Jesus was giving the keys of the kingdom

JESUS WAS GIVING THE KEYS OF THE KINGDOM
EDITED BY GLENN PEASE
Matthew 16:19 New InternationalVersion(NIV)19 I
will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven;
whatever you bind on earth will be[a] bound in
heaven, and whatever you looseon earth will be[b]
loosedin heaven.”
GreatTexts of the Bible
The Keys of the Kingdom
I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatsoeverthou
shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoeverthoushalt loose
on earth shall be loosedin heaven.—Matthew 16:19.
When this promise was given the little Galileancompany was standing on one
of the lowerspurs of the Lebanon, amidst the pleasantrush and music of its
countless brooks, with the grey walls of the Roman castle atCæsarea Philippi
in the distance. Peterhad just made his greatconfession, andby his swift and
far-reaching intuition had establishedhis place as foremostman of the
Twelve. It was under these circumstances thatthis peculiar form of expression
was first used by our Lord. After speaking ofthe supernatural knowledge that
Peterhad receivedfrom the Father, Christ goes on to announce the important
relation of Peter, as the first possessorand witness of such knowledge, to the
Church of the future. And then He advances a step, and speaks ofa future gift

of light and powerand dominion to Peterwhich the Apostle should receive
from His hand: “And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.”
I
The Keys
“I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.”
Keys are the emblems of authority, and this language was addressedto Peter
because ofthe powerthat was to be conferred on him. He was to arrange and
toil, determine and order, in the affairs of Christ’s Kingdom, not, of course,
absolutely, but under Christ, for Christ is the Head. Peter’s authority was to
be real, but none the less derived from and dependent upon Christ’s will.
Now, as Peter’s powerwas not to be absolute, so it was not to be solitary. It
was to be shared by the other Apostles. That is not brought out in the text, for
here Christ is dealing only with His servant who had so grandly confessed
Him. But later on Christ conferred on the entire company of the disciples the
same wonderful powerand privilege as He had conferredon Peter, when He
said, not to any Apostle in particular but to the entire Church, “Receive ye the
Holy Ghost: Whose soever sins ye forgive, they are forgiven unto them; whose
soeversins ye retain, they are retained.” One outcome of the authority was
that Peter, like the others, could bind and unloose, could forbid or enjoin,
what should be done in the Kingdom of Christ. Through the Apostle Christ
was to express His will. Through him the Masterwas to carry on and carry
out His purposes. What Peterordered would be what Christ desired. What
Peterforbade would be the things Christ disapproved, and herein was the
reality of the power, herein the vastness of the privilege, that Christ was to
work in and through him, for that is loftier and grander than for any man to
devise and determine unaided and unguided of the Spirit of God. And it is in

virtue of this real and true guiding Spirit that we have the Epistles of Paul,
and Peter, and John, and others developing the doctrine of the cross ofChrist,
and setting forth the source of and the power of the Christian life.
1. If we refer to anotheroccasionupon which Christ used this metaphor of the
keys, we shall find that Christ was accustomedto associate withthe expression
knowledge and the specific powerthat comes from knowledge.To the lawyers
He said, “Ye took awaythe key of knowledge.”The reference here can only be
to the knowledge thatunlocks the gates leading into the Kingdom of Heaven.
That was Christ’s future gift to Peter. Putting this side by side with the fact
that Christ has just been speaking ofa knowledge ofHis own personand
characterthat had been given to Peter, what can the knowledge thatChrist
would by and by give be but the knowledge ofthe Father, of which He was the
one only spring and channel amongstmen? It was through that knowledge
that Peterwas to open the wayfor men into the Kingdom of Heaven. “To
bind” and “to loose”was to teachand to rule in the Kingdom of Heaven, in
harmony with the knowledge receivedfrom the Father. We observe that the
promise deals more immediately with things, not persons;with truths and
duties, not with human souls. The Apostles dealt with souls as all other
disciples of Christ deal with them, intermediately, through the truths and
precepts on which the salvation of souls turned. The power of the keys, of
binding and loosing, was in reality the power of knowing the essentialtruths
of God’s characterand will.
(1) It is the power of a teacher. Among the Jews, whena scribe was admitted
to his office a key was given to him as the symbol of the duties which he was
expectedto perform. He was setapart to study with diligence the Book of the
Law, and to read and explain it to the people. Jesus Christ reproved the
Rabbis and PhariseesofHis day for having takenawaythe keyof knowledge,
and for shutting up the Kingdom of Heaven againstmen, that is, trying to lock
goodmen out. They knew little of the spirit of the law which they taught, and
their teaching produced evil fruits in the lives of their countrymen.

There is a sense in which all who faithfully preach the word of the Kingdom
hold the keys. When we say that we have gotthe key to a difficulty, or that an
army holds the key to a position, we mean that, howeverlong it may be before
the proof of the poweris manifested, yet it is there. So with those who
proclaim the truth as it is in Jesus. Theirword may be derided, their warnings
scorned, their entreaties mockedat;yet as the word they speak is not their
own but the word of God, so shall that word loose or bind, shut up or set free.
But it is the Lord who does this; man is but His agentfor declaring His
message. Everycommand or threat is heard by conscience, but the thing that
is declaredmay be long a-coming. It will come, however. So with every word
of the gospel:the truth in Jesus is the key of the Kingdom: the decisive proof
we may be long in discovering, but early or late every one must find a barred
or an abundant entrance, according as he has given heed to or neglectedthe
word of life.
When Luther opened the long-closedBible in the Gospels and Epistles, he was
bringing forth out of his treasury things new and old. He was binding and
loosing the consciences ofmen. When Andrew Melville, in Scottishhistory,
took King James by the sleeve as that pedant was arrogating to himself a
spiritual power which was his neither by law nor by grace, and calledhim
“God’s silly vassal,”reminding him that there were two kings and two
kingdoms in Scotland, he may have been lacking in courtesy, but he was
proving himself a scribe of the Kingdom. When John Brown of Harper’s
Ferry stoopedto kiss the child in its slave mother’s arms as he passedto his
death, men of vision might have seenthe keys of the Kingdom at his girdle. All
men now realize that in his own rude way he taught the things of Christ to his
own generation. Whereverand wheneverthe Christian Church, through its
ministers and people and its inspired saints, shall stand to proclaim some high
duty or to renounce some hoary wrong, they shall bind and they shall loose,
and they shall fulfil the function of the Church in the Kingdom of God.1
[Note:W. M. Clow, The Secretof the Lord, 65.]

(2) Again, we are reminded that knowledge is necessaryto life; we believe and
then do. The greatprinciple is taught that the morality of Christianity flows
directly from its theology, and that whoever, like Peter, grasps firmly the
cardinal truth of Christ’s nature, and all which flows therefrom, will have his
insight so clearedthat his judgments on what is permitted or forbidden to a
Christian man will correspondwith the decisions ofheaven, in the measure of
his hold upon the truth which underlies all religionand all morality, namely,
“Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” These are gifts to Peter
indeed, but only as possessorofthat faith, and are much more truly
understood as belonging to all who “possess like precious faith” (as Petersays)
than as the prerogative of any individual or class.
In a chapter of reminiscences whichis given at the end of the secondvolume
of the Letters of Erskine of Linlathen, Principal Shairp writes: “Mr. Erskine
utterly repudiated the characterwhich Renan’s Vie de Jésus drew of our
Lord, and almostresentedthe fatuity which could separate with a sharp line
the morality of the Gospels from their doctrinal teaching as to Christ Himself.
He used to say, ‘As you see in many English churches the Apostles’Creed
placed on one side of the altar, on the other the TenCommandments, so
Renan would divide as with a knife the moral precepts of the Gospels from
their doctrines. Those he would retain, these he would throw away. Can
anything be more blind? As well might you expectthe stem and leaves of a
flowerto flourish when you had cut awaythe root, as to retain the morality of
the Gospels whenyou have discarded its doctrinal basis. Faith in Christ, and
God in Christ, is the only root from which true Christian morality cangrow.’
” 1 [Note:Letters of Thomas Erskine of Linlathen, 1840–1870,p. 375.]
2. The history of St. Peter, as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles, reveals the
facts that the lofty promise contained in the text was fulfilled in three
important particulars.

(1) He is first in the first electionto the vacant apostolate.He is first in the
first greatconversionof souls. His word rolls like the storm. It cuts and
pierces like the sword. We do not require to have the imagination exalted by
the vastgilded letters round the cupola of St. Peter’s at Rome. This is truly to
hold the keys, and to roll back the doors of the Kingdom!
My mother’s death was the secondepochin my father’s life; and for a man so
self-reliant, so poisedupon a centre of his own, it is wonderful the extent of
change it made. He went home, preachedher funeral sermon, every one in the
church in tears, himself outwardly unmoved. But from that time dates an
entire, though always deepening, alterationin his manner of preaching,
because anentire change in his way of dealing with God’s Word. Not that his
abiding religious views and convictions were then originated or even altered—
I doubt not that from a child he not only knew the Holy Scriptures, but was
“wise unto salvation”—but it strengthenedand clarified, quickenedand gave
permanent direction to, his sense of God as revealedin His Word. He took as
it were to subsoil ploughing; he got a new and adamantine point to the
instrument with which he bored, and with a fresh power—with his whole
might, he sunk it right down into the living rock, to the virgin gold. His entire
nature had got a shock, and his blood was drawn inwards, his surface was
chilled, but fuel was heapedall the more on the inner fires, and his zeal, that
τι θερμὸν πρᾶγμα, burned with a new ardour; indeed had he not found an
outlet for his pent-up energy, his brain must have given way, and his faculties
have either consumed themselves in wild, wastefulsplendour and combustion
or dwindled into lethargy.… From being elegant, rhetorical, and ambitious in
his preaching, he became concentrated, urgent, moving (being himself
moved), keen, searching, unswerving, authoritative to fierceness, full of the
terrors of the Lord, if he could but persuade men. The truth of the words of
God had shone out upon him with an immediateness and infinity of meaning
and powerwhich made them, though the same words he had lookedon from
childhood, other and greaterand deeperwords. He then left the ordinary
commentators, and men who write about meanings and flutter around the

