This epistle claims that the Apostle Peter wrote it (1:1). Since there is only one Peter who was an apostle we may be confident of the identity of the writer. There is only one Peter that the entire New Testament mentioned. Scholars did not question Peter's authorship until the nineteenth century when destructive biblical criticism became popular.
"The epistle has been well known and consistently acknowledged as Petrine from the second century well into modern times. . . .
"Aside from the four Gospels and the letters of Paul, the external attestation for 1 Peter is as strong, or stronger, than that for any NT book. There is no evidence anywhere of controversy over its authorship or authority"1
Peter first sent this letter to believers living in the northern regions of Asia Minor (1:1). The locations of these Christians as well as allusions in the epistle indicate that they were mainly Gentiles but also Jews (e.g., 1:14; 2:10).
Peter stated his reason for writing, namely, to encourage his readers who were facing persecution for their faith to stand firm (5:12). Evidently this persecution was widespread among his readers. Local enemies of the gospel were not the only people responsible for it. When Paul travelled around the Roman Empire preaching the gospel, some churches he planted experienced persecution from the unsaved in their communities, but others did not. However 1 Peter reflects persecution of the Christians throughout northern Asia Minor. This condition prevailed after Nero blamed the Christians for burning Rome in A.D. 64. While persecution seems to have been widespread, it may not have been official yet.
Peter died in the mid 60s and spent the last decade of his life in Rome according to reliable tradition.2Many interpreters have regarded his reference to Babylon (5:13) as a reference to Rome that Peter described as Babylon to highlight its paganism. In view of all this information it seems likely that Peter wrote this epistle from Rome about A.D. 64.3
Theologically this epistle is apocalyptic (dealing with the end times). Along with its eschatological focus there is much emphasis on holiness (personal, social, and communal), hope, salvation, community, relationship to the world, the Trinity, and especially suffering.4
". . . much of the material in 1 Peter is the stuff of basic Christian teaching rather than advanced instruction that assumes the mastery (and perhaps the perversion) of the basics, as in the Pauline letters."5
"In many . . . respects, 1 Peter and James form a matched pair within the NT canon. They are Christian diaspora letters roughly similar in length, one directed (probably from Jerusalem) to scattered messianic Jews (i.e., Christians) who are real Jews, and the other directed from Babylon' to scattered Jews' who are in fact Gentile Christians."6
