This is something that started bugging me after a random association yesterday. John the Baptist. On whose authority was he baptising people? No one had died for people's sins yet. From what I understand baptism functions in connection with that. Have I misunderstood something?
And why did Jesus need to be baptised?
I am genuinely curious about the doctrinal reasoning here. It has been a while since I studied these things and for the life of me I cannot remember anything about it. I know that there were several Jewish groups that practised baptism at the time, but I do not know the intra-Christian reasoning for this event.
As a theologian I must say I havn't been doing a lot of research after this, but the first thing I would say would be that whatever view on baptism christians have today (there are some differences on the precise theological importance between Roman Catholics, Reformed (Calvinistic), Lutheran and Baptist churches), it is clear for most people that John the Baptist baptized in a different way.
He basically told people to start living more holy, according to the law of Moses, with a huge emphasis on simply being "honest" (he didn't appear to have a well thought-out ethical system).
As an outward sign of this new way of living, this change of lifestyle, a baptism was mainly focused leaving the past behind and living better lives now. There was probably only a limited theory of salvation involved.
Why Jesus? Noone can probably give a full answer, only that it was "fitting" so that "all righteousness be fulfulled" (Mat.3:15). What all of that involves may take a few years to study, but that was Jesus' answer anyway.
Well, it is comforting to know that I had not forgotten something major and obvious. Considering the centrality of baptism in most Christian denomination, however, I am surprised that this is not more of an issue.
*MySmiley*
structured procrastinator
structured procrastinator
A question on baptism
- 10/06/2011 09:21:44 AM
1080 Views
To my knowledge, baptism does not stem from the Resurrection.
- 10/06/2011 11:01:17 AM
849 Views
What I meant
- 10/06/2011 11:03:08 AM
666 Views
I don't follow.
- 10/06/2011 11:08:07 AM
654 Views
Re: I don't follow.
- 10/06/2011 11:10:40 AM
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I don't keep up with RC theology much.
- 10/06/2011 11:15:52 AM
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Re: I don't keep up with RC theology much.
- 10/06/2011 11:17:53 AM
622 Views
They should, IMHO, but the difficulty of definitively saying is why Limbo was created.
- 11/06/2011 10:39:26 AM
736 Views
Re: They should, IMHO, but the difficulty of definitively saying is why Limbo was created.
- 11/06/2011 11:53:53 AM
653 Views
You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 11:50:53 AM
696 Views
Re: You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 11:52:27 AM
608 Views
Re: You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 11:55:01 AM
674 Views
Re: You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 11:58:36 AM
642 Views
Re: You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 12:16:46 PM
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Re: You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 12:19:16 PM
637 Views
Re: You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 12:25:08 PM
874 Views
Re: You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 12:26:30 PM
848 Views
Re: You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 12:28:45 PM
655 Views
Re: You haven't necessarily developed a wrong impression.
- 10/06/2011 12:29:43 PM
674 Views
Circumcision remains common among Christians mostly for symbolic reasons as well.
- 11/06/2011 10:48:48 AM
721 Views
Hm, I don't know. I don't think I know any non-Jews who are circumsized that see it as a symbol
- 11/06/2011 04:44:02 PM
816 Views
I took a holy dip into the Ganges
- 10/06/2011 11:48:26 AM
744 Views
Early Christians and Jews were obsessed with purity
- 10/06/2011 12:56:58 PM
770 Views
Oh, I know about the historical/academic/anthropological reason
- 10/06/2011 01:04:43 PM
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A first responce
- 10/06/2011 02:09:32 PM
862 Views
Re: A first responce
- 10/06/2011 02:15:07 PM
819 Views
Do you want a theological answer or a historical one?
- 10/06/2011 03:16:44 PM
855 Views
The theological. I already had a fairly good idea of the historical
- 10/06/2011 03:18:51 PM
691 Views
My favorite fact about baptism is that is REQUIRES water... but it can be ANY water
- 10/06/2011 04:31:12 PM
759 Views
That is absurd.
- 10/06/2011 08:37:13 PM
852 Views
It is absurd
- 10/06/2011 08:56:19 PM
700 Views
When your post is eviscerated, resorting to "HURR RELIGION IS DUMB" isn't a winning move.
- 10/06/2011 10:00:39 PM
779 Views
Psh.You can dress it up with spiritualism and semantics, but the concept boils down to "magic water"
- 11/06/2011 03:56:03 AM
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The point is that it's a symbol.
- 11/06/2011 04:45:19 AM
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I have no problem with water as a symbol
- 11/06/2011 04:59:52 AM
717 Views
You are totally missing the point.
- 11/06/2011 02:46:08 PM
807 Views
Which again, is something that sounds nice and spiritual, but doesn't actually make any sense
- 11/06/2011 03:46:51 PM
779 Views
your problem is you're trying to apply objective logic to religion
- 11/06/2011 04:13:01 PM
1031 Views
I'm not, exactly. Religion has internal logic. For example, certain things are "unclean"
- 11/06/2011 04:40:33 PM
668 Views
Beliefs about holy water are internally logical.
- 11/06/2011 07:36:08 PM
716 Views
Shrug. It was on topic.
- 11/06/2011 08:06:16 PM
984 Views
The more I read of your posts, the more I think you fundamentally misunderstand religious symbolism. *NM*
- 11/06/2011 10:51:17 PM
287 Views
Let me clarify: your statements are absurd.
- 10/06/2011 10:14:06 PM
695 Views
Check my response to Ghav for elaboration, but basically, your argument doesn't hold
- 11/06/2011 04:00:18 AM
670 Views
You went from saying spit was good to saying "clean water".
- 12/06/2011 02:04:26 AM
613 Views
I'm completely consistent. I was just staying away from extremes for conversation's sake.
- 12/06/2011 09:02:02 AM
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No one from a respectable faith thinks of holy water as "magic water". Period. *NM*
- 13/06/2011 04:56:53 AM
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All I know, Is a Lutheran Pastor told me, b/c i was not baptised I was going to hell, and had *NM*
- 11/06/2011 03:44:38 PM
272 Views
I never thought of it in that way, that is why I like this site 
*NM*
- 12/06/2011 04:26:40 PM
321 Views
*NM*
- 12/06/2011 04:26:40 PM
321 Views