Peter's Wife

(This post isn't about pop culture but instead a brief musing on a rather mysterious Biblical character.) Peter is probably one of my favourite characters is in the Bible. He was one of the key disciples and a close friend of Jesus. Famously, he denied Jesus three times, realised that he had made a big mistake and then, after the resurrection, accepted Jesus' forgiveness. Peter made plenty more mistakes but each time he tried again and remained passionate about following Jesus. He is a Biblical model of someone who isn't perfect but keeps trying and, ultimately, remains devoted to Jesus. This is all fairly common knowledge, Peter is arguably the most famous disciple and one of the three most known New Testament characters (next to Jesus and Paul). However, something which we can easily overlook is that he had a wife, something which I only realised recently. In Matthew, Mark and Luke we are told that Jesus healed Peter's mother-in-law (Matthew 8:14-18, Mark 1:29-34, Luke 4:38-41). Later on, in one of Paul's letters we are told that Peter has a wife who is also a Christian and who accompanies him on his travels (1 Corinthians 9:5). And that is all we have, these handful of verses reveal all we know about this woman.

What was her name? Where was she from? How old was she? How did she meet Peter? What was her relationship like with Jesus? When and why did she become a Christian? What role did she have in the three years of Jesus' earthly ministry? What about when Peter travel around spreading the Good News, what did she do then? Was it even two different women referenced in the Gospels and then by Paul? Was Peter married twice? As you can see, I have a lot of questions. That's the thing about parts of the Bible, the New Testament particularly, unlike say the Qur'an the Bible's writers didn't necessarily know that they pieces they were writing would end up compiled into a book which would serve as a religious bedrock for thousands of years. Hence, we are often missing the context for parts of the Bible. Take 2 John and 3 John, these were short letters specifically directed at individuals regarding their personal circumstances so how we understand them today is difficult. Likewise, Revelation is an amazing book, and perhaps the craziest in the Bible, but was recorded by someone who couldn't really write that well. The Bible has a divine orchestrator, God, but was written by human hands. I have never read other book like it, it is amazing, but has to be read carefully and I don't think that we can ever understand it all.

Getting back to Peter's wife, she may have been important but is absent from the Bible because the individual writers didn't think that recording who she was specifically would help to achieve their goal of such work. For example, maybe they wanted to focus more on Jesus himself than account for all of his followers or, given that they didn't realise how important their writings would be, thought that who Peter's wife was would be common enough knowledge that it didn't need to be recorded. It's worth bearing in mind that plenty of other Biblical figures have only brief references, such as Bartholomew, James, son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, all of whom were part of the Twelve. So, Peter's wife's absence is annoying but not without precedent.

Of course, the elephant of the room needs addressing, that it is a women who is not being recorded in detail. Peter's wife, based on our scant references to her, is just an extension of her husband and is silent. You could go as far as to say that she is without agency but she did choose to marry Peter, to become a Christian and to travel with him. The issue still stands though that this women is hidden from us whilst male characters around her are written about in detail. The Bible and feminism is a hot topic and one which I don't think we should shy away from. It is unavoidable that the Bible was written in patriarchal societies and that this is evident in the text, one example among many is how the twelve tribes of Israel were founded by men and so, as the twelve disciples are symbolic of them, they are also all men. I don't have the time to go in-depth into a feminist exploration of the Bible and explore all the tricky passages so I need to limit my discussion to Peter's wife. I definitely encourage you though to explore the Bible in regards to this big social issues, not just feminism but social justice, poverty, power, economic, gender, sexuality etc. We can't just assume one thing or another from the Bible without reading it, we need to engage with it and ask God to open our hearts and minds to what He is teaching us through His book. I would describe myself as a Christian feminist, and whilst I do fully believe that God's will is for gender equality, I can't say that the Bible doesn't make me question this sometimes. I still believe that is affirms feminism but it's a complex book whose divine message can sometime be hard for us to understand as God is revealed through human words and read through human minds. Peter's wife is one of these tricky bits. How we can we know so much about her husband but nothing about her? What did she do and why isn't this recorded? Yes we know plenty about other female followers of Jesus, but why nothing about her? Why is this woman only known in her relationship to a man?

As I was thinking about this, I also thought of the many other Biblical characters who we know little about. Peter's wife's absence may be particularly jarring to me but she isn't the only mysterious Biblical figure. May people are just referenced quickly but that doesn't mean that they are less important to God. Our human minds might focus on the big heroes but we are told that God cares for everyone, He has no favouritism and loves each and everyone of us totally. Jesus' parable of the hundred sheep tells us this, that God as our Good Shepherd would leave the ninety-nine sheep to find just one (Luke 15:1-7, Matthew 18:12-14). Mrs Peter may not be given many verses but she is as important to God as Peter or indeed anyone else is. I guess we are back now at how the Bible is a complicated book which is a mesh of different writings written in different contexts, with different authorial motivations and different intended audiences. It is still the most precious book though because it is the living word of God through which he has spoken to people for centuries. It may be a nightmare to read sometimes but it is still holy, still life-changing. Our lack of knowledge over Peter's wife is also, I suppose, very relatable in a sense. We can never know everything and nor is the full picture ever presented to us. Peter's wife's absence is a real example of how not everyone person is well-known and, historically, this has often been the place of women. Think of some people who you vaguely know, you might think very well of them but you don't know everything about their life and you probably never will. From a more Christian perspective, everyone who has followed Jesus will have stories to tell about their relationship with God but proportionally only a few are referenced in the Bible and other writings. I suppose the challenge to us now is to really know other people and particularly to recognise and appreciate the role of people who belong to traditionally overlooked groups. For some, our faith may make us famous but for others of us we are called to a life in the background, to just be a footnote, but all of us are still beloved children of God and equally priceless parts of His family. Thank you for reading!

(St Peter and his wife) If my musings got you thinking here are some questions to consider or things to explore, - Do you find it hard to have Biblical figures referenced who we know so little about? - What challenges you about the Bible? How much trust should we put into it? - Look into some other minor Biblical characters, what can you find out about them and what questions do you have about them? - Who has had a small but significant influence on your life and/or faith? How can you play a small role in serving others? - How does our current context affect how we read the Bible? (Generally, Roman Catholics believe that Peter was the first Pope and that ordained people should be unmarried, so with this context they often interpret Peter to be a widower) - Based on the brief information we have, what do you think Peter's wife was like? What would she have had to do?