Peter's Catholic Epistles

Date of First Epistle. Sent to the “Diaspora* m Asia. Minor. Pontus. Galatia. Cappadocia. Asia. Bithtnia. Silas the Bearer. Object op the Epistle. Its doctrinal statements. The Second Epistle. Its claims to a place in the sacred canon. grounds 09 objection to its Genuineness Examined.

“These are the tones to brace and cheer
The lonely watcher of the fold,
When nights are dark and foemen near.
When visions fade and hearts grow cold.”

M Peter also sounded with the two trumpets of his Epistles.” — Origen.

“Wonderful is the gravity and alacrity of Peter’s discourse, most agreeably holding the reader’s attention.” — Bengel.

“This Epistle is full of apostolic dignity and authority, and worthy of the Prince of the Apostles.” — Erasmus.

“Every part of Peter s writings indicates a mind that felt the power of the doctrines he delivered, and a soul that glowed with the most ardent zeal for the spread of the GospeL” — Home’s Introduction,

T was then, probably after eleven or twelve years of arduous labour in the five great provinces of Lesser Asia, that Peter took up his head-quarters at Babylon. The allotted threescore and ten must now have furrowed his brow with wrinkles and dimmed the lustre of his eye. But he is still strong in faith, giving glory to God.

These previous years, we have every reason to believe, had been spent in continuous Evangelistic ministration: moreover, that these labours did not consist in the mere lmrried visits of the itinerant preacher — the wayfaring man that turneth aside to tarry for a night. We seem warranted to infer that he remained sufficiently long in each place to consolidate the Churches which he reared, and to form intimate and endearing fellowships — fellowships and friendships which he not only retained but strengthened when settled down in the comparative leisure of his final home.

Here also, with the true sympathy of the pastor who “knows his sheep,” he wrote his two comforting and condoling letters, of which we shall now endeavour in succession to give a brief account. As containing the latest product of his mind — his most matured sentiments on Christian ethics and doctrine, they cannot fail to be specially interesting. They give evidence, patent to the observation of the most superficial reader, that a vast transformation had taken place in the entire nature of the man who writes them. We fail to discover any trace of the once proud, reliant disciple, who lorded it over his fellows, and indulged in boastful protestations; who often, in his moments of rash and unguarded impulse, “wist not what he said.” The passion of youth, the impetuosity and arrogance of manhood, the earthquake, the wind, the tempest, and the fire, are all over. There is nothing heard but the “still small voice.” Paul was no egotist; yet even in his Epistles there are many personal references and “boastings,” from which these letters of Peter are free. In the case of the latter, the boisterous day subsides into the calmest of sunsets, where all is love, gentleness, meekness, peace. Even the more venial early fault of Jewish prejudice and intolerance had merged into catholic, expansive, universal charity. There is a total abnegation of self, and a sole glorifying of his Great Lord. The star loses its own lustre the nearer it comes to the glory of the central sun. A beautiful testimony to the power of the grace of Him who, in the words of an old divine, “from the roughest of materials, fashions stones for the high palace of His glory.”

But these remarks will be best substantiated as we examine the Epistles in detail

The First was written probably in the year 63, immediately before Nero’s persecution, which commenced in a.d. 64.

As is the case in the Epistle of St James, he sends it to the “diaspora” with this difference, that the former was a general or circular letter addressed to the dispersed Jewish settlers in all the provinces — European, African, and Asiatic — whereas that of Peter is limited to the latter,” the elect sojourners of the dispersion of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia (proconsular), and Bithynia.,, 1 Not that we are by this to restrict it exclusively to Jewish converts, for we have reason to suppose that the Churches Peter founded were largely

f’The Church,” which in oar authorised version conveys the salutation from “Babylon. * is not in the original. “She that is elected together with you.” Dean Alford in common with others, supports very strongly the theory that the salutation is conveyed by Peter’s wife (1 Cor. ix. 5); and more especially as the Epistle is addressed not to the Churches of the Dispersion, but to the elect sojourner* of the Dispersion. The salutation is to individuals, not a collective body, — “To the Elect Christians,” and greetings are sent from an elect Christian sister in Babylon “She, her husband’s companion in travel,” says Dr Plumptre, “might well send a salutation to those whom she had known, whose wives and daughters she had probably taught to aspire after a higher and purer life, to whom she had presented a type of womanhood as yet new and strange to tfaem.” (See Biblical Studies.) Nor shall I venture any opinion on a disputed point with regard to another reference to “Marcus my son.” in the same verse. I give the words of a note in “Sermons and Essays on the Apostolic Age,” with the opinion which the author seems to share with .many others: “1 Pet. v. IS. It is difficult to resin the conclusion that the V avreicXeVij is the wife of Peter, and if so, that 6 vMs fiov is not metaphorically (in which case t£kvqp would be the natural word, as in 1 Tim. 1. 2), but literally “his son,* r made up of the Gentile element, — those who had “turned from idols to serve the living God.” 1

A few preliminary remarks may be made regarding this cluster of provinces (in the order in which they are here given), which formed his vast diocese — the sheepfold for which he, along with the Beloved Apostle John, were responsible to the Chief Shepherd. We say advisedly “vast diocese,” for it had a superficial area almost equal to the entire of France, with, generally speaking, not a scattered but a dense population. “The 500 cities of Asia Minor,” spoken of by Josephus, give us a glimpse of the numbers with whom he held epistolary converse.

Pontus formed the north-east province, having for its northern boundary the shores of the Black Sea. It was the native country of the Christian Jew Aquila, and became a kingdom of celebrity under the sceptre of Mithridates the Great, who was engaged in a protracted war with the Romans, but on being defeated the greater portion of his dominions were annexed by Pompey to the Roman Empire. Its principal town, Amasia, gave birth to the geographer Strabo. It was distinguished alike for fertility of soil and abundance of inhabitants.

* Dr Plumptre, who traces with great ingenuity subtle references and dedut tions which escape alike the ordinary reader and ordinary scholar, remarks of those to whom this Epistle was sent: — “We may infer from St Peter’s warnings against the luxury that showed itself in 4 the plaiting of hair, and the wear ng of gold, and putting on of apparel,’ that the new faith numbered some at least of the ‘honourable women* of the wealthier classes among its disciples; and from his desire that the believers should be able to give an answer (literally an ap»loffy to every man that asked them a reason of the hope that was in them, that there were men among them with sufficient culture to venture on such a vindication.” — The BM* Educator, p. 130.

