Chapter XVI: Part 16

The only other place that could in any way be proposed as the
Babylon of Peter, is Seleucia on the Tigris; but Michaelis has
abundantly shown that though in poetical usage in that age, and
in common usage afterwards, this city was called Babylon, yet
in Peter’s time, grave prose statements would imply the ancient
city and not this. He also quotes a highly illustrative passage
from Josephus, in defense of his views; and which is of so much
the more importance because Josephus was a historian who lived
in the same age with Peter, and the passage itself relates to an
event which took place thirty-six years before the Christian era;
namely, “the delivery of Hyrcanus, the Jewish high priest, from
imprisonment, with permission to reside in Babylon, where there
was a considerable number of Jews.” (Josephus, Antiquities, XV.
ii. 2.) Josephus adds, that “both the Jews in Babylon and all
who dwelt in that country, respected Hyrcanus as high priest
and king.” That this was the ancient Babylon and not Seleucia,
appears from the fact, that wherever else he mentions the latter
city, he calls it Seleucia.

Wetstein’s supposition that Peter meant the province of Babylon,
being suggested only by the belief that the ancient Babylon did
not then exist, is, of course, rendered entirely unnecessary by
the proof of its existence.

Besides the great names mentioned above, as authorities for the
view which I have taken, I may refer also to Beza, Lightfoot,
Basnage, Beausobre, and even Cave, in spite of his love of
Romish fables.

To give a complete account of all the views of the passage
referring to Babylon, (1 Peter v. 13,) I should also mention
that of Pott, (on the cath. epist.,) mentioned by Hug. This is
that by the phrase in the Greek, ἡ εν Βαβυλωνι συνεκλεκτη, is
meant “the woman chosen with him in Babylon,” that is, Peter’s
wife; as if he wished to say, “my wife, who is in Babylon,
salutes you;” and Pott concludes that the apostle himself was
somewhere else at the time. For the answer to this notion, I
refer the critical to Hug. This same notion had been before
advanced by Mill, Wall, and Heumann, and refuted by Lardner.
(Supp. xix. 5.)

HIS FIRST EPISTLE.

Inspired by such associations and remembrances, and by the spirit of simple truth and sincerity, Peter wrote his first epistle, which he directed to his Jewish brethren in several sections of Asia Minor, who had probably been brought under his ministry only in Jerusalem, on their visits there in attendance on the great annual feasts, which in all years, as in that of the Pentecost on which the Spirit was outpoured, came up to the Holy city to worship; for there is no _proof_ whatever, that Peter ever visited those countries to which he sent this letter. The character of the evidence offered, has been already mentioned. These believers in Christ had, during their annual visits to Jerusalem for many years, been in the habit of seeing there this venerable apostolic chief, and of hearing from his lips the gospel truth. But the changes of events having made it necessary for him to depart from Jerusalem to the peaceful lands of the east, the annual visitors of the Holy city from the west, no longer enjoyed the presence and the spoken words of this greatest teacher. To console them for this loss, and to supply that spiritual instruction which seemed most needful to them in their immediate circumstances, he now wrote to them this epistle; the main purport of which seems to be, to inspire them with courage and consolation, under some weight of general suffering, then endured by them or impending over them. Indeed, the whole scope of the epistle bears most manifestly on this one particular point,――the preparation of its readers, the Christian communities of Asia Minor, for heavy sufferings. It is not, to be sure, without many moral instructions, valuable in a mere general bearing, but all therein given have a peculiar force in reference to the solemn preparation for the endurance of calamities, soon to fall on them. The earnest exhortations which it contains, urging them to maintain a pure conscience, to refute the calumnies of time by innocence,――to show respect for the magistracy,――to unite in so much the greater love and fidelity,――with many others, are all evidently intended to provide them with the virtues which would sustain them under the fearful doom then threatening them. In the pursuance of the same great design, the apostle calls their attention with peculiar earnestness to the bright example of Jesus Christ, whose behavior in suffering was now held up to them as a model and guide in their afflictions. With this noble pattern in view, the apostle calls on them to go on in their blameless way, in spite of all that affliction might throw in the path of duty.

_No proof that he ever visited them._――The learned Hug, _truly_
catholic (but not papistical) in his views of these points,
though connected with the Roman church, has honestly taken
his stand against the foolish inventions on which so much
time has been spent above. He says, “Peter had not seen the
Asiatic provinces; they were situated in the circuit of Paul’s
department, who had traveled through them, instructed them,
and even at a distance, and in prison, did not lose sight of
them.” (As witness his epistles to the Galatians, Ephesians,
and Colossians, all which are comprehended within the circle
to which Peter wrote.) “He was acquainted with their mode of
life, foibles, virtues and imperfections; their whole condition,
and the manner in which they ought to be treated.” The learned
writer, however, does not seem to have fully appreciated Peter’s
numerous and continual opportunities for personal communications
with these converts at Jerusalem. In the brief allusion made in
Acts ii. 9, 10, to the foreign Jews visiting Jerusalem at the
pentecost, three of the very countries to which Peter writes,
“Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia,” are commemorated with other
neighboring regions, “Phrygia and Pamphylia.” Hug goes on,
however, to trace several striking and interesting coincidences
between this epistle and those of Paul to the Ephesians, to
the Colossians and to Timothy, all which were directed to this
region. (Hug’s introduction to New Testament, volume II. § 160.)
He observes that “Peter is so far from denying his acquaintance
with the epistles of Paul, that he even in express terms refers
his readers to these compositions of his ‘beloved brother,’
(2 Peter iii. 15.) and recommends them to them.” Hug, also,
in the succeeding section, (§ 161,) points out some still more
remarkable coincidences between this and the epistle of James,
which, in several passages, are exactly uniform. As 1 Peter i.
6, 7, and James i. 2:――1 Peter i. 24, and James i. 10:――1 Peter
v. 5, 6, and James iv. 6‒10.

