70 Facts About Saint Peter

Saint Peter appears repeatedly and prominently in all four New Testament gospels as well as the Acts of the Apostles.

Saint Peter is the brother of Saint Andrew, and they both were fishermen.

The Gospel of Mark in particular was traditionally thought to show the influence of Saint Peter's preaching and eyewitness memories.

Saint Peter is mentioned, under either the name Peter or Cephas, in Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians and the Epistle to the Galatians.

The sources used to reconstruct the life of Saint Peter can be divided in three groups:.

Saint Peter became the first listed apostle ordained by Jesus in the early Church.

Saint Peter was named Simon, the son of a man named Jonah or John.

In Luke, Simon Saint Peter owns the boat that Jesus uses to preach to the multitudes who were pressing on him at the shore of Lake Gennesaret.

Matthew additionally describes Saint Peter walking on water for a moment but beginning to sink when his faith wavers.

Saint Peter initially refused to let Jesus wash his feet, but when Jesus told him: "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me", Saint Peter replied: "Lord, not my feet only, but my hands and my head".

Simon Saint Peter was twice arraigned, with John, before the Sanhedrin and directly defied them.

Saint Peter takes a missionary journey to Lydda, Joppa and Caesarea.

At Joppa, Saint Peter had a vision given him from God which allowed for the eating of previously unclean animals, leading the early believers to the decision to evangelise the Gentiles.

Simon Saint Peter applied the message of the vision on clean animals to the gentiles and follows his meeting with Cornelius the Centurion by claiming that "God shows no partiality".

Acts 12 narrates how Saint Peter, who was in Jerusalem, was put into prison by Agrippa I but was rescued by an angel.

The synoptic gospels mention that Saint Peter had a mother-in-law at the time he joined Jesus and that Jesus healed Saint Peter's mother-in-law.

Clement of Alexandria claimed that Saint Peter's wife was executed for her faith by the Roman authorities but he did not specify any date or location.

Saint Peter is regarded as the first leader of the early Church, though he was eclipsed in this leadership by James the Just, "the brother of the Lord".

Saint Peter is always listed first among the Twelve Apostles in the Gospels and in the Book of Acts.

Saint Peter often confesses his faith in Jesus as the Messiah.

Saint Peter is often depicted in the gospels as spokesman of all the Apostles.

In John's gospel, Saint Peter is the first person to enter the empty tomb, although the women and the beloved disciple see it before him.

In Luke's account, the women's report of the empty tomb is dismissed by the apostles, and Saint Peter is the only one who goes to check for himself, running to the tomb.

Saint Peter was considered along with James the Just and John the Apostle as the three Pillars of the Church.

Saint Peter was eclipsed in this leadership by James the Just, "the Brother of the Lord".

Dunn proposes that Saint Peter was a "bridge-man" between the opposing views of Paul and James the Just [italics original]:.

For Saint Peter was probably in fact and effect the bridge-man who did more than any other to hold together the diversity of first-century Christianity.

Paul affirms that Saint Peter had the special charge of being apostle to the Jews, just as he, Paul, was apostle to the Gentiles.

Some argue James the Just was bishop of Jerusalem whilst Saint Peter was bishop of Rome and that this position at times gave James privilege in some situations.

Subsequent tradition held that Saint Peter had been the first Patriarch of Antioch.

The Liber Pontificalis mentions Saint Peter as having served as bishop of Antioch for seven years and having potentially left his family in the Greek city before his journey to Rome.

One is that Saint Peter had a group of 12 to 16 followers, whom the Clementine writings name.

However, it is said that the institution of the papacy is not dependent on the idea that Saint Peter was Bishop of Rome or even on his ever having been in Rome.

Eusebius of Caesarea relates that when Saint Peter confronts Simon Magus at Judea, Simon Magus flees to Rome, where the Romans began to regard him as a god.

Early Church tradition says that Saint Peter died by crucifixion at the time of the Great Fire of Rome in the year 64.

Tradition locates his burial place where the Basilica of Saint Peter was later built, directly beneath the Basilica's high altar.

The Church of Quo Vadis, near the Catacombs of Saint Peter Callistus, contains a stone in which Jesus' footprints from this event are supposedly preserved, though this was apparently an ex-voto from a pilgrim, and indeed a copy of the original housed in the Basilica of St Sebastian.

The statement implies that Saint Peter was killed like Jesus and Paul was killed like John.

