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Le pardon purchased by n his baptismal proerly urged by this be--avs of iniquity (5), and im whom he acknowl

Sedeemer (6).

TRATIONS.

for salvation, without a change of -:21-23, Peter addressing Simon eived the ordinance of baptism, says art nor lot in this matter-repent there7-10, John the Baptist admonishes er the Pharisees and Sadducees, who un, telling them that without repenthey could not escape the wrath to

...Acts 2: 38, repent and be baptizFt. 3: 5, the washing of regeneration. Tom's baptism is termed "baptism of re

A

Matth. 3: 11. John says, I baptize you

Baptism above referred to, the phrase egeneration," λουτρόν παλιγγενεσίας, 25 tug of water by the word" Lovroov vdatos 7. are supposed to refer to the Gospel, as ral purification, in opposition to the Levitin reply to this, it may be remarked,

and louroov idaros washing, and washaturally be understood by every reader to uld have been necessary for the apostle to

add some explanatory clause, if he intended by them to designate the doctrines of Jesus.1

III. The subjects of baptism must adore God, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.-According to the formula of baptism, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are the God of those who receive that ordinance. Hence, those who do not receive the doctrines of Jesus Christ or the Son of God, and the doctrines of the apostles or of the Holy Spirit, (§ 9-11) as the doctrines of the Father, with whom the Son and Spirit are one, as the doctrines of their God; either do not receive baptism with a sincere heart, or reject that ordinance after it has been administered to them; that is, either they are not true disciples of Jesus Christ, they are not μαθητευθεις το Χριστῳ made disciples in the name of Christ (Matth. 28: 19. comp. John 4: 1); or they lose that character after having possessed it. For this reason it was, that Christ, when giving his apostles the command to baptize his future disciples, places in immediate connexion with it, the injunction that they should teach the subjects of baptism to keep his commandments. Matth. 28: 20, comp. John 17:20. It was the promotion of his honour (declarative glory) at which Jesus aimed in the institution of baptism; and this too was the design of the Father, when he declared at the baptism of Jesus, that he was his well beloved Son, whom we ought to hear, and who would baptize1 his apostles with the Holy Spirit, which Spirit would, after his death, teach mankind through the instrumentality of the apostles.

IV. God is to be worshipped, in the manner prescribed by

1 Tübing. gel. Anzeig. 1803. p. 52.

2 Matth. 3: 17. John 5: 37. comp. with v. 18. and 1: 34.

3 Matth. 3: 17. comp. 17: 5. The same words are used at the baptism and at the transfiguration of Jesus: merely with the additional phrase, "hear ye him."

4 Matth. 3: 16. comp. John 1: 32. Acts 1: 4 &c.

[BK. IV.

srumentality of the Son and Spirit.

5. Matth. 10: 20.

on to God is a powerful motive to a See supra

2.1 Pet. 3: 21. 4: 2.

Eph. 5: 23-26. § 43. Ill. 4.

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priety of infant baptism.

roper to receive infants into the visaptism, appears evident from the Suerations. The gracious provisions aivation of man, such as remission esson from punishment, to which we ed by baptism, are represented in xtending to little children (§ 68, 58).

so are, although not immediately yi, yet subsequently, to be taught to mands of Christ (1), just as is the who are baptized. Matth. 28: 19,

ess of their early reception (2) Lowers of Christ is rendered the more e fact that, by virtue of their birth es of christian parents, christianity is to them by God. Nor is there any tire of baptism (3) itself, which children for being proper subjects e nature of christian baptism does ecessary to limit the command of

pil nations," (aaria ia εm), to adte command of Jesus, in its natural

acceptation, embraces the whole human family, without reference to diversity of age, it is not probable that children (and among the multitudes who embraced christianity, the question concerning children must have arisen) would have been debarred from baptism by the apostles; for the apostles, as well as the other Jewish converts, had always been accustomed (4) to see little children received into the number of God's people by circumcision (5), and to see it done even under the Old Testament dispensation, in which the people of God, confessedly, was not destined to such an unlimited extension as in the church of Christ, into which we are received by baptism. Under these circumstances, the statement of Origen (6), who derives the custom of infant baptism, by tradition, from the apostles themselves, seems to be entitled to our belief. At any rate, no one, even of the most ancient writers of the church, presumed to object to pedobaptism as being of recent origin (7); although the question of its propriety was often agitated.

ILLUSTRATIONS.

I. Children were to be instructed in the principles of christianity.--Matth. 28:20. Eph. 6:4. The principles of the Essenes were approved of and regarded with admiration, by a part of the Ephesians. And as it was customary among the Essenes to receive strange children and educate them in their principles,1 it would certainly have been altogether unbecoming christian parents, to be negligent in educating their own children in the doctrines and principles of christianity. Hence the apostle requires, that the children of christian parents should be educated, not indeed with the rigour of the Essenes (for to this an al

1 Josephus de Bello Judaico, L. II. c. 8. 4 2.

lusion is doubtless made in the words "provoke not your children to anger,” μη παροργίζετε τα τεκνα ύμων), but in the fear and admonition of the Lord, according to the principles and directions of Jesus, which are far more excellent than all the doctrines of the Essenes. Col. 2: 8—10.

II. Children were to be made disciples.—Matth. 28: 19. Michaelis has proved, in his work On the history of the burial and resurrection of Christ (p. 336 &c), that the word uanTεvoate signifies "to make disciples" and not "to teach," [as it is rendered in the common English version]. He proves-1. that no example can be adduced in which the word μanreveiv signifies "to teach." Nor could the word in the present case, have this signification, as Christ afterwards mentions" teaching," didaoxovtes, specifically.-2. In Acts 14: 21, the word μavnTεvεi evidently signifies " to make disciples" [here also it is erroneously rendered "taught" in the common English version]. This sense of the word can also be proved from the Fathers of the church. In profane authors it is never used in a transitive sense, though it frequently is used intransitively in the very sense for which we contend. Matth. 27: 57, "to be a disciple," μαθητευειν τινι. Christ probably used the word an, which is found in all the Oriental translations of this passage, and which, according to the common usage signifies "to make disciples."

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Wettstein also, in commenting on Matth. 28: 19, has proved at much length, that the word μadŋrevɛw may, with perfect propriety, be taken here in that general sense, in which children are also embraced in it.

III. There is nothing in the nature of baptism itself, which could militate against its administration to children. Little chil

1 Comp. Col. 3: 21. and Note 51 in Dissert. II. in Ep. ad Coloss. 2 του κυριου instead of τῳ κυριῳ an education which is pleasing to God, which promotes the glory of God. See Phil. 2: 30 in the Dissert, on that Epistle.

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