circumference and corners;he was bent on the centre, on touching with his
own fingers, on seeing with his own eyes, the pearl of greatprice. Then it was
that he began to dig into the depths, into the primary and auriferous rock of
Scripture, and take nothing at another’s hand: then he took up with the word
“apprehend”; he had laid hold of the truth,—there it was, with its evidence, in
his hand; and every one who knew him must remember well how, in speaking
with earnestnessofthe meaning of a passage, he, in his ardent, hesitating way,
lookedinto the palm of his hand, as if he actually saw there the truth he was
going to utter.1 [Note:Dr. John Brown, Horœ Subsecivœ, ii. 9.]
(2) But the greatpromise to Peteris fulfilled in a secondway. Spiritual sin
would stealinto the Church; it would glide in under a haze of professionand
pretence, as Milton tells us that Satanpassedin mist into Paradise. It is Peter
who speaks withsuch awful power. Simon makes an attempt to buy the gift of
God with money, and brands upon his own name for ever its ill-omened
connexion with the foul offence (far from obsolete)of buying spiritual offices.
Peter’s voice pronounces his condemnation. “All men,” says the Koran, “are
commanded by the saint.” All men know, if only by instinct, that this
priesthood of goodness has beenwon at the cross, in blood, the “crimson of
which gives a living hue to all form, all history, all life.” Let us no longerlose
our purchase of this mighty term, through fear of its sacerdotalconnotations.
Dissociatedfrom the institution, as it has been well pointed out, the true priest
makes goodhis claims to mediatorship in the heart of his fellows, solelyby the
possessionof those spiritual qualities which create and confirm the impression
that he is nearer to God than they.
Francis of Assisiis pre-eminently the saint of the Middle Ages. Owing nothing
to church or school, he was truly theodidact, and if he perhaps did not
perceive the revolutionary bearing of his preaching, he at leastalways refused
to be ordained priest. He divined the superiority of the spiritual priesthood.
The charm of his life is that, thanks to reliable documents, we find the man
behind the wonder worker. We find in him not merely noble actions, we find

in him a life in the true meaning of the word; I mean, we feel in him both
development and struggle. How mistakenare the annals of the Saints in
representing him as from the very cradle surrounded with aureole and
nimbus! As if the finest and most manly of spectacles were notthat of the man
who conquers his soul hour after hour, fighting againsthimself, againstthe
suggestionsofegoism, idleness, discouragement, then at the moment when he
might believe himself victorious, finding in the champions attracted by his
ideal those who are destined if not to bring about its complete ruin, at leastto
give it its most terrible blows. PoorFrancis!The last years of his life were
indeed a via dolorosa as painful as that where his Mastersank down under
the weightof the cross;for it is still a joy to die for one’s ideal, but what bitter
pain to look on in advance at the apotheosis ofone’s body, while seeing one’s
soul—I would say his thought—misunderstood and frustrated.1 [Note:P.
Sabatier, Life of St. Francis of Assisi, p. xv.]
(3) But there is exhibited yet another fulfilment to the greatpromise. Peteris
also the first to divine the secretof God, to follow the mind of the Spirit. He
climbs rapidly to the highest peak, and is the first herald of the dawn. The old
is, no doubt, very dear to him; he clings to all that is devout and venerable
with the tenacious loyalty of a true Hebrew churchman. He goes up “into the
temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour.” He ascends the house-top
“to pray at the sixth hour.” The services ofthe Temple and of the synagogue
go on upon a parallel line with the first eucharists. But this Hebraic
Christianity, or Christian Hebraism, cannotcontinue indefinitely. There are
souls among the Gentiles longing for forgiveness, forrestand purity. They are
not to dwell in the shadow, to tarry disappointed in the vestibule for ever. It is
for Peterto fling back the doors once again. He receives the vision in the
house of Simon, the tanner, by the seaside.
Far o’er the glowing westernmain

His wistful brow was upward raised,
Where, like an angel’s burning train,
The burnished waters blazed.
And now his part as founder and rock is almost over. The reception of
Cornelius is his last greatact. The last mention of his name in St. Luke’s
narrative is in these sentences:“There rose up certain of the sectof the
Pharisees whichbelieved, saying, That it was needful to circumcise them, and
to command them to keepthe law of Moses. And the apostles and elders came
togetherfor to considerof this matter. And when there had been much
disputing, Peterrose up and said unto them”—his last words are
characteristic—“Butwe believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus
Christ we shall be saved, even as they.”
II
The Powerof the Keys
“Whatsoeverthou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and
whatsoeverthou shalt loose onearth shall be loosedin heaven.”
Although the notion of opening and shutting shades off into that of “binding
and loosing,” it is obvious that the less familiar expressionwould not have
been substituted for the more familiar without some specific reason, which
reasonis in this case supplied by the well-knownmeaning of the words

themselves. The figure of “binding and loosing,” for“allowing as lawful, or
forbidding as unlawful,” is so simple and obvious that no language has been
wholly without it. Twice besides the expressionis used: “Verily I sayunto you,
Whatsoeverye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever
ye shall loose on earth shall be loosedin heaven” (Matthew 18:18);and
“Whose soeversins ye forgive, they are forgiven unto them; whose soeversins
ye retain, they are retained” (John 20:23). On these occasions the words are
spokento others besides St. Peter, and on eachoccasionthe sense is
substantially the same:“So greatshall be the authority of your decisions, that,
unlike those of the ordinary schools orRabbis, whatsoeveryou shall declare
lawful shall be held lawful, whatsoeveryou shall declare unlawful shall be
held unlawful, in the highesttribunal in heaven.”
1. It is, as it were, the solemn inauguration of the right of the Christian’s
conscienceto judge with a discernment of goodand evil, to which up to this
time the world had seenno parallel. In that age, whenthe foundations of all
ancient belief were shaken, when acts which up to that time had been
regardedas lawful or praiseworthy were now condemned as sinful, or which
before had been regarded as sinful were now enjoined as just and holy, it was
no slight comfort to have it declared, by the one authority which all Christians
acknowledgedas Divine, that there were those living on the earth on whose
judgment in these disputed matters the Church might rely with implicit
confidence. In the highest sense ofall, doubtless, this judgment was exercised
by Him alone who taught “as one having authority, and not as the scribes,”
and who on the Mount of the new law drew the line betweenHis own
commandments and what was said by them of old time. In a lowersense it was
exercised, and has ever since been exercised, by all those who by their
teaching or their lives, by their words or their example, have impressed the
world more deeply with a sense ofwhat is Christian holiness and what is
Christian liberty. In an intermediate sense, it has been exercisedby those
whose specialgifts or opportunities have made them in a more than ordinary
degree the oracles and lawgivers ofthe moral and spiritual societyin which
they have been placed. Such, above all, were the Apostles. By their own lives
and teaching, by their Divinely sanctionedjudgments on individual cases(as

St. Paul on Elymas or the incestuous Corinthian) or on generalprinciples (as
in their Epistles), they have, in a far higher sense than any other human
beings, bound and loosedthe consciences, remittedand retained the sins, of
the whole human race for ever.
The Jewishscribe kept the treasury of knowledge.His keys were his powers of
reading and understanding and applying the law of God. He was the expositor
of God’s word, the interpreter of God’s mind, the commentatoron God’s
counsels, the teacherof the truth made known to him by God. He bound the
things of God—His laws, His ideals of life and duty, His lawful sanctions, His
sacredand mystic revelationof Himself—upon men’s hearts and consciences.
He loosedmen’s minds and wills from any bondage, or any tyranny of
unrighteous laws, and he enabled them to refrain from indulging in things
forbidden. What the Jewishscribe with the keys of knowledge andtruth and
duty was to the Law, the Christian Church should be to the Kingdom of God.
“Every scribe which is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a
man that is an householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things
new and old.” That describes both Christ’s ownoffice as the Masterand His
disciples as His Church.
Go into an observatory, and watch some astronomeras he is following the
transit of a star. His telescopeis so adjusted that an ingenious arrangement of
clock-workis made to shift it with the transit of the star. His instrument is
moving in obedience to the movement of the star in the heavens. But the clock-
work does not move the star. The astronomerhas made his faultless
calculations;the mechanic has adjusted his cranks and pendulums and wheels
and springs with unerring nicety, and every movement in the telescope
answers to the movement of the star in the far-off heavens. The
correspondence rests onknowledge.And so when the things that are bound on
earth are bound in heaven. Every legislative counseland decree and
movement in a truly apostolic and inspired Church answers to some counsel
and decree and movement in the heavens. But then the power of discerning

and forecasting the movements of the Divine will and government rests upon
the powerof interpreting the Divine characterand applying its principles of
action, as that characteris communicated to us by Jesus Christ.1 [Note:T. G.
Selby, The Imperfect Angel, 266.]
Over thirty years ago Scotlandwas overwhelmedby a greatcommercial
disasterthrough the failure of one of its leading banks. It was a calamity that
could not stand alone, and day after day the strongestbusiness houses were
compelled to suspend payment. The distress brought upon the shareholders,
many of them widows and orphans brought in a single morning to poverty,
was so greatthat a gigantic lottery of six millions sterling was proposed. One
half of these millions was to be given to subscribers. The other half was to be
given to relieve the distress of those who were impoverished. The object
seemedso praiseworthy, and the misery was so widespreadand so extreme,
that many of the wisestand clearestminds in Scotlandgave it their support.
Suddenly Principal Rainy, the foremost Christian minister of this land in his
day, raised his voice. In a letter full of invincible argument, couchedin
courteous and appealing terms, he protestedagainst this appealto the very
passions and follies, the greed and the gambling, which had produced the
ruin. The scheme was dropped in a day. He had bound and loosedthe
consciencesofmen. All Scotlandunderstood, for one moment at least, the true
meaning of the powerof the keys.2 [Note:W. M. Clow, The Secretof the
Lord, 64.]
2. The power given by these words perhaps goes further still, and implies,
under certain extraordinary conditions, fitness and qualification to pronounce
an unerring spiritual judgment upon the soul’s relation to God. And this leads
us to ask the question, Upon what conditions does this power of opening and
closing the Kingdom of Heaven, and of retaining and remitting the sin of men,
rest? We observe, in the first case, thatnothing whateverwas promised to
Peter, exceptso far as he was alreadythe subject of a teaching inspiration,
and was to become so in a yet richer degree in future days. He held the keys,

and could bind and loose in so far as the Son was revealedto him by the
Father and the Father by the Son, and not one iota beyond. He could not open
the gates ofthe Kingdom by any private authority and apart from the
possessionofthese truths. Then we come to the promise of this same powerto
the whole congregationof the disciples. There is no powerof binding and
loosing apart from Christ’s indwelling presence within the Church. And then
we come to the last case. Christconnectedthe power of absolution with a
symbolic act, in which He made the disciples recipients of His own life, and
partakers and instruments of the Holy Ghost by that fellowship. But it will be
observedthat there is no valid retention or remission of sin that can be
pronounced to men, exceptby the lips of which the Holy Ghost is the
unceasing breath. Given that condition in the case ofeither priest or layman,
one may safelyextend to him the power of absolution.
As the doctor takes the key of his drug-store and selects from the specifics that
are arrangedaround him, he kills or makes alive. His keymeans a powerof
absolution. When it is first put into his hand he is instructed with as solemn a
responsibility as the Judge who pronounces death-sentences. Whenhe selects
this drug, or looks upon that as hopeless to apply under the conditions into
which the patient has fallen, he is dealing with questions of life and death. And
so Christ in His closing admonitions to the disciples teaches thatthey are not
dealing with speculative truth only. The doctrine they are setforth to
disseminate is not, like the curious and trivial questions discussedby some of
the Rabbis, a matter that cannot possibly affectthe spiritual well-being of a
single human soul in the slightestdegree. Theyare not following out questions
that have a hypothetical value only. It is not for some idle debate in the groves
that they are setting forth in the scantyoutfit of couriers. They are
commissionedto deal with grave, spiritual destinies. “Whose soeversins ye
remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soeversins ye retain, they are
retained.”1 [Note:T. G. Selby, The Imperfect Angel, 268.]