_Asia._――It must be understood that there are three totally
distinct applications of this name; and without a remembrance of
the fact, the whole subject will be in an inextricable confusion.
In modern geography, as is well known, it is applied to all that
part of the eastern continent which is bounded west by Europe
and Africa, and south by the Indian ocean. It is also applied
sometimes under the limitation of “Minor,” or “Lesser,” to that
part of Great Asia, which lies between the Mediterranean and the
Black sea. But in this passage it is not used in either of these
extended senses. It is confined to that very narrow section of
the eastern coast of the Aegean sea, which stretches from the
Caicus to the Meander, including but a few miles of territory
inland, in which were the seven cities to which John wrote in
the Apocalypse. The same tract also bore the name of Maeonia.
Asia Minor, in the modern sense of the term, is also frequently
alluded to in Acts, but no where else in the New Testament
unless we adopt Griesbach’s reading of Romans xvi. 5, (Asia
instead of Achaia.)

In the outset of his address, he greets them as “strangers” in all the various lands throughout which they were “scattered,”――bearing every where the stamp of a peculiar people, foreign in manners, principles and in conduct, to the indigenous races of the regions in which they had made their home, yet sharing, at the same time, the sorrows and the glories of the doomed nation from which they drew their origin,――a _chosen_, an “elect” order of people, prepared in the counsels of God for a high and holy destiny, by the consecrating influence of a spirit of truth. Pointing them to that hope of an unchanging, undefiled, unfading heritage in the heavens, above the temporary sorrows of the earth, he teaches them to find in that, the consolation needful in their various trials. These trials, in various parts of his work, he speaks of as inevitable and dreadful,――yet appointed by the decrees of God himself as a fiery test, beginning its judgments, indeed, in his own household, but ending in a vastly more awful doom on those who had not the support and safety of obedience to his warning word of truth. All these things are said by way of premonition, to put them on their guard against the onset of approaching evil, lest they should think it strange that a dispensation so cruel should visit them; when, in reality, it was an occasion for joy, that they should thus be made, in suffering, partakers of the glory of Christ, won in like manner. He moreover warns them to keep a constant watch over their conduct, to be prudent and careful, because “the accusing prosecutor” was constantly prowling around them, seeking to attack some one of them with his devouring accusations. Him they were to meet, with a solid adherence to the faith, knowing as they did, that the responsibilities of their religious profession were not confined within the narrow circle of their own sectional limits, but were shared with their brethren in the faith throughout almost the whole world.

From all these particulars the conclusion is inevitable, that there was in the condition of the Christians to whom he wrote, a most remarkable crisis just occurring,――one too of no limited or local character; and that throughout Asia Minor and the whole empire, a trying time of universal trouble was immediately beginning with all who owned the faith of Jesus. The widely extended character of the evil, necessarily implies its emanation from the supreme power of the empire, which, bounded by no provincial limits, would sweep through the world in desolating fury on the righteous sufferers; nor is there any event recorded in the history of those ages, which could thus have affected the Christian communities, except the first Christian persecution, in which Nero, with wanton malice, set the example of cruel, unfounded accusation, that soon spread throughout his whole empire, bringing suffering and death to thousands of faithful believers.

_Accusing prosecutor._――The view which Hug takes of the scope
of the epistle, throws new light on the true meaning of this
passage, and abundantly justifies this new translation, though
none of the great New Testament lexicographers support it.
The primary, simple senses of the words also, help to justify
the usage, as well as their similar force in other passages.
A reference to any lexicon will show that elsewhere, these
words bear a meaning accordant with this version. The first noun
never occurs in the New Testament except in a _legal_ sense. The
Greek is Ὁ αντιδικος ὑμων διαβολος, (1 Peter v. 8,) in which the
last word (_diabolos_) need not be construed as a substantive
expression, but may be made an adjective, belonging to the
second word, (_antidikos_.) The last word, under these
circumstances, need not necessarily mean “the devil,” in
any sense; but referring directly to the simple sense of its
primitive, must be made to mean “calumniating,” “slanderous,”
“accusing,”――and in connection with the technical, legal term,
αντιδικος, (whose primary, etymological sense is uniformly a
_legal_ one, “the plaintiff or prosecutor in a suit at law,”)
can mean only “the calumniating (or accusing) prosecutor.” The
common writers on the epistle, being utterly ignorant of its
general scope, have failed to apprehend the true force of this
expression; but the clear, critical judgment of Rosenmueller,
(though he also was without the advantage of a knowledge of
its history,) led him at once to see the greater justice of the
view here given; and he accordingly adopts it, yet not with the
definite, technical application of terms justly belonging to the
passage. He refers vaguely to others who have taken this view,
but does not give names.

