Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

PETER, ACTS OF

(BG, 4)

One of the miracle-filled apocryphal acts, centering on a contest between Peter and Simon Magus in Rome (an elaboration on the encounter in the canonical Acts) and on the martyrdom of the apostle. In the competition with Simon, Peter enlists the aid of a dog and a baby, both of which are given the power of speech, and restores three men to life. In a last, desperate attempt to reassert his power over those in attendance, Simon flies over the city of Rome. By means of prayer Peter is able to bring Simon to earth. In the martyrdom, Peter is crucified upside-down as a result of having angered two prominent Roman citizens by preaching chastity to their wives and concubines. Each of the two episodes portrays a major theme of the Acts: the restoration of the faith of those who have been lured away by pagan cults and the insistence on sexual abstinence even within marriage.

The document was almost certainly composed in Greek in the latter half of the 2nd century c.e. Approximately the first third of the document is missing, although it is likely that the stories of Peter temporarily healing his paralyzed daughter (preserved only in a Coptic translation and known as the Act of Peter) and of his healing a gardener’s daughter (summarized in the Epistle of Pseudo-Titus) are from the missing chapters. The remainder of the work is preserved in Latin in the Vercelli manuscript, and the martyrdom, which also circulated independently, is preserved in Greek, Syriac, Ethiopic, Arabic, Armenian, Georgian, Slavonic, and Coptic. The author is unknown, and the most likely candidates for the place of writing are Rome or Asia Minor.

Bibliography. J. K. Elliott, ed., The Apocryphal New Testament, rev. ed. (New York, 1993), 390-430; W. Schneemelcher, “The Acts of Peter,” in New Testament Apocrypha, ed. Schneemelcher-R. McL. Wilson, rev. ed., 2 (Louisville, 1992): 271-321.

James R. Mueller

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

PETER, ACTS OF

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)