Protestant Biblical and Linguistic Scholars on Matt. 16:16-19 (cont'd) . . .
"Furthermore, the whole passage contains semitic structures. In Aramaic the word for both Peter's name and the rock would be identical, Kepha' . . . kepha'." --James B. Shelton, letter to the authors, 21 October 1994, 1, in Scott Butler, Norman Dahlgren, and Rev. Mr. David Hess,Jesus, Peter, and the Keys: A Scriptural Handbook on the Papacy, (Goleta, CA: Queenship, 1996), 21.
"PETER (Gr. Petros). Simon Peter, the most prominent of Jesus' twelve disciples. Peter's original name was Simon (Aram. sim'on, represented in Greek by Simon and Symeon). Jesus gave him the Aramaic name kepha "rock" (Matt. 16:18); Luke 6:14 par.; John 1:42), which is in Greek both transliterated (Kephas; Eng. Cephas) and translated (Petros)." --Allen C. Myers, ed., The Eerdmans Bible Dictionary, (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1987), 818.
"Rock (Aram. Kepha). This is not a name, but an appellation and a play on words. There is no evidence of Peter or Kephas as a name before Christian times. On building on a rock, or from a rock, cf. Isa 51:1ff.; Matt 8:24f. Peter as Rock will be the foundation of the future community (cf. I will build). Jesus, not quoting the OT, here uses Aramaic, not Hebrew, and so uses the only Aramaic word which would serve his purpose." --W. F. Albright, and C. S. Mann, The Anchor Bible: Matthew, (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1971), 195.
"On the other hand, only the fairly assured Aramaic original of the saying enables us to assert with confidence the formal and material identity between petra and Petros: petra = kepha = Petros." --Gerhard Friedrich, ed., and Geoffrey W. Bromley, trans. and ed.,Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, vol. 6, (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1968), 98-99.
"The play on words in [Mat 16] verse 18 indicates the Aramaic origin of the passage." --Suzanne de Dietrich, The Layman's Bible Commentary: Matthew, vol. 16, trans. Donald G. Miller, (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1961), 93.
"On this rock I will build my church: the word-play goes back to Aramaic tradition." --David Hill, "The Gospel of Matthew," in Ronald E. Clements and Matthew Black, eds., The New Century Bible Commentary, (London: Marshall, Morgan & Scott, 1972), 261.
"The feminine word for rock, petra, is necessarily changed to the masculine petros to give a man's name, but the word-play is unmistakable (and in Aramaic would be even more so, as the same form kepha would be occur in both places) . . . ." --R. T. France, The Gospel According to Matthew, (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1985), 254.
"The natural reading of the passage [Mat 16:18], despite the necessary shift from Petros to petra required by the word play in the Greek (but not the Aramaic, where the same word kepha occurs in both places), is that it is Peter who is the rock upon which the church is to be built (thus rightly Morris, France, Carson, Blomberg, Cullman [Peter, 207], Davies-Allison; so too the interconfessional volume by Brown, Donfried, and Reumann [Peter in the NT, 92])." --Donald A. Hagner, Matthew 14-28, in David A. Hubbard and others, eds., World Biblical Commentary, vol. 33b, (Dallas: Word Books, 1995), 470.
5. The keys symbolize authority over the house.
"The keys are the symbol of authority, and Roland de Vaux (Ancient Israel, tr. by John McHugh [New York: McGraw-Hill, 1961], 129 ff.) rightly sees here the same authority as that vested in the vizier, the master of the house, the chamberlain of the royal household in ancient Israel." --W. F. Albright and C. S. Mann, The Anchor Bible: Matthew, (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1971), 196.
"For the same reason, Christ calls the office of teaching the word, (Mat 16:19) 'the keys of the kingdom of heaven'; so that it is idle and foolish to spend much time in endeavouring to find a hidden reason, when the matter is plain, and needs no ingenuity." --John Calvin, Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Isaiah, vol. 2, trans. William Pringle, (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1948), 136-137.
"The image of keys (plural) perhaps suggests not so much the porter, who controls admission to the house, as the steward, who regulates its administration (Is 22:22, in conjunction with 22:15). The issue then is not that of admission to the church (which is not what the kingdom of heaven means; see pp. 45-47) but an authority derived from a delegation of God's sovereignty." --Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary New Testament, (Downer's Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 1993), 256.
"The keeper of the keys has authority within the house as administrator and teacher (cf. Isa 22:20-25, which may have influenced Matthew here). The language of binding and loosing is rabbinic terminology for authoritative teaching, for having the authority to interpret the Torah and apply it to particular cases, declaring what is permitted and what is not permitted. Jesus, who has taught with authority (7:29) and has given his authority to his disciples (10:1,8 ) here gives his primary disciple the authority to teach in his name." --M. Eugene Boring, "Matthew," in Pheme Perkins and others, eds., The New Interpreter's Bible, vol. 8, (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1995), 346.
"The keys of the kingdom would be comitted to the chief steward in the royal household and with them goes plenary authority." --George Buttrick and others, eds., The Interpreter's Bible, (New York: Abingdon, 1951), 453.
"The authority of Peter is to be over the Church, and this authority is represented by the keys." --S. T. Lachs, A Rabbinic Commentary on the New Testament: The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, (Hoboken, NJ: Ktav, 1987), 256.
"What do the expressions 'bind' and 'loose' signify? According to Rabbinical usage two explanations are equally possible: 'prohibit' and 'permit', that is, 'establish rules'; or 'put under the ban' and 'acquit.'" --Oscar Cullman, Peter: Disciple, Apostle, Martyr, trans. Floyd V. Filson, (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1953), 204-205.