Jerome wrote that "at Nero's hands Saint Peter received the crown of martyrdom being nailed to the cross with his head towards the ground and his feet raised on high, asserting that he was unworthy to be crucified in the same manner as his Lord".

The skull of Saint Peter is claimed to reside in the Archbasilica of Saint John Lateran since at least the ninth century, alongside the skull of Saint Paul.

The majority of Saint Peter's remains are still preserved in Rome, under the high altar of St Peter's Basilica.

Currently, most Catholic scholars, and many scholars in general, hold the view that Saint Peter was martyred in Rome under Nero.

Clement of Rome's First Letter, a document that has been dated from the 90s to the 120s, is one of the earliest sources adduced in support of Saint Peter's stay in Rome, but Zwierlein questions the text's authenticity and whether it has any knowledge about Saint Peter's life beyond what is contained in the New Testament Acts of the Apostles.

Also in Catholic belief, Saint Peter was, as the first Bishop of Rome, the first Pope.

However, Saint Peter never bore the title of "Pope" or "Vicar of Christ".

Jesus later alludes to this nickname after Saint Peter declares Jesus to be the Messiah:.

For Christ is the true unmoveable rock of himself, Saint Peter is unmoveable by Christ the rock.

Saint Peter is the light, and yet you are the light: he is the Priest, and yet he maketh Priests: he is the rock, and he made a rock.

Saint Peter is often depicted in both Western and Eastern Christian art holding a key or a set of keys.

Oscar Cullmann, a Lutheran theologian and distinguished Church historian, disagrees with Luther and the Protestant reformers who held that by "rock" Christ did not mean Saint Peter, but meant either himself or the faith of his followers.

Saint Peter believes the meaning of the original Aramaic is very clear: that "Kepha" was the Aramaic word for "rock", and that it was the name by which Christ called Peter.

Yet, Cullmann sharply rejects the Catholic claim that Saint Peter began the papal succession.

Saint Peter writes: "In the life of Peter there is no starting point for a chain of succession to the leadership of the church at large".

Cullmann concludes that while Saint Peter was the original head of the apostles, Saint Peter was not the founder of any visible church succession.

The second rock Jesus refers to must then be the same rock as the first one; and if Saint Peter is the first rock, he must be the second.

Forty-four said Saint Peter's faith is the rock, The remainder looked upon the whole body of believers as the rock.

The Orthodox hold that Saint Peter did not act as leader at the Council of Jerusalem, but as merely one of a number who spoke.

The different orders of liturgies used for sanctification of Church buildings, marriage, ordination, et cetera, reveal that the primacy of Saint Peter is a part of living faith of the Church.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches that Peter was the first leader of the early Christian church after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, recorded in multiple revelations that the resurrected Saint Peter appeared to him and Oliver Cowdery in 1829, near Harmony Township, Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, in order to bestow the apostleship and keys of the kingdom as part of a restoration of priesthood authority.

An old tradition, which involves Habib the Carpenter, mentions that Saint Peter was one of the three disciples sent to Antioch to preach to the people there.

Saint Peter appears in the writings of Baha'u'llah, the Prophet-Founder of the Baha'i Faith, often referred to as The Rock:.

Daniel B Wallace writes that, for many scholars, "the issue of authorship is already settled, at least negatively: the apostle Peter did not write this letter" and that "the vast bulk of NT scholars adopts this perspective without much discussion".

Christian tradition, for example Eusebius of Caesarea, has maintained that Saint Peter was killed in Nero's persecution, and thus had to assume that the Roman persecution alluded to in First Saint Peter must be this Neronian persecution.

Jerome says that Saint Peter "wrote two epistles which are called Catholic, the second of which, on account of its difference from the first in style, is considered by many not to be by him".

Mark having become the interpreter of Saint Peter, wrote down accurately whatsoever he remembered.

The fragmentary Gospel of Saint Peter contains an account of the death of Jesus differing significantly from the canonical gospels.

In traditional iconography, Saint Peter has been shown very consistently since early Christian art as an oldish, thick-set man with a "slightly combative" face and a short beard, and usually white hair, sometimes balding.

Narrative images of Saint Peter include several scenes from the Life of Christ where he is mentioned in the gospels, and he is often identifiable in scenes where his presence is not specifically mentioned.

In particular, depictions of the Arrest of Christ usually include Saint Peter cutting off the ear of one of the soldiers.