{"id":1122,"date":"2010-06-23T14:19:53","date_gmt":"2010-06-23T14:19:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html"},"modified":"2010-06-23T14:19:53","modified_gmt":"2010-06-23T14:19:53","slug":"the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html","title":{"rendered":"The Earliest Iconic Images of Peter and Paul?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Some of you may have heard reports immanating from Rome that the earliest pictures ever of Peter, Paul (and other apostles) have been found in the catacombs. Several things should be said about this: 1) the claim is these images are from the late 4th century.&nbsp; If that is the claim there are likely earlier images in various places in Turkey, including in the cave church of Paul and Thecla (and interestingly some of these images were found near the Thecla Church); 2) the art work, in terms of color and display are already found plentifully in Capadoccia in various of the cave churches there, and indeed in some of the Constantinian churches above ground as well (see my forth coming blog posts on the cave churches).&nbsp; So while I find this story (see below) interesting, it is hardly earth-shattering and the claims about what is &#8216;earliest&#8217;&nbsp;are probably rather hyperbolic.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/news.yahoo.com\/s\/ap\/20100622\/ap_on_re_eu\/eu_vatican_archaeology\">http:\/\/news.yahoo.com\/s\/ap\/20100622\/ap_on_re_eu\/eu_vatican_archaeology<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Some of you may have heard reports immanating from Rome that the earliest pictures ever of Peter, Paul (and other apostles) have been found in the catacombs. Several things should be said about this: 1) the claim is these images are from the late 4th century.&nbsp; If that is the claim there are likely earlier&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Earliest Iconic Images of Peter and Paul? - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Earliest Iconic Images of Peter and Paul? - The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Some of you may have heard reports immanating from Rome that the earliest pictures ever of Peter, Paul (and other apostles) have been found in the catacombs. Several things should be said about this: 1) the claim is these images are from the late 4th century.&nbsp; If that is the claim there are likely earlier&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-06-23T14:19:53+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ben Witherington\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Earliest Iconic Images of Peter and Paul? - The Bible and Culture","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Earliest Iconic Images of Peter and Paul? - The Bible and Culture","og_description":"Some of you may have heard reports immanating from Rome that the earliest pictures ever of Peter, Paul (and other apostles) have been found in the catacombs. Several things should be said about this: 1) the claim is these images are from the late 4th century.&nbsp; If that is the claim there are likely earlier&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html","og_site_name":"The Bible and Culture","article_published_time":"2010-06-23T14:19:53+00:00","author":"Ben Witherington","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html","name":"The Earliest Iconic Images of Peter and Paul? - The Bible and Culture","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website"},"datePublished":"2010-06-23T14:19:53+00:00","dateModified":"2010-06-23T14:19:53+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/06\/the-earliest-iconic-images-of-peter-and-paul.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Earliest Iconic Images of Peter and Paul?"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/","name":"The Bible and Culture","description":"All Things Biblical and Christian","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426","name":"Ben Witherington","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","caption":"Ben Witherington"},"description":"Bible scholar Ben Witherington is Amos Professor of New Testament for Doctoral Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary and on the doctoral faculty at St. Andrews University in Scotland. A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&amp;E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1122\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}