Peter and Cephas in Galatians 2:7-14

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SHW said:
Many people believe that the Apostle Peter was rebuked by Paul in Galatians 2:7-14.

I believe that they misunderstand. Peter and Cephas are two different people in this passage and this is why Paul chose to speak of the Apostle Peter first and then of “Cephas,” one of the 70 disciples along with “James” and “John” who were also not apostles but who were among the original 70 disciples.
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Sorry for jumping in here, and if someone has already said this I apologize, but your position is exactly what is taught in Eusebius’ Church history which was written in 313AD. He says that the Peter, or “Cephas”, who Paul rebuked was a different person than Peter the Pope. He was a simple Priest, not Peter the apostle.

I don’t have the quote in front of me, but it shouldn’t be difficult to find.
 
porthos11 said:
A more likely answer is that there are manuscript variations in the synoptic and Johannine traditions.

John (yochanan) and Jonah (iona) are not the same names, as they do not share the same root, and is attested to by the Greek. This is not the same as John, Juan, and Johann. yona and yochanan are two very different names in Hebrew.

Bar-yona (Gk. Bariona) simply means son of Jonah. Iouannou is genitive for John (Ioannes) not Jonah, (which is Iona in Greek) , so very literally, that translates into “Simon of John.”
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So what’s the difference in meaning between “son of John” and “of John”?

Also – you probably gave some info up thread on how the names Jona & John are different in Hebrew but I missed it. Do you have a clear article on this? I still don’t get it.
 
COPLAND_3 said:
St. Jerome says

Others take it in the simple sense, that Peter is the son of John (ed. note: In Jn 21, the Vulgate has ‘Johannis,’ but in Jn 1, 43, ‘Jona.’), according to that question in another place, “Simon, son of John, lovest thou me?” (Jn 21,15) affirming that it is an error of the copyists in writing here Barjonas for Barjoannas, dropping one syllable.
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I like to think that its not a copyist error. Typically, there are varying copies with and without the error, which reveals the error. If there are no “Simon BarJohn” (or whatever it should have been) copies, than one should assume “Bar-Jonah” is the original intent of the author, wouldn’t you say?

I still find it ironic that, just 15 verses after Jesus refers to Himself as “the sign of Jonah”, that he immediately calls Peter “Simon Bar-Jonah”.
 
mercygate said:
So what’s the difference in meaning between “son of John” and “of John”?

“of John” basically means “son of John”.
Also – you probably gave some info up thread on how the names Jona & John are different in Hebrew but I missed it. Do you have a clear article on this? I still don’t get it.
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In short, Jonah means “dove” and John means “the LORD has graced.”

The links above confirm that.
 
porthos11 said:
The problem lies in the assumption that Paul is using two different names, which he isn’t. He’s using the same name but in two different languages, Greek and Aramaic, which is, of course, not unheard of in ancient times.
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Why use **two ** different first names (Greek and Aramaic) for one man when speaking to a Greek-speaking audience? Makes no sense to me and I doubt that it would make any sense to the persons that he is actually writing to. An explanation would need to be given to the recipients of the letter as to why two different names are being used for the same person in order to prevent confusion. If no explanation is given, it is naturally assumed that two different persons are being discussed when two different names are used.
 
azjanet said:
Why use **two ** different first names (Greek and Aramaic) for one man when speaking to a Greek-speaking audience? Makes no sense to me and I doubt that it would make any sense to the persons that he is actually writing to. An explanation would need to be given to the recipients of the letter as to why two different names are being used for the same person in order to prevent confusion. If no explanation is given, it is naturally assumed that two different persons are being discussed when two different names are used.
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Oh? It never came naturally to me. When I first read that passage, only one man came to mind: St. Peter, and no one else.

Again, Jesus said so, so who am I to question him?
 
Very interesting discussion guys. I am inclined to also believe that Paul, a man who was loath to boast would publicly “boast” about rebuking the apostle Peter - the Head of the Church. I am reasonably certain that this would have been out of character for Paul. So, Paul was talking about another disciple Cephas, one of the 70 disciples, a follower of Peter who had taken the same honorable Aramaic name as his master and patron (thus an “apparent pillar”). Paul who was having a hard time gaining the trust of the original Apostles after persecuting Christians as Saul would not be so bold and rash as to attempt to publicly divide the Church by casting doubt on the seniority of the ecclesial order (Peter as head). Certainly as a new apostle himself (albeit very articulate and educated in OT scripture) who is trying to be accepted and trusted certainly would not dare to alienate himself from the original apostles by self proclaiming himself as a higher authority and appealing to an unwritten oral gospel as a “higher authority” that only he has on his lips.

