St. Peter, His Name and His Office, as Set Forth in Holy Scripture

They also show, with no less clearness, that Christ in bestowing these prerogatives and primacy on Peter, designed to produce the visible unity of His kingdom and Church; and this in two ways, the first typically prefiguring the Church's own unity in Peter, the single Foundation, Bearer of the keys, and supreme Legislator and Judge; the second efficiently, as by a principle and cause, forming, holding together, and protecting, visible unity in that same Peter, as he discharged these functions. For just as the building is based on the foundation, and by virtue of it all the parts are held together, so a kingdom's unity and harmonious administration are first moulded out, and then preserved, in the unity of its supreme authority.

And this Primacy may be regarded from three different points of view; as it is in itself, and as it regards its efficient and its final cause. As to the first, it consists in superior jurisdiction and authority; as to the second, it springs from Christ Himself, who said to Peter alone, "And I too say unto thee," &c.; as to the third, it prefigures, forms, and protects the Church's visible unity.

But to prefigure, to form, and to protect the Church's unity being distinct functions, care must be taken not to confuse them, the former concerning the Primacy as a type, the two latter as the origin and efficient cause; and also not to concede the former while the latter are denied, which latter make up the Primacy as jurisdictional, and the instrument effecting unity. Now Peter is both the type of unity, its origin, and its efficient cause.

A long line¹⁸⁸ of fathers, from the most ancient downwards, regards Peter as at once the type, and the origin, and efficient cause of unity; setting it forth as a prerogative of his headship that no one, whether Apostle, or Prophet, or Evangelist, or Doctor, or Teacher, might separate from him without the crime of schism. In this consists his Primacy, and in this the famous phrase of S. Cyprian finds its solution, that "the Episcopate is one, of which a part is held by each without division of the whole."

And, what is like to the preceding, they hold that Peter is the continuous source of all power in the Church, and that while its plenitude dwells in his person, a portion of it is derived to the various prelates under him. No one has set this forth more fully than S. Leo, in the middle of the fifth century, as where he says, that "if Christ willed that other rulers should enjoy aught together with him, (that is, Peter,) yet never did He give, save through him, what He denied not to others."¹⁸⁹

There is no one of these consequences but seems to result from the words of our Lord here solemnly addressed to Peter.

But, recurring to our general view, we find our Lord three several¹⁹⁰ times appealed to by the Apostles to declare who should be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven; and while on neither of these occasions does He declare to them that there should be no "greater one" among them, though such a declaration would have terminated their rivalry, on the last and most urgent, at the very eve of His departure from them, He sets forth in vivid words what ought to be the character and deportment of the one so to be placed over them; and then turning His conversation from them in a body to Peter in particular, He charges him, at a future time, when He shall obtain for him the gift of a faith that could not fail, to "confirm his brethren." Having before dwelt on the full meaning of these words, we need only remark how marvellously they coincide in force with the prophecy which we have just been considering, while they differ from it in expression. They convey as absolutely a supreme authority as the former; and an authority independent of others, and exclusive of participation; and one which is given for the maintenance of the faith, and of visible unity in that faith. Nor can we imagine a more fitting termination to the whole of our Lord's dealing with His disciples before His passion, than that, when about to be taken from them, He should designate, in words so full of affection and provident care, one who was presently to take His own place among them. "Simon, Simon, I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not, and thou in thy turn one day confirm thy brethren."

