is given entirely in the firstperson, sothat even if it were embodying a formal decree of some kind, it has beenseriously reformulated. Apart from the inherent improbability that Paulhas-without warning or indication-inserted a fragment of such a docu-ment, partly recalled (or discovered among his papers!),21 one should querywhat his purpose might be in doing so. Presumably it would be to lendauthority to his claim that the Council in Jerusalem had simply affirmedhisown position in its official decree. But if the citation were made to buttresshis claim, he surely would have made it quite clear that he was in factreproducing the original wording of the agreement. The wording of vv. 7-8is in fact one of the chief problems with the theory. For, as Ulrich Wilckens

20 See Cullmann, Peter, 18; Erich Dinkler, "Die Petrus-Rom-Frage,"TRu n.F. 25 (1959) 198;idem, SignumCrucis:Aufsitze zum NeuenTestamentund zur christlichenArchdologie Tiibingen:Mohr-Siebeck, 1967) 279-82; GuinterKlein, "Galater2, 6-9 und die Geschichte der Jeru-salemer Urgemeinde,"in Rekonstruktionund Interpretation:Gesammelte Aufsdtzezum NeuenTestament(Munich: Kaiser, 1969) 106-7, 118-19.In addition to these studies, the view has been accepted, with some reservations,by Betz,Galatians, 97; Heinrich Schlier, Der Brief an die Galater (14th ed.; Kritisch-exegetischerKommentaruiber das Neue Testament 7; Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1965) 77; andin part by Ulrich Wilckens, "Der Ursprung der Uberlieferung der Erscheinungen des Aufer-standenen: Zur traditionsgeschichtlichen Analyse von 1. Kor. 15,1-11,"n Dogma und Denk-strukturen(ed. Wilfried Joest and WolfhartPannenberg;G6ttingen: Vandenhoeck& Ruprecht,1963).21 Paul, of course, does incorporate a number of creedal and hymnic fragments in hiswritings, as well as other materials that are clearly "traditional"But the former are readilydiscerned by their balanced cadence, their unusual vocabulary and construction, and, often,their non-Pauline theological slant (e.g., Rom 1:3-4; Phil 2:6-11; 1 Cor 15:3-5). The latter arepatently marked as such (e.g., 1 Cor 11:23-26). Naturally,Paul can never be shown to quote anearlier source in a passage that is thoroughly Pauline in vocabulary,construction, and thought.

468


8/13

Ehrman: Cephas and Peterhas demonstrated, these two verses are permeated by characteristicallyPauline words and phrases: C7tuaTeeu[Latith the accusative occurs only in thePauline tradition (see 1 Cor 9:17; 1 Thess 2:4; and, from the Pastorals, 1 Tim1:11;Titus 1:3);22 the contrast between &xpop3uatoxnd 7eptxol.L is with onlyone exception in the writings of Paul and his followers,23 as is the terma&oTo),1;24 and the term evepyetv and its cognates permeate the Paulinecorpus (34 times), occurring outside of it but twice, once in a tradition sharedby Mark and Matthew and once in James.25The only real exception to the Pauline character of these verses is the name"Peter" itself.26 For Wilckens that is enough to establish the likelihood thatPaul is citing the earlier agreement of the Jerusalem Conference. But theissue at stake is precisely this, Paul's peculiar alternation of names. It willscarcely do to construe our question as the primary evidence for the answer!In point of fact, unless we are somehow to think that the Jerusalem Con-ference lapsed into Pauline jargon (e.g., 7tx(uTutat) when framing its con-clusions, we must conclude, as is usually done, that Paul has not at all quotedthe report verbatim, but expressed it in his own words. Once that concessionhas been made, however, one is back to the root problem of why Paul usesthe name "Peter" in vv. 7 and 8 but "Cephas" in v. 9.

The other theories for this phenomenon are well known and are frequentlydiscounted for a similar want of evidence or probability.27 For our purposesit simply need be noted that if in fact there were two different persons,Cephas and Peter, then the matter would be handily solved. Paul speaks asif Cephas were not Peter because in fact he was not. If this view seems toofarfetched for modern sensibilities, it can at least serve to explain the genesisand perpetuation of the tradition we have sketched.