We are told that, throughout the strain of the civil war in America, Abraham
Lincoln found a true priest in the godly and much-suffering woman who had
charge of his children. He, who became more powerful than any monarch of
modern times through the reverence ofhis countrymen for the man he was,
tells us how he was sustained in that awful crisis of national calamity and
personalsorrow by the prayers in his behalf of this stricken, yet believing
woman. She knew God, Lincoln felt, so she became God’s priest to Lincoln.
He resorted to her for intercessiononhis behalf—he who would, as one truly
remarks, have treatedwith “courteous and civil incredulity a proffer of
sacerdotalgoodofficesfrom Cardinal Gibbons.”2 [Note:A. Shepherd, Bible
Studies in Living Subjects, 231.]
3. Yet the responsibility is always with the man himself. To eachsoul
personally God gives the keys of his own destiny and bids him unlock life’s
closeddoors;puts in his hands the rudder and bids him steerhis bark; gives
him the tools and bids him model his own character. This is the most solemn
fact of all, for this is an undivided and unshared responsibility. I may throw
on others the blame for the failure of the State and the sins of the Church; but
for my decisions respecting my ownlife I am alone responsible. In vain the
reluctant receiverprotests againsttaking the key of his own life; in vain he
endeavours to pass it to some other one; in vain he seeks to avoid the necessity
of deciding life’s problems and making life’s choice. Sometimes he seeksa
father-confessorand asks him to take the keyand bind and loose his life for
him; and the father-confessormay acceptthe trust. But it is in vain. Every one
of us shall give accountof himself to God. Whether the father-confessorsits in
a priest’s chair, or in a Protestantminister’s chair, or in a religious editor’s
chair, he can take no responsibility; he can give counsel, but that is all. To
eachsoul God has given the keys;eachsoul must bind and loose for itself.
A father whose wealthis in ships and warehousesand railroads, but who has
an acre garden attachedto the country homestead, summons his boys one
spring, as he is going to Europe, and says to them, “I put this garden in your

charge;spend what you will; cultivate according to your own best judgment;
send the product to the market; and accountto me for sales and expenditures
when I get home.” “But, Father,” saythe boys, “what shall we sow?” “I
cannot tell you; you must judge for yourselves.” “Where shallwe sell?” “Find
out for yourselves.” “Whatprices ought we to get?” “Learnfor yourselves.”
“But, Father, we know nothing about gardening; we shall make dreadful
mistakes.” “Nodoubt you will,” replies the father, “and you will learn by your
mistakes;and it is your learning, not the gardening, I care for.” “But, Father,
we are afraid we shall bankrupt you.” The father laughs and replies. “You
cannot bankrupt me, if you try, with a summer’s gardening on an acre plot.”
“But, Father,” finally protest the boys, “we are afraid that when you come
back and see how poorly we have done you will find fault with us and be sorry
that you gave us such a trust.” And the father catches up a piece of paper and
writes upon it: “Know all men by these presents that I hereby appoint my
boys, James and John, my true and lawful attorneys, to do all things that may
be necessaryin the cultivation and charge of my acre garden, and I hereby
ratify and confirm beforehand whateverthey may do.” And he signs it, hands
it to them, and goes his way. So God gives to us, His children, in this summer
day out of eternity which we call life, and on this little acre plot of ground out
of the universe which we callthe world, the responsibility and the liberty
involved in the charge of our own destinies, and with this He gives power of
attorney promising beforehand to ratify and confirm whateverwe do in loyal
service to Him and in loyal allegiance to His name and honour.1 [Note: L.
Abbott, Signs of Promise, 187.]
Whatevermay have been the influences which concurred in effecting this
fundamental transformation in Dr. Martineau’s philosophical system, there
can be little doubt that when he preachedthe striking sermonon “The
Christian View of MoralEvil” the process was virtually completed. That
discourse gives expressionin the most emphatic terms to the doctrine of
Ethical Individualism, which forms the keynote of his moral philosophy. “This
sense,” he says, “ofindividual accountability—notwithstanding the ingenuity
of orthodox divines on the one hand, and necessarianphilosophers on the
other—is impaired by all reference of the evil that is in us to any source

beyond ourselves.… There is no persuasionmore indispensable to this state of
mind, and consequentlyno impression which Christianity more profoundly
leaves upon the heart, than that of the personalorigin and personalidentity of
sin,—its individual incommunicable character.… Hence it appears impossible
to defend the doctrines of PhilosophicalNecessity—whichpresents Godto us
as the author of sin and suffering—from the charge of invading the sense of
personalresponsibility.”1 [Note: The Life and Letters of James Martineau, ii.
271.]
The Keys of the Kingdom
BIBLEHUB RESOURCES
The PowerOf The Keys
Matthew 16:19
R. Tuck
It is necessaryto understand the Easternassociations whichhelp to explain
our Lord's figure of the "keys." The keyin the Eastwas a symbol of
authority; it was made long, with a crook at one end, so that it could be worn
round the neck as a badge of office. To "confera key" was a phrase
equivalent to bestowing a situation of greattrust and distinction. The
expressions "binding" and "loosing" are figurative expressions, whichwere in
familiar use in the rabbinical schools. "The schoolofShammai bound men
when it declaredthis or that act to be a transgressionofthe sabbath law. The
schoolof Hillel loosedwhen it setmen free from the obligations thus
imposed." It should be borne in mind that this passage is a part of Christ's
private teaching of the apostles. He was feeling that his own active work was

nearly done, and very soonthe work of saving men would rest on them. He
would prepare them to understand their coming responsibilities;and he
would assure them of their competent endowment to meet those
responsibilities.
I. THEY WOULD HAVE SERIOUS AND AUTHORITATIVE WORK TO
DO. It is remarkable that Jesus never attempted any organization of those
who professedto believe in him. But he contemplatedthat his apostles would
have to organize the converts they made. They could not help occupying a
position of authority. They would be consulted on doctrines; on the
application of doctrines to practicallife and conduct; they would have to deal
with inconsistentdisciples. What they would have to do was illustrated in the
case ofAnanias and Sapphira, and in the admissionof Cornelius. Their Lord
would prepare them for undertaking those responsibilities.
II. THEY WOULD HAVE SPECIAL ENDOWMENTSFOR THEIR
SPECIAL WORK. That is God's law. He makes the gift fit the service that is
calledfor. Among the gifts in the early Church one is named "governments."
That is the gift with which they were endowed. And this distinction needs to
be made clear. Their gift came, not because theywere apostles, but because
this particular work was entrusted to them. Gifts are not possessionsor
rights; they are trusts; and all the honour of them lies in being thus trusted.
III. THEY WOULD HAVE SPECIALDIVINE RECOGNITIONIN THEIR
WORK. What they did, in the loyal and faithful use of their gifts of
government, would be ownedand sealedby God. Illustrate by the Divine
judgment on Ananias, following on Peter's condemnation of him; and the
Spirit following Cornelius'admission. - R.T.

Biblical Illustrator
And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 16:19
The keys
D. Fraser, D. D.
1. The kingdom of heaven does not mean heaven.
2. The kingdom of heaven does not mean the Church. It indicates power:
I. ADMINISTRATIVE.
II. DIDACTIC.
(D. Fraser, D. D.)
"I will give unto thee the keys
J. Morison, D. D.
The Saviour had spokenofan edifice in which Peterwas to be a conspicuous
foundation-stone. The edifice was a temple. The scene was then varied a little;
and the edifice was a city. The scene was variedagain; the city is a kingdom. It
is the kingdom of heaven. All the representations are significant. They are all
appropriate aspects, thoughvaried, of the grand reality. Our Lord promises

to Peterthe keys of the kingdom of heaven. As the kingdom is a city, keys are
needed for the gates. The city is a fortified place, a castle, the palatial
residence of the GreatKing. A stewardof the house is required, a major-
domo, one who may take charge not only of the keys of the gates, but of the
keys of the treasure-house too, and of all the storerooms ofthe establishment.
Our Saviour intimates to Peter that he would be constituted such a stewardof
the house of God. He was to have greatpower and authority as the prime
minister of the King. Acting according to the commands of his Sovereign, he
would have authority to open the gates orto shut them; to open the
storehousesorto close them. His powerwould be, relatively to the King,
administrative only. And in discharge ofthe functions of his high office he
would at once be instructed from above by the Divine Spirit, and be assisted
from around by other high officials — the other apostles. He and they
unitedly would constitute the King's ministry. He would be premier. Hence it
was that on the Dayof Pentecosthe took the lead and opened the gates ofthe
kingdom to the Jews. Hence too, when he was in Joppa, he was instructed by
his Lord to open the gates ofthe kingdom to the Gentiles; and he did it. Hence
also, in all the lists of the apostles, Peteris invariably mentioned first. He has,
however, no successorin his premiership, just as he had no successoras a
Foundation-Stone. The Foundation-Stone lasts for ever. So do all the living
stones. Theylive for ever. And so the ministry of the apostles continues for
ever. The laws of the King are communicated to us for ever through the
ministry of his apostolic ministers.
(J. Morison, D. D.)
The keys of the kingdom
S. Cox, D. D.
Every Jewishscribe, when fully trained and authorized to teachhis brethren,
receivedfrom his tutors and superiors a key, to symbolize the knowledge of
the Divine will which he possessed, andwas about to dedicate to the service of
his brethren; many of them either carried a keyat their girdle, or had it
woven into their robe, as an open sign of the professionto which they had

