First Epistle of Peter

Although the text identifies Peter as its author, the language, dating, style, and structure of this letter have led most scholars to conclude that it is pseudonymous.

[3][4][5] Many scholars argue that Peter was not the author of the letter because its writer appears to have had a formal education in rhetoric and philosophy, and an advanced knowledge of the Greek language,[6] none of which would be usual for a Galilean fisherman.

[8] Another dating issue is the reference to "Babylon" in chapter 5 verse 13, generally agreed to be a claim the letter was written from Rome.

The oldest surviving manuscripts that contain some or all of this book include: 1 Peter is addressed to the "elect resident aliens" scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.

Based on such internal evidence, biblical scholar John Elliott summarizes the addressees' situation as one marked by undeserved suffering.

[19][page needed] Verse 3:19, "Spirits in prison", is a continuing theme in Christianity, and one considered by most theologians to be enigmatic and difficult to interpret.

[21] Some scholars believe that the sufferings the epistle's addressees were experiencing were social in nature, specifically in the form of verbal derision.

[22] Also often advanced as a possible context for 1 Peter is the trials and executions of Christians in the Roman province of Bithynia-Pontus under Pliny the Younger.

Scholars who support this theory believe that a famous letter from Pliny to Emperor Trajan concerning the delation of Christians reflects the situation faced by the addressees of this epistle.

[23][24] In Pliny's letter, written in AD 112, he asks Trajan if the accused Christians brought before him should be punished based on the name 'Christian' alone, or for crimes associated with the name.

[23] In addition, many scholars in support of this theory believe that there is content within 1 Peter that directly mirrors the situation as portrayed in Pliny's letter.

Generally, this theory is rejected mainly by scholars who read the suffering in 1 Peter to be caused by social, rather than official, discrimination.

see this passage as referring to Jesus, after his death, going to a place (neither heaven nor hell in the ultimate sense) where the souls of pre-Christian people waited for the Gospel.