Who did Peter write to?
Peter
speaks to the “elect that are of the Diaspora.” Taking it at face value
there’s no doubt that he wrote to Jews that lived outside Palestine. But 1:1 tells us that these Jews believed in Jesus the Christ. Eusebius the 3rd/4th century church historian takes it as it sits and says Peter wrote to Hebrews, Christian Hebrews in Asia Minor.
It’s a fairly modern view (but nearly a consensus now) that he didn’t
write to Jews—he wrote to Gentiles! This now established view is based
on internal considerations.
J.
Ramsey Michaels represents it well and he makes his points clear. After
giving some reasons for thinking the book was written to Gentiles even
though the address (and other things) points to Jews, thus generating
what he says is “mixed signals,” he says this. “The best explanation of the data is that 1 Peter was written primarily to Gentile Christians in Asia Minor, but that the author, for his own reasons, has chosen to address them as if they were Jews.”
Is there any compelling
reason for believing that Peter’s audience is anything other than
Diaspora Jews? A number of points are offered but maybe I’m just not
able to appreciate them. (It wouldn’t be the first time that that has
happened.) It seems to me that what Michaels admits should be allowed to
stand. Though he doesn’t believe the clear impression he says, “The
clear impression is that the readers of the epistle are Jewish
Christians.”
What suggests that they are Gentiles?
Various
points are offered to support the Gentile audience view. The reader
might think they are rather weak but she or he might think that a number
of weaker arguments, taken together, might make the case. Perhaps, but
then again, six weak arguments don’t really make one strong argument.
They make six weak arguments.
They’re
thought to be Gentiles because they believed in God through Jesus
Christ rather than through the Torah or ancestral religion (1:21).
The point being that if they had been Jews they would have come to
faith in God through the Torah and ancestral religion. But NT writers
would insist that it was precisely because Israel didn’t know God through Jesus Christ that they missed true faith in God.
In
fact Acts 3:6-26 could easily be the development of the richness of
1:21. In that section Peter drives home to fellow-Jews that they
shouldn’t be astonished at what they’ve seen and heard (3:12-13). They
needed to know that it was the work of the God of Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob. His fellows would have found it hard to believe because on their
view their God wouldn’t have vindicated Jesus Christ, which in fact is
what he did when raising him from the dead and glorifying him (3:15).
And what’s more, it was through Jesus that the healed man had faith in and praised the God of Abraham
in the temple (3:8,16). Peter goes on to call them to repent toward God
and turn to him. Peter could easily insist to his fellow Jews that the
only way to know God is through Jesus Christ. In fact, I would have
thought that that was a central claim of Jesus himself when speaking to
the Jews; that if they didn’t come to know the Father through him they
didn’t come to know him at all. Why then would it surprise us if 1 Peter
1:21 is addressed to Jews?
They’re thought to be Gentiles because their past lives were vain and handed down (1:18).
One might have thought that that might be as Jewish as Gentile. In
Isaiah 29:13 God characterized the nation as one that worshiped him in
vain because the teaching the leaders handed down were human structures.
Christ made use of that text in Matthew 15:3-9 concerning the handed down teachings (traditions, 15:3) of the Elders that made worship vain.
And was that the kind of thing the Hebrew writer in 9:14 was getting
at—“dead works”? Peter reminds them that they had been redeemed by the
precious blood of Christ rather than silver or gold. Might he not have
been reminding them of the redemption teaching and practice under the
Old Testament structure? See, for example, Exodus 30:11-16, Numbers
18:15-16 and Jeremiah 32:1-15. I think it’s as easy to see Jews in all
this as it is to see Gentiles. Maybe there’s more in this point than I’m
granting but it doesn’t seem nearly strong enough to offset a plain
address that marks the letter: to Diaspora Jews.
They're thought to be Gentiles because they were once ignorant and driven by impulses and that sounds like Gentiles (1:14).