been setapart. When, therefore, Christ put " the keys of the kingdom of
heaven " into the hands of His disciples, they would understand that they
were to become scribes in His kingdom; teachers ofthe truth, expounders of
the law they had learned from Him; witnesses andexemplars of the life they
had seenHim live. These keys we have authority to use too — keys of
righteousness andcharity, i.e., keys of kindness and goodliving, as well as
keys of wisdom and knowledge. Byour daily conduct, and by the spirit of our
whole conduct, no less than by our words, we are saying to our fellows, "This,
so far as we understand Him, is how Christ would have men live; you have
only to live so, and you will be in His kingdom, under His rule and
benediction." By our goodwords, and our goodworks, we are to constitute
ourselves door-keepersin the House of the Lord, and to open the doors to all
who would enter in. It is, then, no merely personalsalvation, no merely future
and distant heaven, no merely selfishand ignoble task, for which we look and
to which we are summoned. We are looking for the heaven of being now and
always in tune with the will of God, and for a salvationwhich embraces the
whole nature of man, and extends to every race and kindred and tribe.
(S. Cox, D. D.)
Binding and loosing
S. Cox, D. D.
In the language ofthe Jewishschools,to "bind " and to " loose,"meantto
prohibit and to permit, to determine what was wrong and must not be done,
and what was right and ought to be done. Rabbi Sham-mat, for instance,
bound all heathen learning, i.e., he forbade his disciples to acquire it —
declaredwhat we should call "classicalstudies" to be wrong; while Rabbi
Hillel loosedthese studies — declaredthem to be right, that is, and
encouragedhis disciples to take them up. In addressing this promise to His
first disciples, therefore, Christ meant to saythat, humble and unlearned as
they were, yet, in virtue of the new spiritual life and insight which He had
conferredupon them, they should become "masters ofsentences,"andtheir
decisions as to what was right and what wrong, should carry no less authority

than they had once attachedto the decisions oftheir rabbis and scribes. This
promise also extends to us. We are authorized to make those practical
applications of truth to the conditions and needs of the hour, by which the
moral life and tone of men will be raisedand purified. And we have made use
of this powerin the following, among other ways:
1. Abolishing slavery.
2. Raising the status of woman.
3. Securing the education of. children.
4. Advancing the cause of temperance, thrift, industry.
5. Promoting the growth of freedom, and the fraternity of men and nations.In
these and similar ways, the generalteaching of Christ has been applied to the
socialand moral conditions of men, bringing out new bearings of familiar
principles on human conduct and duty.
(S. Cox, D. D.)
Church discipline
Once from the pulpit, at an ordination of elders, the late Rev. M. M'Cheyne
made the following declaration. "When I first entered upon the work of the
ministry among you, I was exceedinglyignorant of the vast importance of
church discipline. I thought that my great, and almostonly, work was to pray
and preach. I saw your souls to be so precious, and the time so short, that I
devoted all my time and care and strength to labour in word and doctrine.
When cases ofdiscipline were brought before me and the elders, I regarded
them with something like abhorrence. It was a duty I shrank from; and I may
truly say it nearly drove me from the work of the ministry among you
altogether. But it pleasedGod, who teaches His servants in another way than
man teaches, to bless some of the casesofdiscipline to the manifest and
undeniable conversionof the souls of those under our care;and from that
hour a new light broke in upon my mind, and I saw that if preaching be an
ordinance of Christ, so is church discipline. I now feel very deeply persuaded

that both are of God; that two keys are committed to us by Christ — the one
the keyof doctrine, by means of which we unlock the treasures of the Bible:
the other the key of discipline, by which we open or shut the way to the sealing
ordinances of the faith. Both are Christ's gift, and neither is to be resigned
without sin."
The opening and shutting powerof the Christian life
H. W. Beecher.
Every praying man and every praying woman on the globe that lives in the
intelligent knowledge ofChrist, and employs the spirit and truth of Christ
intelligently, just as much as councils, and synods, and conventions, and
churches, has this power of the keys. Godgives it to every one that desires to
have the living nature of Christ in him. Ah! do you not suppose there have
been thousands of men, who have gone down through life arrogating this
claim, that never opened the door of heavento one single soul? And yet there
have been hundreds of poor bed-ridden Christians whose keywas bright with
perpetual using, and who, by faith, and example, and testimony, and clarity of
teaching, did bind iniquity in the world, by the golden cords of truth, and did
setloose, by the same truth, those that were bound, giving them powerof
spiritual insight, giving them emancipation, and bringing them into the large
light and liberty of the children of God. Emancipators of the soulthey were —
humble, uncrowned, uncanonical, unordained, God-sanctifiedsouls. They
knew Christ, and loved Him, and poured out His spirit upon men. And every
man that has that spirit has God's keys in his hands, and has authority to bind
and loose — to bind lies and all iniquity, and to setloose all those that suffer
oppressionby reasonof spiritual despotism. They go forth effulgent
messengersofGod's light and the emancipationthat goes with it.
(H. W. Beecher.)
The responsibility of the key-power

H. W. Beecher.
It is no mean prerogative;it is past all estimation, indeed, for honour and for
dignity, to have the power to open heaven to any soul. If God were to give you
the powerto go forth, and, touching the earth, to open its fruitful bosom, so
that where-everyou pressedyour hand or your foot, out there should pour
treasures of grain and treasures offruit; if God were to give you that power
which in ages gone by was attributed to Ceres, whenit was supposedthat she
came to earth and taught men the arts of agriculture — what a powerthat
would be. If God had given you power to touch the hidden treasures of metal;
to know where iron lies buried; to know where all the veins of gold and silver
are; to open up all the treasures beneath the surface of the earth, men would
have supposedthat that was a greatand sovereignendowment — and it would
have been greatand sovereignin a lowersphere. But how much more noble is
it that God has given men the power to develop, not gold and silver that
perish, but riches that never fade, that moth and rust never corrupt, and that
thieves do not break through to steal — eternaltreasures — the immortal
spirits of men. But this is the case. Godhas given authority to every man that
lives in the higher realm of truth, to open the eternalrealm to those around
about him, as an inspired apostle. Foryou are a lineal successorofthe apostle,
every one of you that does the apostle's work. And God sends every man that
goes forth to carry the Spirit of Godto his fellow-men. And it is no small
prerogative, no small honour, but a most responsible trust, to have committed
to you the keys of life and death; to carry in yourself those influences that
shall be a savour of life to some, and a savourof death to others — that shall
be a buttress and a wall of defence to some, and a stumbling-stone and rock of
offence and destruction to others. How solemnit is that Godgives men to be
parents in this life, to rear up congregations outof their own loins, to sit in the
church of the family, and makes fathers and mothers to be apostles, andgives
to them keys, saying, "What you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and
what you loose onearth shall be loosedin heaven." It is even so. You cannot
free yourself from the obligation. You cannothelp it. You are the key-keeper
for your children. You are the door-keeperfor your own offspring. Take heed,
then, how you carry yourselves as parents in your own household — how you
administer God's Word. It depends much upon you whether, at last, your

children shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, or whether they shall
rise to everlasting shame and contempt.
(H. W. Beecher.)
Inspiration carries the keys
Dr. Parker.
When you are inspired you have the keys. In your sublimest moods, when
earth fades into a fleck hardly to be seen, and heavencrowds itself in noble
fellowship upon your soul, the whole man is lifted up in an ecstasyDivine. In
that hour the church holds the keys. You do not hold the keys because of
hereditary descent, orecclesiasticalrelationship, or mechanicalcontrivance,
or superior patronage — you hold the keys only so long as you realize the
inspiration. And no man cantake those keys from you; everywhere the
inspired man keeps the keys — in merchandise, in statesmanship, in
philosophy, in adventure, in religious thinking, in Christian civilization, you
cannot keepdown the inspired man.
(Dr. Parker.)
COMMENTARIES
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers
(19) I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.—Two distinct
trains of figurative thought are blended in the words that follow. (1.) The
palace of a greatking implied the presence of a chief officer, as treasureror
chamberlain, or to use the old Hebrew phrase, as “overthe household.” And
of this, as in the case ofEliakim, the son of Hilkiah (Isaiah22:22), the key of
office, the key of the gates and of the treasure, was the recognisedsymbol. In

the highestsense that key of the house of David belongedto Christ Himself as
the King. It was He who openedand none could shut, who shut and none
could open (Revelation3:7). But that power was now delegatedto the servant
whose very name, as an Apostle, marked him out as his Lord’s representative,
and the after history of Peter’s work, when through him God “openedthe
door of faith unto the Gentiles” (Acts 14:27; Acts 15:7), was the proof of his
faithful discharge ofthe office thus assignedto him. (2.) With this there was
another thought, which in the latter clause of the verse becomes the dominant
one. The scribes of Israelwere thought of as stewards ofthe treasures of
divine wisdom (Matthew 13:52). When they were admitted to their office they
received, as its symbol, the “keyof knowledge”(Luke 11:52), which was to
admit them to the treasure-chambers of the house of the interpreter, the Beth-
Midrash of the Rabbis. For this work the Christ had been training His
disciples, and Peter’s confessionhad shownthat the training had so far done
its work. He was qualified to be a “scribe instructed unto the kingdom of
heaven, and to bring forth out of its treasures things new and old” (Matthew
13:52); and now the “key” was givento him as the tokenof his admission to
that office. It made him not a priest (that office lay altogetheroutside the
range of the symbolism), but a teacherand interpreter. The words that follow
as to “binding” and “loosing” were the formal confirmation in words of that
symbolic act. For they, too, belong to the scribe’s office and not the priest’s,
and express an entirely different thought from that of retaining and forgiving
sins. That powerwas, it is true, afterwards bestowedon Peterand his brother-
apostles (see Note onJohn 20:23), but it is not in question here. As interpreted
by the language which was familiar to the Jews (see Lightfoot, Hor. Hebr., on
this verse), the words pointed primarily to legislative or interpretative
functions, not to the judicial treatment of individual men. The schoolof
Shammai, e.g., bound when it declaredthis or that act to be a transgressionof
the Sabbath law, or forbade divorce on any but the one ground of adultery;
the schoolofHillel loosedwhenit set men free from the obligations thus
imposed. Here, too, the after-work of Peterwas an illustration of the meaning
of the words. When he resisted the attempt of the Judaisers to “put a yoke
upon the neck of the disciples” (Acts 15:10), he was loosing whatwas also
loosedin heaven. When he proclaimed, as in his Epistle, the eternal laws of
righteousness, andholiness, and love, he was binding those laws on the

conscienceofChristendom. It must be remembered, lastly, that the power
thus bestowedon him was conferred afterward(Matthew 18:18)on the whole
company of the Apostles, or, more probably, on the whole body of the
disciples in their collective unity, and there with an implied extensionto
partially judicial functions (see Note on Matthew 18:18).
A few words will, it is believed, be sufficient to set the claims and the
controversies whichhave had their starting point in these words on their right
footing. It may be briefly noted (1) that it is at leastdoubtful (not to claim too
much for the interpretation given above) whether the man Peter was the rock
on which the Church was to be built; (2) that it is doubtful (though this is not
the place to discuss the question) whether Peterwas everin any real sense
Bishop of the Church of Rome, or in any way connectedwith its foundation;
(3) that there is not a syllable pointing to the transmissionof the power
conferredon him to his successorsin that supposedEpiscopate;(4) as just
stated, that the power was not given to him alone, but equally to all the
disciples;(5) that the power of the keys, no less than that of “binding” and
“loosing,”was notsacerdotal, but belonged to the office of a scribe or teacher.
As a matter of interpretation, the Romish argument from this verse stands on
a level with that which sees the supremacyof the successorsofSt. Peterin the
“two greatlights” of Genesis 1:16, or the “two swords” of Luke 22:38. The
claims of the Church of Rome rest, such as they are, on the greatnessofher
history, on her associationwith the imperial city, on the work done by her as
the “light of the wide West” in ages of darkness, onthe imposing aspectofher
imagined unity; but to build them upon the promise to Peteris but the idlest
of fantastic dreams, fit only to find its place in that Limbo of vanities which
contains, among other abortive or morbid growths, the monstrosities of
interpretation.
BensonCommentary
Matthew 16:19. I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven — This
expressionis metaphorical. As stewards of greatfamilies, especiallyofthe
royal household, bore a key or keys in tokenof their office, the phrase of