Galatia (Gaulatia), the country made familiar to us by St Paul’s Epistle, lay to the west of Pontus and east of Phrygia and Bithynia. Ancyra, where the main thoroughfares converged, was its ecclesiastical metropolis. It was originally colonised by some Gallic or Celtic tribes who, three centuries before Christ, had made an irruption into Macedonia and Thrace, and were invited by JNicomedes, King of Bithynia, to cross the Hellespont and help him to subdue his brother. After acceding to his request, they made good their own settlement in the country, and lived predatory lives, till Attains, King of Pergamus, succeeded in curbing them and restricting them within a certain territory. Their independence, for a time regained, was finally lost; and Galatia became a Roman province sixty years before our Apostle set foot on its soil

Cappadocia formed the largest province in Asia Minor. It was bounded by Galatia on the west, and by the Euphrates on the east, with Mount Taurus on the south. It also for long enjoyed its own tributary kings; but at the time Peter was spending his early manhood at Bethsaida, it was absorbed by the Roman power. From Acts ii 9, we find Jews from Cappadocia coming up to Jerusalem to attend the Feast of Passover and Pentecost. These probably carried back to their own country the first intimation of Messiah’s Resurrection, and the fulfilment of Joel’s prophecy as to the outpouring of the Spirit It became the birthplace of Gregory and Basil of a future age.

Still further south and west we have proconsular “Asia;” not Asia Minor, but that portion of it lying along the shores of the iEgean which formed a special Roman province, bequeathed as such by At till us, King of Pergamus. Here were the scenes of Paul’s earliest labours and triumphs. Lystra, the birthplace of Timothy; Iconium, Derbe, and Antioch in Pisidia. It included also the well-known towns, Philadelphia, Sardis, Thyatira, Laodicea, Hierapolis, and Colosse, the latter doubly associated by us with Paul’s Epistle and with his friend Onesimus. Epbesus, the capital and seat of government, “the emporium of Asia Minor, with its schools of magic and its magnificent Temple,” recalls the names of Aquila, Priscilla, Apollos, and their great master and teacher. Smyrna, identified in an after age with “the blessed Polycarp,” who shed his blood as a martyr for the truth in the Stadium, and whose reputed tomb, which we have visited with interest, still crowns the heights above the city; and Alexandria-Troas, from which the Apostle of the Gentiles received his call to the great mission-field of the Wast: leaving the vast domain east of the shores of the JSgean to the Rockman and the Son of Thunder.

Bithynia was situated to the west of Galatia, bounded by the Euxine onhe north and the snowy range of Mount Olympus in the south. Its chief ecclesiastical interest was in times subsequent to the life of Peter. It is associated with that remarkable letter of the younger Pliny to which we have already referred; also with the memorable first Council of Nice. It was into this province the Apostle of the Gentiles sought to enter, but was deterred by some divine Providential intimation, “the Spirit suffered him not*

Such, then, was the wide auditory to which Peter spoke by means of his First Epistle. Silvanus, probably the Silas of the Acts, was the bearer of it. It is sur-PSTW’S CATHOLIC EPISTLES.

raised that, possibly at the instigation of Paul, be may have been sent on a tour of visitation to these Asiatic Churches, some of which -bad been founded by the illustrious Bpipan prisoner, «ud that subsequently visiting Peter in Babylon and reporting on their condition and circumstances, the Apostle of the Circumcision may have resolved to send; back, by tbia faithful minister of Christ, words of needed counsel, comfort, and exhortation. At its close, he * specifies the particular object and motive he had in writing it, “Exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God wherein ye stand.” From sundry allusions, too, it would appear probable that Mark was with Peter at the time of its composition — some have supposed while St Paul had left Rome on a distant missionary expedition. As Mark, we knowy was with the latter in his first imprisonment, it has been surmised that he may have been, during the great Apostle’s absence, the bearer of the encyclical letter to the Ephesians, and proceeded at the same time further east to visit Peter in Babylon. The writer of the Epistle evidently refers in that closing verse, just quoted, to some body of doctrine which his readers had previously received (u the grace of God wherein ye stand “y; and again” Stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance; n indicating, what we have already noted, that he himself previously, by faithful ministerial labour, had a personal connection with these churches which he now sought to build up and establish, not by oral word, but by Epistle.

One very essential part obviously of this First Epistle, and admirably adapted for the purpose, was to comfort his converts and sustain them in their constancy. “It is the following out of our Lord’s command to its writer, ’ when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren, “1 “It was at a time, apparently,” says Professor Plumptre, “when they needed counsel, when no other teacher of equal authority was at hand to comfort them; when St Paul, who had founded so many churches in those regions, had been cut off from them, possibly after that last visit of his, subsequent to the first imprisonment at Rome, of which we read that it was a time of trial and persecution, which led all in Asia ’ to turn away from him,w (2 Tim. i. 15).* “The trial of their faith n (i. 7), was the key-note of the letter. Nor was it an ordinary trial which they were thus either enduring or anticipating — it was a” trial by fire 19 (7) — the emblem of suffering and endurance for the sake of Jesus: — “reproached for the name of Christ n (iv. 14).” The answer for the reason of the hope that was in them “would be demanded, if it had not been already extorted, by threats and penalties. But they were not to be” ashamed “when called thus to” suffer for the will of God” (iv. 19), and “for righteousness’ sake; “but to seek to confront the” evil-doers “(j»ersecutors) with” a good conscience “(iil 16); —” suffering as Christians, n and “glorifying God on this behalf” (iv. 16). Above all, does he counsel bis beloved converts in the midst of these “fiery trials” (iv. 1 2) to look to the exalted and holy example of their divine Saviour, who “suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow His steps” (iL 21). How he repeats and reiterates this one encouraging thought, to disarm the sting of their own persecutions: “because Christ also suffered for us” (ii 21). “For Christ also hath once suffered” (iil 18). “Forasmuch then as Christ hath i Alford. The Bible Educator, p. 190. mffered .... arm yourselves likewise with the same mind” (iv. 1). “Rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings” (iv. 13). “He who dated his own faith,” says Wiesinger, “from the sufferings of his Master, is never weary in holding up the suffering form of the Lord before the eyes of his readers to comfort and stimulate them; he before whom the death of a martyr is in assured expectation, is the man who most thoroughly, and in the greatest variety of aspects, sets forth the duty and the power, — as well as the consolation, of suffering for Christ. If we had not known from whom the Epistle comes, we must have said it must be a rock of the Church who thus writes: a man whose own soul rests on the living Hock, and who here, with the strength of his testimony, takes in hand to secure the souls of others against the harassing storm of present tribulation, and to ground them on the true Rock of Ages.” 1 He further quickens his converts by the elevating thought of “the glory to be revealed n (iv. 13), that that God, who had made them” suffer awhile,” had “called them unto His eternal glory by Christ Jesus” (v. 10). Not only is the frequent reference to this future glory another distinguishing characteristic, but it is a glory, moreover, not distant, but near and imminent: — so much so, as to have led a well-known German commentator to give to Peter the appellation, “the Apostle of Hope.”” While St Paul dwells with most earnestness upon justification by our Lord’s death and merits, and concentrates his energies upon the Christian’s present struggles, St Peter fixes his eye constantly upon the future coming of Christ, the fulfilment of prophecy, the manifestation of the promised kingdom. In

