The place of origin of the Acts of Peter. — There is no unanimity among critics as to the community in which the Acts of Peter was first produced. There is of course a natural tendency to consider in the first place the possibility that the document is Roman. In favoiu: of this view the most com- plete statement is that of Erbes ('Petrus nicht in Rom, sondern in Jerusalem gestorben,' ZKG xxii. 1, pp. 1-47 and 2, pp. 161-231). He lays special emphasis on the fact that the writer is acquainted with the entrance to Rome both from the sea and by road, and knows that the paved way from Puteoli to Rome is bad to walk upon and jars the pilgrims who use it. He also emphasizes the correctness of the narrative in placing the contest between Peter and Simon Magus in the Forum Julium, on the ground that, according to Appian (de Bello Civili, ii. 102), this forum was especially reserved for disputes and closed to commerce. He makes other points of a similar natm-e, but not of so striking a character.
Against this it is urged by Harnack (Altchristl. Litteraturgesch. ii. 559) and Zahn {Gcsch. des NT Kanons, ii. 841) that the local references to Rome are really very small, and do not give more know- ledge than was easily accessible to any one in the 2nd or 3rd century. For instance, that Ai-icia and Terracina are towns not far from Rome is a fact which must have been quite generally known.
Other argiurionts seem to point to Asia rather than Rome for the composition of the Acts. Apart from the OT and NT, the books which clearly were made use of by the redactor of the Acts of Peter are the Acts of Paul and the Acts of John. Now we know with tolerable certainty that the Acts of Paul was written in Asia, and it is usually thought that the Acts of John came from Ei)hesus or the neighbourhood. It is, therefore, not im- probable that the Acts of IVtor came from the
ACTS (APOCRYPHAL)
ACTS (APOCRYPHAL)
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same district. Other possibilities are Antioch or Jerusalem, laut there is less to be said in favour of these than either Rome or Asia.
The date of the Acts of Peter. — The terminus ad quern is some time earlier than Commodian the African Chi-istian poet, who was clearly acquainted with both the Acts of Paul and the Acts of Peter, probably in a Latin version, and appears to have regarded them as undoubted history (of. esp. Commodian, Carmen Apologeticum, 623 S.). _ Com- modian is generally supposed to have written c. A.D. 250, so that some years earherthan this (to allow for the spread of the Acts, their translation, and the growth of their prestige) la the earhest possible date. The terminus a quo is more diffi- cult to find. It is generally conceded that the date ± 165 adopted by Lipsius {Apokr. Apostel- gesch., ii. 1, p. 275) is too early, and opinion usually fixes on the decennium either side of the year 200 as the most probable for the WTiting of the Acts. Harnack thinks that early in the 3rd cent, is the most probable time {Altchr. Lit., ii. 553 ff .)» but Erbes and C. Schmidt inchne rather to the end of the 2nd century. The most important argument is concerned with the compassionate attitude to- wards the lapsi, which is very marked in the Acts. Harnack thinks that this is not intelhgible until 230, while Erbes and Schmidt maintain that in the hght of the Shepherd of Hermas a much earher date ia possible. Obviously this sort of reasoning is somewhat tentative, and it is ap- parently not possible at present to say more than that 180-230 seems to be the half-centm-y within which the composition ought probably to be placed. The sources used by the Ads of Peter. — Apart from the OT and NT, both of which the WTiter uses freely and accepts as equally inspired, the use can clearly be traced of the following books, (a) The Acts of Paul. Apart from various smaller points of contact, the whole account of the mart jt- dom of Peter is clearly based on the martjTdom of Paul. The whole subject is worked out in full detail by C. Schmidt in his Peiru^akten (p. 82 ff.) ; but it should be added that there is per- haps still room for doubt whether that portion of the Codex Vercellensis which deals \\ath Paul really belongs to the Acts of Peter, and is not an addition made by the redactor who formed the excerpt, rather than by the author of the Acts itseK. The fullest statement of this possibiUty is given by Harnack {TU xx. 2 [1900], p. 103 ff.), and a discussion tending to negative his conclu- sions is to be found in Schmidt's Petrusakten, 82 f . — (6) The Acts of John. The frequent verbal dependence of the Acts of Peter on the Acts of John is demonstrated by the long hst of parallel passages given by M. R. James in Apocrypha Anecdota, ii. p. xxiv ff. James, however, thought at that time that this Ust proved the identity of authorship of the two books; but Schmidt has shown conclusively that the facts must be ex- plained as due to dependence rather than to identity of authorship. His most teUing argument is the large use of the OT and NT made by the Acts of Peter as contrasted with their very limited use in the Acts of John. — (c) Schmidt also argues that the Acts used the Kvpvyfia lierpov. Probably he is right, but our knowledge of the KripvyfMis too small to enable the question to be satisfactorily settled.