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Chapter Fourteen Paul and Peter among the Apostles In the previous chapter, Paul’s letters, as our earliest Christian sources, enabled us to gain a grasp of the historical origins of Christianity. Will Paul’s letters also enable us to build upon this knowledge in order to gain a fuller understanding of Paul’s place within the foundations of Christianity? The answer is yes. And an understanding of Paul’s unique role among the apostles will enable us to grasp the distinctive function of the Pauline epistles within the New Testament, and to gain a new and helpful perspective on the proper context for reading Paul’s letters as part of New Testament Scripture. Paul within the Apostolic College We saw in the prior chapter that the “pluriform Christianity” scenario (which claims that the first Christ followers had no core beliefs) depicts Paul as a freewheeling theological inventor. This way of thinking about Paul is reflected in a certain stream of New Testament scholarship, which regards Paul’s teachings as varying from letter to letter. To take one example: it is sometimes held that Paul’s teaching on the resurrection changed between his writing of 1 Thessalonians and his writing of 1 Corinthians, and then again between 1 Corinthians and 2 Corinthians.1 The picture assumed is one of an apostle freely adapting and changing his gospel from one letter to another. With many other scholars, I consider such an approach to Paul misguided. But I find that I, as a Pauline scholar, am also often all too prone to unwittingly think of Paul as an autonomous theologian or thinker working in splendid isolation. For scholars of Paul, who focus our study especially on Paul’s letters, this is perhaps an easy trap to fall into. But our investigation in the previous chapter revealed an important fact about Paul’s apostleship: Paul did not carry out his apostolic mission in isolation, but as a member of a college of apostles. Paul functioned as one member of an apostolic band that had a shared body of fixed core teachings. The depiction of Paul within the “pluriform Christianity” thesis as a theological inventor, whose teachings were in a continual state of flux, is the stuff of fantasy rather than serious history. And even the less radical tendency to view Paul as an autonomous theologian is less than adequate historically. Paul was, to be sure, the most creative of theologians, but his theological thought and work took place in the context of the core teachings he shared with the other members of the apostolic college. Paul, then, was one among a body or college of apostles. But Paul had a unique role in the extraordinary events that formed the apostolic body, which made him different from the other apostles. When we triangulate the evidence of Paul’s letters with that of the four Gospels and Acts, Paul’s distinctive place among the apostles will become clear. The Twelve as the Nucleus of the Apostolic College Within the early church, the guarantors of the gospel proclamation about Jesus, and of the historical, space-and-time reality of Jesus’s resurrection, were the apostles—disciples who had personally seen the risen Lord and been commissioned by him as eyewitnesses of his resurrection (see 1 Cor 9:1; 15:7; cf. Acts 1:21–22; 4:33). According to Paul’s letters, this group was wider than the Twelve. The Twelve were the nucleus of a larger group of apostles, all of whom were likewise eyewitnesses of Jesus’s ministry, the climactic events in Jerusalem, and Jesus’s resurrection (1 Cor 15:7). This latter group included James, the brother of the Lord (Gal 1:19); Andronicus and Junia (Rom 16:7); and others whose names have not come down to us.

According to 1 Corinthians 15:5, at the center of this apostolic confraternity were Peter and the other eleven apostles. This Pauline evidence coheres with the much more detailed picture we get in the four Gospels and Acts, which tell us that the Twelve were chosen by Jesus at the beginning of his ministry, were with him throughout his ministry in Galilee, and were eyewitnesses of the events in Jerusalem culminating in his passion, death, and resurrection (see conveniently Acts 1:21–22; 10:37–42; 13:31). Acts informs us that the appearances of the risen Jesus to Peter, the Twelve, and the other apostles began on the first Easter Sunday and continued throughout the forty-day period between Jesus’s resurrection and his ascension (Acts 1:1–3). Both Acts and the four Gospels indicate that these were extended encounters in which the disciples saw, heard, touched, and ate and drank with Jesus, demonstrating that he had risen from the tomb in his body of flesh and bones (Matt 28:8–20; Luke 24:39–43; John 20:11–29; Acts 1:3–4; 10:40–42). Luke tells us that the apostles, at the end of this forty-day period of resurrection appearances, were also eyewitnesses of Jesus’s bodily ascension into heaven (Luke 24:50–53; Acts 1:4–11). Witnesses of Jesus from the time of his baptism by John until his ascension, and authoritatively commissioned by the risen Lord, the Twelve formed the authoritative core of the apostolic body (1 Cor 15:5; cf. Acts 1:2, 21–26; 2:14). Their unique foundational role is strikingly expressed in the climactic vision of the book of Revelation, where the gates of the new Jerusalem are inscribed with “the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb” (Rev 21:14). The Twelve, then, according to all our New Testament documents, formed the nucleus of the apostolic body. Paul’s Unique Place among the Apostles It is clear from Paul’s own letters, as well as from the four Gospels and Acts, that Paul was unique within this apostolic body. Paul, in contrast with the other apostles, was