Christians of different theological backgrounds are in disagreement as to the exact significance of Peter's ministry. For instance: • Catholics view Peter as the first pope. The Catholic Church asserts that Peter's ministry, conferred upon him by Jesus of Nazareth in the gospels, lays down the theological foundation for the pope's exercise of pastoral authority over the Church. • Eastern Orthodox also believe that Peter's ministry points to an underlying theology wherein a special primacy ought to be granted to Peter's successors above other Church leaders but see this as merely a "primacy of honor", rather than the right to exercise pastoral authority. • Protestant denominations assert that Peter's apostolic work in Rome does not imply a connection between him and the papacy. Similarly, historians of various backgrounds also offer differing interpretations of the Apostle's presence in Rome.
Catholic Church at the Vatican According to Catholic belief, Simon Peter was distinguished by Jesus to hold the
first place of honor and authority. Also in Catholic belief, Peter was, as the first Bishop of Rome, the first
Pope. Furthermore, they consider every Pope to be Peter's successor and the rightful superior of all other
bishops. However, Peter never bore the title of "Pope" or "Vicar of Christ". The Catholic Church's recognition of Peter as head of
its church on earth (with Christ being its
heavenly head) is based on its interpretation of passages from the
canonical gospels of the New Testament, as well as
sacred tradition.
John 21:15–17 The first passage is John 21:15–17 which is: "Feed my lambs... Tend my sheep... feed my sheep" (within the Greek it is Ποίμαινε i.e., to feed and rule [as a Shepherd] v. 16, while Βόσκε i.e., to feed for v.15 & v. 17) – which is seen by Catholics as Christ promising the spiritual supremacy to Peter. The
Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913 sees in this passage Jesus "charging [Peter] with the superintendency of all his sheep, without exception; and consequently of his whole flock, that is, of his own church".
Matthew 16:18 Another passage is Matthew 16:18:
Etymology In the story of the
calling of the disciples, Jesus addresses Simon Peter with the Greek term Κηφᾶς (
Cephas), a Hellenised form of Aramaic
ܟ݁ܺܐܦ݂ܳܐ (
kepha), which means "rock", a term that before was not used as a proper name: Jesus later alludes to this nickname after Peter declares Jesus to be the Messiah: The
Peshitta Syriac version renders Jesus' words into
Aramaic as follows:
Paul of Tarsus later uses the appellation Cephas in reference to Peter.
Interpretation of Matthew 16:18 by
Pierre-Étienne Monnot. Peter holds the Keys of Heaven. (1481–1482) To better understand what Christ meant,
Basil of Caesarea elaborates: In reference to Peter's occupation before becoming an apostle, the popes wear the
Fisherman's Ring, which bears an image of Peter casting his nets from a fishing boat. The keys used as a symbol of the pope's authority refer to the "keys of the kingdom of Heaven" promised to Peter. The terminology of this "commission" of Peter is unmistakably parallel to the commissioning of Eliakim ben Hilkiah in Isaiah 22:15–23. Peter is often depicted in both Western and Eastern Christian art holding a
key or a set of keys. In the original
Greek the word translated as "Peter" is
Πέτρος (Petros) and that translated as "rock" is
πέτρα (petra), two words that, while not identical, give an impression of one of many times when Jesus used a play on words. Furthermore, since Jesus presumably spoke to Peter in their native Aramaic language, he would have used
kepha in both instances.