giving a person the keys naturally grew into use, as an expressionsignificative
of raising him to greatauthority and power. See note on Isaiah 22:22. The
meaning of the promise here is, that Christ would give Peter, (but not to him
alone, for similar promises are made to all the apostles,)powerto open the
gospeldispensation, (which he did, both to Jews and Gentiles;see Acts 3:14;
Acts 10:34;being the first who preachedthe gospelto them;) and to declare
authoritatively the laws thereof, and the terms of salvation, as also to exercise
discipline in the Christian Church, namely, to refuse admission into it to all
those who did not comply with those terms, and to exclude from it all such as
should violate those laws. According to this sense ofthe words, the power of
binding and loosing, added to the power of the keys, may be consideredas
partly explicatory thereof. “It can be no objection,” says Dr. Macknight,
“againstthis interpretation, that it connects the idea of binding and loosing
with that of the keys, contraryto the exactpropriety of the two metaphors;
for all who have studied the Scriptures know, that in many passages the ideas
and expressions are accommodatedto the subject matter, rather than to the
precedentmetaphor.” In further proof that the powerof binding and loosing,
now conferredon Peter, and afterward on all the apostles, chap. Matthew
18:18, included a power of declaring the laws of the gospeland the terms of
salvation, as well as all those acts of discipline which Peterand his brethren
performed as apostles, it may be observed, that “in the Jewishlanguage, to
bind and loose were words made use of by the doctors, to signify the
unlawfulness or lawfulness of things, as Seldon, Buxtorf, and Lightfoot have
proved. Wherefore our Lord’s meaning, at leastin part, was, Whateverthings
thou shalt bind up from men, or declare to be forbidden to them, on earth,
shall be forbidden by Heaven; and whateverthings thou shalt loose to men, or
permit to be done, shall be lawful and obligatoryin the esteemof Heaven.
Accordingly the gendermade use of in both passagesagrees to this
interpretation.” There are some, however, who by the power of binding and
loosing understand the power of actually remitting and retaining men’s sins;
and in support of their opinion they quote John 20:22. But it may be justly
doubted whether our Lord ever bestowedonhis apostles, orany other of his
ministers, any other powerof remitting or retaining men’s sins, than, 1st, the
powerof declaring with authority the Christian terms of pardon, that is,
whose sins are remitted and whose are retained; as is done in the form of

absolution containedin the Liturgy: and, 2d, a powerof inflicting and
remitting ecclesiasticalcensures, thatis, of excluding from and readmitting
into a Christian congregation;togetherwith a particular power of remitting
and retaining, in certain instances, the temporal punishment of men’s sins,
which it is evident from some passagesofthe Acts and the Epistles, the
apostles occasionallyexercised. “This high power of declaring the terms of
salvationand precepts of the gospel, the apostles did not enjoy in its full extent
till the memorable day of pentecost, whenthey receivedthe Holy Ghostin the
plenitude of his gifts. After this their decisions, in points of doctrine and duty,
being all given by inspiration, were infallible definitions, and ratified in
heaven. Here then was an immense honour conferredon the apostles, and
what must yield greatconsolationto the pious. There is nothing doubtful in
the gospel, much less false:but we may safelyrest the salvation of our souls on
the discoveries there made to us, since they have all come originally from
God.”
Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary
16:13-20 Peter, forhimself and his brethren, said that they were assuredof
our Lord's being the promised Messiah, the Son of the living God. This
showedthat they believed Jesus to be more than man. Our Lord declared
Peterto be blessed, as the teaching of God made him differ from his
unbelieving countrymen. Christ added that he had named him Peter, in
allusion to his stability or firmness in professing the truth. The word
translated rock, is not the same word as Peter, but is of a similar meaning.
Nothing can be more wrong than to suppose that Christ meant the person of
Peterwas the rock. Without doubt Christ himself is the Rock, the tried
foundation of the church; and woe to him that attempts to lay any other!
Peter's confessionis this rock as to doctrine. If Jesus be not the Christ, those
that own him are not of the church, but deceivers and deceived. Our Lord
next declaredthe authority with which Peterwould be invested. He spoke in
the name of his brethren, and this related to them as well as to him. They had
no certain knowledge ofthe characters ofmen, and were liable to mistakes
and sins in their own conduct; but they were kept from error in stating the
way of acceptanceand salvation, the rule of obedience, the believer's
characterand experience, and the final doom of unbelievers and hypocrites.

In such matters their decisionwas right, and it was confirmed in heaven. But
all pretensions of any man, either to absolve or retain men's sins, are
blasphemous and absurd. None canforgive sins but God only. And this
binding and loosing, in the common language of the Jews, signifiedto forbid
and to allow, or to teach what is lawful or unlawful.
Barnes'Notes on the Bible
And I will give unto thee ... - A key is an instrument for opening a door.
He that is in possessionof it has the powerof access, andhas a generalcare of
a house. Hence, in the Bible, a keyis used as a symbol of superintendence an
emblem of power and authority. See the Isaiah22:22 note; Revelation1:18;
Revelation3:7 notes. The kingdom of heaven here means, doubtless, the
church on earth. See the notes at Matthew 3:2. When the Saviour says,
therefore, he will give to Peterthe keys of the kingdom of heaven, he means
that he will make him the instrument of opening the door of faith to the world
the first to preachthe gospelto both Jews andGentiles. This was done, Acts
2:14-36;10. The "powerof the keys" was given, on this occasion, to Peter
alone, solelyfor this reason;the powerof "binding and loosing" onearth was
given to the other apostles with him. See Matthew 18:18. The only pre-
eminence, then, that Peter had was the honor of first opening the doors of the
gospelto the world.
Whatsoeverthou shalt bind ... - The phrase "to bind" and "to loose"was
often used by the Jews. It meant to prohibit and to permit. To bind a thing
was to forbid it; to loose it, to allow it to be done. Thus, they said about
gathering wood on the Sabbath day, "The schoolof Shammei binds it" - i. e.,
forbids it; "the schoolof Hillel looses it" - i. e., allows it. When Jesus gave this
powerto the apostles, he meant that whatsoeverthey forbade in the church
should have divine authority; whateverthey permitted, or commanded,
should also have divine authority - that is, should be bound or loosedin
heaven, or meet the approbation of God. They were to be guided infallibly in
the organizationof the church:
1. by the teaching of Christ, and,

2. by the teaching of the Holy Spirit.
This does not refer to persons, but to things - "whatsoever,"not whosoever. It
refers to rites and ceremonies in the church. Such of the Jewishcustoms as
they should forbid were to be forbidden, and such as they thought proper to
permit were to be allowed. Such rites as they should appoint in the church
were to have the force of divine authority. Accordingly, they commanded the
Gentile converts to "abstainfrom pollutions of idols, and from fornication,
and from things strangled, and from blood" Acts 15:20;and, in general, they
organized the church, and directed what was to be observedand what was to
be avoided. The rules laid down by them in the Acts of the Apostles and in the
Epistles, in connectionwith the teachings of the Saviour as recordedin the
evangelists, constitute the only law binding on Christians in regard to the
order of the church, and the rites and ceremonies to be observedin it.
Jamieson-Fausset-BrownBible Commentary
19. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven—the kingdom
of God about to be setup on earth
and whatsoeverthou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven:and
whatsoeverthou shalt loose onearth shall be loosedin heaven—Whateverthis
mean, it was soonexpresslyextended to all the apostles (Mt 18:18); so that the
claim of supreme authority in the Church, made for Peterby the Church of
Rome, and then arrogatedto themselves by the popes as the legitimate
successors ofSt. Peter, is baselessandimpudent. As first in confessing Christ,
Petergot this commission before the rest; and with these "keys," onthe day of
Pentecost, he first "openedthe door of faith" to the Jews, and then, in the
person of Cornelius, he was honored to do the same to the Gentiles. Hence, in
the lists of the apostles, Peteris always first named. See on [1318]Mt18:18.
One thing is clear, that not in all the New Testamentis there the vestige of any
authority either claimed or exercisedby Peter, or concededto him, above the
rest of the apostles—a thing conclusive againstthe Romish claims in behalf of
that apostle.
Matthew Poole's Commentary

And I will give unto thee; not unto thee exclusively, that is, to thee and no
others; for as we no where read of any such powerused by Peter, so our
Saviour’s first question, Whom think you that I am? Letteth us know that his
speech, though directed to Peteronly, (who in the name of the rest first
answered), concernedthe rest of the apostles as wellas Peter. Besides, as we
know that the other apostles had as well as he the key of knowledge and
doctrine, and by their preaching openedthe kingdom of heaven to men; so the
key of discipline also was committed to the rest as well as unto him: Whose
soeversins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soeversins ye
retain, they are retained, John 20:22,23. The keys of the kingdom of heaven;
the whole administration of the gospel, both with reference to the publication
of the doctrine of it, and the dispensing out the ordinances of it. We readof
the keyof knowledge, whichthe scribes and Pharisees took away, Luke 11:52,
and the key of government: The key of the house of David will I lay upon his
shoulder, Isaiah22:21, I will commit thy government into his hand; which is
applied to Christ, Revelation3:7. The sense is, Peter, I will betrust thee, and
the restof my apostles, with the whole administration of my gospel;you shall
lay the foundation of the Christian church, and administer all the affairs of it,
opening the truths of my gospelto the world, and governing those who shall
receive the faith of the gospel.
And whatsoeverthou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and
whatsoeverthou shalt loose onearth shall be loosedin heaven. Some very
learned interpreters think that our Saviour here speakethaccording to the
language then in use amongstthe Jews;who by binding understood the
determining and declaring a thing unlawful; and by loosing, declaring by
doctrine, or determining by judgment, a thing unlawful, that is, such as no
men’s consciences were bound to do or to avoid. So as by this text an
authority was given to these first planters of the gospel, to determine (by
virtue of their infallible Spirit, breathed upon them, John 20:21) concerning
things to be done and to be avoided. Thus Acts 15:28,29, theyloosedthe
Gentiles from the observationof the ceremoniallaw. Some think that by this
phrase our Saviour gave to his apostles, andnot to them only, but to the
succeeding church, to the end of the world, a power of excommunication and

