Second Epistle of Peter
book of the Bible
2 Peter, also known as the Second Epistle of Peter and abbreviated as 2 Pet., is an epistle of the New Testament written in Koine Greek. It identifies the author as "Simon Peter (in some translations, 'Simeon' or 'Shimon'), a bondservant and apostle of Jesus Christ" (2 Peter 1:1). The epistle is traditionally attributed to Peter the Apostle, but most critical scholars consider the epistle pseudepigraphical (i.e., authored by one or more of Peter's followers, using Peter as a pseudonym). Scholars estimate the date of authorship anywhere from AD 60 to 150.
Authorship and date
According to the Epistle itself, it was composed by the Apostle Peter, an eyewitness to Jesus' ministry. 2 Peter 3:1 says "This is now the second letter I have written to you"; if this is an allusion to 1 Peter, then the audience of the epistle may have been the same as it was for 1 Peter, namely, various churches in Asia Minor (see 1 Peter 1:1).
The date of composition has proven to be difficult to determine. Taken literally, it would have been written around AD 64–68, as Christian tradition holds Peter was martyred in the 60s by Nero, and also because Peter references his approaching death in 2 Peter 1:14 ("since I know that the putting off of my body will be soon, as our Lord Jesus Christ made clear to me").
The questions of authorship and date are closely related. Scholars consider the epistle to have been written anywhere between c.
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Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 24, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q131178. VIAF identifies the subject as 183897792. The Library of Congress control number is n84219041. 1 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
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This entry incorporates text from “Second Epistle of Peter” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.