The Church of Rome claimed that papal primacy was validated by the teaching of Scripture in Matthew 16:18-19 in its interpretation of the rock and keys. The Catholic Church also teaches that this interpretation is validated by the unanimous teaching of the Fathers. These claims cannot be substantiated by the facts. Matthew 16 does not imply papal primacy, for the passage says absolutely nothing about successors to Peter or his office. As Oscar Cullmann has stated:
“He who proceeds without prejudice, on the basis of exegesis and only on this basis, cannot seriously conclude that Jesus here had in mind successors of Peter....On exegetical grounds we must say that the passage does not contain a single word concerning successors of Peter....The intent of Jesus leaves us no possibility of understanding Matthew 16:17ff. in the sense of a succession determined by an episcopal { Oscar Cullmann, Peter: Disciple, Apostle, Martyr (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1953), 207, 236.}
In addition to this, the unanimous consent of the Fathers opposes the Roman Catholic interpretation of Matthew 16. The Fathers generally interpret the rock in Matthew 16 as Christ or as Peter's confession of faith in Christ. Some of the Fathers do refer to Peter as the rock but only in the sense that he is the first to confess Christ to be the Son of God and is therefore representative of the entire church. The church is built, therefore, not on Peter personally (and subsequently on the bishops of Rome as his successors) but on Peter's confession of faith and ultimately, therefore, on Christ Himself. Augustine (A.D. 354-430) is typical of the Fathers in this interpretation of Matthew 16:18:
Because thou hast said unto Me, 'Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God;' I also say unto thee, 'Thou art Peter.' For before he was called Simon. Now this name of Peter was given him by the Lord, and in a figure, that he should signify the church. For seeing that Christ is the rock (Petra), Peter is the Christian people. For the rock (Petra) is the original name. Therefore Peter is so called from the rock; not the rock from Peter; as Christ is not called Christ from the Christian, but the Christian from Christ. 'Therefore,' he saith, 'Thou art Peter; and upon this Rock' which thou hast confessed, upon this rock which thou past acknowledged, saying, 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God, will I build My Church'; that is upon Myself, the Son of the living God, 'will I build My Church.' I will build thee upon Me, not Myself upon thee....For men who wished to be built upon men, said, 'I am of Paul; and I of Apollos; and I of Cephas,' who is Peter. But others who did not wish to be built upon Peter, but upon the Rock, said, 'But I am of Christ.' And when the Apostle Paul ascertained that he was chosen, and Christ despised, he said, 'Is Christ divided? was Paul crucified for you? or were ye baptized in the name of Paul?' And, as not in the name of Paul, so neither in the name of Peter; but in the name of Christ; that Peter might be built upon the Rock, not the Rock upon Peter. { St. Augustine, Sermon XXVI.1 2, Series Two, vol. VI, of Schaff and Wace, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 340.}
Here, all agree, is the most renowned theologian of the Catholic Church. He writes after nearly five centuries of church history and gives an interpretation of Matthew 16 (the most important verse of Scripture in Rome's argument for the church's authority) that is a direct contradiction of the Roman Catholic interpretation. How are we to explain this, if, as Vatican I states, there exists a unanimous consensus of interpretation of the meaning of this passage? Why does Augustine deliberately go against such a consensus?
