Posted on 10/21/2006 4:52:03 AM PDT by NYer
From Called To Communion: Understanding the Church Today
Editor's note: This is the second half of a chapter titled "The Primacy of Peter and Unity of the Church." The first half examines the status of Peter in the New Testament and the commission logion contained in Matthew 16:17-19.
The principle of succession in general
That the primacy of Peter is recognizable in all the major strands of the New Testament is incontestable.
The real difficulty arises when we come to the second question: Can the idea of a Petrine succession be justified? Even more difficult is the third question that is bound up with it: Can the Petrine succession of Rome be credibly substantiated?
Concerning the first question, we must first of all note that there is no explicit statement regarding the Petrine succession in the New Testament. This is not surprising, since neither the Gospels nor the chief Pauline epistles address the problem of a postapostolic Church—which, by the way, must be mentioned as a sign of the Gospels' fidelity to tradition. Indirectly, however, this problem can be detected in the Gospels once we admit the principle of form critical method according to which only what was considered in the respective spheres of tradition as somehow meaningful for the present was preserved in writing as such. This would mean, for example, that toward the end of the first century, when Peter was long dead, John regarded the former's primacy, not as a thing of the past, but as a present reality for the Church.
For many even believe—though perhaps with a little too much imagination—that they have good grounds for interpreting the "competition" between Peter and the beloved disciple as an echo of the tensions between Rome's claim to primacy and the sense of dignity possessed by the Churches of Asia Minor. This would certainly be a very early and, in addition, inner-biblical proof that Rome was seen as continuing the Petrine line; but we should in no case rely on such uncertain hypotheses. The fundamental idea, however, does seem to me correct, namely, that the traditions of the New Testament never reflect an interest of purely historical curiosity but are bearers of present reality and in that sense constantly rescue things from the mere past, without blurring the special status of the origin.
Moreover, even scholars who deny the principle itself have propounded hypotheses of succession. 0. Cullmann, for example, objects in a very clear-cut fashion to the idea of succession, yet he believes that he can Show that Peter was replaced by James and that this latter assumed the primacy of the erstwhile first apostle. Bultmann believes that he is correct in concluding from the mention of the three pillars in Galatians 2:9 that the course of development led away from a personal to a collegial leadership and that a college entered upon the succession of Peter. [1]
We have no need to discuss these hypotheses and others like them; their foundation is weak enough. Nevertheless, they do show that it is impossible to avoid the idea of succession once the word transmitted in Scripture is considered to be a sphere open to the future. In those writings of the New Testament that stand on the cusp of the second generation or else already belong to it-especially in the Acts of the Apostles and in the Pastoral Letters—the principle of succession does in fact take on concrete shape.
The Protestant notion that the "succession" consists solely in the word as such, but not in any "structures", is proved to be anachronistic in light of what in actual fact is the form of tradition in the New Testament. The word is tied to the witness, who guarantees it an unambiguous sense, which it does not possess as a mere word floating in isolation. But the witness is not an individual who stands independently on his own. He is no more a wit ness by virtue of himself and of his own powers of memory than Peter can be the rock by his own strength. He is not a witness as "flesh and blood" but as one who is linked to the Pneuma, the Paraclete who authenticates the truth and opens up the memory and, in his turn, binds the witness to Christ. For the Paraclete does not speak of himself, but he takes from "what is his" (that is, from what is Christ's: Jn 16: 13).
This binding of the witness to the Pneuma and to his mode of being-"not of himself, but what he hears" -is called "sacrament" in the language of the Church. Sacrament designates a threefold knot-word, witness, Holy Spirit and Christ-which describes the essential structure of succession in the New Testament. We can infer with certainty from the testimony of the Pastoral Letters and of the Acts of the Apostles that the apostolic generation already gave to this interconnection of person and word in the believed presence of the Spirit and of Christ the form of the laying on of hands.
