Cephas

CEPHAS. S. Paul in his Epistle to the Galatians says, that being come to Jerusalem, he confer’d with the Apostles, lest by any means he should run or had run in vain; the Apostles having acknowledged that God had committed to him the care of preaching to the Gentiles, as he had given the Apostleship to Peter for the circumcised. James, Cephas, and John who seem’d to be pillars of the Church gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship, that we should go unto the Heathen and they unto the Circumcision. … But when Cephas was come to Antioch I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. I said unto Cephas before them all, If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why compellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?

There is a considerable difficulty proposed with relation to these words, which consists in knowing, whether Cephas here reproved by S. Paul is the same with S. Peter, or a different person. We have examined this Question in a particular Dissertation prefixed to S. Paul’s Epistles, the x Plin. l. v. c. 19. & l. xxxvi. c. 26. the sum whereof I shall here lay before you, because we have been informed, that the opinion of S. Peter’s being different from Cephas, made a progress in the World, and that it was of importance to put a stop to it.

The most plausible Arguments therefore that can be produced in favour of this opinion are these. First of all, the Hypotyposes of Clemens Alexandrinus¹, who distinguishes Peter from Cephas. S. Chrysostom², S. Jerom³, Gregory the Great⁴, Oecumenius, and the Author of the Comment on the Epistle to the Galatians, under the name of S. Anselm, evidence that some doubted whether Cephas were the same with S. Peter; Dorotheus of Tyre⁵, and the Author of the Alexandrian Chronicle,⁶ speak of one Cephas among the seventy two Disciples; the Person, they say, whom S. Paul resisted to his Face.

To these Authorities the following reasons are added. If he whom S. Paul resisted to his Face, is S. Peter, it must be said, that the Prince of the Apostles was fallen into Heresy, since at Antioch he taught the Faithful by his Example the quite contrary of what had been decided in his presence at the Council of Jerusalem. But we cannot lay such an Accusation to the charge of this holy Apostle; besides St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Galatians, calls S. Peter twice by his name, Peter, and speaks of him with suitable respect: How then in the same Epistle, and the same discourse, should he call him Cephas, and value himself upon having resisted him to his Face? The Text of this Epistle intimates, that St. Paul looked upon Cephas as much inferior to Barnabas. Cephas, says he, withdrawing from the Gentiles, and designing to eat no more with them, the other Jews imitated his disguise, insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation. What wonder could it be for Barnabas to imitate the Prince of the Apostles? But to have followed the example of Cephas, a vulgar Man, despised, and of no Reputation⁷, might indeed have given S. Paul some uneasiness.

Another proof that Cephas was not S. Peter, is S. Paul’s reproving him with haughtiness, in publick, and with Authority, which he never would have done to the Prince of the Apostles. F. Hardouin, who has written expressly to maintain the opinion which distinguishes Cephas from S. Peter, believes the Cephas mentioned by S. Paul in his first Epistle to the Corinthians, whom our Lord appeared to, who preached at Corinth, and led about a Sister 1 Cor. i. 12. iii. 22. ix. 5 xv. 5.with him, to be the same Cephas whom S. Paul resisted at Antioch. It is observed likewise as a consequent reason, that in the Vulgate, declared authentick by the Council of Trent, they have departed from the Greek Text, and the Antients, who read Petrus instead of Cephas, v. 9, 11, 14.

Lastly, endeavours are used to shew, that S. Peter was at Jerusalem, when S. Paul resisted Cephas to his Face at Antioch, and that the Journey to Jerusalem performed by Paul and Silas, which was followed with convening the Council of Jerusalem, did not happen till some Months after this event; but nevertheless, in the same year of Jesus Christ 49.

Let us now see what is urged in opposition to this opinion. S. Jerom⁸ remarks, that no one had ever thought of distinguishing S. Peter from Cephas, had not the reproaches of Porphyry, and some other Enemies of Christianity, obliged them to it, who pretended to make an advantage of this Dispute between two principal Apostles of the Christian Religion, in order to accuse one of Error, the other of Pride, both of Falshood, and the Christians of vain Credulity. The antient Fathers, in their reply to the Objections proposed by the Enemies of our Religion, have had recourse to different mediums. Some have said, that this Dispute between the two Apostles was only a kind of feint, which they had both concerted together for the instruction of the Faithful, and particularly of the Jews. Others distinguished Peter from Cephas: But this last Party continued almost unknown, and buried in forgetfulness, till these latter Ages, when some Men of Learning, as we have shewn, renewed it.

The Antients who are alledged in favour of this distinction, either proposed it with some doubts, or expressly confuted it, or are of themselves so little worth our Consideration, that they scarce deserve to be confuted. The Book of Hypotyposes, whether it was Clemens Alexandrinus’s, or any other Clemens’s, is now not in being. Photius⁹ who had seen it, speaks of it with the utmost Contempt, as a work abounding with Faults, gross Errors, Fables, and impious Opinions. S. Chrysostom, who has not concealed the force of those Arguments, which might be offered against the common opinion, nevertheless concludes, that all that goes before and follows, demonstrates the whole place to be understood of S. Peter. S. Jerom having related Porphyry’s objection, and the opinion which distinguishes Ce phas from S. Peter, concludes with saying, that he knows no other Cephas besides him, who in the Gospel, and S. Paul’s Epistles, is indifferently called sometimes Peter, sometimes Cephas; and if any to answer Porphyry would allow of a second Cephas, several Passages of Scripture must be erased, which this Enemy of our Religion attacks for no other reason, but because he does not understand them.

S. Gregory the Great confutes the opinion, which distinguishes Peter from Cephas. Oecumenius does not adopt it, no more than the Author of the Comment printed under the name of S. Anselm. Dorotheus of Tyre is a Writer of no Authority; the Alexandrian Chronicle not of much more; and after all, they produce no proof for what they advance. The chronological Order invented by F. Hardouin, to shew that S. Peter was not at Antioch, when the Dispute in question was there stated, is purely arbitrary, and founded upon no solid Argument. The other reasons which are reported, with a design of destroying the common opinion, are only decencies, which cannot be of any force against a Fact clearly set forth in the Text of S. Paul. To pretend that S. Peter never was called Cephas in the Scripture, excepting in the passage only where our Saviour says to him, Thou art Simon the son of Jonah; thou shalt be called Cephas; which is by interpretation a stone, or a Rock, is strange.

If Cephas, whom S. Paul speaks of in so many places of his Epistles, was a Man of so little consideration in the Church, as hitherto to have been almost forgotten, why is the Apostle so concerned to cite him, and make use of his Authority and Approbation? Gal. ii. 9. Gal. ii. 14.Why does he with so much care precaution the Faithful against the Impression of his example? Why lay so much stress upon the appearance of our Saviour to Cephas, as a solid proof of his Resurrection? 1 Cor. xv. 5.How comes this Cephas to have been so neglected by the Evangelists, as not to have been ever mentioned by them? We know the respect and veneration which is due to S. Peter, and to the Pope his Successor; we have all the inclination and interest possible to support his Rights, his Primacy, and Prerogatives: But should this prevent our owning, that S. Peter denied Jesus Christ? and that he was liable to reproof at Antioch? But here is enough of the matter for this Dictionary. If any one would be more particularly informed with relation to this difficulty, he may consult F. Hardouin’s Dissertation, M. Abbot Boileau’s, that of M. Deling. t. 2. Observ. c. 45. and that which we have printed on the same Subject before S. Paul’s Epistles.

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