The Peshitta Text and
the Old Syriac texts use the word "kepha" for both "Peter" and "rock" in Matthew 16:18. John 1:42 says Jesus called Simon "Cephas", as Paul calls him in some letters. He was instructed by Christ to strengthen his brethren, i.e., the apostles. Peter also had a leadership role in the early Christian church at Jerusalem according to The Acts of the Apostles chapters 1–2, 10–11, and 15. Early Catholic Latin and Greek writers (such as
John Chrysostom) considered the "foundation rock" as applying to both Peter personally and his confession of faith (or the faith of his confession) symbolically, as well as seeing Christ's promise to apply more generally to his twelve apostles and the Church at large. This "double meaning" interpretation is present in the current
Catechism of the Catholic Church. Protestant arguments against the Catholic interpretation are largely based on the difference between the Greek words translated "Rock" in the Matthean passage. They often claim that in classical
Attic Greek petros (masculine) generally meant "pebble", while
petra (feminine) meant "boulder" or "cliff", and accordingly, taking Peter's name to mean "pebble", they argue that the "rock" in question cannot have been Peter, but something else, either Jesus himself or the faith in Jesus that Peter had just professed. These popular-level writings are disputed in similar popular-level Catholic writings. The New Testament was written in
Koiné Greek, not Attic Greek and some authorities say no significant difference existed between the meanings of
petros and
petra. So far from meaning a pebble was the word
petros that
Apollonius Rhodius, a writer of Koiné Greek of the third century BC, used it to refer to "a huge round
boulder, a terrible quoit of
Ares Enyalius; four stalwart youths could not have raised it from the ground even a little". The feminine noun
petra (πέτρα in Greek), translated as
rock in the phrase "on this rock I will build my church", is also used in 1 Cor. 10:4 describing Jesus Christ, which reads: "They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ." Although Matthew 16 is used as a primary proof-text for the Catholic doctrine of Papal supremacy, some Protestant scholars say that prior to the Reformation of the 16th century, Matthew 16 was very rarely used to support papal claims, despite it being well documented as being used in the 3rd century by Stephen of Rome against Cyprian of Carriage in a "passionate disagreement" about baptism and in the 4th century by Pope Damasus as a claim to primacy as a lesson of the Arian Controversy for stricter discipline and centralised control. Their position is that most of the early and medieval Church interpreted the "rock" as being a reference either to Christ or to Peter's faith, not Peter himself. They understand Jesus' remark to have been his affirmation of Peter's testimony that Jesus was the Son of God. Despite this claim, many Fathers saw a connection between Matthew 16:18 and the primacy of Peter and his office, such as
Tertullian, writing: "The Lord said to Peter, 'On this rock I will build my Church, I have given you the keys of the kingdom of heaven [and] whatever you shall have bound or loosed on earth will be bound or loosed in heaven' [Matt. 16:18–19]. ...Upon you, he says, I will build my Church; and I will give to you the keys, not to the Church."
Epistles of Paul Paul's
Epistle to the Romans, written about AD 57. around AD 64 or 68.
Protestant rejection of Catholic claims () Other theologically conservative Christians, including
Confessional Lutherans, also rebut comments made by Karl Keating and D.A. Carson who claim that there is no distinction between the words
petros and
petra in Koine Greek. The Lutheran theologians state that the dictionaries of
Koine/NT Greek, including the authoritative
Bauer-Danker-Arndt-Gingrich Lexicon, indeed list both words and the passages that give different meanings for each. The Lutheran theologians further note that:
Oscar Cullmann, a Lutheran theologian and distinguished Church historian, disagrees with Luther and the Protestant reformers who held that by "rock" Christ did not mean Peter, but meant either himself or the faith of his followers. He believes the meaning of the original Aramaic is very clear: that "Kepha" was the Aramaic word for "rock", and that it was also the name by which Christ called Peter. Cullmann concludes that while Peter
was the original head of the apostles, Peter was not the founder of any visible church succession. Taking a somewhat different approach from Cullman, they point out that the Gospel of Matthew was not written in the classical Attic form of Greek, but in the Hellenistic
Koine dialect in which there is no distinction in meaning between
petros and
petra. Moreover, even in Attic Greek, in which the regular meaning of
petros was a smallish "stone", there are instances of its use to refer to larger rocks, as in
Sophocles,
Oedipus at Colonus, v. 1595, where
petros refers to a boulder used as a landmark, obviously something more than a pebble. In any case, a
petros/
petra distinction is irrelevant considering the Aramaic language in which the phrase might well have been spoken. In Greek, of any period, the feminine noun
petra could not be used as the given name of a male, which may explain the use of
Petros as the Greek word with which to translate Aramaic
Kepha. Unlike Oscar Cullmann,
Confessional Lutherans and many other Protestant apologists agree that it's meaningless to elaborate the meaning of "Rock" by looking at the Aramaic language. While the Jews spoke mostly Aramaic at home, in public they usually spoke Greek. The few Aramaic words spoken by Jesus in public were unusual, which is why they are noted as such. And most importantly the New Testament was revealed in Koine Greek,
not Aramaic. Lutheran historians even report that the Catholic church itself did not, at least unanimously, regard Peter as the rock until the 1870s:
