Alfred Persson, the following written by many prominent Protestant clergy will hopefully explain your misinformation about the RCC.
WHO IS THE ROCK OF MATTHEW 16? IT’S PETER
Matthew 16:18 “And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”
It really should be obvious that Peter is the one whom Jesus is describing as the rock. But Protestants raise all kinds of objections on this point.
OBJECTION: PETER COULDN’T BE THE ROCK BECAUSE JESUS IS THE ONLY FOUNDATION
1 Corinthians 3:11 “For other foundation no man can lay, but that which is laid; which is Christ Jesus.”
Those who raise this objection fail to realize that the Bible speaks of all the Apostles as foundations.
Revelations 21:14 “And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.”
Is there a contradiction between Rev. 21:14 and 1 Cor. 3:11? No, of course not. The fact that Christ is the only foundation, as 1 Cor. 3:11 teaches, simply means that everything comes from Christ. All true authority in the Church must come from Christ because the Church itself comes from Christ. Anything outside of Christ is a false foundation.
Peter’s authority comes precisely from Jesus Christ, as Matthew 16 shows. It’s quite obvious, therefore, that if Jesus is the one who established these things in Peter, then what set up in Peter is not a foundation other than of Christ. It’s the very foundation of Christ.
So, the fact that Christ is the foundation or the cornerstone, as we read in Ephesians 2:20, does not mean that Christ Himself could not or did not establish one apostle to have a perpetual office which would be the rock upon which the Church would be built. The two concepts are not mutually exclusive. For example: Jesus is the Good Shepherd (John 10:14), but He also gives the responsibility of shepherding all His sheep to Peter, as we will see in John 21:15-17. Jesus is the one with the keys (Rev. 1:18; Rev. 3:7), but He gives His keys to Peter.
GOD CALLS ABRAHAM THE ROCK IN THE OLD TESTAMENT!
God is declared as the rock throughout the Old Testament and in Deuteronomy 32:4, but Abraham is also described as the rock in Isaias 51:1-2.
Deuteronomy 32:4 “He [God] is the Rock, his work is perfect…”
Isaias 51:1-2 “… look unto the rock whence ye are hewn, and to the hole of the pit whence ye are digged. Look unto Abraham your father…”
The Old Testament says look to the rock, look to Abraham. Abraham is described as the rock because he was the father of all the Israelites. Abraham’s name was changed from Abram to signify his role as rock and father of God’s people. Wouldn’t it be fitting, then, for Jesus to choose someone as the rock and father in the New Testament of the new Israel, the Church? Yes, and that’s why Simon’s name was changed to Petros, which means rock. In light of this evidence, it should be totally obvious to everyone that St. Peter is the rock. Nevertheless, let’s move to some other points.
WHAT ABOUT PETROS VS. PETRA IN THE GREEK?
Protestants argue that Jesus couldn’t have been saying that Peter was the Rock because of the differences in the Greek words. They point out that in the original Greek of Matthew 16:18, Peter’s name is petros, which means small stone, while the word to denote rock is petra, which means large rock. The Greek says: “Thou art Peter (petros) and upon this very rock (petra) I will build my Church.” But this argument is refuted by the following points.
First, the words petros and petra had the same meaning (rock) in the Greek which was used at the time of Christ. In some much earlier ancient Greek poetry, petros meant “small stone” and petra “large rock”; but that slight distinction had already disappeared by the time Matthew’s Gospel was written in Greek. (On this point, see the quote from Protestant D.A. Carson on the next page.)
The minor distinction between petros and petra only exists in Attic Greek, not Koine Greek. The Gospel was written in Koine Greek, in which both petros and petra meant “rock.” Moreover, there was a word for stone which Jesus could have used. It is lithos. If Jesus wanted to call Peter a stone, but not the rock (petros), then He would have used lithos. But He did not. He used petros, which means rock. But if there is an equation between Peter and the rock, why, then, are two different Greek words used (petros and petra)? The answer is found in the very important fact that Jesus spoke in Aramaic, not in Greek.
JESUS SPOKE ARAMAIC, NOT GREEK, IN WHICH PETER’S NAME AND ROCK ARE EXACTLY THE SAME
In Aramaic, Matthew 16:18 would say this: “You are kepha, and on this kepha I will build my Church.”