But the evidence of Paul has not been exhausted by this consideration of22 Wilckens, "Der Ursprung der Uberlieferung,' 72 n. 41.23 The exception is Acts 11:2-3.24 With the exception of Acts 1:25.25 Mark 6:14;Matt 14:2;Jas 5:16.26 Apartfrom the phrase "ro6 uacyTXtov-t a&xpop3uatao. . [r6 TuayyeX,tov]ri 7Cptoltlt,"which is sometimes interpreted as referringto "gospels"of different contents and therefore takento be non-Pauline,or rather anti-Pauline,in character.(As is contended, e.g., in Klein, "Galater2,' 118 n. 3.) But clearly this is not what the phrase means to Paul, as if he suddenly forgot whathe had written in 1:6-7; and there is no reason to assume it ever meant that. Naturally,a Chris-tian proclamation to pagans would include information and emphases different from that

preached to Jews:no Jew would have to be persuaded to "turnfrom lifeless idols to serve theliving and true God"(1Thess 1:10)!But this does not in itself require a "different"meaning "con-trary")gospel.It should be noted also that the words of the phrase in question are themselves Pauline, asis the sharpcontrast of &xpop3uoa-rnd 7eptroxuL.t will hardly do to claim that since the wordsare never combined elsewhere in Paul that they thereby evidence his dependence on an earliersource. What strange results would accrue if all thirty-one hapax legomena found in Galatianswere made to bear such a burden!27 See Betz, Galatians, 96-97.

469


9/13

Journal of Biblical LiteratureGal 2:7-9. There remain the other references to Cephas in Paul's letters,references that provide other points of interest. Indeed, what is striking isthat in virtually every instance, Paul's references to Cephas contain some-thing that is difficult to explain if in fact he meant "Peter,'Jesus' disciple, theone who had received the "apostolateto the circumcised" (Gal 2:8) just asPaul received that to the uncircumcised.In some respects the reference in 1 Cor 15:5 is the most interesting. Inreciting the traditionhe had received concerning the death and resurrectionof Jesus, Paul names Cephas as the first to have witnessed Jesus raised fromthe dead:

3ForI deliveredto you as of firstimportancewhat I also received,thatChristdied for our sins in accordancewith the scriptures,4thathe wasburied,that he wasraisedon the thirddayin accordancewith the scrip-tures, 5andthat he appearedto Cephas,then to the twelve. 6Then heappeared o more thanfivehundredbrethrenat one time,mostof whomare stillalive, hough ome have allenasleep.7Thenhe appearedoJames,then to all the apostles.8Lastof all,as to one untimelyborn,he appearedalso to me.

Scholars have long noted the highly structured character of this fragmentandconcluded that it represents an early creedal formula.28Although there issome dispute concerning the extent of the creed itself-that is, whether itends at v. 5 or continues on through v. 7-most scholars agree that at leastin Paul's formulation of the tradition there appears to be an intentionalparallelismbetween vv. 5-6 on the one hand and vv.7-8 on the other, so thatthere are in effect two lists of witnesses to the resurrection. Furthermore,there seems to be an intentional correlation of function between the two lists,so that each member of the first appears to be construed as a functionalequivalent to its parallel in the second. Leaving aside the precise nature ofthe first set of parallels, since that itself is our overarching concern here, itcan at least be noted that each list begins with an individual to whom Jesusappeared: Cephas (v. 5) and James (v. 7). The lists continue with referencesto groups of Jesus' followers, groups that were instrumental in the establish-ment of the Christian church: "the Twelve" n v. 5 and "all the apostles" inv. 7 (two groups with considerable overlap,of course, but by no means iden-tical). The lists conclude with witnesses that are perhaps to be construed asguarantorsof the tradition: the five hundred believers, who, Paul observes,are for the most part still alive, which suggests perhaps that they can stilltestify to what they have seen (v. 6), and Paul, who is doing just that (v. 8).

Given these clear parallels between the corresponding members of the28 For the following discussion, in addition to the more recent commentaries, see ReginaldH.Fuller, The Formationof the ResurrectionNarratives(New York:Macmillan, 1971);and John E.

