In Mt 28" there is recorded a command of Jesus to baptize 'in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.' The earliest mention we have of this is in the Didac.he, where a similar direction is given.JJ Justin Martyr says that baptism was administered in the Triune Name.§§ Iren^us, who mentions baptism in the Triune Name, bases this not on the command in Matthew but on the traditional faith handed down to him ' " by the elders, the disciples of the apostles." ' |||| That baptism in the Triune Name was universally current about A.D. 1.50 is scarcely in accordance with the evidence. The discrepancy between the command of Jesus and the practice of the Apostolic Church has been accounted for in various ways, some of which are worthy of consideration. (1) Its historicity as part of Matthew's Gospel and its authority as a command of the Lord have been main- tained,HIT the argument adduced being that the words did not constitute a formula to be used, and that baptism into the name of Jesus was virtually the same as baptism into the Triune Name — an explanation that does not account for the fact that the words of Jesus were not in one single case obeyed. (2) The historicity of the words as those of Jesus, questioned, by Neander,*** who declares it undeniable that the account 'does not bear so distinct a historical stamp as other narratives of Christ's reappearance ' is denied by Strauss, Weinel, Clemen, Harnack, Robinson, Sabatier.ttt
• Ac 193- 4- B. t Eo 63, 1 Co 113. 14 102, G.al 32!.
t 1 Co 611 1213, Eph 46, Col 212, 1 P 321. In none of tliese cases would the ' ceremonial formula have been out of place * (Exp, 6th ser., iii. (19U1] 411).
§ Ac 825-« 1014-15. II Ac 18.
II Vis. iii. 3; Sim. ix. 16 (ct. ix. 13); the Athoa MS reads ' name of God.*
** Ch. ix.
tt Cyprian, Ep. Ixxiii. 17-18 ; P. C. Conybcare, iJCr" ii. SO.";.
tt Ch. vii. ; but see J. H. Bernard, Exp, 6th sen, v. [1902] 61.
§§ Ayot. i. 61.
II II Exp, 7th ser., iv. [1907] 42 ; A. Harnack, History of Dogma, ii. [1S96J 22.
mi Resch, EocpT vi. 247 ; J. T. Marshall, ih. p. 39,''i ; Critical Review, v. [ISO.')] 42; F. H. Chase, JThSl vi. [1904-0.1) 481 St., viii. [1906-07] 161 II. ; VV. O. Allen, ICC, 'Matthew '3, 1912, p. 305(1. : J. V. Barllet, ERE ii. 376 ; A. Plumnier, aDB i. 242 ; J. H. Bernard. Exp, Rth ser., v. [1902] 61.
•" Life ofJesvs Christ, ISSO, pp. 131, 484 n.
ttt D. F. Strauss, Life of Jesus^, 1892, p. 746 f., 8a.V8 : 'The formula in Matthew sounds so exactl.v as if it had been borrowed from the ecclesiastical ritual, that tliere is no slitrlit prol)aI>ilit.v in the supposition that it was transferred from thence into the mouth of Jesus.' H. Weinel, in Jesus
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(3) Tlie historicity of tlio words as part of the First Gosi)el, questioiicil hy iSamiav,* who says ' they belong to a coinparatively late ami sus- pected part of the Gospel,' is assailed hy Cony- beare.t who holds that iho command to baptize in the Triune Name was interpolated for dogmatic reasons in some copies of the Gosiiel, and that its place in the text was not fully assured till after the Council of Nica'a, instancing the fact that Eusebius of Caesarea (A.D. 313-3:5y), when quoting or referrinjj to it, continually omits or stops short of the words which refer to baptism. This practi- cally is the opinion of such scholars as Moll'att and Kirsojjp Lake.J Of singular interest are the opinions of liruce. At lirst maintaining that this and other post-Ilesurrection sayings ' bear internal evidence of being last words from their fitness to the situation,' § he comes to favour an idea of Keim that Mt 28'", an authentic logion spoken by Jesus before His death, was transferred by Matthew to what he deemed a specially suitable place — the final leave-taking, the trinitarian formula simply summing up ' in brief compass the teaching of Jesus ' ; 11 tiien he accepts the idea that the apostles knew the formula but ' did not consider themselves under bondage to a form of words, but felt free to use an equivalent form,' H and comes at last to think that tlie words 'are not so much' a report of ' what the risen .lesus said ... as a summary of what the Apostolic Church understood to be the will of the exalted Lord.' ** But even if the passage be a genuine logion of Jesus, the knowledge of which may have been contined to only a few, preserved only in one Gospel which is dated c. A.D. 80,+t it cannot be used as evidence against what, so far as one knows, was an actual anil universal custom. The slight variety in the words which record the baptism in the name of Jesus — clearly of no signilicance JJ — shows that there was indeed no stereotyped formula whicli must not be dejiarted from, but raises no doubt as to the fact that baptism was in the name not of three persons, but of one.
The meaning of such baptism is clear. When we remember the use of the name in the exorcism of demons, when we remember that the world into which the religion of Jesus came was ' a world without natural science, steeped in belief in every kind of magic and enchantment, and full of public and private religious societies, every one of which had its mysteries and miracles and its blood - bond with its peculiar deity,' that ' it was from