not a follower of Jesus during his ministry, nor an eyewitness of the culminating events in Jerusalem. Nor was he among the disciples who witnessed Jesus’s post-Easter appearances prior to his ascension (cf. Acts 13:31). Moreover, Paul had originally opposed and persecuted the new Christian movement (1 Cor 15:9; Gal 1:13–14; Acts 7:54–8:3). Nevertheless, Paul became an apostle when he too saw and was commissioned by the risen Christ (1 Cor 15:8–9; cf. Rom 1:1; 1 Thess 2:7; Acts 14:4, 14; 26:16–18). But Paul saw the risen Jesus in such a way that he was “born out of due time” (1 Cor 15:8). For in this extraordinary event, Paul saw the risen Jesus approximately eighteen months after his ascension into heaven (Gal 1:13–17; Acts 9:1–22; 22:1–16; 26:9–23). Alone among the apostles, Paul saw the ascended and glorified Jesus (1 Cor 9:1). Paul’s seeing of Jesus thus had a very different character than Jesus’s self-disclosures to the other apostles. This fact is reflected in the very different ways in which the same author, Luke, describes Jesus’s resurrection appearance to the Twelve in his gospel and Jesus’s resurrection appearance to Paul in the book of Acts: And as they were speaking these things, Jesus himself stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” Terrified and frightened, they were supposing that they were beholding a spirit. And he said to them, “Why are you troubled and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet that it is I myself; handle me and see, because a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. And while they were still disbelieving it from their joy and were amazed, he said to them, “Do you have something to eat here?” And they gave him a piece of a roasted fish. And he took it before them and ate it. (Luke 24:36–43)

And as Paul was journeying it happened that he was drawing near to Damascus, and suddenly there flashed around him a light from heaven, and when he had fallen to the ground he heard a voice speaking to him: “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” And he said, “Who are you, Lord?” And he said, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.” (Acts 9:3–5) And yet, Paul’s postascension encounter with the ascended and glorified Christ was nonetheless (in a mystery that none of our New Testament texts explain) an objective, physical event. This is evident in Acts, which reports that Paul’s eyes were physically blinded by the divine effulgence emanating from the Lord (Acts 9:8–9; 22:11). Moreover, in both 1 Corinthians 15:1–11 and Luke-Acts the same verb of seeing (the Greek verb horaō) is used for both the preascension appearances of the risen Jesus to the Twelve and his postascension appearance to Paul (cf. 1 Cor 15:5–8; Luke 24:34, 39; Acts 9:17, 27; 26:16). And in 1 Corinthians 15:1–11, Paul’s emphatically placed “last of all” (1 Cor 15:8) sharply distinguishes these physical, objective appearances of the risen Lord to the apostles in 15:5–8, including the appearance to Paul, from all later subjective visions and ecstatic experiences, including Paul’s own later “visions and revelations of the Lord” (2 Cor 12:1).2 According to 1 Corinthians 15:3–8, these appearances of the risen Lord are the unrepeatable foundation of the church, and the appearance to Paul was the last of them. The list of witnesses to Jesus’s resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15:5–8 thus has a fascinating composite character, due to the unique character of Paul’s encounter with the risen Lord. The list consists primarily of appearances of Jesus, after his resurrection but prior to his ascension, to the apostles he had previously chosen, as well as to other disciples (1 Cor 15:5–7). This portion of the list corresponds to the resurrection narratives of the four Gospels (Matt 28; Mark 16; Luke 24; John 20–21) and the summaries in Acts (10:36–41; 13:26–37), which tell of the disciples seeing, hearing, touching, and eating and drinking with the risen Lord. But linked to and yet distinguished from them is a mysterious and final postascension appearance to Paul (1 Cor 15:8). This final member of the list corresponds to Luke’s report in Acts of Jesus’s appearance to Paul in an overwhelming (and debilitating) blaze of glorious light (Acts 9:1–22; 22:1–16; 26:9–23). Because of the unique character of his eyewitness encounter with the risen Lord, Paul had (as we will see) a distinctive place among the apostles. But first we must discuss the role of Peter. Peter among the Apostolic Pillars The Twelve, we have seen, formed the nucleus of the apostolic body. In their exercise of their unique commission from Jesus, the Twelve functioned collaboratively as a team or college. And yet, according to the picture drawn in the four Gospels, not all the members of the Twelve were of equal weight and authority. Within the Twelve was an inner circle of apostles with a unique position. When Jesus raised to life the daughter of Jairus, the ruler of the synagogue, he did not take all the apostles with him, but only Peter, James, and John (Mark 5:37; Luke 8:51). When Jesus’s glory was manifested on the mountain at the transfiguration, the only eyewitnesses of this momentous event were the disciples Jesus had taken with him: Peter, James, and John (Matt 17:1; Mark 9:2; Luke 9:28). And at the garden of Gethsemane before his passion, the apostles Jesus took with him to pray were Peter, James, and John (Matt 26:37; Mark 14:33). Moreover, in the lists of the names of the apostles given in the four Gospels and Acts, the first four names are always either Peter, Andrew, James, and John (Matt 10:2; Luke 6:14) or Peter, James, John, and Andrew (Mark 3:16–17; Acts 1:13). The order in Mark and Acts is especially