The answer, quite simply, is that there never was a patristic consensus on the interpretation of Matthew 16 to support that propounded by the Roman Catholic Church. John Chrysostom (ca. A.D. 344-407), one of the greatest theologians and exegetes of the Eastern church, echoes Augustine in his interpretation with these words: 'And I say unto thee, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church; that is, on the faith of his confession.' { Homilies of S. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. Matthew, Homily 54.3, in A Library of the Fathers of the Holy Catholic Church.} The fact is, the overwhelming majority of the Fathers of the early centuries did not support the Roman Catholic interpretation of Matthew 16:18-19 as proposed by Vatican I. Johann Joseph Ignaz von Dollinger, one of the most renowned Roman Catholic historians of the last century, a teacher of church history for forty-seven years, affirmed, to my amazement, what I discovered in the church Fathers:
Of all the Fathers who interpret these passages in the Gospels (Matt 16:18, John 21:17), not a single one applies them to the Roman bishops as Peter's successors. How many Fathers have busied themselves with these texts, yet not one of them whose commentaries we possess-Origen, Chrysostom, Hilary, Augustine, Cyril, Theodoret, and those whose interpretations are collected in ca tenas-has dropped the faintest hint that the primacy of Rome is the consequence of the commission and promise to Peter! Not one of them has explained the rock or foundation on which Christ would build His Church of the office given to Peter to be transmitted to his successors, but they understood by it either Christ Himself, or Peter's confession of faith in Christ; often both together. Or else they thought Peter was the foundation equally with all the other Apostles, the twelve being together the foundation-stones of the church (Apoc. xxi. 14). The Fathers could the less recognize in the power of the keys, and the power of binding and loosing, any special prerogative or lordship of the Roman bishop, inasmuch as what is obvious to any one at first sight-they did not regard the power first given to Peter, and afterwards conferred on all the Apostles, as any thing peculiar to him, or hereditary in the line of Roman bishops, and they held the symbol of the keys as meaning just the same as the figurative expression of binding and loosing. {Johann Joseph Ignaz von Dtlinger, The Pope and the Council (Boston: Roberts, 1869), 74.}
Roman Catholic apologists have consistently charged that the Protestant exegesis of Matthew 16 grew out of the Reformers' need to legitimize their opposition to the papacy. Consequently, they invented a novel interpretation that contradicted the traditional view of the church. But the facts actually reveal the opposite, as Oscar Culhnann confirms:
'We thus see that the exegesis that the Reformers gave....was not first invented for their struggle against the papacy; it rests upon an older patristic tradition.' {Cullmann, Peter: Disciple, Apostle, Martyr, 162.}
It is the Protestant and Eastern Orthodox interpretation that is endorsed by the Fathers of the early church and not the Roman Catholic, which contradicts that consensus. The Roman Catholic interpretation is, in fact, a direct contradiction of the decrees of Trent and Vatican I, which state that it is unlawful to interpret Scripture in any way contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers.
The Church of Rome claims that papal primacy can be validated by the facts of history in that it was the universal practice of the church from the very beginning. These claims are false; the facts of history contradict them. The attitudes and practices of the Fathers and councils reveal that the church never viewed the bishops of Rome as being endowed with supreme authority to rule the church universal. And there never has been a supreme human ruler in the church. This whole concept was repudiated by Pope Gregory the Great (A.D. 590-604) when he rebuked the bishop of Constantinople for attempting to arrogate to himself the title of 'universal bishop.' He insisted that such a position and title are unlawful in the church of Jesus Christ:
“Now I confidently say that whoever calls himself, or desires to be called, Universal Priest, is in his elation the precursor of Antichrist, because he proudly puts himself above all others. Nor is it by dissimilar pride that he is led into error; for, as that perverse one wishes to appear as God above all men, so whoever this one is who covets being called sole priest, he extols himself above all other priests....Certainly Peter, the first of the apostles, himself a member of the holy and universal Church, Paul, Andrew, John-what were they but heads of particular communities? And yet all were members under one Head. And (to bind all together in a short girth of speech) the saints before the law, the saints under the law, the saints under grace, all these making up the Lord's Body, were constituted as members of the Church, and not one of them has wished himself to be called universal. Now let your holiness acknowledge to what extent you swell within yourself in desiring to be called by that name by which no one presumed to be called who was truly holy.”{ Epistles of St. Gregory the Great, Book VII, Epistle 33, and Book V, Epistle 18, Series Two, vol. XII, of Schaff and Wace, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 226, 167.}
Baloney!
Pope Gregory didn't know he was Pope? I'll stick to my history. What authority did Pope Gregory the Great have then rebuking the Bishop of Constantinople?
What authority did Pope Clement have correcting the Church in Corinth seeing he was in Rome? They had their own Bishop.