Quoted by Alfoid, p. 256.

this be is the true representatire of Israel, moved by those feelings which were best calculated to enable him to do his work as the Apostle of the Circumcision.“1 With such comforting and elevating themes, we may safely aver that there is no portion of Scripture which has proved a greater help to the tried believer, whether these trials be from sin or sorrow. It is full of strong consolation; with its representations of God as a Father, preparing His children by His own loving discipline for their eternal home — the inheritance “incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away” (i. 4).

Its doctrinal statements are very pronounced and de* cided, leaving little room for the “negative theology “of recent times* The precious sacrifice of the Redeemer —” the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ “(i. 2), takes its central place in Peter’s teaching. He reminds his readers of the great procuring cause of liberty, peace, salvation; — they were “redeemed with, the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot “(L 19); words which perhaps vividly recalled — or rather were themselves suggested by — the never-to-be-forgotten exclamation which bad revolutionised his thoughts, and transfigured his whole life —” Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world!” They were pointed by the Rockman “to the chief corner Stone laid in Zion, elect, precious n (iL 6) — to the Great Surety- Substitute and Propitiation “who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree w (it 24); and as if to leave no manner of doubt as to this foundation truth of his belief, he recurs to it in still more emphatic words in the third chapter,” Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust, that

* Art. “Peter,” Bib. Die.

He might bring us to God.” “The most salient characteristic of this writing,” says a French divine —” that which from the commencement strikes the attention and touches the heart — are the transports with. which the Apostle sets forth the Redemption. His opening (i. 2) is a cry of acknowledgment and joy. The idea of the salvation brought by Jesus Christ, the recollection of His promises and His example, dominates over all his thoughts, is found at the basis of all his instructions, and recurs as the motive of even his smallest precepts. .... There is here, moreover, a profound feeling of the price which the reconciliation of man cost, — the blood shed upon the cross (i. 2, 18, 19; ii. 24, «fec), as well as of the danger of neglecting this great salvation, and the folly of confronting the judgment of Him — who after having here acted as a Father (i. 15, 17), will judge without respect of persons hereafter.,, 1

Nor is there any trace or support of Antinomianism in his creed; — the great practical lesson he enforces is “holiness.” Called by Him who is holy, they were bound to be “holy in all manner of conversation” (L 15). He reminds them of their high prerogatives — “a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people;” invested with these high privileges in order to “show forth the praises of Him who had called them out of darkness into His marvellous light” (ii. 9). They are the professing followers of One “who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth” (ii. 22).

But he is not content with mere general exhortations on the subject of sanctifi cation. He enters with singular minuteness of detail into practical duties arising out of

1 Ceilerier, quoted by Dr Kitto.

the relationships of common life; addressing pastors and people, rulers and subjects, masters and servants, husbands and wives; — descending to a special enumeration of the sins of the heart and the tongue and the life: “malice, guile, hypocrisy, envy, evil-speaking “(ii. 1); “fleshly lusts which war against the soul” (ii. 11). Recalling one of the painful incidents of a hallowed past, he remembers how his Lord had forewarned him of the subtle power of the great Tempter; and how, true to the monition, Satan had “sifted him as wheat. 99 With that sad experience in view, he can, with all the deeper solemnity and earnestness, warn them of “their adversary the devil, who as a roaring lion goeth about seeking whom he may devour” (1 Pet. v. 8.)

It is also worthy of note (distinctly appearing throughout all the Epistle), his demonstration to his Jewish brethren, that in accepting the doctrines of the Gospel, they were in truth not renouncing their ancient distinctive privileges; they retained these on a higher platform and under an advanced dispensation. He beautifully spiritualises Judaism. They are still a “peculiar people,” but holding a grander charter of election. Their fathers were encouraged to “hope in God,” but they are “begotten again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (i. 3). Their ritual of sacrifice had culminated in the death of the great Antitype — “the Lamb without blemish and without spot “(i. i 9). They enjoyed a better than the royal Levitical priesthood: for they were themselves priests; — each individual believer a” king and priest unto God “(ii. 9). A nobler land was theirs than Palestine — they were the living stones of a more enduring Temple than that which crowned the summits of Moriah” (ii 5).

“Do yon not believe, n says Van Oosterzee, “that in the hearing of such language, the hearts of the strangers in the Dispersion beat with more joyous exultation?”

Nor can the reader fail to trace, in the perusal of this beautiful letter, what might be called the inverted personality of the writer. It is not the letter we should have expected from him in bis earlier days; — but it is quite the ideal pastoral we should look for, after tracing his future history in the Acts of the Apostles; — written by the man whom the grace of God had softened and saddened, subdued and transformed.” The quick, impetuous Peter is heard admonishing with a mildness and serenity of argument which might only have been looked

for from the most gentle of human spirits We

are enabled to contemplate his completed character. We find it retaining all the elements which gave it a degree of rude grandeur even at the commencement of his course; which made us feel when he first pronounced his most sublime confession, ‘Thou art the Christ, the Son of God! ’ and when he dared to attempt a pathway over the angry sea, because it led to his Lord.” 1 We almost trace the thoughts welling up in his bosom as memory carried him back to the former days of pride, waywardness, arrogance, and vain-boasting, as he dictated the words which spoke by implication of his own besetting sin and the change grace had effected — “Be ye clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.” Who can fail to be struck with the rebuke which the reputed Prince of Apostles conveys to those who would arrogate for him a precedence so strangely at variance with his own words? Assuredly that man claimed no infallible

i Cave’s “Lives of the Apostles,” p. 17. lordship over his fellows who penned the exhortation: u The elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an elder; and a witness of the sufferings of Christf and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed: Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly; not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind; neither as being lords over God’s heritage, but being ensamples to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away w (1 Pet. v. 1-4). What a travesty of these noble and beautiful sentiments (a brother shaking to brothers — co-ordinate in rank and service) is the proud assumption of Roman decretals, and hierarchal pomp and splendour! 1

