medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
This does not quite reflect the historical evidence. The earliest joint celebration of the two saints is mid-3rd c. (ca. 258), 2 centuries before Leo. My source is Roch Kereszty and William S. Farmer (one a Catholic, one a Protestant, both New Testament scholars), _Peter and Paul in the Church of Rome::The Ecumenical Potential of a Forgotten Perspective (New York: Paulist, 1990), pp. 84, 92-93, citing M. Righetti, _Manuale di storia liturgica_, vol. 2 (Milan: Ancora, 1955), 348-49. I have not seen Righetti; perhaps someone else on the list can enlighten us as to his evidence for a joint 3rd century cult.
Earlier testimony comes from Greek writers: Ignatius of Antioch (ca. 110-115), Irenaeus of Lyon (but from Asia Minor, i.e., Greek-speaking), the First Letter of Clement to the Corinthians ( written in the 90s?), and from the Latin writer Tertullian. They all mention and highlight the joint martyrdom of Pter and Paul in Rome. This sort of unanimity cannot simply be a phantom. Leo I did not invent this out of thin air but was acting on a long tradition. All the texts and NT evidence is cited by Kereszty and Farmer. A century before Leo the synod of Arles in a letter to Sylvester I directly attributes the preeminence of Rome to both saints
Nineteenth-century historians were fond of calling on "true history" to show that Roman claims emerged relatively suddenly in the 5th-century under Leo. Of course 19th-century Western European (Enlightenment-Protestant) historians had an axe to grind on this point and were merely lending "modern" Rankean historical-science authority to confessional polemics dating back to the 16thc and beyond that, back to the 9th and 11th century disputes with Constantinople. That's why Farmer's and Kereszty's joint work is significant. Farmer devoted some of his work as a scholar to pointing out the biased, polemical locus for much of 19thc New Testament scholarship, pointing out that those who prided themselves on debunking the "hidden agendas" of "confessional (read Catholic) historians" themselves were embedded in a historical context, one that was stridently anti-Catholic. In short, Farmer, a Protestant himself, practiced "historical critical method" on those who insisted that Leo I invented the Roman papacy out of power-grabbing motives, showing that they failed to acknowledge for themselves how "where one stands influences what one sees" in history even though they were quick to acknowledge it for writers from the ancient past.
I did check my 1962 Missal and discover that the introduction to the Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul says that the June 29 date is based on the date of the translation of their relics. But this introduction, of course, gives no futher scholarly information. The 1970 revisions did introduce more emphasis on Paul into the June 29th propers; my earlier post was based on the 1970 propers, which was unwise. The older proper emphasized Peter on June 29 and Paul on June 30. With the 1970 suppression of Paul's commemoration on the 30th, he was worked back into the June 29th liturgy with greater equality to Peter and June 30th was given over to the rest of the Neronian martyrs.
Dennis Martin
Byzantine liturgy also cites Peter and Paul together (94)
>>> [log in to unmask] 06/30/01 11:16PM >>>
Paul specifically is commemorated on 30 June--I don't know about the
Neronian martyrs. The broader acceptance of the dual feast for P and P on
29 June was effected by Leo Ist in the 5th century, supposedly as a
strategy of Papal policy to aggrandize (or continue to aggrandize) Rome.
See, Harry W. Tajra, The Martyrdom of St. Paul: Historical and Judicial
Context, Traditions, and Legends, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum
Neuen Testament, 67 (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Sieback), 1994).
Leah Rutchick
At 08:19 AM 6/30/01 -0500, you wrote:
>medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
>
>The basic answer is that they are the two outstanding leaders of the first
>generation of the Christian Church. Peter's primary role is evident in
>the first 11 chapters of Acts of the Apostles and Paul's in the rest of
>the account (with his conversion in ch. 9 and his cameo appearance at the
>stoning of Stephen in ch. 7--I'm citing from memory here and hope my
>references are correct). They both had connections to Antioch,
>apparently--Paul's is clear from Acts and Peter's is mentioned by the
>earliest Church historians. Peter plays a key role in opening the
>Christian vision to embrace non-Jews (Acts 10--Cornelius), Paul carries
>out that vision. Peter later backed down under pressure from the more
>strictly Jewish-Christian party at Jerusalem (which is what Paul
>apparently rebuked him for--mentioned in Paul's Letter ot the Galatians)
>but seems to have reversed his reversal.
>
>They share a feast day because they both ended up at and were martyred at
>Rome. Given the significance of martyrdom in the rise of the cult of
>saints, they are the primary reason why Roman primacy (whether of "honor"
>or of "jurisdiction") emerged. Roch Kereszty and William Farmer have a
>little book making this argument. The title escapes me but it's something
>about Peter and Paul and Roman Primacy. Their shrines were venerated at
>Rome long before the persecutions ended--the archeological evidence is now
>clear that the site of Peter 's martyrdom under the Basilica of St. Peter
>on Vatican Hill was being venerated by the middle 2nd century and probably
>long before that, probably from the time of his death. St. Peter's is not
>the cathedral church for Rome but a martyr's basilica. Given Peter's role
>in Acts, the dominical commissioning not only in Mt. 16 but also in John
>21, that alone would perhaps have been enough to propel the Church of Rome
>to primacy. (The Church there was founded before either Peter or Paul
>arrived in Rome, so neither is the founder of that city's diocese, but
>they clearly gave leadership to it when they did arrive.)
