"Jesus saith to them: But whom do you say that I am? Simon Peter answered and said: Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answering, said to him: Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jona: because flesh and blood hath not revealed it to thee, but my Father who is in heaven. And I say to thee: That thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound also in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose upon earth, it shall be loosed also in heaven. Then he commanded his disciples, that they should tell no one that he was Jesus the Christ."
-Matthew 16:18
There are a couple of things that have to be presumed when reading this text.
1. Christ is King
"He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High; and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of David his father; and he shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever."
-Luke 1:32
2. The Church is the Kingdom of God (compare the eternity of the kingdom described below with Matthew 16, and the interchangeability of Church and Kingdom above):
"But in the days of those kingdoms the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, and his kingdom shall not be delivered up to another people, and it shall break in pieces, and shall consume all these kingdoms, and itself shall stand for ever."
-Daniel 2:44
I don’t think our Lord used terms or phrases that had no meaning behind them. The phrase "keys to the kingdom" is fairly loaded and has a particular meaning.
"This is what the Lord, the LORD Almighty, says: ’Go, say to this steward, to Shebna, who is over the house: What are you doing here and who gave you permission to cut out a grave for yourself here, hewing your grave on the height and chiseling your resting place in the rock?... I will depose you from your office, and you will be ousted from your position. "In that day I will summon my servant, Eliakim son of Hilkiah. I will clothe him with your robe and fasten your sash around him and hand your authority over to him. He will be a father to those who live in Jerusalem and to the house of Judah. I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open. I will drive him like a peg into a firm place; he will be a seat of honor for the house of his father. All the glory of his family will hang on him: its offspring and offshoots—all its lesser vessels, from the bowls to all the jars."
-Isaias 22:15-16, 19-24
Israel and Judah did not exist in a vacuum, as they modeled their kingdom on those of other nations (primarily Egypt).
"Then all the ancients of Israel being assembled, came to Samuel to Ramatha. And they said to him: Behold thou art old, and thy sons walk not in thy ways: make us a king, to judge us, as all nations have... But the people would not hear the voice of Samuel, and they said: Nay: but there shall be a king over us. And we also will be like all nations: and our king shall judge us, and go out before us, and tight our battles for us."
-1 Samuel 4-5, 19-20
Did Egypt have a similar office to that of steward in Israel?
"And again Pharao said to Joseph: Behold, I have appointed thee over the whole land of Egypt. And he took his ring from his own hand, and gave it into his hand: and he put upon him a robe of silk, and put a chain of gold about his neck. And he made him go up into his second chariot, the crier proclaiming that all should bow their knee before him, and that they should know he was made governor over the whole land of Egypt. And the king said to Joseph: I am Pharao; without thy commandment no man shall move hand or foot in all the land of Egypt. And he turned his name, and called him in the Egyptian tongue, Zaphnah-paaneah (saviour of the world). And he gave him to wife Aseneth the daughter of Putiphare priest of Heliopolis. Then Joseph went out to the land of Egypt."
-Genesis 41:41-45
What our Lord is talking about is a royal office, that of the steward (vizier, majordomo). It is a single office, occupied by one person at a time, whose symbol of authority are the keys (Israel) or a signet ring (Egypt), etc. The authority that the steward had was over all of the king’s subjects, without exception. It was not limited to any precinct, territory, region, etc.
The power of binding and loosening is something different. That too is a loaded phrase, and I would turn to the Jewish Encyclopedia for clarity:
Rabbinical term for "forbidding and permitting." The expression "asar" (to bind herself by a bond) is used in the Bible (Num. xxx. 3 et seq.) for a vow which prevents one from using a thing. It implies binding an object by a powerful spell in order to prevent its use (see Targ. to Ps. lviii. 6; Shab. 81b, for "magic spell"). The corresponding Aramean "shera" and Hebrew "hittir" (for loosing the prohibitive spell) have no parallel in the Bible.Our Lord only gave the keys to Peter. When we look at the power to bind and loosen, that too is given to Peter individually (the Greek is singular in Matthew 16), and the Apostles as a body (the Greek is plural).
