For many years, The Catholic Church has been under attack by both Anti-Catholic Protestants and the secular media, academia, etc. Nearly all of the doctrines, which the Church holds most dear, are ridiculed. One of these doctrines is the Papacy and the Primacy of Peter. Many anti-Catholics and well meaning Protestants claim that the Primacy of Peter is unbiblical.
They further claim that Matthew 16:13-20 does not support the Papacy at all. What they do claim is that Our Lord was going to build His Church on Peter's confession and Himself. However, this makes absolutely no sense if it is looked at in context. The passage in question is this:
13 When Jesus came into the coasts of Casesarea Philippi, He asked is disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of Man am?
14 And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist: some, Elijah; and others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets.
15 He saith unto them; But whom say ye that I am?
16 And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ the Son of the Living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him,
17 Blessed art thou Simon Bar-Jona. For flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in Heaven.
18 And I say unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
19 And I will give unto thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loosed on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven.(KJV)
According to some Protestants, the rock that is referred to in verse 18 is Christ
Himself but that certainly makes no sense. Our Lord is pronouncing a blessing on Peter. He states that he is blessed because God had revealed that Jesus is the Christ to Peter. Then Our Lord renames him from Simon to Peter. Our Lord spoke Aramaic, not Greek as some Protestants think. They usually like to point out that in Greek, Peter is named Petros and the rock is called petra. What they say is that Petros means small stone or pebble and petra is a massive rock. However, by the time that the Gospel of St. Matthew was written, petros and petra were interchangeable. It wouldn't have made sense for Peter to have a feminine sounding name (petra) so St. Matthew put the masculine ending of the word for Peter's name (petros).
In Aramaic, the language that Christ spoke…there is no problem. Kepha is the only word for big rock in Aramaic so the passage would be read like this, "And I say unto thee, that thou art Kephas and upon this kepha I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it." The rock must refer to Peter because grammatically, rock must refer to the closest noun, which is Peter and not Christ (Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build My Church).
Our Lord not only renames Simon to Peter but He also promises that the gates of hell will not prevail against the Church. Also, Our Lord gives the Keys to the Kingdom of Heaven to Peter. This is an allusion to Isaiah 22:22 when God replaces Shebna with Eliakim. The key to the House of David is given to Eliakim as well as the power to bind and loose (opening and shutting doors to various people).
This position is commonly called Prime Minister or vicar. Our Lord in Matthew 16 is giving Peter (and his successors) the position of Vicar on earth. The chief cornerstone is Christ and the Keys ultimately belong to Him but what he is doing in this passage is sharing this authority with Peter. The last promise that is made to Peter is that, "whatsoever thou shalt bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in Heaven.
This authority of binding and loosing is not restricted to Peter alone. In John 20: 21-23, Our Lord gives all the Apostles the power to forgive and retain sins. The authority of binding and loosing was given to all the Apostles, but the keys were given to Peter alone. Peter was given the job of Prime Minister or Vicar and the Apostles were given the job of being ministers.
This dogma wasn't new during the Early Church. In fact the earliest of the Church Fathers interpreted these passages the same way. Tertullian wrote in 211 AD, "For though you think that heaven is still shut up, remember that the Lord left the keys of it to Peter here, and through him to the Church, which keys everyone will carry with him if he has been questioned and made a confession [of faith]." In 220 AD, he also writes, "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 (Matthew 16:18-19)…What kind of man are you, subverting and changing what was the manifest intent of the Lord when he conferred this personally upon Peter? Upon you, he says, I will build my Church; and I will give to you the keys."
In 248 AD, Origen wrote, If we were to attend carefully to the gospels, we should also find, in relation to those things which seem to be common to Peter…a great difference and a preeminence in the things (Jesus) said to Peter, compared with the second class (of Apostles). For it is no small difference that Peter received the keys not of one heaven but of more, and in order that whatsoever things he binds on earth may be bound not in one heaven bun in them all, as compared with the many who bind on earth and loose on earth, so that these things are bound and loosed not in (all) the heavens, as in the case of Peter, but in one only; for they do not reach so high a stage with power as Peter to bind and loose in all the heavens."
Cyprian of Carthage wrote in 251 AD, "The Lord says to Peter: 'I say to you, 'he says, 'that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church'…On him [Peter] he builds the Church, and to him he gives the command to feed the sheep (John 21:17), and although he assigns a like power to all the apostles, yet he founded a single chair [cathedra], and he established by his own authority a source and an intrinsic reason for that unity. Indeed, the others were that also which Peter was [ie., apostles], but a primacy is given to Peter, whereby it is made clear that there is but one Church and one chair. So too, all [the apostles] are shepherds, and the flock is shown to be one, fed by all the apostles in single-minded accord. If someone does not hold fast to this unity of Peter, can he imagine that he still holds the faith? If he [should] desert the chair of Peter upon whom the Church was built, can he still be confident that he is in the Church?"
He also wrote in 253 AD, "There is one God and one Christ, and one Church, and one chair founded on Peter by the word of the Lord. It is not possible to set up another alter or for there to be another priesthood besides that one altar and that one priesthood. Whoever has gathered elsewhere is scattering."
The list goes on and on. The Church Fathers were unanimous in their belief that Peter is the rock and Christ was the one that gave the keys to him. This doesn't in any way diminish the authority of Christ. He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He is the chief cornerstone and He has never relinquished the power to bind and loose. Our Lord still has the keys but He has shared that authority with Peter and his successors.
The danger in denouncing the Papacy is that Protestants are really rejecting Christ because, "Verily, Verily, I say unto you, he that recieveth whomsoever I send recieveth me, and he that recieveth me recieveth him that sent me. "(John 14: 20) This is definitely a dangerous position to be in. We should pray that many eyes and hearts will be open to the Truth so that we can truly be one.