significant, as it breaks the expected linkage of Andrew with his brother Peter, in order to place Peter, James, and John at the head of the list. And in the narrative of Acts, Peter and John function with a unique charism and authority among the other apostles (Acts 3–4; 8:14–25; 9:32–43; 10–12). In the four Gospels and Acts, Peter and James and John form a core group of apostolic pillars within the larger college of apostles. According to the four Gospels, within this apostolic inner circle Peter had a place of priority or primacy. According to Matthew, Jesus himself had bestowed on Peter, whose given name was Simon son of John, the new name of Peter or “Rock” (Greek: petros) and given him the keys of the kingdom of God (Matt 16:16–19). In Luke it was Peter for whom Jesus prayed that his faith not fail, in order that he might “strengthen his brothers” (Luke 22:31–32). And according to John, Jesus commissioned Peter to “shepherd my sheep” (John 21:15–19; cf. 1:41–42). Peter is always first on the evangelists’ lists of the apostles (Matt 10:2; Mark 3:16; Luke 6:14; Acts 1:13). These lists always use the name betokening Simon’s primacy, Petros or Peter; Matthew’s list specifically designates Peter as the “first” (prōtos). Peter’s name is likewise always first in the lists of the apostolic inner circle or pillars (Matt 17:1; 26:37; Mark 5:37; 9:2; 14:33; Luke 8:51; 9:28). And according to Luke 24:34, Peter was the first apostle to see the risen Christ. Peter’s priority among the apostles is conspicuous in the narrative of Acts (Acts 1:15–26; 2:14–41; 3:1–4:31; 5:1–42; 8:14–25; 9:32–42; 10–12; 15:6–21). Peter’s priority or leadership among the apostles was considered axiomatic within the ancient church (see Tertullian, Monogamy 8; Modesty 21; Origen, Homilies on Exodus 5.4; Cyprian, The Unity of the Catholic Church 4; Letters 33.1; 43.5; Jerome, Against Jovinianus 1.26). Peter clearly had a unique position not only among the Twelve, but also among the apostolic pillars. And yet, according to the four Gospels, Peter did not carry out this function independently but collaboratively, as the head or first of a band or company of apostles. This is expressed in the apostolic lists themselves, where Peter is not alone, but the “first” (Matt 10:2) among the college of the Twelve. In the same way, Peter was not the only apostle who saw the risen Christ, but the first in a company of eyewitnesses (Luke 24:34–43; Mark 16:7). This collaborative context is precisely the way we see Peter’s primacy functioning in the book of Acts, among both the inner circle and the wider body of the Twelve (Acts 1–12; 15). According to Acts, an important shift among the apostolic pillars took place in 44 CE, approximately a decade after the first Easter. At that time Herod Agrippa I put James, the brother of John, to death (Acts 12:2). Thereafter in Acts we see James, the brother (or cousin) of Jesus, although not a member of the Twelve, functioning with a distinct authority among the inner circle of the apostles (Acts 12:17; 15:1–35). What was the relationship of Paul to this apostolic inner circle? Paul among the Apostolic Pillars In any study of Paul’s role among the apostles, Paul’s report in Galatians 2:6–9 of the outcome of the Apostolic Council is fundamental: 6But those who were recognized as authoritative—what they were makes no difference to me; God shows no partiality—in our conference added nothing to me. 7But, to the contrary, having seen that I have been entrusted with taking the gospel to the gentiles, just as Peter has been entrusted with taking the gospel to the Jewish people 8(for the God who had worked powerfully in Peter in his apostleship to the Jewish people had also worked powerfully in me in my apostleship to the nations), 9and recognizing the grace given to me, James and Peter and John,

who were recognized as pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the right hand of partnership, that we might go to the gentiles, and they to the Jewish people. (Gal 2:6–9) We have seen that the four Gospels and Acts portray Peter, James, and John as the authoritative core of the apostolic body, with Peter having a position of unique priority or primacy. Advocates of the thesis (explored in chapter 13) of an originally pluriform Christianity (a Christianity without core beliefs transmitted by the apostles) routinely call the historicity of this portrayal into question. It is therefore significant that Galatians 2:6–9, a source independent of the four Gospels and Acts and of undoubted authenticity, corroborates this picture in several striking ways. Paul in Galatians 2:9 makes explicit reference to Peter, James (the brother of Jesus), and John as the authoritative center of the apostolic body; he informs us that Peter, James, and John were regarded as the “pillars” of the community of Christ followers. The metaphor of “pillars” envisions the church as a temple, the dwelling place of God, and describes Peter, James, and John as the support of the entire structure.3 Peter’s primacy among these pillar apostles is evident as well. Paul, here as elsewhere, always refers to Simon as “Cephas” (“Rock” in Aramaic, 1 Cor 1:12; 3:22; 9:5; 15:5; Gal 1:18; 2:9, 14) or “Peter” (“Rock” in Greek, Gal 2:7, 8), that is, by the name given to him by Jesus and signifying his primacy. And Galatians 2:7–8 ascribes to Peter a unique position not only among the Twelve but also among the apostolic pillars. For here the mission of James, Peter, and John to the Jewish people (2:9) is described as especially entrusted to Peter (2:7–8). Peter’s unique role is also implicit in Paul’s report concerning his fifteen-day conference with Peter in Galatians 1:18–20 (explored in the previous chapter). And just