_The time_ when this epistle was written is very variously fixed
by the different writers to whom I have above referred. Lardner
dating it at Rome, concludes that the time was between A. D. 63
and 65, because he thinks that Peter could not have arrived at
Rome earlier. This inference depends entirely on what he does
not prove,――the assertion that by Babylon, in the date, is meant
Rome. The proofs of its being another place, which I have given
above, will therefore require that it should have been written
before that time, if Peter did then go to Rome. And Michaelis
seems to ground upon this notion his belief, that it “was
written either not long before, or not long after, the year 60.”
But the nobly impartial Hug comes to our aid again, with the
sentence, which, though bearing against a fiction most desirable
for his church, he unhesitatingly passes on its date. From his
admirable detail of the contents and design of the epistle, he
makes it evident that it was written (from Babylon) some years
after the time when Peter is commonly said to have gone to Rome,
never to return. This is the opinion which I have necessarily
adopted, after taking his view of the design of the epistle.

Another series of passages in this epistle refers to the remarkable fact, that the Christians were at that time suffering under an accusation that they were “evil-doers,” malefactors, criminals liable to the vengeance of the law; and that this accusation was so general, that the name, Christian, was already a term denoting a criminal directly liable to this legal vengeance. This certainly was a state of things hitherto totally unparalleled in the history of the followers of Christ. In all the accounts previously given of the nature of the attacks made on them by their enemies, it is made to appear that no accusation whatever was sustained or even brought against them, in reference to moral or legal offences; but they were always presented in the light of mere religious dissenters and sectaries. At Corinth, the independent and equitable Gallio dismissed them from the judgment-seat, with the upright decision that they were chargeable with no crime whatever. Felix and Festus, with king Agrippa II., also, alike esteemed the whole procedure against Paul as a mere theological or religious affair, relating to doctrines and not to moral actions. At Ephesus, even one of the high officers of the city did not hesitate to declare, in the face of a mob raging against Paul and his companions, that they were innocent of all crime. And even as late as the seventh year of Nero, the name of Christian had so little of an odious or criminal character, that Agrippa II. did not disdain to declare himself almost persuaded to assume the name and character. And the whole course of their history abundantly shows, that so far from the idea of attacking the Christian brotherhood in a mass, as guilty of legal offenses, and making their very name nearly synonymous with criminal, no trace whatever of such an attack appears, until three years after the last mentioned date, when Nero charged the Christians, as a sect, with his own atrocious crime, the dreadful devastation by fire of his own capital; and on this ground, every where instituted a cruel persecution against them. In connection with this procedure, the Christians are first mentioned in Roman history, as a new and peculiar class of people, called _Christiani_, from their founder, _Christus_; and in reference to this matter, abusive charges are brought against them.

_Evil doers._――These passages are in ii. 12, iii. 16, iv. 15,
where the word in Greek is κακοποιοι, (_kakopoioi_,) which
means a malefactor, as is shown in John xviii. 30, where the
whole point of the remark consists in the fact, that the person
spoken of was considered an actual violator of known law; so
that the word is evidently limited throughout, to those who were
_criminals in the eye of the law_.

_The name Christian denoting a criminal._――This is manifest from
iv. 16, where they are exhorted to suffer for this alone, and to
give no occasion whatever for any other criminal accusation.

Illustration: BETHLEHEM, AT NIGHT.

A third characteristic of the circumstances of those to whom this epistle is addressed, is, that they were obliged to be constantly on their guard against accusations, which would expose them to capital punishment. They were objects of scorn and obloquy, and were to expect to be dragged to trial as thieves, murderers, and as wretches conspiring secretly against the public peace and safety; and to all this they were liable in their character as Christians. The apostle, therefore, in deep solicitude for the dreadful condition and liabilities of his friends, warns those who, in spite of innocence, are thus made to suffer, to consider all their afflictions as in accordance with the wise will of God, and, in an upright course of conduct, to commit the keeping of their souls to him, as a faithful guardian, who would not allow the permanent injury of the souls which he had created. Now, not even a conjecture can be made, much less, any historical proof be brought, that beyond Palestine any person had ever yet been made to suffer death on the score of religion, or of any stigma attaching to that sect, before the time when Nero involved them in the cruel charge just mentioned. The date of the first instances of such persecutions was the eleventh year of the reign of Nero, under the consulships of Caius Lecanius Bassus, and Marcus Licinius Crassus, according to the Roman annals. The commencement of the burning of Rome, which was the occasion of this first attack on the Christians, was in the last part of the month of July; but the persecution did not begin immediately. After various contrivances to avert the indignation of the people from their imperial destroyer, the Christians were seized as a proper expiatory sacrifice, the choice being favored by the general dislike with which they were regarded. This attack being deferred for some time after the burning, could not have occurred till late in that year. The epistle cannot have been written before its occurrence, nor indeed until some time afterwards; because a few months must be allowed for the account of it to spread to the provinces of Asia, and it must have been still later when the news of the difficulty could reach the apostle, so as to enable him to appreciate the danger of those Christians who were under the dominion of the Romans. It is evident, then, that the epistle was not written in the same year in which the burning occurred; but in the subsequent one, the twelfth of Nero’s reign, and the sixty-fifth of the Christian era. By that time the condition and prospects of the Christians throughout the empire were such as to excite the deepest solicitude in the great apostle, who, though himself residing in the great Parthian empire, removed from all danger of injury from the Roman emperor, was by no means disposed to forget the high claims the sufferers had on him for counsel and consolation. This dreadful event was the most important which had ever yet befallen the Christians, and there would certainly be just occasion for surprise, if it had called forth no consolatory testimony from the founders of the faith, and if no trace of it could be found in the apostolic records.

