“ If St Paul's epistle to the Ephesians be genuine, and it were really known to the writer of 1 Peter, and if Peter were martyred in 64, the theory of Petrine authorship demands that it was written by Peter between 59 and 64. On the Petrine hypothesis this is the most probable view. The weak point is that it assumes a great spread of Christianity in the provinces of Asia Minor outside the activity of Paul, and that the official persecution of Christians as such began throughout the Roman Empire under Nero, for neither of which is there corroborative evidence. ”

“ It begins with exhortations not to forget prayer and love, then the believers are warned to be careful to suffer only as Christians, not as breakers of the laws. The elders and the younger men are reminded of their duties to the community and to one another The whole is brought to a close with an exhortation to all to fight manfully against the devil and to trust in God.
Date and Authorship—These two questions are so closely connected that they cannot be considered separately. The external evidence of tradition is that the epistle was written by St Peter. ”

“ The former hypothesis has a few supporters, notably T. Zahn and Spitta, but most writers are emphatic in thinking that 2 Peter has incorporated Jude, and this view is almost certainly correct (see Jude, Epistle of) . The connexion with the Apocalypse of Peter is more complicated: the evidence of a comparison between the two documents (which is made in full in F. H. Chase's article in Hastings's Dictionary of the Bible) is to show that either one document is dependent on the other, or both were written by the same person, or both come from the same circle. ”