absolution, to admit in and to castout of the church, and promises to ratify
what they do of this nature in heaven; and that this text is expounded by John
20:23, Whose soeversins ye remit, they are remitted; and whose soeversins ye
retain, they are retained; and that the powerof the church, and of ministers in
the church, as to this, is more than declarative. That the church hath a power
in a due order and for just causes, to castpersons out of its communion, is
plain enough from other texts; but that the church hath a power to remit sins
committed againstGodmore than declaratively, that is, declaring that upon
men’s repentance and faith God hath remitted, I cannotsee founded in this
text. Certain it is, that Christ doth not here bind himself to confirm the
erroneous actions ofmen, either in excommunications or absolutions;nor to
authorize all such actions of this nature that they do. I do therefore rather
incline to think that our Saviourby this promise declaredhis will, that his
apostles should settle the affairs of the gospelchurch, determining what
should be lawful and unlawful, and setting rules, according to which all
succeeding ministers and officers in his church should act, which our Lord
would confirm in heaven. And that the ordinary powerof churches in
censures is rather to be derived from other texts of Scripture than this, though
I will not deny but that in the generalit may be here included; but I cannot
think that the sense ofbinding and loosing here is excommunicating and
absolving, but a doctrinal or judicial determination of things lawful and
unlawful granted to the apostles;the not obeying or living up to whose
determinations and decisions may be indeed a just cause ofcasting persons
out of the communion of the church, as the contrary obedience and
conformity to them a goodground of receiving them in again. But whether in
this text be not granted to the apostles a further powerthan agrees to any
ministers since their age I much doubt, and am very prone to believe that
there is.
Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible
And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven,.... By the
kingdom of heaven is meant the Gospel, which comes from heaven, declares
the king Messiahto be come, speaks ofthings concerning his kingdom, is the
means of setting it up, and enlarging it, displays the riches of his grace, and
gives an accountof the kingdom of heaven, and of persons'right unto it, and

meetness for it. "The keys" ofit are abilities to open and explain the Gospel
truths, and a mission and commissionfrom Christ to make use of them; and
being said to be given to Peterparticularly, denotes his after qualifications,
commission, work, and usefulness in opening the door of faith, or preaching
the Gospelfirst to the Jews, Acts 2:1 and then to the Gentiles, Acts 10:1 and
who was the first that made use of the keys of evangelicalknowledge with
respectto both, after he, with the rest of the apostles, hadreceivedan
enlargedcommissionto preach the Gospelto all nations, beginning at
Jerusalem. Otherwise these keys belongedto them all alike;for to the same
persons the keys, and the use of them, appertained, on whom the power of
binding and loosing was bestowed;and this latter all the disciples had, as is
manifest from Matthew 18:18 wherefore this does not serve to establishthe
primacy and powerof Peterover the rest of the apostles;nor do keys design
any lordly domination or authority; nor did Christ allow of any such among
his apostles;nor is it his will that the ministers of his word should lord it over
his heritage:he only is king of saints, and head of his church; he has the key of
David, with which he opens, and no man shuts, and shuts, and no man opens;
and this he keeps in his own hand, and gives it to none. Peteris not the door-
keeperof heaven to let in, nor keepout, whom he pleases;nor has his
pretended successorthe keys of hell and death; these also are only in Christ's
hands: though it has been said of the pope of Rome, that if he sends millions of
men to hell, none should say to him, what dost thou? but the keys here
mentioned are the keys of the kingdom of heaven; or of the Gospel, which was
shut up in the Jewishnation, through the ignorance, malice, and calumnies of
the Scribes and Pharisees, who would neither embrace it, or enter into the
kingdom of God themselves, nor suffer others that were going to enter into it;
and through their taking away the key of knowledge, orthe right
interpretation of the word of God; and through a judicial blindness, which
that nation in generalwas givenup to: and this was shut up to the Gentiles
through the natural darkness that was spreadover them, and through want of
a divine revelation, and persons sent of God to instruct them: but now Christ
was about, and in a little time he would (for these words, with what follow, are
in the future tense) give his apostles both a commissionand gifts, qualifying
them to open the sealedbook of the Gospel, and unlock the mysteries of it,
both to Jews and Gentiles, especiallythe latter. Keys are the ensigns of

treasurers, and of stewards, and such the ministers of the Gospelare;they
have the rich treasure of the word under their care, put into their earthen
vessels to open and lay before others;and they are stewards ofthe mysteries
and manifold grace ofGod, and of these things they have the keys. So that
these words have nothing to do with church powerand government in Peter,
nor in the pope, nor in any other man, or setof men whatever;nor to be
understood of church censures, excommunications, admissions,orexclusions
of members: nor indeed are keys of any such similar use; they serve for
locking and unlocking doors, and so for keeping out those that are without,
and retaining those that are within, but not for the expulsion of any: but here
they are used in a figurative sense, for the opening and explaining the truths
of the Gospel, for which Peterhad excellentgifts and abilities.
And whatsoeverthou shalt bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven: and
whatsoeverthou shalt loose onearth, shall be loosedin heaven. This also is not
to be understood of binding, or loosing men's sins, by laying on, or taking off
censures, and excommunications;but only of doctrines, or declarations of
what is lawful and unlawful, free, or prohibited to be received, or practised; in
which sense the words, , "bound and loosed", are usedin the Talmudic
writings, times without number, for that which is forbidden and declaredto
be unlawful, and for that which is free of use, and pronounced to be so:in
multitudes of places we read of one Rabbi "binding", and of another
"loosing";thousands, and ten thousands of instances of this kind might be
produced; a whole volume of extracts on this head might be compiled. Dr.
Lightfoot has transcribed a greatmany, sufficient to satisfyany man, and give
him the true sense of these phrases;and after him to mention any other is
needless;yet give me leave to produce one, as it is short, and full, and explains
these phrases, and points at the persons that had this power, explaining
Ecclesiastes12:11 and that clause in it, "masters of the assemblies".
"these (saythey (t)) are the disciples of the wise men, who sit in different
collections, andstudy in the law; these pronounce things or persons defiled,
and these pronounce things or persons clean, "these bind, and these loose";
these reject, or pronounce persons or things profane, and these declare them
right.''

And a little after,
"getthyself an heart to hear the words of them that pronounce unclean, and
the words of them that pronounce clean;the words of them that "bind", and
the words of them that "loose";the words of them that reject, and the words
of them that declare it right''
But Christ gave a greaterpowerof binding and loosing, to his disciples, than
these men had, and which they used to better purpose. The sense ofthe words
is this, that Peter, and so the rest of the apostles, should be empoweredwith
authority from him, and so directed by his Holy Spirit, that whateverthey
bound, that is, declaredto be forbidden, and unlawful, should be so: and that
whateverthey loosed, that is, declaredto be lawful, and free of use, should be
so;and accordinglythey bound some things which before were loosed, and
loosedsome things which before were bound; for instance, they bound, that is,
prohibited, or declaredunlawful, the use of circumcision, which before, and
until the death of Christ, was enjoined the natural seedof Abraham; but that,
and all ceremonies, being abolishedby the death of Christ, they declaredit to
be nothing, and of no avail, yea, hurtful and pernicious; that whoeverwas
circumcised, Christ profited him nothing, and that he was a debtor to do the
whole law: they affirmed, that the believing Gentiles were not to be troubled
with it; that it was a yoke not fit to be put upon their necks, which they, and
their fathers, were not able to bear, Galatians 5:1. They bound, or forbid the
observance ofdays, months, times, and years;the keeping holy days, new
moons, and sabbaths, which had been used in the Jewishchurch for ages past;
such as the first day of the new year, and of every month, the day of
atonement, the feasts ofthe passover, pentecost, and tabernacles, the jubilee
year, the sabbaticalyear, and seventh day sabbath, Galatians 4:9. They
loosed, ordeclared lawful and free, both civil and religious conversation
betweenJews and Gentiles;whereas, before, the Jews had no dealings with
the Gentiles, nor would not enter into their houses, nor keepcompany with
them, would have no conversationwith them; neither eat, nor drink with
them; but now it was determined and declared, that no man should be called
common, or unclean; and that in Christ Jesus, andin his church, there is no
distinction of Jew and Gentile, Acts 10:28. They also loosed, orpronounced
lawful, the eating of any sort of food, without distinction, even that which was

before counted common and unclean, being persuaded by the Lord Jesus
Christ, by the words he said, Matthew 15:11. They asserted, thatthere is
nothing unclean of itself; and that the kingdom of God is not meat and drink;
or that true religion does not lie in the observance ofthose things; that every
creature of God is good, and fit for food, and nothing to be refused, or
abstainedfrom, on a religious account, provided it be receivedwith
thanksgiving, Romans 14:14. And these things now being by them bound or
loosed, pronouncedunlawful or lawful, are confirmed as such by the authority
of God, and are so to be consideredby us.
(t) T. Bab. Chagiga, fol. 3. 2.
Geneva Study Bible
{6} And I will give unto thee the {n} keys of the kingdom of heaven:and
whatsoeverthou shalt {o} bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and
whatsoeverthou shalt loose onearth shall be loosedin heaven.
(6) The authority of the Church is from God.
(n) A metaphor takenfrom stewards who carry the keys: and here is set forth
the powerof the ministers of the word, as Isa 22:22 says, and that poweris
common to all ministers, as Mt 18:18 says, and therefore the ministry of the
gospelmay rightly be called the key of the kingdom of heaven.
(o) They are bound whose sins are retained; heavenis shut againstthem,
because they do not receive Christ by faith: on the other hand, how happy are
they to whom heavenis open, who embrace Christ and are delivered by him,
and become fellow heirs with him!
EXEGETICAL(ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)
Meyer's NT Commentary
Matthew 16:19. And I will give to thee the keys of the Messianic
kingdom,[457]i.e. the power of deciding as to who are to be admitted into or
excluded from the future kingdom of the Messiah. Forthe figurative
expression, comp. Luke 11:52; Revelation1:18; Revelation3:7; Revelation
9:1; Revelation10:1; Isaiah22:22; Ascens. Isaiah6:6.

