Matthew 16:16-18
New English Translation
16 Simon Peter answered,[a] “You are the Christ,[b] the Son of the living God.” 17 And Jesus answered him,[c] “You are blessed, Simon son of Jonah, because flesh and blood[d] did not reveal this to you, but my Father in heaven! 18 And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades[e] will not overpower it.
Read full chapterFootnotes
- Matthew 16:16 tn Grk “And answering, Simon Peter said.”
- Matthew 16:16 tn Or “Messiah”; both “Christ” (Greek) and “Messiah” (Hebrew and Aramaic) mean “one who has been anointed.”sn See the note on Christ in 1:16.
- Matthew 16:17 tn Grk “answering, Jesus said to him.” The participle ἀποκριθείς (apokritheis) is redundant, but the syntax of this phrase has been modified for clarity.
- Matthew 16:17 tn The expression “flesh and blood” could refer to “any human being” (so TEV, NLT; cf. NIV “man”), but it could also refer to Peter himself (i.e., his own intuition; cf. CEV “You didn’t discover this on your own”). Because of the ambiguity of the referent, the phrase “flesh and blood” has been retained in the translation.
- Matthew 16:18 tn Or “and the power of death” (taking the reference to the gates of Hades as a metonymy).sn In the OT, Hades was known as Sheol. It is the place where the unrighteous will reside (Matt 11:23; Luke 16:23; Rev 20:13-14). Some translations render this by its modern equivalent, “hell”; others see it as a reference to the power of death.
Matthew 16:16-18
New International Version
16 Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”(A)
17 Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood,(B) but by my Father in heaven.(C) 18 And I tell you that you are Peter,[a](D) and on this rock I will build my church,(E) and the gates of Hades[b] will not overcome it.
Footnotes
- Matthew 16:18 The Greek word for Peter means rock.
- Matthew 16:18 That is, the realm of the dead
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