Peter's tomb in Jerusalem?

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Was recently in a debate about Peter’s having lived and died in Rome, and the other guy posted this link:

aloha.net/~mikesch/peters-jerusalem-tomb.htm

I thought I’d seen everything, but this one was new to me. As I read it, it came across as a big hoax, but I haven’t been able to find out anything else about this claim. Anybody ever field this one before?

Appreciate any information.
 
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SteveT:
Was recently in a debate about Peter’s having lived and died in Rome, and the other guy posted this link:

aloha.net/~mikesch/peters-jerusalem-tomb.htm

I thought I’d seen everything, but this one was new to me. As I read it, it came across as a big hoax, but I haven’t been able to find out anything else about this claim. Anybody ever field this one before?

Appreciate any information.
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I would ask. Who made the discovery? When was it made? With whom are they affiliated? What independent validation of the find has been performed by a bona fide, competent professional organization? What could be their ulterior motives? Those making new discoveries generally submit their facts to independent scientific boards; has this been done?
 
Even the mosed biased scholars will admit (if they are honest at all) that Peter’s bones lie under the Vatican.
 
There’s a detailed account of the discovery of St. Peter’s bones (in Rome) in the book The Bones of St. Peter by John Evangelist Walsh.

I don’t think it’s in print any longer but there are used copies to be had if you look hard enough.
 
Is it really relevant? Where his bones are entombed? It sounds like yet another attempt to disprove the Catholic Church. The problem is, it’s not significant where his bones ended up except to the “nuts” who dream up stuff like this. It falls on their misconception that the “roman” of the Roman Catholic Church, (yeah I know it’s just the Catholic Church) means it must be in Rome, which it doesn’t. The papacy was removed from Rome for many years, while it was in France, it was still “roman” which is the rite, not the location.
 
Another thing that strikes me as weird is that protestants have a differnt place for the crucifixion and ressurection tomb of Jesus than the Catholic and Orthodox which by tradtion goes back nearly 2000 years and made official Chrstian pigrimages at the time of Constantine. Yet evangelical christians hat the of the very ORthodox and Catholic looking shrines (kind of chessy sometimes) soin the mid 1800’s some protestant supposedly finds the real places and they make a nice garden without the kitch and they have their own uplifiting cherry ressurection tomb. THis borders on the ridiculous but just another way for them to deny apsotolic tradtion I guess. On evangelical Bible tourse they are going to a very differnt shrine than the ones Catholics and Orthodox go to when the see the place Jesus died and rose again.

As for Peter all of the early fathers and chrsitain histories say Peter died in Rome and from the time of the catacombs Roman Christians have been venerating the tomb of Peter for over 1900 years have they been wrong all this time. Or is this Johnny come lately wrong?
 
There’s a detailed account of the discovery of St. Peter’s bones (in Rome) in the book The Bones of St. Peter

I read it a few years ago and it is a quite brilliant book.

Upon this Rock I build my Church.

Does God have a sense of humour? 🙂
 
There’s a clue to the writer’s agenda in one paragraph:

"Mark you, all the priests agree that the Vatican and St. Peter’s were built over a pagan cemetery. This was a very appropriate place for them to build since, as even Cardinal Newman admitted, there are many pagan practices in the Roman Catholic Church. "

That makes me question the author’s objectivity and his reliability to accurately report facts. I have to wonder whether he is accurately quoting anyone else in the article.

The author also refers to the “Garden Tomb” as the site of Jesus’ burial. Today, almost every archeologist believes that The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is built over Jesus’ tomb. Nobody gives credibility to the Garden Tomb. In fact, I once saw a documentary on the Garden Tomb, in which their own curator gave an ambiguous answer to the effect of “many people believe that this may perhaps have been the tomb of Jesus.” Their own curator wouldn’t say it IS, but that perhaps it may be. If he runs the joint and he’s not convinced, why should I be convinced?!

The fact that the author has fallen for this now-disproved claim further damages his credibility.