δώσω] The future expresses the idea of a promise (the gift not being, as yet,
actually conferred), as in the case ofοἰκοδομήσω, pointing forward to the
time when Christ will no longeradminister the affairs of the church in a
direct and personalmanner. This future already shows that what was meant
cannot have been the office of preaching the gospel, whichpreaching is
supposedto leadto admissioninto the kingdom of heaven, wherever God has
prepared men’s hearts for its reception(Düsterdieck, Julius Müller). The
similitude of the keys corresponds to the figurative οἰκοδομ., Matthew 16:18,
in so far as the ἘΚΚΛΗΣΊΑ, Matthew 16:18 (which is to be transformed into
the ΒΑΣΙΛΕΊΑΤ. ΟὐΡ. at the secondcoming), is conceivedofas a house, the
doors of which are openedand lockedby means of keys (generally, not exactly
by two of them). In regardto Peter, however, the figure undergoes some
modification, inasmuch as it passes fromthat of the foundation of rock, not
certainly into the lowerone of a gate-keeper, but (comp. Luke 12:4; 1
Corinthians 4:1; 1 Corinthians 9:17; Titus 1:7) into that of an οἰκονόμος
(ΤΑΜΊΑς, Isaiah 22:15 ff.), from the ordinary relation of a disciple to the
church to the place of authority hereafter to be assignedhim in virtue of that
relation. The authority in question is that of a house-steward, who is
empoweredto determine who are to belong and who are not to belong to the
household over which his master has commissionedhim to preside.[458]All
this is expressedby means of an old and sacredsymbol, according to which
the keys of the house are promised to Peter, “that he may open and no man
shut, that he may shut and no man open” (Isaiah as above).
For the forms κλεῖς and (as Tischendorf8, on inadequate testimony)
ΚΛΕῖΔΑς, see Kühner, I. p. 357.
ΚΑῚ Ὃ ἘᾺΝ ΔΉΣῌς Κ.Τ.Λ.] a necessaryadjunct of this power: and
whatsoeverthou wilt have forbidden upon earth will he forbidden in heaven
(by God), so that it will, in consequence, preventadmission into the Messianic
kingdom; and whatsoever thou wilt have permitted upon earth (as not

proving a hindrance in the way of admission to the future kingdom) will be
permitted in heaven. It will depend on thy decision—whichGodwill ratify—
what things, as being forbidden, are to disqualify for the kingdom of the
Messiah, andwhat things, as being allowed, are to be regardedas giving a
claim to admission. δέειν and ΛΎΕΙΝ are to be tracedto the use, so current
among the Jews, of‫רסא‬ and ‫,ריתה‬ in the sense ofto forbid and to allow.
Lightfoot, p. 378 ff.; Schoettgen, II. p. 894 f., and Wetsteinon this passage;
Lengerke’s note on Daniel 6:8; Rosenmüller, Morgenl. V. 67; Steitz, p. 438 f.
Following Lightfoot, Vitringa, Schoettgen, and others, Fritzsche, Ahrens,
Steitz, Weizsäcker, Keim, Gess (I. p. 68), Gottschick in the Stud. u. Krit. 1873,
also adopt this interpretation of those figurative expressions. In the face of this
common usage, it would be arbitrary and absurd to think of any other
explanation. The same may be said not only of the reference to the supreme
administrative powerin general(Arnoldi and the older Catholics), or to the
treasures of grace in the church, which Peteris supposedto be able to
withhold or bestow as he may deem proper (Schegg), but likewise ofthe view
which represents the words as intended to indicate the power of admitting
into and excluding from the church (Thaddaeus a S. Adamo, Commentat.
1789, Rosenmüller, Lange), and in support of which an appeal is made,
notwithstanding the ὅ, to the ancient practice of tying or untying doors;as
well as of that other view which has been so currently adopted, after
Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euth. Zigabenus, Erasmus, Luther, Beza, Calvin,
Maldonatus, to the effectthat what Jesus means is the remission and non-
remissionof sins.[459]So Grotius, Olshausen, de Wette, Bleek, Neander,
Glöckler, Baumgarten-Crusius, Döllinger, Julius Müller, Düsterdieck. But to
quote in connectionwith this the different and much later saying of Jesus,
after His resurrection, John 20:23, is quite unwarranted; the idea of sin is a
pure importation, and although λύειν ἁμαρτ. may properly enough be
understood as meaning: to forgive sins (Isaiah 40:2; Isaiah 3 Esdr. Matthew
9:13; Sir 28:8; and see Kypke on Matthew 18:18), yet the use of ΔΈΕΙΝ
ἉΜΑΡΤ., in the sense of retaining them, is altogetherwithout example.
Exception has been taken to the idea involved in our interpretation; but
considering that high degree of faith to which Peter, as their representative,
here shows them to have attained, the apostles must be supposed to possess
“the moral power of legislation” (objectedto by de Wette) as well, if they are

to determine the right of admissionto the Messiah’s kingdom;see Steitz also,
p. 458. This legislative authority, conferredupon Peter, can only wearan
offensive aspectwhen it is conceivedof as possessing anarbitrary character,
and as being in no way determined by the ethicalinfluences of the Holy Spirit,
and when it is regardedas being of an absolute nature, as independent of any
connectionwith the rest of the apostles (but see note on Matthew 18:18).
Comp. Wieseler, Chronol. d. Ap. p. 587 f. Ahrens, likewise, correctly
interprets the words in the sense of to forbid and to allow, but supposes the
words themselves to be derived from the practice of fastening with a knot
vessels containing anything of a valuable nature (Hom. Od. viii. 447).
Artificial and far-fetched, but resulting from the reference of the keys to the
ταμεῖον.
ἔσται δεδεμ.]Observe how that is spokenof as already done, which is to take
place and be realized immediately on the back of the ὃ ἐὰν δήσῃς. Comp.
Buttmann, neut. Gr. p. 267 [E. T. 311];Kühner, II. 1, p. 35. To such a degree
will the two things really harmonize with one another.
[457]See Ahrens, d. Amt. Schlüssel, 1864;Steitz in the Stud. u. Krit. 1866, p.
436 ff.; likewise the reviews of the first-mentioned work in the Erlang.
Zeitschr. 1865, 3, p. 137 ff.; and that of Düsterdieck in the Stud. u. Krit. 1865,
p. 743;Julius Müller, dogm. Abh. p. 496 ff.
[458]There is no force in the objectionthat this would be to confound the keys
of the house-stewardwith those of the porter (Ahrens). The keys of the house
are entrusted to the stewardfor the purpose of opening and locking it; this is
all that the figure implies. Whether lie opens and locks in his own person, or
has it done through the medium of a porter, is of no consequencewhatever,
and makes no difference as far as the thing intended to be symbolized is
concerned. The power of the keys belongs, in any case, to the οἰκονόμος, and
not to the θυρωρός. The view of Ahrens, that the keys are to be regardedas

those of the rooms, and of the place in which the family provisions are stored,
the ταμεῖον, the contents of which it is supposed to be the duty of the steward
to distribute (so also Döllinger, Christenth. u. Kirche, p. 31), is in opposition to
the factthat the thing which is to be opened and lockedmust be understoodto
be that which is expressedby the genitive immediately after κλείς
(accordingly, in this instance, the kingdom, not the ταμεῖον), comp. note on
Luke 11:52, likewise Isaiahas above. Moreover, according to the explanation
of Ahrens, those, on whose behalf the ταμίας uses his keys, would have to be
regardedas alreadywithin the kingdom and participating in its blessings, so
that there would be no further room for the idea of exclusion, which is not in
keeping with the contrastwhich follows.
[459]In which case the result of apostolic preaching generally, i.e. its efficacy
in judging men by the spiritual power of the word (Julius Müller, comp.
Neanderand Düsterdieck), ceases to have any significance other than that of a
vague abstraction, by no means in keeping with the specific expressionof the
text, and leaving no room for assigning to Peterany special prerogative. This
also in answerto Weiss, bibl. Theol. p. 99, 2d ed., who holds that, originally,
the words were intended to indicate merely that generalcommissionwhich
was given to the apostles to publish among men the call to the kingdom of
God.
Cambridge Bible for Schools andColleges
19. the keys of the kingdom of heaven] This expressionwas not altogether
new. To a Jew it would convey a definite meaning. He would think of the
symbolic key given to a Scribe when admitted to his office, with which he was
to open the treasury of the divine oracles. Peterwas to be a Scribe in the
kingdom of heaven. He has receivedauthority to teachthe truths of the
kingdom.
whatsoeverthou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven] To bind (cp.
ch. Matthew 23:4) is to impose an obligationas binding; to loose is to declare a

precept not binding. Such expressions as this were common: “The schoolof
Shammai binds it, the schoolof Hillel loosethit.” The poweris over things, not
persons. The decisions of Peter as an authorized Scribe of the Kingdom of
God will be ratified in heaven.
Bengel's Gnomen
Matthew 16:19. Δώσω σοὶ,[746]I will give thee) The future tense. Christ
Himself, after His glorification, receivedthe keys economically.[747]See
Revelation1:18, and German exposition of the Apocalypse. Our Lord
afterwards gave the keys, which He here promised, to Peter, not alone, but
first in order of time (cf. Luke 5:10); since Peterwas the first who, after the
resurrectionof Christ, exercisedthe apostolicaloffice;see Acts 1:15; Acts
2:14. If the keys had been given exclusively to Peter, and the Bishop of Rome
after him, and not to the other apostles also, evenafterthe death of Peter, the
Bishop of Rome should have actedas pastor to the other apostles.—ΤᾺς
ΚΛΕῖς, the keys)Keys denote authority. Tertullian, in his work on fasting, ch.
15, says, Apostolus claves macellitibi tradidit: the apostle[748]has given thee
the keys of the meat market, where he alludes to 1 Corinthians 10:25. The
keys are available for two purposes, to close and to open; the keys themselves
are not said to be two.[749]One and the same keycloses and opens in
Revelation3:7. The Jews declare thata thousand keys were given to Enoch.
See James Alting’s Hist. promot. acad. Hebr. p. 107.—τῆς βασιλείας τῶν
οὐρανῶν, of the kingdom of heaven) He does not say of the Church, nor of the
kingdoms of the world.—δήσης, λύσης, thou shalt bind—thou shalt loose)The
keys denote the whole office of Peter. By the expressions, therefore, ofbinding
and loosing,[750]are comprehendedall those things which Peterperformed in
virtue of the name of Jesus Christ, and through faith in that name, by his
apostolic authority, by teaching, convincing, exhorting, forbidding, permitting
(see Tertullian, already quoted), consoling, remitting (see Matthew 18:18;
Matthew 18:15; John 20:23);by healing, as in Acts 3:7; Acts 9:34; by raising
from the dead, as in Acts 9:41 (cf. ibid. Acts 2:24); by punishing, ibid.
Matthew 5:5; cf. 1 Corinthians 5:5; he himself records, in Acts 15:8, an
instance of a matter performed on earth and sanctionedin heaven. It is
advisable to compare with this passage thatin Matthew 18:18, and with both
of them the third in John 20:23. In this passage,to Peteralone, after uttering

his confessionconcerning Jesus Christ, the authority is promised, first of
binding, and secondly of loosing sins, and whatsoeveris included under that
authority; and this is done as it were enigmatically, it not being expressed
what things were to be bound and loosed, because the disciples were not yet
capable of understanding so wonderful a matter; see Luke 9:54. In chapter 18,
after our Lord’s transfiguration, the disciples, who had made some progress
in faith, are invested in common with the authority, first of binding, and
secondlyof loosing, the offences of their brethren, but most especiallyof
loosing them by prayers in the name of Christ. In John 20, after His
resurrection, our Lord having breathed upon His disciples, gives them the
authority, firstly of remitting, and secondly of retaining sins; for thus are the
words and their order[751]changedafter the opening of the gate of salvation.
The greatestpart of the apostolic authority regards sins (cf. Hosea 13:12). The
remaining particulars are contained in this discourse by synecdoche. It is not
foreign to our presentpurpose to compare a passageofAristophanes as to the
use of the verb λύειν—Frogs;Act ii. scene 6, Epirrhema[752][Ed. Dindorf,
691],—αἰτίανἐκθεῖσι, ΛΥΣΑΙ τὰς πρότερονἁμαρτίας (χρή)—i.e.” we oughtto
forgive (or remit) the faults of those who explain the cause of them.”
[746]The margin of Ed. 2 makes the reading σοὶ δώσω equal in authority to
δώσω σοί.—E. B.
[747]i.e. As Christ, without any derogationto His proper Divinity.—(I. B.)
[748]Sc. St Paul.—(I. B.)
[749]More keys, in fact, may be accountedto have been delivered to Peter.
Hence it was that with so greatefficacyhe openedthe entrance into the
kingdom of heaven to the Jews and Gentiles. Comp. the opposite case [of the