The Petrine succession in Rome
In opposition to the New Testament pattern of succession described above, which withdraws the word from human manipulation precisely by binding witnesses into its service, there arose very early on an intellectual and anti-institutional model known historically by the name of Gnosis, which made the free interpretation and speculative development of the word its principle. Before long the appeal to individual witnesses no longer sufficed to counter the intellectual claim advanced by this tendency. It became necessary to have fixed points by which to orient the testimony itself, and these were found in the so-called apostolic sees, that is, in those where the apostles had been active. The apostolic sees became the reference point of true communio. But among these sees there was in turn–quite clearly in Irenaeus of Lyons–a decisive criterion that recapitulated all others: the Church of Rome, where Peter and Paul suffered martyrdom. It was with this Church that every community had to agree; Rome was the standard of the authentic apostolic tradition as a whole.
Moreover, Eusebius of Caesarea organized the first version of his ecclesiastical history in accord with the same principle. It was to be a written record of the continuity of apostolic succession, which was concentrated in the three Petrine sees Rome, Antioch and Alexandria-among which Rome, as the site of Peter's martyrdom, was in turn preeminent and truly normative. [2]
This leads us to a very fundamental observation. [3] The Roman primacy, or, rather, the acknowledgement of Rome as the criterion of the right apostolic faith, is older than the canon of the New Testament, than "Scripture".
We must be on our guard here against an almost inevitable illusion. "Scripture" is more recent than "the scriptures" of which it is composed. It was still a long time before the existence of the individual writings resulted in the "New Testament" as Scripture, as the Bible. The assembling of the writings into a single Scripture is more properly speaking the work of tradition, a work that began in the second century but came to a kind of conclusion only in the fourth or fifth century. Harnack, a witness who cannot be suspected of pro-Roman bias, has remarked in this regard that it was only at the end of the second century, in Rome, that a canon of the "books of the New Testament" won recognition by the criterion of apostolicity-catholicity, a criterion to which the other Churches also gradually subscribed "for the sake of its intrinsic value and on the strength of the authority of the Roman Church".
We can therefore say that Scripture became Scripture through the tradition, which precisely in this process included the potentior principalitas–the preeminent original authority–of the Roman see as a constitutive element.
Two points emerge clearly from what has just been First, the principle of tradition in its sacramental form-apostolic succession—played a constitutive role in the existence and continuance of the Church. Without this principle, it is impossible to conceive of a New Testament at all, so that we are caught in a contradiction when we affirm the one while wanting to deny the other. Furthermore, we have seen that in Rome the traditional series of bishops was from the very beginning recorded as a line of successors.
We can add that Rome and Antioch were conscious of succeeding to the mission of Peter and that early on Alexandria was admitted into the circle of Petrine sees as the city where Peter's disciple Mark had been active. Having said all that, the site of Peter's martyrdom nonetheless appears clearly as the chief bearer of his supreme authority and plays a preeminent role in the formation of tradition which is constitutive of the Church-and thus in the genesis of the New Testament as Bible; Rome is one of the indispensable internal and external- conditions of its possibility. It would be exciting to trace the influence on this process of the idea that the mission of Jerusalem had passed over to Rome, which explains why at first Jerusalem was not only not a "patriarchal see" but not even a metropolis: Jerusalem was now located in Rome, and since Peter's departure from that city, its primacy had been transferred to the capital of the pagan world. [4]
But to consider this in detail would lead us too far afield for the moment. The essential point, in my opinion, has already become plain: the martyrdom of Peter in Rome fixes the place where his function continues. The awareness of this fact can be detected as early as the first century in the Letter of Clement, even though it developed but slowly in all its particulars.
Concluding reflections
We shall break off at this point, for the chief goal of our considerations has been attained. We have seen that the New Testament as a whole strikingly demonstrates the primacy of Peter; we have seen that the formative development of tradition and of the Church supposed the continuation of Peter's authority in Rome as an intrinsic condition. The Roman primacy is not an invention of the popes, but an essential element of ecclesial unity that goes back to the Lord and was developed faithfully in the nascent Church.
But the New Testament shows us more than the formal aspect of a structure; it also reveals to us the inward nature of this structure. It does not merely furnish proof texts, it is a permanent criterion and task. It depicts the tension between skandalon and rock; in the very disproportion between man's capacity and God's sovereign disposition, it reveals God to be the one who truly acts and is present.