_Committing the keeping of their souls to God._――This view of
the design of the epistle gives new force to this passage, (iv.
19.)

_First mentioned in Roman history._――This is by Tacitus, (Annals
xv. 44,) who thus speaks of them:――“Nero condendae urbis novae
et cognomento suo appellandae gloriam quaerere, et sic jussum
incendium credebatur. Ergo abolendo rumori subdidit reos,
et quaesitissimis poenis affecit, quos per flagitia invisos,
vulgus Christianos appellabat,” &c.――“It was believed that Nero,
desirous of building the city anew, and of calling it by his
surname, had thus caused its burning. To get rid of this general
impression, therefore, he brought under this accusation, and
visited with the most exquisite punishments, a set of persons,
hateful for their crimes, commonly called Christians. The name
was derived from Christus, who, in the reign of Tiberius, was
seized and punished by Pontius Pilate, the procurator. The
ruinous superstition, though checked for a while, broke out
again, not only in Judea, the source of the evil, but also in
the city, (Rome.) Therefore those who professed it were first
seized, and then, on their confession, a great number of others
were convicted, not so much on the charge of the arson, as on
account of the universal hatred which existed against them. And
their deaths were made amusing exhibitions, as, being covered
with the skins of wild beasts, they were torn to pieces by dogs,
or were nailed to crosses, or, being daubed with combustible
stuff, were burned by way of light, in the darkness, after the
close of day. Nero opened his own gardens for the show, and
mingled with the lowest part of the throng, on the occasion.”
(The description of the cruel manner in which they were burned,
may serve as a forcible illustration of the meaning of “the
fiery trial,” to which Peter alludes, iv. 12.) By Suetonius,
also, they are briefly mentioned. (Nero, chapter 15.) “Afflicti
suppliciis Christiani, genus hominum superstitionis novae et
_maleficae_.”――“The Christians, a sort of men of a new and
pernicious (_evil doing_) superstition, were visited with
punishments.”

That this Neronian persecution was as extensive as is here
made to appear, is proved by Lardner and Hug. The former in
particular, gives several very interesting evidences, in his
“Heathen testimonies,” especially the remarkable inscription
referring to this persecution, found in Portugal. (Collection
of Ancient Jewish and Heathen Testimonies, chapter iii.)

From the uniform tone in which the apostle alludes to the danger as threatening only his readers, without the slightest allusion to the circumstance of his being involved in the difficulty, is drawn another important confirmation of the locality of the epistle. He uniformly uses the second person when referring to trials, but if he himself had then been so situated as to share in the calamity for which he strove to prepare them, he would have been very apt to have expressed his own feelings in view of the common evil. Paul, in those epistles which were written under circumstances of personal distress, is very full of warm expressions of the state of mind in which he met his trials; nor was there in Peter any lack of the fervid energy that would burst forth in similarly eloquent sympathy, on the like occasions. But from Babylon, beyond the bounds of Roman sway, he looked on their sufferings only with that pure sympathy which his regard for his brethren would excite; and it is not to be wondered, then, that he uses the second person merely, in speaking of their distresses. The bearer of this epistle to the distressed Christians of Asia Minor, is named Silvanus, generally supposed to be the same with Silvanus or Silas, mentioned in Paul’s epistles, and in the Acts, as the companion of Paul in his journeys through some of those provinces to which Peter now wrote. There is great probability in this conjecture, nor is there anything that contradicts it in the slightest degree; and it may therefore be considered as true. Some other great object may at this time have required his presence among them, or he may have been then passing on his journey to rejoin Paul, thus executing this commission incidentally.

This view of the scope and contents of this epistle is taken
from Hug, who seems to have originated it. At least I can
find nothing of it in any other author whom I have consulted.
Michaelis, for instance, though evidently apprehending the
general tendency of the epistle, and its design to prepare its
readers for the coming of some dreadful calamity, was not led
thereby to the just apprehension of the historical circumstances
therewith connected. (Hug, II. §§ 162‒165.――Michaelis Vol. IV.
chapter xxvii. §§ 1‒7.)

THE SECOND EPISTLE.

