Is Peter the Rock on which the Church Is Built?

Published Feb 22, 2023, 1:42 AM

In this episode, Prof. Kathryn Schifferdecker and Katie Langston gather to answer the listener submitted questions.

Watch the video version on Youtube.

Guest, Shively Smith, is the Assistant Professor of New Testament at Boston University School of Theology and Affiliate faculty for the PhD Concentration in Homiletics. She is also Resident Scholar and an itinerant elder at the historic Metropolitan AME Church of Washington DC.

This episode was recorded on January 4, 2023 over Zoom.

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Enter the Bible podcast, where you can get answers or at least reflections on everything you wanted to know about the Bible but were afraid to ask. I'm Katie Langston,

and I'm Kathryn Schifferdecker , and we have as a special guest today, Professor Shively Smith, Reverend Dr. Shively Smith. She is the assistant professor of New Testament at Boston University School of Theology and an itinerant elder of the African Methodist Episcopal Church and resident scholar at Metropolitan AME Church in Washington, D.C. So she splits her time between Boston and D.C. and she just won a prestigious award as a mentor of the year in the Biblical Scholar Guild. And so we're just very happy to have her with us. Welcome SHIVELY. Thanks for taking the time in your busy life to be with us.

Thank you so much for having me.

Well, it's we look forward to the conversation. So we have a question for you from one of our readers. And I'll just again remind our listeners and viewers that you are welcome to and encouraged to submit questions on the Enter the Bible dot org website. So this question has to do with Peter and Shively. We know that your your focus for a number of years has been on Peter and the Petrine literature, the first the letters of Peter in the New Testament. And so the question is, is Peter the rock on which the church is built? And this references a famous passage in the Gospels where Jesus says, "You are Peter, you are Petra Petros And on this rock I will build my church." And there's been different interpretations of that. So we'll get into that and talk about the larger Peter tradition as well. So Shively, how would you how would you begin answering that question?

I would I will begin by just saying that's what that's what the Bible says. So, yes, Right. So I think it's important to say so that the first that tradition is very, very important as Matthew chapter six. So we're talking about Matthew chapter 16 verses 17 through 19. And right there in 18, we get this declaration of Jesus to Peter that says, I tell you, you are Peter. And on this rock I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not shall not prevail against you. So my direct answer is, that's what that's what it says. All right. So in at least Matthew's understanding and I would say running through throughout the gospel understanding is this notion of the importance of not even notion. It is literally the depiction of the importance of Peter as not just an apostolic figure and actor, but as really a centering space. And then you move into something like acts and you see Peter, you know, taking front, front and front stage in the beginning of Acts as we begin to see the emergence of the church and all the stories connected there. So yeah, I mean our gospels, the New Testament opens with a clear sense of the significance of Jesus and Peter's role as a main spokesperson and leader and representative of the apostolic apostolic tradition and community and discipleship. And I think that that Matthew 16:18 is a signal that we have to take seriously the Peter figure, our model and example.

Could you? There's a there's a wordplay here right in in this verse 19:16, 18. Could you could you explain that to those of our listeners who, like me, have forgotten their Greek or may never have had the Greek ?

Let's see if I can help. So when we talk about Matthew 16:18, you get the name Peter Petrus in set alongside the object, the noun Petrus or the Rock. So we're getting this play between the, the, the name of a person and of the figure of being the rock. So really you start thinking about so what? What becomes foundational in some ways of thinking about Peter as Foundation for Ecclesia, right. For for church and congregation. The life I mean that's the other piece is also important is this is church this church language this shows up explicitly here in Matthew doesn't show up elsewhere in the other gospels. So Matthew is stringing together some very important concepts and very important markers for understanding not only Peter, but also how we understand the ecclesia, the body of Christ and what and what is foundational there. I love thinking about the the play on words here between Peter and the Rock, because I think it pushes us. This church is as within the church and as Bible readers to begin to to ask the question of what is a rock, What does a rock do right? What does a rock not do? Right? It really does invite the theological imagination of us to start asking some of those other questions.

