Mark 8:32

‘And Peter drew him aside and began to rebuke him.'

For the use of the verb proslambano as ‘drew aside' compare Acts 18:26. Peter did not want to make an open issue of the matter, and did not want to embarrass Jesus or himself. But the word ‘rebuke' is fairly strong. Peter clearly felt quite strongly about it.

Possibly he took Jesus aside to warn Him that He was in danger of putting people his disciples off (compare John 6:60), or it may have been that he may even have thought that He was being too pessimistic and was mistaken. Either way he felt that things needed putting right, and he was the man to do it. The rebuke takes us quite by surprise. No friend of Jesus had ever rebuked Him in this way over His teaching, or, as far as we know, would again. Indeed it was so presumptious that without the additional information provided by Matthew 16:17 we would be at a loss to understand it. The words and commendation of Jesus had gone to his head and made him think very foolishly. (It has made many think very foolishly ever since. We need to especially to watch ourselves when we are being commended).

Peter's problem may have been mainly with the idea of Jesus needing to suffer. Alternately it may have been with the idea that such suffering would be at the hands of the religious leadership of Israel, for current teaching about the Messiah did not exclude the possibility of a glorious martyrdom at the hands of Israel's enemies, but it would never have thought of it as being at the hands of his own people. In view of what follows (the fact of Jesus' strong rebuke and His teaching that those who followed Him must also suffer) the former seems more likely, although it may have included both.

The whole affair suggests that Peter now thought that he was at last beginning to understand things better and was becoming something of an authority. Why, had not Jesus Himself said that the Father was revealing things to him (Matthew 16:17)? And that gave him false courage and a false sense of his own importance and understanding. (Let him who thinks that he stands beware lest he fall (1 Corinthians 10:12)). Along with his natural impetuosity, which comes out again and again in the Gospels and Acts, and the position of respect he held, this was in danger of becoming a problem. It was therefore necessary that he recognise immediately that he had still much to learn.

There is no doubt that Peter's rebuke was presumptious from a disciple to his teacher, especially such a teacher as Jesus had revealed Himself to be, and when heard for the first time it comes as a distinct shock. It certainly revealed that Peter had the wrong idea of what the Messiahship he had mentioned involved for Jesus, and it equally certainly showed that he had wrong ideas of his own importance and understanding. He had overstepped the line between disciple and compatriot. He had thus to be shown that while he was beginning to have a glimmer of understanding (‘you are the Messiah') it was not much more than that. He still ‘saw men as trees walking' (Mark 8:24). For parallel examples of rebukes that had to be shown to be wrong compare Mark 10:13; Mark 10:48. But this is the only example we have of a disciple rebuking Jesus.