Apostles Peter

Simon, later known as Peter or Cephas (Aramaic for 'rock'), was a Jewish fisherman from Bethsaida in Galilee in the early first century. The New Testament identifies him as the son of Jonah or John and as the brother of the apostle Andrew. The Gospel of John places his origin in Bethsaida; the Synoptic Gospels associate him with a household in Capernaum, where Jesus healed his mother-in-law, which indicates that Peter was married. He and Andrew worked as fishermen on the Sea of Galilee, at times in partnership with James and John, the sons of Zebedee. According to the Gospels, Jesus called Simon and Andrew from their nets and gave Simon the name Peter, connected in Matthew with the saying that on this rock the church would be built.

Peter belonged to the inner circle of Jesus' disciples and is described as present at the Transfiguration, the raising of Jairus's daughter, and the agony in Gethsemane. The Gospels portray him as impulsive and outspoken: he attempted to walk on the water toward Jesus, confessed Jesus as the Messiah and Son of God at Caesarea Philippi, and later denied knowing Jesus three times during the Passion, after which he wept. Post-resurrection narratives, including the appendix to the Gospel of John, describe an appearance by the Sea of Galilee in which the risen Jesus restored Peter and charged him to feed his sheep. In the Acts of the Apostles, Peter is the leading figure of the Jerusalem community in the years immediately after Jesus' death. He preached at Pentecost, was associated with healings in Jerusalem, and, according to Acts, received a vision that led him to baptize the Gentile centurion Cornelius, an important step in the inclusion of non-Jews. Acts also recounts his imprisonment under Herod Agrippa I and a subsequent release.

Paul's letter to the Galatians records that Peter (Cephas) was regarded as a pillar of the Jerusalem church together with James and John, that Paul conferred with him in Jerusalem, and that later at Antioch Paul opposed him over table fellowship with Gentiles. Acts 15 presents Peter as arguing that Gentile converts should not be required to take on the full yoke of the Mosaic law. Early Christian writers from the late first and second centuries onward hold that Peter exercised a period of leadership at Antioch and that he subsequently went to Rome. The First Letter of Clement, written from Rome toward the end of the first century, already refers to Peter's martyrdom. Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, and Eusebius of Caesarea identify him as a founder of the Roman church. The apocryphal Acts of Peter and a tradition reported by Origen and Eusebius state that he was crucified; later legend adds that he requested to be crucified head downward because he judged himself unworthy to die in the same manner as Jesus. Clement of Alexandria further reports that Peter had children and that his wife suffered martyrdom.

The precise year of Peter's death is not recorded in contemporary sources. Christian tradition places it in Rome during the reign of Nero, commonly in connection with the persecution that followed the fire of 64. He is believed to have been buried on the Vatican Hill near the circus associated with Nero. By the fourth century a shrine on that site was well known, and the emperor Constantine built a basilica over it. Excavations beneath the present St. Peter's Basilica in the twentieth century revealed a second-century memorial (tropaion) and human remains that the Catholic Church has associated with the apostle, although scholarly opinion on the identification is not unanimous. From antiquity Peter has been venerated as a chief apostle. In Roman Catholic tradition he is the first bishop of Rome and the first pope; Eastern churches honor him as a leading apostle and as the first bishop of Antioch. His principal feast, shared with the apostle Paul, is 29 June. Other commemorations include the Chair of Saint Peter. He is invoked as patron of fishermen, net makers, shipwrights, sailors, locksmiths, the papacy, and the city of Rome, among many other professions, places, and causes.