Views Concerning The Church and the Sacraments During the Second Period (300-750 A.D.): The Doctrine of the Church (16): The Papacy.

Augustine (died in the year 430)) the greatest theological authority of the Latin church, at first referred the words, "On this rock I will build my church," to the person of Peter, but afterward expressly retracted this interpretation, and considered the petra (rock, H.V.) to be Christ, on the ground of a distinction between petra(upon this rock) and Petrus (thou art Peter); a distinction which Jerome also makes, though with the intimation that it is not properly applicable to the Hebrew and...