If in the course of history the attribution of such authority to men could repeatedly engender the not entirely unfounded suspicion of human arrogation of power, not only the promise of the New Testament but also the trajectory of that history itself prove the opposite. The men in question are so glaringly, so blatantly unequal to this function that the very empowerment of man to be the rock makes evident how little it is they who sustain the Church but God alone who does so, who does so more in spite of men than through them.
The mystery of the Cross is perhaps nowhere so palpably present as in the primacy as a reality of Church history. That its center is forgiveness is both its intrinsic condition and the sign of the distinctive character of God's power. Every single biblical logion about the primacy thus remains from generation to generation a signpost and a norm, to which we must ceaselessly resubmit ourselves. When the Church adheres to these words in faith, she is not being triumphalistic but humbly recognizing in wonder and thanksgiving the victory of God over and through human weakness. Whoever deprives these words of their force for fear of triumphalism or of human usurpation of authority does not proclaim that God is greater but diminishes him, since God demonstrates the power of his love, and thus remains faithful to the law of the history of salvation, precisely in the paradox of human impotence.
For with the same realism with which we declare today the sins of the popes and their disproportion to the magnitude of their commission, we must also acknowledge that Peter has repeatedly stood as the rock against ideologies, against the dissolution of the word into the plausibilities of a given time, against subjection to the powers of this world.
When we see this in the facts of history, we are not celebrating men but praising the Lord, who does not abandon the Church and who desired to manifest that he is the rock through Peter, the little stumbling stone: "flesh and blood" do not save, but the Lord saves through those who are of flesh and blood. To deny this truth is not a plus of faith, not a plus of humility, but is to shrink from the humility that recognizes God as he is. Therefore the Petrine promise and its historical embodiment in Rome remain at the deepest level an ever-renewed motive for joy: the powers of hell will not prevail against it . . .
Endnotes:
[1] Die Geschichte der synoptischen Tradition, 2d ed. (198 1), 147- 51; cf. Gnilka, 56.
[2] For an exhaustive account of this point, see V. Twomey, Apostolikos Thronos (Münster, 1982).
[3] It is my hope that in the not-too-distant future I will have the opportunity to develop and substantiate in greater detail the view of the succession that I attempt to indicate in an extremely condensed form in what follows. I owe important suggestions to several works by 0. Karrer, especially: Um die Einheit der Christen. Die Petrusfrage (Frankfurt am Mainz, 1953); "Apostolische Nachfolge und Primat", in: Feiner, Trütsch and Böckle, Fragen in der Theologie heute (Freiburg im.Breisgau, 1957), 175-206; "Das Petrusamt in der Frühkirche", in Festgabe J. Lortz (Baden-Baden, 1958), 507-25; "Die biblische und altkirchliche Grundlage des Papsttums", in: Lebendiges Zeugnis (1958), 3-24. Also of importance are some of the papers in the festschrift for 0. Karrer: Begegnung der Christen, ed. by Roesle-Cullmann (Frankfurt am Mainz, 1959); in particular, K. Hofstetter, "Das Petrusamt in der Kirche des I. und 2. Jahrhunderts", 361-72.
[4] Cf. Hofstetter.
Um, that makes it, by definition Presbyterian....
________________________________
It has been eye opening for me to read about the early church because it breaks down so many myth's. The most obvious being this grand hierarchal authority.
I am printing this post out and keeping it to remember and to give to my family and friends.
This is exactly what being a Catholic means to me.
Thank you. It was worth reading through this long thread to get to this post.
The assumption that Peter's imprisonment and angelic deliverance occurred in the same year as Herod's death is unjustified and unsupported.
he never mentions the name of Peter
It is likely that Paul knew that Peter was traveling away from Rome at that time. Given Peter's authority, only upon Peter's absence would Paul have written such an apostolic letter. Ray's timeline (mentioned earlier in this thread) shows Peter traveling in Bithynia, Pontus, and Cappadocia during this time (i.e. the time when Paul wrote the letter to the Romans).
Not once is Peter mentioned in this epistle and since Paul is asking for the presence of Mark only we can assume that Peter is already dead.