as in the four Gospels and Acts we saw Peter carrying out this function collaboratively, as the leader of a college of apostles, likewise in Galatians 2:6–9 Peter functions in concert with the other pillars, James and John (2:9; cf. 1:18–20). The picture Galatians 2:6–9 draws of a group of “pillar” apostles headed by Peter is in striking coherence with the portrayal of the four Gospels and Acts. Although the historicity of the four Gospels and Acts on this score is sometimes brought into question, Galatians 2:6–9 triangulates with the evidence from the four Gospels and Acts to show that this is a firm historical datum. What is also striking in this passage is the unique position of Paul. These verses recognize not only a core group of apostolic pillars, James and Cephas and John, but also a kind of shared apostolic primacy between Peter and Paul, one the apostle to the Jewish people, the other the apostle to the gentiles. Paul’s apostleship is depicted as parallel in charism and authority with that of Peter (“I have been entrusted . . . just as Peter” [2:7]; “the God who had worked powerfully in Peter . . . worked powerfully in me” [2:8]). The “right hand of partnership” given to Paul (and his coworker Barnabas) by the apostolic pillars in 2:9 is commonly regarded as simply a recognition of Paul’s apostleship.4 But, given by the apostolic pillars Peter, James, and John, I believe this partnership clearly involved something greater: an equal (although distinct) authority together with them of witness, mission, and teaching. Thus Paul’s conference with Peter, James, and John involved more, I would propose, than recognition of Paul’s apostleship. It involved the recognition of Paul’s inclusion, together with them, among the apostolic pillars. This is a facet of Paul’s apostleship that has not received extensive discussion in contemporary scholarship on Paul. And yet I believe this dimension of Paul’s apostleship is critical for understanding Paul’s place within Christian origins. Ernst Barnikol, in an article from the previous century, called attention to the preeminent place given to Paul among the apostles in Galatians 2:7–9. According to Barnikol, this passage describes Peter and Paul as “the two great

figures high above all other Christian missionaries of the early period.”5 So striking is this conception of “the parallelism of the apostles Peter and Paul” that Barnikol believed it could not have arisen until “the proclamation of the early Catholic Church in the second century.”6 For this and other reasons he regarded verses 7–8 as a second-century interpolation into the text of Galatians.7 The vast majority of Pauline scholars rightly reject this unfounded interpolation theory, and are in agreement that Galatians 2:7–8 is from the hand of Paul. As such, the passage provides bedrock evidence for a dimension of Paul’s apostleship that in my view has been hitherto insufficiently recognized. I would propose that, just as James the brother of Jesus, although not one of the Twelve, was recognized as being among the apostolic inner circle by the middle 40s CE at the latest, so also Paul, at the latest by the time of the Apostolic Council in 49, was included with Peter, James, and John among the core body of apostolic pillars. Moreover, Paul’s apostolic charism was recognized as second only to that of Peter, and Peter and Paul were closely linked together as the twin pillars of the apostolic body. As we have seen, Barnikol considered the picture drawn in Galatians 2:7–8 of Paul’s unique authority alongside Peter to have no equivalent in the first century. But I believe this passage has previously unrecognized parallels, both within and outside Paul’s letters. First, let us consider Luke’s portrayal of the Jerusalem Council in Acts. Paul’s report of the council focuses especially, as he tells us explicitly, on the private conference he held with the pillars, Peter, James, and John (Gal 2:2, 6–10). Luke’s report, by contrast, concentrates on the public deliberations of the council (Acts 15:1–35). Nonetheless, Acts offers important corroborating evidence. For the narrative of Acts focuses on three key speeches, whereby “after much debate” (15:7) the council’s deliberations were brought to an authoritative conclusion (15:6–21). These three speeches in Acts are given by Peter (15:6–11), Paul and Barnabas (15:12), and James (15:13–21). Paul here, once again, is linked with Peter and James, the two apostles with whom he met in his important visit to Jerusalem in 37 CE (Gal 1:18–20), and by whom in private conference at the council he was given the right hand of partnership (Gal 2:9). Now to the evidence elsewhere in Paul’s letters. First Corinthians 15:5–8, as we saw in the previous chapter, consists of a carefully structured account of the eyewitnesses of Jesus’s resurrection: 5He was seen by Peter, then by the Twelve; 6then he was seen by more than five hundred brothers and sisters at the same time, of whom the majority remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; 7then he was seen by James, then by all the apostles; 8and last of all, as to one untimely born, he was seen by me as well. Three apostles are given special prominence, as the only persons individually identified: Peter, James, and Paul. Here, once again, we see Peter, James, and Paul linked together, as the core of the apostolic body of witnesses to Jesus’s resurrection. We see Peter’s primacy as the first in the list, and (as in Luke 24:34) the first apostle to see the risen Christ (1 Cor 15:5). And the parallel prominence within the list of Peter, James, and Paul, consistent with our other evidence, functions to include Paul among the apostolic pillars. We also see in this ancient confession that these apostolic pillars work in concert and unity with one another, with the Twelve, and with the rest of the apostles and their coworkers. The collaborative nature of the work of the apostolic body is here implicit in the fact that, as in the four Gospels and Acts, Peter is not the only eyewitness of the risen Christ listed, but the first in a company of eyewitnesses (1 Cor 15:5–8; cf. Luke 24:34–43; Mark 16:7). This collegial character of the apostolic mission is a key focus of

