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Some Christians claim that Peter, the man, is not the rock on which Jesus builds his Church, but Peter’s profession of faith is. Actually, no. Apologist Suan Sonna explains why.
Cy Kellett:
Did Jesus really found the Catholic church with a pun? Suan Sonna is next.
Cy Kellett:
Hello, and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host. And if you engage at all in defending the Catholic faith, one of the things that you will have to defend is the papacy. And in order to do that, you’re going to have to defend the special role of Peter. The special role given to Peter by Christ himself. And if you’re going to defend that proposition, you’re going to have to get clear on what exactly did Jesus mean when he said, “Thou art Peter. And upon this rock, I will build my church.” Well, in order to get clear on that, we turn to Bible scholars. We turn to the history and tradition of the church. And for this episode, we turn to Suan Sonna to clear it all up for us. Here’s what he had to say. Suan Sonna, Catholic Answers affiliate apologist. Thank you for being with us.
Suan Sonna:
I’m glad to be back.
Cy Kellett:
So here’s one of those things that comes up a lot in apologetics conversations between Catholics and Protestants. But not only between Catholics and Protestants. This trying to get exactly what it means that Peter is called Peter, meaning the rock. And that Jesus says, “Upon this rock, I will build my church.: And I have to be kind of honest with you, to Catholics… I think average Catholics, it looks pretty obvious what Jesus is saying there. But the conversations have all kinds of twists and turns. So should we be confident that Jesus is referring to Peter when he says he’ll build his church upon this rock?
Suan Sonna:
Yes. And the reason why is… Well, I’ll go into five reasons why. But I’ll just say that even when I was Protestant, when I looked at how strong the evidence was. Not based on Catholic scholarship. Not based on, as much as I love you guys at Catholic Answers, even when I was Protestant. Not even Catholic Answer articles. I was looking at Protestant, New Testament scholars, and the evidence that they presented was so overwhelming that I had to change my mind.
Cy Kellett:
Oh, that’s very interesting. So it was Protestant scholars of the text who make an examination of the text in the Greek, and the Aramaic, and all that. They were coming to this conclusion?
Suan Sonna:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. And that’s actually the first reason why I would say that Peter is the rock. I’m not saying that this is a proof necessarily. But it’s more like just a piece of evidence. Right? It’s a reason to kind of pay attention. And instead the consensus of New Testament scholars since the 1970s has been that the person of Peter is the rock of Matthew 16:18. Not as confession. Not as faith. Not Jesus. The person of Peter.
Cy Kellett:
Okay. So was there a moment, or was there an insight that someone had that moved the scholarly consensus in that direction? Or is it just that as scholarship progressed, the one side just began to have kind of dispositive weight on it.
Suan Sonna:
I think Charles Talbert in his 2010 commentary on Matthew. He describes how a 1976 opinion began to shift in identifying Peter as the rock of Matthew 16:18. And what he goes on to mention is that we had recently discovered this 13th century Jewish Midrash. Now a Midrash is like a rabbinic commentary on scripture. And we saw that in Jewish tradition, they had consistently referred to Abraham as the rock on which God had built Israel. And then when you go to like Isaiah chapter 51, verses one to two, it says, “Look to Abraham, your father, and Sarah, your mother. Look to the rock from…” Or actually it’s the other way around. “Look to the rock from which you were hewn and the quarry from which you were dug. Look to Abraham, your father and Sarah, your mother.” And so there was already a tradition among the Jews, even during the time of Jesus and then consistently afterwards, where they referred to Abraham as the rock.
Cy Kellett:
Ah, so this would have been a clear kind of precursor, so to speak, I guess, in Jewish tradition. And you’re saying that this commentary, this Midrash was kind of rediscovered in the 1970s. And this is what gave people a new impetus to think this through again?
Suan Sonna:
Well, yeah. What Talbert suggests is that this was kind of the definitive final nail in the coffin-
Cy Kellett:
Uh-huh (affirmative).
Suan Sonna:
… that started making people really shift sides. But then you also had really good scholarship in the early 20th century or late 19th century by like Marvin Vincent. And in there, Vincent talks about how the grammar of the passage and just what is natural is the fact that Peter is the rock. It doesn’t seem natural to say that Jesus is the rock because when you think about what Peter’s name actually is. In our English years, we think Peter is Peter. Right? And we don’t think about what it really means, which is literally rock.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
And so, scholars like Michael J. Wilkins, Landry Keck, they’ll talk about how when we look at what Jesus is saying in Matthew 16:18. Especially Jesus said the phrase originally in Aramaic. To our English ears, it should actually sound like this. You are rock and on this rock, I will build my church.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
And when you put it like that, then you can’t miss the pun. You can’t miss that oh, well the second rock is very much the first one.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah. Right. I mean, do people ask the question? Why did Jesus change Peter’s name at all? Why didn’t he just leave his name Simon? That would seem to be the dumbest move in the world. And I don’t mean this to be a smart Alec comment. But to change Peter’s name to rock, and then later make this comment about the rock. But it doesn’t refer to Peter. Like, why would you change Peter’s name then?
