Humanae Vitae, Pope Paul VI, and Paul the Apostle (Part 1)

51 years ago, in July 1968, Pope Paul VI published an encyclical letter called Humanae Vitae ('Human Life') that is one of the most counter-cultural documents ever produced by the Catholic Church. In 1968, the Sexual Revolution was in full swing in the West, and social norms (and legal codes) concerning sexual behaviour were rapidly changing or would change in the future as a result. Specifically, sexual and related behaviours that were becoming or would become increasingly normalised in society included artificial contraception (especially the Pill), abortion, pornography, masturbation, premarital sex, casual sex, and homosexual sex. The common denominator to all of these items is the driving of a wedge between sex and procreation. The only essential purpose of sex is enjoyment (including relational bonding, for the more conservatively and monogamously minded); pregnancy is an incidental side effect that can be welcomed, avoided, or terminated as desired.

Against this background—and against the advice of some of his theological advisers—Pope Paul VI authoritatively taught in Humanae Vitae that the sexual act has two essential purposes, namely unitive and procreative. The unitive purpose is to unite married couples in mutual love, thus strengthening the marital bond. The procreative purpose is to produce offspring and thus perpetuate the human race. These purposes are intimately related in that a strong marital union contributes to a healthy setting for raising children. By declaring both of these purposes to be essential to the sexual act, the Pontiff implicitly reinforced the Church's long-standing prohibition on non-procreative sexual acts (e.g., masturbation, oral sex, anal sex) and explicitly forbade the use of contraception: 'any action which either before, at the moment of, or after sexual intercourse, is specifically intended to prevent procreation' is excluded. The only family planning method that is permitted is periodic abstinence, i.e. to 'take advantage of the natural cycles immanent in the reproductive system and engage in marital intercourse only during those times that are infertile.' In effect, the Pope ruled all the 'fruits' of the Sexual Revolution off-limits. This was a radical stand to make, as by this time most of the Protestant world had embraced contraception as an acceptable family planning method, and many observers—Catholic and non-Catholic—assumed that the Pope would follow suit.

Humanae Vitae does not quote any Scripture, since it is intended more as a pastoral instruction than a theological treatise. Nevertheless, my recent study of the letters of St. Paul have led me to marvel at how aptly Pope Paul VI was named; for his teachings in Humanae Vitae are anticipated in the writings of his namesake apostle. (This is true despite the fact that Paul (and Scripture generally) offers no direct teaching on contraception.) In what follows I will briefly comment on Paul's ideas on sexuality and marriage based on passages in Romans and 1 Corinthians, and compare them to Humanae Vitae.

Injunctions against sexual immorality (porneia) are a common feature of the Pauline and deutero-Pauline1 epistles (1 Cor. 6:9-10; 2 Cor. 12:21; Gal. 5:19-21; 1 Thess. 4:3-5; Eph. 5:3-5; Col. 3:5-9; 1 Tim. 1:9-10). However, these are generally brief warnings and 'vice lists' that offer little insight into the theological grounding of Paul's sexual ethic. We do observe that sexual immorality is of 'the flesh,' the morally compromised aspect of human nature (Gal. 5:19), and that it correlates with idolatry and 'the Gentiles who do not know God' (1 Thess. 4:5; Eph. 5:5). The material that gives us greater insight into Paul's sexual ethic is found in Romans 1:18-32 and in 1 Corinthians 5-7.

Romans 1:18-32 is a section of the letter that contributes to a wider argument. Paul here effectively assumes the guise or role of a scrupulously law-observant Jew or Jewish Christian in order to indignantly condemn Gentiles for their idolatry and resulting loose morals. By v. 32 his Judaeo-centric readers are cheering him on as he unloads on the 'Gentile sinners' (for this phrase see Gal. 2:15). However, it is all a setup: beginning in 2:1 he turns the tables on self-righteous fellow Jews in order to eventually conclude that 'all, both Jews and Gentiles, are under sin' and in need of the redemption that is in Christ Jesus (Rom. 3:9, 24). The point is not that Gentiles are actually good and Jews are bad, but that everyone is bad. Therefore, Paul's attack on Gentile sin in Romans 1:18-32, although a clever rhetorical device, does represent his actual views.

The main thrust of Romans 1:18-32 is that the Gentiles are culpably ignorant of God and idolatrous, and that as a result God has 'given them up' to their human fallenness ('the lusts of the hearts,' 1:24; 'degrading passions,' 1:26; 'their undiscerning mind,' 1:28), resulting in all kinds of wicked behaviour enumerated in vv. 29-31. However, in vv. 25-27 Paul singles out certain immoral sexual behaviour for special censure:

25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie and revered and worshiped the creature rather than the creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. 26 Therefore, God handed them over to degrading passions. Their females exchanged natural relations for unnatural, 27 and the males likewise gave up natural relations with females and burned with lust for one another. Males did shameful things with males and thus received in their own persons the due penalty for their perversity. (NABRE)

Now, Romans 1:26-27 is one of what LGBT Christians refer to as 'the clobber passages' that are used as proof texts (often without any nuance) to oppose same-sex relationships/marriage, or simply to make gay people feel unwelcome. My intention is certainly not to 'clobber' anyone but only to carefully examine Paul's contextual meaning. Notice that the immoral sexual behaviour described in vv. 26-27 results from denying God's creatorship.2 This implies that, for Paul, sexual morality is grounded in God's creative design, i.e., in nature. This is confirmed when Paul describes the illicit behaviour as an exchange or abandonment of 'the natural function' or 'the natural relations' (Greek: tēn phusikēn chrēsin) and as 'contrary to nature' (para phusin). By referring here to humans in their sexuality as 'male' (arsēn) and 'female' (thēlus) (terms Paul rarely uses),3 Paul alludes to the Genesis creation story ('he made them male [arsēn] and female [thēlus],' Gen. 1:27 LXX) and so grounds his understanding of 'the natural function' in the sexual complementarity of creation and the accompanying responsibility to procreate (Gen. 1:28). This reading of Paul's intent is supported by evidence from his historical context in Hellenistic Judaism.4

In Humanae Vitae, Pope Paul VI follows in his namesake's footsteps, emphasising that the Church's teaching on marriage 'is based on the natural law as illuminated and enriched by divine Revelation'. The Church acknowledges and defers to God's 'wisely ordered laws of nature,' including the natural phenomenon of sexual procreation. While Paul in Romans 1:26 probably refers to female-female homoerotic acts,5 just as 1:27 clearly refers to male-male homoerotic acts,6 it would be consistent with Paul's reasoning to regard as 'contrary to nature' and thus immoral any sexual act that involves a departure from 'the natural function' of sex, which includes its procreative purpose. Thus, in prohibiting measures intended to 'obstruct the natural development of the generative process,' Pope Paul VI in Humanae Vitae drew a conclusion that had been anticipated by Paul the Apostle in Romans 1:26.

The second part of this article will look at Paul's teaching on sex and marriage in 1 Corinthians 5-7, and how this too anticipates the teaching of Pope Paul VI in Humanae Vitae.