>
>The death of St. Paul in Rome underscored the importance of the Church of
>Rome. It is often asserted that the Church at Rome became the center for
>unity, gained primacy (primacy primarily is about unity, not
>administration, if one reads Irenaeus, Cyprian, Ignatius of Antioch
>etc.--of course administration and unity are closely related to each
>other) because Rome was the capital of the empire. I do not think this is
>true, except to the degree that Rome's role as capital was clearly a major
>factor in bringing Peter and Paul there (for different reasons and by
>different routes). I Clement is one source indicating that the joint
>martyrdom of Peter and Paul was a key to Rome's primacy. Paul was never
>understood to have been the bishop of the church of Rome, but he is
>celebrated in the liturgy for June 29th as teacher and apostle to the
>Gentiles; Peter as guardian of the legacy of Judaism and as the head of
>the apostolic college.
>
>When Jerusalem was destroyed twice (AD 70 and 135) and the two other major
>eastern Patriarchates (Antioch, Alexandria) were conquered first by
>Persians and then by Islam, the patriarchate of Rome and the upstart (in
>church historical terms) patriarchate of New Rome (Constantinople) were
>left facing each other. The rest, is, as they say, history--the ancient
>rivalry between Greeks and Latins, cultural resurgence in the 9thc in the
>East, in the 11th c. in the West etc. led eventually to
>schism.. Constantinople had apostolic claims in St. Andrew, the apostle
>to the Scythians, but compared to Peter and Paul at Rome, Constantinople's
>claims had to rest more heavily on its position as (new) capital of the empire.
>
>If one studies the propers for the Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul, one
>realizes that the feast is as much about the governance of the Church as
>anything else. This is simply a major feast of the Roman Church, and,
>since nearly all of northern and western Europe was (re) evangelized
>directly under strong Roman ties (Augustine of Canterbury to England,
>Boniface to Germany, and since Catholic evangelization in the Americas and
>Africa and Asia was carried out primarily in the early modern era from
>Western Europe rather than from Orthodox Constantinople or Moscow (which
>had other, pressing matters, on its mind) or even from Protestant Western
>Europe (for theological reasons, Protestants did not begin missionary work
>until the late 18thc, with a few exceptions; Protestantism did spread, of
>course, to the Americas by direct immigration), because of this historical
>pattern, the Roman Rite was carried much more widely around the world than
>it otherwise might have been. Had these patterns been different,
>conceivably the unity focused on Peter and Paul at Rome could have been
>maintained within a variety of liturgical rites or relatively equal
>size (the Catholic Church today, which is larger than the Roman Rite,
>includes 21 other liturgical rites among dioceses that see themselves
>unified around the See of Peter at Rome. but the 21 other rites have
>numerically very few adherents compared to the adherents of the Roman Rite).
>
>To summarize: The centrality of Rome as a symbol for unity within the
>early church, firmly established already during the first few centuries,
>was based primarily on the martyrdom of Peter and Paul at Rome. This
>predates the development of jurisdictional claims for the Patriarchate of
>Rome outside that patriarchate, which are developing already in the
>controversies over the celebration of Easter (2nd century) and the
>controversies between Cyprian and Stephen {3rd century) but which are
>elaborated only under Leo I (5th century). The jurisdictional claims grow
>out of the honor/unity claims; disagreement about the meaning of Roman
>jurisdiction outside the Roman Patriarchate, eventually became the common
>explanation for the shattering of that unity (which, of course, always had
>its loopholes and tattered fringes--unity is a very fragile commodity in
>any human community), though cultural and poltiical factors underly the
>disagreement over jurisdiction. That the Roman bishop had a degree of
>jurisdiction throughout his patriarchate (as did all the ancient
>patriarchs) was not disputed; the Roman patriarchate, more than any other
>patriarchate, expanded to cover the entire globe.
>
>Peter and Paul each have a separate day on their own: the conversion of
>St. Paul, the Chair of Peter elsewhere in the calendar. But June 29th is
>the feast of their martrydom, followed on June 30 by the commemoration of
>the rest of the martyrs of the Neronian persecution. Since the calendar
>of saints days in the Roman Rite grew out of the martyrology of the Roman
>diocese, it is not surprising that Peter and Paul would be put
>together. They are named together and at the head of, distinct from the
>rest of the list of other Roman martyrs in the Canon of the Roman
>Rite. This indicates a very ancient practice of honoring them in one
>breath as the protomartyrs of the Church of Rome.
>
>I don't know how ancient the June 30th celebration of the martyrs of the
>Neronian persecution is. I suspect it is a more modern addition, but
>perhaps someone else knows.
>
>Dennis Martin>
> >>> [log in to unmask] 06/28/01 08:28PM >>>
>medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
>
>Today (29. June) is the feast day of:
>
>Peter and Paul (d. c. 64). Most of what we know about both comes from the
>New Testament. Both were venerated from very early times. What I want to
>know is why they share a feast day.
>
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