Several years ago I participated in a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. In our travels we saw many “tour groups” comprised of non-Catholic Christians. And I wondered what it must be like to think that the Catholic Church has somehow gotten it all wrong over the years, but to visit any of the significant sites in His life, you have to go inside a Catholic church.

The home in Nazareth where Mary was living when the Angel announced that she would bear a son. The place where Jesus was born in Bethlehem. The Garden of Gesthemene. The place in Jerusalem where Our Lord was crucified and buried. All are located inside Catholic churches.

And that’s really why the Garden Tomb exists, so that non-Catholic Christians can have at least one spot to call their own, even if it isn’t authentic.

I see this manufactured controversy as an attempt to show that those dumb ol’ Catholics don’t even know where St. Peter is buried. His implication is, if St. Peter isn’t buried in Rome, then the Pope can’t really he his successor.
 
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Tom:
Is it really relevant? Where his bones are entombed? It sounds like yet another attempt to disprove the Catholic Church.
I’m sure that’s it, but, the thing is, virtually all of the experts, secular, protestant, and Catholic, verify that the grave discovered under the Vatican does
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contain the bones of the Apostle Peter. The tomb was marked “Here lie the bones of Peter”, Remember, at that time “Peter” was not a proper name, at that time no one was named Peter .
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I’m sure that’s it, but, the thing is, virtually all of the experts, secular, protestant, and Catholic, verify that the grave discovered under the Vatican does contain the bones of the Apostle Peter. The tomb was marked “Here lie the bones of Peter”, Remember, at that time “Peter” was not a proper name, at that time no one was named Peter .
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Excellent Point. Also another thing to note the tunnels and tomb itslef have trails of keys drawn on the walls . Why keys?
Mt 16:18 some dude named Peter has the keys to the kingdom.
This is too much of a coincidence people.
 
Paul W:
And that’s really why the Garden Tomb exists, so that non-Catholic Christians can have at least one spot to call their own, even if it isn’t authentic.
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My sentiments exactly.
Come to think of it the Garden Tomb mirrors the existence of protestant denoms. It appears for nowhere in Christian History for over 1800 years and voila it suddenly appears and is declared to true sight that replaces the authenic sight that has appeared since 33 AD. I have never been to the signt but if anyone has can you tell me what do they say about the Church of the Holy Holy Sepulchre. How do they knock the place pilgrims have gone to 2000 years the place Eusebius the church historina says is the place was buried. The place Helena (Constantie’s mohter) found pilgrims flocking to this site before it was marked and excavated as the burial place of Christ. You just dump all this history becuase you find another hill that looks like a skull and a tomb that has a pretty garden around it. No serious archeologist says this place is the burial place as the tomb is of a far earlier period than the time of Christ. IF the catholic church coudln’t get the burial place right how in the world did they get the new testament right. Makes no sense. I would like the explanation.
 
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SteveT:
Was recently in a debate about Peter’s having lived and died in Rome, and the other guy posted this link:

aloha.net/~mikesch/peters-jerusalem-tomb.htm

I thought I’d seen everything, but this one was new to me. As I read it, it came across as a big hoax, but I haven’t been able to find out anything else about this claim. Anybody ever field this one before?

Appreciate any information.
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Well, for starters, the homepage of this effort is called BIBLELIGHT. The faith statement of BIBLELIGHT MINISTRIES IS:

We believe that all doctrinal statements are the fallible and unauthoritative words of men. In light of that, BibleLight’s editor believes in:

• The inerrant literal Bible
• The deity, sinlessness and resurrection of Jesus Christ
• Salvation by grace through faith alone
• A pretribulational eschatology

Peterson indicates that for Peter to have been Pope, he would have to have been in Rome. Ten points off the top for that bit of logic.

He also quotes "Roman Catholic Bishop, Strossmayer, in his great speech against papal infallibility before the Pope and the Council of 1870 said, ‘Scaliger, one of the most learned men, has not hesitated to say that St. Peter’s episcopate and residence in Rome ought to be classed with ridiculous legends.’ This speech is well known to be a forgery.

