"Upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it."
Matthew 16:18 · King James Bible
Where it was
Caesarea Philippi lay at the very northern edge of the land of Israel, at the foot of Mount Hermon, where a great spring poured out of a cave and became one of the sources of the Jordan River. In Jesus's day it was a Greco-Roman city, rebuilt and beautified by Herod's son Philip the Tetrarch and named after the emperor Caesar and himself. The great cave was a shrine to the god Pan. It was as pagan a place as a Jewish rabbi could stand in.Why it matters in the Bible
In Matthew 16 Jesus deliberately takes his disciples all the way up here — to the far northern edge of the land, in the shadow of the pagan grotto — and asks them the question the whole Gospel has been building toward. "Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?"They answer: some say John the Baptist, some say Elijah, some say Jeremiah or one of the prophets.
Then Jesus asks it directly: "But whom say ye that I am?"
Peter — impulsive Peter — answers for all of them: "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God."
Jesus blesses him: "Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it."
Six days later, on a high mountain nearby (traditionally Mount Hermon just above the town), Jesus is transfigured before Peter, James, and John — Moses and Elijah appear with him, and the voice from the cloud says, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him."