The authenticity of tl*e Epistle, which it would be but of place to examine here, is ’ undoubted. Few portions of the Sacred Canon rest on more irrefragable evidence, both external and internal. It was universally accepted by the Church of the first centuries, and all the more reliable scholars of recent times have accorded with the verdict of antiquity. The style of the Epistle is peculiarly Peter’s own. It lacks the system and logical sequences of St PauL One topic, or even word, seems suddenly to suggest another, and he indulges in those rapid transitions characteristic of his whole mind and nature. The reiteration of thought also is remarkable. “In this Epistle,1’ says Dr Hartwell Home, “he writes with such energy and rapidity of style, that we can scarcely perceive the pauses of his discourse, or the

l “That Apostle, after whom the Church of Rome erer by preference calls herself; but whose First Epistle, in itself, suffices to make manifest her departure in man j respects from the truth.” — Van Oottcraca. distinction of his periods. Little solicitous about the choice or harmonious disposition of words, his thoughts and his heart were absorbed with the grand truths which he was divinely commissioned to proclaim.“1” A few great facts, broad solid principles, on which faith and hope may rest securely with a spirit of patience, confidence, and love, suffice for his unspeculative mind.“2 It is evident from some peculiar expressions which he has appropriated, that he must have been familiar with Paul’s writings. Indeed this is only in accordance with the latter /own declaration, that he had communicated the Gospel, which he preached among the Gentiles,” privately to tJwse of repute” including doubtless Peter among these.8 A careful reader of this Epistle, comparing it with those which Paul addressed to the Romans, Ephesians, Colossians, Galatians, Tbessalonians, and 1st Corinthians, will detect the use of identical words and turns of phrases, which give unmistakable proof that the elder Apostle had drunk deep into the spirit, and not unwittingly adopted the very phraseology, of his distinguished and honoured brother in Christ.4 We may take, as an illustration, one of these similarities, which is worthy of note in connection with the scene at Antioch, when the two Apostles were brought into collision. Whatever were their variances then, on the very subject of that variance they are at one now. Paul thus writes to the Galatians regarding the rights and responsibilities of Christian liberty: “Brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only

1 Home’s Id trod action, in loco.

Art. “Epistles of Peter,” Bib. Die.

S On these affinities and coincidences see Alford’s “Prolegomena.” See these compared passages given in fall in Kitto’s Cyclopaedia, Art. “Peter.”

20 use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another” (Gal. v. 13.) Peter echoes back the sentiment of his brother in a kindred strain: “As free, and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness, but as the servants of God” (1 Peter ii. 16). “St Peter, therefore, we see,” remarks Bishop Wordsworth, “did not manifest any resentment towards St Paul for the rebuke given at Antioch, and for the publication of its history to the world. He frankly comes forward and adopts St PauVs own language on that very question which had been the subject of their dispute. Here is a noble specimen of victory over self, and of generous confession of error; here is a beautiful practical application of his own precepts concerning Christian humility, meekness, and gentleness, and of love for the sheep whom Christ purchased with His blood.” Indeed, by sending this First Epistle by the hand of Paul’s friend and companion Si lv anus (v. 12), and in the second one making such marked allusions to the “wisdom” displayed by the great Apostle in his writings (2 Pet. iii. 15, 16), he would seem desirous of repudiating and rebuking the unseemly partisanships which would make those two ministers of Christ, who were so essentially one, the heads or leaders of opposing parties in the Church. “At the close of his life,” it has been justly said,” he appears not glorying in his early fame, as leader of the first Apostles, not entrenching himself within the sphere of his natural Jewish prepossessions, but striving to merge his own individual character and existence in the career of him whom his own followers would fain represent as his rival and his enemy. ... It may well be taken as the pledge of the last work of St Peter, in cashing absolutely and for ever this fatal schism, which would have divided the two great .Fathers of our faith — him who gave it its first outward form; and him who proclaimed its deep inward spirit.

A like similarity to j that between the writings of Peter and Paul,, cannot fail to be noted between many expressions in the encyclical Epistle of James, with those in this First Epistle of his early friend. These are not to be considered as “plagiarisms,” but rather the identical expression of two minds that had been often in the past brought together; each writer gives, in his own way, the outcome of his private cogitations. Yet even the phraseology in which their thoughts are reproduced, has been noted to be characteristic of the two men. The sentences of James are cast in sterner moulds; while in Peter’s there is that mellowed gentleness and tenderness of later years to which we have previously alluded. “Whether through natural disposition, discipline, or circumstance, there is far more of softness and gentleness to be discerned in St Peter, by the witness of his Epistle, than we find in St James. 1 Ye adulterers and adulteresses.’ * Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl.’ * Wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?’ It is in this form of stern and point blank address, that St James would arouse some readers of his epistle; to whom, if St Peter were speaking, we should judge that he would rather say, as in a similar case we find lie does say, * Dearly beloved, I beseech you, as strangers and’ pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which, war against the 80111.’” 2

l “Sermons on the Apostolic Age.”
t “Waiting for the Light,” p. 186.

We cannot better close these observations on this First Epistle of our Apostle, than in the words of the saintly Leighton: “It forms a brief yet very clear summary both of the consolations and instructions needful for the encouragement and direction of a Christian in his journey to heaven, elevating his thoughts and desires to that happiness, and strengthening him against all opposition in the way, both that of corruption within, and temptations and afflictions from without. The heads of doctrine contained in it are many, but the main that are insisted on are these three: faith, obedience, and patience; to establish them in believing, to direct them in doing, and to comfort them in suffering.” 1

If the genuineness and authenticity of Peter’s First Epistle, as we have seen, are incontested, securing from Apostolic times a rare unanimity in its favour, it is not to be denied that his Second Epistle has not enjoyed the same; although we shall endeavour to show that the main grounds on which these doubts of its cai tonicity have been founded are insufficient and untenable.

It would exceed the limits of this volume, and be foreign to its object, to enter exhaustively upon this question. Those who may desire to prosecute the investigation will find the arguments for and against its reception fully stated by all the best known exegetical

1 1 hare deemed it unnecessary to add to the balk of this rolame by inaerting the text of the Epistles, alike so familiar and accessible to the reader. The more so, as the alterations from the authorised version are, generally speaking, unimportant; tending in this instance, as, indeed, in the rendering of the entire English Bible, to confirm our faith in the accuracy of our excellent translators. commentators. We shall endeavour, throwing ourselves on the forbearance of our readers, to present a resumt of the pros and cons, with the results in favour of the retention of the Epistle in its place among the m sacred writings.