History is clear on the universal authority of the Bishop of Rome:
HISTORICAL COMMENTARY ON ST. PETER AND THE "PRIMACY OF ROME" From Anglican scholar J.N.D. Kelly The Oxford Dictionary of Popes (1986) under Peter, St, Apostle (page 5-6) "The papacy, through successive popes and councils, has always traced its origins and title-deeds to the unique commission reported to have been given by Jesus Christ to Peter, the chief of his Apostles, later to be martyred when organizing the earliest group of Christians at Rome....According to Matt 16:13-20, when Jesus asked the disciples whom they took him to be, Simon answered for them all that he was the Messiah, the Son of the living God; in reply Jesus pronounced him blessed because of this inspired insight, bestowed on him the Aramaic name Cephas (= 'rock'), rendered Peter in Greek, and declared that he would build his indestructible church on 'this rock', and would give him 'the keys of the kingdom of heaven' and the powers of 'binding and loosing' .... "[In the first half of Acts]...Peter was the undisputed leader of the youthful church. It was he who presided over the choice of a successor to Judas (1:15-26), who explained to the crowd the meaning of Pentecost (2:14-40), who healed the lame beggar at the Temple (3:1-10), who pronounced sentence on Ananias and Sapphira (5:1-11), and who opened the church to Gentiles by having Cornelius baptized without undergoing circumcision (10:9-48). He was to the fore in preaching, defending the new movement, working miracles of healing, and visiting newly established Christian communities... "It seems certain that Peter spent his closing years in Rome. Although the NT appears silent about such a stay, it is supported by 1 Peter 5:13, where 'Babylon' is a code-name for Rome, and by the strong case for linking the Gospel of Mark, who as Peter's companion (1 Pet 5:13) is said to have derived its substance from him, with Rome. To early writers like Clement of Rome (c. 95), Ignatius of Antioch (c. 107), and Irenaeus (c. 180) it was common knowledge that he worked and died in Rome."
Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church (Eerdmans, 1910) -- "Rome was the battle-field of orthodoxy and heresy, and a resort of all sects and parties. It attracted from every direction what was true and false in philosophy and religion. Ignatius rejoiced in the prospect of suffering for Christ in the centre of the world; Polycarp repaired hither to settle with Anicetus the paschal controversy; Justin Martyr presented there his defense of Christianity to the emperors, and laid down for it his life; Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Cyprian conceded to that church a position of singular pre-eminence. Rome was equally sought as a commanding position by heretics and theosophic jugglers, as Simon Magus, Valentine, Marcion, Cerdo, and a host of others. No wonder, then, that the bishops of Rome at an early date were looked upon as metropolitan pastors, and spoke and acted accordingly with an air of authority which reached far beyond their immediate diocese." (Schaff, volume 2, page 157)
On St. Clement of Rome (c. 96 AD), reckoned as the fourth Pope from St. Peter, Schaff states -- "...it can hardly be denied that the document [Clement to the Corinthians] reveals the sense of a certain superiority over all ordinary congregations. The Roman church here, without being asked (as far as appears), gives advice, with superior administrative wisdom, to an important church in the East, dispatches messengers to her, and exhorts her to order and unity in a tone of calm dignity and authority, as the organ of God and the Holy Spirit. This is all the more surprising if St. John, as is probable, was then still living in Ephesus, which was nearer to Corinth than Rome." (Schaff, volume 2, page 158)
The succession list of bishops in the apostolic see of Rome of the first two centuries as provided by Schaff (volume 2, page 166) is --
"It must in justice be admitted, however, that the list of Roman bishops has by far the preminence in age, completeness, integrity of succession, consistency of doctrine and policy, above every similar catalogue, not excepting those of Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria, and Constantinople...." (Schaff, page 166)
Schaff then proceeds to list the Bishops of Rome just as I have them above, along with the corresponding Roman Emperors. St. Irenaeus gives this exact list of successors to Peter as Bishops of Rome up to his time (Against Heresies 3:3:1-3 c. 180-199 AD), as does St. Hegesippus up to his time (about 20 years earlier, c. 160 AD) cited in the first History of the Church by Eusebius.