But if our Lord's preference of Peter, as to rank and dignity in the Church, was during his lifetime consistent and uniform; if, moreover, He made to him, twice, promises so large as to include and go far beyond all that He said to the Apostles in common; and if He took out, as it were, of what He had first promised to Peter a portion which He afterwards promised as their common inheritance to the rest; His dealing with Peter and the Apostles after His resurrection is the exact counterpart to this. The fulfilment is equivalent to the promise. In the fourfold prophecy to Peter, in Matt. xvi. the last member is, "And whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth, it shall be bound also in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, it shall be loosed also in heaven." That this is a grant of full legislative and judicial power, given to one, we have seen. Now on a later occasion it is repeated to the twelve together, Matt. xviii. 18. But the other three members of the prophecy made to Peter are never repeated to the twelve. In the fulfilment the same distinction takes place. To the twelve in common our Lord communicates the power contained in the fourth member of His original promise, saying, John xx. 21, "As the Father hath sent Me, I also send you. Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose sins ye shall forgive, they are forgiven them: and whose sins ye shall retain, they are retained: " to which the other forms contained in Matt. xxviii. 18, Mark xvi. 15, Luke xxiv. 49, Acts i. 4, 8, of preaching the Gospel to every creature, of waiting for the power of the Holy Ghost wherewith they should be endued, of teaching men to observe all things which He had commanded, are equivalent, though less definite. But nowhere are the powers contained in the first three members of the prophecy to Peter communicated to the twelve. As the promises were made to Peter alone originally, so to Peter alone are they, as we shall see, fulfilled. Indeed, it could not be otherwise, for the promises to be the rock of the Church, by coherence with which the Church should be impregnable, and the bearer of the keys, are in their own nature confined to one, and exclusive of participants, and once made by the very Truth Himself to one man, they ranged under his power all his brethren: "For the promises of Jesus Christ, as well as His gifts, are without repentance; and what is once given indefinitely and universally is irrevocable."¹⁹¹ Besides that, another indisputable principle must be taken into account, viz., "that power given to several carries its restriction in its division: " just as if a king before his death bequeaths the whole administration of his sovereignty to a board of twelve councillors, though the sum of authority so conveyed be sovereign, yet the share of each individual in the college will be restricted by the equal right of his colleagues. Whereas "power given to one alone, and over all, and without exception, carries with it plenitude, and, not having to be divided with any other, it has no bounds save those which its terms convey." Such was the power originally promised to Peter; and such, no less, that which was ultimately conveyed. He stands apart and alone no less in the fulfilment than in the promise. And under another image, but one equally expressive with the first, the Lord conveys an authority as absolute and as exclusive. The "bounds which its terms convey" are the whole fold of Christ: "the sheep" no less than "the lambs: " "to govern" no less than "to feed."¹⁹² As the great Architect of the heavenly city said to Peter, "Thou art the Rock;" as "the King of kings," who "hath the key of David," and "on whose shoulder is the government," said to Peter, "To thee will I give the keys of the kingdom of heaven;" as He "who upholdeth all things by the word of His power," and "in whom all things consist," said to Peter, "Confirm thy brethren: " so to the same Peter, the same "Great Shepherd of the sheep," said, "Feed My lambs, be shepherd over My sheep," thus committing to him the chief Apostles themselves who heard this charge, and causing there to be for ever "one fold and one shepherd," on earth as in heaven.

It remains briefly to consider these three palmary texts in their reciprocal relations to each other, by which the fullest light is thrown upon the scriptural prerogatives of S. Peter.

1. First, then, all these texts are in the most marked manner circumscribed to Peter alone. In all he is addressed by name; in all he is distinguished by other circumstances from his brethren at the time present with him; in all a special condition is attached belonging to him; in the first, superior faith – in the second, faith, which, by a particular gift, the fruit of Christ's own prayer, should never fail – in the third, superior love. So that, without an utter disregard of the meaning of words, and the force of the context, and every law of grammar and philology, no one of these texts can be extended from its application to Peter alone, and made common to the other Apostles.

2. Secondly, the note of priority in time is secured to Peter by the first text, to which the other two correspond. Even if the promise in Matt. xviii. 18, made to all the Apostles, were of equal latitude with that previously made to Peter, which it is so very far from being that it contains one point only out of four, yet, the fact that they had been already ranged by the former under him, and that he had been promised singly what they afterwards were promised in common, would make a vast difference between them; indeed, the difference of the Primacy. But, as it is, the very first mention of the Church is connected with a promise made to Peter of the highest authority in that Church, and a perpetual relationship, entering into its inmost constitution, between it and his person. Before the Church is formed, it is foretold that Peter shall rule her: before she is set up against the gates of hell, that, by virtue of her coherence with Him, she should prevail over them. And the germ of her Episcopate, on which she is to grow, is sown in His person; just as, in the last act of our Lord, that Episcopate is delivered over to Him, universal and complete.