With the single exception of the ancient fragment known as the Muratorian Canon, it was, after the fourth century, embodied in all the catalogues, and incorporated in the Canon of Holy Scripture. It was received by Athanasius, Cyril, Jerome, Epiphanius, Augustine, RuHnus. It is enumerated in the Canon of Laodicea (circa 360 a.d.) It was adopted by the Council of Carthage a.d. 393; in later times by the Council of Trent, and since acknowledged and recognised by all reformed confessions.2 Accepted, too, by such authoritative names as Michaelis, Lardner, Olshausen, and the more reliable and scholarly of modern English theologians.

And now for a few of the reasons which have generated doubts regarding its reception. Origen, in the third century, is the earliest to express hesitation. While cordially admitting the authority of the First Epistle, he puts the Second into the category of “doubtful.” His expression is, “Peter has left one acknowledged Epistle, perhaps a second, for this is contested.” Yet in other places (as in one of the mottoes which head this chapter, taken from his “Homily on Joshua”), he evidently recognises its

1 None will be found to do so with greater fairness than Dean Alford, who in his Prolegomena to 2d Peter gives, without the feelings or bias of a partisan, and with the minute accuracy of a scholar, full details. See also an elaborate article in Kitto’s Bible Cyclopaedia.

s It was received by Luther, but placed by him among what he called

The Apocrypha of the New Testament.” genuineness, and, as one of “two trumpets,” puts it on a par with the first. Tet again, on Numbers, “as Scripture saith in a certain place (2 Peter ii. 16), * The dumb animal, speaking with human Voice, convicted the madness of the prophet.’ “l

Eusebius, by. whom the statements of Origen are preserved, and referring to these doubts which had been insinuated, relegates it among the Antikgomena, or books whose authority had been disputed. His words are: “As to Peter’s letters, one Epistle — that which .is called the first — is received as genuine, because this the ancient Fathers use as undoubted in their writings; but that which we have called the second, we have not understood to be include d among the New Testament Scriptures. Yet, ‘as it appeared useful to many, it has. come to be reverenced with the other sacred books.”

It is not found in the Peschito or ancient Syriac version of the New Testament Scriptures: at all events, it occupies a subordinate place among the Apocryphal books of the Syriac Church. “It is not directly quoted by any writer before the latter part of the third century, though phrases occur hi some earlier writers, that seem, as it were, echoes of its language, or of that of some writing closely resembling it.”2 It will be sufficient, however, here; to note in passing, that we may accept as a tolerably sufficient and satisfactory explanation of this un familiarity, as compared at all events with the Pauline Epistles, that these latter were written to churches occupying a prominent place in

See Alford, in looof who, however, States at the same time that the Epistle is not quoted in Origen’s extant Greek works, hut only those in * Latin version*

s Bible Educator, p. 133. the eye of the world; while those of Peter were sent to Asiatic communities, many of which in these’ earlier centuries were comparatively unknown, or at least restricted in their intercourse with the rest of Christendom. In the words of Dean Alford, both Epistles are among “those latter fruits of the great outpouring of the Spirit on the Apostles, which, not being entrusted to the custody of any one church or individual, required some considerable time to be generally known; which when known were suspected, bearing, as they necessarily did, traces of their late origin and notes of polemical argument; but of which, as apostolic and inspired writings, there never was, when once they became known, any general doubt” (p. 273).

The earliest argument we find seriously urged against the genuineness of Peter’s Second Epistle, that which is mentioned indeed by Jerome as being the specific reason for its rejection, is the discrepancy in style and language with the first The words of that ancient Father are: “He (Peter) wrote two Epistles which are named catholic, of which the second is by most denied to be his, because of the variation of its style from the former Epistle” The objection was resumed at the era of the Reformation, and supported then and since, among others, by Erasmus, Calvin,1 De Wette, Reuss, Neander. Granting, which we do not, that the objection is a serious one, even Jerome himself, while stating it, is the first to suggest a probable explanation. It is

l Calvin’s verdict Is peculiar: “If the Epistle be regarded as unworthy of credit that it came from Peter, not that he himself wrote it, but some one of his disciples in obedience to his orders. He was then, as is probable, in extreme old age and near death. It is possible that at the request of the disciples he suffered the Epistle to go forth as his djriug testimony.” — Commentary, in loc to the following effect: — That as Peter was evidently in the habit of employing an amanuensis, he may possibly have dictated his two Epistles to different transcribers (probably Mark and Silvanus), leaving to them the clothing of his thoughts and ideas in their own phraseology. As we have quoted the language in which this old writer couches his objection, we may add the precise words of his refutation: — “The two Epistles which are ascribed to Peter are discrepant in style and character and structure of words; by which we understand that, from straits of circumstances, he used different interpreters.” Nor is this the only cause to account for discrepancy. Although it is impossible to

I arrive even approximately at the extent of the interval, some years at all events must have elapsed between the writing of the two Epistles. The one was probably composed during the Apostle’s residence in Babylon, when he had no immediate apprehension of

r suffering and death; the other when on the threshold of his martyrdom, possibly during the agitation of his last journey, when summoned, as we shall in next chapter describe, to take his stand at Caesars judgment-seat in the imperial capital.2 The innocent Christians had recently been accused as the incendiaries of Home. There is every probability that a summary mandate had gone forth from the exasperated authorities in the metropolis to seize the chiefs and ringleaders of the obnoxious sect in east and west, and that Peter, accord-

1 The Fathers supposed that uch of the sacred writers as did not understand Greek (among whom they reckoned St Peter) dictated in their native language to an amanuensis, who wrote down in Greek what they uttered in Hebrew” — Kitto* Bible Cycloptd.a, art., Epixtles of St Peter.

