“And Jesus’ plan is not to write a book and then just hope that everyone follows it and interprets it in the same way.”
Let’s get this straight. You grab your doctrine of succession from a book, then run off and build a system around it (with other bits you grabbed from the book) and then turn around and pooh-pooh the book when it rebukes you to your face?
No way to treat a book Jesus had ANYTHING to do with, Charles.
He didn’t pooh-pooh the book.
The idea of succession is at least coeval with the book, if not prior to it.