Baptismal Regeneration?

[Scott Hutchinson]

I was friends with a Baptist pastor,and He said what Dake wrote on the Trinity was heretical.However he did have some stuff,I gave my Dakes bible away to someone in the church.

[SDG]

Originally Posted by Sam

The author uses for his authority the writings of post-apostolic authors and creeds of the Roman church. Usually Oneness writers shun these things because that is where they say the doctrine of the trinity is found. Is this an admission in the Pentecostal Herald that the UPC holds to a Roman Catholic doctrine of washing away of sin in baptism?

Also, he is strangely silent about another ancient document which may have been written as early as 60 AD which speaks of water baptism this way:
And concerning baptism, baptize in this manner:
Having first taught all of these things, baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living water.
But if you have no living water, baptize in other water ((preferably cold)); and if you cannot do so in cold water, do so in warm.
But if you have neither, pour water three times upon the head in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."

This is from a writing called the Didiche or the Limuda. In the AESV Bible it is part of Acts 15:23-29.

Need I say more? I TOLD YOU SO!!!

It's laughable guys like TR now align themselves w/ this ....

TR ... u believe like Justin Martyr that not only does baptism apply the blood of Jesus but provides "illumination of understanding"?

I'm gonna like this thread ...

Thanks for sharing Sam.

[SDG]

Who knew it??? the Catholics were right all the time

[SDG]

Who knew it??? the Catholics were right all the time

[SDG]

Let's add Tertullian to the list of Apostolic Fathers shall we ...

The most striking presentation of this conception, if not the earliest, is that of Tertullian. "Is it not wonderful too," he writes, "that death should be washed away by bathing?" To justify such ascription of efficacy to water baptism he expatiates on the age and the dignity of water. "Water is one of those things that, before all the furnishing of the world, were quiescent with God in a yet unshapen state." It is venerable, therefore. It has dignity also as having been "the seat of the Divine Spirit, more pleasing to him, no doubt, than all the other then existing elements." "Water alone - always a perfect, gladsome, simple, material substance, pure in itself... supplied a worthy vehicle for God." "Water was the first to produce that which had life, that it might be no wonder in baptism if water know how to give life." He speaks of water as "the primary principle of baptism." "The Spirit of God who hovered over the waters from the beginning would," he maintained, "continue to linger over the waters of the baptized." "Thus," he continues, "the nature of the waters, sanctified by the Holy One, itself conceived withal the power of sanctifying." "All waters, therefore,in virtue of the pristine privilege of their origin, do, after invocation of God, attain the sacramental power of sanctification; for the Spirit immediately supervenes from the heavens and rests over the waters, sanctifying them from himself; and being thus sanctified they imbibe at the same time the power of sanctifying."


It's all in the water!!!!

[Hoovie]

Originally Posted by Daniel Alicea

Who knew it??? the Catholics were right all the time

They most certainly are in some things!

[SDG]

Brother Shaw why didn't you quote Justin Martyr in his fullest context??? ....

More of the OP scholarship ... or do we have to accept this because it's in the Herald?

Did you forget that he also taught that praying and fasting brought remission of sins ... that was part of the quote you provided ... but perhaps conveniently/cleverly edited ....

Surely this regenerates us too!!!!

The rest of the story ....

As many as are persuaded and believe that what we teach and say is true, and undertake to be able to live accordingly, are instructed to pray and to entreat God with fasting, for the remission of their sins that are past, we praying and fasting with them. Then they are brought by us where there is water, and are regenerated in the same manner in which we were ourselves regenerated. For, in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, they then receive the washing with water (The First Apology. Chapter LXI).

[SDG]

Some of Justin Martyr's teachings, a Platoist, on regeneration were similar to

Mithra-Like Practices


The "god" Helios is actually also called "Mithra Helios". And Justin had practices that were similar to those employed by the followers of the sun-god Mithra:

For, in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, they then receive the washing with water...And this washing is called illumination, because they who learn these things are illuminated in their understandings (First Apology 61).


And this food is called among us Εύχαριστία [the Eucharist], of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished...Which the wicked devils have imitated in the mysteries of Mithras, commanding the same thing to be done. For, that bread and a cup of water are placed with certain incantations in the mystic rites of one who is being initiated, you either know or can learn (First Apology 66).
Then we all rise together and pray, and, as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like manner offers prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen; and there is a distribution to each, and a participation of that over which thanks have been given, and to those who are absent a portion is sent by the deacons. And they who are well to do, and willing, give what each thinks fit; and what is collected is deposited with the president, who succours the orphans and widows and those who, through sickness or any other cause, are in want, and those who are in bonds and the strangers sojourning among us, and in a word takes care of all who are in need. But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly (First Apology 67).