Perhaps, but then Gentiles didn’t have a monopoly on ignorance or evil
impulses. Romans 6:12,17,19 and 7:7 aren’t addressed only to Gentiles.
And when it comes to ignorance Luke 23:34 is as surely directed at the
Jews as at Gentiles. Peter himself tells his national leaders that it
was out of ignorance that they slew the Messiah (Acts 3:17, and see Paul
in Acts 13:27). Paul speaks of Israel’s
ignorance in Romans 10:1-3 and in pointed sarcasm he implies a moral
ignorance in Romans 2:17-24. You understand I’m not saying 1 Peter is
written to Jews because it’s possible to cite such passages as these.
I’m saying that maybe we should just let the 1:1 address stand as it is
unless we have compelling reasons to do otherwise.
They
are thought to be Gentiles because Peter says to them that once they
were not God’s people but now in Jesus Christ they are (2:10).
The background to this text is Hosea chapters 1 through 3, al of which
should be read. Hosea, a prophet to the North, speaks God’s word
concerning Israel in particular. There’s not a Gentile in sight. Because Israel
has rejected God he has rejected her and says she is not his people.
But the day would come when he would woo her and bring her back to
himself under the rule of his servant “David”. The section is Jewish
throughout and if Peter used it to speak to Jews it would be no surprise
at all. In fact, so thoroughly Jewish is it that some have criticized
Paul for using it of both Jew and Gentile in Romans 9:24-25
It
looks like Paul applies these Hosea texts to both Jews and Gentiles in
Romans 9:24-25. I say it “looks like” he does because I think there’s
another option. But I don’t wish to take the discussion down another
road so let’s take it for now that he does. We “know” Paul included
Gentiles in his use of the text because he says so in 9:24. But what
reason do we have for saying Peter excluded Jews?
They are thought to be Gentiles because they were called out of darkness. It’s true that Gentiles lived in darkness but are we to suppose Israel wasn’t called out of darkness? Why isn’t it reasonable to think of the darkness in Isaiah 8:19—9:2 out of which Jesus called Israel (see Matthew 4:15-16)? See Luke 1:79, Acts 26:18,23 and Romans 11:10 where God’s judgement on Israel
is described as bringing them into darkness. Again, the point here is
not that we can match Jewish darkness with Gentile darkness therefore Peter wrote to Jews. No, Peter says he wrote to Jews and talk of darkness should not offset that.
They are thought to be Gentiles because the description in 4:3-4 couldn’t possibly be of Jews.
I think this is by far the strongest argument in favor of a Gentile
audience and maybe it should be sufficient to make the case. The text
says, “For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans
choose to do—living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing
and detestable idolatry. They think it strange that you to not plunge
with them into the same flood of dissipation, and they heap abuse on
you.”
But
there are things to be said even here. Two things at least. In the
Greek text Peter doesn’t say to his readers, “You have spent enough time
living like Gentiles.” Many versions (there are a number of exceptions)
read as if he had done just that. Now maybe that’s what he meant but
it’s not quite what he said. The truth is, in 4:3 Peter said something
like: “The years that have gone by are more than enough time for the
kind of life that Gentiles purposed and have lived.” The Greek text doesn’t come out and say, “The years that have gone by are more than enough time for you
to have lived out the purpose of the Gentiles.” (Personal pronouns are
absent from the Greek text of these verses as Michaels himself reminds
us.)
What
if Peter is thinking of his fellow-Jewish Christians, an island of
troubled saints in an ocean of pagan ungodliness, tempted to give way to
bitterness, reprisals and envy? Might he not say by way of admonition
and encouragement that the years had seen enough of that and that they
had been called to something different? It could easily sound like an
old man’s summary of the wicked world. Bigg, in
the ICC says, “One idea haunts the whole Epistle; to the author, as to
the patriarch Jacob, life is a pilgrimage; it is essentially an old
man’s view.”
