•1. 1 (or. xii, 13: "For by one Spirit (or in one spirit, iv iri -I'si'/ion) we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether bond or free, ami wore all made to drink of one Spirit." The re- semblance of this passage to the last is very clear. In the old dispensation there was a marked division be- tweenJew .nil Gentile; under the Gospel there is one body in Christ. As in Gal. iii, 16, Christ is the seed (to n-rn/ict), so here he is the bod}' (to adfia) into which all Christians become incorporated. All dis- tinction; of .lew and Gentile, bond and free, are abol- ished. By the grace of the same Spirit (or perhaps •• in ono spirit" of Christian love and fellowship (comp. Eph. ii, is i, without division or separate interests) all ar^ joined in baptism to the one body of Christ, his universal church. Possibly there is an allusion to both sacraments. "We were baptized into one body, v. ■ wore made to drink of one Spirit" (cvTIvEvpa tiro- rioQnfiev : Lachm. and Tisch. omit ta). Both our baptism and our partaking of the cup in the commu- nion are tokens and pledges of Christian unity. They in uk our union with the one body of Christ, and they sir • means of grace, in which we may look for one Spirit to be present with blessing (comp. 1 Cor. x, 3, 17; see Waterland on the Euchari t, ch. x, and Stan- ley on 1 Cm-, xii, 13).
5. Com. \i, !. and Col. ii, 12, are so closely parallel that we may notice them together. As the apostle in the two last-considered passages views baptism as a joining to the mystical body of Christ, so in these two passages he goes on to speak of Christians in their b iptism as buried with Christ in his death, and raised again with him in Ins resurrection. As the natural bodj of I Ihrisl was laid in the ground and then raised ii]> again, so his mystic d body, the church, descends in baptism into the waters, in which also (ev <.j, sc. ftrnrrlo-pan, Col. ii, 12) it is raised up again with Christ, through " faith in the mighty working of God, who raised him from the dead." Probably, as in the former passages Paul had brought forward baptism as the Bymbol of Christian unity, so in those now before M- he refers t > it as the token and pledge of the spirit- ual death to sin and resurrection to righteousness; and moreover of the final victory over death in the through the power of the resurrection of It is said that it was partly in reference to ' i i in Colossians that the early Christians so
gen irally used trine immersion, as signifying thereby the three days in which Christ lay in the grave (see Suicer,s. .. ...,„, II. a).— Smith, Append, s. v.
J Jewish Baptism. — Purifications by washing
common among the Jews. See Ad-
1 ''•''.%. I" the language of the prophets, cleansing
d as an emblem ofthe purification of
I whii l, in the Messianic age is to glorify the
- iul in her innsrmost recesses, and to embrace the
who! » of I ti nation | Ezek. xxxvi, 25 sq. ;
Zech. xiii 1 >. Of the antiquity of lustrations by wal
rows there is no question, but it is still
1 ! I whether baptism was practised, as an
rite, in connection with circumcision before
the coming of Christ. It is well established that, as early as the second century ofthe Christian sera, this proselyU baptism was an established rite among tiro .lews; and their writers, as well as many Christian theologians (e. g. Lightfoot, Wetstein, Wall, and oth- ers), claim for it a much greater antiquity. But this opinion is hardly tenable, for, as an act which strictly gives validity to the admission of a proselyte, and is no mere accompaniment to his admission, baptism certain- ly is not alluded to in the New Testament; while, ::s to the passages quoted in proof from the classical (pro- fane) writers of that period, they are all open to the most fundamental objections. Nor is the utter silence of Josephus and Philo on the subject, notwithstanding their various opportunities of touching on it, a less weighty argument against this view. It is true that mention is made in the Talmud of that regulation as already existing in the first century A.D. ; but such statements belong only to the traditions of the Gema- ra, and require careful investigation before they can serve as proper authority. This Jewish rite was prob- ably originally only a purifying ceremony ; and it was raised to the character of an initiating and indispensa- ble rite, co-ordinate with that of sacrifice and circum- cision, only after the destruction of the Temple, when sacrifices had ceased, and the circumcision of prose- h'tes had, by reason of public edicts, become more and more impracticable. See Proselyte.
2. John's Baptism. — " It was the principal object of John the Baptist to combat the prevailing opinion that the performance of external ceremonies was suffi- cient to secure participation in the kingdom of God and his promises; he required repentance, therefore, as a preparation for the approaching kingdom of the Messiah. That he may possibly have baptized heathens also seems to follow from his censuring the Pharisees for confiding in their descent from Abraham, while they had no share in his spirit ; yet it should not be overlooked that this remark was drawn from him by the course of the argument (Matt, iii, 8, {) ; Luke iii, 7, 8). We must, on the whole, assume that John con- sidered the existing Judaism as a stepping-stone by which the Gentiles were to arrive at the kingdom of God in its Messianic form. The general point of view from which John contemplated the Messiah and his kingdom was that of the Old Testament, though close- ly bordering on Christianity. He regards, it is true, an alteration in the mind and spirit as an indispensa- ble condition for partaking in the kingdom of the Mes- siah ; still, he looked for its establishment by means of conflict and external force, with which the Messiah was to be endowed ; and he expected in him a Judge and Avenger, who was to set up outward and visible distinctions. It is, therefore, by no means a matter of indifference whether baptism be administered in the name of that Christ who floated before the mind of John, or of the suffering and glorified One, such as the apostles knew him ; and whether it was considered a preparation for a political, or a consecration into a spiritual theocracy. John was so far from this latter view, so far from contemplating a purely spiritual de- velopment of the kingdom of God, that he even began subsequently to entertain doubts concerning Christ (Matt, xi, 2). John's baptism had not the character of an immediate, but merely of a preparatory conse- cration for the glorified theocracy' (John i, 31). The apostles, therefore, found it necessary to rebaptize the disciples of John, who had still adhered to the notions of their master on that head (Acts xix). To this apos- tolic judgment Tertullian appeals, and in his opinion coincide the most eminent teachers of the ancient church, both ofthe East and the West.". — Jacobi, in Kitto1* Cyclop, s. v. See John (the Baptist).