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y §^ fy ^ . ^^^ v ^ i ^ Bi iS ^ sceiy be called lexceptiQUft jta this & bservatfon : and the l | p£ tar niust be a more inveterate theorist than I am willing to coosider him , if he can seriously maintain , that in the enumeration , " one Lord , one faith , one baptism , oue God and Father of all , " Ephes . iv . 5 , 6 ; or in the burial with Christ in baptism , referred to , Col . ii . 12 ; or in that remarkable passage , bearing directly against the Doctor ' s theory , in which the Apostle , after alluding to the ark of Noah , " wherein few , that is , eight souls were saved by water " add * , < c the antetype to which—baptism , now saves also us , " 1 Pet . iii . 20 , 21 ; or in those innumerable instances in which the actual administration of the rite is narrated , and the various other passages where baptism is spoken of simply and without any accompanying noun to
qualify or explain it;—in all the ^ e , I say , the Doctor cannot mean to maintain that any other than a literal baptism ( in water / should say , but , at any rate , a literal baptism of some sort ) is contemplated . Upon the same principle likewise in the two passages , Rom . vi . 3 , and Gal . iii . 27 , * where baptism " into Christ , " or '/ 7 to his death i k ofthe of
" z , " s spoen , use siq clearly indicates that Christ and his death are referred to as the end or design of the baptism , ( in what particular sense is immaterial to our present purpose , ) and not as its figurative element ;—the element being , for any thing expressed to the contrary , literal water . I find four leading passages in which
baptism " in a name" is mentioned : that in Acts ii . 38 , already noticed ; that in I Cor . i 13 , in which St . Paul asks the Corinthians whether they were baptized in his name ; the remarkable passage , Acts xix . 5 ; and the injunction of our Lord , Matt , xxviii . 19 , to which the Doctor more immediately applies his criticism . Now , it happens most unfortunately for the metaphorical theory , that the Greek preposition which our translators have chosen to render " in " is not ev in cither of the four passages , but in that in Acts is btti , and in the
* These two passages are sometimes adduced to shew that baptism , even during , y : fhe apostolic age , was not universal in . tne Christian Church . The futility ,
however , of the Antibaptist criticism oa the expressions , " so many of us , ' * and € C so many of you , " becomes sufficiently evident when it is mentioned , that the phrases " of us" and " of you , " in the partitive force of which the sole strength of the criticism consists , are not in the
original , and that oaci would , therefore , be more correctly rendered whosoever or all who . The expressions , " we all " and " ye ally' in the immediate context , shew that in each ease the Apostle did not intend to make any exception out of the persons addressed .
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three , others * i * « $ « The context of the passage in Corinthians clearly Shews the baptism there spokeu of to be literal , and so confirms the peculiar signification of ei <; as indicating the end , and not the
means of baptism . Our Lord ' s injunction shall immediately be considered * But the passage , Acts xix . 5 , is highly important : * for whether understood as part of the historian ' s own narrative , or a continuation of Paul ' s address in
the fourth verse , as suggested by some learned critics ; that is , whether the baptism spoken of be one administered by John to his hearers , or by Paul to his hearers , the rite was evidently in either case a literal baptism in water . The entire passage , indeed , especially if the suggestion just noticed be adopted ,
furm > hes a striking instance of the force of eiq > as indicating- the design or purpose , as distinguished from the element or means of baptism : and this force is here peculiarly confirmed by the accompanying conjunction \ vcl in order that , 10 the end that , the effect of which , in our
common version , is altogether lost by the palpable mistranslation " that , " as if the conjunction had been simply c ort . The entire passage literally runs thus : Paul asks , " Unto what ( EI 2 t ;) then were ye baptized ? And they said , Unto ( e * 0 John ' s baptism . Then said Paul , John verily baptized with the baptism of
repentauce , telling the people [ that it was ] unto ( E 1 X , in answer to the previous inquiry , eiq t / , unto what ?) him coming after him , in order ; , or to the end that C 1 NA ) they might believe ; that is , unto { eiq ) the Christ , Jesus . And his ( i . e . John ' s ) hearers were [ thus , or in this seuse ] baptized unto ( £ * $ , mistranslated m ) the name of the Lord Jesus /'
Having thus reviewed the various forms of construction in which baptism is mentioned by the sacred writers , 1 proceed to apply the important distinction between bv and mq which they establish , to Dy Jones ' s criticism . After adducing the expressions to baptize with windy to baptize with fire , and others of
a like kind , as exemplifying the metaphorical use of the term baptism , but in every one of which , or at least such of them as occur in the New Testament , and clearly allude to a figurative element , I believe he will find the preposition employed to be uniformly £ v , he draws this notable conclusion : " Thus , too , to
baptize in a name , signifies to assume that name without the ceremony of plunging in water actually accompanying it . "
* I am aware that the genuineness of this passage has been doubted : but it will be observed , that I cite it as an illustration of a point of construction iu language , rather than as an authority for a imtttei of fact or doctrine .
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1826, page 6, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1716/page/6/
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