Posted on 01/27/2008 7:56:14 PM PST by Manfred the Wonder Dawg
Putting a book mark here.
This is a keeper.
Something suitable for all of us.
Well --- the way you have stated it is incorrect. Peter was a Jewish fisherman not Palestinian and his native language was Hebrew not Aramaic. So -- get your facts straight before pontificating.
The historical timing of the persecution is wrong.
Wrong -- Peter is writing to the "sojourners", those Jews and Jewish Christians who had to leave Judea and Jerusalem because of the political unrest, and the Roman armies moving in to quell the violence erupting in the Holy Land at that time [65 AD], that began to spin out of control especially after the murder of James, the brother of Jesus.
These Jewish Christians remembered the words of Jesus about the coming days of vengeance, took heed to those words, and many of them sojourned to northern Asia Minor. These Jewish Christians suffered persecution amongst their own Jewish community not only in Jerusalem and Judea but were also facing it again in the Jewish communities of northern Asia Minor wherein they were now "sojourners".
The date of the epistle is given at 80-110 AD based on the writing style, etc.
Baloney -- what evidence do you have that that wasn't Peter's Greek writing style or that he hadn't learned to read and write in Greek since Pentecost in 30 AD???? You Greeks are absolutely too much. You think that you have to be Greek to understand your own language, and you get upset when others master it better than your own -- especially a Jew named Peter.
That pretty much closes the case.
In your Greek Orthodox dreams ---
When this was written, Peter was long dead.
So then these words by the author of the epistle of I Peter are a big lie:
"Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia ..."
And the Church at that time participated in the propagation of this big lie??? That great institution that you believe to be the hope of your salvation participated in the propagation of deceit and falsehood??? Oh -- kosta -- be it not so!!! Better to admit I Peter was written by Peter circa 65 AD than defame that great institution of yours.
Thus, there is no proof that 1 Peter as well as 2 Peter were written by Peter the Apostle. In favct, all evidence seems to point to the contrary.Why was it accepted as authoritative? The Church embraced 1 Peter as authoritative early on because it was absolutely vital for the Church's survival to overcome the Petrine-Pauline dispute (which, contrary to some opinions, did not end at the Council in Jerusalem, not do the accounts if this event in Acts and in Paul's' Epistles match).
So, then the ethic that drove the Church that you trust for your salvation was "Ends justifies the Means" morality -- and not the Truth??? Hmmmm????
You are saying that the leaders of your early Church were willing to compromise, to embrace a lie, tell a fib, propagate falsehood, to disseminate a phony letter for the sake of settling a dispute -- a non-existent one at that??? Is that the great institution that you are trusting in for your eternal salvation???
By your own words you condemn that "church" and those leaders therof that would do such a thing -- not the epistle itself.
The real church always accepted I Peter because copies of it began circulating in 65 AD amongst the Jewish Christian communities of Asia Minor. And true Christians everywhere with the Holy Spirit within them were able to recognize the truth of the words of the author therein. They were capable of recognizing the real scriptures and distinguishing them the phony ones, the real evidence from the phony argument. Take a lesson ---
lol, beginning in grade school, they told me just to move my lips, do not sing
??? Trudeau was a Jesuit educated French Canadian
Do you always make things up like this? Even a cursory check of facts would show you that you need your own medicine. The area where Peter lived is Plestine; it has nothing to do with being Jewish. The Jews of the 1st century AD spoke Aramaic, not Hebrew.
Catholics would say that same thing -- DO say the same thing. We may not mean exactly what Protestants mean by "denomination" but I could say that exact same words without fear of error.
actually, the Jews of that time probably spoke Greek, seeing as how that was the common language of the Roman empire. Jerusalem ws a very cosmopolitan city, with Syrian, Greek, Latin, Hebrew and Aramaic all being spoken.
Show us all the word for "Palestine" in that Greek New Testament of yours. You won't find any because Israel began to be called Palestine only after the Romans renamed it in the middle of the 2nd century AD -- not before.
