Apostolic Succession
Definition:
The doctrine that the 12 apostles have successors to whom authority has
been passed by divine appointment. In the Roman Catholic Church, the
bishops as a group are said to be successors of the apostles, and the
pope is claimed to be the successor of Peter. It is maintained that the
Roman pontiffs come immediately after, occupy the position and perform
the functions of Peter, to whom Christ is said to have given primacy of
authority over the whole Church. Not a Bible teaching.
Was Peter the “rock” on which the church was built?
Matt. 16:18, JB: “I now say to you: You are Peter and on this rock I
will build my Church. And the gates of the underworld can never hold out
against it.” (Notice in the context [vss. 13, 20] that the discussion
centers on the identity of Jesus.)
Whom did the apostles Peter and Paul understand to be the “rock,” the “cornerstone”?
Acts 4:8-11, JB: “Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, addressed them,
‘Rulers of the people, and elders! . . . it was by the name of Jesus
Christ the Nazarene, the one you crucified, whom God raised from the
dead, by this name and by no other that this man is able to stand up
perfectly healthy, here in your presence, today. This is the stone
rejected by you the builders, but which has proved to be the keystone
[“cornerstone,” NAB].’”
1 Pet. 2:4-8, JB: “Set yourselves close to him [the Lord Jesus Christ]
so that you too . . . may be living stones making a spiritual house. As
scripture says: See how I lay in Zion a precious cornerstone that I have
chosen and the man who rests his trust on it will not be disappointed.
That means that for you who are believers, it is precious; but for
unbelievers, the stone rejected by the builders has proved to be the
keystone, a stone to stumble over, a rock to bring men down.”
Eph. 2:20, JB: “You are part of a building that has the apostles and
prophets for its foundations, and Christ Jesus himself for its main
cornerstone.”
What was the belief of Augustine (who was viewed as a saint by the Catholic Church)?
“In this same period of my priesthood, I also wrote a book against a
letter of Donatus . . . In a passage in this book, I said about the
Apostle Peter: ‘On him as on a rock the Church was built.’ . . . But I
know that very frequently at a later time, I so explained what the Lord
said: ‘Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church,’ that
it be understood as built upon Him whom Peter confessed saying: ‘Thou
art the Christ, the Son of the living God,’ and so Peter, called after
this rock, represented the person of the Church which is built upon this
rock, and has received ‘the keys of the kingdom of heaven.’ For, ‘Thou
art Peter’ and not ‘Thou art the rock’ was said to him. But ‘the rock
was Christ,’ in confessing whom as also the whole Church confesses,
Simon was called Peter.”—The Fathers of the Church—Saint Augustine, the
Retractations (Washington, D.C.; 1968), translated by Mary I. Bogan,
Book I, p. 90.
Did the other apostles view Peter as having primacy among them?
Luke 22:24-26, JB: “A dispute arose also between them [the apostles]
about which should be reckoned the greatest, but he said to them, ‘Among
pagans it is the kings who lord it over them, and those who have
authority over them are given the title Benefactor. This must not happen
with you.’” (If Peter were the “rock,” would there have been any
question as to which one of them “should be reckoned the greatest”?)
Since Jesus Christ, the head of the congregation, is alive, does he need successors?
Heb. 7:23-25, JB: “Then there used to be a great number of those other
priests [in Israel], because death put an end to each one of them; but
this one [Jesus Christ], because he remains for ever, can never lose his
priesthood. It follows, then, that his power to save is utterly
certain, since he is living for ever to intercede for all who come to
God through him.”
Rom. 6:9, JB: “Christ, as we know, having been raised from the dead will never die again.”
Eph. 5:23, JB: “Christ is head of the Church.”
What were “the keys” entrusted to Peter?
Matt. 16:19, JB: “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven:
whatever you bind on earth shall be considered bound in heaven; whatever
you loose on earth shall be considered loosed in heaven.”
In Revelation, Jesus referred to a symbolic key used by himself to open up privileges and opportunities to humans
Rev. 3:7, 8, JB: “Here is the message of the holy and faithful one who
has the key of David, so that when he opens, nobody can close, and when
he closes, nobody can open: . . . I have opened in front of you a door
that nobody will be able to close.”
