‘STAND FAST IN THE FAITH’

New Zealand Tablet, 13 November 1913, Page 3

‘STAND FAST IN THE FAITH’

(A Weekly Instruction specially written for the N.Z .

Tablet by ‘Ghimel’.)

THE PRIMACY OF ST. PETER {Continued) THE PROMISE IN ST. MATTHEW XVI., 8

In answer to a question, Peter immediately and decisively professed his belief in the Divine Sonship of His Master. Our Lord, after declaring that His follower’s knowledge was a personal blessing, the outcome not of human instruction but of a special revelation granted to Him by the Father, Went on to reward Peter for his proclamation of faith, ‘ Thou art Peter (Cepha, Rock), and upon this rock (Cepha) I will build My Church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give to thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth it shall be bound also in Heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, it shall be loosed also in Heaven.’ .

(a) Peter is the rock on which Christ promises to build His Church. —ln the language spoken by our Lord, Aramaic, the word for Peter and for Rock, is one and the same, so that the sentence originally ran : ‘ Thou are Cepha (rock), and on this Cepha (rock) I will build My Church.’ This at once rules out the many attempts made by Protestants to explain the term ‘ rock ’ as referring to Christ .-Himself, or to Peter’s faith, etc. It is Peter and no other who is the Rock on which Christ has promised Himself to build His Church. Indeed, Rationalistic and Protestant scholars of more modern times freely admit that, as the words stand, the only possible interpretation is the Catholic one, based on the unanimous consent of the Fathers. Dr. Plummer, Commentary on St. Matthew, 1910, may be taken as typical of most scholars: ‘The Messiah is going to build His Church, a new Israel, for which Peter is to supply the foundation. It is quite clear that here Christ Himself is not the foundationrock or foundation-stone. He is the Builder of the edifice, determining when, where, and how it shall be raised. He is the source of all activity in framing the building. . . . Our Lord would speak in Aramaic, as “Bar-Jonah” tends to show; and in Aramaic Cepha would be used in both places. . . . Cepha means either “rock” or “stone.” The fact that Christ Himself is elsewhere, by a different metaphor, called the “corner-stone” (Eph. ii., 20; 1 Pet. ii., 4-8.) must not lead us to deny that Peter is here the foundation-rock or stone. In Eph. ii., 20; the Apostles and the Christian Prophets are the foundation, as Peter is said to be here. The first ten chapters of Acts show us in what sense Peter was the foundation on which the first stones of the Christian Israel were laid. He was the acknowledged Head of the Apostolic body, and he took the lead in admitting both Jews and Gentiles into the Christian Church. “All attempts to explain the ‘rock’ in any other way than as referring to Peter have ignominiously failed” (Briggs, North American Rev., Feb., 1907, p. .348). - Neither the confession of Peter nor the faith of Peter is an adequate explanation. . . . Such a Confessor [as Peter] might well be regarded as a foundation. Others confessing the same faith would be added (Apoc. xxi., 14), and on these the superstructure would be raised; but Peter was the first. It is with him that the erection of the Christian Church begins’ (pp. 228-9).

(b) The. Meaning of the Metaphor , ‘Rock.’ —Peter is to be to the Church what a skilled architect makes the foundation in regard to a housethe principle of stability, of unity, of durability, and of increase. (c) The gates of hel Is hall not prevail against it. — In this striking metaphor Christ referred to the power and cunning of the Church’s enemies, visible and invisible, and He promised that the Church, through her union with Peter, the strong foundation, would stand unshaken. Peter, therefore, must be the great secret of power, and power in a corporate body resides in the head.

J; (d) i will give to thee the Kegs of the Kingdom, of Heaven. —Through the prophet Isaias, God declared that the worthless Sobna should he deposed from his office, and Eliacim, the son of Helcias, put in his place: ‘I will clothe him with thy robe . . . and will give power into his hand . . . and I will lay the key of the house of David upon his shoulder ; and he shall open and none shall shut; and he shall shut and none shall open (Is. xxii. 21-22). The key is always the symbol of authority. 'Legal possession of a house is given by the delivery of the keys; a chief steward or agent holds the keys. To Peter, then, are promised the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, that is, as is clear from the context, the Keys of Christ’s Church on earth, and is thereby made its chief ruler and watchful guardian. His power is supreme— Lord set no limit to it; perpetuah to last as long as the kingdom lasts. (e) Whatsoever thou shall hind, etc. Here the Founder of the. Church determines the character and the extent of the power just given. It is a power to ‘ bind ’ and to c loose,’ that is, as the context and Scriptural usage prove, to legislate and to exercise judicial authority. And this spiritual power is universal and supreme. Universal, for Christ speaks without any limitation as to persons, or subject matter ‘ whatsoever ’; supreme, for the decrees of this spiritual power are immediately ratified in Heaven, without any reference to an earthly power.