peter...rock...Cephas

[praxising]

Christ changing Simon’s name from Simon to Peter? Yes - HUGE theological significance!.

Are you confident it was Jesus who changed his name, or is it that Jesus just knew the nickname he was called by? (I was taught in Biblical school that calling someone a “rock” in those indicated stubborness.)

If, in fact, Simon’s father was named John, then Jesus calling Peter “Barjona” when Peter calls Jesus Messiah, would seem to be very significant.

But unless we find some authoritative source for Greek text that the majority of scholars agree is very reliable, and they have explained the discrepancy with the Textus Receptus, it doesn’t matter.

 

[Salvatore123]

praxising,

I am about 100% certain that it was Christ himself who “renamed” Simon as “Peter” (or, Kepha, in Aramaic).

I was always taught this, and every commentary I have states that it was Christ who named Simon “Peter”, and that “Peter” was a unique name for a person, as no one else in the bible is called Peter, and I read somewhere that not even ancient histories by people such as Josephus and Eusebius do not mention the name “Peter” referring to anyone other than St. Peter.

So I am pretty sure that Christ was responsible for the renaming Simon.

 

[Salvatore123]

Praxising,

And aside from the biblical text itself:

Mat. 16:18: “And I tell you, you are Peter . . .”, we have the Catechism stating:

"881 The Lord made Simon alone, whom he named Peter, the “rock” of his Church. He gave him the keys of his Church and instituted him shepherd of the whole flock.400 "The office of binding and loosing which was given to Peter was also assigned to the college of apostles united to its head.“401 This pastoral office of Peter and the other apostles belongs to the Church’s very foundation and is continued by the bishops under the primacy of the Pope.”

Even Protestants do not contest that Christ renamed Simon, “Peter”. The meaning behind Christ doing this, however, is the major issue not only with Protestants, but also, to an extent, the Orthodox faith.

 

[Salvatore123]

praxising,

As far as what you were taught in bible school, your teacher was pretty close.

I am sure you realize that the Greek word for Peter is “petros”, meaning “rock”.

[Protestants try to make hay out of the differences between “petros” (the masculine) and “petra” (the feminine) to suggest that Peter was actually the “petra” whereas Christ was the “petros”. That completely ignores the fact that Christ would have called Simon “Kepha” in Aramaic, when he addressed Simon in Matthew 16. And Aramaic does not have a masculine and feminine tense for “kepha” (which also means rock).]

Back to your bible school teacher . . .

“Petrous” is the Greek adjective of the Latin/Greek word for rock: petra.

“Petroleum” is a combination of “petra” (rock) and “oleum” (oil). As “petroleum” is a substance that comes from rock formations in the earth, it makes perfect sense why Christ would have renamed Simon “Peter”, considering that Peter (after Christ prayed that he would not fail him in later life) was “solid as a rock” loyal to Christ after Pentecost, while leading Christ’s newly formed church.

 

[ftbond]

If you really want some good info on the Peter - Petros - petra - kepha “linguistics” stuff, you ought to check out freetowne.com/pppk

It’s pretty “neutral”, and it has good source and refrence info… Answers a bunch of questions…

 

[Salvatore123]

Sorry for the long absence - much going on in my life lately . . .

I teach writing to fellow attorneys (in an often vain attempt to get them to communicate using common english rather than archaic legalese that even they do not understand), so words mean a great deal to me.

The problem with placing emphasis/importance on certain words (which, of course, is what we should all do), is that by doing so, we presume that the writer also places the same emphasis/importance on the words HE chose. That is a huge presumption . . . even when it came to St. Jerome (after all - even HE held the “personal” position that the so-called “deuteros” were not canonical - but he included them nevertheless).

I don’t know why I did not mention this before, but when we come to loggerheads over the meaning of words in a language that is truly “dead” (such as Aramaic - Latin is NOT dead, contrary to what many claim; it is dead as a regularly spoken language, but not with regard to Holy Mother Church and the sciences), I should have mentioned one of the most obvious hindrances to meaning we have everyday: finding a word that means both male and female. We have no such word in the english language.

Political correctness has gone so far that many advocate that we write such things as “man or woman” or “he or she” or “him or her”, or, even worse, using the plural “they” and “them”, to eliminate any reference to sex.

I refuse to bow to that correctness and continue to teach what language has meant for several thousand years: when we use the word “man” (unless we are attempting to differentiate between laws for a man and laws for a woman), we are using it to mean encompassing “all mankind” - man and woman.

Using the logic of certain politically correct thinkers, I suppose I should complain to God that it was unfair that he permitted women to have children and not men . …

 

[bmonk]

If Jesus was not calling Peter the Rock in MT 16:18, then why do the other apostles call him the rock (Cephas) throughout the NT?

Jn 1:42, Mk 3:16, 1 Corinthians 1:12; 1 Corinthians 3:22; 1 Corinthians 9:5; 1 Corinthians 15:5; Galatians 1:18; Galatians 2:9; Galatians 2:11; Galatians 2:14*

As Catholics, we have the long tradition that Simon was given the name Peter by Jesus–Peter being from the Greek form Petros/Petras, while the Aramaic was Kephas as you note. (Paul especially likes that version.) We have no problem with it.

We also note that others were given nicknames by Jesus: James and John were called “Boanerges, sons of Thunder” in Mk 3:17. And then there was the whole phenomenon of multiple names: Joseph Bar Sabbas/Justus (Acts 1:23), Joseph called Barnabas, “Son of Enouragement” (Acts 4:36), and the most famous, Saul/Paul (Acts 13:9). So having multiple names was not unheard of in that time and place.

 

[NotWorthy]

As Catholics, we have the long tradition that Simon was given the name Peter by Jesus–Peter being from the Greek form Petros/Petras, while the Aramaic was Kephas as you note. (Paul especially likes that version.) We have no problem with it.

We also note that others were given nicknames by Jesus: James and John were called “Boanerges, sons of Thunder” in Mk 3:17. And then there was the whole phenomenon of multiple names: Joseph Bar Sabbas/Justus (Acts 1:23), Joseph called Barnabas, “Son of Enouragement” (Acts 4:36), and the most famous, Saul/Paul (Acts 13:9). So having multiple names was not unheard of in that time and place.

Joseph/Barnabas and Saul/Paul are examples of people having a Hebrew name and a Greek and/or Roman name.

For instance, Saul’s name is used the whole team he is among the Jews and the Jewish Christians. But after he is sent out by the Holy Spirit to evangelize the Gentiles in chapter 13 (or is it 14), he goes by his Roman name, Paul.

Also, I always assumed “Sons of Thunder” was a pet name for James and John. There is one time where they ask Jesus if they can call lightning down from the sky to strike some people who are healing others but are not of Jesus disciples. Jesus was calling them “sons of thunder” because they were all noise and no lightning — or “all talk and no action”.