Footnotes

• 1 The deutero-Pauline epistles are those that claim to have been written by Paul but that many modern scholars believe were written by someone else in his name, even after his death. The deutero-Pauline letters mentioned here are Ephesians, Colossians, and 1 Timothy. Romans, 1-2 Corinthians, Galatians, and 1 Thessalonians were all indisputably written by Paul himself.
• 2 The link that Paul identifies between idolatry and sexual immorality is causal: the one leads to the other. Of course, in making this connection Paul would have been well aware of the sexual debauchery and prostitution that often accompanied idolatrous worship. However, this does not mean that Paul condemns sexually immoral acts only when practiced as part of idolatrous worship. The text is clear that he condemns such acts because they are intrinsically contrary to the natural order.
• 3 Neither of these words occurs elsewhere in Paul's letters apart from Gal. 3:28, where the gendering of humans is again the point at issue. In the entire rest of the New Testament, the words arsēn and thēlus occur together only in Matt. 19:4 and Mark 10:6, both quotations from the creation story of Gen. 1:27 made to ground Jesus' teaching on marriage.
• 4 For example, Paul's contemporary Philo of Alexandria describes homoerotic acts as 'contrary to nature' (para phusin, the same phrase Paul uses in Rom. 1:26) and condemns pederasty not only because of the damage it does to the violated young men but because the pederast disregards his responsibility to procreate (Special Laws 3.37-39). Elsewhere, he condemns the men of Sodom for discarding 'the law of nature' regarding sexuality (On Abraham 133-136). Josephus, Paul's younger contemporary, explains that Jewish laws allow no sexual intercourse except that 'according to nature' (kata phusin), namely of a man with his wife, and that only for procreation (Against Apion 2.199). He later condemns the Elean and Theban Greeks for doing 'that contrary-to-nature (para phusin, again same phrase as Rom. 1:26) and licentious thing of intercourse with males,' adding that they attribute such practices to their gods in order to justify their 'improper and contrary-to-nature (para phusin) pleasures' (Against Apion 2.273-275). The Sentences of Pseudo-Phocylides (first century B.C.E./first century C.E.) makes it obligatory to marry and procreate to 'give something to nature' (phusei, 175-76) and to 'Go not beyond natural (phuseōs) sexual unions for illicit passion' (190) (text and translations from Walter T. Wilson, The Sentences of Pseudo-Phocylides [Berlin: de Gruyter, 2005]). The same general moral principle that God's laws follow from the created order of nature is apparent in 4 Maccabees (late first century C.E.): 'Therefore we do not eat defiling food, for, believing that the law is divine, we know that the Creator of the world shows us sympathy by imposing a law that is in accordance with nature (kata phusin)' (4 Macc. 5.25-26 NETS). Finally, Wisdom of Solomon 14 identifies idolatry as the origin of sexual immorality (porneia, v. 12) and more specifically of 'inversion of procreation' (geneseōs enallagē, v. 26). The similarities between this passage and Romans 1:18-32 are so striking that numerous scholars have argued for some sort of literary dependence.
• 5 It is also possible, though less likely, that the sexual acts 'contrary to nature' involving females that Paul has in mind here are heterosexual oral and/or anal sex. The former is condemned in one other early Christian text, the Epistle of Barnabas (cf. 10.8). What makes female-female homoerotic acts the most likely meaning is that only females are mentioned as the actors and that the male-male acts in v. 27 are likened to those in v. 26 using the word 'likewise' (homoiōs).
• 6 Most English translations, for understandable reasons, neglect to convey the sexual explicitness of the Greek text. The phrase translated 'Males did shameful things with males' in the NABRE renders arsenes en arsesin tēn aschēmosunēn katergazomenoi. Aschēmosunē does literally mean 'disgrace' but is used as a euphemism for genitals in the Septuagint (Ex. 20:26; Lev. 18:6; Deut. 23:14) as well as in Rev. 16:15 (cf. BDAG 147). Given the sexual context of Rom. 1:27 it is best understood in this sense here, and so a literal translation of this phrase would be, 'Males working the member in males,' an obvious reference to male-male sexual intercourse.

Simon Peter, Chief Steward of the King's Household: An Exposition of Matthew 16:17-19

Note: this article is not as long as it looks. Most of the space is taken up by footnotes!

Matthew 16:18-19 has been called one of the most controversial passages in all of Scripture.1 Certainly this has been true since the Reformation, with Catholics touting this dominical saying as a proof text for the papacy and Protestants denying that it is anything of the kind. Over the past few decades, however, biblical scholars have managed to clear away much of the polemical haze that previously clouded interpretation of this passage. There is now a broad consensus among both Protestant and Catholic scholars on certain aspects of the saying's meaning. The purpose of this article is to explore this fascinating saying in light of recent biblical research and then to reflect briefly on its ecclesiological implications.

Although I find "hostile witness" arguments in theological discourse to be objectionable,2 I do note that most of the scholars I will be citing in this article are Protestant, only to emphasise that I am not merely presenting a Catholic-biased perspective on this passage.

1. The saying in context
2. The immediate context
3. You are Peter, and upon this rock I will construct my Community
4. The gates of Hades will not be able to defeat it
5. I will give to you the keys of the kingdom of heaven
6. Whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven
7. The priestly aspect of Peter's role
8. The polemical dimension to the saying
9. Summary of exegetical findings
10. Ecclesiological implications: papacy or no papacy?


1. The saying in context

What follows is my translation of Matt. 16:13-20, following the NA28 Greek critical text:

13 And Jesus, having come into the region of Caesarea Philippi, put a question to his disciples, saying, "Whom do men claim the Son of Man to be?" 14 And they said, "Some say it is John the Baptizer, others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets." 15 He said to them, "And you (plural)? Who do you claim me to be? 16 And Simon Peter said in reply, "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God." 17 And Jesus said to him in reply, "Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood have not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. 18 And I, for my part, tell you that you are Peter (Greek: petros), and upon this rock (Greek: petra) I will construct my Community (or, Church), and the gates of Hades will not be able to defeat it. 19 And I will give to you (singular) the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you (singular) bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you (singular) loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven. 20 Then he ordered the disciples not to tell anyone that he is the Messiah.

If you don't want to rely on my translation skills (and you probably shouldn't), feel free to mouse over the following links to read the passage in the NRSV or NABRE.

2. The immediate context

The conversation between Jesus and his disciples at Caesarea Philippi runs thus. First, Jesus puts a question to his disciples collectively, which they answer collectively. Second, Jesus puts another question to his disciples collectively, which Simon Peter answers individually with a direct assertion about Jesus: "You are the Messiah..." Third, Jesus pronounces a blessing upon Simon Peter individually. The blessing begins with a declaration that Simon's statement was a revelation from God in heaven, and continues by reciprocating with a direct assertion about Simon: "You are Peter, and..."3 The meaning of this latter assertion in verses 18-19 is our primary concern here.

Simon Peter plays a prominent role in the wider Matthean narrative.4 He is given much more attention than than any other disciple of Jesus. He is the first disciple Jesus calls (4:18), and he is explicitly "first" in the list of the twelve apostles (10:2). However, things are not all rosy for Simon Peter. His faith falters when he walks on water (14:25-31). Immediately after Jesus's blessing of Peter in Caesarea Philippi, we find the account of Jesus's stern rebuke of Peter, "Get behind me, Satan!" when he fails to understand Jesus's saying about the cross (16:21-23). When Jesus finds his disciples asleep in Gethsemane, he directs the collective rebuke "to Peter" (26:40), as though he were responsible for the collective failure. Most famously of all, Matthew records Peter's threefold denial of Jesus in painstaking detail (26:33-35, 58, 69-75). Thus the Matthean Peter is a vitally important but deeply flawed character. (Space will not allow us to discuss the portrayal of Peter in Acts and other parts of the NT.)5

3. You are Peter, and upon this rock I will construct my Community

In saying, "You are Peter," Jesus is giving Simon Barjona a new name of great significance. Davies and Allison correctly observe that this moment stands in the grand tradition of important biblical figures receiving new names from God at pivotal moments (e.g., Abram becoming Abraham, Sarai becoming Sarah, Jacob becoming Israel).6 In this sense, Peter is being likened to an eschatological patriarch.

The sharpest Protestant-Catholic debate over this passage has concerned the referent of "this rock." It is unfortunate that in many sermons and popular-level discussions this debate continues, because it is largely resolved at the scholarly level. The rock is Peter. This is clear in the Greek from wordplay that is unfortunately lost in translation. The wordplay survives in French: "Et moi, je te le déclare, tu es Pierre et sur cette pierre je construirai mon église..."7 A rough English translation that preserves it might be, "You are Rocky, and on this rock..." The Greek reads, su ei Petros, kai epi tautē tē petra... The Greek word petra means "rock," while petros has a slightly different nuance, closer to "stone." If wordplay is intended, why is it not exact? Why is Simon named Petros and not Petra? The answer is simple: petra is a feminine word, so it has been modified in the nickname into a (relatively rare) masculine word, petros, of similar meaning. Actually, though, it is Matthew or his source who has encountered and resolved this little Greek linguistic problem. The saying was probably originally transmitted in Aramaic,8 where the word for "rock" (כפא, kephaʾ) is masculine, so no gender modification was required. Hence, in Aramaic terms Jesus would have said, "You are kephaʾ, and on this kephaʾ..." Originally, then, the wordplay was exact.9 For this reason, nearly all scholars today agree that Peter himself is "this rock [on which] I will construct my Community".10 Commentators also have some sharp words for those who, driven by theological bias, continue to propagate speculative interpretations of the rock, such as that it is Peter's faith, or Peter's confession in v. 16, or that it is Jesus.11

Most translations render this clause along the lines of, "You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church." I have translated, "construct my Community." "Construct" because Jesus is using a building construction metaphor here. Rock or stone is suitable as a building foundation (cf. Matt. 7:24-25; 21:42), and every other occurrence of the verb oikodomeō in Matthew refers to physical construction (7:24-26; 21:33; 21:42; 23:29; 26:61; 27:40). As most scholars agree, Jesus is likening his Community to a building, more specifically the Temple (an ecclesiological metaphor used elsewhere in the NT; cf. 1 Cor. 3:9-17; Eph. 2:19-21; 1 Pet. 2:5-8; Rev. 3:12).12 Matt. 16:18 is one of only two places in the Gospels where the word ekklēsia (usually translated "church") occurs (the other being Matt. 18:17). Jesus was foretelling that he would found the eschatological community that we today know as the Church. Perhaps Matthew's readers would have already understood ekklēsia as a technical term like "church," but in the original saying it would have come across as "my (Messianic) Community."13

To summarise, in this clause Jesus promises to make Simon Peter personally the foundation of his eschatological Community, which we know as the Church. Verse 19 elaborates on Simon Peter's role, but first we must touch on the last part of v. 18.

