Peter: False Disciple and Apostate according to Saint Matthew
Overview
After surveying various wide-ranging assessments of Matthew’s portrayal of Peter, Robert Gundry offers a brand-new analysis, examining every Matthean passage where Peter’s name occurs as well as passages where Matthew apparently omitted the name though it occurs in his sources. Gundry places Matthew’s portrayal of Peter within the framework of two major, distinctive themes in the First Gospel—the church as a mixed body of true and false disciples and persecution as exposing false discipleship. Gundry uses this investigation to support his claim that Matthew portrays Peter as a false disciple and apostate, like Judas Iscariot, and that Peter’s denials of Jesus rule him out of God’s kingdom.
- Provides a thought-provoking interpretation of Peter
- Analyzes the appearance and portrayal of Peter in the Gospel of Matthew
- Introduction
- Peter in Matthew Prior to Matthew 16:13-23
- Peter in Matthew 16:13-23
- Peter from the Mount of Transfiguration through the Garden of Gethsemane
- Peter’s Denials of Jesus along with the Suicide of Judas Iscariot
- Matthew’s Omissions of Peter
- False Discipleship in Matthew
- Persecution in Matthew
- A Recapitulation and Some Possible Implications
In this highly controversial work on Peter, Robert Gundry’s intellectual gifts and remarkable powers of analysis are displayed to an even higher degree than in his previous publications. . . . Those who pay close attention to this brief but unusually weighty book will not be able to read Matthew in quite the same way that they did before.
—Moisés Silva, professor emeritus of New Testament, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary
Peter, long thought to be ‘prince of the apostles’ and one of the heroes of the Gospel of Matthew, is shown here to be neither. This extraordinarily closely-argued volume by Robert Gundry offers a compelling case that Matthew constructs the figure of Peter as a failed disciple and an apostate. . . . A courageous book that will require scholars to reassess how the Peter of Matthew came to be, in Gundry’s words, ‘airbrushed’ and turned into a model disciple and central figure in ecclesiastical memory.
—John S. Kloppenborg, professor of religion, University of Toronto
If Bob Gundry is known for anything, it is for his dogged pursuit of the meaning of Scripture. Here he once again provides fresh, penetrating analysis—in the present case, leading to an unsettling conclusion. Provocative, as he can often be, Gundry is never boring but always instructive and well worth a careful reading.
—Donald A. Hagner, professor of New Testament, Fuller Theological Seminary
- Title: Peter: False Disciple and Apostate according to Saint Matthew
- Author: Robert Gundry
- Publisher: Eerdmans
- Print Publication Date: 2015
- Logos Release Date: 2016
- Pages: 139
- Era: era:contemporary
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subject: Bible. N.T. Matthew › Commentaries
- ISBNs: 9780802872937, 080287293X
- Resource ID: LLS:PTRFLSDSNTMTTHW
- Resource Type: Bible Commentary
- Metadata Last Updated: 2022-09-30T02:30:52Z