There are other alternatives to which you are not giving sufficient consideration. One is that Mark the nephew of Barnabas is not the "John Mark" of Acts 12 who wrote the Gospel of Mark and became the first bishop of Alexandria. Another is that since Timothy is in Ephesus, and Peter was in Rome, we shouldn't expect Paul to saying anything to Timothy about Peter. It is possible that Peter and Paul were both imprisoned at the same time, though in different cells. (I've actually visited the traditional cell in Rome where Paul is said to have been chained. It is utterly dark and dank, small, and not joined to other cells like in an American prison.) So we have to be careful not to put weight on arguments from silence when there are so other equally plausible explanations for Paul's not mentioning Peter. Peter himself refers to "our beloved brother Paul" in 2 Peter 3:15, and this epistle is thought to have been written shortly before Peter's death, since he says that the "laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent". (2 Peter 1:14). There is no good reason therefore, to reject the testimony of the patristic tradition that Peter and Paul were martyred at the same time under Nero in Rome, probably in 67 AD.
For those who think Peter was in Iraq (and not Rome), if you know anything about ancient geography, you will see that it would be very odd for him to be have been writing letters to "Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia" from present-day Iraq. (1 Peter 1:1; 2 Peter 3:1) Since he was writing letters to those places, he most likely had traveled there and in his two epistles was writing follow-up letters to strengthen the churches there in the faith. The only place relatively near to those locations, that would make sense to be referred to as 'Babylon', is Rome.
-A8
Most fogies are foggie. That's what makes them a fogie.
We'll add some bad church music and he can be a fuguie
This looks like a good link. I haven't read it yet...
"...There is a deeper reason for a mystic being "mute" — that is what the name imports — than that he wishes to make a mystery of his discoveries. He is "mute" because, as a mystic, he has nothing to say. When he sinks within himself he finds feelings, not conceptions; his is an emotional, not a conceptional, religion; and feelings, emotions, though not inaudible, are not articulate. As a mystic, he has no conceptional language in which to express what he feels..."
We have historical information from Josephus (a reputable source) stipulating that Herod Agrippa died in A.D.45. As pointed out in post # 1438 Peter was in and about Jerusalem from Pentecost to A.D. 54. We know for a fact he was there at the Council in A.D. 51. I never said Peter was delivered from prison the same year Herod died.....but obviously Herod died thereafter....and we know when it was (45 A.D.).
It is likely that Paul knew that Peter was traveling away from Rome at that time. Given Peter's authority, only upon Peter's absence would Paul have written such an apostolic letter.
Why would this be likely? Paul was given the authority, not Peter. To presuppose that Peter was anywhere in or about Rome at any time is speculation.
There are other alternatives to which you are not giving sufficient consideration. One is that Mark the nephew of Barnabas is not the "John Mark" of Acts 12 who wrote the Gospel of Mark and became the first bishop of Alexandria.
The reason we know that this Mark is the companion of Peter is that Paul is asking for Timothy to also stop and get his "scrolls and parchments" at Troas. He had evidently left them there when he had been arrested the final time and wanted to make sure these "Scriptures" [2 Peter 3:15-16] would be placed in safe hands....probably having Mark and Timothy take them to the Apostle John. Mark, of course, would be bringing along with him all of Peter's writings as well as the Book of Mark. Paul was already in possession of the works of Luke....as Luke was with him. Jude and the Book of Hebrews, I'm certain, would also have been among Paul's possessions at that time.
I believe you see the initial canonizing of the New Testament here. Certainly by that time the Book of Matthew had been copied countless times and as soon as John received the "Parchments, Scrolls, Peter's writings and Luke's" he would have added his own books and we would then have had all of New testament scripture present for the early churches. We do know that John and the Greeks safe guarded the original writings.
There is no Biblical record of Peter ever having been in or about Rome and much evidence points to the contrary. It makes no sense that scripture would be completely silent about his presence there if he was that instrumental in the development of the Roman Church.
The distinction between mysticism of this type and evangelical Christianity, from the point of view which is now occupying our attention, is nevertheless clear. Evangelical Christianity interprets all religious experience by the normative revelation of God recorded for us in the Holy Scriptures, and guides, directs, and corrects it from these Scriptures, and thus molds it into harmony with what God in His revealed Word lays down as the normal Christian life.
