Forged

by Bart D. Ehrman

  Forgeries in Support of Paul

  JUST AS THERE WERE forgers who wanted to emphasize that Paul stood at odds with the Jerusalem disciples Peter and James and that Paul, therefore, misinterpreted the Christian message, there were others who took Paul’s side and wanted to argue that he was in perfect harmony with the teachings of Peter and James, and that all three, therefore, were on the side of truth. This is at least one of the overarching points of two of the books we already considered in Chapter 2, 1 and 2 Peter, as well as a book that scholars have as a rule been loath to label a forgery, even though that is what it appears to be—the New Testament book of Acts.

  1 PETER

  We have seen a number of reasons for thinking that, whoever wrote 1 Peter, it was not actually Peter. There are, however, additional reasons, two of which relate to my claim, here, that the book was written to show that Peter and Paul were completely simpatico. The first has to do with the audience of the letter. The one thing we know about the historical Peter’s missionary activities is that he went to the Jews in order to try to convert them to believe in Christ. When Paul met with the “Jerusalem apostles” (Peter, James, and John), they agreed that just as Peter was in charge of the mission to the Jews, Paul would go to the Gentiles (Gal. 2:6–9). What is striking about 1 Peter is that it is written to Gentiles, not Jews (2:10; 4:3–4). But that’s Paul’s area, not Peter’s. Moreover, the geographical destination of the letter is Paul’s. The letter is directed to Christians living in five regions of Asia Minor, a place where Paul had started churches. Nothing connects the historical Peter with these places.

  These features of the letter seem less odd when seen in the total context of what the letter is trying to accomplish. Not only is it providing comfort to those who are suffering for their faith; in doing so it is trying to make Peter sound like Paul, the missionary to the Gentiles in Asia Minor. Why would it want to do that? Surely it is for reasons we have seen: there were other Christians who maintained, even in the churches of Asia Minor, that Peter and Paul were at each other’s throats and represented different understandings of the gospel. Not for the author of 1 Peter. He writes a letter in the name of Peter that sounds very much like a letter of Paul.

  The two people that the pseudonymous author names in the letter, Silvanus and Mark (5:12–13), are otherwise known as companions of Paul (see, e.g., 1 Thess. 1:1; Philem. 24). The use of Scripture in the letter is very similar to the way Paul uses Scripture; Hosea 2:25 is quoted in 2:10, for example, to show that Gentiles are now the people of God, just as Paul uses the same verse in Romans 9:25. The moral exhortations of the letter sound like Paul’s; for example, Christians are to be “subject to every human institution,” as in Romans 13:1–7. And most important, the theology espoused in the letter is the theology of Paul. Just as isolated examples, which could be multiplied many times over: it is faith that leads to salvation (1:9); the end of all things is at hand (4:7); and the death of Christ brings salvation from sins (2:24; 3:18). These may all sound like things every Christian could well say. But when you look at the actual wording of the passages, you would be hard pressed at times to say that this isn’t straight from Paul: “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness” (2:24); “For Christ also died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God” (3:18).

  It is not convincing to mount a counterargument by saying this letter contains some differences from Paul’s own letters as well. One can argue that about all of Paul’s undisputed letters; each one has distinctive things to say. The point is that this letter forged in the name of Peter appears to go out of its way to embrace views attested otherwise for Paul. Here we have a forger who wants to insist that the two great apostles of the church were completely on the same page in their understanding of the gospel, in the face of other Christians who argued that they were at odds with one another.

  2 PETER

  Something similar can be said of 2 Peter. In this case the author goes even farther out of his way to insist that he is Peter, as he not only names himself “Simeon Peter” in 1:1, but stresses that he was personally present with Jesus on the mount at the transfiguration: “We were eyewitnesses of his majesty…for we were with him on the holy mountain” (2:16–19). This really is Peter! And he really likes Paul! In fact, he more than likes Paul—he thinks Paul’s letters are Scripture.

