5. What the true effect of baptism is, and what is the real grace conveyed by water hallowed in Christ, I will presently tell you; meantime I will deal with this argument as it deserves. An ill knot,' says the common proverb, requires but an ill wedge to split it.' The text quoted by the objector, "a bishop must be the husband of one wife," admits of quite another explanation. The apostle came of the Jews and the primitive Christian church was gathered out of the remnants of Israel. Paul knew that the Law allowed men to have children by several wives, [2038] and was aware that the example of the patriarchs had made polygamy familiar to the people. Even the very priests might at their own discretion enjoy the same license. [2039] He gave commandment therefore that the priests of the church should not claim this liberty, that they should not take two wives or three together, but that they should each have but one wife at one time. Perhaps you may say that this explanation which I have given is disputed; in that case listen to another. You must not have a monopoly of bending the Law to suit your will instead of bending your will to suit the Law. Some by a strained interpretation say that wives are in this passage to be taken for churches and husbands for their bishops. A decree was made by the fathers assembled at the council of Nicæa [2040] that no bishop should be translated from one church to another, lest scorning the society of a poor yet virgin see he should seek the embraces of a wealthy and adulterous one. For as the word logismoi, that is, "disputings," refers to the fault and misdoing of sons in the faith, [2041] and as the precept concerning the management of a house refers to the right direction of body and of soul, [2042] so by the wives of the bishops we are to understand their churches. Concerning whom it is written in Isaiah, "Make haste ye women and come from the show, for it is a people of no understanding." [2043] And again "Rise up, ye women that are wealthy, [2044] and hear my voice." [2045] And in the Book of Proverbs, "Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies. The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her." [2046] In the same book too it is written, "Every wise woman buildeth her house: but the foolish plucketh it down with her hands." [2047] Nor does this, say they, derogate from the dignity of the episcopate; for the same figure is used in relation to God. Jeremiah writes: "As a wife treacherously departeth from her husband, so have ye dealt treacherously with me, O house of Israel." [2048] And the apostle employs the same comparison: "I have espoused you," he says to his converts, "to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ." [2049] The word woman is in the Greek ambiguous and should in all these places be understood as meaning wife. You will say that this interpretation is harsh and does violence to the sense. In that case give back to the scripture its simple meaning and save me from the necessity of fighting you on your own ground. [2050] I will ask you the following question, Can a man who before his baptism has kept a concubine, and after her death has received baptism and has taken a wife, become a clergyman or not? You will answer me that he can, because his first partner was a concubine and not a wife. What the apostle condemns then, it would seem, is not mere sexual intercourse but marriage contracts and conjugal rights. Many persons, we see, because of narrow circumstances refuse to take upon them the burthen of matrimony. Instead of taking wives they live with their maid-servants and bring up as their own the children which these bear to them. Thus, if through the bounty of the Emperor they gain for their mistresses the right of wearing a matron's robes, [2051] they will at once come beneath the yoke of the apostle and sorely against their will will have to receive their partners as their wedded wives. But, if their poverty prevents them from obtaining an imperial rescript such as I have mentioned, the decrees of the Church will vary with the laws of Rome. Be careful therefore not to interpret the words "the husband of one wife," that is, of one woman, as approving indiscriminate intercourse and condemning only contracts of marriage.
I bring forward all these explanations not for the purpose of resisting the true and simple sense of the words in question but to shew you that you must take the holy scriptures as they are written, and that you must not empty of its efficacy the baptismal rite ordained by the Saviour, or render vain the whole mystery of the cross.