Lest anyone think that he did not, notice what the historian and scholar K. Latourette observed:

One of the earliest descriptions of the Eucharist, that by Justin Martyr, not far from the middle of the second century, recognizes the similarity to what was seen in one the mystery cults, Mithraism...it has been repeatedly asserted that in baptism and the Eucharist Christians borrowed from the mysteries and that Christianity was simply another one of these cults...The similarity is striking (Latourette KS. A History of Christianity, Volume 1: to A.D. 1500. HarperCollins, San Francisco, 1975, p. 198).

Of course, true Christianity could not "borrow" from the sun-cults, but Justin and those that follow his examples apparently have.
It should be understood that while Justin calls the newly baptized "illuminated" the Bible does not.
Are you aware that one objective of mystery religions like Mithraism was to become illuminated? Notice the following:

FOR more than three centuries Mithraism was practised in the remotest provinces of the Roman empire and under the most diverse conditions...the promise of complete illumination, long withheld, fed the ardor of faith with the fascinating allurements of mystery...The gods were everywhere, and they mingled in every act of life; the fire that cooked the food and warmed the bodies of the faithful, the water that allayed their thirst and cleansed their persons, the very air that they breathed, and the light that illuminated their paths, were the objects of their adoration. Perhaps no other religion ever offered to its sectaries in a higher degree than Mithraism opportunities for prayer and motives for veneration (Cumont, Franz. Translated from the second revised French edition by Thomas J. McCormack. The Mysteries of Mithra. Chicago, Open Court [1903] pp. 104,120,149).

I suspect that some who had some connection with Mithraism professed Christ and that those ceremonies got picked up by apostates who Justin apparently distantly came into contact with. And even though Justin is attempting to state that Mithraism copied "Christian" ceremonies, the fact is that the Mithra ceremonies, including Sunday worship, were in existence prior to Jesus coming. Jesus, of course, kept Saturday for the Sabbath.


Hence it would appear that those who practiced Sunday, called baptized persons "illuminated" (a term indicating "light", such as sunlight) and the mystic eucharistic ceremonies were following non-Christian influences as it obviously did not happen the other way around with these practices.


Sadly, however, it seems that many non-biblical practices slowly became part of the Greco-Roman churches. And while this apparently was not intentional on the part of people like Justin, the relatively early acceptance of such non-biblical practices seems to have led to additional ones being added later.

http://www.cogwriter.com/justin.htm




He was a sacramentalist when it came to the Eucharist and baptism and their proported roles in our regeneration!!!

[James Griffin]

Sam- not commenting on conclusions here, but yes it was the custom of many in that era to be baptized upon death bed in the belief that baptism remitted sin, and it increased the likelihood of dying without sin. And it is a common belief Constantine did just that.


http://www.answers.com/topic/constantine-i-the-great

Above link is actually a compilation of several articles on Constantine but pertinent to your observation:

In 326, Constantine had his eldest son Crispus tried and executed, as he believed accusations that Crispus had been having an affair with Fausta, Constantine's second wife. A few months later he also had Fausta killed as the apparent source of these false accusations.

Eusebius reports that Constantine was baptized only shortly before his death in 337. He moved from the Capital to a neighboring thermal spa to take the waters, and thence to his mother's city of Helenopolis, where he prayed in the great church that she built in honor of Lucian the apostle. With this, he followed one custom at the time which postponed baptism until old age or death[19]

19. In this period infant baptism, though practiced (usually in circumstances of emergency) had not yet become a matter of routine in the west. See Thomas M. Finn (1992), Early Christian Baptism and the Catechumenate: East and West Syria. See also Philip Rousseau (1999). "Baptism", in Late Antiquity: A Guide to the Post Classical World, ed. Peter Brown.

[SDG]

Originally Posted by TRFrance

Well, let's not miss the Bro. Shaw's point here.

The issue that the brother is getting at is not whether the Didache or these other writings were divinely inspired. The issue is whether the belief of baptism for remission of sins was widely held in the church of the first few centuries.

Without getting into a debate on the merits of the doctrine, the fact is...whether one agrees with the doctrine or not, one can not make an informed argument that the concept of baptism for the remission of sins wasn't a widely held doctrine in the church of the first few centuries.

Yeah held by paganist philosophers who believed the Eucharist, fasting and praying also remitted sins.

You got to be kidding me ....

Surely your best bet is sticking to the 7 or so passages mandating baptism and the countless analogies formulated by the 3 step theologians.