After writing the former epistle to the Christians of Asia Minor, Peter probably continued to reside in Babylon, since no occurrence is mentioned which could draw him away, in his old age, from the retired but important field of labor to which he had previously confined himself. Still exercising a paternal watchfulness, however, over his distant disciples, his solicitude before long again excited him to address them in reference to their spiritual difficulties and necessities. The apprehensions expressed in the former epistle, respecting their maintenance of a pure faith in their complicated trials, had in the mean time proved well-grounded. During the distracting calamities of Nero’s persecution, false teachers had arisen, who had, by degrees, brought in pernicious heresies among them, affecting the very foundations of the faith, and ending in the most ruinous consequences to the belief and practice of some. This second epistle he wrote, therefore, to stir up those who were still pure in heart, to the remembrance of the true doctrines of Christianity, as taught by the apostles; and to warn them against the heretical notions that had so fatally spread among them. Of the errors complained of, the most important seems to have been the denial of the judgment, which had been prophesied so long. Solemnly re-assuring them of the certainty of that awful series of events, he exhorted them to the steady maintenance of such a holy conduct and godly life, as would fit them to meet the great change which he so sublimely pictured, whenever and however it should occur; and closed with a most solemn charge to beware lest they also should be led away by the error of the wicked, so as to fall from their former steadfast adherence to the truth. In the former part of the epistle he alluded affectingly to the nearness of his own end, as an especial reason for his urgency with those from whom he was so soon to be parted. “I think it meet as long as I am in this tabernacle, to stir you up to the remembrance of these things, knowing as I do that the putting off of my tabernacle is very near, according to what our Lord Jesus Christ made known to me.” This is an allusion to the prophecy of his Master at the meeting on the lake, after the resurrection, described in the last chapter of John’s gospel. “Therefore,” writes the aged apostle, “I will be urgent that you, after my departure, may always hold these things in your memory.” All which seems to imply an anticipated death, of which he was reminded by the course of natural decay, and by the remembrance of the parting prophecy of his Master, and not by anything very imminently dangerous or threatening in his external circumstances, at the time of writing. This was the last important work of his adventurous and devoted life; and his allusions to the solemn scenes of future judgment were therefore most solemnly appropriate. Those to whom he wrote could expect to see his face no more, and his whole epistle is in a strain accordant with these circumstances, dwelling particularly on the awful realities of a coming day of doom.

The first epistle of Peter has always been received as authentic, ever since the apostolic writings were first collected, nor has there ever been a single doubt expressed by any theologian, that it was what it pretended to be; but in regard to the epistle just mentioned as his second, and now commonly so received, there has been as much earnest discussion as concerning any other book in the sacred canon, excepting, perhaps, the epistle to the Hebrews and John’s Revelation. The weight of historical testimony is certainly rather against its authenticity, since all the early Fathers who explicitly mention it, speak of it as a work of very doubtful character. In the first list of the sacred writings that is recorded, this is not put among those generally acknowledged as of divine authority, but among those whose truth was disputed. Still, quotations from it are found in the writings of the Fathers, in the first, second and third centuries, by whom it is mentioned approvingly, although not specified as inspired or of divine authority. But even as late as the end of the fourth century there were still many who denied it to be Peter’s, on account of supposed differences of style observable between this and the former epistle, which was acknowledged to be his. The Syrian Christians continued to reject it from their canon for some time after; for in the old Syriac version, executed before A. D. 100, this alone, of all books supposed to have been written before that translation that are now considered a part of the New Testament, is not contained, though it was regarded by many among them as a good book, and is quoted in the writings of one of the Syrian Fathers, with respect. After this period, however, these objections were soon forgotten, and from the fifth century downwards, it has been universally adopted into the authentic canon, and regarded with that reverence which its internal evidences of truth and genuineness so amply justify. Indeed, it is on its internal evidence, almost entirely, that its great defense must be founded,――since the historical testimonies, (by common confession of theologians,) will not afford that satisfaction to the investigator, which is desirable on subjects of this nature; and though ancient usage and its long-established possession of a place in the inspired code may be called up in its support, still there will be occasion for the aid of internal reasons, to maintain a positive decision as to its authenticity. And this sort of evidence, an examination by the rigid standards of modern critical theology proves abundantly sufficient for the effort to which it is summoned; for though it has been said, that since the ancients themselves were in doubt, the moderns cannot expect to arrive at certainty, because it is impossible to get more _historical_ information on the subject, in the nineteenth century, than ecclesiastical writers had within reach in the third and fourth centuries; still, when the question of the authenticity of the work is to be decided by an examination of its contents, the means of ascertaining the truth are by no means proportioned to the antiquity of the criticism. In the early ages of Christianity, the science of faithfully investigating truth hardly had an existence; and such has been the progress of improvement in this department of knowledge, under the labors of modern theologians, that the writers of the nineteenth century may justly be considered as possessed of far more extensive and certain means of settling the character of this epistle by _internal_ evidence, than were within the knowledge of those Christian fathers who lived fourteen hundred years ago. The great objection against the epistle in the fourth century, was an alleged dissimilarity of style between this and the former epistle. Now, there can be no doubt whatever that modern Biblical scholars have vastly greater means for judging of a rhetorical question of this kind, than the Christian fathers of the fourth century, of whom those who were Grecians were really less scientifically acquainted with their own language, and no more qualified for a comparison of this kind, than those who live in an age when the principles of criticism are so much better understood. With all these superior lights, the results of the most accurate modern investigations have been decidedly favorable to the authenticity of the second epistle ascribed to Peter, and the most rigid comparisons of its style with that of the former, have brought out proofs triumphantly satisfactory of its identity of origin with that,――proofs so much the more unquestionable, as they are borrowed from coincidences which must have been entirely natural and incidental, and not the result of any deliberate collusion.