Suan Sonna:
Right. I think that hypothesis or that interpretation kind of causes unnecessary confusion. And people talk about, for instance, well, if your interpretation is correct, then it makes Jesus look bad. Or it makes Peter look like he’s competing with Christ or something like that. But here I would actually say that this interpretation would actually make Jesus sound incredibly misleading and kind of tone deaf.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
Right. It’s because it’s like, you just called a guy rock. And then you’re going to say on this rock, I’ll build my church. But then you, oh, you switched like right-
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
… in the middle between those two to something way different.
Cy Kellett:
Okay. So you gave us the scholarly consensus that started to change in the 1970s. And now you’re saying that is it’s quite firm, the scholarly consensus, that this second reference to the rock refers to Peter.
Suan Sonna:
Yeah. Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Cy Kellett:
You talked about how these Jewish traditions, around Abraham particularly, are were helped to form that scholarly consensus. Any other Jewish traditions you want to get to because I want to get to a key point? And, but I don’t want to move on too fast.
Suan Sonna:
Well, that’s the main one that I just wanted to emphasize.
Cy Kellett:
Okay. Because I think the thing that really is the convincer for many people is in Greek Jesus… Matthew does not give us Jesus saying the same word. He says Petros and Petra. And so, that we do get a linguistic clue. And I think what people will say is, well Matthew’s giving us that linguistic clue in Greek, which would in Aramaic, it was probably just a… You could hear it because of the tone of Jesus’ voice. But now Matthew’s writing in Greek. He wants us to hear that. And so this is actually quite intentional on Matthew’s part that Petra is a different word than Petros.
Suan Sonna:
Yeah. Well the objection’s often raised that if Jesus originally let’s say spoke in Aramaic this phrase. He would’ve used for rock Peter, and rock, the second rock, this rock. He would’ve used [foreign language 00:08:12]. Right? Or [foreign language 00:08:14]. And so the two words would’ve been the same. And so there’s this question then on, when Matthew wrote his gospel, why does he use in Greek Petros for Peter and then Petra for rock in this rock?
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
And I think I recently actually wrote an article about this called The Rock Explains the Papacy. And I think it’s a kind of a brilliant answer because I think the basic idea is that in the Greek written form, like when Jesus speaks it. Right? When he says you are rock. Okay. We know that rock is Peter. “And then upon this rock, I’ll build my church.” Obviously this rock is now kind of playing on a part of the person of Peter or an aspect of him. And so, I use this analogy of like, for instance, if I say the rock is the rock of the WWE. Right? And then I use two different ways that you could write that out. You could make it both capitalized. So the rock, capital R, is the rock. Right? Of the WWE which is just kind of like a redundant identity statement.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah. Right.
Suan Sonna:
Whereas you could say the rock. Okay. Capital R. Is the rock. Lowercase R, of the WWE, which then kind of shows you. Okay. He’s this foundational figure. He’s of some kind of importance. And scholars believe that when Jesus was using this pun, that’s what he meant to say. But when you speak it. Right? Like when I speak that first sentence and that second sentence. The same sentence, just different versions of it however. When I speak it, it sounds exactly the same. And it actually technically speaking, it’s the same word. Rock and rock both times.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
But when I write it out, you can see the pun highlighted in written form. And so the words, Petros and Petra by Jesus’ day were interchangeable. Right? They weren’t significantly different at all. I mean, I think at most the difference would be something like stone versus rock.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah. Okay.
Suan Sonna:
But then D. A. Carson points out in his Expositor’s Bible commentary, that’s really a poetic distinction. Like you can’t really have anything substantially hang upon that difference.
Cy Kellett:
No.
Suan Sonna:
And then I mentioned other scholars like Craig Keener, who point out. Yeah. They were interchangeable by Jesus’ day. This is not a significant difference.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
And so I think the reason why you have two different words, Petros and Petros. Because Petros obviously is a name refers to a man. But then, you don’t want to repeat the same name twice or what could be perceived as the same name twice. So I don’t want to use when I’m writing out the rock is the rock of the WWE two capital Rs.
