Wednesday, May 16, 2007
The Mark of the Covenant
Circumcision as a sign of the Abrahamic Covenant is often seen as analogous to baptism as a sign of the New Covenant. It is because of this apparent correlation that many churches today still practice infant baptism (circumcision was to be administered to infants who were 8 days old). Is this a fair assessment and is this practice a proper application of baptism as it is Biblically described?
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2 comments:
I see the correlation of those that profess infant baptism in the circumcision and water baptism BUT I don’t think they are the same thing and I would argue that it is a mightily big stretch to use this at the connecting factor. If this was the “link” and water baptism is then the NT equivalent to the OT circumcision then why wasn’t Jesus baptized as an infant? I would continue to argue that they are not the equivalent. Baptism is the symbol used for the believers mark (if you will “mark”). In the NT there is only two places that possibly bend towards infant baptism and they don’t even specifically say this it is alluded too and those that want to use infant baptism simple put in their own theology where it fits best for them to use it. All explicit examples in the NT of baptisms are examples of persons who are professed Christ as Lord; hence a Believers Baptism.
Interestingly, many scholars believed John the Baptist, based on the context of his ministry, was an Essene. John had regarded the Jerusalem establishment of his day to be hopelessly corrupt and preached excoriating sermons against it. He urged the populace to repent and to accept the Essene rite of purification by baptism in the River Jordan. Luke suggests that John the Baptist and Jesus were related. At Jesus's baptism he had been called the Son of God by a voice from heaven, seemingly as a confirmation that he was the Messiah. There was actually nothing unusual to people of that day of such a proclamation from above: the Rabbis often experienced what they called a "bat qol": literally translated as "Daughter of the Voice," - a form of inspiration that had replaced the more direct prophetic revalations of the near past. Rabbi Yohannan ben Zakkai had heard such a bat qol when the Holy Spirit had descended upon him and his disciples some 100 years earlier in the form of fire.
Interestingly, many scholars argue the nature of Jesus's mission and wonder aloud if he was a Pharisee or an Essene himself, particularly pointing to passages from Mark. Certainly, the Essenes were against the Jewish "Breakers of the Covenant" and led celibate but communal lives with collective ownership, as described in Acts. It is possible that Jesus was a reformed Pharisee, like Paul, who adopted Essene customs. Baptism is largely seen as having been first supported by the Essenes as a purification ritual from earliest literature dating to the 2nd Century BC. They were strict believers of nonviolence, devoted to Yahweh, and often chanted a familiar law often derived from Hillel's Golden Rule, that Jesus adopted and modified in his own teachings: do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
The Essenes were against animal sacrifice, and Philo's concordance that dates to 1st Century BC (as well as that of Josephus) shows that many of their teachings about animal sacrifice, mirror Jesus and later Paul's teaching on the subject.
As far as a relationship to Jewish culture, baptism is clearly more paralleled with the Jewish custom of Mikvah, (not circumcision), though it is not spoken of as "baptism."
As Methodists, we believe that baptism is meant to save us in Christ's name. Baptists and Calvinists are the only denominations that do not necessarily see baptism as having Sacramental power, but rather as being "a worthy practice."
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