Baptismal Regeneration?
 

This article is from pages 18 and 19 of the June 2008 Pentecostal Herald.

The article is by Matthew Shaw, who is a librarian and teaches English at Ball State University. He serves as the minister of music at the United Pentecostal Church of New Castle, Indiana. His pastor is Jeffery y. Jaco.

Ancient Writings on the Efficacy of Baptism for the Remission of Sins
The Shepherd of Hermas, a second century apocalyptic work, supports both the notion of baptism by immersion and for spiritual cleansing: “[W]e went down into the water and obtained remission of our former sins.

Water baptism is the most ancient rite in Christianity, and the New Testament is replete with examples of baptism by immersion from John’s baptism of repentance in the River Jordan to the proselytes of the Apostles to the epistlary metaphors of baptism as burial with Christ (Romans 6:4) and Noah’s ark (1 Peter 3:20-21). While most Christian denominations observe some ordinance of baptism, the majority of Protestants reduce the act to a mere public profession of faith, decrying the doctrine of remission of sins in baptism as salvation by works rather than salvation by grace. In fact, neither biblical exegesis, nor history divides baptism from salvation. Patristical writings, which are non-canonical, post Apostolic epistles and apologetics, provide ample credence that early Christians universally accepted water baptism as the sole mode for remitting sins.

St. Clement, purportedly the same Clement named by Paul in Philippians, asks in a letter to the Corinthians, “[S]hall we, if we keep not our baptism pure and undefiled, come into the kingdom of God?” Clearly, Clement identifies Christian baptism as the moment of cleansing. St. Barnabas examines foreshadowing of baptism and the cross in the Old Testament: “Concerning the water, it is written with respect to Israel, how that will not receive the baptism that bringeth remission of sins, but will establish one for themselves.” Further, he writes: “Learn e: having received the remission of our sins, and having hoped upon the name of the Lord, we have become new, having been again created entirely.” These passages explicitly connect the erasure of sins with water baptism, and Barnabas explains that this accompanies hoping on the name of the Lord, the most primitive apostolic baptismal formula.

The Shepherd of Hermas, a second century apocalyptic work, supports both the notion of baptism by immersion and for spiritual cleansing: “[W]e went down into the water and obtained remission of our former sins.” Hermas like Barnabas, refers to invocation of the name of Jesus in the rite: “’For before a man,’saith he, ‘has borne the name of [the Son of] God, he is dead; but when he has deceived the seal, he layeth aside his deadness and resumeth life. The seal then is the water: so they go down into the water dead, and they come up alive.’” Baptism in the name of Jesus is, in Hermas, regenerative.

Justin Martyr expanded the biblical baptismal formula to “in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit,” but he retained the Apostolic teaching of baptism for the remission of sins; “[We] may obtain in the water the remission of sins formerly committed, and this washing is called illumination, because they who learn these things are illuminated in their understandings.”

While the New Testament doctrine of water baptism by immersion solely in the name of Christ degenerated with the increasing schisms and encroaching apostasy of the early church, the nascent Catholic communion retained the biblical connection between baptism and the remission of sins. The Roman Creed, which dates from the third century, includes a generic belief in the “remission of sins,” and the fourth century Nicene Creed says: “I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins.” Though most Protestant eschew the idea of spiritual regeneration in the baptismal ceremony, the scriptural view espoused by modern Oneness Pentecostals is greatly supported both by the primary text of God’s Word and the most ancient bishops and apologists for the Christian faith. Baptism is an indisputable element of the new birth; and b faith in the redemptive work of the blood of Jesus Christ, our sins are truly washed away in the fountain of His forgiveness.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Jim

This is quite an interesting argument for this point of view. However, I don't think you would totally agree with it.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

The author uses for his authority the writings of post-apostolic authors and creeds of the Roman church. Usually Oneness writers shun these things because that is where they say the doctrine of the trinity is found. Is this an admission in the Pentecostal Herald that the UPC holds to a Roman Catholic doctrine of washing away of sin in baptism? Also, he is strangely silent about another ancient document which may have been written as early as 60 AD which speaks of water baptism this way:
And concerning baptism, baptize in this manner:
Having first taught all of these things, baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living water.
But if you have no living water, baptize in other water ((preferably cold)); and if you cannot do so in cold water, do so in warm.
But if you have neither, pour water three times upon the head in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."
This is from a writing called the Didiche or the Limuda. In the AESV Bible it is part of Acts 15:23-29.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

I think what the writer is essentially saying is that (unlike what some Evangelicals and Pentecostal "1-steppers" may wish for us to believe) the concept of baptism for remission of sins is not only in the bible, but was clearly and commonly expressed in the writings of the second and third century believers.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Very good points

Yes, I was very surprised that he quoted Justin Martyr. I can remember reading stuff quoted from McClain an early oneness historian and he heavily criticized Justin Martyr.