Cy Kellett:
Ah, so that would explain Matthew’s choice to say Petra the second time. It’s just you actually are preserving the pun there. You’re not destroying the pun.
Suan Sonna:
Right. And you know, this is actually the explanation that’s been offered by D. A. Carson in the Expositor’s Bible commentary. W. D. Davies, and Dale Allison. They cite Joseph Fitzmyer and other scholars to show that this is probably the best explanation for why Matthew switches between these two words. Even though they’re interchangeable.
Cy Kellett:
Okay. All right. But if that linguistic little quirk linguistically has a simple explanation like that. There is still some conflict over the word this.
Suan Sonna:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Cy Kellett:
So I almost feel like sometimes people imagine it going, “Thou art Peter,” pointing at Peter. “And on this rock,” like pointing back at himself. Some people like on me. Or I don’t know how you would do it if it means Peter’s confession of faith. But that this somehow has an unclarity to it that makes us not want to say that you’re the rock, and on this rock. That the this refers to Peter himself.
Suan Sonna:
Well, all these hypotheses that… Maybe like Jesus pointed to himself the second time. Right? So maybe he said, “You are Peter.” Right? And then he says, “And on this rock, I’ll build my church,” or something like that. These are all speculation. They’re not founded in the text. And so one of the things that we want to do when we’re interpreting scripture is to kind of employ a kind of textualism where we remain as faithful as we can to the text. And if the author doesn’t say, for instance, oh yeah. And Jesus was pointing to himself or pointing to Peter. Then we shouldn’t start inferring that. That’s speculation. Whereas the Catholic interpretation really is the simplest explanation in this fact that it’s the most natural. And it takes the text as it is. It doesn’t try to do further speculation. And it just preserves what seems to be the clear intent of Jesus. And so, I think that’s one way that you can deal with the question. But I remember there’s another part, and I want to make sure I got to it.
Cy Kellett:
I guess that was it just had to do with what is the word this referring to? That-
Suan Sonna:
Right.
Cy Kellett:
… people will say that that’s ambiguous.
Suan Sonna:
Yeah. And so Marvin Vincent, who’s a Protestant scholar writing, I think over a hundred years ago. He actually has this brilliant quote in his book of word studies in the New Testament. So I’m just going to read it. He says this, “The reference of Petra. Petra is the Greek word for the second rock. So for Peter, it’s Petros. For this rock, it’s Petra. The reference of Petra to Christ is forced and unnatural. The obvious reference of the word Petra is to Peter. The emphatic, this, as in upon this rock naturally refers to the nearest antecedent, Peter.
Cy Kellett:
Oh yeah.
Suan Sonna:
And besides, the metaphors this weakens since Christ appears here. Not as the foundation. But as the architect. On this rock, I will build my church.”
Cy Kellett:
Oh yes. What a weird metaphor it would be if he’s both the rock and the builder.
Suan Sonna:
Right. Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Cy Kellett:
I see. Ah, very interesting. So in Aramaic, we wouldn’t have had two words. We would’ve had just one. What about the question about in the Greek language for Matthew? Matthew was making a choice here. I mean, every writer with every word they make in a certain sense is making a choice. So did he have other choices of how he could have conveyed the word rock if he wanted to make a clearer distinction?
Suan Sonna:
Yes. And we actually know what Greek word he would’ve used, and it would’ve been the Greek word lithos. And so, I just want to quote to you from D. A. Carson again. So D. A. Carson says this. “Had Matthew wanted to say no more than that Peter was a stone in contrast with Jesus, the rock. The more common word would have been withos, stone of almost any size. Then there would have been no pun. And that is just the point that there is a pun. And so he uses two words that are so virtually identical, Petros and Petra, that it allows him to preserve the pun rather than using lithos because then lithos would’ve broken the pun.”
Cy Kellett:
I see. Okay. So my objections that I… At least the objections that I’m familiar with are dwindling. As a matter of fact, I don’t think that I can think of anymore objections. But I guess that is your key point that you’re making is at least in the community of Bible scholars. Not many people are making objections anymore. This is more or less settled in the scholarly realm. But that maybe that hasn’t permeated out into the more popular understanding.
