This scene illustrates the miracle that Peter performed after he was released from prison, thanks to Paul's intercession. According to the account in the Golden Legend, once out of prison, Peter was taken to the tomb of the son of Theophilus, Prefect of Antioch. Here St Peter immediately resurrected the young man who had been dead for fourteen years. As a result, Theophilus, the entire population of Antioch and many others were converted to the faith; they built a magnificent church and in the centre of the church a chair for Peter so that he could sit during his sermons and be heard and seen by all. Peter sat in the chair for seven years; then he went to Rome and for twenty-five years sat on the papal throne, the cathedra, in Rome.

Masaccio sets the scene in a contemporary church, with contemporary ecclesiastical figures (actually the Carmelite friars from Santa Maria del Carmine) and a congregation that includes a group of four figures at the extreme right of the fresco portraying (from left to right) Masolino, Masaccio, Leon Battista Alberti and Brunelleschi.

Vasari, in his Life of Masaccio, mentions the work of Filippino Lippi, but later chroniclers refer to all the frescoes in the chapel as by Masaccio. It was not until the 19th century that once again the work of Filippino was pointed out, distinguishing it from that of Masaccio; and since then critics have been in almost total agreement with this theory.

Scholars have suggested that Filippino was commissioned to complete the work that Masaccio had left unfinished or to repair sections which been damaged or destroyed because they depicted characters that were enemies of the Medici, like the Brancacci. There is no doubt that the Brancacci family was subjected to something similar to a "damnatio memoriae" after they had been declared enemies of the people and exiled. Vasari had also identified several contemporary figures in those parts painted by Filippino.