Peter Did NOT Swim Ahead

Why is it that preachers feel the need to add things that are not there to scripture, and ignore things that are there? I use the story of Peter encountering Jesus on the Sea of Galilee following Jesus' resurrection as an exammple. The story is found in the 21st chapter of John's Gospel. Peter decided that he wanted to go fishing. The other disciples joined him. As they were casting their nets - and not being successful in their endeavors - the resurrected Jesus showed up on the shore and asked them if they were catching anything. Without recognizing him, they replied that they were catching nothing. He said to them, "Cast your net on the right hand side of the boat and you will find a catch." They did and so many fish filled their net that they were unable to haul it in. In that instant, John (identified as "the disciple whom Jesus loved") recognized the land-bound stranger as Jesus. Here is where things get interesting and preachers/teachers begin to add things to the text and ignore things that are in the text.

When Peter heard it was Jesus, he grabbed "his outer garment (for he was stripped for work), and threw himself into the sea." (21:7) The thing that is ALWAYS added to this text are the words, "and he swam ahead." Why do people add that? It isn't in the text and it doesn't even make sense! And the thing they always leave out is the detail of him grabbing his outer garment. Logically, if Peter were going to swim ahead, he wouldn't grab his outer garment. That big heavy robe-like garment would simply slow him down and might even put him in danger of drowning! Some commentators say that the boat was in shallow water - so shallow, in fact, that Peter simply waded to shore. Again, people have added that concept and NOTHING in the text indicates that Peter got to the shore first or even attempted to get to the shore first.

One of the major principles of interpreting scripture is that wherever possible, scripture should be used to interpret itself. In this case, we can look at John's own writing. In chapter 20, in the account of the resurrection, John points out the he and Peter were running together toward the empty tomb, and that John arrived at the tomb first (20:4). John then, reveals that even though he had arrived first, Peter was the first to enter the tomb (20:6). So John has a habit of describing how events unfolded and in this instance, he made no effort at all to let his readers know that Peter arrived on shore first. Further, he doesn't even describe Peter's arrival!

All of this, so far, has been rather circumstantial. Now we come to a language clue. Notice, that when the disciples arrive, they see a charcoal fire with some fish already cooking, along with some bread (21:9). Then Jesus says, "Bring some of the fish which you have caught." And here is the language clue - "Peter WENT UP and drew the net to land." Now think about that for a moment. If Peter had been standing beside Jesus - close enough to observe the fire, fish, and bread - and if he headed to the boat to drag the net to land, how would that movement toward the water have been described? He would have "gone down" to the sea and boat. In John 6:16-17 we get that exact description: "When evening came, his disciples WENT DOWN to the sea, got into a boat, and started across the sea..." So for John to say that Peter WENT UP to the boat, we have to see a different picture. The only way for Peter to go UP to the boat, is for him to still be in the water. The word translated "went up" is described in the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament like this: The basic meaning is spatial, i.e., “to rise from the depths to the heights.” It is used for climbing aboard a ship (bold mine).

So what do we know? Peter did not grab his coat - jump into the water and swim or wade ahead of the other disciples. He grabbed his coat - jumped into the water - and when Jesus asked for a fish, Peter WENT UP and got what Jesus asked for. But why? Can we figure that out? And how do we know the number of fish that were in the net? I'll discuss those issues later. But for now, understand that the Bible does not indicate that Peter swam ahead of the other disciples when they saw Jesus on the shore after the resurrection.