Catholic historian Philip Hughes writes -- "Ever since the popes were first articulate about the General Council, they have claimed the right to control its action and to give or withhold an approbation of its decisions which stamps them as the authentic teaching of the Church of Christ. Only through their summoning it, or through their consenting to take their place at it (whether personally or by legates sent in their name), or by their subsequent acceptance of the council, does the assembly of bishops become a General Council. No member of the Church has ever proposed that a General Council shall be summoned and the pope be left out, nor that the pope should take any other position at the General Council but as its president...in no council has it been moved that the Bishop of X be promoted to the place of the Bishop of Rome, or that the bishop of Rome's views be disregarded and held of no more account than those of the bishop of any other major see...the general shape is ever discernible of a Roman Primacy universally recognized, and submitted to, albeit (at times) unwillingly -- recognized and submitted to because, so the bishops believed, it was set up by God himself." (Hughes, The Church in Crisis: A History of the General Councils, page 5-6)
From the old Catholic Encyclopedia (1913) -- "History bears complete testimony that from the very earliest times the Roman See has ever claimed the supreme headship, and that that headship has been freely acknowledged by the universal Church. We shall here confine ourselves to the consideration of the evidence afforded by the first three centuries. The first witness is St. Clement, a disciple of the Apostles, who, after Linus and Anacletus, succeeded St. Peter as the fourth in the list of popes....The tone of authority [in his Epistle to the Corinthians] which inspires the latter appears so clearly that [Protestant scholar J.B.] Lightfoot did not hesitate to speak of it as 'the first step towards papal domination' ...Thus, at the very commencement of church history, before the last survivor of the Apostles had passed away, we find a Bishop of Rome, himself a disciple of St. Peter, intervening in the affairs of another Church and claiming to settle the matter by a decision spoken under the influence of the Holy Spirit. Such a fact admits of one explanation alone. It is that in the days when the Apostolic teaching was yet fresh in men's minds the universal Church recognized in the Bishop of Rome the office of supreme head....The limits of the present article prevent us from carrying the historical argument further than the year 300. Nor is it in fact necessary to do so. From the beginning of the fourth century the supremacy of Rome is writ large upon the page of history. It is only in regard to the first age of the Church that any question can arise. But the facts we have recounted are entirely sufficient to prove to any unprejudiced mind that the supremacy was exercised and acknowledged from the days of the Apostles." (volume 12, article "Pope" page 263, 264)
From the New Catholic Encyclopedia (1967) -- "That in the primitive Christian period the Roman Church was credited with an authority superior to that of any other patriarchal see, can be gathered from the letter written by Pope Clement I (c. 92) to the Corinthians in which he made important statements concerning the nature of the Church and laid down principles that in embryonic form contains maxims of government. That in view of its location, the Roman Church was in actual fact credited with preeminence over other sees is a matter of history....Numerous testimonies could be cited to prove the factual preeminence of the Roman Church." (volume 10, article "Papacy" page 952)
To be fair, the NCE goes on to state that in the earliest centuries there was "no doctrinal elaboration of the jurisdictional position of the Roman Church" and this too is "a matter of history." However, the same could be said of the Holy Trinity and the Person of Christ. There was no formal doctrinal elaboration on these (whether the Papacy, the Trinity, or Christology) until the fourth century (e.g. the Council of Nicaea and thereafter). From there the Catholic doctrines (on the Papacy, the Trinity, Christology, Mariology, the sacraments, even the 27-book canon of the New Testament) begin to be formally defined, elaborated upon, and developed in the creed, practice and life of the Church and her liturgy.
