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.