The only way that Cephas and Peter could be the same person in the Galatians passage would be if Paul was speaking to differentiate the “office of Peter’s Chair” from the man Peter. That is, chastising Peter (Simon) “the man” publicly but respecting the title and office of Peter (e.g. “Cephas”, The Rock). This however would require that the Galatian Church membership all widely knew the story of how Peter got his name changed and titular honors. This is not however the context of how Paul uses the two names and in any case it would all lend even more unassailable credibility to the Catholic position that Peter was first pope since it means Paul is recognizing Peter’s authority.

Bottom Line - Paul was subordinate to Peter and unless a hypocrite himself he would not have boasted that he rebuked Peter as head of the Church. It should be logically unassailable that Paul was not talking about Peter but rather a disciple or protegee of Peter who had “the appearances” and apparent aspirations of being more important than was proved by his conduct. It would be inconceivable for Peter, who previously denied Christ at the crucifixation but later wept bitterly and was personally forgiven by Christ had a single remaining ounce of cowardly nature in him. No, Peter was a changed and transformed man in Christ and he would not have had an iota of fear remaining in him to cower before Jew, Gentile or Roman.

This Cephas - was NOT the same man as the apostle Peter.

James
 
verse 11, St. Paul says: “But when Cephas came to Antioch I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned.” I find it interesting that he says “I opposed him to his face.” This implies, to me, at least, that he was dressing-down someone who normally outranked him. He would not make a point of a statement implying boldness (“to his face”) if he were dealing with just any old mucky-muck. I, for one, do not refer to a rebuke of my daughter, for example, as one I make “to her face”; but if I were to rebuke my boss’ boss, say, then, yes, I very well might make a point of mentioning that I “rebuked him to his face.” No. It is clear that St. Paul is rebuking even Peter himself! And he has the courage of his convictions to do it right to his face.

Second, in verse 14, we have two more pieces of information. Here’s the verse: "But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, “If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?” This Cephas that St. Paul is referring to is a Jew. I am not aware of any other Jew who had the name “Rock,” either in Hebrew/Aramaic, or in Greek, or some other language translated into Greek. It was meant to be of singular significance by Christ, and it would be “cheeky” at best for some other Christian to be using it at the same time Simon Peter yet lived. It would be even cheekier for a Jewish Christian to be using it, since it would obviously not be his given name, and he would have had to deliberately adopt it. The second piece of evidence from verse 14 is the fact that this Cephas is “compelling” the Gentiles to live like Jews. Really, how many Jewish Christians were running around in St. Paul’s day who had authority sufficient to be ordering the Gentile converts around on various matters? How many fewer than that were there who also were known as “Cephas,” but were not Simon Peter himself?

To me, this is a no-brainer. St. Paul has to screw-up the courage to rebuke someone of higher station than himself. This person he is rebuking, therefore, is presumably of Apostle rank. He is specifically referred to as being Jewish, and he is specifically rebuked as one with authority over Gentile converts.

Who on earth could all of this add-up as referring to other than Simon bar Jonah, AKA Simon Peter, AKA “Cephas”? And who among Jewish Christians of the First century would have had the nerve to “co-opt” the name given to Simon bar Jonah by Jesus Himself?

And, if there were such a personage, of such high rank, why haven’t we seen any other evidence of his existence? REAL evidence of someone whose rank would MATTER?

All the “evidence” the naysayers are providing is SPECULATION.

BTW, no one seems to blame PAUL for having Timothy circumsized so as not to offend the Jewish Christians (Acts 16:3).

Didn’t Paul contradict himself?!?
 
Remember, this Cephas/Peter (why is Paul using the transliterated Aramaic word to a Greek-speaking audience) is a PILLAR… so if it’s another Cephas, wouldn’t we know more about him as we do the various James of the early Church?

Such a pointless debate really… how does this effect the primacy of the papacy? It doesn’t.

People can rebuke a pope for his behaviour just as people have several times, like Catherine of Siena who rebuked three bishops who supported an anti-pope (“what made you do this? You are flowers who shed no perfume, but stench that makes the whole world reek.” ) and with Pope Gregory XI (“Be not a timorous child, but manly . . .”).
 
Bastoune said:
Remember, this Cephas/Peter (why is Paul using the transliterated Aramaic word to a Greek-speaking audience) is a PILLAR… so if it’s another Cephas, wouldn’t we know more about him as we do the various James of the early Church?

Such a pointless debate really… how does this effect the primacy of the papacy? It doesn’t.