I think about the story of Peter wanting to walk to Jesus on the water. And then he starts to sink like a rock.

That's right. Right. So this notion of even though it is the rock, is the is the foundation, the foundational element of Peter and Peter's story one of always this stalwart, a moving figure? Which it is not, Peter has real, you know, failings to him. And yet the story says I wonder to what degree we have created space to understand that that's a part of this rock, this rock tradition of Peter. It's not just the successes and the strengths in places that you see, such as the Pentecost Speech in Acts. It is the real missteps, the real human moments that are also a part of it that I think it opens up us to imagine and talk about as well.

So I think there's been just like a disagreement or a dispute between Catholics and Protestants when it comes to kind of interpreting this passage where the Catholic tradition would argue that, you know, that Peter is more or less the first pope. And the Protestant tradition, I think, would interpret those passages differently. It occurs to me that those are like, probably, it's probably a pretty anachronistic question to begin with, right, where the development of the church ecclesiologically had not gotten to the point where we were even contemplating things like popes and stuff like that. But I wonder how you might, as a biblical scholar, sort of tease apart those, you know, those arguments and and maybe, I don't know, provide some wisdom or insight into that question.

Yeah, I think there's this So there's some historical points here as well as I think some biblical textual points. So the the place where you get the real claim of Peter is foundational for the papacy in actually establishing authority. One of the places I always go to is looking at someone like Pope Leo the Great in the fifth century. So my dates are going to be a little off: mid 400s to 465 or something. Here you have someone really claiming and embracing the Matthew 16:17 through 19 passage as a marker for that you know claiming that Peter's authority giving them the kingdoms of the heaven, the foundation of the rock really affirms the authority of sort of the Catholic papacy. So there's there's a historical marker where this becomes a figure that gets claimed and this moment is claimed as real, a particular real authority structure there. But the other piece that I think is so that's on the Catholic side for me. So what happens in terms of Protestant circles that I think is important is is also in Matthew, but it's in this very similar. So there's the Matthew 16 through 19. But then there's a real claiming of places like Matthew 18:18. So whatever you lose,on Earth will be loosed in heaven, whatever, you know. So this binding and loosing a passage in Matthew 18 becomes a way in which, depending on depending on where you're located, the authority that Peter is granted in Matthew 16 is read as being expanded to all disciples and to all discipleship in Matthew 18. So what we're really talking about in some ways is how what we are privileging and how we're putting biblical text in conversation, authorizing texts. I mean, these are authorizing texts, right? That claim to put authority and power on figures that people see themselves and that institutions in our Christian faith and and denominations and locations see ourselves living into and continuing. Right. And so what you see is an emphasis on this happening in some way. So the Catholic tradition really emphasizes that Matthew 16 piece to emphasize papal authority. Protestants see that and love that like that, too, Right? Right. Well, we see an expansion of discipleship in authority in places like Matthew 18. We're not even talking about the Peter and Paul scenario even in this. I'm talking about around the Peter figure, how foundational power is being understood.

Yeah. Say a little more for our listeners of the Peter and Paul.

Yeah, I was about to go there too, because I was about to. You know, a lot of folks say, well, actually, the, you know, the real founder of Christianity was Paul because he's the one who spread it to the Gentiles

Yeah.

Like his letters were particularly authoritative in terms of the theology that's been handed down to us. So who's you know, who's the winner? Who's the real winner, Shively?

