Binding and loosing


Binding and loosing is originally a Jewish Mishnaic phrase also mentioned in the New Testament, as well as in the Targum. In usage, to bind and to loose simply means to forbid by an indisputable authority and to permit by an indisputable authority.. One example of this is Isaiah 58:5-6 which relates proper fasting to loosing the chains of injustice.
The poseks had, by virtue of their ordination, the power of deciding disputes relating to Jewish law. Hence, the difference between the two main schools of thought in early classical Judaism were summed up by the phrase the school of Shammai binds; the school of Hillel looses.
Theoretically, however, the authority of the poseks proceeded from the Sanhedrin, and there is therefore a Talmudic statement that there were three decisions made by the lower house of judgment to which the upper house of judgment gave its supreme sanction. The claim that whatsoever bind or loose on earth shall be bound or loosed in heaven, which the Gospel of Matthew attributes to Jesus, is probably therefore just an adoption of a phrase popular at the time.
This is also the meaning of the phrase when it is applied in the text to Simon Peter and the other apostles in particular when they are invested with the power to bind and loose by Christ.
This also serves as the scriptural and traditional foundation for the Catholic Church's conception of papal authority, stemming from such an investiture of St. Peter, since, according to Roman Catholic doctrine, the Popes are the Successors of St. Peter.

Phrase in context

First evidence of binding and loosening

Acts chapter 15 expresses the first documented instance of loosening and binding; what has been later termed the Council at Jerusalem. Here the early controversy of circumcision was resolved, and loosened from being a qualification for salvation and acceptance into the community of believers. In the depiction below, we see an appeal to follow what has been revealed by the Holy Spirit, and not what opinions of men would suppose. Four things are bound while one thing is loosened:
Controversy still exists today whether the authority to loosen or bind is still in effect, if it passed at some point during the church's early development, or to what extent Gospel and doctrine have been loosened or bound by either the Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Coptic Orthodox, Protestant and other traditions.