[He
goes on to say (4:4) that the Gentiles abused them because they
wouldn’t run with them in the same excesses. It’s possible that Peter is
saying that the Gentiles are shaking their heads that his readers are
“no longer” running with them. Some versions render it that way. It
might be the correct interpretation but there’s nothing in the actual
text that says this.]
Let
me summarize on 4:3-4 at this point. I’m suggesting that Peter doesn’t
say his readers had lived like Gentiles in the past and that they called
a halt to it. I’m saying that he might be admonishing his readers in a
Gentile environment by saying that the passing (past) years had
witnessed enough corruption lived out by Gentiles and that they should
continue to resist it whether or not that means they suffer abuse.
But
secondly, let’s take it that Peter is saying that his readers had in
the past engaged in this ungodliness and excess but had called it to a
halt. Would that prove his readers were Gentiles? Michaels thinks that
no one would have spoken of Jews in the terms we find in 1 Peter 4:3. I
find that surprising. Paul in Romans 3: 9-19 has a collage of scriptures
that shows how wicked the Jewish people could become. In 3:9 he insists
that Jews are no better morally than the Gentiles he has earlier
described. Hosea and Amos are a scorching condemnation of a people that
have sunk to drunken orgies, widespread sexual immorality, idolatry and
the like. Yes, I recognize that some changes occurred after the Exile
but idolatry and outrage continued after the Return, as Ezra and
Nehemiah make clear. The Jewish corruption under Antiochus IV shows they
were capable of much evil.
The book of James is written to Jewish
readers, Christians and non-Christians. Chapter 4:1-4 is anything but
praise! And 5:1-6 is a blunt condemnation of Diaspora Jews in their
self-indulgence, cruelty and injustice. In Ephesians 2:1-3 Paul includes
the Jews in the pursuit of evil lusts, following the world spirit.
Here’s what the text says. “As for you, you were dead in your
transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the
ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the
spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also
lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful
nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by
nature objects of wrath.”
All of that to say this, if 4:3 was a Peter’s description of his readers’ past life that still wouldn’t prove they were Gentiles.
1 Peter as addressed to Messianic Jews
I
think Peter wrote to Jewish Christians who had been born again (compare
John 3:3-5 and James 1:18 with 1 Peter 1:18—2:1)? They might have been,
as many scholars have suggested, recently baptized believers who have
“now” turned to Jesus Christ. If in their past they had been going along
with the Gentiles those days are definitively gone and none too soon.
I think his use of Old Testament categories to describe them is right on target since these Jewish believers are the true Israel
(compare Romans 9:6-7) because they received the Messiah as the
precious cornerstone. They are contrasted with their leaders who
rejected Christ (1 Peter 2:6-8 and Acts 4:10-11 where Peter uses the
same text to the Jewish leaders). And it was the same Peter who in Acts
3:22-23 quotes Deuteronomy 18:15-19 saying that those who reject the
coming Prophet will be “cut off from among the people.” Peter, like
Paul, sees the true Israel
as those who rejoice in Jesus Christ as the Messiah. The rest are cut
off from among “the people”. That is, they are not classed as part of
the true People of God.
When
he likens their suffering to the suffering of the Servant Christ from
Isaiah 53 could he not be including them with the concept of the
“servant” as Paul certainly did in Acts 13:47 (the Lord commanded “us”)?
Might that notion not be strengthened by Peter’s remark in 4:13 that
their sufferings are “the suffering of Christ”?
Finally, in 4:3 Peter contrasts his readers with Gentiles. In light of 1:1
that should lead us to think they are Jewish. Michaels confesses that
this is “striking” and goes on to speak of Peter’s “strong conviction
that his Gentile Christian readers are actually Jews in God's sight.” So
why not allow them to actually be Jews? (You might be interested in reading the comments on whether NT writers thought of Gentile Christians as “Jews”. Click here.)
©2004 Jim McGuiggan. All materials are free to be copied and used as long as money is not being made.
Many thanks to brother Ed Healy, for allowing me to post from his website, theabidingword.com.