Charles Ellicott Commentary Matthew 16:17

"And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jonah: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father who is in heaven." — Matthew 16:17 (ASV)

Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona. Looking to the reality of our Lord’s human nature—its capacity for wonder (Mark 6:6, Luke 7:9), anger (Mark 3:5), sorrow (John 11:35, Luke 19:41), and other emotions—it is not overly bold to recognize in these words something like a tone of exalted joy. It is the first direct personal beatitude He pronounced; and, as such, it presents a marked contrast to the rebukes which had been addressed to Peter, as to the others, for being “without understanding,” “of little faith,” with “their heart yet hardened.” Here, then, He had at last found the clear, unshaken, unwavering faith which was the indispensable condition for the manifestation of His kingdom as a visible society on earth. The beatitude is solemnized by the full utterance of the name the disciple had before he was called by the new name of Cephas, or Peter, to the work of an Apostle. He was to distinguish between the old natural life and the new supernatural life .

Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee. A better translation is, It was not flesh and blood that revealed it. The words are used in their common Hebrew meaning (1 Corinthians 15:50; Ephesians 6:12) for human nature and human agency in all their manifold forms. The disciple had received the faith he now professed not through popular rumors, nor through the teaching of scribes, but by a revelation from the Father. He was led, in the strictest sense of the words, through the veil of our Lord’s human nature to recognize the divine.