  As we have seen, 2 Peter stresses that even though a long time has passed since Jesus declared that the end of all things would be “soon,” everything is in fact going according to plan. Soon in God’s calendar is not the same as soon in ours, for “with the Lord one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day” (2:8). God has in fact put off the time of the end in order to provide more time for more people to be saved: “Consider the patience of our Lord as salvation.” This, claims the author, is taught by “our beloved brother Paul,” who, we are told, “wrote to you according to the wisdom that was given to him, speaking about these thing in all his letters, in which there are matters hard to understand, which the unlearned and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do with the rest of the Scriptures” (3:15–16).

  There are several important points here. Paul is Peter’s “beloved brother.” They agree on all essential points. Other Christians have misinterpreted (“twisted”) Paul’s letters. They do this as well with the “other” Scriptures. Among other things, this means that “Peter” considers the letters of Paul to be Scripture. For this author, then, if anyone interprets Paul’s letters to mean that he and Peter disagree, they have flat-out misinterpreted the letters. Paul’s letters speak the truth, and Peter agrees with them.

  Except, of course, that the person who wrote this letter was not actually Peter, but someone later claiming to be Peter. One of the ultimate goals of this pseudonymous writer is perfectly clear: he very much wanted his readers to think that the apostle to the Jews and the apostle to the Gentiles had no differences of opinion.

  THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES

  The Acts of the Apostles is the earliest surviving account we have of the spread of Christianity in the years immediately after the death of Jesus. It is a historical narrative that tries to explain how Christianity moved geographically from its beginnings in the city of Jerusalem, throughout Judea, into Samaria, and then into other parts of the Roman Empire, until it finally reached the city of Rome itself. But Acts is concerned not only with the geographical spread of the religion, but also with what you might call its “ethnic” spread. The author is particularly interested in the question of how the Jewish religion of Jesus and his followers became a religion adopted by Gentiles, non-Jews. Given the author’s interest in the conversion of former pagans to the new faith, it is no surprise that the ultimate hero of the story is Paul, known in the early church as the apostle to the Gentiles par excellence.

  Paul in this narrative does not start out as a follower of Jesus, however. Quite the contrary. As the budding Christian church grows by fits and starts in its early months through the preaching of such empowered apostles as Peter, who is the main character of the book’s first twelve chapters, it also incurs the hatred of Jews who refuse to convert and see the newfound religion as blasphemous and dangerous. Eventually the chief opponent of the new faith is Saul of Tarsus, a highly religious Jew who is authorized to hunt down and imprison anyone who professes faith in Christ.

  But then in one of the greatest turn-arounds in early Christian history—or in all of history, some would argue—the great persecutor of the faith becomes its most powerful preacher. En route to persecute Christians in the city of Damascus Paul has a vision of the resurrected Jesus and comes to believe that the faith he had once opposed is true (Acts 9). After meeting with those who were apostles before him—Peter and others—Paul devotes himself as zealously to propagating the new faith as he had once devoted himself to oppressing it. Paul travels throughout the Mediterranean regions of Asia Minor, Macedonia, and
Achaia (modern Turkey and Greece), visiting major urban areas, preaching the gospel, converting mainly Gentiles, and starting churches.

  Early in his missionary work a major point of contention arises among the leaders of the church, however. Don’t the Gentiles who are coming to believe in Jesus need to convert to Judaism, if they are to be followers of the Jewish messiah? Don’t they need to be circumcised and to keep the Jewish law? Some of the Christian leaders think that the answer is yes; others think the answer is no. Peter himself, in this story, firmly thinks no. In no small measure this is because, even before Paul’s missionary journeys, God has revealed to Peter, personally, in a vision, that Gentiles are to be accepted into the faith without becoming Jews (Acts 10–11). Peter in fact is the first to convert a Gentile.

  And so when a church conference is called to decide the matter in Acts 15, halfway through the narrative, there are some outside, unnamed spokespersons for the view that Gentile converts should be required to keep the law. But the main insiders—not just Paul, but also Peter and James, head of the Jerusalem church—are completely on the other side and stand shoulder to shoulder in insisting that the salvation of Christ has gone to the Gentiles, who do not have to accept the Jewish law in order to be saved.

