Good question SM,
St. Paul the Jєω actually accused St. Peter of "judaizing".
Found some good posts that clearly he was a Jєω.
The gospels say that Peter’s birth name was Simon, which is generally assumed to be Semitic, but it can also be Greek. In the gospels, his brother is called Andrew, which is a Greek name and therefore an important guide to the ethnic background of Peter. At this point, the evidence would point to Peter being a gentile. Peter is portrayed as being a Galilean fisherman, but Galilee was a province populated by both Jєωs and gentiles. On the other hand, Peter seems to have been an observant Jєω, familiar with Jєωιѕн teachings. In Mark 8:29, Peter calls Jesus the Christ (Messiah), which surely only a Jєω would do.
In his epistles, Paul portrays Cephas (Peter) as the apostle to the Jєωs, a role for which a gentile would hardly be suited, and with Jerusalem as his base. This is very strong evidence that Peter was a Jєω.
In summary, there is mixed evidence in the gospels as to whether Peter was a Jєω or a gentile, but Paul’s testimony indicates convincingly that he was a Jєω.
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Yes, Simon Peter was a Jєω.
Church tradition says that Peter’s wife was named Perpetua. Her father, Aristobulus, was a son of Andronicus, who was the son of Miriam, the daughter of Jacob, the Patriarch of Jerusalem, who was the father of Joseph of Nazareth.
So Peter already had an indirect relationship with Jesus through his wife.
In addition, he and his brother, Andrew, were business partners with Zebedee and his sons. Zebedee was the older brother of Mary the mother of Jesus
So, here again, Peter was already well acquainted with Jesus before he was ever asked to become a disciple.
The only differences I can readily see, according to John's Last Gospel, when "Christ came unto His own", Peter received him, unlike the others.
Related to that, I would think he would have been exempt from the Pharisee's racial curse, of, "Let His blood be upon us and our children!"
Last point is that there is a Church custom, that converted Jєωs cannot go in clerical rank beyond the priesthood. I don't have the Church source for this, but I've spoken to ex seminarians who are aware of it too. Why would this custom or provision be? Because of the Jєω's propensity to fall back to judaism. It appears to be a genetic weakness and I would attribute that to the blood curse mentioned above.
There's Jєωιѕн lineage in the modern popes, from Pope Pius XII onwards. Not sure about John XXIII, but he was clearly masonic. Francis very likely is Jєωιѕн.
Good information. I had never heard all of this before. Forgive me if I'm being simplistic or showing streaks of Novus Ordo brainwashing, but I thought it was just a "given" that all of the twelve Apostles were Jєωs. Looking at it from another angle, how common would it have been, in first-century Palestine, for a gentile --- and what kind of gentiles would these have been, Greeks, Arabs? --- to take up with a nascent Jєωιѕн-derived religious sect, led by Someone Who was perceived as just a Jєωιѕн teacher, albeit a teacher who taught as no other teacher had taught before? I suppose anything's possible.
And what would the "genetic weakness" be? I know the late comedian Jackie Mason (he was good, quite conservative, pity he couldn't have been one of us) said "I have never known a completely healthy Jєω", and that seems to bear out --- I had a Jєωιѕн boss (though ostensibly Christianized) before I retired, and that girl had everything in the world wrong with her, morbid obesity, digestive issues, allergies, you name it, even seemed to have misophonia and a narcissistic personality disorder. (The short, terse word I would use to sum her up cannot be repeated here, but hint, it's very common in Australia.)
And keep in mind that, according to many accounts, JP2 was not the first Polish pope, St Pius X was. His family name was Sarto, which was an Italian calque of the common Polish name "Krawczyk" (krov-chuk), which translates to "tailor". It's always been common for Jєωs to be in the garment trade, indeed, my wife and I surmised that she might have distant Jєωιѕн ancestry, and her maiden name was one that evoked the garment trade as well (it wasn't Krawczyk). I opined that she looked about as Jєωιѕн as Goldie Hawn or Amanda Bynes, but as it turns out... and I would never in a million years taken Alyson Hannigan to be Jєωιѕн, Irish name, red hair, and all, but now that it's called to my attention, yeah, I can see it, there is something distinctive about the mouth, think Milton Berle, only less exaggerated. We have a local news anchor, same thing, now that I know, it jumps out at me. Gwyneth Paltrow would be another example, note her teeth and mouth sometime. It's obvious.
So you never know. My grandfather and uncle would not have looked a bit out of place at any ѕуηαgσgυє, in fact, I always thought of my uncle as kind of Jєωy, picked up a fast, choppy Cleveland accent (think Dr Oz or Bob Hope) from years of living there, but no, Southern Appalachian hillbillies, not a drop. My father, God rest his precious soul, always looked so Native American that we just took it for granted (somewhat resembled Bob Barker), but when we ran AncestryDNA, nope, not a drop of that either.