4. The gates of Hades will not be able to defeat it

There is considerable debate about the meaning of "the gates of Hades," but this need not detain us much here. In the cosmology of the context, heaven is the realm of God, earth is the realm of humankind, and Hades is the realm of darkness and death. Its depiction as having "gates" heightens the cosmological image. Syntactically speaking, the feminine pronoun "it" (autēs) could refer to the petra (rock) or the ekklēsia (Community); the latter seems more likely. The promise, then, is that as the eschatological Community extends the reign of God on earth (which has arrived in the ministry of Jesus; cf. Matt. 4:17; 12:28), the powers of evil, darkness and death will be unable to stop it.14 As this promise is sandwiched between assertions about Simon Peter, it appears that his role is instrumental to the success and survival of the eschatological Community.

5. I will give to you the keys of the kingdom of heaven

"You" here is singular in Greek (soi), so Jesus is still addressing Peter individually in v. 19. Before going further, we need to excise the popular picture of St. Peter standing at the pearly gates admitting souls into heaven.15 The second part of the verse makes it clear that Jesus is talking about Peter's activity "on earth." The "kingdom of heaven" in Matthew is not about sending people from earth to heaven, but releasing heaven on earth. The kingdom of heaven entails God's will being done "on earth, as it is in heaven" (Matt. 6:10). This occurs provisionally through the mission of Jesus and his eschatological Community (Matt. 28:18-20), and consummately at "the end of the age" when the Son of Man comes and removes all evil "out of his kingdom," so that "the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father" (Matt. 13:40-43).

The keys are universally recognized by scholars to denote authority.16 However, a more specific understanding of this metaphor is possible once we recognize, as numerous scholars have, that Matt. 16:19 alludes to Isa. 22:15-25.17 There, Isaiah speaks an oracle on behalf of Yahweh to "that official, Shebna, master of the palace" (v. 15). After condemning Shebna as a disgrace, Yahweh declares,

19 I will thrust you from your office and pull you down from your station. 20 On that day I will summon my servant Eliakim, son of Hilkiah; 21 I will clothe him with your robe, gird him with your sash, confer on him your authority. He shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to the house of Judah. 22 I will place the key of the House of David on his shoulder; what he opens, no one will shut, what he shuts, no one will open. 23 I will fix him as a peg in a firm place, a seat of honor for his ancestral house; 24 On him shall hang all the glory of his ancestral house: descendants and offspring, all the little dishes, from bowls to jugs. (Isa. 22:19-24 NABRE)

Here, then, we have an account of an "office" that comes with "authority," including being the bearer of "the key of the House of David." The imagery of opening and shutting irrevocably strikingly parallels that of binding and loosing with the backing of heaven in Matt. 16:19 (language that is discussed further below). Also corroborating the parallel is the reference to the "house of David," since in Matthew 16 Peter has just confessed Jesus to be the Messiah, the Son of God, which in Matthean parlance means the eschatological Davidic king (cf. Matt. 1:1 etc.).

One person (Shebna) is deposed from this office and another (Eliakim) is appointed in his place. Drawing extensively on biblical and archaeological research, Willis describes for us the status of "high government official under consideration here":18

סכן in Isa. 22.15 means 'substitute' (for the king), 'prefect', 'governor', 'steward', or 'deputy', that is, the person responsible for the care of the royal palace and of the people, thus the highest official in the land under the king... occurrences of the title אשר על הבית, '(he) who (is) over the house(hold)'... suggest that... it referred to a high governmental official who was in charge of the royal palace and its inhabitants, and later to one who held the highest post in the nation under the king and was over the entire royal estate. Accordingly, he held a governmental position similar to that of the 'chief steward' in Egypt and a high official in Canaanite city states. The contexts in which the Hebrew word אב 'father' (or its equivalent) appears as a term for a high governmental official in... indicate this individual was 'second in command' under the king, with very widespread administrative responsibilities. 'The key of the house of David' which which Yahweh says he will place on Eliakim’s shoulder (which, apparently, had been on Shebna’s shoulder) evidently refers to an actual large wooden key which the royal ‘steward’ carried on his shoulder to lock and unlock doors to various public buildings and offices, whose locks were large (cf. Judg. 3.25; 1 Chron. 9.27). Thus is signified his extensive authority in the Judean governmental administration. He was in charge of the governmental offices and royal chambers, and permitted or refused people to go in to the king. From the central governmental complex in the royal capital, he exercised supreme authority over the entire country.19

To summarise, we have in Isaiah 22 a description of a high office, the chief steward of the royal household, who is called a "father" to the house of Judah and is second-in-command in the kingdom, effectively a substitute for the king himself. Within the oracular narrative, one person (Shebna) is to be deposed from this office and another (Eliakim) appointed.20

Before discussing what all this might mean for our interpretation of Matt. 16:19, it is crucial to note that this is not the only NT passage to draw on Isa. 22:15-25. In Jesus's letter to the church in Philadelphia in Revelation, he describes himself as "The holy one, the true, who holds the key of David, who opens and no one shall close, who closes and no one shall open" (Rev. 3:7 NABRE). This is an almost word-for-word quotation of Isa. 22:22. However, here Jesus places himself in the office of chief steward of the king's household, the holder of the keys (cf. also Rev. 1:18). Implicitly, God is the king here and Jesus is his second-in-command.21 That Jesus could construe himself as the occupant of the office described in Isa. 22:15-25 shows just how lofty and important this office was. It also shows that this oracle was being interpreted eschatologically in the early church.

Back then to Matt. 16:19 with this information in hand. Here, Jesus is cast in the role of king (16:16) and appoints Peter as his second-in-command, his chief steward over the royal household. Alternatively, one might argue that God is the ultimate king, that he will delegate absolute authority to his Messiah, and that the Messiah will in turn delegate this authority (symbolized by the keys) to Peter. The risen Jesus declares, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me" (Matt. 28:18). However, because he will not physically exercise this authority "on earth" after ascending to heaven, he delegates it to his eschatological Community, his royal household—and ultimately, to Peter, the chief steward over the royal household.

In light of this Isaianic background to Matt. 16:19, commentators have variously described Peter as "the major domo of [Jesus's] kingdom,"22 "the chief steward, the major domus, in the Kingdom,"23 "the steward (the chief administrative officer) in the kingdom of heaven,"24 having "the same authority as that vested in the vizier, the master of the house, the chamberlain, of the royal household in ancient Israel,"25 "a sort of supreme rabbi or prime minister of the kingdom,"26 "the primary custodian and guarantor of the tradition of the teaching of Jesus."27

6. Whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven

Jesus's appointment of Peter as his chief steward who will oversee his royal household is backed up with an additional promise. The second-person verbs are singular in Greek, so the addressee is still Peter individually. The "binding and loosing" metaphor is a subject of extensive debate that actually merits a separate article. At least two other verses come into play here: Matt. 18:18, where a similar promise is made to the Community collectively (with plural verbs) and John 20:23, where the risen Jesus tells the disciples (i.e. apostles), "Receive the holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained." Via a linguistic argument that we cannot reproduce here, some scholars have concluded that these are all modified versions of an original Aramaic saying that followed Isa. 22:22, along these lines: "whatever you open is opened (by God); whatever you shut is shut (by God)."28 John 20:23 interprets/applies the saying specifically to the matter of forgiveness of sins. Matt. 18:18 applies it to the matter of disciplining (and ultimately excommunicating) a sinning member.29 In Matt. 16:19, most scholars agree that the scope of binding and loosing is broader and more general, comprising halakhic authority (authority over religious law, i.e. determining dos and don'ts for community members) and/or doctrinal authority.30 This is, of course, closely related to forgiveness of sins and community discipline, because before a sinner can be forgiven or disciplined it is necessary to determine what is and is not sin.31

Therefore, this saying most likely assumes that Peter has the authority to make rulings on what is permitted and what is forbidden in the community. What is more, Jesus asserts that when Peter makes rulings on earth, these rulings "will have been" made in heaven. Most scholars believe that the rare verb tense (future perfect passive) used here should be taken seriously.32 Hence, Jesus is not saying that heaven will ratify Peter's rulings, but that whatever rulings Peter makes will already have been ratified in heaven. This does not, as Turner claims, diminish the weight of delegated earthly authority;33 rather, it properly relates it to divine authority. Peter's rulings still carry divine authority, but he cannot preempt God. Rather, God makes a ruling and then communicates it to the Community through Peter.