People can rebuke a pope for his behaviour just as people have several times, like Catherine of Siena who rebuked three bishops who supported an anti-pope (“what made you do this? You are flowers who shed no perfume, but stench that makes the whole world reek.” ) and with Pope Gregory XI (“Be not a timorous child, but manly . . .”).
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Thanks for the comments. I find myself teetering back and forth on this. It’s not a pointless debate since it gives enormous insight into the character and interaction of the leaders of the early church. Christians tend to idealize the apostles and early church fathers when in fact they were all very human men with real character faults and tendencies to sin. What we see in Galatians could be nothing more than the old “good cop bad cop” political game that we often see played out by politicians working in collaboration with each other (e.g. one playing the role of fall guy so the other can use their unique influence to gain esteem and trust) to win over new constituents.

What is ironic is the class reversal that is going on here between Peter and Paul. I think this is more a social dynamic than it is a matter of ecclesial or authority posturing. Peter was a mere uneducated fisherman who was probably not well received by orthodox and the higher caste intellectual Jews. Given his modest social background I am opining that Peter probably personally desired to ascend to a closer social camaraderie and recognition with the more refined orthodox Jews which were a peer class above him. Paul on the other hand came precisely from this other higher order Jewish caste. Paul was a highly regarded upper caste Jewish scholar who enjoyed the social benefits and rights of Roman citizenship. No doubt Paul, as Saul, was seeking to gain social standing when he previously was persecuting the lower caste Jewish Christian converts (and maybe even a few early Gentile converts). So its extremely interesting to project that Paul was likely trying is socially distance himself from his prior Jewish hoity-toity roots and change his social standing by appearing to be a champion to the Gentiles while leveraging his prior orthodox Jewish clout. At the same time it is plausible that Peter socially wants to ascend in his Jewish social caste. If my projections are true then it was inevitable that there was to be a normal and opportunistic social tension between the two as they both crossed social paths.

Clearly politics existed even in the early church and that fact itself is a compelling evidence for an ordered ecclesial authority with at least one pillar standing higher than another at the center (to at the very least keep the rain from pooling on a completely flat horizontal roof from the outside). 😃

James
 
CentralFLJames said:
This Cephas - was NOT the same man as the apostle Peter.

James
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I agree. Did you read the paper at members.cox.net/studyhisword/PeterVindicated.pdf? I addressed these same issues in this paper that you have in your post.

Every time Peter was confronted with eating with Gentiles, etc., Peter explained his vision and it was the end of the discussion. Cephas was one of the 70 disciples. There is archeological proof that there were Aramaic speaking persons named Cephas 400 years before Christ was born and it is documented in my paper.

God Bless!
SHW
 
Bastoune said:
Remember, this Cephas/Peter (why is Paul using the transliterated Aramaic word to a Greek-speaking audience) is a PILLAR… so if it’s another Cephas, wouldn’t we know more about him as we do the various James of the early Church?
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Greeks would not understand this name switching of Peter to Cephas in a letter unless an explanation was plainly given for the name switch. Paul knew that the Greeks knew that Peter and Cephas were two different men. The first 70 disciples were very well known. Many of them had the same common names such as James.
Such a pointless debate really… how does this effect the primacy of the papacy? It doesn’t.
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If your good name were maligned in the future, would you not want it vindicated?
People can rebuke a pope for his behaviour just as people have several times, like Catherine of Siena who rebuked three bishops who supported an anti-pope (“what made you do this? You are flowers who shed no perfume, but stench that makes the whole world reek.” ) and with Pope Gregory XI (“Be not a timorous child, but manly . . .”).
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Catherine did not write her letters to Church officials for the public to view. They were private letters which just happened to be kept for posterity.

Peter was not “supposedly” a pillar. He was the head pillar. 🙂
 
SHW said:
I agree. Did you read the paper at members.cox.net/studyhisword/PeterVindicated.pdf? I addressed these same issues in this paper that you have in your post.

Every time Peter was confronted with eating with Gentiles, etc., Peter explained his vision and it was the end of the discussion. Cephas was one of the 70 disciples. There is archeological proof that there were Aramaic speaking persons named Cephas 400 years before Christ was born and it is documented in my paper.

God Bless!
SHW
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Yes I did read it and enjoyed it. Good work.

I think its certainly eye opening and should strike yet another blow from “another angle” against those non-Catholics who want to use Galatians as a weak proof text to claim an invisible church with no ecclesial hiearchy.

