common in !N'ew Testament times. The apostle Petei seems to have been only known as " Cephas" in the Corinthian Church. Out of the five other places in the New Testament where the name Cephas is found, four are in the epistle to the Corinthians, while the name Peter is not used in that epistle at all.
Nifanius gives the names of three Popes who have so grossly mistaken the origin of the word Cephas as to suppose that it is derived from the Greek word which signifies " a head," and that it indicated Peter's headship in the Church! Such a palpable blunder is one of a thousand proofs that Popes are no more infal- lible than other men. Calovius makes the same charge against no less a person than Cardinal Beharmine,
If it be asked why our Lord gave Simon this new name, the best answer appears to be that it was given with a special refer- ence to the change which grace was to work in Simon's heart. Naturally impulsive, unstable, and unsteady, he was finally to become a firm, solid stone in the Church of Christ, and to testify his unshaken adherence to Christ by suffering martyrdom.
Chrysostom thinks that our Lord altered Simon's name " to show that it was He who gave the old covenant, that it was He who called Abram Abraham, and Sarai Sarah, and Jacob Israel."
Lightfoot, on these verses, after noticing the error which Roman Catholic writers attempt to found upon it, about Peter being the rock upon which the Church is built, makes the following curious observation, — " If they will so pertinaciously adhere to it, let us apprehend our Lord speaking prophetically ^ and fore- telling the grand error that would spring up in the Church, namely that Peter is a rock, than which the Christian Church has known nothing more sad and destructive."
Let it be noted, in leaving this passage, that the selection of such humble unlearned men as th -se here described, to be the first apostles and preachers of the Grospel, is a strong evidence of the truth of Christianity. A religion which was propagated by such weak instruments, in the face of persecution and oppo- sition from the great and learned, must be a religion from God. Such results from such instrumentahty cannot possibly be ac- counted for on natural principles.