7. The priestly aspect of Peter's role

Ganzel notes that the office described in Isa. 22:15-25 is not only political but has a religious dimension: Eliakim is "garbed in sacerdotal vestments," which implies that "another aspect of his role was to protect the sanctity of the holy places... the preservation of the status of the palace, the Temple, and Jerusalem."34 Barber goes further, noting that in early Jewish tradition there are "several indications that Isaiah 22 was understood as describing Eliakim as a priestly figure."35 Accordingly, several scholars have come to the conclusion that Peter in Matt. 16:17-19 is depicted in a priestly role, perhaps even as high priest in the eschatological Community.36 This finds support in John 20:23 where, as already noted, a similar saying has been explicitly interpreted in terms of the priestly function of forgiving and retaining sins.

Thus, if we give full weight to the Isaianic background of Matt. 16:17-19, it is apparent that Jesus is appointing Peter to a high office with halakhic, doctrinal and priestly scope, second in kingdom authority only to King Jesus himself.

8. The polemical dimension to the saying

Scholars have observed that by describing Peter as the rock on which his spiritual House (Temple) is built, by making him the chief steward of the royal household and by delegating to him heaven-backed halakhic authority, Jesus is implicitly denying these prerogatives to the existing Jewish religious system.37 "The scribes and Pharisees have taken their seat on the chair of Moses," says Jesus (Matt. 23:2), which is regarded by many scholars as a description of teaching authority (whether arrogated or real).38 The Pharisees "tie up heavy burdens and lay them on people's shoulders, but they will not lift a finger to move them" (Matt. 23:4)—a failure of their "binding and loosing" responsibilities.39 The scribes and Pharisees "lock the kingdom of heaven before human beings" (Matt. 23:13), and so their authority over the kingdom is taken away (Matt. 21:43) and the keys given to Peter instead. The Jerusalem Temple will be destroyed (Matt. 24:2), but "something greater than the temple" has come (Matt. 12:6); Jesus is building a new, spiritual Temple and founding it on Peter the rock.

Within the context of this polemic, one must consider Jesus's words in Matt. 23:8-12. After excoriating the scribes and Pharisees for their self-aggrandizement, Jesus declares,

8 As for you, do not be called 'Rabbi.' You have but one teacher, and you are all brothers. 9 Call no one on earth your father; you have but one Father in heaven. 10 Do not be called 'Master'; you have but one master, the Messiah. 11 The greatest among you must be your servant. 12 Whoever exalts himself will be humbled; but whoever humbles himself will be exalted. (NABRE)

How can we to square this with the notion that Jesus has appointed Peter as something akin to Chief Rabbi, an office that in Isaiah is called "master of the palace" and "father"? The answer is not to water down the saying in Matt. 16:17-19 and conclude that Matthew envisions a democratically egalitarian community without hierarchy.40 Rather, as verses 11-12 emphasize, authority in the kingdom of heaven is subject to the higher principle of service. It is not authority that is the problem, it is how the authority is exercised: whether in a domineering way like the Gentile rulers (Matt. 20:25), a fame-loving way like the scribes and Pharisees (Matt. 23:7), or a serving, sacrificial way like the Son of Man (Matt. 20:28). Moreover, even Peter as chief steward of the royal household is but the first among servants, among disciples—the distance between his rank and that of his fellow disciples is tiny compared to the distance between his rank and those of God and his Messiah.

9. Summary of exegetical findings

In response to Simon Barjona's confession of faith in his Messiahship at Caesarea Philippi, Jesus gave him a new name, Peter, symbolizing his pivotal position as the rock on which the new Temple, the Messianic Community, will be founded (v. 18). We can sum up our findings on v. 19 thus:

the major opinion of modern exegetes… has it that Peter, as a sort of supreme rabbi or prime minister of the kingdom, is in 16.19 given teaching authority, given that is the power to declare what is permitted...and what is not permitted...Peter can decide by doctrinal decision what Christians must and must not do. This is the traditional Roman Catholic understanding, with the proviso that Peter had successors.41

10. Ecclesiological implications: papacy or no papacy?

The above summary identifies the point at which an exegetical argument for the papacy from Matt. 16:17-19 breaks down: no successors to Peter are mentioned.42 I have elsewhere offered historical evidence for apostolic succession; I will close this article by arguing that this saying, interpreted theologically in its wider Matthean context, logically necessitates a papacy. By "a" papacy, I mean a perpetual line of individual successors to Peter who continue his office as holder of the keys of the kingdom of heaven. It cannot be proven from Matthew that the Roman Catholic bishops of Rome are this line of successors, though I know of no rival claim that has any historical credibility.

First, the observation that Matt. 16:17-19 does not mention Peter's successors is an argument from silence. Matthew construes these words as spoken to Peter during Jesus's earthly ministry; their scope is the church's earliest beginnings and not the full sweep of ecclesiastical history. Matthew's Gospel, like most of the New Testament, shows little explicit concern with the problem of post-apostolic church order. Although the writers did not know the day or the hour of the Son of Man's coming (cf. Matt. 24:36), they expected it to come soon (cf. e.g., Phil. 4:5; Jas 5:8; Rev. 22:20) and thus did not anticipate a long post-apostolic era. Nevertheless, since Peter was almost certainly dead by the time Matthew's Gospel was written, the prominence given to Peter suggests that his authority retained ongoing relevance for the Matthean community.43 While Matthew does not spell out in what form Petrine authority might still exist after Peter's death, he also does not mention any cessation of Petrine authority (nor does he even have Jesus foretell Peter's death, as John does [21:18-19]). Furthermore, if Matthew understood Peter's office as analogous to the Jewish priesthood or high priesthood, this would have contributed to the idea that the office was transferable. The argument from silence cuts both ways and is finally inconclusive.

At the close of Matthew's Gospel, Jesus gives the Great Commission (Matt. 28:18-20). He declares that "all authority in heaven and on earth" has been given to him, and on that basis ("Go therefore") he sends the Eleven out on their global mission of baptizing and teaching. This command is accompanied by a promise, "And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age." In Matthean parlance, "the end of the age" corresponds to the coming of the Son of Man and the final judgment (13:39-43; 13:49; 24:3). So, Jesus's commission to the Eleven, rooted in Jesus's absolute authority over heaven and earth, remains in force and has the full backing of Jesus's authority and presence, until the Second Coming. It therefore remains in force today. However, "the Eleven" (28:16), to whom these words were explicitly spoken, are all long dead. We are therefore bound to concede that, although Matthew is silent on how this delegated authority to baptize and teach might continue after the Eleven died, it did and does continue.

Now, in Matt. 16:17-19 we have a specific and concrete instance of Jesus's delegation of some of his "all authority in heaven and on earth." He founds his Community on an individual, earthly "chief steward," Simon Peter, who receives an earthly commission with heavenly backing. Do the words, "I am with you always, until the end of the age" not apply as much to Peter's individual commission as to the Eleven's collective commission in 28:19? Both flow out of Jesus's absolute, undying authority over heaven and earth. We can as easily argue that the Great Commission died with the Eleven as that the keys died with Peter. Both events would contradict the promise, "I am with you always" as well as the promise, "and the gates of Hades shall not be able to defeat it." As is clear from the Isaianic background, the keys given to Peter symbolize an office (one that has two successive occupants within the background narrative itself). I suggest, then, that if Jesus still has "all authority in heaven and on earth," and is still "with" his Community, the keys of the kingdom of heaven that he gave to Peter must still be held by someone.

A final note concerns the ecclesiological benefits of a unitary, visible head of the Community, a doctrinal and halakhic authority whose rulings are final, backed by heaven. As Cardinal Newman explained in his classic Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, the full authority of the papacy took centuries to be acknowledged and asserted. Nevertheless, if one considers the collective "binding and loosing" authority of Matt. 18:18 without the individual "binding and loosing" authority of Matt. 16:19, the problem arises, what if members or factions within the Community cannot agree on a doctrinal or halakhic matter? What if two factions mutually excommunicate each other, both declaring their ruling to be backed up by heaven? What is to be done in such cases? Sadly, church history reminds us that these questions are not merely hypothetical. But an individual holder of the keys, a chief steward of the king's household, seated on the chair of St. Peter, offers an unambiguous resolution of such conundrums. If Jesus saw fit to found his Community with an individual chief steward in charge—who happened to be a deeply flawed person, apart from the help of the Holy Spirit—why should an individual chief steward subsequently become a bad idea for the Community?