2 Bishop Sherlock supposes five years to intervene between the writing of the two Epistles. ing to the true rendering of the words, had “suddenly “{not” shortly,” as in A. V.) received tidings in Babylon that he must prepare for the “putting off of his tabernacle “(2 Peter i. 14). Much, we repeat, there would surely be in the circumstances of the Apostle to account for this want of similarity between a letter written at such a crisis and an older Epistle. Even in ordinary compositions, there are few authors unconscious of their style undergoing material alteration by the lapse of yeai-s, by outward influences and impressions, and specially by the fellowships with which at the time of writing they may be surrounded.” Who sees not,” to quote the words of Dr Cave, “the vast difference of Jeremiah’s writing in his Prophecy and in his Book of Lamentations? between St John in his Gospel, his Epistles, and Apocalypse 1 How oft does St Paul alter his style in several of his Epistles — in some more lofty and elegant, in others more rough and harsh? besides hundreds of instances that might be given, both in ecclesiastical and foreign writers, too obvious to need insisting on in this place.” In these early days of the Church, when all was in a state of chaos and unsettlement, when revealed truth had not yet been formulated into the creeds and confessions of later years, and when the doubts and heresies of to-day were succeeded by new phases of error to-morrow, a writer’s weapons had to be changed and modified to adapt themselves to shifting exigencies. A single year might be enough to alter his whole cast of thought, and to mould his very language into new shape and form. Accordingly we may readily imagine that Peter, either in the comparative seclusion of his Babylon home or the active occupations of his Babylon ministry, would pen a very different letter from what he would compose as the old man, accompanied and watched by a Roman guard, who had heard his earthly knell too surely rung; who wrote under that moat solemnising of human influences, that he was bidding farewell for ever to the home of his manhood and age, and being hurried to a violent death. Bishop Wordsworth thus repels the objection to the genuineness of the Epistle, founded on the force and energy of style being out of harmony with the advanced age of the writer: — “The force of the Holy Spirit stirring within him vents itself in bold comparisons and imaginative metaphors, and in an impetuous flood of words. Nor was his old age any bar to this poetic outpouring of his soul What Moses was in his old age when he sang his last song; what David was in his old age when he chanted his last psalm, full of ardour and energy imparted by the Holy Ghost, who inspired him; such was the aged Apostle St Peter when he wrote his Second Epistle before his martyrdom for Christ. 99 We at once reject the escape from the difficulty of a divergence in style suggested by Grotius, that the “Syineon,” who in the opening sentence of the Epistle announces himself the author, was St James’ successor in the bishopric of Jerusalem, and that the name Peter had been interpolated in a later age. The supposition is at once refuted by the writer declaring himself the author of the former Epistle (iii. 1), by his specific reference to being personally known to Jesus (i. 14), to his enjoying the peerless privilege of having been om of the spectators of the glory on “the Holy Mount,” and to have heard the voice which came from the Excellent Glory attesting his Lord’s Messiahship (L 16-18). Still more unwarrantable and unworthy seems to be the view of Neander, who construes that very avowal of authorship into a proof of the apocryphal character of the Epistle — indicating, he alleges, an attempt at

deception by this obtrusive introduction of an incident in Peters history. Such an inference to any candid render is surely inadmissible. If valid, it would impair the genuineness of some of the Pauline Epistles, specially those which most correspond with the object Peter had in view when he denounces false teachers, and brings into prominence his own Apostolic authority in rebuking error and vindicating truth. Neander’s objection ought rather in all fairness to be enlisted as an argument in support of genuineness.

We have alluded to the main ground of doubt and rejection arising from the difference of style in the two Epistles. It may be well, however, to state more particularly in what this discrepancy is alleged to consist.

Some hostile critics have dwelt on what they assert to be the total omission of quotations from the Old Testament which abound in the First Epistle: that in the second, the thoughts and sentences follow in much more regular order and sequence than in the earlier one, where they are more desultory, taking the shape generally of isolated utterances and propositions. That there is a diversity, too, in the name or title given to the Saviour in the two Epistles. In the first, it is simply “Christ” or “Jesus Christ;” in the second, it is “our Lord Jesus Christ,” “Jesus, our Lord,” but never “Christ “only.” The revelation of Jesus Christ” in the First Epistle, as descriptive of His second coming, is altered into “Day of God,”” Day of Judg-

ment,” in the second. The general tone of the latter is alleged to be more in harmony with the vivid and graphic picturing of the Apocalypse of St John, than with the earlier writing of his more prosaic friend; while the taunt of the scoffer at the long delay of the expected coming of Christ, would seem to point to a date later than that of the age of Peter. A sufficient time would not otherwise elapse to make the phrase applicable, “Our fathers fell asleep.”

Granting that there is a certain force in one or more of these minute criticisms, it is, only right to inquire if there does exist, after all, so remarkable a discrepancy as has been alleged between the two Epistles; also, on the other hand, if there are no points of resemblance that may be traced between the two, that would lead us to infer identity of authorship.

It forms, indeed, a curious, illustration of diversity in opinion and conflict of judgment, when we find such an acute and able critic as Michaelis basing his defence of the genuineness of the Epistle on its similarity of sentiment and language with those of its predecessor! Nor do we think the impartial student will fail to recognise the justice of the verdict of this distinguished commentator. All the more satisfactory are these resemblances which he and others have traced, that they are in themselves comparatively insignificant, and therefore undesigned, not bearing the marks of systematic forgery.

Let us present a few specimens.

The salutation in both Epistles has a remarkable identity in one word there employed. The verb occurs in these two Epistles alone, and in no others, “Grace and peace be multiplied” There is a similar correpeter’s catholic epistles. 589

Bpondence in the writer’s view of ancient prophecy (compare 1 Peter i. 10-12 with 2 Peter i. 19-21, and iiL 2). — Alford. The same retributive judgment is foretold in 1 Peter iv, 17, and 2 Peter ii. 3. The expression, or rather combination, of two words (d.awou xat atfT/Xou), “without blemish and without spot,” of

1 Peter L 19 is repeated, though with a different application, in 2 Peter iii. 14, “without spot and blameless.” One of these words, as noted by Dr Plumptre, does not occur elsewhere in the New Testament. The same accurate scholar points out the employment in each Epistle of the rarely-used word — also occurring nowhere else in the New Testament — the “behold “of 1 Peter ii. 12, iii 2, and the “eye-witnesses” of 2 Peter i. 16 (fawnus/* and totorai). There is in both not only a reference to the Deluge, but the number of persons saved — viz., eight — is specified (1 Peter iiL 20, 2 Peter ii. 5). “As free, and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness” (1 Peter ii. 16). “While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption * ( 2 Peter ii. 19). The inculcation of humility and the condemnation of pride (1 Peter v. 5-8) has its parallel in

2 Peter ii. 18 in the condemnation of those who “speak great swelling words of vanity.” The writer’s partiality is remarkable for the use of the word “precious” in both Epistles — in the one as applied to the trial of faith and the blood of Christ (1 Peter i. 7, 19), and to faith itself and the promises of the Gospel in the other (2 Peter i. 1-4). 1 Even the objection to which we have alluded, of a diversity in the name and title given to the Redeemer, is thus disposed of by Dean Alford: —

l See entire article in Bible Educator, p. 134.