Paul’s exhortation to unity in the first part of the letter, 1 Corinthians 1–4 (cf. esp. 1:12; 3:22). And it is explicit and emphatic in 1 Corinthians 15:11: “Whether, then, it was I or they, so we proclaim, and so you believed.” Peter and Paul in the Ancient Church There is a fascinating feature of the list of witnesses to Jesus’s resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15:5–8: each of the named apostles in this list of eyewitnesses, Peter, James, and Paul, would die as martyrs for their proclamation of the resurrection. Their martyrdoms are recorded nowhere in the New Testament, but we know of them from reliable primary source evidence from outside the Bible. Josephus, the Jewish historian, provides us with a precious account of the martyrdom of James in Jerusalem in 62 CE (Jewish Antiquities 20.200). At some point in the 60s (the precise dates are disputed), both Peter and Paul would come to Rome, teach and confirm the church there, and become martyrs for their proclamation of the gospel (1 Clement 5–6; Ignatius, To the Romans 4.3; Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.1–3; Dionysius of Corinth, in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.25.8; the Roman presbyter Gaius, in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.25.6–7; Tertullian, Prescription against Heretics 36; Against Marcion 4.5). Our sources thereafter, which include our very earliest sources outside the New Testament, reflect what appears to have been a virtually universal early Christian understanding of Peter and Paul as the twin pillars of the apostolic body. Writing between 85 and 95 CE, Clement—a leader of the Christ followers at Rome—recounts the martyrdoms of Peter and Paul at Rome, calling them “the greatest and most righteous pillars” of the church (1 Clement 5). Here Clement uses the word “pillar” (Greek: stuloi), the same word Paul employed in Galatians 2:9. In calling them the greatest of the pillars, Clement describes Paul and Peter as the core apostles within the apostolic body. Ignatius, writing to the Romans, similarly links the unique authority of the two apostles: “I do not give you commands, as did Peter and Paul” (To the Romans 4.3). Irenaeus (Against Heresies 3.3.2) likewise refers to “the two most glorious of the apostles, Peter and Paul” (gloriosissimis duobus apostolis Petro et Paulo). There is a consistency in the data spanning well over a century, from Galatians 2:6–9 to 1 Corinthians to Acts to 1 Clement to Ignatius to Irenaeus, that is quite striking. Our earliest sources, both within and outside the New Testament, concur that Paul was more than an apostle. Along with Peter, James, and John, he was among the apostolic pillars who were the foundation of the apostolic body. His apostolic charism and authority were second only to that of Peter, the first among the apostles, with whom in all our sources he is closely linked. In what did the preeminence of Paul’s apostolate lie? According to Paul’s own letters, his unique apostolic charism involved his distinctive role “to bring to the gentiles the good news of the riches of Christ” (Eph 3:8), and his accompanying revelatory “insight into the mystery of Christ” (Eph 3:4), that is, the mystery of the full inclusion of the gentiles in the people of God through union with Christ (Rom 16:25–27; Eph 3:1–13; Col 1:24–29). Here we find another link between Paul and Peter. For according to Acts, the revelation of the full inclusion of the gentiles by faith and baptism, apart from the Jewish identity markers of circumcision, food laws, and Sabbath keeping, was first vouchsafed to Peter, and gentiles were first brought into the church through Peter’s proclamation of the gospel (Acts 10–11; 15:7–9). Within Acts, Paul’s apostolic mission to the gentiles is the outworking of this initial work of Peter (Acts 11:19–26; 13–28). Paul’s Distinctive Role among the Apostolic Pillars

The unique place of Paul within ancient Christianity that we have explored in this chapter illumines many otherwise perplexing aspects of his letters. For example, the supposed contrast between the four Gospels, where we learn the first eyewitnesses of the resurrection were women, and the list of eyewitnesses in 1 Corinthians 15:1–11, where only male disciples are named, has seemed a difficulty to many. The consensus is that the names of women eyewitnesses were omitted from the list in 1 Corinthians for missionary purposes, to increase the credibility of the list within the ancient world, in which the validity of testimony by women was widely questioned. Scholars usually divide only on whether this was a commendable attempt at cross-cultural communication or a cowardly act of sexism. But, as the discussion above has shown, this analysis simply misses the point. None of the eyewitnesses, whether male or female, including the Twelve, are identified or named except Peter, James, and Paul. Their special prominence within the list reflects their function as the core or pillar apostles within the apostolic body. Paul’s unique apostolic role sheds light on the seemingly contradictory evidence in his letters regarding whether he was dependent upon or independent of the Twelve. The evidence is not in fact contradictory, but