Footnotes

• 1 W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, Jr., A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on The Gospel According to St. Matthew (3 vols.; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1988-1991), 2:623.
• 2 A hostile witness argument entails citing scholars from an opposing ecclesiastical camp against their own theological position. The idea is something like, "Even some of your own admit that your theology is wrong! If even your own scholars are not convinced by your arguments, what makes you think I will be?" I have two objections to this line of reasoning. First, as discussed here, when an ecclesiastical tradition is willing to host debate on theological issues and to allow its scholars to air dissenting exegetical viewpoints, this is a sign of intellectual maturity and not weakness. Second, the post-Vatican II climate in biblical scholarship has been strongly ecumenical, and in keeping with this new ethos, some scholars are eager to show themselves more self-critical than polemical. To use this hard-fought openness in exegetical and theological dialogue to score polemical points is, in my view, not in good taste.
• 3 "The Greek phrasing of this declaration, when compared with that of v. 16, conveys a reciprocity which can be rendered in English only by heavy overtranslation. Simon has declared, ‘You are the Messiah,’ to which Jesus now responds, ‘And I in my turn have a declaration for you: You are Peter.’" (R. T. France, The Gospel of Matthew [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007], 620)
• 4 "Matthew has made it clear in 10:2 that Peter comes ‘first’ among the Twelve. Throughout the gospel he is mentioned far more often than any other disciple, and he regularly takes the lead." (France, Gospel of Matthew, 622)
• 5 We can just note Bauckham's assessment concerning Acts: "Up to chapter 11, it is unquestionably Peter who is pre-eminent among the leaders of the church, and Luke’s first reference to James (12:17) is designed to suggest that James’ rise to eminence coincided with Peter’s relinquishing of permanent leadership in Jerusalem... in chapter 12 the narrative has reached the point where leadership at the centre in Jerusalem can no longer be combined with personal leadership in the missionary movement out from the centre. Peter, who had combined these roles, steps out of the narrative. James steps in, as the wise and statesmanlike leader at the centre, while Paul assumes the leading role in at least one movement of the gospel further and further out from the centre. However, the issue in chapter 12 is not only the succession to Peter himself. Peter has appeared in the earlier chapters of Acts not simply as an individual leader, but as the leading member of the Twelve." (Richard J. Bauckham, "James and the Jerusalem Church", in The Book of Acts in its First Century Setting, vol. 4, ed. Richard J. Bauckham [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995], 432, 436).
• 6 Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:623-24; cf. France, Gospel of Matthew, 620.
• 7 Pierre Bonnard, L’Évangile selon Saint Matthieu, 2nd edn (Paris: Delachaux & Niestlé, 1970), 241
• 8 Two lines of evidence support this conclusion. First, two other NT writers preserve a Greek transliteration of Peter's Aramaic name, Kēphas = Kephaʾ (John 1:42; 1 Cor. 1:12; Gal. 1:18; etc.). John 1:42 explicitly tells us that Petros is a translation of Kephaʾ. Secondly, Jesus's saying in Matt. 16:17-19 contains at least two other Semitisms: the name Simon Barjona (the prefix "Bar" being Aramaic for "son of") and the Semitic idiom "flesh and blood," which denotes mere mortals in contrast to God and angels.
• 9 On the wordplay issue, see Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:627; Donald A. Hagner, Matthew (2 vols.; Dallas: Word Books, 1993, 1995), 2:470; France, Gospel according to Matthew, 621.
• 10 "A majority of exegetes from all denominations therefore support the view that Peter is the petra: the rock or foundation stone on which Jesus will build his church" (Hans Kvalbein, "The Authorization of Peter in Matthew 16:17-19: A Reconsideration of the Power to Bind and Loose", in The Formation of the Early Church, ed. Jostein Ådna [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005], 153); "Although some Protestants disagree (see esp. Caragounis 1989), Jesus plays on the nickname Peter in speaking of him (as spokesman for the disciples) as the foundation of the nascent church (cf. Eph. 2:20; Rev. 21:14). This more natural understanding of Jesus’s words is preferable other views that take the rock to be Jesus or Peter’s confession of Jesus" (David L. Turner, Matthew [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008], 404-405).
• 11 "καὶ ἐπὶ ταύτῃ τῇ πέτρᾳ has been the object of much heated debate and much wasted ingenuity. ‘This rock’ has been identified variously with Peter’s faith or confession, with Peter’s preaching office, with the truth revealed to Peter, with the twelve apostles, with Jesus, with Jesus’ teaching, and even with God himself. All this is special pleading. The most natural interpretation is that of Roman Catholic tradition: the rock is Peter." (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:627); "The frequent attempts that have been made, largely in the past, to deny [that it is Peter who is the rock upon which the church is to be built] in favor of the view that the confession itself is the rock (e.g., most recently Caragounis) seem to be largely motivated by Protestant prejudice against a passage that is used by the Roman Catholics to justify the papacy. Not infrequently these attempts reveal the improper influence of passages such as 1 Cor 3:11 and Eph 2:20. But to allow this passage its natural meaning, that Peter is the rock upon which the church is built, is by no means either to affirm the papacy or to deny that the church, like the apostles, rests upon Jesus as the bedrock of its existence." (Hagner, Matthew, 2:470); "A second escape route, beloved especially by those who wish to refute the claims of the Roman Catholic Church based on the primacy of Peter as the first pope, is to assert that the foundation rock is not Peter himself, but the faith in Jesus as Messiah which he has just declared. If that was what Jesus intended, he has chosen his words badly, as the wordplay points decisively toward Peter, to whom personally he has just given the name, as the rock, and there is nothing in his statement to suggest otherwise. Even more bizarre is the supposition that Jesus, having declared Simon to be Petros, then pointed instead to himself when he said the words ‘this rock.’ This would be consonant would subsequent NT language about Jesus as the foundation stone (see below), but in regard to this passage it is the exegesis of desperation; if such an abrupt change of subject were intended, it would surely require a ‘but’ rather than an ‘and,’ and could hardly be picked up by the reader without some ‘stage direction’ (as in 9:6) to indicate the new reference." (France, Gospel according to Matthew, 622)
• 12 "que cette parole du Christ matthéen est moins isolée qu’on l’a dit puisque, dans son fond, comme l’a remarqué Cullmann, elle correspond à sa déclaration sur la construction ou reconstruction du Temple, parole diversement recueillie par la tradition évangélique (Mc. 14.57 s; Jn. 2.19) et qui doit avoir joué un rôle décisif au procès de Jésus" (Bonnard, L'Évangile selon saint Mathieu, 245); "Lampe (v) seems to assume that it would be awkward to speak of building upon a stone instead of a rock; but the image behind Mt 16.18 is of a temple being constructed, and in Judaism the temple was founded not upon a rock but upon a (foundation) stone" (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:626); "The metaphorical use of ‘build’ (οἰκοδομήσω) is appropriate to a community conceived of as a spiritual ‘house’ or ‘temple’ (cf. ‘house of Israel’ and note the description of the church as ‘God’s building’ in 1 Cor 3:9; cf. Eph 2:19-21)." (Hagner, Matthew, 2:471); "The metaphors of (foundation) rock and of building go together, and the latter will be used frequently in the NT for the development of the church, often linked with the idea of a new temple to replace the old one in Jerusalem (e.g., Mark 14:58; 1 Cor 3:9-17; Eph 2:19-22; 1 Pet 2:5); the metaphor of a new temple has already been introduced by Matthew in the reference to ‘something greater than the temple’ in 12:6, and will underlie much of the language about the destruction of the temple in ch. 24 and the charge that Jesus planned to destroy and rebuild the temple in 26:61; 27:40." (France, Gospel according to Matthew, 623); "Jesus' response to Peter that he will "build" the church thus appears connected to the Davidic imagery already evoked by the apostles confession; that is, as the "son of David" he will build the eschatological temple, here identified as the church." (Michael Patrick Barber, "Jesus as the Davidic Temple Builder and Peter’s Priestly Role in Matthew 16:16-19," Journal of Biblical Literature 132 [2013]: 941)
• 13 "When Matthew uses the Greek word ekklēsia for the community to be built by Jesus on the rock of Peter, he is most certainly not putting a later development of Christian self-organisation back into the earlier gospel context. The translation of the word here and in 18:17 as ‘church’ is perhaps slightly unfortunate and at any rate, Peter himself cannot have understood it thus, in the acquired sense of this term. His idea of ekklēsia was the one given in the Old Testament: it was God’s congregation, originally the people of Israel, a usage of the Greek word preserved in the New Testament by Stephen in his speech (Acts 7:38) and by the writer of Hebrews (2:12). For Peter therefore, Jesus did not speak of ‘my church’, but of ‘my congregation’—it was the new community to be established by Jesus, through the new covenant, that was meant, and the stress is quite clearly on the possessive pronoun. If we want to go on using ‘church’ in this passage, we can do so only provided we keep in mind that the meaning of the word as used in that dialogue between Jesus and Peter was quite different from what we have become accustomed to see in it. This does not preclude a measure of development, or the existence of certain structures within this ekklēsia, even in New Testament times: Paul in 1 Cor. 12:38 uses the word in the context of a primitive organisational hierarchy. But wherever we look, in Acts (8:3, 15:41, 20:28) and in Paul’s own letters (e.g. 1 Cor. 7:17, 14:33, 16:19; and particularly in Rom. 16:5, 16:16), the term refers to the mere body of Christians, the congregation as such. Whatever may have happened to this congregation, and to Peter within it, after the Ascension, in Jerusalem, Antioch, Rome and elsewhere, when Jesus uses the word in Mt. 16:17 it is in a Messianic reinterpretation of the Old Testament concept—a reinterpretation, however, that puts Peter unmistakably in a key position." (Carsten P. Thiede, Simon Peter: From Galilee to Rome [Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1988], 39-40)