Notice that in Aramaic the same word (kepha) is used in both places. There is absolutely no difference between the two. Jesus was equating Simon and the rock upon which the Church would be built. This is also captured in French translations of this passage, which say: “Tu es pierre, et sur cette pierre…”
The Protestant misunderstanding on this point comes in because when one translates the Aramaic which Jesus spoke into the Greek, the Aramaic word kepha becomes petra. Petra is the normal word for rock in Greek and it’s feminine. The fact that petra is feminine is no problem for the second part of the passage: upon this kepha (upon this rock); but petra obviously cannot be used for Peter’s new name because Peter is a man.
Thus, in the Greek, Peter’s name is simply changed to Petros, a synonym for petra, but one which has a masculine ending. That’s the only reason that there is any difference at all between the two words. There is no doubt that Jesus was declaring that Peter is the rock.
MANY PROTESTANTS ADMIT THAT IT’S OBVIOUS THAT PETER IS THE ROCK
Even some Protestants have been forced to admit, in the face of the facts, that it’s futile to continue to deny that Peter is the Rock.
David Hill, Presbyterian minister and senior lecturer of biblical studies at the University of Sheffield, writes: “It is on Peter himself, the confessor of his Messiahship, that Jesus will build the Church… Attempts to interpret the ‘rock’ as something other than Peter in person (e.g. his faith, the truth revealed to him) are due to Protestant bias, and introduce to the statement a degree of subtlety which is highly unlikely.” (Quoted from The Gospel of Matthew, New Century Bible Commentary, p. 261.)
In the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, a Protestant work edited by Protestants Gerhard Kittel and Gerhard Friedrich, there is an article by well-known Protestant Oscar Cullman. This is found in Vol. 6:108 of the Theological Dictionary. Cullman states:
“But what does Jesus mean when he says: ‘On this rock I will build my Church’? The idea of the reformers that he is referring to the faith of Peter is quite inconceivable in view of the probably different setting of the story. For there is no reference here to the faith of Peter. Rather, the parallelism of ‘thou art Rock’ and ‘on this rock I will build’ shows that the second rock can only be the same as the first. It is thus evident that Jesus is referring to Peter, to whom he has given the name Rock. He appoints Peter… to be the foundation of his ecclesia. To this extent Roman Catholic exegesis is right and all attempts to evade this interpretation are to be rejected.”
Dr. John Broadus (1886), a Reformed Baptist Bible scholar, was forced to admit:
“As Peter means rock, the natural interpretation is that ‘upon this rock’ means upon thee. No other explanation would probably at the present day be attempted… But there is a play upon words, understand as you may. It is an even more far-fetched and harsh play upon words if we understand the rock to be Christ: and a very feeble and almost unmeaning play upon words if the rock is Peter’s confession… Let it be observed that Jesus could not here mean himself by the rock, consistently with the image, because he is the builder. To say, ‘I will build,’ would be a very confused image. The suggestion of some expositors that in saying ‘thou art Peter, and on this rock’ Jesus pointed at himself, involves an artificiality which to some minds is repulsive.” (John A. Broadus, Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, Valley Forge, PA: Judson Press, 1886, p. 356.)
The Baptist D.A. Carson, professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Seminary, was also forced to acknowledge:
“Although it is true that petros and petra can mean ‘stone’ and ‘rock’ respectively in earlier Greek, the distinction is largely confined to poetry. Moreover the underlying Aramaic is in this case unquestionable; and most probably kepha was used in both clauses (‘you are kepha’ and on this kepha’
, since the word was used both for a name and for a rock… The Greek makes the distinction between petros and petra simply because it is trying to preserve the pun, and in Greek the feminine petra could not very well serve as a masculine name.” (Quoted in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Volume 8, p. 368.)
WE KNOW JESUS SPOKE IN ARAMAIC BECAUSE THE BIBLE GIVES US SOME OF HIS ARAMAIC WORDS
Since the Aramaic is relevant to the aforementioned points about Peter being the rock, consider the evidence that Jesus did, in fact, speak in Aramaic. We know Jesus spoke in Aramaic, first of all, because the Gospels record some of the Aramaic words which He used. Consider Matthew 27:46, where Jesus says from the cross, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” Those words are Aramaic; they’re not Greek; they mean, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
Another example is John 19:13,17 “When Pilate… sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is called the Pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha… And he [Jesus] bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha.”