And while you are at it, show us the word "Aramaic" in that Greek bible of yours??? Jesus spoke to Paul on the road to Damascus in Hebrew and Paul understood it and Paul spoke to the crowd in Acts 22 in Hebrew and the crowd understood it and the inscription on the cross was in Greek, Latin, and Hebrew not Greek, Latin, and Aramaic.
H-E-B-R-E-W
More confabulation...the very first verse of 1 Peter says "to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia..." Do you even have a clue where those areas are?
These Jewish Christians remembered the words of Jesus about the coming days of vengeance, took heed to those words, and many of them sojourned to northern Asia Minor
You just can't stop writing your own history. That's fraud. The Jews lived all over, in Egypt and in Greece and in Asia Minor (modern Turkey). IN FACT (an alien word for you, obviously), they lives do LONG outside of Israel that their generations spoke Greek!
Baloney -- what evidence do you have that that wasn't Peter's Greek writing style or that he hadn't learned to read and write in Greek since Pentecost in 30 AD????
It's one thing to learn how to speak market Greek and another to write sophisticated Greek mixed with Greek philosophy and developed theology. Remember, even Acts say he was unschooled.
You are presuming again. I don't get upset if someone masters Greek better than my own language. My native tongue is not Greek. You'd have to prove that he did.
So then these words by the author of the epistle of I Peter are a big lie
I don't know. Maybe his name was really Peter.
And the Church at that time participated in the propagation of this big lie
The Church believed what theChurch believed. And the Church has not been exactly free from machinations. Evene the first Church historian, Eusebius (4th century), admits that they retain that which is suitable for the Church and reject that which isn't.
Better to admit I Peter was written by Peter circa 65 AD than defame that great institution of yours
Is this like hiding the fact that some priests are not exactly priestly for fear of defaming the "instituton." Now we are going to subject the truth to a sanitized version of the truth out of fear? How honest and earnest is that?
I never condmened the Church. I am sure the majority of churches earnestly believed that 1 Peter was written by Peter and that it was Godsent. Somone in the Church saw to it that it is read and accepted for the better of the Church.
The same was true of the Epistle of Barnabas for about 3 centuries and then the epistle was dropped. Why? All of a sudden it was no longer "inspired?" Or because it didn;t sevre the original purpose? or because somone made a mistake for 300 years in treating it as scripture?
The real church always accepted I Peter because copies of it began circulating in 65 AD amongst the Jewish Christian communities of Asia Minor
That's news! But you will just have to provide some documentation verifying this claim. I will be eagerly waiting for you to come up with one.
I'm starting to get the idea that our respective definitions of "plain meaning" are worlds apart.To which I offer a hearty, "Amen, yeah, howdy!"
Finally, for a moment, someone gets it! We are very far apart in our weltanschaaungen. Yes. Very Very far apart.
To return to my artillery duel metaphor, we are so far apart that we can't tell if our shots hit their targets. But a difference between this and an artillery duel is that artillery folks, send out spotters, get information on the relationship between where shell landed and where the target is, and make corrections. Here however most participants just fire random shells and then get accuse the target of cheating when it doesn’t blow up.
And evidently some think that by firing lots of shell they are pleasing God and being obedient to their call, whether or not they hit the target. In related news, the_conscience saith: in post 881
I guess we can all shut off our computers and the debates are over since neither of us can know anything about the other., and earlier:
[I guess it got pulled - it was in a post that described me as "nauseating, as I recall. Anyway it was a response to my assertion of the syllogistic impossibility that if someone makes a statement about every member of a class, the expectation around here seems to be that the members of the class should not view that statement as being about them. I BELIEVE that the response was a complaint to the effect that if one could not make disparaging personal remarks about a class of people then we could not have a conversation on these matters.]For adumbration of how easily one falls into personal attacks we have in Post 556
Romanists prefer playing in the shadows which satisfies their idolatrous nature.and in post 280
***Who’d be dopey enough to believe that?***And in post 288Ask MarkBsnr.
Then I pointed you to the one “dopey enough”.So what is that? The first post is a group mind-reading, the implication of which is that individual "Romanists" such as, say MarkBsnr, prefer playing in the shadows. The other two comprise directly calling a poster "dopey".