• 14 "Contrary to the usual interpretation of our passage, the locus of this revelation, the church, will not be a vestibule into the kingdom of heaven conceived as a realm, a domain which human beings enter to escape from the assaults of Hades. The church will rather be the site of the battle between the powers of Hades and the power of heaven. In the age inaugurated by Jesus' death and resurrection, the gates of the underworld will swing open and the horrors of the pit will erupt onto the earth with a roar, attacking everything on it—including the church—with unbridled fury. In the midst of this peril, however, Peter will be given the keys that unlock the gates of heaven. Those gates, too, will swing open, and the kingly power of God (basileia tōn ouranōn) will break forth from heaven to enter the arena against the demons. Hades will not prevail against the church because God will be powerfully at work in it, revealing his purposes for it and imparting the heavenly power to fulfill those purposes, so that his will is done on earth as it is in heaven (6:10)." (Joel Marcus, "The Gates of Hades and the Keys of the Kingdom (Matt 16:18-19)", Catholic Biblical Quarterly 50 [1988]: 455); "It is possible that there is a mythological background to the imagery of the rock. ‘My church’, interpreted in the light of 2 Sam 7 (see p. 603), evokes the idea of a temple, and the conception of the people of God as a temple was well known in both Judaism and early Christianity. This is important because in Jewish tradition the rock at the base of the temple on Zion, the so-called ʾeben setiyya, is at the centre of the world. It links heaven and the underworld, being the gate to the former as well as the portal to Hades, the realm of the dead. Note that in 16.18c mention is made of the ‘gates of Hades’. Perhaps, then, the informed reader should imagine the church at the centre of the cosmos, sitting on top of the powers of evil.” (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:627-28). Davies and Allison take the gates of Hades to refer "not to the realm of the dead but to the ungodly powers of the underworld which will assail the church... The promise is that even the full fury of the underworld’s demonic forces will not overcome the church” (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:632-33). Differently, France: "The ‘gates’ thus represent the imprisoning power of death: death will not be able to imprison and hold the church of the living God. The metaphor, when seen against its OT background, does not therefore encourage the suggestion of some interpreters that ‘Hades’ represents not death but the demonic powers of the underworld, which are then pictured as making an eschatological assault on the church. Still less does it support the romantic imagery, sometimes derived from the traditional but incorrect translation ‘gates of hell,’ of the church as a victorious army storming the citadel of the devil. The imagery is rather of death being unable to swallow up the new community which Jesus is building. It will never be destroyed." (Gospel according to Matthew, 624-25)
• 15 "Peter will act on Christ’s behalf after the Ascension, not in heaven (it is in blatant contradiction to the text if Christian folk myth sees Peter standing at the gates of heaven), but here on earth (Mt. 16:19). He will have to open the doors of the kingdom of heaven to those who have accepted the risen Christ as their Lord, and to shut them to those who have not." (Thiede, Simon Peter, 41); "The traditional portrayal of Peter as porter at the pearly gates depends on misunderstanding ‘the kingdom of heaven’ here as a designation of the afterlife rather than denoting God’s rule among his people on earth." (France, Gospel according to Matthew, 625)
• 16 "The giving of keys manifestly means the bestowing of authority; to have keys means to have power, to be in control (cf. Rev 1.18; 2 En. 40.9-11; b. Sanh. 113a)." (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:635)
• 17 "The first line recalls the words spoken of Eliakim (self-applied to Jesus in Rev. 3:7) in Isa. xxii. 22: 'And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder' (cp. Rev. iii. 7). Here the key symbolizes a particular office which is held by an individual; similarly, Matt. xvi. 19 is addressed to an individual" (J. A. Emerton, "Binding and Loosing—Forgiving and Retaining," Journal of Theological Studies 13 [1962]: 325); "Matthew’s description of Peter’s great confession of Christ and then opposition to his announcement that he would go to Jerusalem and be crucified there (Mt. 16.13-23) assumes that his readers knew the Old Testament passage concerning Shebna and Eliakim in Isa. 22.15-25. There are three critical issues in this Matthean pericope, the solution to each of which may be illuminated by recognizing the way this Isaianic text provides a background for it." (John T. Willis, "An Interpretation of Isaiah 22.15-25 and its Function in the New Testament," in Early Christian Interpretation of the Scriptures of Israel: Investigations and Proposals, ed. Craig A. Evans and James A. Sanders [Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1997], 344); "As many scholars have noted, Jesus bestowal of the "keys of the kingdom" on Peter in Matt 16:19 appears to draw on Isa 22:22, where the "key of the house of David" is given to Eliakim, a figure given the position of "chief steward."" (Barber, "Jesus as the Davidic Temple Builder," 944); "the giving of the keys of the Kingdom of heaven to Peter has its closest OT parallel in Isa 22.22… Although this verse does not appear to have received a messianic interpretation in Judaism, ‘the house of David’ did have messianic associations, and the text—which is applied to Jesus in Rev 3.7—is about the activity of a man second only to the king. That it lies behind Mt 18.19 is altogether likely (cf. Emerton (v))." (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:603); Hagner acknowledges "the links between v 19 and Isa 22:22," though he does not discuss them in detail (Matthew, 2:472); "Taking up the imagery of Isa 22:20-22, Jesus declares Peter to be the steward (the chief administrative officer) in the kingdom of heaven, who will hold the keys, so that, like Eliakim, the new steward (cf. Isa 22:15) in the kingdom of David, ‘he will open, and no one shall shut; he will shut, and no one shall open.’" (France, Gospel according to Matthew, 625).
• 18 Willis, "Interpretation of Isaiah 22.15-25," 337
• 19 Willis, "Interpretation of Isaiah 22.15-25," 337-38. Similarly, Ganzel describes the position described in this passage as "one of the highest offices in the land, second only to the king, and comparable to the medieval majordomo. It has even been suggested that Shebna's authority exceeded that of the king" (Tova Ganzel, "Isaiah’s Critique of Sheba’s Trespass: A Reconsideration of Isaiah 22.15-25," Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 39 [2015]: 471). Again, "The description of Eliakim’s function ‘as a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem’ is not an expansion of his spheres of responsibility, but rather details the expectations of the person who will now carry out the second-most-important office in the land" (Ganzel, "Israel's Critique of Shebna's Trespass," 483)
• 20 Verse 25 may indicate that Eliakim himself would ultimately also fail in this office and be deposed, although Ganzel regards this verse as recapitulating what was to happen to Shebna, so that "regarding Eliakim, the oracle concludes on an optimistic note" ("Israel's Critique of Shebna's Trespass," 486).
• 21 "In the context of Isa. 22.15-25, the king is Hezekiah and, first Shebna, then Eliakim is his major domo; and, essentially parallel to this, in Rev. 3.7, God is the king and Christ is his major domo. Under God’s appointment to this position, Christ has complete authority over God’s kingdom; he has the key of David, and he allows or forbids people to enter that kingdom." (Willis, "Interpretation of Isaiah 22.15-25," 350).
• 22 Willis, "Interpretation of Isaiah 22.15-25," 351.
• 23 Alan Hugh McNeile, The Gospel according to Matthew (London: Macmillan, 1915), 243.
• 24 France, Gospel according to Matthew, 625.
• 25 W. F. Albright and C. S. Mann, Matthew: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (New York: Doubleday, 1971), 196-97.
• 26 Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:638.
• 27 Hagner, Matthew, 2:473.
• 28 Cf. Emerton, "Binding and Loosing," 328-31; Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:640-41.
• 29 "the halakhic decisions of the community have the authority of heaven itself. In context the reference is to the church’s verdict on the behaviour of an individual Christian." (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:787)
• 30 "it is probable that the practice to which the Matthean ‘binding and loosing’ refers is the interpretation of the Scriptures and the determination of an appropriate Christian way of life" (Raymond F. Collins, “Binding and Loosing,” in Anchor Bible Dictionary, ed. David Noel Freedman, 6 vols. [New York: Doubleday, 1992], 1:743-45.744); "the major opinion of modern exegetes… has it that Peter, as a sort of supreme rabbi or prime minister of the kingdom, is in 16.19 given teaching authority, given that is the power to declare what is permitted (cf. the rabbinic sere/sera’) and what is not permitted (cf. the rabbinic ’asar/’asar). Peter can decide by doctrinal decision what Christians must and must not do...This interpretation of binding and loosing in terms of teaching authority seems to us to be correct" (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:638); "Peter has the authority to ‘bind’ and ‘loose’ by issuing authoritative halakhah" (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:787); "In its primary meaning, the phrase ‘binding and loosing’ refers to the allowing and disallowing of certain conduct, based on an interpretation of the commandments of the Torah, and thus it concerns the issue of whether or not one is in proper relationship to the will of God (contrast the reference to the Pharisees’ misuse of their authority [note implied keys!] in 23:13)… Matthew may have in mind the teaching office of Peter and the apostles (for whom the power of binding and loosing is also assumed in the plural verbs of 18.18 in the discourse on ‘church discipline’)." (Hagner, Matthew, 2:473); "The metaphor of ‘tying up’ and ‘untying’ also speaks of administrative authority. The terms are used in rabbinic literature for declaring what is and is not permitted. When the same commission is given to the whole disciple group in 18:18, it will be specifically in the context of dealing with sin within their community (see comments there). Such authority to declare what is and is not permissible will of course have personal consequences for the person judged to have sinned, but it is the prior judgment in principle which is the focus of the ‘tying’ metaphor, and there, as here, the objects of both verbs will be expressed in the neuter, not the masculine; it is things, issues, which are being untied, not people as such. The historical role of Peter in Acts well illustrates the metaphor, as it was to him that the responsibility fell of declaring that Gentiles might be accepted as members of the new ekklēsia (10:1-11:18), though of course the exercise of his disciplinary authority could also have dire personal consequences for those who stepped over the mark (Acts 5:1-11; cf. 8:20-24)." (France, Gospel according to Matthew, 626); "Matthew may have intended his authorization to encompass not only matters of doctrine but also excommunication, and even determination of the ultimate destiny of church members." (Richard H. Hiers, "‘Binding’ and ‘Loosing’: The Matthean Authorizations," Journal of Biblical Literature 104 [1985]: 249); "Therefore, it seems best to side with those exegetes who interpret "binding and loosing" in Matt 16:19 as declaring forbidden or permitted, i.e., promulgation of authoritative halakah. Our passage speaks of the revelation to Peter in the earthly sphere of the interpretation of the law that has been decided in heaven. He is given total power on earth to distinguish valid from invalid prohibitions, "binding" upon human beings the observance of certain of them—even some not explicit in the Mosaic torah—and "loosing" them from the observance of others of them—even some enjoined by Moses" (Marcus, "Gates of Hades," 452).
• 31 "The three most popular interpretive options relate the imagery of "binding" and "loosing" to (1) teaching authority, (2) authority over social boundaries, and (3) forgiveness of sins. As I shall explain, however, these three options appear to involve conceptual overlap, making it difficult to insist that any one meaning is exclusively in view." (Barber, "Jesus as the Davidic Temple Builder," 947)
• 32 "The Greek expressions ἔσται δεδεμένον (δεδεμένα) and ἔσται λελυμένον (λελυμένα) are future perfect periphrastics. Since this syntactical form is rare in the New Testament, the force of its meaning must be respected here. Hence, the statements in which these periphrastics appear in Mt. 16.19 and 18.18 should be rendered: ‘Whatever you shall bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatever you shall loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven’ (so also the Vg.). ‘It is the Church on earth carrying out heaven’s decisions, communicated by the Spirit, and not heaven ratifying the Church’s decisions.’" (Willis, "Interpretation of Isaiah 22.15-25," 348-49); "It seems likely, therefore that these repeated future perfects are there for a reason. They change the sequence of actions. With simple futures, Peter would take the initiative and heaven would follow. But with future perfects the impression is that when Peter makes his decision it will be found to have been already made in heaven, making him not the initiator of new directions for the church, but the faithful steward of God’s prior decisions. In this syntactical form the saying becomes a promise not of divine endorsement, but of divine guidance to enable Peter to decide in accordance with God’s already determined purpose." (France, Gospel according to Matthew, 627)