Both Gabbatha and Golgotha are Aramaic words, providing more evidence that this was the language Jesus used. But St. John calls them Hebrew in the Bible because, as scholars explain, that “Hebrew,” as commonly used in the New Testament, refers to the Aramaic.
THERE IS ALSO STRONG EVIDENCE THAT THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW WAS ORIGINALLY WRITTEN IN ARAMAIC AND THEN TRANSLATED INTO GREEK
There is strong evidence from the early Church fathers that the Gospel of Matthew was originally written in Aramaic and then translated into Greek. Eusebius, who is the historian of the early Church, the first one to write a history of the Church from the beginning to his own day in the 4th century, repeatedly stated that Matthew wrote his Gospel in Hebrew, meaning Aramaic.
In Book 3, Chapter 3, of his Ecclesiastical history, Eusebius quotes Papias to state: “Matthew composed his history in the Hebrew dialect, and everyone translated it as he was able.” By the “Hebrew dialect” he means Aramaic.
In Book 6, Chapter 25, Eusebius quotes Origen to state: “The first [Gospel] is written according to Matthew… who having published it for Jewish converts, wrote it in the Hebrew.”
In Book 6, Chapter 25, Eusebius quotes the great early Church father St. Irenaeus to state: “Matthew, indeed, produced his gospel written among the Hebrews in their own dialect, while Peter and Paul proclaimed the gospel and founded the Church at Rome.”
As cited by Eusebius, St. Irenaeus not only says that Matthew wrote his Gospel in the Hebrew dialect (i.e., Aramaic), but also that Peter founded the Church at Rome – something many non-Catholics deny, even though the historical evidence that Peter was in Rome is irrefutable. “All the ancient traditions tell of Peter’s martyrdom in Rome, and not a single source places it elsewhere. Very few events of the apostolic Church are so well attested.”3
Keep in mind that Eusebius, who cites Papias, Origen and Irenaeus to show that Matthew wrote in Aramaic, lived from approximately 260 to 340 A.D. and wrote the very first complete Church history. As if that were not sufficient to silence all objections in this regard, we actually have internal biblical evidence that Peter’s name in Greek, Petros, is equivalent to Petra, the rock upon which the Church is built. This internal evidence comes from John 1:42.
JOHN 1:42 EQUATES PETER’S NAME WITH THE ROCK
Please follow this logically.
John 1:42 “Jesus looked at him and said, “You are Simon son of John. You will be called Cephas (which, when translated, is Peter).” (New International Version)
In John 1:42, Peter’s new name is given in its Aramaic form: Cephas. Some may ask, “I thought Peter’s name was Kepha in Aramaic.” Yes, but in English versions of John 1:42, Cephas is simply the Anglicized version of the Aramaic Kepha. So John 1:42 says that Cephas is translated as Peter, the apostle’s name.
Cephas = Peter’s name (John 1:42).
We also know that Cephas would be translated as petra, the word for the rock (Mt. 16:18) upon which the Church is built.
Since Cephas = Peter’s new name (as John 1:42 says) and Cephas = petra, the word for rock, it is undeniable that Peter’s new name = petra, the rock.
Peter’s new name is equivalent to the rock. There’s no doubt about it.
The Primacy of Peter is a collection of essays by Eastern “Orthodox” scholars. The Eastern “Orthodox” are not Catholic and do not accept the Papacy. This work (The Primacy of Peter) was edited by the famous Eastern “Orthodox” scholar John Meyendorf. In this Eastern “Orthodox” work, it is repeatedly admitted that the Bible teaches that Peter is the rock:
“There is a formal and real identity between Peter and rock. Jesus will build the church upon Cephas.” (The Primacy of Peter, edited by John Meyendorf, St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1992, p. 48.)
“By confessing his faith in the divinity of the Savior, Peter became the Rock of the Church.” (The Primacy of Peter, p. 72.)
“The Apostle Peter is the rock on which the Church is built, and will remain the rock until the coming of the Lord.” (The Primacy of Peter, p. 122; also pp. 63-65; etc.)
