Hi John,
You wrote, "First Please do not confuse true Bible teaching with being Anti-Catholic."
Your statement is a non sequitur. I referred to your statement, "It was not till about 170 A.D. that people began to teach that Peter had even been in Rome at all" as Anti-Catholic lore, which entails extra-Biblical history. If you consider the events 170 A.D. to be "Bible teaching," please explain.
You can not show from God's word that anyone after Peter was given the authority Peter had.
Your demand is unBiblical for the reason that the history of the NT does not extend past Peter's death. I've already made this comment, and you need to respond to what I responded with, not with a reassertion of your original premise, which I have shown to be invalid.
You have to assume direct parallels between Peter and Daniel and Joseph. It never states it.
That's the beauty of allusion. It's never explicit, yet that does not diminish its literal-historical truth as an implicit affirmation through the grammatical devise of literarly allusion. In demanding that all teaching in the Bible be explicit, you have denied the Bible from being what it is. When the author utilizes allusion to convey a point, you nullify the Word of God by denying the author his prerogative. In doing so, you deny Biblical truth for the sake of your own Anti-Catholic tradition.
In fact, neither Daniel nor Joseph had successors.
No, they don't. Yet, isn't this besides the point if the Biblical authors weren't making an allusion to them? Why go on to speak about their successors if they themselves are irrelevant to begin with? In making this point, you are affirming the validity of my premise that Matthew if alluding to both Daniel and Joseph.
You have to assume that the keys that Christ had in Revelation 3:7 is a second set.
John, keys are metaphorical, not real. It is a symbol for authority. Christ, the Heavenly King and invisible Head of the Church, manifests his authority on earth through his Vicar, his Prime Minister, his Vizier, who is the visible head of the Church.
You have to assume that Babylon and Rome are one and the same--it never states it.
Yes, I do have to assume that, and no this isn't explicit in the text. Yet, my assumption is based upon a conclusion due to a study of the historical situation surrounding the composition of Peter's epistle, which demonstrates quite convincingly that Peter is using a code term for Rome.
G.J. Polkinghorne, writing in the Protestant International Bible Commentary, explains:
"Babylon (5:13) cannot be the city on the Euphrates, which after A.D. 41 was very sparsely populated and with which Peter had no connection. Nor can a Roman garrison in Egypt be seriously considered. Rome must be meant, cf. Rev. 17 and 18, as was universally accepted until Reformation times. The symbolic designation would save trouble should the censor's eye light on the letter in transit." (1)
(1) G.J. Polkinghorne, "1 Peter," International Bible Commentary, ed. F.F. Bruce, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1986), 1551.
Even if Peter was in Rome you have not shown a second with his authority, a successor if you will.
His successor is Linus, as named by Irenaeus in his famous apology against the Gnostic heretics in Adversus Haereses (3:3:3). In the same work, Irenaeus writes:
"Matthew also issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect, while Peter and Paul were preaching at Rome, and laying the foundations of the Church. After their departure, Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, did also hand down to us in writing what had been preached by Peter." (2)
(2) Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies, III, 1, A.D. 189.
Or the ecclesiastical writer Tertullian who records:
"[T]his is the way in which the apostolic churches transmit their lists: like the church of the Smyrneans, which records that Polycarp was placed there by John, like the church of the Romans, where Clement was ordained by Peter" (Demurrer Against the Heretics 32:2 [A.D. 200]).
If he was in Rome, what makes you think the men who followed him were more than elders in the church. Peter was an elder you know. (See 1 Peter 5:1)
The term in Greek is presbyterus, which is the etymological background of the English word "priest". You can check it out on Dictionary.com by typing in "priest" and analyzing the term's etymology. The Pope is certainly a priest of Jesus Christ.
We are talking approx. 110 yrs. after his death. A lot of urban legions can happen in that time.
And the canon of the New Testament wasn't solidified until the end of the fourth century. So your point is?
If apostolic tradition isn't reliable, then neither is the table of contents in your Bible, or even the Gospels themselves which were written decades after the events they speak on.
