KEYS, POWER OF THE. Normally in the Bible, and always in the NT, “key” (κλέις) is used in a fig. sense to refer to the means of entry into the realms of spiritual destiny. The phrase “the power of the keys” is not, strictly speaking, a Biblical one, although the keys themselves do symbolize the spiritual authority to open or close the gates of hell or the kingdom of heaven.

I. Keys in the ancient world. Many ancient peoples thought of the realms of spiritual destiny as entered by doors, and of the gods and angelic beings or the demons as having the keys to those realms. Among the holders of such keys were Shamash (Babylonia), Dike (Greece), Janus (Rome), Aion-Kronos (Mithraism) and Helios (Neo-Platonic period). The underworld, too, had key-keepers: Nedu (Babylonia), Pluto, Aiacos, Persephone and Selena-Hecate (Greece), Anubis (magic lit.) and Isis (mystery religions). Cf. Jeremias, 744ff.

II. Keys in the OT and Judaism. Judges 3:25 refers to the key to the doors of King Eglon’s private quarters; in this case alone is the word “key” used non-fig. Isaiah 22:22 refers to the investing of Eliakim, the son of Hilkiah, with the authority of comptroller of David’s household: “I [Yahweh] will lay the key of the house of David on his shoulder; what he opens no man shall shut and what he shuts no man shall open” (NEB). Of this crucial v. Bright comments most significantly for an understanding of NT usage: “The key, carried slung from the shoulder, was the symbol of the major-domo’s authority to admit or deny access to the king...” (Peake, in loc.).

Consistent with Isaianic usage, the rabbinics refer to the giving of keys as a symbol of the granting of authority. For example, in the 2nd cent. Apocalypse of Baruch the angel Michael is described as ὁ κλειδοῦχος τῆς βασιλείας τῶν ὀυρανῶν (the keeper of the keys of the heavenly realm). In Heb. Enoch, ’Anaphiel Yahweh keeps the keys to the palaces in the seventh heaven where the righteous dead are kept. Also significant are the reference in the Babylonian Talmud to the key of rain which opens the doors of heaven and other references to the keys to thunder, lightning, snow, ice and frost (cf. Jeremias, 745).

III. Keys in the NT

1. The key to the sky. Much in the tradition of the Babylonian Talmud, Luke 4:25 speaks of a time in Elijah’s days when the doors of heaven (the sky) never opened to let the rain come down and Revelation 11:6 says the two witnesses have the “power to shut the sky, that no rain may fall.”

2. Keys to the realms of spiritual destiny. On a more spiritual level is the idea of the key to the reign of God (Matt 16:19 and 23:13). In the former v. Jesus tells Peter, “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven.” The pl. here reflects a Jewish belief that God held four keys in His hand—to rain, conception, resuscitation of the dead, and crops (see also IV below). In the latter v., the Pharisees and legal experts are accused of shutting (the verb is κλείειν, lit. “to lock [with a key]”) the door of the kingdom of heaven in men’s faces. In the light of Bright’s comment (above) and the Jewish tendency to use “heaven” as a substitute for “God,” the Jewish leaders are accused of preventing the access of men to God’s royal presence.

The underworld had many keys because it had many doors or gates. Rabbi ’Aqiba tells of the time when God will give Michael and Gabriel the keys to open the 40,000 gates of gēhinnōm (“hell”) (cf. Jeremias, 746, n. 33). God says (Rev 1:18) “I have the keys of Death and Hades (ἁδης).” Bousset suggests that to get these keys from the ruler of the underworld God must have won them in a victorious battle; Cullmann adds that God intends to open the doors of Death’s domain for those imprisoned inside (209; cf. also Jeremias, 746). Revelation 9:1 and 20:1 refer to “the key of the (shaft of the) bottomless pit.” Jeremias sees this as a well-like shaft where evil spirits are imprisoned. It is to be opened in the end-time so that demonic locusts can blight the earth, and once again at the beginning of the millennium so that Satan can be incarcerated in it. Jeremias also argues that this abyss must be distinguished from Death’s domain (746). In these NT passages Death, hell and the “bottomless pit” all reflect a view of the grave as a prison in which men are bound and held captive.

3. The key of David. John is told to write the words of Christ, “who has the key of David; who opens and no one shall shut, who shuts and no one opens” (Rev 3:7). Christ has set before the church at Philadelphia “an open door, which no one is able to shut,” i.e. access to God and to David’s city, the new Jerusalem, in the last age. The allusion to Isaiah 22:22 is apparent.

4. The key of (to) knowledge. Luke 11:52 criticizes the Jewish lawyers for taking away the key of knowledge, i.e. of the kingdom of God. Scholars have debated the meaning of this passage (cf. the parallel form in Matt 23:13). On the lips of Jesus (Sitz im Leben Jesu), Jeremias suggests, the phrase τῆς γνώσεως was prob. a genitive of apposition: “You have taken away the key to God’s kingdom, namely knowledge of him.” But in its present Lucan context it would be more natural as an objective genitive: “You have taken away the key to knowledge,” i.e. the knowledge of God contained in the OT Scriptures which the scribes were supposed to unlock for God’s people (Jeremias, 747f.).

IV. Peter’s keys. Matthew 16:17-19 assumed in the course of church history a significance far out of proportion to the role the passage plays in the Gospel. Particularly as the doctrine of penance was elaborated in the Western church and at the time of the Protestant Reformation did it become a crux interpretationem. Within the Roman Catholic tradition, the doctrine of the “privilege of Peter” developed into a doctrine of church unity centering in the bishop of Rome, the “pope.” He delegated to those bishops and priests in communion with him the power to forgive sins through a system of penance and absolution. Protestants traditionally have emphasized Peter’s faith as the foundation “rock” of the Church, and have rejected the idea that Peter’s privilege was transmitted to Peter’s successors. Although the keys are not specifically mentioned, most contemporary Biblical exegetes see the giving of the keys to Peter as synonymous in meaning (Matt 18:18) with “binding” and “loosing” (q.v.). They therefore agree that the same authority given to Peter (Matt 16:19) is here given to the other apostles, and in fact to the whole Christian congregation (but for a different view, see Jeremias, 752). Typical are the words of the Catholic Biblical scholar T. Worden: “The actual power to forgive sins is not given directly to Peter and the apostles in Matthew 16:19 and 18:18. These verses are better interpreted as referring to the full authority given to the Church in matters of doctrine and morals.” There is a tendency to see the exercise of the keys in the threefold process of excommunication by reprimand, public rebuke, and full excommunication of Matthew 18:15-17 and Titus 3:10. Agreement has not been reached on the extent of the correspondence between Peter’s authority to bind and loose and the current Catholic practice of penance.

Bibliography By far the most important article on the topic is J. Jeremias, “κλέις,” TDNT, 3: 744-753. See also Thomas Worden, “The Remission of Sins: II,” New Testament Abstracts, 2 (1958), 262; O. Cullmann, Peter: Disciple, Apostle, Martyr (2nd ed., 1962), 209, 210; J. Bright, “Isaiah I,” [Peakes] Commentary on the Bible (1962) on Isa 22:22; R. Bultmann, History of the Synoptic Tradition (1963), 138-142, 258f., et in passim; W. Bousset, Kyrios Christos (1970), 65. For relevant periodical lit., see B. M. Metzger, Index to Periodical Literature on Christ and the Gospels, and, for more recent material, New Testament Abstracts.