Alsup, The Post-ResurrectionAppearanceStoriesof the Gospel Tradition(Calwer TheologischeMonographien 5: Stuttgart:Calwer, 1975) 55-64, and the literature cited there.

470


10/13

Ehrman: Cephas and Petertwo lists, what significance can be attached to their respective firstmembers,Cephas andJames?Perhapsthese two are singled out because of their impor-tance in establishing the church in Jerusalem. But in that case one wonderswhy John, the other aTxTXog,s not also mentioned. More commonly it issuggested that they are similarin playing a leadership role among the groupsmentioned subsequently, "Cephas" (i.e., Peter, in this view) among theTwelve, and "James"among the apostles29 This view has a good deal to besaid for it, but it is made difficult by Paul's insistence in the second list thatthe resurrected Christ appeared to "all" he apostles (v. 7). Is James really theleader of all the apostles? He certainly was not acknowledged as a leader byPaul at a later date nor, apparently,by Barnabas,earlier. Perhaps then, as ismore likely,he is being construed as a leader among the original apostles inJerusalem. But if that is the point, the parallel no longer exists-for in factit was Peter, not James, who led the original group of apostles.30Thus it may be that Paul has construed the parallel between Cephas andJames in a differentwayaltogether.Here it should be observed that this Jamesis decidedly not one of Jesus' twelve disciples but is, presumably, Jesus'brother, whose conversion to faith and whose position of authority in thechurch were secured not on the basis of a personal association with Jesuswhile alive,but by apersonal audience with Jesus afterhis death. Could it notbe that, given the parallelnature of the two lists, Cephas should be construedsimilarly,namely, as one who was not Jesus' earthly disciple but who wasthought to have had a personal revelation of Jesus and was, as a result, con-verted? It maybe significant, in this connection, that Paulis a third individualnamed in this list, another unbeliever who was granted a personal visitationfrom Jesus, resulting in his leadership role in the Christian community.One other feature of this passage merits careful consideration. Therewould be no reason to suspect that James is to be excluded from membershipin the group of the apostles mentioned subsequently. Quite to the contrary,since the second list states that Jesus appeared to James and then to all theapostles, there is every good reason to assume that James is one member ofthis larger group. What about Cephas in the first list? Strikingly,the wordingis differenthere, so that Jesus is not said to appear to all the Twelve,after hehad already appeared to one of them. Rather,he "appearedto Cephas andthen to the Twelve."Perhaps given the blinders we normally wear whenreading a text like this, we have overlooked that there is nothing here to indi-cate that Cephas is being construed as an individual member of the groupmentioned subsequently. It can at least be stated with some confidence that

29 Thus, e.g., Wilckens, "Der Ursprung der Uberlieferung" 70-72.30 Another point to be considered against assuming that the parallel between the first twomembers of these respective lists, the individuals Cephas and James, consists in their relation-

ship with the groups mentioned subsequently, is that the parallel between the second membersof the lists (the "Twelve"'nd "allthe apostles")do not reside in their relationship with the thirdmembers (the five hundred and Paul).