I agree with you about the fact that regenaration in water doctrine goes concurrent with the Roman Catholic belief.

I think most oneness proponents even the writer of this article would claim that there was a reason that the passage that you last quoted was left out of most of the protestant bibles. They would say because it was not inspired.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Yes, this is why Paul was so proud of the people that he had baptized in Corinth and also why he made baptism his central theme in Romans (Romans being his suma teologia of all his writings). But wait, baptism was not his central theme, it was faith in Jesus, SO THAT NO MAN COULD BOAST.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Well, let's not miss the Bro. Shaw's point here.

The issue that the brother is getting at is not whether the Didache or these other writings were divinely inspired. The issue is whether the belief of baptism for remission of sins was widely held in the church of the first few centuries.

Without getting into a debate on the merits of the doctrine, the fact is...whether one agrees with the doctrine or not, one can not make an informed argument that the concept of baptism for the remission of sins wasn't a widely held doctrine in the church of the first few centuries.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Maybe someone else wants to get dragged into that argument.

As for me, its been there, done that. Cant be bothered.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

I may be wrong here. Perhaps someone can correct me if I am. I seem to remember hearing or reading that Emperor Constantine waited until just before his death to be baptized because he believed that baptism would wash away sins and he wanted to be clean when he died. I don't have any historic writing to cite for that but it seems I heard or read it somewhere.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Never heard of that one before.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Like I said, I may be wrong about it but it seems to me I heard it or read it somewhere.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

What is the difference between baptismal regeneration doctrine and our view of water baptism's role in salvation? Do we believe in baptismal regeneration?

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Baptismal regeneration is the commonly held view that something mystical happens to an individual when they take a religious bath. Somehow, God pours out a special vial of blood and removes their sins. They believe you are not saved unless you are baptized, because it is the actual act of baptism that removes sin.

The only problem with this is if you sin again, you need to be rebaptised and we all know we sin again probably within a few minutes of the original baptism.

I recently heard a very well know UPC evangelist state that baptism removes sin and if you sin again, God will deal with you about it. This is the stupidest remark I've ever heard. He is considered one of the most sought after evangelist in the Organ.

However, this view detaches salvation away from Christ and his finished work and places it in our hands.

It totally negates the work of the cross and allows us to be co-contributors in our own salvation.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

That is true sam. I have read the in one of my Christian History books (I believe the author was Eldridge). Also David Calhoun, seminary professor of I believe it is called Covenant Seminary (Presbeterian) in St Louis stated that.

If anyone wants free seminary lectures you can download like 20 different subjects from their web page. I heard Calhoun say that in one of his Early Church History lectures.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Often UPC preachers imply that the blood is then applied afterwards during communion. This is why they will often say, now that we have taken communion let us rejoice because all of our sins since baptism have been washed away.

Like I said it is very similar to the Roman catholic view of imparted grace through special sacraments of the church.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

How do we contribute anything to remission of sins? By stepping in the water and calling on the name of the Lord?

We don't have to be rebaptized after our initial burial in the water. That is as bad as me saying (which I have) that One steppers have to be continually rebaptized in the Holy Spirit because the Spirit departs from them every time they sin ....how can the Holy Spirit fill an unclean vessel except remission of sins happens at repentance otherwise sinners were filled with the Spirit before their sins were remitted in Acts 10.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

I can't site it for you off the top of my head either but I have read it before.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

There is no virtue in H20 but at the same time we can't reduce MARK.16:16 to a mere suggestion either.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

I haven't heard this; however it doesn't surprise me. It is possible this doctrine is why the Catholics take communion daily though. Makes sense if they actually teach your sins are removed through the sacrament.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Scott, baptism is what we do because of what he did!

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Of course I agree water baptism is because of what He did.It's an act of faith.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Here is something to consider Jesus alone can only forgive a person of their sins.
If a preacher could do something to you to forgive or remit sins,then men could have ability to forgive sins,then if that were possible Jesus would have died in vain.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Scott

I would never want to get on your bad side by offending you because you are one of the kindest people of this site.

