01 — Foundations
The human and historical ground from which the Apostle Peter is called: Simon bar-Jonah, a working fisherman of Bethsaida and Capernaum on the Sea of Galilee, married, an Aramaic-speaking Jew of the Galilean am ha-aretz, brought to Jesus by his brother Andrew and renamed Cephas — “the Rock.” These files establish what the Gospels let us see of the man before his apostolate and how securely each detail stands.
Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Apostle)
Before he is the chief of the apostles, Simon is a fisherman with a boat, a partnership, a household, and a brother. The Gospels are unusually specific about his ordinary life: his trade, his town, his marriage, his Galilean speech that later betrays him in Jerusalem (Matt 26:73). This section sets that foundation — the fisherman of Galilee and his world — and then narrates the call by the lakeshore and the renaming to Cephas/Peter (John 1:42; Mark 1:16–18; Luke 5:1–11), the act in which the Lord gives Simon the name that will carry the whole later argument over “the rock.”
Files in This Section
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| The Fisherman of Galilee | Simon bar-Jonah of Bethsaida and Capernaum (John 1:44; Mark 1:21, 29); his trade and partnership with the sons of Zebedee (Luke 5:10); his marriage and mother-in-law (Mark 1:30; 1 Cor 9:5); his Galilean world and Aramaic name Cephas; what the Gospels disclose of the man before the call. |
| The Call of Simon | Andrew’s bringing of Simon to Jesus and the renaming to Cephas (John 1:40–42); the call by the Sea of Galilee, “I will make you fishers of men” (Mark 1:16–18; Matt 4:18–20); the miraculous catch and “depart from me, for I am a sinful man” (Luke 5:1–11); Peter’s place at the head of every list of the Twelve (Matt 10:2; Mark 3:16). |
See Also
- The Confession at Caesarea Philippi — where the name “Rock” is taken up again
- The Restoration — the second call by the same lakeshore
- The Sources and What Can Be Known — how the Gospel data are weighed
- Holy Scripture — the reading of the Gospels in the Orthodox tradition
References
- The Holy Bible — the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, cited by chapter and verse.
- Bockmuehl, Markus. Simon Peter in Scripture and Memory. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012.
- Cullmann, Oscar. Peter: Disciple, Apostle, Martyr. 2nd ed. Trans. Floyd Filson. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1962.
- Brown, Raymond E., Karl P. Donfried, and John Reumann, eds. Peter in the New Testament. Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1973.