reflects the unique character of Paul’s apostleship that we have explored in this chapter. As an apostle “born out of due time” (1 Cor 15:8), who was an eyewitness neither of Jesus’s ministry nor of the culminating events in Jerusalem, Paul’s apostleship was, on the one hand, dependent upon and subordinate to the Twelve. Paul’s postascension inclusion in the apostolic body explains his conference with Peter in 37 CE; Paul wanted to talk with him face-to-face regarding Peter’s eyewitness testimony to the Jesus events (Gal 1:18–19). And the unique role of the Twelve within the apostolic college explains why Paul, although himself an apostle, laid his gospel before the apostles in Jerusalem for their consideration at the Apostolic Council in 49 CE. On the other hand, Paul’s independent authority among the apostolic pillars is evident in his joint partnership with Peter, James, and John in the apostolic mission (Gal 2:9). This aspect of Paul’s apostleship helps to illumine a core question. Scholars have long debated the reasons for Paul’s seeming indifference (even insouciance) toward the apostolic pillars in Galatians 2:6, and his apparent disregard in Galatians 2:11–14 of the authority of Peter, whom Paul called out publicly for reversing his past practice and no longer eating with gentile Christ followers. But Paul’s actions gain a new coherence when we read these passages in light of his consciousness of his own standing on an equal footing with Peter and James among the apostolic pillars, and his conviction of his unique commission among them to safeguard the mystery of the full inclusion of the gentiles in Christ (Gal 2:4). Paul is not questioning Peter’s authoritative role, but exercising his own authority as the member of the apostolic inner circle granted unique revelatory insight into the mystery of Christ (Eph 3:1–19; Col 1:24–27). The Apostolic Pillars and the New Testament If we examine the relationship between the apostolic pillars and the writings that make up the New Testament, we see a fascinating picture. A large percentage of the books of the New Testament bear the name of one or another of this apostolic inner circle (Peter, Paul, James, or John).8 The list is extensive: thirteen epistles of Paul, two epistles of Peter, one epistle of James, and for John, a gospel, three epistles, and the book of Revelation. But the foundational role of the apostolic pillars within the infrastructure of the New Testament is more extensive than even the list above would imply. Let us begin with Peter. We have already

seen that Peter was active in Rome in the 60s CE. Our ancient sources are unanimous that Mark, the coworker of Peter, served as Peter’s translator in Rome, and that Mark’s Gospel is a digest of Peter’s proclamation of the gospel (Papias, in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 3.39; Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.1; Clement of Alexandria, in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 6.14; Tertullian, Against Marcion 4.5; cf. 1 Pet 5:13). One key source is Papias, who wrote in the first quarter of the second century, based on his interaction with apostles and eyewitnesses in the latter decades of the first century, and who specifically claims that he received his information regarding the origins of Mark’s Gospel from the apostle John himself (Papias, in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 3.39.15). Another key source is Irenaeus, who received his information from Polycarp (who lived 70–156 CE), a disciple of the apostle John (Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.1.1–2). These and further evidences for the Gospel of Mark as a digest of Peter’s testimony have been explored insightfully by such scholars as Martin Hengel, Richard Bauckham, and William Lane.9 To be sure, a number of New Testament scholars reject this convergence of evidence regarding the origins of Mark’s Gospel, but on entirely insufficient grounds. Our historical evidence is in my view conclusive that this gospel is the work of Mark, and the foundations of its narrative lie in Peter’s proclamation of the Jesus events. We may note in passing that the origins of Mark’s Gospel in Peter’s testimony offers dramatically important historical information regarding the origins of the Gospels. We saw in the previous chapter that Paul’s letters, our earliest sources, provide striking historical confirmation of the eyewitness origins of the passion and resurrection narratives of our canonical gospels, strongly suggesting that the Gospels as a whole have their origin, not in later myths, but in eyewitness testimony. The evidence regarding the Petrine origins of Mark’s Gospel converges with our evidence from Paul’s letters. Mark’s narrative has its source not only in eyewitness testimony, but in the testimony of the central eyewitness, Peter himself. But Peter’s impact on the canonical gospels is most likely even more profound. Matthew, Mark, and Luke are called by scholars the Synoptic Gospels, because they tell the story of Jesus’s deeds and teachings in a very similar way (John’s Gospel tells the story in its own, distinctive way). Like the majority of New Testament scholars today, I hold to the theory of “Markan priority,” the view that Mark was our earliest gospel, and that Matthew and Luke used Mark in composing their own gospels. In my view this theory requires modification, to factor in the existence of an earlier draft of Mark (called “proto-Mark” by scholars). But I believe the thesis that Matthew and Luke in their narratives follow Mark’s basic outline has strong plausibility. If so, the core narrative of all three Synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, had its origins in Peter’s