• 33 Cf. Turner, Matthew, 405.
• 34 Ganzel, "Israel's Critique of Shebna's Trespass," 485.
• 35 Barber, "Jesus as the Davidic Temple Builder," 944.
• 36 "Jesus is the Davidic messiah, who, like the son of David, will build a temple, understood as the community. Given that the community is described as a temple, it is no wonder that Jesus describes Peter s leadership role over it in terms of priestly authority; as God appointed the priestly Eliakim in Isaiah, Jesus establishes Peter as a priestly figure over the temple community." (Barber, "Jesus as the Davidic Temple Builder," 953); "In the material which was used by the final redactor Peter was looked upon as a counterpart to the high priest. He is the highest representative for the people of God, for a church metaphorically said to be built on the temple mount. Thus the frames of reference for this tradition are priestly. This influences our interpretation of the contrasting words "bind" and "loose" in v 19. If this verse is to be interpreted in the light of the priestly frames of reference which we have found in the Enoch-Levi-tradition, it deals with binding in and loosing from sin, i.e. a priestly function given to Peter instead of to the temple priests under the high priest." (Tord Fornberg, "Peter—the High Priest of the new covenant?" East Asia Journal of Theology 4 [1986]: 116)
• 37 "We have already remarked on our preference for interpretation (x): Peter is the authoritative teacher without peer. This harmonizes with the dominant rabbinic usage and, more importantly, with 23.13: ‘But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you shut the kingdom of Heaven against men; for you neither enter yourselves, nor allow those who would enter to go in.’ Here, as the context proves, the scribes shut the door to the kingdom by issuing false doctrine. The image is closely related to 16.19, and the inference lies near to hand that just as the kingdom itself is taken from the Jewish leaders and given to the church (21.43), so are the keys of the kingdom taken from the scribes and Pharisees and given to Peter. Supportive of this is the broader context of Peter’s confession. In the immediately preceding 16.5-12 Jesus warns: ‘Beware of the leaven of the scribes and Pharisees’. Matthew takes this to be about the teaching of the scribes and Pharisees. It would make good sense for the evangelist, in the very next paragraph, to tell a story in which Jesus replaces the Jewish academy with his own ‘chief rabbi’." (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:639); “In Matthew we find two scribal "schools" opposing each other, the Matthean one and the Pharisaic one. This situation is mirrored in two pericopes preceeding our text, Matt 15:1-20 and 16:5-12, where v12 explicitly warns the reader for the teaching (didache) of the Pharisees and Sadducees. In these two texts Matthew makes Jesus repudiate the Jewish magisterium. This prepares the way for our pericope about the Petrine magisterium.” (Fornberg, "Peter—the High Priest of the new covenant?", 116)
• 38 "The ‘teaching chair’ is not, as was consistently thought in the church’s interpretation, a pure metaphor; there is archaeological evidence for it from various ancient synagogues—of course, without the designation ‘seat of Moses.’ It was a marble seat near the Torah shrine on which the learned man sat and taught facing the people. Such teaching chairs were probably just coming into use in the first century CE. The ‘teaching chair’ in the synagogue is probably associated with the idea of Moses’ authority that came down to the scribes by way of elders and prophets (m. ʾAbot. 1.1). Thus the archaeological-realistic and the metaphorical meanings of the term belong together. The aorist ‘sat’ (ἐκάθισαν) can definitely be understood literally. The scribes and Pharisees put themselves on the seat of Moses. That is, in the time to which Matthew looks back, they appropriated for themselves the teaching authority in the synagogues." (Ulrich Luz, Matthew: A Commentary, 3 vols. [trans. James E. Crouch; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001-2007], 3:99); "‘Moses’ seat’ can be taken in four different ways, between which it is impossible to decide. (i) Old synagogues at Chorazin, Delos, Dura Europos and elsewhere contained not only stone benches but isolated stone seats. These have been identified as chairs for synagogue presidents and so connected with our text. The difficulty, however, is that the said synagogues were all built several centuries after Matthew. Further, there is no inscriptional support for the identification. Still, καθέδρα was used by the rabbis (qetidra’), and late texts know the expression, ‘cathedra of Moses’; so we do not have here an originally Christian formulation. (ii) ‘Seat of Moses’ may be a metaphor for teaching authority (cf. ex cathedra and the professor’s ‘chair’): the scribes and Pharisees teach with Moses’ authority (cf. m. ’Abot. 1.1). In other words, they run his ‘school’. Certainly the name ‘Moses’ connotes authority; and the image of Moses sitting on Sinai was well known in ancient Judaism (cf. the Moses typology in Mt 5.1-2). Maybe the contrast between the plural subject, ‘scribes and Pharisees’, and the singular, ‘seat’, favours the non-literal interpretation. Note, however, that interpretation (ii) is contained within (i); for one who sat on a special seat named after Moses would obviously be an authority of some sort (cf. again ex cathedra: churches have literal chairs or thrones for bishops). (iii) Roth (as in n. 13) suggested that ‘Moses’ seat’ be identified with the receptacle of the Torah scroll. (iv) Perhaps ‘Moses’ seat’ had a precise reference which time has lost. Viviano (v), p. 11, discerns ‘a veiled allusion to the early rabbinic session at Jamnia’." (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 3:268)
• 39 One should note however that the tying up metaphor here is not the same as the binding and loosing metaphor. "The verb ‘to bind, to tie’ (δεσμεύω) is intended to make one think of binding sheaves and bundles rather than of ‘binding’ (δέω) in the sense of doctrine or of the legal decisions of the rabbis as in 16:19; 18:18." (Luz, Matthew: A Commentary, 3:102)
• 40 Contra Luz, who states, "A church without higher and lower members, a church of serving, a church of equals, of sisters and brothers in solidarity—this is what Matthew has in mind. The exclusive fatherhood of God in the church excludes not only other gods; it also excludes human patriarchs. The exclusivity of Christ as master excludes other, human teachers and masters. In Christ’s church there may be no hierarchy, thus no sacred rule, because there may be no archy of any kind, no rule of brothers and sisters over brothers and sisters. There may be only reciprocal service...Thus from Matthew’s perspective a hierarchical church of the Catholic type or an institutional church of the Protestant type are a fundamental denial of the faith" (Matthew: A Commentary, 3:110-11). Luz seems to assume here that reciprocal service is antithetical to hierarchy, but even Jesus, the Master himself, participates in reciprocal service (Matt. 20:28)!
• 41 Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:638.
• 42 "cette promesse ou prophétie du Christ matthéen ne s’adresse strictement qu’à Pierre, sans la moindre allusion à des «successeurs» éventuels" (Bonnard, L'Évangile selon saint Mathieu, 245); "All such apologetic rewritings of the passage are in any case beside the point, since there is nothing in this passage about any successors to Peter. It is Simon Peter himself, in his historical role, who is the foundation rock. Any link between the personal role of Peter and the subsequent papacy is a matter of later ecclesiology, not of exegesis of this passage." (France, Gospel according to Matthew, 622); "Peter is not just a representative disciple, as so many Protestant exegetes have been anxious to maintain. Nor is he obviously the first holder of an office others will someday hold, as Roman Catholic tradition has so steadfastly maintained." (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:643); "a similar majority from all confessions, including Roman Catholic scholars, do not support the traditional Roman Catholic view that this text introduces the idea of an apostolic succession pointing to the primacy of Peter as the first bishop of Rome" (Kvalbein, "The Authorization of Peter in Matthew 16:17-19," 153).
• 43 "But is there more to Peter’s pre-eminence than his special status in salvation-history? We consider this likely. One should seriously entertain the notion that Matthew conceived of Peter as an authoritative link, perhaps the authoritative link, between Jesus on the one hand and the Matthean community on the other. If the First Gospel was composed in Antioch it is not implausible that some of the book’s special material (M) was thought of—whether rightly or wrongly—as stemming from Peter. Moreover, if Matthew, like Papias after him, believed that Peter was in some sense a source for the Gospel of Mark, then in view of his adoption of most of that gospel our evangelist could have thought of his own composition as depending in no small way upon the great apostle. There is thus some reason to infer that the office of key-holder (16.19) may have included the passing down of tradition. Also not impossible is the suggestion that Peter was thought of as holding some type of ‘office’ which others held after him. This would certainly go a long way towards explaining Matthew’s interest in one who was, after all, long since dead. Further, shortly after Matthew penned his gospel, Ignatius of Antioch expounded a fairly developed view of the episcopal office. Was Peter perhaps already perceived by Matthew and his readers as having some relationship to that emerging institution? Unfortunately, we cannot address the issue with great conviction. We know far too little about Matthew’s church and its concrete situation to make confident assertions about either possible historical links to Peter or the relationship (if any) between that church’s authorities or ‘offices’ and Jesus’ chief apostle. But of a few things we can be reasonably sure. Peter was not simply a representative disciple for Matthew, and he was not just the first disciple to be called. He was the pre-eminent apostle, which meant he held a significance and authority the other disciples did not hold. His rôle in salvation-history was pivotal, and probably his authority continued to make itself felt in the living tradition of Matthew’s community." (Davies and Allison, Gospel According to St. Matthew, 2:651-52)
• I 13 Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” 14 And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” 15 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 16 Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” 17 And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven. 18 And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it. 19 I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” 20 Then he sternly ordered the disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah.
• II 13 When Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” 14 They replied, “Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” 15 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 16 Simon Peter said in reply, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” 17 Jesus said to him in reply, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. 18 And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. 19 I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” 20 Then he strictly ordered his disciples to tell no one that he was the Messiah.