Suan Sonna:
Yeah. I mean, it’s pretty shocking because I thought when I was a Baptist, good Baptist investigating the scriptures. That there was widespread confusion and debate on whether or not the rock of Matthew 16:18 is Christ, or Peter, or his confession. And then I started reading good conservative scholars like Craig Keener, like D. A. Carson. And I started realizing, wait a minute. No. This has been settled for a long time. And it just amazed me that a lot of mainstream Protestants weren’t simply aware of this consensus. Now, of course, when you go through the literature, you will find scholars here and there who will still try to say, “It’s Peter’s confession. Or it’s maybe Christ.” You’ll see that from time to time. But that has become so rare nowadays that it doesn’t really threaten that there is a consensus. And even the scholars who do kind of try to say it’s like Peter’s confession, or they who do try to say it’s Christ. They will usually admit in a footnote that they are in the extreme minority on this particular question.
Cy Kellett:
Okay. So let’s say we treat that as settled then just for a moment. I mean, that’s a different question than is Christ establishing the papacy at this moment? And so, I mean, I want to say that, and just get your take on that because I don’t… It seems to me that a Protestant person, and I would guess that the ongoing Protestantism of these scholars would suggest this as well. That you could concede that Christ is giving Peter himself a special role here without having to concede everything to the Catholic Church. Now, admittedly, I think you should concede to the Catholic Church. I think the Catholic Church is true. And it is the church that Christ founded. But I feel like maybe that would take the temperature down a little bit if this wasn’t a desperate moment for the Protestant person looking at this.
Suan Sonna:
Yeah. I think that when it comes to this particular observation. Right? I think it is true that if you concede that the person of Peter is the rock of Matthew 16:18. It doesn’t automatically get you to the papacy.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
But it certainly doesn’t hurt-
Cy Kellett:
No.
Suan Sonna:
… the Catholic case.
Cy Kellett:
Right.
Suan Sonna:
It also doesn’t hurt that as Catholics we’ve been saying this for a long time. And then finally, Protestant New Testament scholarship, or I shouldn’t just say Protestant New Testament scholarship, but just New Testament scholarship in general. And especially among Protestant New Testament scholars, they agree now with the Catholic exegesis of this passage. And in fact, when you read some of their commentaries, they ferociously defend it. And they’re saying, “Guys, we got to stop saying that the person of Peter is not the rock.” So, for instance, Oscar Cullman, the Lutheran scholar, and in the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament. He says, “Roman Catholic exegesis is correct. And all Protestant attempts to evade this interpretation are to be rejected.”
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
That’s kind of paraphrasing him just a little bit. Right?
Cy Kellett:
It’s pretty clear. Yeah. Right. Right. I see what you’re saying though. But so it does have… It’s going to bear weight because there were two different claims. And if it settled on the one claim, then you have to let go of the other one. And so, it does have a certain kind of emotional power or heat around it. But what maybe a more profitable thing to do would be… Well, first of all, not to base your Biblical interpretations on trying to prove somebody else wrong. Just listen to what the Bible actually says. And two, maybe we could begin to dialogue together about, well what does that mean then? If Christ said this about Peter, what’s the meaning of that? And I’m sure that we’d have many disagreements on that. But at least we’d have a more productive conversation.
Suan Sonna:
Right. We’re talking now about the person of Peter. And so, what about Peter? Right? And then, when you think about the fact that rocks in Jewish tradition are known to be everlasting, reliable foundations. Foundations that don’t move, that remain. Then it’s like in what sense then does Peter remain in the church? In what sense does Peter continue to be that foundation? And so then we… Eventually that starts boiling into a larger conversation on the primacy of Peter. Because I think also it surprises me that there are a lot of mainstream Protestants who will say, “Oh, but you know, Peter’s just one disciple among the others. There’s nothing special about him.” And then you also see in the scholarship, all of the scholars saying basically, “No. I mean, Peter was clearly the leader of the 12. Or at least the chief spokesman.”
Suan Sonna:
He clearly had a primacy of some sort. Right? And it’s like, well, at this point then, we’re getting closer and closer to the papacy. And a lot of scholars would point out that they think in the first 12 chapters of the book of Acts, you see how Peter really is the dominant figure of the church. And I love how Jimmy Akin in his debate with Steven Nemes. He said that Peter was a lion for the church. Right? And I just love that image because it really shows that the Peter who had denied Jesus, and then had been reinstituted into service. He got his act together. He matured, and he became the foundation that the church needed him to be. I mean, you have the baptism of Cornelius. You have him preaching the first sermon. You have him supervising over the successor to Judas. You have all these examples. Oh, declaring judgment on Ananias and Sapphira.
Cy Kellett:
Right.
Suan Sonna:
One of the few times that God actually kills someone in the New Testament. And you see very clearly that there is something distinct and unique about Peter. And that he is this image of unity and strength in the church. And so at that point then, you start getting closer and closer, I think, to not just… I don’t know. Peter being first among equals. But he really was a leader.