Eastern Orthodox The
Eastern Orthodox Church regards Apostle Peter, together with Apostle Paul, as "Preeminent Apostles". Another title used for Peter is
Coryphaeus, which could be translated as "Choir-director", or lead singer. The church recognises Apostle Peter's leadership role in the
early church, especially in the very early days at Jerusalem, but does not consider him to have had any "princely" role over his fellow Apostles. The New Testament is not seen by the Orthodox as supporting any extraordinary authority for Peter with regard to faith or morals. The Orthodox also hold that Peter did not act as leader at the
Council of Jerusalem, but as merely one of a number who spoke. The final decision regarding the non-necessity of
circumcision (and certain prohibitions) was spelled out by
James, brother of Jesus (though Catholics hold that James merely reiterated and fleshed out what Peter had said regarding the latter's earlier divine revelation regarding the inclusion of Gentiles). Eastern and Oriental Orthodox do not recognise the Bishop of Rome as the successor of Peter but the
Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople sends a delegation each year to Rome to participate in the celebration of the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul. In the
Ravenna Document of 13 October 2007, the representatives of the
Eastern Orthodox Church agreed that "Rome, as the Church that "presides in love" according to the phrase of Ignatius of Antioch ("To the Romans", Prologue), occupied the first place in the
taxis, and that the bishop of Rome was therefore the
protos among the patriarchs if the Papacy unites with the Orthodox Church. They disagree, however, on the interpretation of the historical evidence from this era regarding the prerogatives of the bishop of Rome as
protos, a matter that was already understood in different ways in the first millennium". With regard to Jesus' words to Peter, "Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build my church", the Orthodox hold Christ is referring to the confession of faith,
not the person of Peter as that upon which he will build the church. This is allegedly shown by the fact that the original Septuagint uses the feminine demonstrative pronoun when he says, "upon this rock" (ταύτῃ τῇ πέτρᾳ); whereas, grammatically, if he had been referring to Peter, he would allegedly have used the masculine.
Syriac Orthodox Church The Fathers of the Syriac Orthodox Church tried to give a theological interpretation to the primacy of Apostle Peter. They were fully convinced of the unique office of Peter in the primitive Christian community.
Ephrem,
Aphrahat and
Maruthas who were supposed to have been the best exponents of the early
Syriac tradition unequivocally acknowledge the office of Peter. The Syriac Fathers, following the rabbinic tradition, call Jesus "Kepha" for they see "rock" in the Old Testament as a messianic Symbol (yet the Old Maronite Syriacs of Lebanon still refer to Saint Peter as "Saint Simon the Generous" or Simon Karam"). When Christ gave his own name "Kepha" to Simon he was giving him participation in the person and office of Christ. Christ who is the Kepha and shepherd made Simon the chief shepherd in his place and gave him the very name Kepha and said that on Kepha he would build the Church.
Aphrahat shared the common Syriac tradition. For him Kepha is in fact another name of Jesus, and Simon was given the right to share the name. The person who receives somebody else's name also obtains the rights of the person who bestows the name. Aphrahat makes the stone taken from Jordan a type of Peter. He wrote: "Jesus [Joshua] son of Nun set up the stones for a witness in Israel; Jesus our Saviour called Simon Kepha Sarirto and set him as the faithful witness among nations." Again, he wrote in his commentary on
Deuteronomy that
Moses brought forth water from "rock" (Kepha) for the people and Jesus sent Simon Kepha to carry his teachings among nations. God accepted him and made him the foundation of the Church and called him Kepha. When he speaks about the transfiguration of Christ he calls him
Simon Peter, the foundation of the Church. Ephrem also shared the same view. The Armenian version of
De Virginitate records that
Peter the rock shunned honour. A
mimro of Efrem found in Holy Week Liturgy points to the importance of Peter. Both
Aphrahat and
Ephrem represent the authentic tradition of the Syrian Church. The different orders of liturgies used for sanctification of Church buildings, marriage, ordination,
et cetera, reveal that the primacy of Peter is a part of living faith of the Church.
New Apostolic Church The
New Apostolic Church, which believes in the re-established Apostle ministry, sees Peter as the first
Chief Apostle.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches that Peter was the first leader of the early Christian church after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. While the Church accepts apostolic succession from Peter, it rejects papal successors as illegitimate.
Joseph Smith, the founder of
Mormonism, recorded in multiple revelations that the resurrected Peter appeared to him and
Oliver Cowdery in 1829, near
Harmony Township, Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, in order to bestow the apostleship and keys of the kingdom as part of a
restoration of priesthood authority. In interpreting , Latter-day Saint leader
Bruce R. McConkie stated, "The things of God are known only by the power of his Spirit", and "that which the world calls Mormonism is based upon the rock of revelation". In his April 1981
general conference address, McConkie identified the rock of which Jesus spoke as the rock of revelation: "There is no other foundation upon which the Lord could build His Church and kingdom. ...Revelation: Pure, perfect, personal revelation—this is the rock!" == Non-Christian views ==