More Satanic Statistics and Diabolical Data

I wrote a blog post a few months back which made a statistical argument that the frequency with which Satan or the devil is mentioned basically remains constant across the New Testament writings (once the length of individual books by word count is taken into account). This runs counter to the claims of some Christadelphians that references to Satan or the devil peter out as one moves from the narrative portions of the New Testament (the Gospels and Acts) to the epistles and Revelation.

In parts of the Western church, the devil has become conspicuous by his absence in recent years. For instance, the Church of England made headlines a few months ago when they removed any reference to the devil from the liturgy of the christening service. A journalist writing before Pope Francis' accession noted that Pope John Paul II only mentioned Satan twice during his 27 year papacy and that his successor Benedict XVI was similarly reluctant to mention the devil in public.

By contrast, Pope Francis' first year in office has seen a shift of emphasis, with the pope having apparently performed an exorcism and emphasizing in a homily that the devil exists.

Christians have different ways of bridging the gap between the pre-scientific worldview of the biblical writers and the modern scientific worldview. Very often the literal devil which the New Testament speaks about doesn't make it across the gap but is de-mythologized into a vague symbol of evil, and ultimately dispensed with altogether, being remembered only through a few pithy sayings like "Speak of the devil" or "The devil's in the details."

It is fair to ask whether the marginalization and disappearance of Satan from the teaching of some parts of the church is something of which Jesus and the earliest Christians would have approved. Some simple New Testament statistics make such a claim difficult to affirm. By my own count, the devil is mentioned explicitly by a name or title 102 times in the New Testament in 67 distinct passages. This count excludes terms which symbolically represent the devil rather than referring to him directly, such as strong man, birds, enemy that sowed the tares, serpent, and dragon. It also excludes references to demons, evil spirits, etc. I think this frequency is enough to show that Satan is an important theological theme within the New Testament -- much more so than in the Old Testament.

I also think that the number one impetus for the prominence of Satan within the New Testament is the frequency with which Jesus referred to him. The Gospels record 23 sayings of Jesus which mention Satan. If we remove duplicates (those sayings recorded in more than one Gospel) and one in which he is merely referring to what the Pharisees said, we still have 17 distinct sayings of Jesus which mention Satan. This is roughly equal to the number of distinct sayings of Jesus which explicitly mention 'resurrection' or rising from the dead. Jesus told three parables involving Satan. He also mentioned Satan in the context of moral teaching, prayer, and prophetic discourse. His vocabulary across the Gospels includes five distinct terms for Satan: Satan, the devil, the evil one, the ruler of this world, and the enemy. We can also add that Satan is mentioned in four of the letters to the seven churches in Revelation 2-3. The author describes these letters as dictated to him by Jesus, so on this basis one could arguably add four more sayings of Jesus about Satan, bringing the total to 21. Even if we are reluctant to attribute all the sayings ascribed Jesus in the New Testament to the historical Jesus (which I am not), there is little doubt that Satan formed an important part of Jesus' worldview. This should give pause to any church which is in a hurry to jettison Satan from its teaching and liturgy.

Christians who seek to demythologize the New Testament worldview often look to Paul as their model, because they believe that Paul himself was a demythologizing influence on the early church. Bultmann¹ and Phipps² are two writers who have taken such an approach. However, two recent studies on Paul's view of Satan by Williams³ and Becker⁴ have challenged this reading of Paul and reminded us that his worldview was not that of a modern rationalist but that of an ancient Jew. If we accept the historicity of Acts and take Paul as the author of all the epistles from Romans to Philemon, then we from Paul's lips or pen 22 distinct references to Satan. Paul's vocabulary for Satan is even more diverse than Jesus' within the New Testament. He uses eight distinct terms for Satan: Satan, the devil, the evil one, the god of this age/world, Beliar, the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit now at work in the children of disobedience, and the tempter. It is unlikely that Paul would be so colourful in his vocabulary if he viewed Satan as an obsolete tradition.

In summary, while some might think that the church risks losing touch with today's culture by maintaining its traditional teaching that Satan is real, the alternative is surely to lose touch with the priorities and practices of Jesus, Paul and the early church. The statistics bear this out.

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1 Bultmann, R. (1984). New Testament Mythology and Other Basic Writings. Philadelphia: Fortress Press.^↩
2 Phipps, W. E. (2008). Supernaturalism in Christianity: Its Growth and Cure. Macon: Mercer University Press.^↩
3 Williams, G. (2009). The spirit world in the letters of Paul the Apostle: a critical examination of the role of spiritual beings in the authentic Pauline epistles. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.^↩
4 Becker, M. (2013). Paul and the Evil One. In Koskenniemi, E. & Fröhlich, I. (Eds.), Evil and the Devil (127-141). London: Bloomsbury Publishing.^↩