Pharisees,who shut up the kingdom of heaven againstmen], ch. Matthew
23:4; Matthew 23:13; Luke 11:52.—V. g.
[750]These words as to binding and loosing do not properly apply to the keys,
but yet have a close connectionwith the use of the keys.—V. g.
[751]The order before had been—1. Binding (answering to retaining); 2.
Loosing (answering to remitting). The order is now reversed.—ED.
[752]In old comedy, a speech, usually of Trochaic tetrameters, spokenby the
Coryphæus after the Parabasis. Liddell and Scott, q. v.—(I. B.)
“The keys of the market,” i.e. the free use of authority to buy and eat
whatevermeat is soldin it.—ED.
‘Œconomice,’in conformity with the Mediatorialeconomy, which appertains
to Him.—ED.
Ba, Rec. Text, Origen 3,525a, 529d, 530a, support δώσω σοί. Dbc Vulg. Cypr.
support σοὶ δώσω—ED.
Pulpit Commentary
Verse 19. - I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. The
metaphor of a house or castle, with its gates that must be opened with keys, is
still maintained; or else the idea is of the exercise ofa stewardship in a
household. But the latter seems unnecessarilyto introduce a new notion, and
to mar the concinnity of the passage. In Isaiah22:22 we read, "The key of the
house of David will I lay upon his shoulder; and he shall open, and none shall

shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open" - where the figure is similar. The
delivery of the keys of a city, etc., to a person, symbolizes the handing over of
the authority to that person. "The kingdom of heaven" means here the visible
Church of Christ in its most extended form. In this Church, hereafterto be
constituted, Peterpersonallyis promised a certain authority. This is a
personalreward for his goodconfession, anda prediction of the wayin which
he was to exercise it. At the same time, there is a change in the figure used. He
who was the foundation of the Church is now its overseer, and may open or
shut its doors, may admit or exclude whomsoeverhe will, always following the
guidance of the inspiring Spirit. This promise was fulfilled after the Dayof
Pentecost. It seems to have been at this time only promised, not conferred
upon Peter. The actualgift of the powerto him and his brother apostles took
place after the Resurrection, as we readin John 20:22. The "power of the
keys," as it is called, is consideredto have two branches - a legislative power
and an absolving power. The former Peterexercisedwhen he took the lead
after the effusion of the Spirit, and opened the door to the Jews. It was his
actionthat admitted the Gentiles, without compliance with the distinctive rites
of Judaism, to all the privileges of the gospel(see Acts 15:7). This most
momentous precedent he establishedand made goodfor all time. These were
legislative acts which he had the honour of introducing, and which, thus
inaugurated, upheld, and defended by him, tended to advance that unity
which the Lord held so dear. As an instance of his shutting the door of the
kingdom in the face of an impious intruder, we may notice his rebuke to
Simon Magus (Acts 8:21), "Thou hast neither part nor lot in this matter." The
absolving power, supposedto be containedin the gift of the keys, seems rather
to belong to the terms of the succeeding promise. We conceive that this power
was first given to St. Peterin acknowledgmentofhis goodconfession, and as
an emblem of unity, and was afterwards bestowedonall the apostles. Thatthe
Fathers did not regard it as limited exclusively to Peter, may he seenby
quotations gatheredby Wordsworth and other commentators. Thus
Tertullian, 'Scorpiac.,'10, "Memento claves hic Dominum Petro, et per illum
Ecclesiae reliquisse;" St. Cyprian, 'De Unit.,' p. 107, "Apostolis omnibus post
resurrectionemsuam parem potestatemtribuit;" St. Augustine, 'Serm.,' 295,
"Has claves non homo unus, sed unitas accepitEcclcsiae." Whatsoeverthou
shalt bind on earth, etc. "Binding" and "loosing" has beenexplained in

various ways. Some saythe terms mean admitting or debarring from the
Church, which would make them identical with the power of the keys, and
would give no additional privilege; whereas it is plain that further honour is
intended to be bestowed. Others affirm that the expressionis to be understood
of absolution from sin. They take the metaphor to be derived from a prisoner
and his chain. Sinners are tied and bound with the chain of their sins; they are
releasedonrepentance by the ministry of reconciliation(2 Corinthians 5:18,
19); they are bound, when the means of grace are withheld from them, owing
to the absence oftokens of' sincerity and faith. This is the view takenin the
Anglican Ordinal, where to the priest it is solemnly said, "Whose sins thou
dost forgive, they are forgiven; and whose sins thou dost retain, they are
retained." But this was no specialgift to Peter; it was bestowednotlong after
upon all the apostolic body in the very same terms (Matthew 18:18), and was
indeed inherent in the ministry. This interpretation also introduces a new
element into the promise, which does not agree with the context. There is
nothing to lead one to expectsuch an item, and to supply "sins" to the general
term "whatsoever" twice repeated, is harsh and unnatural. A more
reasonable explanationof the phrase is derived from the use of the terms
among the Jews themselves. In their Talmudic glosseswe find equivalent
expressions. "To bind" is to forbid, to pronounce unlawful; "to loose" is to
allow, to declare lawful. And the Lord here promises Petera certain pre-
eminence in the government and organizationof the Church, and that the
rules which he ordained and the sentences whichhe should pass in the due
exercise ofhis apostolicalauthority, should be ratified and confirmed in
heaven (Burgon). The phrase is found in Josephus, expressive ofthe
possession, ofunrestricted authority. Thus he speaks ofthe Phariseesas
having powerto loose and bind (λύειν τε καὶ δεῖν) whom they would ('Bell.
Jud.,' 1:05. 2). And it is noted that an inscription upon a statue of Isis reads,
"I am the queen of the country, and whatsoeverI bind no man can loose"
(Diod. Sic., 1:27). This is a personaldistinction conferredon St. Peter in the
exercise ofan office common to all the apostles, it was needful, in the early
Church, that one should be chosen, primus inter pares, to be the chief office
bearer and leader of the body of believers. Notthat he conceivedhimself to be,
or was recognizedby others as, infallible, or as an irresponsible despot; many
events before and after Pentecostforbid such an assumption; but his faith,

character, and zeal pointed him out as well constituted to regulate and order
the infant community, and to take the first part in maintaining that unity
which was essentialto the new kingdom. This personalprimacy may justly be
conceded, evenby those who are most inimical to the arrogantclaims of the
papacy; for it carries not with it the consequenceswhichhave been appended.
Precedencein rank does not of necessityinvolve supreme or even superior
authority. A duke has no authority over a baron, though he has precedence.
The fuller considerationof this sphere of the subject belongs rather to the
historian and the polemist than to the expositor, and to such we leave it, only
adding that, in his peculiar privilege, Peterstands alone, and that in his
extraordinary powerhe had, and was intended to have, no successors.
Vincent's Word Studies
Keys (κλεῖδας)
The similitude corresponding to build. The church or kingdom is conceivedas
a house, of which Peteris to be the steward, bearing the keys. "Evenas he had
been the first to utter the confessionofthe church, so was he also privileged to
be the first to open its hitherto closedgates to the Gentiles, when God made
choice of him, that, through his mouth, the Gentiles should first hear the
words of the Gospel, and at his bidding first be baptized" (Edersheim, "Life
and Times of Jesus").
Bind - loose (δήσῃς - λύσῃς)
In a sense common among the Jews, offorbidding or allowing. No other terms
were in more constant use in Rabbinic canon-law than those of binding and
loosing. They representedthe legislative and judicial powers of the Rabbinic
office. These powers Christnow transferred, and that not in their pretension,
but in their reality, to his apostles;the first, here, to Peter, as their
representative, the second, afterhis resurrection, to the church (John 20:23,
Edersheim). "This legislative authority conferredupon Peter canonly wear
an offensive aspectwhenit is conceivedof as possessingan arbitrary
character, and as being in no way determined by the ethicalinfluences of the
Holy Spirit, and when it is regarded as being of an absolute nature, as
independent of any connectionwith the restof the apostles. Since the power of

binding and loosing, which is here conferredupon Peter, is ascribed(Matthew
18:18)to the apostles generally, the powerconferred upon the former is set in
its proper light, and shown to be of necessitya powerof a collegiatenature, so
that Peteris not to be regarded as exclusively endowedwith it, either in whole
or in part, but is simply to be lookedupon as first among his equals" (Meyer
on Matthew 16:19;Matthew 18:18).
PRECEPTAUSTIN RESOURCES
"Keys to the Kingdom of Heaven"
Matthew 16:19
Theme: Jesus has given the gift of great spiritual authority to His church on
earth.
(Delivered Sunday, June 24, 2007 at Bethany Bible Church. Unless otherwise
noted, all Scripture references are takenfrom The Holy Bible, New King
James Version; copyright 1982, Thomas Nelson, Inc.)
Over the past few weeks, we have been studying togetherfrom what I believe
is one of the most important passages in the Bible. It's containedin the Gospel
of Matthew. It is, in fact, the very heart of Matthew's Gospel. So much of what
we have been studying in Matthew's Gospelhas led up to it; and so much of
what we will be studying in it will have its basis in it.
In Matthew 16:13-19, we read;
When Jesus came into the region of CaesareaPhilippi, He askedHis disciples,
saying, “Who do men say that I, the Sonof Man, am?” So they said, “Some

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