So this is important. This is important. As you introduce me, I'm a I'm a Petrine scholar. So the first thing I say is, look, before there was Paul, there was Peter. So I always say, Wow. So, like, my go to is to say, if you read the Book of Acts, we do not start with Paul. We start with Peter. And it is Peter who we see going to the Gentiles first in Acts 10 . It is Peter who is speaking, actually actually speaking at the Jerusalem Council in Acts in Acts 15. And Paul and Peter are actually positioned in the text like Acts 15 as, they're partners. They are on the same side advocating for this. So there's a way in which I say so let's be careful about the sort of some of the, I would say, anachronistic and even ahistorical distinctions that have said Peter went Peter with Peter was to messianic Jewish believers and Paul went to the Gentiles to make them believers. Even the biblical text itself and the New Testament shows you that it's not that neat and clean. What we're dealing with is multiple different Christian communities, and these two figures are in are moving in and out of spaces that are Jewish Christian believers, that are gentile Christian believers, sometimes together, sometimes not. They sometimes have different ways of being in these spaces. You see something happens in Galatians two, Galatians two. But Peter is also a part, is very much a part of a leader and a part of that conversation and that movement.

So maybe we could move. We're talking about kind of traditions about Peter, both in Scripture and and later, as you were talking about Pope Leo. What about where do where do first and second Peter come in here? I'm thinking, especially as we're talking about Peter as the Rock. I had to look it up to make sure I have the right chapter. But of course, first Peter, Chapter two, right. With that beautiful passage about the living stones, you know, come to him, a living stone rejected by mortals, yet chosen and precious in God's sight. And like living stones, let yourself be built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood. And then it quotes a psalm, the stone that makes them stumble. Oh, so the stone that the builders rejected has become the very head of the corners, Right? Speaking of Jesus as the the cornerstone. So can you...

Yeah. It's so with Peter and Paul, I do not like to talk about winners and losers. But when we get into these letters, I do. So I'm also the epistolary scholar. So, like, there's a clear winners here. Okay, so clear winner 1 Peter, 1 Peter is so I always say as I tell my stories, as soon as it makes it takes so, so, so like the gospels, like Peter's, like Paul's letters, 1 Peter is a is a letter that that exceeds its time stamp and geographical location and containing and is embraced by sort of a larger church world of the ancient world. And I always think that is one of the reasons is because of the beauty of 1 Peter 2, to the way in which again is some of that it's playing on that. Matthew 16:18 Peter And rock language is giving context to that, an affirmation, a positioning of this sort of apostolic Peter figure to a larger church dynamic. 1 Peter is the letter is the one place sort of Acts 11 where we get Christian the Christian label actually explicitly used . So in 1 Peter 4 and that Christian label is a stigma. So it's not, it's not a good thing. And the letter encourages them to embrace the stigma, the pejorative label of Christian. And it does that after it establishes the beauty of the Peter Apostolic figure and this foundational church, the way in which it is foundational to understand the foundation of the church. Right? So I, I on one level, I would say 1 Peter's a clear winner in terms of extending the Peter tradition into sort of foundational for understanding Christian identity, Christian community against resistance, against attack. So that's one. 2 Peter's a different story. Second, Peter is a much later actually, I talk about it in my forthcoming book, actually, as I begin by talking about it as the baby of the family. So it is the latest of all the writings of the New Testament. And so it seems to look like something like 1 Peter, but not all the way. It has some of the stuff that I would have wanted in 1 Peter and 2 Peter's, where you get the fourth Transfiguration account of the New Testament. But second, Peter is, was always contested, always contested. And then because it seems to speak to and represent a way of Christian community and being that looks very different than what you see in 1 Peter and what you see in the Peter the Petrine tradition in the gospels and very antagonistic, very polemical, doesn't seem to seems to struggle with these notions of diverse Christian communities. That is actually a part of the Peter Peter story, whether you're in the Gospels or even in first Peter. So I say there's no winners or losers between Paul and Peter, but we might need to talk a little bit about the difference in Peter conversation between 1 Peter's and 2 Peter, which makes the tradition complicated.

Interesting. So the second Peter probably arises then out of a more of a situation of conflict or persecution. Is that what people think?

