Matthew 16:19

δώσω σοι τὰς κλεῖδας τῆς βασιλείας τῶν οὐρανῶν, καὶ ὅ ἐάν δήσῃς ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἔσται δεδεμένον ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς, καὶ ὅ ἐάν λύσῃς ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἔσται λελυμένον ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς.

My translation: I will give to you the keys of the Kingdom of the Heavens, and [that] which you should bind upon the earth (prohibit, fasten, compel) will be bound in the heavens, and [that] which you should loose (untie; release, set free; break, set aside, destroy, pull down; break up, allow) upon the earth will be loosed in the heavens.

Matthew 16:19 is massively interesting for a thousand different reasons. Much of the Church’s affirmation of the Power of the Pope, his proclaimed infallibility as regards faith and morals, the succession of Apostle’s, the manner in which the Catholic Church, much to the dismay of our protestant brothers and sisters, claims pride of place, stems in part from this verse. To be sure, in this part of Matthew in particular, it would be unfortunate to lose the surrounding context. The Greek of the new testament isn’t known for it’s beauty — at least not to ears trained on Plato, Homer, and other more traditionally “classical” authors; the dismay expressed by St. Augustine at the ruin wrought on the Greek language by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John is well-known. Still, Matt 15-20 is worth a good look if any one has the time, and will probably come under the scrutiny of this blog eventually, if only for the beauty of it’s rhetoric.

I would like to briefly call attention to a few things in the Greek that might not have been teased out in my translation or in various translations. First, the semantic range of the word λύω (the second person aorist subjunctive of which is seen above) is impressive. It is my opinion, that the word is here used by the evangelist to express the kind of power being conferred by Christ on Peter — the idea that we should take from the passage, due largely to the word λύω, is the transference of an enormous authority. I think this sense comes out well in most translations given and read today.

Another thing that I’d like to call attention to is the perfect aspect of both δεδεμενον and λελυμενον. The “perfect” is the construction used in Greek to indicate the durative quality of an event being discussed. Certain verbs that we use in English take a perfect form in Greek because they are inherently durative (they have a lasting quality). For example, the verb “to know” (οἶδα) is perfect in form but present in translation. When I know something, I do not immediately forget it, but I retain the knowledge that I’ve gained. Think of the a soldier saying “I’ve been hit (durative = perfect)” vs. a child saying “he slapped me.” The soldier will remained wounded; it would be relatively absurd (though grammatically possible) for the child to remain slapped.

“Knowing” thus has a lasting effect, and this semantic reality is reflected nicely for us in the morphology of the word. (This tidbit of knowledge courtesy of Prof. James Redfield) For this reason, death, or that someone is dead, is often, in Homer, discussed using the verb “to die” of the dead person, in the perfect aspect. Death, to quote my professor, is durative.

I mention this because the aspects of δεδεμενον and λελυμενον, give some counterweight to the seemingly arbitrary authority conferred on Peter. What is bound on earth is bound in heaven, and what is loosed on earth loosed in heaven indeed — but these things are really, really bound, and really, really loosened. A correct reading of this passage thus gives us a two-fold account of the power of binding and loosening given to Peter. He may decide, and has wide latitude in his decisions — but he is, it is intimated to us, in some sense bound himself by those decisions, and by the durative aspects of δεδεμενον and λελυμενον.

Credo Ut Intellegam

JS