Gospel of Peter Gospel of Peter (κατὰ Πέτρον Εὐαγγελίῳ, kata Petron Euangeliō). A noncanonical gospel of unknown authorship. May have been composed by a docetic or another heretical sect. Possibly dates from about ad 150. This work was never widely authoritative during the early church period.

Because Serapion of Antioch referenced the document and was ordained as bishop in “the eleventh year of the reign of Emperor Commodus” (Jerome, Lives of Illustrious Men, 41), his account would date the gospel’s use to about ad 190. The text has been mentioned or alluded to historically by Eusebius of Caesarea (ca. ad 263–339), Origen (ca. A.D. 185–254), and Theodoret, the bishop of Cyrus (ca. ad 393–457), but these comments were not necessarily favorable. Many scholars have identified early papyri fragments from Akihmim and Oxyrhynchus as portions of the Gospel of Peter, but the identification is uncertain.