Personally, I don’t think we have to characterize the members of one another’s groups as dopey (or as anything else) to learn about one another. It IS possible to express the criticism of one another’s beliefs without making even general personalization.
Are we really to believe that calling a particular person “dopey enough” or saying a whole group of people have or want martyr complexes is going to help us know more about each other. Is it? Isn’t there another way that is likely to be more fruitful? Isn’t there a way which would ensure that subsequent “artillery duels” would have a higher percentage of actual hits?
In my exile I have had the salutary experience of watching the posts go by. And it is simply astonishing not only how little our thinking is understood, but how those who misunderstand seem to prefer not understanding the enemy (for such they think we are) to knowing the truth about us.
I think there is another way. I think it would involve not the intentional goading of others until they come around to one’s point of view but rather probing, patient, and intelligent questioning, questioning intelligent enough to deal with Forest Keeper’s perception of two groups with two very different “plain meanings” for a particular text.
It seems to me that once one sees that we are so very far apart that it seems that we don't even agree on the plain meaning of "something", then the whole paternalistic provocation to which Quix admitted, not only to no consequence, but to the acclaim of his co-religionists, in post 410 has got to be seen as worse than useless.
For those who came in late, here it is: a clear unabashed declaration of intent to provoke:
What loving purpose can my fiesty fierce provocative postings serve?It might be useful and it might generate less heat than light if we tried to understand one another’s POV, rather than intentionally provoke them. Now that may be viewed as trying to make the RF "ecumenic", but I'm kind of wishing it would just be less disgraceful.
At least let the charges you all levy at us have some discernible relationship to the facts.
But, I really honestly believe, and Quix's #410 cited above confirms me in this opinion, that there are some here who intend insult and bad-feeling – all for our own good, of course.
Consider this, please: At Mass on Monday, before the service I was talking with a brother, who is doing advanced degree work in Patristics. I mentioned the new "diagnosis" of “Sado-Evangelism” to him, and he just shook his head, and then laughed ruefully.
Why do you suppose he reacted like that? Why the rueful laugh? I didn't have to give him any details. I just mentioned the coined word. It certainly resonated with him. As we chatted we began to share experiences of people showing that they assume that we don't know zip about the Bible, that we, well, do all the things we are accused of here, and, especially of people seeming to get a pleasure out of behaving in a condescending, insulting, impolite, aggressive, controlling manner, seeming to use “Evangelism” as a cover to hurt and control people.
You can say it as often as you like, and that seems to be pretty often, but I don’t worship our nice icon of Dominic or our tacky statue of Mary. I just don’t. You can say it 10,000 times and it won’t be any truer than it is now.
But, evidently the “provocation camp” is content to make accusations of us that we simply do not recognize, because somehow it’s good to upset us. Breaking the noses off statues in Anglican Churches won’t heal the wounds in hearts. But the evidently some think that spiritual warfare and healing is best carried out by destroying the beautiful.
So I think that Forest Keeper's highly useful comment will probably do no good. To establish some kind of meaningful communication -- even if only as a means which some Protestants might use to argue more persuasively about how very wrong we are -- seems to be a goal too few people would embrace. Much more fun just to keep on provoking.
So the Prots will continue to tell us what we think and do, and we will continue to deny it, and threads will become heated and some will be closed.
Whom that is supposed to serve or glorify is completely escapes me.
And yes, I quite seriously think that some of the posters here have serious "issues" such as I have described. I think trying to excuse a non-stop barrage of intentionally offensive posts on the grounds that it might save souls is, at the very kindest, eccentric.