Steve Ray writes on the development of doctrine in the early Catholic Church --
"And so the Church developed as she grew but did not change her organic nature or her Christ-established essence. The growth did not contradict what had gone before but rather complemented it in an essential unity with the Church's past stages of development. Under the pressure of increasing size, theological deviations, and persecution in the first century, leadership solidified and became layered, as is essential for the growth of any organization. This process was first developed and set in motion during the life of the apostles. It was a process of maturation that was fundamental to the organism and vital to its growth. The result of that growth in our age is still known as the Catholic Church and is essentially the same as the acorn planted two thousand years ago. The body is now in adulthood and bears the same marks as it did in the first century: oneness, holiness, catholicity, and apostolicity -- in short, the Catholic Church. The development of the Church and of doctrine and leadership is simply part of the expected growth of the organic structure." (Upon This Rock [Ignatius Press, 1999], page 118)
Anglican scholar J.N.D. Kelly in his classic work Early Christian Doctrines sums up how unanimous the Church was in the patristic period, particularly the fourth and fifth centuries where the documentary evidence becomes overwhelming for the primacy and authority of the Papacy --
"Everywhere, in the East no less than the West, Rome enjoyed a special prestige, as is indicated by the precedence accorded without question to it....Thus Rome's preeminance remained undisputed in the patristic period. For evidence of it the student need only recall the leading position claimed as a matter of course by the popes, and freely conceded to them, at the councils of Ephesus (431) and Chalcedon (451). We even find the fifth-century historians Socrates and Sozomen concluding...that it was unconstitutional for synods to be held without the Roman pontiff being invited or for decisions to be taken without his concurrence. At the outbreak of the Christological controversy, it will be remembered, both Nestorius and Cyril hastened to bring their cases to Rome, the latter declaring that the ancient custom of the churches constrained him to communicate matters of such weight to the Pope and to seek his advice before acting. In one of his sermons he goes so far as to salute Celestine as 'the archbishop of the whole world' .....It goes without saying that Augustine [c. 354 - 430 AD] identifies the Church with the universal Catholic Church of his day, with its hierarchy and sacraments, and with its centre at Rome....By the middle of the fifth century the Roman church had established, de jure as well as de facto, a position of primacy in the West, and the papal claims to supremacy over all bishops of Christendom had been formulated in precise terms....The student tracing the history of the times, particularly of the Arian, Donatist, Pelagian and Christological controversies, cannot fail to be impressed by the skill and persistence with which the Holy See [of Rome] was continually advancing and consolidating its claims. Since its occupant was accepted as the successor of St. Peter, and prince of the apostles, it was easy to draw the inference that the unique authority which Rome in fact enjoyed, and which the popes saw concentrated in their persons and their office, was no more than the fulfilment of the divine plan." (Kelly, pages 406, 407, 413, 417)
The Anglican study The See of Peter by James T. Shotwell/Louise Ropes Loomis (NY: Octagon Books, 1965) on the early evidence for the primacy of Rome -- "Unquestionably, the Roman church very early developed something like a sense of obligation to the oppressed all over Christendom....Consequently there was but one focus of authority. By the year 252, there seem to have been one hundred bishops in central and southern Italy but outside Rome there was nothing to set one bishop above another. All were on a level together, citizens of Italy, accustomed to look to Rome for direction in every detail of public life. The Roman bishop had the right not only to ordain but even, on occasion, to select bishops for Italian churches....To Christians of the Occident, the Roman church was the sole, direct link with the age of the New Testament and its bishop was the one prelate in their part of the world in whose voice they discerned echoes of the apostles' speech. The Roman bishop spoke always as the guardian of an authoritative tradition, second to none. Even when the eastern churches insisted that their traditions were older and quite as sacred, if not more so, the voice in the West, unaccustomed to rivalry at home, spoke on regardless of protest or denunciation at a distance.... "The theory of [Pope] Stephen, that kindled his contemporaries to such utter exasperation, was rather that the Church was a monarchy, a congeries indeed of bishoprics but all of them subject to the superior authority of the one bishop who sat upon the throne of the prince of the apostles [Peter]. The Roman See, as distinct from the Roman church, was and sought to be predominant, not for its situation or other wordly advantes, not even for its treasure of doctrine, bequeathed by its two founders, but, primarily and fundamentally, because its bishop was heir in his own person to the unique prerogative conferred upon Peter. To Peter had been granted a primacy among the apostles, so to the Roman bishop was assigned a leadership over the bishops....The Arians, who had ousted Athanasius from Alexandria, offered to submit the case to [Pope] Julius for his judgment. Athanasius himself and other orthodox refugees from eastern sees went directly to Rome as to a court of appeal... "At the general Council of Sardica [343 AD]...the orthodox Easterners and Westerners stayed behind to issue another, in which they claimed for the Roman bishop an appellate jurisdiction over all the Church in honor of 'the memory of Peter, the apostle.'