Neverhteless, I would say to your post that you are right in that Mark 16:16 is a command of the Lord. Nevertheless, we go back to Paul's argument about how Abraham was not justified by circumsion but by his faith years before the circumsion. According do the Dake bible concordance there are 1050 commands in the New Testament for the New Testament believer. I doubt very seriously that we are in accordance with all of these commands all of the time. That is why we trust in HIM. I do think we are still write in trying to convince trinitarians that they should be baptized in Jesus name because it was a command from the Lord. Nevertheless, if they do not I am not going to disdain them.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Only Jesus can forgive sins, but I believe baptism is a command of Scripture. Refuse to be water baptized in Jesus name at your own risk. :preach

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Look at it this way if one believes in Christ they will desire to obey Christ.
No offense but Dake has some good points,but on alot of things he was nutty as a fruitcake.
It takes alot to get on my bad side disagreeing with me isn't one of them.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

I concur.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

I do not agree with Dake on all his points either. But all he did was go throught the NT and categorize all the times and things Christians were commanded to do.

By the way to try to bring down an argument by criticizing the author of the argument is an AD HOMINEM fallacy. It is a fallacy because it does not direct the specific point of the argument, it demeans the character of the author of the argument. By so doing it skirts the true issue.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

I have a partial Dake Bible, just the NT and Psalms. I don't really use it. Have you read some of the things he has to say on the nature of God (trinity)?

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

I have read a few things. To be honest with you, I skip over those parts because he says that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost all their own spirit forms. I do not agree with that.

What did you think of his trinity statements?

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Dake is like Mattew Henry you chew the meat and try the fat away.
I personally think Dakes bible is too overpriced.Footnotes are good and are often helpful,but they themselves aren't the inspired scripture.Same with reading Bernard or anybody else.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

I was friends with a Baptist pastor,and He said what Dake wrote on the Trinity was heretical.However he did have some stuff,I gave my Dakes bible away to someone in the church.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Need I say more? I TOLD YOU SO!!!

It's laughable guys like TR now align themselves w/ this ....

TR ... u believe like Justin Martyr that not only does baptism apply the blood of Jesus but provides "illumination of understanding"?

I'm gonna like this thread ...

Thanks for sharing Sam.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Let's add Tertullian to the list of Apostolic Fathers shall we ...

The most striking presentation of this conception, if not the earliest, is that of Tertullian. "Is it not wonderful too," he writes, "that death should be washed away by bathing?" To justify such ascription of efficacy to water baptism he expatiates on the age and the dignity of water. "Water is one of those things that, before all the furnishing of the world, were quiescent with God in a yet unshapen state." It is venerable, therefore. It has dignity also as having been "the seat of the Divine Spirit, more pleasing to him, no doubt, than all the other then existing elements." "Water alone - always a perfect, gladsome, simple, material substance, pure in itself... supplied a worthy vehicle for God." "Water was the first to produce that which had life, that it might be no wonder in baptism if water know how to give life." He speaks of water as "the primary principle of baptism." "The Spirit of God who hovered over the waters from the beginning would," he maintained, "continue to linger over the waters of the baptized." "Thus," he continues, "the nature of the waters, sanctified by the Holy One, itself conceived withal the power of sanctifying." "All waters, therefore,in virtue of the pristine privilege of their origin, do, after invocation of God, attain the sacramental power of sanctification; for the Spirit immediately supervenes from the heavens and rests over the waters, sanctifying them from himself; and being thus sanctified they imbibe at the same time the power of sanctifying."


It's all in the water!!!!

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

They most certainly are in some things! :)

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Brother Shaw why didn't you quote Justin Martyr in his fullest context??? ....

More of the OP scholarship ... or do we have to accept this because it's in the Herald?

Did you forget that he also taught that praying and fasting brought remission of sins ... that was part of the quote you provided ... but perhaps conveniently/cleverly edited ....

Surely this regenerates us too!!!!

The rest of the story ....

As many as are persuaded and believe that what we teach and say is true, and undertake to be able to live accordingly, are instructed to pray and to entreat God with fasting, for the remission of their sins that are past, we praying and fasting with them. Then they are brought by us where there is water, and are regenerated in the same manner in which we were ourselves regenerated. For, in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, they then receive the washing with water (The First Apology. Chapter LXI).

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Some of Justin Martyr's teachings, a Platoist, on regeneration were similar to

Mithra-Like Practices


The "god" Helios is actually also called "Mithra Helios". And Justin had practices that were similar to those employed by the followers of the sun-god Mithra:

For, in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, they then receive the washing with water...And this washing is called illumination, because they who learn these things are illuminated in their understandings (First Apology 61).