eyewitness testimony to Jesus’s deeds and teaching. In regard to Paul’s place within the canonical writings, the Pauline letter corpus itself takes up a good part of the New Testament. But more can be said about the Pauline foundations of the New Testament canon. The Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts are, all scholars agree, a single work by one author in two volumes. This two-volume work makes up over a quarter of the New Testament. The author clearly presents himself as a companion of Paul on his missionary journeys, in the so-called “we passages” of Acts (16:10–17; 20:5–15; 21:1–18; 27:1–28:16). All ancient readers of the book of Acts of whom we have evidence read the “we passages” as the author’s artful signal to his readers that he himself was among Paul’s coworkers and an eyewitness to the events of Paul’s mission of which he wrote. And our early Christian sources unanimously identify the author of Luke and Acts as Paul’s fellow worker Luke (Justin, Dialogue

with Trypho 103.19; Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.1.1; 3.14.1; Tertullian, Against Marcion 4.2.2; 4.5.3; Muratorian Canon 2–8; cf. Philem 24; Col 4:14). The evidence is in my view convincing that the author of this work was Luke, a coworker of Paul.10 If Luke-Acts is the work of Paul’s fellow laborer Luke, his gospel and Acts obviously have close and vital connections to Paul and the Pauline mission. And once again (we may note in passing) this evidence corroborates the evidence from Paul’s letters regarding the reliability of the four Gospels that we surveyed in the previous chapter. For the “we passages” in the book of Acts make clear that, as Paul’s coworker, Luke not only was an eyewitness of Paul’s mission but also had direct and extensive contacts with apostles and eyewitnesses of Jesus’s ministry such as James (Acts 21:18), and with companions and coworkers of the apostles such as Philip (Acts 21:8; cf. 6:5–7; 8:4–40) and Silas (Acts 16:6–40; cf. 15:22–35). The Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts, then, are closely tied to Paul’s apostleship and work. This is also true of the book of Hebrews. This anonymous work was probably not authored by Paul. However, scholars today agree that it was certainly written by someone within the Pauline circle, as its reference to “our brother Timothy” attests (Heb 13:23; cf. Rom 16:21; 1 Cor 4:17; 16:10–11; 2 Cor 1:19–20; Phil 2:19–24; 1 Thess 3:1–2). First Peter similarly has a connection with the Pauline mission, through its apparent coauthorship by Paul’s coworker Silvanus (1 Pet 5:12; cf. 2 Cor 1:19–20; 1 Thess 1:1; 2 Thess 1:1). Likewise the book of Jude, with its assertion of authorship by “Jude, a slave of Jesus Christ, and brother of James” (Jude 1), claims close ties to the circle of James. The table below summarizes the connections our various books of the New Testament have with the apostolic pillars. The list indicates the books that bear the name of a member of this core body, together with books that have a close connection (on the evidence considered above) to one or more of these pillars (marked with an asterisk). The following books of the New Testament either claim authorship by, or have strong connections with, the apostolic pillars Peter, Paul, John, and James: PAUL PETER JOHN JAMES Romans 1 Corinthians 2 Corinthians Galatians Ephesians Philippians Colossians 1 Thessalonians 2 Thessalonians 1 Timothy 2 Timothy Titus Philemon Luke* Acts* Hebrews* 1 Peter 2 Peter

Mark* John 1 John 2 John 3 John Revelation James Jude* It is a striking fact that the table includes all but one of the twenty-seven books of the New Testament (the only exception being Matthew’s Gospel). Every book but one of the New Testament either claims authorship by, or can be argued to have close connections with, one of the apostolic pillars: Peter, Paul, John, or James. The core role of these figures within the apostolic body, which is in evidence in all our early sources, is reflected in the very makeup of the New Testament itself. And over half the New Testament is either authored by Paul or strongly connected with him. The early Christian understanding of the unique charism and authority of Paul’s apostleship, as second only to that of Peter, corresponds to the dominant place of Paul within the New Testament canon. Reading Paul’s Letters within the New Testament What are the implications of the historical foundations of the New Testament in the witness of the apostolic pillars for the reading and study of Paul’s letters? I believe it is in Paul’s distinctive function among the pillars of the apostolic body, as the apostle given unique comprehension of the mystery of Christ, that we discover the true synthesis between his collaborative work in transmitting the core teaching shared in common by the apostolic college (1 Cor 15:11), and his work as a creative theologian within his letters. And in so doing we discover the proper context in which Paul’s letters are to be read, whether in the first century or the twenty-first. Paul’s collaborative work among the apostolic pillars, that apostolic inner circle whose witness to Christ forms the body of the New Testament canon, reveals that Paul’s letters are to be read in concert with the whole New Testament. By the same token, Paul’s unique role among the apostolic pillars, which is reflected in the dominant position of his epistles within the canon, reveals that the whole New Testament is to be read in concert with Paul’s letters. The traditional theological principle of reading Paul’s epistles in light of the whole canon, and the whole canon in light of Paul’s epistles, letting “Scripture interpret Scripture,” is in fact indispensable for reading Paul’s letters