cheenc03a.pdf

SIMON PETER
ning as it has come down to us, Paul travels from
Rome to Spain shortly before Simon, and after him
Peter, come to Ilome. and that Peter
dies before the return of Paul to Rome,
& ~ ~ which ~ has already ~ ~ been $ predicted ,
($33"). can be taken as showing that
the author deliberately wished to set aside the contemporaneous
presence of the two in Rome ar that war
reported in the Catholic Actr. At the same time,
should one choose to take it so, it would be necessary
to be able to show some reason which could have led
him to wish this.
(a) NO such reason is to be found in the dogmatic
sphere, as if Peter and Paul were not at one in their
doctrine and the author therefore did not wish to make
them come upon the scene together. Of any incompatibility
in their doctrine this author knows as
little as does the writer of the Catholic Acts ; on the
contrary, Peter is anxiously . ermcted . in Rome bv Pads
dircipl& (g 336). -
(6) On the other hand there is much that is attractive,
at firrt right, in the view of Erber (Zf. Kirchmgrrih.
22 [rgo~]. 176-179) that Paul war in the pre-Catholic
Acts taken away from Rome from the rame motive as
we have already (above. 5 268) seen to be operative
in the time after Irenaeu. Peter had to be the role
head of the church of Rome, in order to be able to
figure as the first binhoo there. If, however. the
author really had this interest at heart; we shallhave
to pronounce his mode of giving effect to it to be
very unskilful; for in the account he gives Paul is in
Rome both before and after Peter, and aftex an explicit
prediction suffers the death of a martyr there (§ 33a).
(c) On the assumption of so specifically Roman an
interest as this we should further expect to find that the
pre-Catholic Acts would in other respects also betray
the rame interest. But of anything of the sort there is
surprisingly little. The burialLplace of Peter is here
the private tomb of Marcellus (g 338). not. as in the
Catholic Acts (see 34 A), a famous rite like the terebinth
on the Vatican, where he is said to have died.
v,r:..