6. Let me now fulfil the promise I made a little while ago and with all the skill of a rhetorician sing the praises of water and of baptism. In the beginning the earth was without form and void, there was no dazzling sun or pale moon, there were no glittering stars. There was nothing but matter inorganic and invisible, and even this was lost in abysmal depths and shrouded in a distorting gloom. The Spirit of God above moved, as a charioteer, over the face of the waters, [2052] and produced from them the infant world, a type of the Christian child that is drawn from the laver of baptism. A firmament is constructed between heaven and earth, and to this is allotted the name heaven,--in the Hebrew Shamayim or what comes out of the waters,'-- [2053] and the waters which are above the heavens are parted from the others to the praise of God. Wherefore also in the vision of the prophet Ezekiel there is seen above the cherubim a crystal stretched forth, [2054] that is, the compressed and denser waters. The first living beings come out of the waters; and believers soar out of the laver with wings to heaven. Man is formed out of clay [2055] and God holds the mystic waters in the hollow of his hand. [2056] In Eden a garden [2057] is planted, and a fountain in the midst of it parts into four heads. [2058] This is the same fountain which Ezekiel later on describes as issuing out of the temple and flowing towards the rising of the sun, until it heals the bitter waters and quickens those that are dead. [2059] When the world falls into sin nothing but a flood of waters can cleanse it again. But as soon as the foul bird of wickedness is driven away, the dove of the Holy Spirit comes to Noah [2060] as it came afterwards to Christ in the Jordan, [2061] and, carrying in its beak a branch betokening restoration and light, brings tidings of peace to the whole world. Pharaoh and his host, loth to allow God's people to leave Egypt, are overwhelmed in the Red Sea figuring thereby our baptism. His destruction is thus described in the book of Psalms: "Thou didst endow the sea with virtue through thy power: thou brakest the heads of the dragons in the waters: thou brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces." [2062] For this reason adders and scorpions haunt dry places [2063] and whenever they come near water behave as if rabid or insane. [2064] As wood sweetens Marah so that seventy palm-trees are watered by its streams, so the cross makes the waters of the law lifegiving to the seventy who are Christ's apostles. [2065] It is Abraham and Isaac who dig wells, the Philistines who try to prevent them. [2066] Beersheba too, the city of the oath, [2067] and [Gihon], the scene of Solomon's coronation, [2068] derive their names from springs. It is beside a well that Eliezer finds Rebekah. [2069] Rachel too is a drawer of water and wins a kiss thereby [2070] from the supplanter [2071] Jacob. When the daughters of the priests of Midian are in a strait to reach the well, Moses opens a way for them and delivers them from outrage. [2072] The Lord's forerunner at Salem (a name which means peace or perfection) makes ready the people for Christ with spring-water. [2073] The Saviour Himself does not preach the kingdom of heaven until by His baptismal immersion He has cleansed the Jordan. [2074] Water is the matter of His first miracle [2075] and it is from a well that the Samaritan woman is bidden to slake her thirst. [2076] To Nicodemus He secretly says:--"Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God." [2077] As His earthly course began with water, so it ended with it. His side is pierced by the spear, and blood and water flow forth, twin emblems of baptism and of martyrdom. [2078] After His resurrection also, when sending His apostles to the Gentiles, He commands them to baptize these in the mystery of the Trinity. [2079] The Jewish people repenting of their misdoing are sent forthwith by Peter to be baptized. [2080] Before Sion travails she brings forth children, and a nation is born at once. [2081] Paul the persecutor of the church, that ravening wolf out of Benjamin, [2082] bows his head before Ananias one of Christ's sheep, and only recovers his sight when he applies the remedy of baptism. [2083] By the reading of the prophet the eunuch of Candace the queen of Ethiopia is made ready for the baptism of Christ. [2084] Though it is against nature the Ethiopian does change his skin and the leopard his spots. [2085] Those who have received only John's baptism and have no knowledge of the Holy Spirit are baptized again, lest any should suppose that water unsanctified thereby could suffice for the salvation of either Jew or Gentile. [2086] "The voice of the Lord is upon the waters...The Lord is upon many waters...the Lord maketh the flood to inhabit it." [2087] His "teeth are like a flock of sheep that are even shorn which came up from the washing; whereof everyone bear twins, and none is barren among them." [2088] If none is barren among them, all of them must have udders filled with milk and be able to say with the apostle: "Ye are my little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you;" [2089] and "I have fed you with milk and not with meat." [2090] And it is to the grace of baptism that the prophecy of Micah refers: "He will turn again, he will have compassion upon us: he will subdue our iniquities, and will cast all our sins [2091] into the depths of the sea." [2092]
7. How then can you say that all sins are drowned in the baptismal laver if a man's wife is still to swim on the surface as evidence against him? The psalmist says:--"Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity." [2093] It would seem that we must add something to this song and say "Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not a wife." Let us hear also the declaration which Ezekiel the so called "son of man" [2094] makes concerning the virtue of him who is to be the true son of man, the Christian: "I will take you," he says, "from among the heathen...then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean from all your filthiness...a new heart also will I give you and a new spirit." [2095] "From all your filthiness" he says, "will I cleanse you." If all is taken away nothing can be left. If filthiness is cleansed, how much more is cleanness kept from defilement. "A new heart also will I give you and a new spirit." Yes, for "in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision but a new nature." [2096] Wherefore the song also which we sing is a new song, [2097] and putting off the old man [2098] we walk not in the oldness of the letter but in the newness of the spirit. [2099] This is the new stone wherein the new name is written, "which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it." [2100] "Know ye not," says the apostle, "that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life." [2101] Do we read so often of newness and of making new and yet can no renewing efface the stain which the word wife brings with it? We are buried with Christ by baptism and we have risen again by faith in the working of God who hath called Him from the dead. And "when we were dead in our sins and in the uncircumcision of our flesh, God hath quickened us together with Him, having forgiven us all trespasses; blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way nailing it to His cross." [2102] Can it be that when our whole being is dead with Christ and when all the sins noted down in the old "handwriting" are blotted out, the one word "wife" alone lives on? Time would fail me were I to try to lay before you in order all the passages in the Holy Scriptures which relate to the efficacy of baptism or to explain the mysterious doctrine of that second birth which though it is our second is yet our first in Christ.