Apostle Peter

Simon, later called Peter, was a first-century Jewish fisherman from Bethsaida in Galilee, a town also associated with his brother Andrew and with the apostle Philip. The Gospel of John identifies Bethsaida as their city; other New Testament passages place Peter's household in Capernaum, on the northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee, where Jesus healed Peter's mother-in-law. His original name appears as Simon or Simeon; Jesus gave him the Aramaic name Cephas, meaning rock, rendered in Greek as Petros. He was married, as the Synoptic Gospels attest by mentioning his mother-in-law, and the apostle Paul, in the First Letter to the Corinthians, refers to Cephas as taking a believing wife along on his travels. Clement of Alexandria, writing in the late second century and quoted by Eusebius of Caesarea, stated that Peter had children and that his wife suffered martyrdom. Nothing in the New Testament records the names of his wife or children, and later identifications, such as the association of a daughter with the Roman martyr Petronilla, belong to legend rather than to early, verifiable tradition.

In the Gospel narratives Peter belongs to an inner group among the Twelve Apostles, together with James and John the sons of Zebedee, and is present at the Transfiguration, the raising of Jairus's daughter, and the agony in Gethsemane. At Caesarea Philippi he confesses Jesus as the Messiah, after which, in Matthew's account, Jesus declares him the rock on which the church will be built and speaks of giving him the keys of the kingdom of heaven. The same Gospels also record his threefold denial of Jesus in the courtyard of the high priest during the Passion and, in the Fourth Gospel, a threefold restoration by the risen Christ at the Sea of Tiberias, with the charge to feed Christ's sheep. He is portrayed as impulsive and outspoken: he attempts to walk on the water, rebukes Jesus over the prediction of the Passion and is himself rebuked, draws a sword in the garden and cuts off the ear of the high priest's servant, and frequently serves as spokesman for the disciples. The Synoptics describe his call while fishing with Andrew, and Luke adds the miraculous catch of fish.

In the Acts of the Apostles Peter appears as a leading figure in the Jerusalem community in the years after Jesus's death and resurrection. He preaches at Pentecost, interprets the outpouring of the Spirit, performs healings such as that of the lame man at the Beautiful Gate, and speaks before the Sanhedrin. In the account of Cornelius the centurion at Caesarea, he becomes the instrument by which uncircumcised Gentiles are received into the church without first becoming Jewish proselytes, a turning point confirmed, in Acts, at the council in Jerusalem. He is imprisoned under Herod Agrippa I, who had already executed James the son of Zebedee, and, according to Acts, is miraculously released. Paul's letter to the Galatians describes a confrontation at Antioch in which Paul opposed Cephas over table fellowship with Gentile believers, indicating both Peter's recognized standing and the sharp tensions surrounding the Gentile mission. Two New Testament epistles bear Peter's name. First Peter was widely received in antiquity as apostolic and addresses Christians in Asia Minor in terms of exile, holiness, and suffering; the authorship of Second Peter has been disputed by many modern scholars on linguistic and historical grounds, though the letter itself claims Petrine origin.

Later Christian tradition, already reflected in first- and second-century writers such as Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Dionysius of Corinth, Irenaeus of Lyons, and Tertullian, holds that Peter went to Rome and died there as a martyr during the persecution associated with the emperor Nero, commonly placed in the mid-60s of the first century. Origen, as cited by Eusebius in the Ecclesiastical History, reported that Peter was crucified head downward at his own request. He is also remembered as having led the church in Antioch for a period before going to the West; Jerome and other later writers assign him a number of years as bishop of Antioch. Tradition locates his burial on the Vatican Hill beside the Circus of Gaius and Nero, where the emperor Constantine I later built a basilica. Twentieth-century excavations beneath the present St. Peter's Basilica uncovered a second-century tropaion or memorial and a complex of tombs that the Roman see has associated with the apostle's grave; in 1968 Pope Paul VI announced that relics found there had been identified as Peter's, a claim that remains a matter of scholarly discussion. In Catholic tradition he is the first Bishop of Rome and therefore the first pope; the churches of Antioch likewise count him as their first bishop. His principal feast, shared with the apostle Paul, is kept on 29 June; other commemorations include the Chair of Saint Peter.