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Jesus blessed infants. That’s kind of a big deal.
The New Testament ascribes many different titles and descriptions to Jesus. He is the King of Kings, the Great High Priest, the Prince of Peace, and the list goes on (waaaay on). Since these descriptions are true, it’s interesting to bear them in mind as we watch Jesus in the gospel accounts. We see people… Continue reading
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Bromiley on Infant Baptism
“The children of confessing Christians awaken to self-conscious life with the promise of the gospel in their ears and may thus have the mark of the covenant on their bodies. [ . . .] The call to them is not to enter into a totally new covenant relationship proclaimed for the first time from outside”.… Continue reading
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in totidem verbis – considering a problematic hermeneutic (part 2)
In my previous post I mentioned a well-used hermeneutical principle which I called in totidem verbis, meaning “in just so many words”. This principle says that we often understand what the Bible is teaching by seeing it laid out for us explicitly and plainly in the words before us. And it makes obvious sense. In… Continue reading
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in totidem verbis – considering a problematic hermeneutic (part 1)
Reading and correctly interpreting the Bible isn’t always easy. There are complex historical, social, and theological ideas which are presented to us across an array of literary genres, from multiple authors writing in different contexts. However, there are things the Bible says which are easy to identify without much effort. For example, the Bible claims… Continue reading
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Water Rites – a poem
Can sin be drowned in water,E’en with a flood of tears?Or is it rather SpiritThat grafts the sinner in? Does parting of the watersMake Exodus come true?Or is it rather death to sin That makes one born anew? Between the two creationsTwo baptisms confessThe one depicts the story,The other makes one blest. Immersion in Christ’s storyDeath,… Continue reading
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Did Tertullian View Infant Baptism as an ‘innovation’?
Short answer, no. In the book Believer’s Baptism: Sign of the New Covenant in Christ, Steven A. McKinion suggests that Tertullian’s De Baptismo was “written in response to the innovative practice of infant baptism” (p. 173; emphasis mine). Unfortunately, such a statement reveals a reluctance to deal with Tertullian on his own terms, in his own context. Bryan Holstrom, author of Infant Baptism… Continue reading
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More about Origen on Infant Baptism
Here are some quotes from Origen on infant baptism, including the quote I used in my last post about Origen: 1. In his Homilies on Luke (XIV on 2:22a) he remarks “therefore children also are baptized”. 2. In his Homilies on Leviticus (VIII 3 on 12.2) he says baptism is given “according to custom of the Church, to infants… Continue reading
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Origen on Infant Baptism
“For this reason, moreover, the Church received from the apostles the tradition of baptizing infants too.” – Origen, Commentary on Romans, (ca.244 A.D.) “Origen could, of course, have been wrong about the apostolic origins of infant baptism. He was writing, it must be recalled, the best part of two centuries after the time of the apostles, and… Continue reading
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Oh look. Yet. Another. Blog.
“What has been will be again,what has been done will be done again;there is nothing new under the sun.” The writer of the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes (1:9) got it right, and this blog is proof. Doesn’t the world have enough blogs as it is? Aren’t blogs an outdated way of getting your “message”… Continue reading
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