  Newly authorized by this unified decision, Paul goes back to the mission field and establishes more churches, before running into trouble with the Jewish authorities during a visit to Jerusalem. Most of the final third of the book of Acts deals with Paul’s imprisonment and trials as he attempts to defend himself, insisting that he has not been doing anything contrary to the Jewish law. He, instead, has always supported the law in preaching that Jesus himself is the Jewish messiah who has been raised from the dead (even though he thinks Gentiles are not required to keep the law). Paul eventually appeals to present his case before the Roman emperor, as he is entitled to do as a Roman citizen. The book ends with his journey to Rome and his house arrest there, where he is shown preaching to all who will hear while waiting for his trial.

  As should be clear from this summary, one of the overarching themes of Acts is that Peter, the hero of the first third of the book, and Paul, the hero of the rest, were completely aligned in every respect. They agreed on the practical question of whether Gentiles should be required to keep the Jewish law; they agreed on the need and approach to the mission to convert Gentiles; they agreed on every theological issue. To this extent the book of Acts lines up very nicely with the two other books of the New Testament we have already considered, 1 and 2 Peter, and against a number of books from outside the New Testament, such as the Epistle of Peter and the Pseudo-Clementine Homilies. One could also argue that it stands at odds with what Paul himself had to say in the book of Galatians, where Peter is not treated in a friendly way.

  As it turns out, there are many other differences between what the book of Acts says about Paul and what Paul says about himself in his letters. I won’t go into all the gory details here, as they are more fully discussed in other places that are easily accessible.6 Just with respect to Galatians, though, I might point out that, whereas Acts is quite clear that Peter realized, even before Paul did, that it was a good and right thing to share meals with Gentiles who did not keep kosher, in Galatians 2 this is precisely what Peter refuses to do when Jewish “brothers” show up in town. One could argue that Paul was right, that Peter was simply being hypocritical. But there is nothing in Galatians to suggest that Peter actually saw it this way or that he thought Paul was right about the matter. The historical Peter may have thought that sharing meals with Gentiles when Jews were around was wrong. If so, then the historical Peter thought differently from the way the Peter of the book of Acts thought.

  There are other differences between Acts and Galatians that are even harder to reconcile. Here I’ll mention just two. In Galatians Paul tries to convince his Gentile readers that it would be an enormous mistake if they were to become circumcised and begin following the Jewish law. He wants to insist that his understanding of this matter came directly from God, in the revelation he had of Christ that turned him into a follower. He did not—he emphatically and decidedly did not—get this message from those who were apostles before him, Peter, James, and the others. In fact, he stresses, after the vision of Christ that converted him, he did not even go to Jerusalem to talk with the apostles. He went away into Arabia, then back to Damascus, and did not go to Jerusalem for another three years (1:15–19). This makes the story of Paul’s conversion in the book of Acts very interesting. Here we are told that Paul is blinded by his vision of Jesus on the road to Damascus; he then enters the city and regains his sight. And what’s the very first thing he does when he leaves town? He makes a beeline straight to Jerusalem to see the apostles (Acts 9:1–26). Well, which is it? Did he stay away from Jerusalem, as Paul himself says, or did he go there first thing, as Acts says?

  Moreover, whom does he see there? Paul insists in Galatians 1:18–19 that in his fifteen-day visit he saw only two people, Peter and James, the brother of Jesus. Paul is emphatic on this point, which he stresses by swearing an oath: “What I am writing to you, before God, I am not lying!” (1:19–20). It’s not clear why he wants to stress the point so strongly. Is it because he doesn’t want anyone to think that his message was passed along to him by the original disciples of Jesus, most of whom he never met? In any event, what is clear is the contrast with Acts. There, when Paul arrives in Jerusalem directly after being converted, he meets with apostles and spends some time among them—not just with Peter and James, but apparently with all of them (9:26–30).