“This, which has been also alleged as against the identity of writers, is, I submit, strikingly characteristic of the different realms of thought of the two Epistles. In the first it is community of suffering and glorification with Him which is to give encouragement; His lordly and glorious titles are dropped, and His office (‘Christ ‘), or combined Person and office (‘Jesus Christ’ or ‘Christ Jesus’) is ever brought forward. But in this second, where warning and caution against rebellion are mainly in view, we are ever reminded of His lordship, by iLord* and of what He did for us, by * Saviour;* and without the former, or both titles, He never appears” (p. 269). Farther, as pointed out by the same writer, the alleged absence of reference to the Old Testament Scriptures is k simply unfair and untrue, as the reader will judge for himself by referring to 2 Peter i 19-21; ii. 1, 5-7, 15, 22; iil 2, 4-5, 8, 13 1

On the above and other grounds, impossible to state in so brief a compass (among these, very chiefly the subjective one — its internal structure), we may with

1 Dean Alford has added several other ingenious, undesigned coincidences, alike from Peter’s 1st Epistle and from his sayings in the Gospels and the Acts. (See p. 872.)

To examine the question of the similarity between a portion of the Second Epistle of Peter and the Epistle of Jude (Lebbaeus) would occupy more space than can be allowed. St Jude, by a reliable tradition on the authority of Hippolytus, had the country of Mesopotamia, with its capital Edessa, appropriated to him. Is it unreasonable to surmise that, bordering as it did on the Babylonia of Peter, the two faithful ambassadors of Christ had at times met together to discuss the prevalent heresies and dangers to which the Church was subjected, and that each gave in his own phraseology the thoughts which had occurred at these brotherly conferences; specially the warnings and denunciations they had. by mutuil compact, deemed it well to commit to 44 pen and ink,” and circulate far and wide among the flocks committed to their charge? Or we have the alternative theory, that both may have drawn from some other authority five. ocument unknown to us, and which has perished. The former view seems the more likely and natural.

strong confidence retain our faith in this precious letter, as being part and parcel of the “all Scripture which is given by inspiration of God;” invested to the Church with the greater interest and solemnity, as having been written by Peter at the time when the note of preparation had been sounded for the violent “departure n of which his Lord had forewarned him. It would be passing strange if, after all, one of the most touchingly beautiful and powerful of the Apostolic writings had turned out to be a literary artifice, a base deliberate forgery, opening with the assumption of an Apostolic name and title, and closing by an affectionate entreaty to “grow in grace.” The spurious writings of the earlier centuries, even the best of them, are very different — puerile, mystical, and fanciful, compared with this; — coin which betray their counterfeit beside the true ring of this currency of heaven. We might possibly have been staggered — there would have been some plausibility, at least, for caution and hesitation — had the letter in question abounded in hierarchal pretensions, the assertion on the part of Peter of the bold claims of future centuries. But it maintains the same singular reticence as regards the author, which is characteristic of the First Epistle: no lording it over God’s heritage; on the contrary, its tone throughout is humble, self-forgetting, affectionate. In fact, as Calvin says, “If it is to be received as canonical, Peter must have been its author.... For any other one to have personated the Apostle would have been a deception unworthy the Christian name.” “The Church,” says Canon Cook in his able article,” which for more than fourteen centuries has received it, has either been imposed upon by what must in that case THE FOOTSTEPS OF 6T PETER.

be regarded as a Satanic device, or derived from it spiritual instruction of the highest importance. If received, it hears attestation to some of the most important facts in our Lord’s history, casts light upon the feelings of the Apostolic body in relation to the elder Church and to each other, and, while it confirms many doctrines generally inculcated, is the chief, if not the only voucher for eschatological views touching the destruction of the framework of creation which from an early period have been prevalent in the Church. “V, For our own part we accept it reverentially, as in all respects worthy of him who made the noble confession of his Master’s Messiahship, who enjoyed such pre-eminent tokens of that Masters tenderness and love, and to whom in a deep spiritual sense, as the leader in subsequent Apostolic thought and action, the keys of the kingdom had been committed. It is in keeping with his fervid zeal; worthy of the heart that had been quickened by a generous restoration, of the tongue which had been touched with living fire on the day of Pentecost, of the brave soul whose heroism in many a trying hour was to culminate soon in a crueL martyrdom. We could not afford to defraud our Bibles of so precious a compendium of the mysteries of spiritual religion; and if a man’s last recorded words are regarded with special sacred interest, it is remarkable that he who was the first to testify to the divinity of his Lord, after a lapse of twenty years leaves this as his last known bequest to the Church of the future, with the light of eternity shining upon his soul. It is an echo of the testimony of Caesarea Philippi embodied in a doxology —” Our Lord and * Smith’s Bib. Die, Art. “Peter,” p. 800.

Saviour Jesus Christ. To Him be glory both now and for ever. Amen.”

And now as to the subject-matter and design of the Epistle.

Without any formal dedication, we infer from iii. 1 that it was addressed to “them that have obtained like precious faith with us;” — the same individuals or communities to whom his First Epistle was sent — “This Second Epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance” (2 Peter iii. 1); though there is reason to believe (i. 1) that he designed the second letter for a wider and more general auditory than the other. He adopts in his Apostolic superscription, not the ordinary name Simon, but the Hebrew, or rather Aramaic form of Symeon. The letter would seem to have been mainly prompted in order to counteract the spread of some dangerous errors alike in doctrine and practice — errors which he evidently regarded with more serious apprehension than the “fiery trials” which had formed the burden of the earlier communication. Obnoxious teachers and teaching, “lawless men,” had crept into the Church. He remembered the words of the Lord Jesus how He said — and he counselled his flock accordingly — “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in ’ sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do meu gather grapes of thorns, or fig3 of thistles?” (Matt. viL 15, 16). It is evident that the blight of Antinomianism is that to which he specially alludes as spreading far and wide its withering influence. What Paul mourned over in Europe, had become a still more