471


11/13

Journal of Biblical Literatureanyone without any previous knowledge of the matter might well be led tosuppose that James was one of the apostles, without at all being led to suspectthat Cephas was one of the Twelve.What now of Paul's other references to Cephas? Here the one thing thatcannot be overlooked is that, taken at least on face value, they appearto standsomewhat at odds with what we knowabout Peter'srole in the early Christianchurch, at least as Pauldescribes it in Galatians. There Paul states explicitlythat Peter was entrusted with the "apostolateto the circumcised,'"ust as hehimself had been given the apostolate to the uncircumcised (Gal 2:8). Thismust mean that as Paul was committed to evangelizing Gentiles, Peter wascommitted to evangelizing Jews (whether in Palestine or abroad).This makesPaul's other references to Cephas curious indeed, if in fact they are to betaken as references to Peter.Consider first the situation, puzzling as it has proved for interpreters overthe ages, that occurred in Antioch: the confrontation of Paul and Cephas.3lWhatever the precise nature of the dispute, and whether it was Paul orCephas who got the better of the argument, it is perfectly clear from whatPaul tells us that Cephas was in Antioch associating with Christianswho hadbeen converted from paganism. Why he was doing so Paul does not say.Butin any case it seems to be an unusual thing to do for someone who wasdedicated to evangelizing non-Christian Jews. Why is he not in the Jewishmission field rather than among Gentile churches?32 And why would itrequire a delegation fromJerusalem to informhim- him, the PalestinianJewtrying to win Jewish converts -that eating with Gentiles might compromisehis mission? Would a Jew seeking Jewish converts "live like a Gentile" and"not like a Jew"(Gal 2:13)while doing so? I doubt whether we will ever havea fully satisfactoryanswer to these questions, but I cannot help but note thatif in fact this person is not the one entrusted with the apostolate to the cir-cumcised, there is no problem as to why he does not seem to be doing whathe had been appointed to do.Somewhat less persuasive, but nonetheless worthy of note, is Cephas'spossible relationship with the converted pagans who comprised the churchin Corinth. Whether Cephas had actuallyvisited Corinth, of course,has beenhotly debated. Here it is not necessary to delve into all the problems asso-ciated with the party slogans of 1 Cor 1:12 and 3:22, "I am of Paul, I am ofApollos, I am of Cephas, I am of Christ" It is enough to note that of the threeChristianleaders mentioned here, two of them, Paul and Apollos, had clearlyministered among these converted pagans.Tomymind, there is no compellingreason to doubt that the third had as well. The Corinthians certainly seem

31 In addition to the commentaries, see, e.g., George Howard, Crisis in Galatia (Cambridge:University Press, 1979) 21-28, and the literature he cites there.

32 This is not to question, of course,whether the church in Antioch was a mixed congregation.It clearly was. The issue, however,is why Cephas as a missionary to non-ChristianJews wouldbe spending his time with converts from paganism.

472


12/13

Ehrman: Cephas and Peterto know something about Cephas's activities. This much can be assumed onthe basis of 1 Cor 9:5, in which Paul does not appear to be giving his readersnew information about Cephas but rather to be presupposing that theyalready knew that he was accompanied on his journeys by his wife. Had hemade a stop among the Corinthian congregation? If so, it must have been aninfluential visit, if indeed some members of the congregation are claiming apersonal allegiance to him as a leader or teacher over the one who estab-lished their church. But if this is the case, it is again puzzling that the onething Paul says about the ministry of Peter is that it focused on evangelizingnon-ChristianJews, while every time he mentions Cephas it is in associationwith converts from paganism.

IV. Summary and ConclusionsThe tradition that Cephas and Peter were two different persons is both

very ancient and remarkablypersistent. The tradition is explicitly attested inthe early second century and may well have been derived from our earliestsources for the life and work of the apostles, the NT documents themselves.Using these writings, an early Christian could have concluded that amongJesus' followers were two with similar epithets: Cephas, one of the pillars ofthe church in Jerusalem, and the disciple Peter,later an evangelist among theJews.3 What, though, about the historical question: Was Cephas Peter?None of the witnesses that deal with the issue from the second centurydown to the Middle Ages can be construed, of course, as primary evidence,one way or the other. But in point of fact there is only one primary witness:the apostle Paul, the only writer from antiquity whom we know beyondreasonable doubt to have been personally acquainted with Cephas. Paul'stestimony must be construed as prima facie evidence and cannot be dis-counted because of what is said in later sources, written by those who didnot know Cephas,34or by general improbabilities that may seem to attend to33 An obvious objection to our thesis, that the NT documents themselves can account for thetradition that Cephas and Peter were two different persons, is that one of these documents, the

Gospel of John, actually identifies the two. But even a close reading of John 1:42 does notnecessarily preclude the possibility that we have two persons going under the same epithetamong Jesus' early followers. This is manifestly demonstrated by Origen in his commentary onJohn. Origen notes that it is difficult indeed to reconcile the Johannine account of Peter's call(chap. 1) with that found in the early part of Mark (Comm.Jn. 10.8.31).He observes not onlythat the accounts themselves are radically different but also that in Mark Peter does notrecognize Jesus' identity and receive his nickname until halfway through the narrative,whereasin John all this transpiresin his very first encounter with Jesus. For Origen, of course, this kindof literary tension did not require some kind of historical resolution, such as the view thatCephas and Peter were in fact two different persons. Rather,it showed the need to go beyondthe literal to a spiritual interpretation of the divinely inspired text. All the same, it bears notingthat a careful reading of the Fourth Gospel does not in itself require the view that there wasonly one person named Cephas/Peter.

