What Would an Ancient Person Think of a Talking Cross? Reading Gospel of Peter 10,38–42 as Ancient Mediterranean Religious Literature
Scholars have paid surprisingly scant attention to a strange but important element of the Evangelium Petri —namely, the walking, talking cross ( Evangelium Petri 10,38-42). Those who have given the cross proper attention have not produced convincing or sufficiently analytical interpretations of it....
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2025
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| In: |
Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum
Year: 2025, Volume: 29, Issue: 2, Pages: 183-206 |
| Further subjects: | B
animated cross
B cultic statues B Epiphany B Gospel of Peter B Idolatry B cross-piety |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Scholars have paid surprisingly scant attention to a strange but important element of the Evangelium Petri —namely, the walking, talking cross ( Evangelium Petri 10,38-42). Those who have given the cross proper attention have not produced convincing or sufficiently analytical interpretations of it. This article argues that the general scholarly inattention owes in part to a failure to acknowledge the "weirdness" of the text, and that to understand the role of the cross here, we must first see it as a manifestation of ancient Mediterranean religious convictions. In doing so, we observe that the Evangelium Petri draws from Greco-Roman epiphany narratives and idol discourse in order to deify Jesus and to justify his then-contemporary worship. |
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| ISSN: | 1612-961X |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1515/zac-2025-0013 |
