RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Ban Baptism
The public announcement seems to have become customary first in France, then in England (where the Synod of Westminster, 1200, decreed that no marriage should be contracted without banns thrice published in the church), and were prescribed for the whole Church by Innocent III in the Lateran Council of 1215. According to the provisions of the Council of Trent the proclamation must be made in the place of residence of both parties on three consecutive Sundays or feasts of obligation. The bishop may dispense from this rule, and in case of need the parish priest may disregard it; in any case its observance does not affect the validity of the marriage. The evangelical churches of Germany retained this custom, as involving investigation of possible impediments
and intercession of the congregation for the couple, and most secular laws, where marriage in church is required, have also sanctioned it, as a preliminary to ecclesiastical marriage. [In the Church of England the Prayer-book requires the publication of banns on three successive Sundays, after the second lesson at morning or evening prayer. This may be avoided by the procuring of a special licence from the Archbishop of Canterbury. In the United States banns are published only in the Roman Catholic Church and certain minor denominations.]
(E. Friedberg.) Bibliography: Bingham, Origines, book xxii, chap, ii, § 2; E. Martene, De antiquis ecclesice ritibus, book ii, chap, ix, art. v, 3 vols., Antwerp, 1736-37; J. Fessler, Der Kirchenbann und seine Folgen, Vienna, 1862; Schilling, Der Kirchenbann nach kanonischen Recht, Leipsic, 1859.
I. Biblical Doctrine.
1. Origin and Practise.
2. Significance of Christian Bap-
tism. II. Church Doctrine.
1. Patristic Teaching. Primitive Period (§1). Fourth Century (§ 2). Augustine (§ 3).'
2. Eoman Catholic and Eastern
Teaching. Scholasticism and Later Roman
Catholicism (§1). The Eastern Church (§ 2).
3. Teaching of the Reformers. Lutheran (§1). Reformed (§ 2).
Modern Developments (§3). III. Liturgical Usage. 1. General Development to the Reformation. Original Forms (§1). The Subapostolic Age (§ 2). In Tertullian (§ 3). Lines of Development (§ 4).
BAPTISM.
2. Development of the Ritual in Vari-
ous Parts of the Church. Syria (§1).
Asia Minor and Constantinople (§2). Egypt and Ethiopia (§ 3). Rome (§ 4). Spain and Africa (§ 5). Milan and North Italy (§ 6). Gaul (§ 7).
3. The Baptismal Service in the Refor-
mation Churches. Three Main Types (§1). Later Development (§ 2).
4. The Minister of Baptism.
5. The Time for Baptism.
6. The Place of Baptism.
7. Sponsors.
IV. Discussion of Controverted Points. 1. The Argument against the Necessity of Immersion. Immersion, even if the Original Form, a Circumstantial Detail (§1). The Apostolic Practise not Certain (§2).
Philological Considerations (§ 3). Archeological Considerations (§ 4). Considerations from Symbolism
(§5). The Mode of Applying the Water
Unessential (§ 6).
2. The Baptism of Infants. Arguments against Infant Baptism
(§ 1).
Arguments in Reply (§ 2).
Origin of Infant Baptism (§ 3).
Patristic Testimony (§ 4).
The Schoolmen and the Reformation Period (§5).
3. The Baptist Position Concerning
Immersion and Infant Baptism. True Baptism a Burial in Water
(§ 1). The Testimony of Cyprian (§ 2). Origin of Affusion (§3). The Argument from Symbolism
(§4). Objections to Infant Baptism
(§5).
I. Biblical Doctrine. — 1. Origin and Practise :
Conybeare has tried to prove that the original text of Matt, xxviii, 19 did not contain the baptismal command or the Trinitarian formula, which were interpolated, according to him, at the beginning of the third century. But since the investigations of Riggenbach, the ordinary reading may be considered the original. Jesus, however, can not have given his disciples this Trinitarian order of baptism after his resurrection; for the New Testament knows only baptism in the name of Jesus (Acts ii, 38; viii, 16; xix, 5; Gal. iii, 27; Rom. vi, 3; I Cor. i, 13-15), which still occurs even in the second and third centuries, while the Trinitarian formula occurs only in Matt, xxviii, 19 and then only again Didache vii, 1 and Justin, Apol., i, 61. It is unthinkable that the Apostolic Church thus disobeyed the express command of the Lord, which it otherwise considered the highest authority. Occurrences like those of Acts xix, 1-7 ought to have shown that the prescribed formula of baptism could not have been shortened to " the name of the Lord Jesus," if the character of baptism was to be retained as commanded. Judging from I Cor. i, 14-17, Paul did not know Matt, xxviii, 19; otherwise he could not have written that Christ had sent himnot to baptize, but to preach the gospel. More-
over, had it been known at the Apostolic Council, the missionary spheres could not have been so separated that Peter was recognized as the apostle of the circumcision, Paul and Barnabas as apostles of the heathen (Gal. ii, 7-8); rather would the original apostles have claimed the universal apostolate for themselves. Finally, the distinctly liturgical character of the formula Matt, xxviii, 19 is strange; it was not the way of Jesus to make such formulas. Nevertheless this baptismal command contains the elements which constitute Christian baptism; for the activity of the Son in baptism implies the immediate cooperation of the Father; and from the beginning Christian baptism has been considered the mediating agency of the Holy Spirit. Therefore while the formal authenticity of Matt, xxviii, 19 must be disputed, it must still be assumed that the later congregations recognized as the will of their Lord that which they experienced as the effect of baptism and traced it back to a direct word of Jesus.
If Matt, xxviii, 19 can not be considered as a baptismal command, we have no direct word of Jesus which institutes baptism; for Mark xvi, 16 belongs to the spurious appendix of the Gospel and is dependent upon Matt, xxviii, 19. But from the very beginning the Christian Church has umversally
Baptism