  These differences between what Acts says about Paul and what Paul says about himself can be multiplied time and again, especially if we were to turn to Pauline letters other than Galatians. One reason the differences matter is that Paul wants to distance himself from the apostles to claim that his message came directly from Christ, not from those who were apostles before him. The book of Acts, on the other hand, wants to insist that Paul conferred with the other apostles before he started taking his message out into the mission field. Moreover, for Paul the other apostles gave him no message that Christ had not already revealed to him. If the others, even Peter and James, disagreed with him, then they were disagreeing not with him, but with God, who had revealed himself to Paul through Christ. For Acts, on the other hand, there is no possibility of Paul and the others disagreeing. God informed them all equally of the truth of the gospel, and they all preach the gospel. It is the same message, the same theology, the same practical conclusions: they are all on the same page, up and down the line.

  The other reason the differences between Paul and Acts matter is because Acts claims to be written by someone who was a companion of Paul. But given the numerous discrepancies between Paul’s letters and the book of Acts, that looks highly unlikely. The author of Acts never names himself, and to that extent he is writing anonymously. But church tradition, starting about a century after the book was written, attributed the book to someone named Luke. And why Luke?

  The reasoning is a bit complicated, but it goes like this. The first important point to make is that the Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts, both of them anonymous, were written by the same author. This is shown by their similar theological views, their shared vocabulary and writing style, and such clear indications as the opening verses of the two books, both of which are dedicated to someone named Theophilus. The second book actually indicates that it is the second of two books written to this person. Almost certainly, then, the author of Acts is the author of Luke. Acts is the second volume of a two-volume work.

  But why think it was written by someone named Luke? Even though the Gospel of Luke gives no hint as to its author, there are clues that surely must be intentional in the book of Acts. In four passages of Acts the author stops speaking in the third person about what “they” (Paul and his companions) were doing and starts speaking about what “we” were doing (16:10–17; 20:5–16; 21:1–18; 27:1–28:16). This is someone who is claiming to hav
e been with Paul as a traveling companion during his missionary journeys. But he doesn’t say who he is.7

  Readers over the centuries have thought, however, that his identity could be inferred. This author is someone who is especially concerned with the Gentile mission of the early church and who is particularly invested in showing that Gentiles do not have to become Jews in order to be Christian. It is sensible to conclude that this person was probably himself a Gentile. So now we are narrowing the matter down a bit; the author is allegedly a Gentile traveling companion of Paul. Do we know of any such persons?

  In the letter to the Colossians we learn of three persons who were Gentile companions of Paul: Epaphras, Demas, and Luke the physician (Col. 4:12–14). Of these three, it seems unlikely that Demas could be the author, since we learn elsewhere that Demas “abandoned” Paul (2 Tim. 2:10). Epaphras appears to have been known as the founder of the church in Colossae (Col. 1:5–7), a church that is never mentioned in Acts. That would be odd, if its founder were the author. This leaves then one candidate, Luke the Gentile physician. So we have the age-old assumption that the book of Acts was written by Luke, a traveling companion of Paul. This assumption is found already in the late second-century church father Irenaeus. Irenaeus was writing a century after the book of Acts was produced. He is nonetheless the first surviving Christian author to make extensive reference to the book, and he indicates, based on his knowledge of the “we” passages, that “Luke was inseparable from Paul, and was his fellow-laborer in the gospel, as he himself clearly evinces.”8

  Despite this ancient tradition, the problems with identifying Luke as the author of the book are rife. For one thing, the idea that Luke was a Gentile companion of Paul comes from Colossians, a book that appears to have been forged in Paul’s name after his death. To be sure, there is also a Luke named in Paul’s authentic letter of Philemon (v. 24), but nothing is said there about his being a Gentile. He is simply mentioned in a list of five other people. An even bigger problem presents itself in the fact that there are so many discrepancies between what Acts says about Paul with what Paul says about himself.