Cy Kellett:
But it’s now… And I’ll probably close with this unless you spark something else in me. There you can read scripture. I mean, these things happen on many levels. Or they present us with many levels of interpretation. And certainly it would be also fair to say, in addition to everything that you just said, that Peter’s story is meant also to be a demonstration for the individual believer. That we are to be like Peter. We’re to see in Peter’s story our own story. So that when Jesus says to Peter, “You’re the rock.” We may say that there’s an ecclesiastical kind of meaning to that. But there’s also to each of us, Christ wants to build upon us. Protestants are not foolish when they personalize the story of Jesus. It’s just that’s not all of the levels. They’re not exhausting all the levels. Would you say that’s fair.?
Suan Sonna:
Yeah. When people talk about how they think that… Well, when they want to emphasize that the confession of Peter is what Christ built the church on. What it’s implied there is that they also want to say, “Ah, and we too can be the foundation of the church.” Right?
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Suan Sonna:
Through having that same confession. And I mean, if you think about it though, I think that’s a valid interpretation. But it’s not, I guess, the most direct intention of Christ.
Cy Kellett:
Okay.
Suan Sonna:
It can be a secondary intention. It can be a secondary meaning. But what’s the primary meaning? Well, the primary meaning is that the person of Peter is the rock, and he is going to have this foundational role in the church. And then we can look upon that confession because it’s through the confession. Right? That he is named rock.
Cy Kellett:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Suan Sonna:
Or he goes from Simon to Peter. And then from there, one thing that we have to watch out for is this kind of, I guess, like Sunday homily hermeneutic. Right? Where, for instance, we say, “Yeah. And Jesus rose again from the dead, just as Jesus can raise up our dreams from the dead. And can raise up our hopes.”
Cy Kellett:
Oh I see.
Suan Sonna:
And it’s like no. That’s beautiful. That’s good. And that’s how the fathers also wanted to expand the meaning of the text. Right? But you can’t use that expansion as if that is equal in level to the primary meaning, or intention, and the textual structure that’s there. And so, I think that’s… We need to emphasize both without overemphasizing the secondary meaning.
Cy Kellett:
Gotcha. Yeah. Beautifully said. Suan Sonna, I always enjoy the conversations with you. Thanks for doing this one with us. I think this will be very helpful to lots of people. I hope it will promote dialogue rather than shut off dialogue. I know that you have the same hope. But I’m just very grateful to you. Thank you for the time you spend with us.
Suan Sonna:
Yeah. No problem. Thank you.
Cy Kellett:
One thing I’ve always appreciated about the apologists here at Catholic Answers is that when someone calls up and tries to make an apologetics case using a particular verse of scripture, when that is not actually what that verse of scripture says or implies. They’ll just straighten them out on it. And say, “No. Don’t use that to defend the Catholic faith because that’s not what the scripture itself intends.” And I get the sense from that conversation with Suan that more and more Protestant scholars, apologists for Protestantism, Protestant Bible scholars are saying that. And it would be good if we could maybe move beyond this now because it’s not an issue that once it’s settled, it settles everything. But I think out of respect for the Lord and for Matthew who wrote that gospel. If the meaning is clear, we should just say the meaning is clear. And then, we can discuss what does it mean? That that’s what Jesus said, and that’s what Jesus did.
Cy Kellett:
Hope you enjoyed this episode. If you’d like to give us a comment on it, or maybe suggest a future episode, you can always just send us an email. Focus@catholic.com is our email address. Focus@ catholic.com. If you’d like to support us, please go to GiveCatholic, and give whatever you like. There’s a $5 million limit. Please do not go over $5 million. GiveCatholic.com. When you give, leave a little note that says that you’re giving it for Catholic Answers Focus.
Cy Kellett:
If you want to follow us on YouTube, we’re over there. Go to CatholicAnswersFocus.com. And then you can just click on the YouTube link. And you get all the episodes that we’ve got loaded up over there at YouTube. If you wouldn’t mind hit the little bell, subscribe. We’re growing. I think we’ve tripled in the last few months of our subscribers over on YouTube. So do that a couple more times. And I don’t know. That’d be everybody on earth pretty soon. And if you want to get us on podcast, you can get us wherever you get a podcast. Maybe Apple, Spotify, STCH, or whatever you use. Just subscribe there. Then you’ll be notified when new episodes are available. I’m Cy Kellett, your host. Thanks again to Suan Sonna for taking the time with us. Thank you for taking the time with us. We appreciate that you do. We’ll see you next time God willing right here on Catholic Answers Focus.