This account of the second epistle is also taken from Hug and
Michaelis, to whom, with Lardner, reference may be made for the
details of all the arguments for and against its authenticity.

As to the place and time of writing this epistle, it seems quite probable that it was written where the former one was, since there is no account or hint whatever of any change in Peter’s external circumstances; and that it was written some months after it, is unquestionable, since its whole tenor requires such a period to have intervened, as would allow the first to reach them and be read by them, and also for the apostle to learn in the course of time the effects ultimately produced by it, and to hear of the rise of new difficulties, requiring new apostolical interference and counsel. The first seems to have been directed mainly to those who were complete Jews, by birth or by proselytism, as appears from the terms in which he repeatedly addresses them in it; but the sort of errors complained of in this epistle seem to have been so exclusively characteristic of Gentile converts, that it must have been written more particularly with reference to difficulties in that part of the religious communities of those regions. He condemns and refutes certain heretics who rejected some of the fundamental truths of the Mosaic law,――errors which no well-trained Jew could ever be supposed to make, but which in motley assemblages of different races, like the Christian churches, might naturally enough arise among those Gentiles, who felt impatient at the inferiority in which they seemed implicated by their ignorance of the doctrines of the Jewish theology, in which their circumcised brethren were so fully versed. It seems to have been more especially aimed at the rising sect of the Gnostics, who are known to have been heretical on some of the very points here alluded to. Its great similarity, in some passages, to the epistle of Jude, will make it the subject of allusion again in the life of that apostle.

HIS DEATH.

Henceforth the writings of the New Testament are entirely silent as to the chief apostle. Not a hint is given of the few remaining actions of his life, nor of the mode, place, or time of his death; and all these concluding points have been left to be settled by conjecture, or by tradition as baseless. The only passage which has been supposed to give any hint of the manner of his death, is that in the last chapter of John’s gospel. “Jesus says to him――‘I most solemnly tell thee, when thou wast young, thou didst gird thyself and walk whither thou wouldst; but when thou shalt be old, another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldst not.’ This he said, to make known by what sort of death he should glorify God.” It has been commonly said that this is a distinct and unquestionable prophecy that he should in his old age be crucified,――the expression, “another shall gird thee and carry thee whither thou wouldst not,” referring to his being bound to the cross and borne away to execution, since this was the only sort of death by which an apostle could be said, with much propriety or force, to _glorify God_. And the long-established authority of tradition coinciding with this view, or rather, suggesting it, no very minute examination into the sense of the passage has ever been made. But the words themselves are by no means decisive. Take a common reader, who has never heard that Peter was crucified, and it would be hard for him to make out such a circumstance from the bare prophecy as given by John. Indeed, such unbiased impressions of the sense of the passage will go far to justify the conclusion that the words imply nothing but that Peter was destined to pass a long life in the service of his Master,――that he should after having worn out his bodily and mental energies in his devoted exertions, attain such an extreme decrepid old age as to lose the power of voluntary motion, and die thus,――at least without _necessarily_ implying any bloody martyrdom. Will it be said that by such a quiet death he could not be considered as _glorifying_ God? The objection surely is founded in a misapprehension of the nature of those demonstrations of devotion, by which the glory of God is most effectually secured. There are other modes of martyrdom than the dungeon, the sword, the axe, the flame, and the stone; and in all ages since Peter, there have been thousands of martyrs who have, by lives steadily and quietly devoted to the cause of truth, no less glorified God, than those who were rapt to heaven in flame, in blood, and in tortures inflicted by a malignant persecution. Was not God truly glorified in the deaths of the aged Xavier, and Eliot, and Swartz, or the bright, early exits of Brainerd, Mills, Martyn, Parsons, Fisk, and hundreds whom the apostolic spirit of modern missions has sent forth to labors as devoted, and to deaths as glorious to God, as those of any who swell the deified lists of the ancient martyrologies? The whole notion of a bloody martyrdom as an essential termination to the life of a saint, grew out of a papistical superstition; nor need the enlightened minds of those who can better appreciate the manner in which God’s highest glory is secured by the lives and deaths of his servants, seek any such superfluous aids to crown the mighty course of the great apostolic chief, whose solid claims to the name and honors of _Martyr_ rest on higher grounds than so insignificant an accident as the manner of his death. All those writers who pretend to particularize the mode of his departure, connect it also with the utterly impossible fiction of his residence at Rome, on which enough has been already said. Who will undertake to say, out of such a mass of matters, what is truth and what is falsehood? And if the views above given, on the high authority of the latest writers of even the Romish church, are of any value for any purpose whatever, they are perfectly decisive against the notion of Peter’s martyrdom at Rome, in the persecution under Nero, since Peter was then in Babylon, far beyond the vengeance of the Caesar; nor was he so foolish as ever after to have trusted himself in the reach of a perfectly unnecessary danger. The command of Christ was, “When you are persecuted in one city, flee into another,”――the necessary and unquestionable inference from which, was, that when out of the reach of persecution they should not wilfully go into it. This is a simple principle of Christian action, with which papist fable-mongers were totally unacquainted, and they thereby afford the most satisfactory proof of the utter falsity of the actions and motives which they ascribe to the apostles. One of these stories thus disproved is connected with another adventure with that useful character, Simon Magus, who, as the tale runs, after being first vanquished so thoroughly by Peter in the reign of Claudius, returned to Rome, in the reign of Nero, and made such progress again in his magical tricks, as to rise into the highest favor with this emperor, as he had with the former. This of course required a new effort from Peter, which ended in the disgrace and death of the magician, who, attempting to fly through the air in the presence of the emperor and people in the theater, was by the prayer of Peter caused to fall from his aspiring course, to the ground, by which he was so much injured as to die soon after. The emperor being provoked at the loss of his favorite, turned all his wrath against the apostle who had been directly instrumental in his ruin, and imprisoned him with the design of executing him as soon as might be convenient. While in these circumstances, or as others say, before he was imprisoned, he was earnestly exhorted by the disciples in Rome, to make his escape. He accordingly, though very desirous of being killed, (a most abominably irreligious wish, by the way,) began to move off, one dark night; but had hardly got beyond the walls of the city,――indeed he was just passing out of the gate-way,――when, whom should he meet but Jesus Christ himself, coming towards Rome. Peter asked, with some reasonable surprise, “Lord! where are you going?” Christ answered, “I am coming to Rome, to be crucified again.” Peter at once took this as a hint that he ought to have stayed, and that Christ meant to be crucified again in the crucifixion of his apostle. He accordingly turned right about, and went back into the city, where, having given to the wondering brethren an account of the reasons of his return, he was immediately seized, and was crucified, to the glory of God. Now it is a sufficient answer to this or any similar fable, to judge the blasphemous inventor out of his own mouth, and out of the instructions given by Christ himself to his servants, for their conduct, in all cases where they were threatened with persecution, as above quoted.

