4A Religious identity through diversity in baptism Flashcards
Give an example of New Testament support for infant baptism.
• Acts 2:38-9. “Repent, and be baptised…the promise is for you, for your children” (Peter)
What was the view of infant baptism in the early church?
• Uniformly practised + supported by many church fathers
What was Augustine’s view of infant baptism?
- I.b. = a “tradition received from the apostles” as a means of removing OS
- Infants, who are not yet able to imitate J, are “ingrafted” into his body
- J gives the grace of his spirit, “which he secretly infuses even into infants”
- It does not matter that the infants are unable to profess personal faith; “When children are presented to be given spiritual grace…it is done by the whole of Mother Church”
- Baptism = a sacrament
- Aug. wrote that North African C.tians at the time called baptism, “salvation”, and the Eucharist, “life”
- “the sacrament of baptism is most assuredly the sacrament of regeneration”
Who endorsed Augustine’s teaching?
- The 416 Council of Mileum II
- “because all have sinned…even infants who…have not been able to commit any sin are therefore baptised unto the remission of sins”
Who was Huldrych Zwingli?
• The leader of the Protestant Reformation in Switzerland
What was Zwingli’s view of infant baptism?
• Differed from Augustine only in that he did not regard baptism as a means of regeneration, but as its sign and seal
• Quotes Romans 4:11: Abraham “received the sign of circumcision as a seal of righteousness that he had by faith”
∴ baptism seals the remission of sin by the blood of J, and our incorporation in J by faith, prod. by HS
• The divine promise = guaranteed to young children on the basis of their parents’ pledge to bring them up in the C.tian faith
• The sacrament = divinely instituted and efficacious to aid/strengthen faith
• A sign of belonging to the new covenant (circumcision = the old)
• “doctors have ascribed to the water a power it does not have and the holy apostles did not teach”
When were the first Christian objections to infant baptism?
• Reformation
How did believers’ baptism originate?
- A diverse group of radical reformers began baptising adults who had made a profession of their faith
- They were hated by Catholics and Protestants, who gave them the name, Anabaptists (‘rebaptisers’)
- Early members did not accept the name, arguing that their baptism was no ‘second baptism’ ∵ i.b. = unscriptural ∴ void
Give an example of New Testament support for believers’ baptism.
- Acts 9:18: Saul = baptised after he encounters J in a vision on the road to Damascus
- There is no record of infants being baptised; baptism = only administered to adult believers
Why did the 1547 Council of Trent denounce believers’ baptism?
• While it invariably follows faith, it involved baptising those who had already been baptised as infants
Who is Karl Barth?
• One of the 20th C.’s most influential theologians
What was the name of Barth’s book relating to baptism?
• ‘The Teaching of the Church regarding baptism’
What was Barth’s view of believers’ baptism?
- Baptism does not bring about human salvation, but bears testimony to salvation by its symbolic representation of renewal in Christ
- Not a sacrament, rather a human action that acknowledges the one true “sacrament of the history of Jesus Christ”
- It “seals” the reality of G’s grace but does not generate that reality
- I.b. = misguided ∵ it is coercive; consent is crucial as the individual may not be willing to take the first step and ∴ “it is not done in obedience, it is not administered according to proper order.”
Barth was aware that…
• My views will leave me in theological and ecclesiastical isolation”
Who supported Barth’s view?
• Moltmann