...[by the time of Pope Damasus]...there can be no doubt that large numbers of eastern Christians had by this time become convinced of the genuine superiority of the Roman See in faith and religious insight. The eastern emperor Theodosius published an edict requiring his subjects to accept the doctrine which Peter had committed to the Romans....it was the trustworthy authority of Peter to which the East paid homage in the fourth century, not the wealth nor the power of Rome....From the time when Eleutherus was asked to condemn the Montanists, through the period when Callistus, Stephen and Dionysius revised and interpreted dogma, down to the days when the Nicene creed was defended on the ground of its Roman origin and Liberius and Damasus endorsed or rejected eastern declarations of faith according as they did or did not measure up to their own standards, the Roman bishops asserted their right to speak for the tradition of Peter." (Shotwell/Loomis, page 217-228) The Orthodox study The Primacy of Peter (St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1992) by John Meyendorff states on St. Clement of Rome and the ante-Nicene period (before 325 AD) -- "Let us turn to the facts. We know that the Church of Rome took over the position of 'church-with-priority' at the end of the first century. That was about the time at which her star ascended into the firmament of history in its brightest splendor...Even as early as the Epistle to the Romans, Rome seems to have stood out among all the churches as very important. Paul bears witness that the faith of the Romans was proclaimed throughout the whole world (Rom 1:8)....we have a document which gives us our earliest reliable evidence that the Church of Rome stood in an exceptional position of authority in this period. This is the epistle of Clement of Rome...We know that Clement was 'president' of the Roman Church...." (Afanassieff from Meyendorff, page 124) "The epistle [Clement of Rome to the Corinthians] is couched in very measured terms, in the form of an exhortation; but at the same time it clearly shows that the Church of Rome was aware of the decisive weight, in the Church of Corinth's eyes, that must attach to its witness about the events in Corinth. So the Church of Rome, at the end of the first century, exhibits a marked sense of its own priority, in point of witness about events in other churches. Note also that the Roman Church did not feel obliged to make a case, however argued, to justify its authoritative pronouncements on what we should now call the internal concerns of other churches. There is nothing said about the grounds of this priority....Apparently Rome had no doubt that its priority would be accepted without argument." (Afanassieff from Meyendorff, page 125-126) "Rome's vocation [in the "pre-Nicene period"] consisted in playing the part of arbiter, settling contentious issues by witnessing to the truth or falsity of whatever doctrine was put before them. Rome was truly the center where all converged if they wanted their doctrine to be accepted by the conscience of the Church. They could not count upon success except on one condition -- that the Church of Rome had received their doctrine -- and refusal from Rome predetermined the attitude the other churches would adopt. There are numerous cases of this recourse to Rome...." (Afanassieff from Meyendorff, page 128f, 133) "It is impossible to deny that, even before the appearance of local primacies, the Church from the first days of her existence possessed an ecumenical center of unity and agreement. In the apostolic and the Judaeo-Christian period, it was the Church of Jerusalem, and later the Church of Rome -- 'presiding in agape,' according to St. Ignatius of Antioch. This formula and the definition of the universal primacy contained in it have been aptly analyzed by Fr. Afanassieff and we need not repeat his argument here. Neither can we quote here all the testimonies of the Fathers and the Councils unanimously acknowledging Rome as the senior church and the center of ecumenical agreement. It is only for the sake of biased polemics that one can ignore these testimonies, their consensus and significance." (Schmemann from Meyendorff, page 163-164)
Kenneth Whitehead asks in his wonderful apologetics book One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic: The Early Church was the Catholic Church (Ignatius Press, 2000) --
"We must ask: What Church existing today descends in an unbroken line from the apostles of Jesus Christ (and possesses the other essential marks of the true Church of which the Creed speaks)? Further, what Church existing today is headed by a single, recognized, designated leader under the headship of Peter? To ask these questions is to answer them. Any entity claiming to be the Church of Christ -- his body! -- must demonstrate its apostolicity, its organic link with the original apostles, on whom Christ manifestly established his Church. Nothing less can qualify as the apostolic Church that Jesus founded." (Whitehead, page 36)
see also St. Augustine, Pelagianism, and the Holy See ("Rome has spoken; the case is closed")
St. John Chrysostom on the Apostle Peter
END
Phil Porvaznik