Peter used “keys” entrusted to him to open up (to Jews, Samaritans,
Gentiles) the opportunity to receive God’s spirit with a view to their
entering the heavenly Kingdom
Acts 2:14-39, JB: “Peter stood up with the Eleven and addressed them in a
loud voice: ‘Men of Judaea, and all you who live in Jerusalem . . . God
has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ.’ Hearing
this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the apostles,
‘What must we do, brothers?’ ‘You must repent,’ Peter answered ‘and
every one of you must be baptised in the name of Jesus Christ for the
forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy
Spirit. The promise that was made is for you and your children, and for
all those who are far away, for all those whom the Lord our God will
call to himself.’”
Acts 8:14-17, JB: “When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had
accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them, and they
went down there, and prayed for the Samaritans to receive the Holy
Spirit, for as yet he had not come down on any of them: they had only
been baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid hands on
them, and they received the Holy Spirit.” (Verse 20 indicates that Peter
was the one taking the lead on this occasion.)
Acts 10:24-48, JB: “They reached Caesarea the following day, and
Cornelius [an uncircumcised Gentile] was waiting for them. . . . Peter
addressed them . . . While Peter was still speaking the Holy Spirit came
down on all the listeners.”
Did heaven wait on Peter to make decisions and then follow his lead?
Acts 2:4, 14, JB: “They were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began
to speak foreign languages as the Spirit gave them the gift of speech. .
. . Then [after Christ, the head of the congregation, had stirred them
up by means of the holy spirit] Peter stood up with the Eleven and
addressed them.” (See verse 33.)
Acts 10:19, 20, JB: “The Spirit had to tell him [Peter], ‘Some men have
come to see you. Hurry down, and do not hesitate about going back with
them [to the home of the Gentile Cornelius]; it was I who told them to
come.’”
Compare Matthew 18:18, 19.
Is Peter the judge as to who is worthy to enter the Kingdom?
2 Tim. 4:1, JB: “Christ Jesus . . . is to be judge of the living and the dead.”
2 Tim. 4:8, JB: “All there is to come now is the crown of righteousness
reserved for me, which the Lord [Jesus Christ], the righteous judge,
will give to me on that Day; and not only to me but to all those who
have longed for his Appearing.”
Was Peter in Rome?
Rome is referred to in nine verses of the Holy Scriptures; none of these
say that Peter was there. First Peter 5:13 shows that he was in
Babylon. Was this a cryptic reference to Rome? His being in Babylon was
consistent with his assignment to preach to the Jews (as indicated at
Galatians 2:9), since there was a large Jewish population in Babylon.
The Encyclopaedia Judaica (Jerusalem, 1971, Vol. 15, col. 755), when
discussing production of the Babylonian Talmud, refers to Judaism’s
“great academies of Babylon” during the Common Era.
Has an unbroken line of successors been traced from Peter to modern-day popes?
Jesuit John McKenzie, when professor of theology at Notre Dame, wrote:
“Historical evidence does not exist for the entire chain of succession
of church authority.”—The Roman Catholic Church (New York, 1969), p. 4.
The New Catholic Encyclopedia admits: “ . . . the scarcity of documents
leaves much that is obscure about the early development of the
episcopate . . . ”—(1967), Vol. I, p. 696.
Claims of divine appointment mean nothing if those who make them are not obedient to God and Christ
Matt. 7:21-23, JB: “It is not those who say to me, ‘Lord, Lord’, who
will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the person who does the will of my
Father in heaven. When the day comes many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord,
did we not prophesy in your name, cast out demons in your name, work
many miracles in your name?’ Then I shall tell them to their faces: I
have never known you; away from me, you evil men!”
See also Jeremiah 7:9-15.
Have the claimed successors to the apostles adhered to the teachings and practices of Jesus Christ and his apostles?
A Catholic Dictionary states: “The Roman Church is Apostolic, because
her doctrine is the faith once revealed to the Apostles, which faith she
guards and explains, without adding to it or taking from it.” (London,
1957, W. E. Addis and T. Arnold, p. 176) Do the facts agree?