3. Thirdly, those three texts are exactly equivalent to each other: they each involve and express the other. They could not have been said of different persons without contradiction and confusion. He who has one of them must have the rest. There is variation of image, but identity of meaning. Thus, the relation between Peter and the Church is in the first, that of Foundation and Superstructure; of the heaven-built city, and of him who holds its keys: in the second, it is that of the Architect, who, by skill and authority, won for him, and given to him, by the Supreme Builder, the Word and Wisdom of God, maintains every living stone of the structure in its due place: in the third it is that of the supreme and universal Pastor and his whole flock. In all of these there is the habit of dependence between the superior and that over which he is set: in all the need of close coherence with him. Observe in particular the identity of the second and third. The special office of the Shepherd of¹⁹³ souls is to lead his flock into suitable pastures, that is, duly to instruct them in the Divine Word and Will: the pastoral office is identical with that of teaching: "He gave some Apostles, some Prophets, some Evangelists, some pastors and teachers," the former are distinguished, the last united together: where the Apostle observes, that the whole ministry, from the highest to the lowest, is organised "to edify the body of Christ into the unity of faith," and to preserve men from being "carried about by every wind of doctrine." But if this was the design of Christ as to the whole ministry, and as to each individual teacher, most of all was it in instituting one supreme and universal Pastor: in him most of all would be seen the perfect fitting in together¹⁹⁴ of each individual member: he was set up especially for the compacting of each spiritual joint, the harmony and cohesion of the whole. Here, then, the office of the universal Pastor or Teacher is precisely equivalent to him, who, by another image confirms, strengthens, consolidates his brethren. Thus, in the second text Christ foretold the third. But the more we contemplate all the three in their mutual relations, the more a certain thought suggests itself to the mind. There is a special doctrine concerning the most Holy Trinity, the most distinctive of that great mystery, which expresses the reciprocal indwelling of the Three Persons. Now something analogous may be said of the way in which these three texts impermeate and include each other, of their exact equivalence, and distinct, but inseparable force: of whom one is said, of the same must all.

4. Fourthly, they all indicate a sovereign authority, independent itself, but on which all others depend; symbolising power from above, but claiming obedience from below; immutable in itself, but by which all the rest are made proof against change; for it is not to the sheep that the shepherd is responsible, but to their owner. It has been said throughout that the one special mark of Peter's distinction was a peculiar association with Christ. It is not therefore by any infringement of equal rights that this authority is set up, but as the representative, the vicegerent, of Him in whom all power dwells: who bore this authority in His own body, and who committed to another what was first His own, both by creation and by purchase – "Feed My sheep." In all these texts the immediate transference of authority from the Person of the God-man is most striking; in Peter He inaugurates His great theandric dispensation, and forms the Body which He was to leave on earth. Thus these texts most clearly express that important doctrine of antiquity, the keystone of the Church's liberty from the world, which is the reason why the world so hates it, "The first See is judged by no man." So entirely have political ideas and jealousies infected our mode of judging of spiritual things – to such a degree is our peculiar civil liberty made the standard of Church government – that it is necessary to insist again and again on what to Christians ought to be a first principle, viz., that "all power and jurisdiction in the Church, like the Church herself, ought to rest not upon natural and human authority, but on the divine authority of Christ. This is the reason why we may pronounce no otherwise concerning such jurisdiction, than we know has been handed down from Christ, its proper author and founder. Now it is certain that at the same moment at which Christ instituted the community called the Church, such a power was introduced, and entrusted as well to Peter singly as the head, as to the Apostles under him. Nay, that power was fixed and constituted, and its ministers and bishops marked out, before the Church, that is, the whole body and commonwealth, had grown into coherence. And so ecclesiastical jurisdiction did not first dwell in the community itself, and was then translated by a sort of popular suffrage and consent to its magistrates; but from the very first origin Peter was destined to be single chief of the future body, and next to him the other Apostles."¹⁹⁵