_Referring to his being bound to the cross._――Tertullian seems
to have first suggested this rather whimsical interpretation:
――“Tunc Petrus ab altero cingitur, quum cruci adstringitur.”
(Tertullian, Scorpiace, 15.) There seems to be more rhyme than
reason in the sentence, however.

The rejection of this forced interpretation is by no means a
new notion. The critical Tremellius long ago maintained that
the verse had no reference whatever to a prophecy of Peter’s
crucifixion, though he probably had no idea of denying that
Peter did actually die by crucifixion. Among more modern
commentators too, the prince of critics, Kuinoel, with whom
are quoted Semler, Gurlitt and Schott, utterly deny that a
fair construction of the original will allow any prophetical
idea to be based on it. The critical testimony of these great
commentators on the true and just force of the words, is of the
very highest value; because all received the tale of Peter’s
crucifixion as true, having never examined the authority of the
tradition, and not one of them pretended to deny that he really
was crucified. But in spite of this pre-conceived erroneous
historical notion, their nice sense of what was grammatically
and critically just, would not allow them to pervert the passage
to the support of this long-established view; and they therefore
pronounce it as merely expressive of the helplessness and
imbecility of extreme old age, with which they make every
word coincide. But Bloomfield, entirely carried away with the
tide of antique authorities, is “surprised that so many recent
commentators should deny that crucifixion is here alluded
to, though they acknowledge that Peter suffered crucifixion.”
Now this last circumstance might well occasion surprise,
as it certainly did in me, when I found what mighty names
had so disinterestedly supported the interpretation which I
had with fear and trembling adopted, in obedience to my own
long-established, unaided convictions; but my surprise was of
a decidedly agreeable sort.

The inventors of fables go on to give us the minute particulars of Peter’s death, and especially note the circumstance that he was crucified with his head downwards and his feet uppermost, he himself having desired that it might be done in that manner, because he thought himself unworthy to be crucified as his Master was. This was a mode sometimes adopted by the Romans, as an additional pain and ignominy. But Peter must have been singularly accommodating to his persecutors, to have suggested this improvement upon his tortures to his malignant murderers; and must have manifested a spirit more accordant with that of a savage defying his enemies to increase his agonies, than with that of the mild, submissive Jesus. And such has been the evident absurdity of the story, that many of the most ardent receivers of fables have rejected this circumstance as improbable, more especially as it is not found among the earliest stories of his crucifixion, but evidently seems to have been appended among later improvements.

PETER’S MARTYRDOM.