So I think both are persecution and conflict. That is conflict from two different directions that get attached to Peter's tradition. 1 Peter, is conflict of Christian communities experiencing from those outside the community. Second, Peter is self-made conflict inside Christian communities where it seems to be the power holders who get to determine who, who, who, who among them is considered heretical and who are not. And I mean, in this very I mean, so when you read it carefully. Even the rhetoric of the of the people that they're targeting, the rhetoric they use is very hard. Call you call them curse people like us, them to pigs and dogs. I mean, this is all in 2 Peter. So when I hear about this is a person in Peter tradition a second Peter looks very odd to me. Sounds very odd to me in the larger, in the larger story of Peter that you see in places like Matthew 16, in Acts 15, in Acts 2 that, just stand out. Mark 8 that just stand out. And in a way that I think we have to be careful.

Well, let's go back let's go back to that figure of Peter then in the gospels in an act. So obviously, I think most people, when they hear the name Peter, will think of the denial, the three times that Peter denies Jesus. But that's not the end of the story. Right. And as the gospel say, So, how how would you describe Peter's trajectory? You know, the figure of Peter as depicted in the gospels and Acts?

You know, I think that this was so interesting because I think this is also a difference between Protestant and Catholic and sort of Catholic traditions, how Peter's handled. So Catholic tradition is really good at acknowledging and understanding the way in which Peter is a dynamic apostolic figure. Protestants tend to be very up on the dynamic in the conversion or the turning or the transformation of Paul when we privilege and pride ourselves on that and we miss that Peter is also is very much a dynamic shifting figure in our tradition. The one who goes and sees is with Jesus, I will not deny. And then we see this sort of failing of of denial that moves into something like, I keep going to Acts because I think that that's so important. Here you go. And Acts 1 and 2 and who takes center stage? Peter And Peter is unmoving. Why is this sort of unwavering figure. You say, Wow, what happened? So in the tradition itself, Peter, is a figure that to me that looks very human, right? Like, like now. Yeah, it looks I mean, human and human in a way. I think that could that should encourage some of our traditions that focus so much on Paul and miss Peter himself. Some of us not to belabor it, but I think it's important some of us start, especially for new to the faith or new Christians, very zealous and excited. I've worked with new believers before, right? I am all you know. And then the first misstep or the first failing in their zealous faith, it it can be destroying like crippling. I have failed and I and I go, Paul, doesn't help you here. But Peter can. Reach for Peter to encourage new believers who are zealous and are the ones who are in the assembly. I will not leave you. I will cut the ear of any one for Jesus. And then they misstep. They back off. They you know, and they and they they like, what do I do? Peter is a character in this tradition that really helps us to understand how you get back, how you can get back, how you come back, even in your faith, how we make a misstep, and then we can make a better step the next time.

You can almost imagine, you know, that. If you think about it in those terms, then the rock on which Christ builds the church is that of human beings.

That's right.

You know, frail and fragile and messed up and messy and sinful and redeemed and loved. And that's the rock on which Christ builds the church.

That's right. We sink, we float. We're whole. Sometimes we're tired. That is the that is the church. And how how deeply loved does that mean we are?

Hmm. Amen. Yeah. Well, we are just so happy that you have shared some of your wisdom with us here, Shively . And we know that that was just that we could have gone much deeper. And you obviously can go much deeper. You mentioned a book that you're writing on Peter. Do you just want to give a shout out about what that is?

Sure. So my next book on Peter is actually on Second Peter. So it's called Interpreting the Second Pete and Interpreting Second Peter through African-American Women's Moral Writings. And so that's coming out in SBL Press in March 2023, and I'm looking forward to it. So I'm living in first and second Peter these days.

Well, it's obviously a rich, fertile ground for theological imagination. So thank you for that. And thank you to our listeners for joining us again for the Enter the Bible podcast. Get high quality courses and commentaries and resources, videos and more reflections at Enter the Bible dot org. Thanks for joining us.