The life of Peter has a triple interest, (a) His personality is attractive because of its naturalness, buoyancy, and Wgour. Belonging to the class of men who are readily undeistood, his impetuosity, candour, freedom of speech, transparency of motive, his large and genial humanity, appeal strongly to our hearts. Peter is the Luther among the Apo-stles. (b) Again, he is the most representative of the Apostles. Were it not for him, our know- ledge of their Wews, tastes, hopes, prejudices, and difhculties would be scanty ; but, owing to his words and acts, these stand out in 1x)ld relief. It is in Peter that we see the kind of men whom our Lord deliberately chose to be His closest friends and the agents for the fulfllment of His purposes. The methods, too, by which the disciples became qualified for their great functions are most fully revealed in the treatment of Peter by Jesus — the patient wisdom, the boundle.ss charitj', the humour, the severitj', the perfect frankness, the unreserved intimacy, (c) Again, the career of Peter after the j A.scension is the most striking evidence at once of 1 his natural capacity and of the transformation ett'ected in him by his friendship with Jesus. The disciple is now worthy of the designation 'Rock.' He shows himself to be the natural leader of the new community : its most powerful and energetic member both in counsel and in act.
The career of Peter falls into two great sections, divided by the Ascension : his life as a discijde and Apostle under our Lord, and his life as the first leader of the Christian Church.
1. Prior to our Lord's Ascension. — Simon Peter was the son of a man called Jonas (Mt 16'") or John (Jn l''-), or possibly Jonas John, a flshernian on the Sea of Galilee. His mother's name is not recorded. The place of his birth was probablj- Bethsaida (Jn 1**). Xo mention is made of the date of his birth ; but, a* he was a married man when our Lord's ministry opened, it is likely that he was born about the same time as Jesus. How long his parents lived is not knoA^Ti : thej' may have died before he became intimate ^vith Jesus. It may be assumed from his later life that he was brought up by them in habits of temjjerance, fnigality, diligence, and piety. He could read and write, and had considerable acquaintance with the Greek tongue as spoken in Galilee. He followed his father's occupation, obtaining by it an income adequate to all the wants of his household. By the time he is first spoken of in the Gospels he is married, and living in Capernaimi, where he has a house of his own, which at a subsequent date
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appears to have been the centre of the labours of our Lord in Capernaum (Mk V-^- ^9 9'^^).
Attracted by the Baptist, Peter and his brother Andrew becamp his disciples.i Andrew was one of the two disciples of the Baptist who heard him declare that Jesus was the Lamb of God (Jn P^), and who, after their interview with Jesus, were convinced that He was the Messiah. He com- municated to his brother the great discovery he had made, and brought him to Jesus, who, reading his very soul, and perceiving what he was and what he was capable of becoming, announced that he should bear the name Peter or ' Rock ' ( Jn 1'*^). The acquaintanceship thus formed passed after an interval of a few months, during part of which Peter was with Jesus, into discipleship and jjer- manent fellowship. When our Lord began His ministry in Galilee, the two brothers Peter and Andrew were summoned by Him to become, in His own striking language, ' fishers of men ' : and this call was immediately followed by that of two other brothers, 'their partners in business, James and John (Mk V<^- ^o). The final stage of Peter's relationship to Jesus was that of Apostle. Our Lord had determined to select a very few persons from the larger number of ^ His adherents to be constantly in His society, and to act as His mes- sengers. Peter was the first to be chosen (Mk 3'^). This place was not given him by accident. He was the first of the Apostles, not in authority or rank or precedence, for ideas of this description were utterly foreign to the mind of our Lord ; but his courage, resourcefulness, energy, and devotion con- stituted him the natural leader of the new body. He was their spokesman, the interpreter of their wishes, hopes, desires, and purposes. Many words specially uttered by him or spoken by our Lord to him are preserved in the Gospels, and in several of the miracles of our Lord he has a unique place. The perception of our Lord's character, and familiarity with His views of God, of man, of righteousness and of salvation, as well as with His hatred of unreality and formalism, and with the depth and range of His sympathies for the common people and even for social outcasts^set up an intellectual ferment in the mind of Peter which ultimately engendered a fixed and definite view of our Lord's Person. On two occasions that conviction was expressed in memorable terms. At Capernaum, Peter, undismayed and unmoved by the rapid fall in our Lord's popularity due to His refusal to become a political instead of a re- ligious leader, affirmed Him to be the only possessor of the words of eternal life, the Holy One of God (Jn 6^^^-). Then, not long after, when the common people had ceased to regard our Lord as the Messiah, and assigned Him only the subordinate place of a forerunner, Peter, without a moment's hesitation, clothed in fit words the conviction which had now attained maturity and consistency in his mind — the ripe fruit of his intercourse with oxir Lord ; he affirmed that He was the Messiah (Mt jgisflf. ) This confession was rewarded with the famous promise, the sense of which is still in dispute — ' Thou art Peter, and on this rock J. will build my church.' The common view among the Fathers that the rock is Jesus Himself has scarcely any support among the interpreters of to-day. A number of Protestant scholars agree with the Roman Catholic Church in understanding the rock of Peter himself ; but this explanation fails to answer two questions. Why, if Peter is the rock, did not Jesus simply say ' on thee ' ? Whence, too, the distinction in the present text between the two words for ' rock ' {wiTpos and iriTpa), a distinction Avhich must surely have been found in some form in the original Aramaic ? But be the rock Peter him- self or his confession, it is clear that our Lord was