2P formidable adversary in the more effeminate and sensuous Asiatic nature: — “For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things” (Phil. iii. 18, 19). Bishop Wordsworth, while he allows for the very considerable diversity of feeling and style to which we have alluded, observes that “there were good reasons for the difference. St Peter had a twofold work to do: first, to declare the truth; next, to refute error. He had executed the first of these two tasks in his former Epistle: he performs the second in the latter. ... If the Church of Christ had not had any enemies who assailed her doctrinal foundations, St Peter might have been contented with the work of building up the fabric of Christian life grounded on Christian faith; but his position was like that of the wise and valiant leader of God’s ancient people, Nehemiah, in building up the Holy City after the Babylonish captivity. He and his associates were encountered by Sanballats and Ammonites, who interrupted the labour, and were ready to overthrow it. They had, therefore, a double work to do: they must fight as well as build. ... In the First Epistle, St Peter had been, like a faithful and affectionate shepherd, feeding and tending Christ’s sheep and lambs; but in the Second Epistle he is like the same shepherd driving away the wolves, who were ready to tear and devour those sheep and lambs which Christ had purchased with His own blood, and had specially committed to his care.” These false teachers seem specially to have made the second coming of the Lord the subject of their profane derision, making light of the warnings concerning the day of approaching reckoning — a day which the description of the writer invests with an awe and solemnity paralleled in no other part of Scripture, unless in those final discourses of his Master, to which he himself listened, regarding the same subject, on the Mount of Olives. He speaks of the delay of the advent which had emboldened this scoffing of the atheist, as a token of God’s long* suffering mercy and forbearance — a mercy, however, which would have itB limits. Not perhaps when Peter wrote had these heretical teachers developed their assaults against the truth into any distinctive systems of error such as that of the Gnostics and Nicolaitanes of subsequent years, but he too surely foresaw “where* unto these things would grow,”~-the too certain germ of future apostacies. He brings prominently forward the great topic of his ministry — the passport alike to the kingdom of grace here, and the kingdom of glory hereafter. Four times in the Epistle is the same cardinal saying repeated unchanged — “The knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” And as having been himself an eye-witness of the words and deeds of Jesus, he is the more competent to be their instructor in the true way of salvation. He exhorts his faithful converts to seek advancement in the divine life, that so an entrance might at last be ministered unto them abundantly into Christ’s, everlasting kingdom (i. 10, 11). Still more than in the First Epistle, does he dwell on the “Parousia” — its joy to those who are “looking for and hasting unto it* (2 Peter iii. 12), and who shall then “be found of Him in peace, without spot and blameless” (iii 14); while. on the other hand, awful are the denunciations he utters against the above false teachers we have just referred to, terrible the doom of hypocrites and apostates. He closes with the solemn warning —” Ye therefore, beloved, seeing ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, being led away with the error of the wicked, fall

from your own stedfastness “(2 Peter iii. 17). But he who on the day of Pentecost called on the weeping, stricken multitudes to” repent,” points even the guiltiest to that same Lord who is 44 long-suffering, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (iii. 9).

There is an association of an interesting kind, peculiar to itself, suggested by Peter’s Second Epistle, which cannot be passed in silence, viz., his reference to the writings of the great Apostle of the Gentiles. These two great chiefs of the ancient Church had been for long years separated by long distance. For a quarter of a century — save once at Jerusalem, ‘tnce also at Antioch, and possibly at Corinth — they had never met. The meeting at these two latter cities, moreover, had doubtless regretful memories. The one was the scene of a merited public rebuke; the other, though we have no reason to infer the existence of personal animosity or alienation, was where the names of the two Apostles had become, on the lips of bigots, wild party watchwords antagonistic to true brotherhood. Peter, however, was now unexpectedly cheered and comforted by fellowship with his illustrious friend in another form. This we gather from the special mention of the name of Silvanus at the close of his First Epistle (v. 12). Silvanus had been long the companion of St Paul He is mentioned by him among the salutations in his Epistles to the Thessalonians; by some, though this is doubtful, he is supposed to be the amanuensis (Tertius) who wrote the Epistle to the Romans. He appears, in coming to visit the Apostle of the Circumcision in Babylon, to have brought along with him the priceless gift of Paul’s letters — those of them, at all events, that were already written. Some have contended, from the peculiarity of the expression “written unto you,” that very specially was reference made to the great Epistle whose authorship is so uncertain — the Epistle to the Hebrews, — an Epistle which, from its whole scope and contents, would have a peculiar value and interest to the Apostle of the Circumcision as well as the Christianised Hebrews of the Dispersion, for whose behoof it seems mainly to have been intended. What a gush of feeling must have thrilled the old man’s heart, as he bent over these inspired guiding lights for the Church of his age, as well as for the Church of future Christendom 1 How rejoiced would he be to find, that whatever may have been former divergencies, or even threatened estrangements, Paul and he were now essentially at one in the great cardinal articles of that faith for which both were ready to die I — both actuated by the same loyal love and allegiance to their great Master — both alive to the hydra-headed foe imperilling the truth alike dear to them — both with equal earnestness contending for the purity of the faith delivered unto the saints! “Hard to be understood” as some things were in these Epistles of his “beloved brother,” they would come to him in his old

i “All his Epistles” must be taken in a relative sense, as referring to bis more important writings, — those which Peter had seen. The collection of his entire Epistles was not made before the second century.

age as ministering angels. He gratefully recognises for himself, as well as for others,” the wisdom given 99 unto the writer (2 Peter iii. 15); and doubtless their perusal, while awaking grateful and hallowed remembrances of the past, would tend to cheer and brace the lonely watcher in the fold,M when his ear caught only too surely the mutterings of that coming storm of which a Divine Monitor had long ago forewarned him.

In closing this chapter it may not be out of place to mention, that — although utterly unreliable, and bearing in their whole style and matter the refutation of their genuineness- — the Apostle was credited in later centuries with being the author of other books and treatises. We cannot do better than give the condensed account of these apocryphal compositions furnished by Dr Cave: —” Besides his Divine Epistles, there were other supposititious writings which, in the first ages, were fathered upon St Peter. Such was the book called his Acts, mentioned by Origen, Eusebius, and others; but rejected by them. Such was his Gospel, which probably at first was nothing else but the Gospel written by St Mark, dictated to him (as is generally thought) by St Peter; and therefore, as St Jerome tells us, said to be his; though in the next age there appeared a book under that title, mentioned by Serapion, Bishop of Autioch, and by him at first suffered to be read in the Church; but afterwards, upon a more careful perusal of it, he rejected it as apocryphal, as it was by others after him. Another was the book styled his Preaching, mentioned and quoted by Clemens Alexaudrinus and

l See some interesting remarks of Professor Plumptre in “Biblical Studies.” by Origen, but not acknowledged by them to be genuine, nay, expressly said to have been forged by heretics, by an ancient author contemporary with St Gyprian. The next was his Apocalypse, or Revelation; rejected, as Sozomen tells us, by the ancients as spurious, but yet read in some churches in Palestine in his time. The last book was his Judgment, which probably was the same with that called Hermes, or Pastor — a book of good use and esteem in the first times of Christianity, and which, as Eusebius tells us, was not only frequently cited by the ancients, but also publicly read in churches.”1

While these writings are at once dismissed as spurious and unauthentic, we gladly fall back on the two priceless inspired legacies he has bequeathed to us in the encyclical Epistles which have formed the subject of this chapter, — writings, which, in the words of the commentator to whom we are largely indebted in the preceding pages, “as the Sacred Canon became fixed, acquired, and have since maintained, their due and providential place among the books of the New Testament.”2

& Care s “Lives of the Apostles,” pp. 159, 160. Alford, p. 273.