34 For example, the Fourth Gospel. Although I agree with J. Louis Martyn ("Glimpses into

473


13/13

Journal of Biblical Literaturethe case.35Although it may be unfortunate that Paul did not explicitly differ-entiate between Cephas and Peter, he could hardly have been expected todo so, any more than he could have been expected to state that James, oneof the two other Jerusalem axcXotl,was not the son of Zebedee.36All the same,we can no longer affordto overlook the peculiar results of this study.WhenPaul mentions Cephas, he apparently does not mean Simon Peter, the dis-ciple of Jesus.37The implications of this conclusion will be obvious to anyone who hasworked at anylength with the NT materials. For those who have not, we cansimply mention the following: (1) Paul would not have gone to Jerusalem,three years after his "conversion"Gal 2:18-20), in order to learn more aboutthe life of Jesus from one of his closest disciples, Peter.Instead, he would havegone to confer with Cephas, a leader of the Jerusalem church, perhaps con-cerning missionary strategy.(2) Peter may not have even been present at theJerusalem Conference in which Paul's Gentile mission was approved andsanctioned (Gal 2:1-10). (3) No longer would we know if Peter was accom-panied by his wife on his missionary journeys (1 Cor 9:5), nor whether hevisited Corinth. (4) The confrontation at Antioch (Gal 2:11-14) would nothave been between Peter and Paul,that is, between Jesus'closest disciple andhis most avid apostle. It would have been between a Jerusalem and a Paulineform of Christianity,pure and simple. (5) Finally,there would remain no NTevidence of Peter'spresence in Antioch, where tradition ascribes to him thefirst bishopric (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.36).the History of the Johannine Community," n L'Evangilede Jean: Sources,redaction, theologie[ed. M. de Jonge; BETL 44; Gembloux: Duculot, 1977] 149-75; reprinted in his Gospel of Johnin Christian History [New York:Paulist, 1979]) that John 1:42 is embedded in a pericope thatgoes back to the earliest stages of the Johannine community, there can be no doubt that theverse as it has come down to us, with its Greek translation of Aramaic terms, is a much latercomposition, made any time down to the final redaction of the Gospel, perhaps as late as theend of the first century.

35 Viz., the improbability that two of Jesus' closest followers were given the same nickname,a nickname that is previously unattested. This problem can be accounted for on other grounds.See especially Riddle, "The Cephas-Peter Problem";see also n. 38.36 The natural tendency to think of Galatians' three pillars-James, Cephas, and John-interms of the Gospels' "innergroup"of disciples- "Peter,James,and John" may itself have con-tributed to the popular identification of Cephas as Peter in Gal 2:8-9.37 It is impossible, of course, to reconstruct the events that would have led to two of Jesus'

early followers sharing an unusual nickname. But there is one other curious piece of evidenceto consider: the traditionpresupposed by the author of 2 Peter,who calls himself "Simeon Peter."What is odd, of course, is that the proper name is given in its Aramaic form, whereas thenickname is translated into Greek. Why is it not "Simeon Cephas"or "Simon Peter"(as in factseveral MSS ave made it!)?Admittingthe hypothetical nature of any suggestion, it could be thatthe nickname of Jesus' disciple Simeon (Simon, "thebrother of Andrew")was not bestowed onhim until after the death of Jesus, perhaps among the Hellenistic Jews he had converted in hismission "to the circumcised" In this case "Kephas"would have been the nickname of one ofthe three styloi of the early Jerusalem church, a man converted to faith in Jesus soon after thecrucifixion by some kind of vision of the resurrected Lord (1 Cor 15:5).

474

simão cefas

Documents