5. Fifthly, it must be observed that there is a definiteness about these texts which belongs in a far less degree to those forms in which the co-ordinate and co-equal authority of the Apostles, as such, is expressed. This last is left to be harmonised and brought into operation by the superior power of the chief. They are indeed sent into all the world, they are immediately instituted by our Lord, they have the promise that His power shall be with them, and that their sentence shall stand good in heaven and on earth; but this promise, which is the most distinct made to them, has been already gathered up into the hands of one, and in its practical issue is limited by the necessity of cooperating with that one; that is, the authority of Peter includes and embraces theirs, but theirs is ranged under his. Theirs is modified not only by being shared, but by having his set over them. Now observe how distinct and clear, how definite in their meaning, while universal in their range, are the things said of him alone; 1. That he should be the rock on which Christ would build His Church; 2. That permanence and victory should belong to that Church for ever through Him: 3. That he should bear the keys in the kingdom of heaven: 4. That whatever singly he should bind and loose, should be bound and loosed in heaven as well as on earth: 5. That he should confirm his brethren, the Apostles themselves being the very first so called: 6. That he should be the Shepherd of the fold. What can constitute inequality between two parties, if such a series of promises given to one, and not to the other, does not?

6. Sixthly, these promises cannot be contemplated without seeing that the ordinary and regular government of the Church springs from the person whom they designate, and in whom they are concentrated. To take the last, all spiritual care is summed up in the word Pastorship, the office of priest, bishop, metropolitan, patriarch, and pope, rising in degree, and extending in range, but in its nature the same. On the contrary Apostles, (with this one exception, in virtue of the Primacy,) Prophets, and Evangelists, are extraordinary officers, attending the opening of the dispensation, but afterwards dropping off. But the Church, as it was to endure for ever, and the orderly arrangement of the divine ministry, were summed up in the Primacy, and flowed forth from it as the full receptacle of the virtue of God the Word Incarnate. And so it is the head of the ministerial body. All which is set forth as in a picture to the mind, in that scene upon the shore of the lake of Galilee, when the Lord said to Peter, "Feed My sheep."

7. And, again, Peter was thus made the beginning and principle of spiritual power, as it left the Person of God the Word, not for once, but for ever. Long as the structure should endure, its principle of cohesion must bind it. As the law of gravitation binds all worlds together in the natural kingdom, and is a continuous source of strength and harmony, so should be in the spiritual kingdom that force which the same Wisdom of God established; it goes on with power undiminished; it is the full fountain-head from which all streams emanate; it is the highest image of God's power as the centre and source of all things. This idea is dwelt upon by S. Cyprian and S. Augustine, as well as by Pope S. Innocent,¹⁹⁶ the contemporary of the latter, and was afresh expressed in a synodical letter of the three provinces of Africa to Pope Theodore, in A. D. 646, "No one can doubt that there is in the Apostolic See a great unfailing fountain, pouring forth waters for all Christians, whence rich streams proceed, bountifully irrigating the whole Christian world."¹⁹⁷

8. And, lastly, in these great promises Peter is specially set forth as the type and the efficient cause of visible unity in the Church. Such was the very purpose of Christ, that His disciples might be one, as He and the Father are one. For this end, in the words of S. Augustine, "He entrusted His sheep to Peter, as to another self, He willed to make him one with Himself;" and in the words of S. Leo, "He assumed him into the participation of His indivisible unity."¹⁹⁸ But this is seen no less plainly in the words of Christ, than in the Fathers; for He made one Rock, one Bearer of the keys, one Confirmer of the brethren, and one Shepherd. The union of millions of naturally conflicting wills in the profession and belief of one doctrine is almost the very highest work of divine power; and as grace, that is, the Holy Spirit diffused in the heart, is the inward efficient of this, so the outward, both symbol and instrument, is the Primacy, that "other self" which the Lord left in the world. And as the Church of God through every succeeding age grows and expands, the need of this power becomes greater and not less, and reverence to that "single chair in which unity was to be observed by all,"¹⁹⁹ a more imperative virtue, or rather an ever-deepening instinct, of the Christian mind.