And this food is called among us Εύχαριστία [the Eucharist], of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished...Which the wicked devils have imitated in the mysteries of Mithras, commanding the same thing to be done. For, that bread and a cup of water are placed with certain incantations in the mystic rites of one who is being initiated, you either know or can learn (First Apology 66).
Then we all rise together and pray, and, as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like manner offers prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen; and there is a distribution to each, and a participation of that over which thanks have been given, and to those who are absent a portion is sent by the deacons. And they who are well to do, and willing, give what each thinks fit; and what is collected is deposited with the president, who succours the orphans and widows and those who, through sickness or any other cause, are in want, and those who are in bonds and the strangers sojourning among us, and in a word takes care of all who are in need. But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly (First Apology 67).

Lest anyone think that he did not, notice what the historian and scholar K. Latourette observed:

One of the earliest descriptions of the Eucharist, that by Justin Martyr, not far from the middle of the second century, recognizes the similarity to what was seen in one the mystery cults, Mithraism...it has been repeatedly asserted that in baptism and the Eucharist Christians borrowed from the mysteries and that Christianity was simply another one of these cults...The similarity is striking (Latourette KS. A History of Christianity, Volume 1: to A.D. 1500. HarperCollins, San Francisco, 1975, p. 198).

Of course, true Christianity could not "borrow" from the sun-cults, but Justin and those that follow his examples apparently have.
It should be understood that while Justin calls the newly baptized "illuminated" the Bible does not.
Are you aware that one objective of mystery religions like Mithraism was to become illuminated? Notice the following:

FOR more than three centuries Mithraism was practised in the remotest provinces of the Roman empire and under the most diverse conditions...the promise of complete illumination, long withheld, fed the ardor of faith with the fascinating allurements of mystery...The gods were everywhere, and they mingled in every act of life; the fire that cooked the food and warmed the bodies of the faithful, the water that allayed their thirst and cleansed their persons, the very air that they breathed, and the light that illuminated their paths, were the objects of their adoration. Perhaps no other religion ever offered to its sectaries in a higher degree than Mithraism opportunities for prayer and motives for veneration (Cumont, Franz. Translated from the second revised French edition by Thomas J. McCormack. The Mysteries of Mithra. Chicago, Open Court [1903] pp. 104,120,149).

I suspect that some who had some connection with Mithraism professed Christ and that those ceremonies got picked up by apostates who Justin apparently distantly came into contact with. And even though Justin is attempting to state that Mithraism copied "Christian" ceremonies, the fact is that the Mithra ceremonies, including Sunday worship, were in existence prior to Jesus coming. Jesus, of course, kept Saturday for the Sabbath.


Hence it would appear that those who practiced Sunday, called baptized persons "illuminated" (a term indicating "light", such as sunlight) and the mystic eucharistic ceremonies were following non-Christian influences as it obviously did not happen the other way around with these practices.


Sadly, however, it seems that many non-biblical practices slowly became part of the Greco-Roman churches. And while this apparently was not intentional on the part of people like Justin, the relatively early acceptance of such non-biblical practices seems to have led to additional ones being added later.

http://www.cogwriter.com/justin.htm




He was a sacramentalist when it came to the Eucharist and baptism and their proported roles in our regeneration!!!

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Sam- not commenting on conclusions here, but yes it was the custom of many in that era to be baptized upon death bed in the belief that baptism remitted sin, and it increased the likelihood of dying without sin. And it is a common belief Constantine did just that.


http://www.answers.com/topic/constantine-i-the-great

Above link is actually a compilation of several articles on Constantine but pertinent to your observation:

In 326, Constantine had his eldest son Crispus tried and executed, as he believed accusations that Crispus had been having an affair with Fausta, Constantine's second wife. A few months later he also had Fausta killed as the apparent source of these false accusations.

Eusebius reports that Constantine was baptized only shortly before his death in 337. He moved from the Capital to a neighboring thermal spa to take the waters, and thence to his mother's city of Helenopolis, where he prayed in the great church that she built in honor of Lucian the apostle. With this, he followed one custom at the time which postponed baptism until old age or death[19]

19. In this period infant baptism, though practiced (usually in circumstances of emergency) had not yet become a matter of routine in the west. See Thomas M. Finn (1992), Early Christian Baptism and the Catechumenate: East and West Syria. See also Philip Rousseau (1999). "Baptism", in Late Antiquity: A Guide to the Post Classical World, ed. Peter Brown.

Re: Baptismal Regeneration?
 

Yeah held by paganist philosophers who believed the Eucharist, fasting and praying also remitted sins.

You got to be kidding me ....

Surely your best bet is sticking to the 7 or so passages mandating baptism and the countless analogies formulated by the 3 step theologians.