I will be putting up a moderated forum on the topic of S-E within 10 or so days. I'm going to be gathering anecdotes from people who have been targeted by people claiming to be presenting the Gospel of Christ, especially those who explicitly or implicitly say that they are being intentionally cruel for the sake of our souls, and trying to classify and organize them and then I’m going to run the observations by some pros I know.
Yeh -- it is where a lot of the Jews who left Israel proper went to when they saw the armies of Rome begin to descend uupon the Holy Land after the death of James the brother of Jesus as Josephus also notes. You call them strangers, I'll call them sojourners. Get real --
These Jewish Christians remembered the words of Jesus about the coming days of vengeance, took heed to those words, and many of them sojourned to northern Asia Minor. You just can't stop writing your own history. That's fraud. The Jews lived all over, in Egypt and in Greece and in Asia Minor (modern Turkey). IN FACT (an alien word for you, obviously), they lives do LONG outside of Israel that their generations spoke Greek!
But these Jews to whom Peter was specifically writing were the ones who had just migrated up there to the area from the Holy Land as they saw the trouble coming to their homeland around the mid 60's AD. Thus Peter addresses his letter "to the strangers/sojourners" -- they were strangers to the area after having moved up there from Jerusalem and Judea
It's one thing to learn how to speak market Greek and another to write sophisticated Greek mixed with Greek philosophy and developed theology. Remember, even Acts say he was unschooled.
Unschooled until the day of Pentecost when God gave them the gift of tongues. He learned his Greek from the Master himself as many on that day no doubt did -- it was Pentecostal Greek -- that's why it was so good.
II Peter is your documentation -- you know -- since I comes before II -- except for those with dyslexia.
I don't know. Maybe his name was really Peter.
LOLOL -- Oh no, not a second Peter!!!
Well -- even if there had been a second Peter, the wise leaders of the church would have called this second Peter's letter "II Peter" not "I Peter" ---- right???? :)
Mad Dawg, my conscience prohibits me from responding to all your contentions on the Lord's Day but I will leave some Scripture upon which we can all ponder.
Where do you think all these appalling wars and quarrels come from? Do you think they just happen? Think again. They come about because you want your own way, and fight for it deep inside yourselves. You lust for what you don't have and are willing to kill to get it. You want what isn't yours and will risk violence to get your hands on it.You wouldn't think of just asking God for it, would you? And why not? Because you know you'd be asking for what you have no right to. You're spoiled children, each wanting your own way.
You're cheating on God. If all you want is your own way, flirting with the world every chance you get, you end up enemies of God and his way. And do you suppose God doesn't care? The proverb has it that "he's a fiercely jealous lover." And what he gives in love is far better than anything else you'll find. It's common knowledge that "God goes against the willful proud; God gives grace to the willing humble."
So let God work his will in you. Yell a loud no to the Devil and watch him scamper. Say a quiet yes to God and he'll be there in no time. Quit dabbling in sin. Purify your inner life. Quit playing the field. Hit bottom, and cry your eyes out. The fun and games are over. Get serious, really serious. Get down on your knees before the Master; it's the only way you'll get on your feet.
Don't bad-mouth each other, friends. It's God's Word, his Message, his Royal Rule, that takes a beating in that kind of talk. You're supposed to be honoring the Message, not writing graffiti all over it. God is in charge of deciding human destiny. Who do you think you are to meddle in the destiny of others?
Nicely said.
Bravo.
This is from one of the resources in one article you quote from. It agrees with Paul J. Achtemeier’s “Introduction to the New Testament” pgs. 515-525.
An Introduction to the New Testament by Richard Heard
Richard Heard, M.A., M.B.E., M.C., was a Fellow of
Peterhouse, Cambridge and University lecturer in Divinity at Cambridge (1950). Published by Harper & Brothers, New York, 1950.
Chapter 17: The First Epistle of Peter
Authorship
“The epistle is written in Peter’s name to the elect who are sojourners of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia (1:1) from Babylon (5:13) by the hand of Silvanus (5:12). It was quoted by Polycarp and Papias in Asia Minor in the early years of the second century, and its authenticity was undisputed in the early church, although Babylon was generally understood as a cryptic reference to Rome.