The mystic, on the other hand, tends to substitute his religious experience for the objective revelation of God recorded in the written Word, as the source from which he derives his knowledge of God, or at least to subordinate the expressly revealed Word as the less direct and convincing source of knowledge of God to his own religious experience. The result is that the external revelation is relatively depressed in value, if not totally set aside
For the first 300 years the early church just ran around evangelizing until so many goofy views started springing up that someone decided that perhaps it would be good to write down what Christians believe. The "grand hierarchal" that the early fathers refer to is simply because there was no other choices up until this time. Interesting, the Orthodox never recognized a Pope as the top dog.
Interesting how many feel they need "mysticism" in their Christian walk.
Now Bro Harley . . . please . . . avoid forcing me to deal with two major . . . conflicts in the same thread???!!! LOL.
Then 'splain this one for me:
2Th 2:7 For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way. 2Th 2:8 Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming;
Here we see the Church as the proper authority to which individuals may appeal where differences arise.
Don't think I do not respect Apostolic authority or a church's authority. This is not the case. If it were, then how could I quote from their writings? The point is, if their writings are secondary to oral succession, then why even have the writings? If this is the case, then why do y'all quote these writings? What authority do you have to defend your Church. The debate for all Catholics should end with, "because they say so".
It is interesting that you post scriptures indicating that the laity have the ability and even the duty to interpret scripture and identify sin on their own. The question here is that what to do when the church is in sin or teaching errors.
Adiaireton8 is advocating a course of action, namely prayer for the reconciliation of the person who has been excommunicated. This is an act of love, correct? This is also entirely consistent with St. Paul's example after he directs the community at Corinth to excommunicate a son and his mother or stepmother for incest (1 Cor 5: 1,2), he nonetheless admonishes the church to act with charity toward these two individuals. (2 Cor 2:5-11)
1Co 5:5 I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
The result of the first controversy you post is that Paul decides to give the offender the death penalty since, because he cannot stop sinning, it is better for him to be dead and hope to be judged well at the resurrection. Does this, perhaps, give us an insight as to what the first Bishop of Rome would have done to these pedophile priests and their leaders who covered for them?
2Co 2:6 Sufficient for such a one is this punishment which was inflicted by the majority,
Again, the majority of the laity decided what was sin (interpreted scripture on their own) and took care of the matter. This does not say, "You should not have interpreted scripture on your own, you're busted when I get there". It says, "good job for taking care of business".
Since St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila were mentined here as "mystics", I have to say that the second paragraph in this post--apparently quoted from a link, does not present Christian mysticism in its true sense.
St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila,--and St. Therese, and St. Elizabeth of the Trinity, based their writings strictly on Scripture.
I realize this is tangental to the original thread topic, but if one is not familiar and conversant with the works of these Catholic "mystics", then what is said about them is not accurately understood or portrayed.
I think it's inmportant to make distinctions re:a faulty and generalized description of mysticism, as if were self-delusion or occultic in nature.
Again, that's something for different thread, but since it has come up and beeen defined from one source, I want to clarify that the source does not offer an accurate or more comprehensive understanding. Even the use of the words "tends to" and "relatively" give away that this is generalization.
typos and failure to spellcheck...mea culpa.
This is not unique to your organization...For us Christians who received the Holy Spirit upon calling on Christ to save us, we have these same things, always...Not just at communion...But we have communion to reflect upon that Last Supper and the crucifiction...
But we don't get raised up everytime we eat the bread and drink the juice...We ARE raised up to sit with Jesus Christ, now and forever...We don't keep going up and down before and after communion...
But I always wondered, how long does a Eucharist last???How long can you go between Eucharists before you need to get 'refueled'???
Every Catholic I talked to (you are the exception) says you guys can not possibly have assurance of being raised up with Christ...
Those of us on the other side know we have that assurance and if you do, you maybe ought to pass that knowledge along to some of the other Catholics...
List for us all the Ante-Nicene Fathers and their exact words right here for us. We want you to show us. Post the precise words so we can check them out for ourselves. Maybe the complete list of Ante-Nicene fathers testifying to this Petrine Bishopric in Rome will bring this matter to an end. Come on, adaire, adaire ya. Let's see documented facts, from the earliest through the AnteNicene period. No more rhetoric. Post your "Fathers'" words, so that we can all see what you choose to trust rather than the Scriptures themselves.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.