Moreover, while the Vatican has said that the bones are very likely those of St. Peter, nobody can say for certain that they truly are. The probability is extremely high, so high that at this point the burden of proof would lie on those who believe that they are not, but never can it be known for certain.

Do read John Evangelist Walsh’s THE BONES OF ST. PETER. (Walsh was a member of my parish!)

Peterson’s article is so riddled with incompetence that it utterly lacks credibility. Even if you wanted to accept his argument, you couldn’t. For example, what do you think the chances are that an ossuary neatly inscribed, Simon Bar Jonah, would be found in the same spot as three other ossuaries labeled Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, and that all four of these luminaries of the gospel would have died long enough before the destruction of Jerusalem for their bodies to have decomposed to allow placement of the bones in ossuaries???
 
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SteveT:
Was recently in a debate about Peter’s having lived and died in Rome, and the other guy posted this link:

aloha.net/~mikesch/peters-jerusalem-tomb.htm

I thought I’d seen everything, but this one was new to me. As I read it, it came across as a big hoax, but I haven’t been able to find out anything else about this claim. Anybody ever field this one before?

Appreciate any information.
Click to expand...
Well, for starters, the homepage of this effort is called BIBLELIGHT. He indicates that for Peter to have been Pope, he would have to have been in Rome. He also quotes "Roman Catholic Bishop, Strossmayer, in his great speech against papal infallibility before the Pope and the Council of 1870 said, ‘Scaliger, one of the most learned men, has not hesitated to say that St. Peter’s episcopate and residence in Rome ought to be classed with ridiculous legends.’ This speech is well known to be a known forgery. Moreover, while the Vatican has said that the bones are very likely those of St. Peter, nobody can say for certain that they truly are. The probability is extremely high, so high that at this point the burden of proof would lie on those who believe that they are not, but never can it be known for certain.

Do read John Evangelist Walsh’s THE BONES OF ST. PETER. (Walsh was a member of my parish!)

The article is so riddled with clues of incompetence that it shrieks lack of credibility. For example, what do you think the chances are that an ossuary neatly inscribed, Simon Bar Jonah, would be found in the same spot as three other ossuaries labeled Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, and that all four of these luminaries of the gospel would have died long enough before the destruction of Jerusalem for their bodies to have decomposed to allow placement of the bones in ossuaries???
 
As to St. Peter having spent some years, and having died in Rome, it’s well attested by a great deal of evidence including patristic and other ancient writings/documents, and archaeological finds. The link for a synopsis in the Catholic Answers library under “Was Peter in Rome” has been given above.

I was fortunate to have had the opportunity to tour the “necropolis” under St. Peter’s a few years ago. I highly recommend it for anyone visiting Rome, although you don’t want to go in if you’re claustrophobic. It’s a bit close and stuffy.

The reason that Constantine leveled the old necropolis on Vatican Hill to build the first St. Peter’s was because the site was well attested as the burial site of the apostle, and had been recorded as a Christian pilgrimage site already for a couple hundred years, despite Roman persecutions, which puts it within living memory of those who would have had first-hand knowledge of the events surrounding Peter’s martyrdom and burial.

When Constantine’s structure needed to be replaced due to its decrepit condition, the Saint Peter’s we know today was built. When Michaelangelo did his work on the dome over the high altar, he took it on faith that the dome would be centered over the tomb of Peter. He got it right. After touring the necropolis, seeing Peter’s tomb, reading the history, passing through the grottoes under St. Peter’s, I wasn’t prepared for the feeling I got standing near the high altar and looking up into, and feeling dwarfed by that incredible dome. The inscription towering overhead in bright gold leaf:

TU ES PETRUS, ET SUPER HANC PETRAM EDIFICAMUR ECCLESIAM MEAM

Profound. Beautiful.

The testimony of nearly two thousand years of continuous Christian history is as clear as the inscription.
 
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