The attribution to Peter has been widely challenged in modern times on a number of grounds. We know that at least three writings were in circulation in the second century which were falsely attributed to Peter, the epistle which is included in the New Testament as the Second Epistle of Peter, an Apocalypse of Peter, and a Gospel of Peter. Some features of this epistle too have led critics to regard it as also being a forgery, dating from the end of the first century or the very beginning of the second century.
The epistle is written in fluent and idiomatic Greek, much better than that of Paul, and the Biblical quotations show an intimate knowledge of the Septuagint; this is hard to understand if the epistle is really the work of an Aramaic speaking and illiterate fisherman (Mt. 26:73, Acts 4:13). There are numerous echoes of both the language and ideas of the Pauline epistles, notably of Romans, and some critics have interpreted the general theological tone of the epistle as reflecting a ‘central’ churchmanship more compatible with a post-apostolic stage of development, when Paul’s epistles were more widely known, than with an earlier period. The references to persecution, especially the possibility of suffering ‘as a Christian’ (4:16), are sometimes taken to imply a date in the time of Trajan (A.D. 98-117) whose letters to Pliny (A.D. 112) furnish the first certain evidence that Christianity was regarded as of itself a crime against the state. It has been suggested, in pursuance of these arguments, that the main part of the epistle (1:3-4:11) consists of a sermon to newly-baptised converts; this has been incorporated in a letter written to meet a crisis of persecution by a Christian who introduced Peter’s name in an endeavour to give his words of exhortation an official and apostolic authority.
The weight of this attack on the Petrine authorship cannot be denied, but the ascription can still be defended with some confidence, especially if the Silvanus of the epistle is, as there is no reason to doubt, Silas, the companion of Paul on his second missionary journey. The case for Peter’s authorisation of the epistle, paradoxical as it may seem, is strengthened by the probability that he did not himself have a ready command of the Greek language. It is expressly stated at the close of the epistle that Peter has written ‘by the hand of Silvanus’. If Peter could not himself speak Greek and wished to send a letter to Greek-speaking Gentiles in Asia Minor, he could either have dictated a letter in Aramaic for subsequent translation into Greek or have had a Greek letter composed for him by someone he could trust. There is nothing improbable in his adopting the latter course, and there are two curious pieces of evidence in its favour. Silvanus is called ‘our faithful brother, as I account him’ (5:12), a description which gains special point if he had actually drafted the letter for Peter in a language which Peter only imperfectly understood. We know, too, from Acts that, when the decree of the Council of Jerusalem was sent to Antioch, the apostles and elders wrote ‘by the hand of ’ Judas and Silas, a phrase which suggests that Silas had a part in the drafting of the pastoral letter in which the decree was incorporated (Acts 15:23)
This explanation of the composition of the epistle fully meets the difficulties both of language and of ‘Paulinism’. Silas’ selection as one of the delegates from the Council of Jerusalem to Antioch was probably due in part to the fact that he spoke Greek well and could explain the decrees to the Gentile Christians there (Acts 15: 32), and his intimate connection with Paul on the second missionary journey would account for the affinities of language and thought between this epistle and those of Paul. Nor is it necessary to assume that the ‘fiery trial’ (4:12) and the possibility of suffering ‘as a Christian’ (4:16) imply a persecution essentially different in kind from that which Paul and Silas had undergone in their travels.
The part played by Silvanus in the writing of the epistle helps us also to understand the circumstances in which it was written. The identification of ‘Babylon’ with Rome fits in with the general later tradition of Peter’s presence at Rome, and although many scholars dispute the historical value of this tradition which they hold to be ultimately derived from the misinterpretation of this very verse in I Peter, a Roman origin for the epistle cannot be ruled completely out of court. Yet there is a real difficulty in accepting the identification. Quite apart from the absence of any intelligible reason for Peter using such a cryptic term for Rome in an epistle in which he bids his readers honour the Emperor (2:17), no convincing evidence has so far been adduced for Rome being called Babylon before the Jewish War of A.D. 70 had fanned the flames of Jewish hatred.