I can live with either conclusion: 1) Peter and Cephas as the same person or 2) as two separate individuals. I tend toward the latter 2nd case though. But these verses are not critical to my faith and my firm conviction in the scriptural and divinely appointed legitimacy of papal supremacy with a real ecclesial episcopate structure (e.g. a Vicar/pope with a communion of bishops, priests, deacons and religious laiety).

I have never really understood why The Catholic Church seems to want to emphasize that the name Cephas was unique and a name previously unused. That’s very hard to prove. Frankly, I don’t think we get any extra “zing” out of name-exclusivity. Jesus (Yeshua) didn’t need his name to be unique and non-existent before He was born and named (“Christened” ;)) and later Anglicized from the transliterated Greek name Iēsus as “Jesus”. In fact Yeshua was a very common name among Jews of the Second Temple Period, and this is believed to be the Hebrew or Aramaic name for our English name-term “Jesus”. 🤷

This whole detail level analysis in this area of scripture would not even be necessary if not for the rude and unwarranted claims by neo-Christians (Protestants) who come out of the aether 1,400 years distant in history to challenge the history of over 200 prior papal successors and all the past accumulated ecclesial history. I guess when one adapts a “bible only” view of the world it becomes easy to ignore the forensic archaeological evidence and the abundant ecclesial history. 🤷

But I think that there is some good that comes of these various Protestant challenges to ecclesial authority though. In fact I must wonder if God permitted the Protestant heresy not only to purify The Catholic Church from latent secular influences and heretics but also to compel His Church scholars and apologetics to dig ever deeper to find an unassailable bulwark of iron-clad faith based on scholarship. The truth is, without the Protestants trying hard to find any post-rebellion reason they can in scripture to justify their rebellion and dodging of ecclesial authority and revising of church history, Catholics would not have needed to dig deep into its apostolic teachings, theology, history and traditions. God keeps us sharp by constantly challenging us. We Catholics prior to the challenge of Protestant Revolution tended to take most teachings completly on blind faith. But now that we are compelled to go deeper the more I am certain that we Catholics “have had it right from the beginning”.

So, personally, I appreciate your research. My observations here are that perhaps too many people fail to recollect that the Bible comes to us from copies of original manuscripts and that copy errors and various language transliteration “artifacts” are without a doubt present in the various bible translations. People forget that Jesus and the apostles mostly all spoke Aramaic - NOT GREEK. The instant somone put anecdotal accounts to parchment in Greek the semantics change - if even ever so slightly. These Greek manuscripts come to us from at the very best as copies of 2nd hand accounts originally spoken in Aramaic and interpreted by scribes and followers of the early disciples. There is enough redundancy in scripture from different authors to give us high confidence that the essential message of Christ and the apostles are captured accurately though… But no doubt some of the apostle’s disciples and scribes used the same “pen names” of their masters and what we subscribe in scripture to the various apostles are in fact NOT personally penned in most cases by the apostles. Certainly the Greek copies were not and so really NONE of the NT comes to us directly from the lips or quill of a single apostle. This is why I can’t take serious any non-Catholic who wants to pull out single NT verses as proof texts to support the legion of neo-Christian theories used to try to justify the past schisms, rebellions and rampant escalating Protestant denominationalism.

James
 
CentralFLJames said:
Yes I did read it and enjoyed it. Good work.

I think its certainly eye opening and should strike yet another blow from “another angle” against those non-Catholics who want to use Galatians as a weak proof text to claim an invisible church with no ecclesial hiearchy.
James
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Thanks for replying and for the compliment. I keep learning new things via this forum. 🙂

Just the various titles of “Bishop,” “Elders (Priests, Fathers)” etc. indicate a hierarchy of authority. (cf. 1 Timothy 5:17) Even the angels (9 choirs) are hierarchical. There can be no real “order” without a hierarchy. Jesus will rule over all eventually and everything will be in submission to him. (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:24)

Romans 13:1 “Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God.”

Hebrews 13:7 “Remember those who rule over you, who have spoken the word of God to you, whose faith follow, considering the outcome of their conduct.” (cf. also 2 Corinthians 10:8)

We get the leadership we “deserve.” If we want to be fairly governed by “public” authority then we must pray for those in authority (cf. 1 Timothy 2:1-3) and we must also become imitators of Christ and worthy of the name of “Christian” (cf. 2 Timothy 2:19) in order for our land to be healed. 2 Chronicles 7:13-14

Regarding a supposedly “invisible Church” – the Church was already established throughout the “whole known world” by the time the New Testament was written. Romans 1:8 “First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world.”

The Apostles and disciples very “visibly” changed the world! There were Christians in every “known” country according to St. Paul during his own lifetime.
 
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