Identity of God
“The Trinity is the term employed to signify the central doctrine of the
Christian religion.”—The Catholic Encyclopedia (1912), Vol. XV, p. 47.
“Neither the word Trinity, nor the explicit doctrine as such, appears in
the New Testament . . . The doctrine developed gradually over several
centuries and through many controversies.”—The New Encyclopædia
Britannica (1976), Micropædia, Vol. X, p. 126.
“There is the recognition on the part of exegetes and Biblical
theologians, including a constantly growing number of Roman Catholics,
that one should not speak of Trinitarianism in the New Testament without
serious qualification. There is also the closely parallel recognition
on the part of historians of dogma and systematic theologians that when
one does speak of an unqualified Trinitarianism, one has moved from the
period of Christian origins to, say, the last quadrant of the 4th
century.”—New Catholic Encyclopedia (1967), Vol. XIV, p. 295.
Celibacy of the clergy
Pope Paul VI, in his encyclical Sacerdotalis Caelibatus (Priestly
Celibacy, 1967), endorsed celibacy as a requirement for the clergy, but
he admitted that “the New Testament which preserves the teaching of
Christ and the Apostles . . . does not openly demand celibacy of sacred
ministers . . . Jesus Himself did not make it a prerequisite in His
choice of the Twelve, nor did the Apostles for those who presided over
the first Christian communities.”—The Papal Encyclicals 1958-1981 (Falls
Church, Va.; 1981), p. 204.
1 Cor. 9:5, NAB: “Do we not have the right to marry a believing woman
like the rest of the apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?”
(“Cephas” is an Aramaic name given to Peter; see John 1:42. See also
Mark 1:29-31, where reference is made to the mother-in-law of Simon, or
Peter.)
1 Tim. 3:2, Dy: “It behoveth, therefore, a bishop to be . . . the husband of one wife [“married only once,” NAB].”
Before the Christian era, Buddhism required its priests and monks to be
celibate. (History of Sacerdotal Celibacy in the Christian Church,
London, 1932, fourth ed., revised, Henry C. Lea, p. 6) Even earlier, the
higher orders of the Babylonian priesthood were required to practice
celibacy, according to The Two Babylons by A. Hislop.—(New York, 1943),
p. 219.
1 Tim. 4:1-3, JB: “The Spirit has explicitly said that during the last
times there will be some who will desert the faith and choose to listen
to deceitful spirits and doctrines that come from the devils; . . . they
will say marriage is forbidden.”
Separateness from the world
Pope Paul VI, when addressing the United Nations in 1965, said: “The
peoples of the earth turn to the United Nations as the last hope of
concord and peace; We presume to present here, together with Our own,
their tribute of honor and of hope.”—The Pope’s Visit (New York, 1965),
Time-Life Special Report, p. 26.
John 15:19, JB: “[Jesus Christ said:] If you belonged to the world, the
world would love you as its own; but because you do not belong to the
world, because my choice withdrew you from the world, therefore the
world hates you.”
Jas. 4:4, JB: “Don’t you realise that making the world your friend is making God your enemy?”
Resorting to weapons of war
Catholic historian E. I. Watkin writes: “Painful as the admission must
be, we cannot in the interest of a false edification or dishonest
loyalty deny or ignore the historical fact that Bishops have
consistently supported all wars waged by the government of their
country. I do not know in fact of a single instance in which a national
hierarchy has condemned as unjust any war . . . Whatever the official
theory, in practice ‘my country always right’ has been the maxim
followed in wartime by Catholic Bishops.”—Morals and Missiles (London,
1959), edited by Charles S. Thompson, pp. 57, 58.
Matt. 26:52, JB: “Jesus then said, ‘Put your sword back, for all who draw the sword will die by the sword.’”
1 John 3:10-12, JB: “In this way we distinguish the children of God from
the children of the devil: anybody . . . not loving his brother is no
child of God’s. . . . We are to love one another; not to be like Cain,
who belonged to the Evil One and cut his brother’s throat.”
In the light of the foregoing, have those who claim to be successors to
the apostles really taught and practiced what Christ and his apostles
did?