But antiquity itself drew no other conclusions from the concentration of these great privileges in the person of Peter. We have but to go back to a time before the present nationalities of Europe, those jealous foes of Peter's authority, had come into existence, and we find the chief men of France, and Spain, and Italy, interpreting the above texts as we have done. Take one whose testimony from the circumstances of his life ought to be above suspicion. John Cassian was by birth a Scythian, was educated in a monastery at Bethlehem, travelled through Egypt, and made himself acquainted with its most distinguished religious men, went to Constantinople, and was ordained deacon by S. Chrysostome, and afterwards at Rome priest by Pope Innocent I. On the capture of Rome by Alaric, he settled at Marseilles, about the year 410, and there founded two monasteries. In his work on the Incarnation he says,²⁰⁰ "Let us ask him, who is supreme, both as disciple among disciples, and as teacher among teachers, who, steering the course of the Roman Church, held the supremacy as well of the faith as of the priesthood. Tell us, therefore, tell us, we pray, O Peter, Prince of the Apostles, tell us how the Churches ought to believe. For just it is that thou, who wast taught of the Lord, shouldst teach us, and open to us the door whose key thou hast received. Shut out all who undermine the heavenly house, and turn away those who attempt to make an entry through treacherous caverns and illicit approaches; because it is certain that no one shall be able to enter the door of the kingdom, save he to whom the key placed by thee in the Church shall open it. Tell us, therefore, how we ought to believe that Jesus is the Christ, and to confess our common Lord." Again, fourteen hundred years ago, Maximus, Bishop of Turin in that day, confessed by his words, what his successor of the present day bears witness to by his sufferings: for he writes of Peter, "As²⁰¹ the Good Shepherd he received the defence of the flock, so that he, who before had been weak in his own case, might become the confirmation to all: and he who had been shaken by the temptation of the question asked him, might be a foundation to the rest by the stability of his faith. In fine, for the firmness of his devotion he is called the Rock of the Churches, as the Lord says, 'Thou art Peter, and upon this Rock I will build My Church.' For he is called the Rock, because he was the first to lay the foundations of the faith among the nations, and, because, as an immoveable stone, he holds together the framework and the mass of the whole Christian structure. Peter, therefore, for his devotion is called the Rock, and the Lord is named the Rock by His inherent power, as the Apostle says, 'and they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ.' Rightly does he merit to share the name, who, likewise, merits to share the work." Again, far and wide has the lying story been spread by false-hearted men, who above all things, hate the spiritual kingdom which God has set up in the world, that Peter's power has been the growth of gradual encroachment on the secular authority. Now, long before Pelayo renewed the Spanish monarchy in the mountains of the Asturias, and while Augustine, sent by Pope Gregory, was laying the foundation of the English Church, S. Isidore, Bishop of Seville, from 598 to 636, the very highest of the ancient Spanish doctors, wrote thus explicitly to his colleague at Toledo:²⁰² "But as to the question of the equality of the Apostles, Peter is pre-eminent over the rest, who merited to hear from the Lord, 'Thou shalt be called Cephas – Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church.' And not from any one else, but from the very Son of God and the Virgin, he was the first to receive the honour of the pontificate in the Church of Christ, to whom also, after the resurrection of the Son of God, was said by the same, 'Feed My lambs,' noting by the name of lambs the prelates of the churches. And although the dignity of this power is derived to all Catholic bishops, yet in a more special manner it remains for ever in the Roman bishop, who is by a certain singular privilege set as the head over the other limbs. Whoso, therefore, renders not reverently to him due obedience, involves himself, as being severed from the head, in the schism of the Acephali."

It would be easy to multiply such authorities of a period prior to the formation of all the existing European states. It was the will of God, providing for His Church, that before the old Roman society was utterly upheaved from its foundations by the deluge of the Northern tribes, reverence for S. Peter's throne should be fixed as an immovable rock, on which a new Christian civilization might be founded. Thus Pope Gregory II., writing to the Emperor Leo the Isaurian, about the year 717, only sums up the force and effect of all preceding tradition, when he says: "The whole West turns its eyes upon us, and, unworthy though we be, puts complete trust in us, and in that blessed Peter, whose image you threaten to overturn, but whom all the kingdoms of the West count for a God upon earth."²⁰³