The only authority which can be esteemed worthy of consideration
on this point, is that of Clemens Romanus, who, in the latter
part of the first century, (about the year 70, or as others
say, 96,) in his epistle to the Corinthians, uses these words
respecting Peter:――“Peter, on account of unrighteous hatred,
underwent not one, or two, but many labors, and _having thus
borne his testimony_, departed to the place of glory, which was
his due,”――(ὁυτως μαρτυρησας επορευθη εις τον οφειλομενον τοπον
δοξης.) Now it is by no means certain that the prominent word
(_marturesas_) necessarily means “bearing testimony by death,”
or _martyrdom_ in the modern sense. The primary sense of this
verb is merely “_to witness_,” in which simple meaning alone, it
is used in the New Testament; nor can any passage in the sacred
writings be shown, in which this verb means “to bear witness to
any cause, _by death_.” This was a _technical_ sense, (if I may
so name it,) which the word at last acquired among the Fathers,
when they were speaking of those who bore witness to the truth
of the gospel of Christ by their blood; and it was a meaning
which at last nearly excluded all the true original senses
of the verb, limiting it mainly to the notion of a death by
persecution for the sake of Christ. Thence our English words,
_martyr_ and _martyrdom_. But that Clement by this use of the
word, in this connection, meant to convey the idea of Peter’s
having been killed for the sake of Christ, is an opinion utterly
incapable of proof, and moreover rendered improbable by the
words joined to it in the passage. The sentence is, “Peter
underwent many labors, and having thus borne witness” to the
gospel truth, “went to the place of glory which he deserved.”
Now the adverb “_thus_,” (ὁυτως,) seems to me most distinctly
to show what was the nature of this testimony, and the manner
also in which he bore it. It points out more plainly than any
other words could, the fact that his testimony to the truth of
the gospel was borne in the zealous labors of a devoted life,
and _not_ by the agonies of a bloody death. There is not in
the whole context, nor in all the writings of Clement, any hint
whatever that Peter was _killed_ for the sake of the gospel; and
we are therefore required by every sound rule of interpretation,
to stick to the primary sense of the verb, in this passage.
Lardner most decidedly mis-translates it in the text of his work,
so that any common reader would be grossly deceived as to the
expression in the original of Clement,――“Peter underwent many
labors, _till at last_ being martyred, he went,” &c. The Greek
word, ὁυτως, (_houtos_,) means always, “in this manner,” “thus,”
“so,” and is not a mere expletive, like the English phrase, “and
_so_,” which is a mere form of transition from one part of the
narrative to the other.

In the similar passage of Clemens which refers to _Paul_, there
is something in the connection which may seem to favor the
conclusion that he understood Paul to have been put to death
by the Roman officers. His words are,――“and after having _borne
his testimony_ before governors, he was _thus_ sent out of the
world,” &c. Here the word “thus,” coming after the participle,
may perhaps be considered, in view also of its other connections,
as implying his removal from the world by a violent death, _in
consequence of_ the testimony borne by him before the governors.
This however, will bear some dispute, and will have a fuller
discussion elsewhere.

But in respect to the passage which refers to Peter, the burden
of proof may fairly be said to lie on those who maintain the old
opinion. Here the word is shown to have, in the New Testament,
no such application to _death_ as it has since acquired; and
the question is whether Clemens Romanus, a man himself of the
apostolic age, who lived and perhaps wrote, before the canon was
completed, had already learned to give a new meaning to a verb,
before so simple and unlimited in its applications. No person
can pretend to trace this meaning to within a century of the
Clementine age, nor does Suicer refer to any one who knew of
such use before Clement of Alexandria (See his Thesaurus; Μαρτυρ.
) Clement himself uses it in the same epistle (§ xvii.) in its
unquestionable primary sense, speaking of Abraham as having
received an honorable testimony,――(εμαρτυρηθη;) for who will say
that Abraham was _martyred_, in the modern sense? The fact too
that Clement nowhere else gives the least glimmer of a hint that
Peter died any where but in his bed, fixes the position here
taken, beyond all possibility of attack, except by its being
shown that he uses this verb somewhere else, with the sense of
_death_ unquestionably attached to it.

There is no other _early_ writer who can be said to speak of
the manner of Peter’s death, before Dionysius of Corinth, who
says that “Peter and Paul having taught in Italy together, _bore
their testimony_” (_by death_, if you please,) “about the same
time.” An argument might here also be sustained on the word
εμαρτυρησαν, (_emarturesan_,) but the evidence of Dionysius,
mixed as it is with a demonstrated fable, is not worth a
_verbal_ criticism. The same may be said of Tertullian and the
rest of the later Fathers, as given in the note on pages 228‒233.

An examination of the word Μαρτυρ, in Suicer’s Thesaurus
Ecclesiasticus, will show the critical, that even in later times,
this word did not necessarily imply “one who bore his testimony
to the truth at the sacrifice of life.” Even Chrysostom, in
whose time the peculiar limitation of the term might be supposed
to be very well established, uses the word in such applications
as to show that its original force was not wholly lost. By
Athanasius too, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego are styled
_martyrs_. Gregory Nazianzen also speaks of “living martyrs.”
(ζωντες μαρτυρες.) Theophylact calls the apostle John a _martyr_,
though he declares him to have passed through the hands of his
persecutors unhurt, and to have died by the course of nature.
Clemens Alexandrinus has similar uses of the term; and the
Apostolical Constitutions, of doubtful date, but much later than
the first century, also give it in such applications. Suicer
distinctly specifies several classes of persons, not martyrs
in the modern sense, to whom the Greek word is nevertheless
applied in the writings of even the later Fathers; as “those
who testified the truth of the gospel of Christ, at the peril
of life merely, without the loss of it,”――“those who obeyed the
requirements of the gospel, by restraining passion,” &c. In some
of these instances however, it is palpable that the application
of the word to such persons is secondary, and made in rather
a poetical way, with a reference to the more common meaning
of loss of life for the sake of Christ, since there is always
implied a _testimony_ at the risk or loss of something; still
the power of these instances to render doubtful the meaning
of the term, is unquestionable. (See Suicer’s Thesaurus
Ecclesiasticus, Μαρτυρ, III. 2, 5, 6.)