The traces of Gnostic speculation confirm the hypothesis of a date early in the 2nd cent, if not within the 1st. They are too incipient and naive to be described as related to the system of Valentinus ; neither the personification of the Cross nor the allusion to Christ's Divine Power is much more than the popular setting of ideas which form the basis for the doctrines attacked in the First Epistle of John and in Ignatius. ' Peter' is not the attempt of a Gnostic theorist to work over the canonical texts in the interests of Docetism or Valentinianism.
As soon as the Akhmim fragment was published,
* ' Peter,' e.g., introduces Herod among the Judges of Jesus. So far he agrees with the tradition followed by Luke, but then he calls Herod ' the king,' whereas Luke corrects this (9'0 Marcan term (&*) at an earlier stage, and never uses it in the Passion narrative.
t Even apart from the possibility of common written sources, the factor of oral tradition must be estimated if we are not here, as in the Synoptic problem, to be misled by the juxtaposition of printed texts with hypotheses which are ultra-Iiterary and artificial.
498 GOSPELS (U^^CAIsTONICAL)
GOSPELS (UNCAJS"ONICAL)
it was conjectured by some critics that the Akhmlm fragment of the Apocalypse of Peter might also be a part, or an elaboration of part, of the Gospel. The Apocalypse contains a vision of two righteous saints in heaven granted to the twelve on ' the mountain,' with a special revelation, granted to Peter alone, of hell. A similar problem emerges (cf. p. 504) in connexion with the so-called ' Gospel of Bartholomew.' The dividing line between Apocalypses and Gospels of our third class is naturally wavering, and if on other grounds it could be established that the Gospel of Peter was originally a Gospel of the Death and Kesurrection, there would be less improbability about the con- jecture that the Petrine Apocalypse and the Petrine Gospel were either the same work, to begin with, or organically related.
Repeated attempts have been made to connect this Gospel with material extant in other quarters. Vblter (cf. p. 496) actually identifies it with the Gospel of the Egyptians ; Harnack suggests that the Pericope Adulterse originally belonged to it ; and H. Stocks (ZKG, 1913, pp. 1-57) argues that lost fragments of it are embedded in Asc. Is. xi. 2-22, iii. 13Mv. 18 (the latter passage describes, int&r alia, how the Beloved appeared on the third day sitting on the shoulders of Gabriel and Michael, who had opened the tomb).
The remarkable phrase about Jesus feeling no pain (ws ixT]5h irbvov Ix^") on the Cross ought perhaps to be taken in the light of the description of the heroic Blandina amid her tortures (iJ-riU ata-Orjcnv ^n Tuv (Tvfi^aivdvTui' 'ix°^'^^ ^'^ '"'?'' eSiriSa kt\., Eus. HE V. 1. 56).
Special Literature. — The Akhmim fragment, first published, six years after its discovery, by U. Bouriant in Mimoirespubliis par les membres de la mission archiologiqtie frangaise au Caire ix. 1 (Paris, 1S92), 137-147, with a photographic reproduction (ib. ix. 3, 1893, p. 217 f.), led to a series of critical editions by O. von Gebhardt (Das Eoangelitnn und die Apokalypse des Petncs, Leipzig, 1893) ; A. 'Lods * (L'Evangile et V apocaly pse de Pierre . . . aoec un appendice sur les rectifica lions d apporter au texte grec du lirrre d'U4noch, Paris, 1S93) ; H. von Schubert t (Die Composition des pseudo-petrinischen Evangelienfragments, Ber- Un, 1893) ; Zahn {Das Eimngelium des Petrus, Erlangen and Leipzig, 1893); Harnack (TCix. 2, Leipzig, 1893, pp. 8f., 23 f.); J. Kmuzq (Das neuaufgefundene Bruchsldckdes sogen. Petrus- erangelium, do., 1S93) ; P. Lejay (in REG, 1893, pp. 59-84, 267- 270) ; van Manen {Het evangelie van Petrus. Tekst en Vertaling, Leiden, 1893) ; and Semeria (in liB, 1894, pp. 522-560). English editions by J. A. Robinson and M. R. James (The Gospel according to Peter and the Revelation of Peter^, London, 1892); H. B. Swete (The Apocryphal Gospel of St. Peter. The Greek text of the newly discovered fragment-, London, 1893; also, EvayyeKiov Kara Herpov. The Akhmim fragment of the Apoc- ryphal Gospel of S. Peter edited with an introdtiction, notes, and indices, London, 1893) ; the Author of ' Supernatural Reliaion' (The Gospel according to Peter, London, 1S94) ; and A. Rutherfurd (Ante-Nicene Chr. Lib. ix., Edinb., 1S97, pp. 3-31, with J. A. Robinson's tr.). Critical studies by A. Sabatier (L'Evangile de Pierre et les ivang. canmiiques, Paris, 1S93) ; A. Hilgenfeld (ZWT, 1893, p. 439f.); von Soden (ZTK, 1893, pp. 52-92); V. H. Stanton (JThSt iu [1900-01] Iff.); Vblter (XSTW, 1905, p. 36Sf.) ; K. Lake (The Resiirrectitm of Jesus Christ, London, 1907, pp. 148 f., 177 f.); and C. H. Turner (JThSt xiv. [1912-13J 161 flf.).
(e) The Gospel of Basilides. — In Alexandria Basilides and his scliool maintained their apostolic succession along two lines. They claimed as their authority for doctrine Glaucias, the interpreter of Peter (Clem. Strom, vii. 17. 4), and they circulated an edition of the Gospel or Gospels which had been prepared in their own interests. This is the so- called ' Gospel of Basilides,' though the title ((card Bao-iXldrjv) was of course due to his opponents.
There seems no reason to doubt the accuracy of Origen's reference to a Gospel of Basilides, which that distinguished Egyptian Gnostic must have composed before the middle of the 2nd cent.