There is nothing inherently improbable, on the other hand, in Peter having worked in Babylon and its neighbourhood, where we know from Josephus (Ant. 15:2, 3) there were large communities of Jews. The absence of any tradition connecting Peter with Babylon is explicable by the great break between the Christian communities of East and West that followed upon the disasters of A.D. 70 and the subsequent misfortunes of Christianity in Palestine and elsewhere. We know next to nothing of the early spread of Christianity in directions other than that North-West mission whose progress Luke has so faithfully recorded.
We know next to nothing of the coming of Christianity to the provinces of Asia Minor named in the epistle other than Galatia and Asia, but it is not rash to see in the evangelisation of Northern Asia Minor the results of the same impetus that led Paul through Southern Asia Minor. Whether Silas himself had played a part in this further spread of the Gospel, or whether his role is to be envisaged as that of liaison between the apostles and the actual missionaries, we can never know. He is last mentioned in Acts as being summoned by Paul to come to him at Athens (Acts 17:15), and Paul mentions him with Timothy as a joint author of his epistles to the Thessalonians in A.D. 49, probably at Corinth (cf. II Cor. 1:19). It seems reasonable to assume that he continued to be interested in, possibly to share in, missionary journeys to parts of Asia Minor in the years that followed, and that the first epistle of Peter is a message of instruction and encouragement from the apostle through Silvanus to some of the new and predominantly Gentile (cf. 4:3-4) churches which had been e founded. The encyclical nature of the epistle and the lack of greetings to individuals suggest that Peter had not himself visited these areas, and that the epistle may in fact have been a kind of official recognition of the churches in a new mission-field, possibly to be carried round by Silvanus on a tour of inspection and confirmation.
The date of the epistle can only be conjectured. If the tradition of Peter’s martyrdom at Rome under Nero is accepted, it cannot be later than the early sixties. A dozen years may sound a short time for churches to have sprung up over so wide an area, but the rapidity with which Paul established churches on his missionary journeys indicates that such a swift expansion elsewhere was not impossible.”
The slander that Peter, the cousin of Jesus, was an illiterate, ignorant Galilean fisherman is disproved by the Gospels where he is presented as a wealthy businessman in the fishing business with partners, hired help, more than one fishing boat and having a business that was established enough to succeed during the two years he was absent from it. It was also located in a major trading city along the Roman Way where he had to know Greek in order to successfully trade.
By the way, to cite Kummell or Perrin as disinterested scholars in interpreting anything having to do with the authenticity of scripture is rediculous. They are both proponents of a very low view of scripture.
As to Eusebius’ bias take on Papias, this from your own cited web site,
“Eusebius’ skepticism was no doubt prompted by his distaste - perhaps a recently acquired distaste (Grant 1974) - for Papias’ chiliasm and his feeling that such a theology qualified Papias for the distinction of being “a man of exceedingly small intelligence” (Hist. Eccl. 3.39.13). Nevertheless Eusebius’ analysis of the preface is probably correct; and his further point that Papias’ chiliasm put him to the same camp as the Revelation of John is surely relevant. It is notable that Eusebius, in spite of his desire to discredit Papias, still places him as early as the reign of Trajan (A.D. 98-117); and although later dates (e.g., A.D. 130-140) have often been suggested by modern scholars, Bartlet’s date for Papias’ literary activity of about A.D. 100 has recently gained support (Schoedel 1967: 91-92; Kortner 1983: 89-94, 167-72, 225-26).”
In the end there is no way around it, both can't be right.
IICor. 11:3-4 But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. For if he who comes preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or if you receive a different spirit which you have not received or a different gospel which you have not accepted-you may well put with it!
I will stick with Scripture and pray for those who refuse to believe in the simplicity of salvation. The complexity of the answers on the other side bears witness to their error.
ICOR. 1:18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those that are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
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