Petros/petra

[The_Scott]

I agree with your parsing of the Greek, but I disagree with the conclusion you draw from it. That petra is in the dative is not in dispute.

The whole point I made about the dative case was in response to OP’s link, where the person was saying, “Why doesn’t it say ‘You are PETROS, and upon this PETROS…’?”

The case of petra, however, doesn’t tell us why petra was chosen when Matthew could have used petros in the dative as well. In other words, “You are Petros [nominative, masculine, singular] and upon this petroi [dative, masculine, singular]” could just as easily been chosen,

So you’re asking why the word petra wasn’t changed completely to masculine, in all the cases? I’m not sure, and you may want to check it out, but I don’t think Petros was ever used before. All places I’ve seen said that the name Petros always relates to petra.

Nevertheless, Christ must have given Peter the masculine equivalent of petra, since it’d be like calling him a female name no matter what. But Christ didn’t need to change the word completely, since “rock” was already a feminine noun.

Come to think of it, has there ever been a man named Petros before Christ? That’d be interesting to look up!

especially if petros and petra were “interchangeable” at the time Matthew wrote his gospel.

Again, see above. It may be that Christ simply said “You are Rock [masculine] and upon this rock [feminine].” It is a pun, after all.

Notice too that the entire gender disagreement issue would have disappeared had Mattthew chosen Petros/petroi. And to put a cherry on top, Petros/petroi would have been an even better preservation of the supposed wordplay based on kepha/kepha in the hypothetical underlying Aramaic.

I don’t even think Petros can be declined like a noun, since it isn’t a noun in the proper since, but rather a name.

Why, then, did Matthew choose petra at all when he clearly didn’t have to?

Perhaps because he didn’t wish to fundamentally change the word petra?

Two possibilities come to mind: 1. The underlying Aramaic used two words for rock, not one. Here I would suggest Kepha/minra given the fact that minra, not kepha, always translates the Hebrew tswur in the Aramaic Targumim, while petra always translates tswur in the Septuagint.

But does not the Hebrew word for rock also translate as ke’fa like the Aramaic?
And I haven’t heard of the word “tswur” before in Hebrew. Do you mean “tzur”?

Forgive my ignorance, but I’m not very knowedgable in Hebrew (something I want to fix, soon!).

1. Matthew chose two words for “rock”–not because the words were distinct in meaning–but simply because the words were distinct. And this he did most likely because he has two rocks is mind.

Correction: he had two different words for rock – the masculine name Petros and the actual feminine noun petra. Doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a different rock.

I can say “I’m enjoying this literature called Ilium by Dan Simmons” or “I’m enjoying this novel called Ilium by Dan Simmons,” and you’d still think of it as the book that I am currently reading, despite the change in the word. (Didn’t mean to advertise. )

 

[Pax]

Could you be specific?

How do you know? The Syriac versions that we have are translations from the Greek, not the Aramaic. How do you know that those translations can tell us what the spoken Aramaic or written original may have been? (If you can answer that, publish it! For as of yet, no one has an answer for that.)

Name them. And I’ll name you many who claim that it was originally written in Greek.

Such as?

Again, this is not in dispute. I fully recognize that Simon-Bar-Jonah is “Cephas,” and the Aramaic “Kepha” stands behind his name. That’s never been in dispute. What is in dispute is that “this rock,” and specifically the Greek word “petra,” is also “kepha” in the supposed underlying Aramaic. The evidence simply does not justify that assumption, as I’ve already demonstrated.

Miguel,

Do your own research on this so as to satisfy yourself. I am not claiming that there are no scholars in your camp concerning “earliest known manuscripts” that are available to us. Those would certainly be the Greek. That, however, does not preclude the very real possibility and easily discovered scholarship that indicates that Matthew was probably written in Aramaic. Papias of Hierapolis, Eusebius, and Irenaeus give early evidence to that understanding. There are plenty of scholars since that support the view. So you think that lining up those in your camp against those in my camp will prove something. I don’t think so.

Moreover, you have not demonstrated much of anything when it comes to kepha/petra in the Aramaic. Please note that non-Catholic scholars generally attack the Catholic position by contending that petra is kepha(large rock) and argue that petros, as it pertains to Peter, means small rock via the Greek petros. You are in a rather small creative minority that is trying to contend that petra is different from kepha and that the word kepha is not the underlying term in the Aramaic. That to me is where the greatest speculation resides.

Why do you think that French translations say, and always have said, Pierre for petros and Pierre for petra? Scholars have generally understood that the meaning is rock in both instances. Only those that want to attack the primacy of Peter take the opposing view and make the speculation that you are making relative to the Aramaic. Simply read the oldest available Aramaic manuscripts…they use kepha. The burden is on you to prove that they are in error. Good luck with that.

God bless.

 

[ftbond]

if you want to see some of the best info I’ve ever seen on Peter, Petros, petra and kepha, go check out this site:

freetowne.com/pppk

good stuff… mainly linguistics… the guy doesn’t get into doctrinal issues, doesn’t seem to be trying to prove anything, one way or the other…