in their original historical context. To read Paul’s letters in effective isolation from the other New Testament writings would be not only a theological but also a historical mistake. Paul’s historical place, then, among the apostles is mirrored in the place of Paul’s letters within the New Testament. Paul is therefore not to be read as a freewheeling theological inventor, nor is the theological contribution of his letters to be minimized. We may summarize the function of Paul’s letters within the canon, and the proper context for reading Paul’s epistles as part of New Testament Scripture, as follows: Paul’s letters provide the fullest theological elaboration within the New Testament of the teaching he shared in common with Peter, John, James, and the other apostles and eyewitnesses of Jesus. Conclusion: Paul among the Apostles and in the New Testament Paul, we have seen, did not function independently, but as one member of a college of apostles. The Twelve were the nucleus of this apostolic body, and Paul’s apostleship functioned differently from theirs, because of his unique historical relationship to the Jesus events. But Paul was more than an apostle. He functioned, together with Peter, James, and John, among a core nucleus of

“pillars” within the apostolic college. Within this core group, Peter and Paul shared a unique status as the two “greatest and most righteous pillars” of the apostolic body. The relationship of this inner circle among the apostles to our canonical New Testament is profound. Every book but one of the New Testament either claims authorship by or has close connections to one of these four pillars among the apostles—Peter, Paul, John, or James. And Paul occupies a central place within the New Testament canon: over half of the New Testament is either authored by Paul or closely connected with him. Paul’s own letters describe his distinctive apostolic charism in terms of his identity as “apostle to the gentiles,” and his unique revelatory insight into the mystery of the full inclusion of the gentiles in the Israel of God through incorporation into Christ. The function of Paul’s epistles within the New Testament corresponds to this historical role of Paul among the apostolic pillars. Paul’s letters provide the fullest theological elaboration within the New Testament of the body of doctrine shared in common by the apostolic college. But this elaboration is given its distinctive Pauline shape by Paul’s unique apostolic charism to bring the good news of Christ to the gentiles, and to make known the mystery of the inclusion of the gentiles in Christ. Paul’s unique role among the apostles is reflected in the twofold method we have employed in this book, studying Paul’s gospel as the fulfillment of Israel’s hopes and Scriptures in Christ, and in the context of the beliefs and thought systems of the ancient gentile world to which Paul believed he had been called. If we are to read Paul’s letters in full perspective, both of these lenses are necessary, for he was and still remains “the apostle to the gentiles.” 1. For a classic survey (and withering critique) of such theories, see Ben F. Meyer, “Did Paul’s View of the Resurrection of the Dead Undergo Development?” TS 47 (1986): 363–87. 2. Cf. Friedrich Lang, Die Briefe an die Korinther (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1986), 213–14, 216. 3. On the metaphor, see Simon Gathercole, “The Petrine and Pauline Sola Fide in Galatians 2,” in Lutherische und Neue Paulusperspektive, ed. Michael Bachmann and Johannes Woyke (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005), 316–17. 4. Cf., for example, H. J. Schoeps, Paul: The Theology of the Apostle in the Light of Jewish Religious History, trans. Harold Knight (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1961), 72; Richard B. Hays, “The Letter to the Galatians,” NIB 11:225–27. 5. Ernst Barnikol, “The Non-Pauline Origin of the Parallelism of the Apostles Peter and Paul: Galatians 2:7–8,” Journal of Higher Criticism 5 (1988): 285–300 (English translation of 1931 German original). 6. Barnikol, “Non-Pauline Origin,” 285–86. 7. William O. Walker has recently sought to revive Barnikol’s interpolation theory (“Galatians 2:7b–8 as a Non-Pauline Interpolation,” CBQ 65 [2003]: 568–87). Prominent among the arguments Walker puts forward is the shared apostolic primacy presupposed in Gal 2:7–8 (582–83). 8. In some cases, modern scholars dispute whether a given book was authored by the apostle to whom it is attributed or by a disciple or follower of that apostle. Space precludes a discussion of each of these cases (but see the introduction for a discussion of the authorship of Paul’s letters). Such questions are in any case irrelevant to the point here, which is to tally the books attributed in our canonical New Testament to a member of this core group among the apostles.

9. For further discussion and evidence, see Martin Hengel, Studies in the Gospel of Mark (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985), 1–84; Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), 124–82; William L. Lane, The Gospel according to Mark, NICNT (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974), 7–12. 10. For the most thorough scholarly case for Paul’s coworker Luke as the author of Luke-Acts, see the masterful analysis of the evidence in Joseph A. Fitzmyer, The Gospel according to Luke, AB 28A (New York: Doubleday, 1981), 1:35–53. Advocates of the thesis discussed in chapter 13 of an originally pluriform Christianity (that is, a Christianity disconnected from the witness and teaching of the apostles) regularly dismiss this evidence, but offer in my judgment forced explanations of the historical data that are unconvincing.