Die Taten des Petrus und der Zwölf Apostel (NHC VI,1)

Abstract

The Nag Hammadi Codices were discovered in 1945. After a long wait, a facsimile edition was published just after the translation into English (James M. Robinson, The Nag Hammadi Library, 1977), so, despite the delay, “The Acts of Peter and the Twelve Apostles” is hardly unknown in the scholarly world. It, and other works in the “Library,” demonstrate one trajectory taken by the traditions about Peter, James, Thomas, and other followers of Jesus, as well as Jesus himself. What we have in this present work, which is a lightly revised edition of the author’s 2016 Promotionsschrift, is both a new translation and a detailed commentary on the work. For that we heartily thank Katharina Stifel.The structure of this book is indeed like that of a good critical commentary. After a preface, the work starts with 34 pages of introduction covering the physical structure of the work (which takes up 12 sheets of the codex, which is itself dated in the 4th century), its dating (by one scholar as early as AD 90 in Syria, although Stifel argues that given the contents it should be dated in the 3rd century), and the history of its study. The second section is 27 pages of transcribed text on one page and German translation on the facing page, and then an index of Coptic words, of Coptic words that originated in Greek, of personal names, of types of sentences, and similar linguistic analysis, the indexes taking up the last 36 pages of the 63-page section. The next 235 pages are the commentary on the work. This commentary comes in four sections: a 6-page discussion of methodology, 20 pages examining the relationship of this work to other documents and theological concepts contained in them, from the canonical Gospels to other parts of the Nag Hammadi Codices (this is a type of Traditionsgeschiche), then a 36-page introduction to the narrative in which its context, time, symbols, and narrative style are examined, and, finally, a 170-page paragraph-by-paragraph commentary. The final section of the book is 47 pages of back matter: abbreviations, bibliography, names and contents index, and an index of references to the canonical Scriptures, Nag Hammadi Codices, Patristic writers, and Classical Greek authors. This index will be quite useful for those wishing to trace the trajectory of specific passages in the NT or Greek works.As in a review of any critical commentary, it is impossible to enter into a detailed discussion of Stifel’s analysis. She has done a stereotypically thorough German analysis that I doubt will ever be duplicated. She has done this in a surprisingly readable, if at times technical, German. (If one is writing about Coptic and the traditions behind the Coptic, of an ancient manuscript and how it was constructed, and of traditions and images and how and where they have been used, one can hardly avoid being technical at times.) She has given us the context in which a number of the Patristic authors wrote and so has contributed to the interpretation of their works as well as showing the development of certain NT ideas and contributing to the understanding of the particular group that treasured the Nag Hammadi Codices. Thus, her indexes as well as her discussion of the relationship of the work to other documents and earlier theological concepts are extremely valuable to scholars who might not normally have an interest in the contents of the Nag Hammadi Codices. In exploring symbolism and narrative, she has contributed to the study of the Apocalypse and other such uses of symbolism in a narrative context. Finally, and this I must say as a non-expert in Coptic, she has apparently contributed to the linguistic and developmental analysis of Coptic, or at least within the Coptic world influenced by Christianity. I suspect that too few will read this work because they will not guess its relevance to their field of research. That is unfortunate, for it is a monument of scholarship that does have relevance far beyond its specific focal document, “The Acts of Peter and the Twelve Apostles.”