Previously we have reviewed here the work of Ken Schei titled Christianity Betrayed which hypothesized that Paul was the "666" described in Revelation who ruined Christianity. We can now take a closer look at a particular aspect of his presentation concerning Peter vs. Paul, a topic we looked at in detail here.
Schei devotes only about half a dozen pages to this issue. Much of his argument initially is based upon a translation of Gal. 2:11-13 that has Paul calling Peter and the others who stopped eating with Gentiles "cowards". What the passage says in the KJV is that Peter and company were "carried away with their dissimulation" -- the word means hypocrisy, or acting a feigned part, and has nothing to do with moral or physical or any other sort of cowardice. One can only guess how Schei arrives at this translation; he does not specify the version he uses.
At any rate, he sees this as a case of Paul "attacking the competition" as in a political campaign, to the extent that he supposes that this is Paul's way of unseating Peter as the head of the church. As we have shown in our detail-article, however, Paul actually acknowledges the leadership of the pillars (including Peter) and their superiority and takes special pains not to detract any honor from them. Schei is also off the mark when he states that the "only rationale Paul presents to back his authority is his own claim of personal revelation." [32] As noted, that claim was accepted and therefore honored by Peter and the pillars, and is not at all at issue.
Schei also moves outside the Bible to apocryphal documents where he supposes that Paul is being secretly named as "Simon" by Peter and refuted. The apocryphal Peter, however, disses those who accuse him of "dissolution of the law" and this was not the issue in Gal. 2. Schei also quotes Brandon [92-3] who, like Massey, mixes together all of Paul's various opponents from different letters as though they were the same group (see our answer in the link), and claims that Paul shows "embarrassment about his relations with the leading Apostles," when in fact the opposite is true: Paul clearly and unreservedly speaks of his relations with the leading apostles, and of the honor and recognition they accorded him.
Schei therefore offers little of merit on this topic.
-JPH