The power of binding and loosing was always claimed by the Pharisees. Under Queen Alexandra, the Pharisees, says Josephus ("B J." i, 5, § 2), "became the administrators of all public affairs so as to be empowered to banish and readmit whom they pleased, as well as to loose and to bind." This does not mean that, as the learned men, they merely decided what, according to the Law, was forbidden or allowed, but that they possessed and exercised the power of tying or untying a thing by the spell of their divine authority, just as they could, by the power vested in them, pronounce and revoke an anathema upon a person. The various schools had the power "to bind and to loose"; that is, to forbid and to permit (Ḥag. 3b); and they could bind any day by declaring it a fast-day (Meg. Ta’an. xxii.; Ta’an. 12a; Yer. Ned. i. 36c, d). This power and authority, vested in the rabbinical body of each age or in the Sanhedrin (see Authority), received its ratification and final sanction from the celestial court of justice (Sifra, Emor, ix.; Mak. 23b).
In the New Testament.
In this sense Jesus, when appointing his apostles to be his successors, used the familiar formula (Matt. xvi. 19, xviii. 18). By these words he virtually invested them with the same authority as that which he found belonging to the scribes and Pharisees who "bind heavy burdens and lay them on men’s shoulders, but will not move them with one of their fingers"; that is, "loose them, " as they have the power to do (Matt. xxiii. 2-4). In the same sense, in the second epistle of Clement to James II. ("Clementine Homilies, " Introduction), Peter is represented as having appointed Clement as his successor, saying: "I communicate to him the power of binding and loosing so that, with respect to everything which he shall ordain in the earth, it shall be decreed in the heavens; for he shall bind what ought to be bound and loose what ought to be loosed as knowing the rule of the church." Quite different from this Judaic and ancient view of the apostolic power of binding and loosing is the one expressed in John xx. 23, where Jesus is represented as having said to his disciples after they had received the Holy Spirit: "Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained." It is this view which, adopted by Tertullian and all the church fathers, invested the head of the Christian Church with the power to forgive sins, the "clavis ordinis, " "the key-power of the Church."
"And if he will not hear them: tell the church. And if he will not hear the church, let him be to thee as the heathen and publican. Amen I say to you, whatsoever you shall bind upon earth, shall be bound also in heaven; and whatsoever you shall loose upon earth, shall be loosed also in heaven. Again I say to you, that if two of you shall consent upon earth, concerning any thing whatsoever they shall ask, it shall be done to them by my Father who is in heaven."
-Matthew 18:17-19
Aside from Peter who was given the authority to bind and loosen, all of the other Apostles have to work together. At least two or three... none (aside from Peter) can act individually. Limits of territorial jurisdiction, are the byproduct of the power to bind and loosen, and not a Divine mandate itself (as the Petrine Ministry or Apostolic authority are) but is rather a custom which developed into law, in order to provide smooth governance. Revelation tells us that there is one Church ruled by many bishops:
"Take heed to yourselves, and to the whole flock, wherein the Holy Ghost hath placed you bishops, to rule the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood."
-Acts 20:28
"And I have so preached this gospel, not where Christ was named, lest I should build upon another man's foundation."
-Romans 15:20
It was not until the Council of Nicaea that clergy were absolutely restricted to their diocese (i.e. limits of jurisdiction) concerning ordinary affairs:
"On account of the great disturbance and the factions which are caused, it is decreed that the custom, if it is found to exist in some parts contrary to this canon, shall be totally suppressed, so that neither bishops nor presbyters nor deacons shall transfer from city to city. If after this decision of this holy and great synod anyone shall attempt such a thing, or shall lend himself to such a proceeding, the arrangement shall be totally annulled, and he shall be restored to the church of which he was ordained bishop or presbyter or deacon."
-Council of Nicaea, Canon XV
Posts
