Baptism

[~Shalhevet~]

Why/For what purpose did John the Baptist perform baptisms before Jesus was born? Sorry if this is a dumb question. I thought baptism was for the remission of sins (after Jesus' birth).

[Believer1997]

Before he was born? I do not think so.... He was about 6 months older than Jesus - they were relative contemporaries.

Matthew 3

11"I baptize you with water for repentance. But after me will come one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not fit to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. 12His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire."

[

b]The Baptism of Jesus

13Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John. 14But John tried to deter him, saying, "I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?"

15Jesus replied, "Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness." Then John consented.

16As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting on him. 17And a voice from heaven said, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased."

[~Shalhevet~]

So there were no baptisms before jesus?

[~Shalhevet~]

Read William Barclay's "The Mind of Jesus". Baptism was part of the ritual that a Gentile observed when converting to Judaism; it symbolized a rebirth.What was so radical about John's ministry was that he taught that Jews needed to be baptised as well. That was unthinkable to the Jews of John's day; after all, they were the "chosen people" and their understanding was that they were chosen to the exclusion of other people, rather than being a "light to all the nations."

Do any Jews still practice this?

[mizzdy]

So there were no baptisms before jesus?

What John was doing wasn't something terribly new to the Jews, ritual cleansing was a part of their lives. Babtism is immersion which is how they ritually cleansed themselves all throughout the OT, we find many of the references in Lev. It was a sign also of conversion from one way of life to another, from paganism to following the ways of God. Its not a brand new thing at all but the church has taken this and claimed it as its own. Do a search on Judaism, mikva, early 1st century practices and do a search for John the babist you will come up with some interesting stuff!

[other one]

I don't really have any specific scripture to quote on the subject, but it does seem to me from everything I have read, that Baptism is a ritual cleansing as was done when giong into the temple, and this cleansing prepares you for the Holy Spirit to come and clean out our insides on a spiritual level.

[leoxiii]

I don't really have any specific scripture to quote on the subject, but it does seem to me from everything I have read, that Baptism is a ritual cleansing as was done when giong into the temple, and this cleansing prepares you for the Holy Spirit to come and clean out our insides on a spiritual level.

That is a pretty good way to put it.

Baptism is the outward sign of an interior event.

But the two usually occur simultaneously.

[OneLight]

I don't really have any specific scripture to quote on the subject, but it does seem to me from everything I have read, that Baptism is a ritual cleansing as was done when giong into the temple, and this cleansing prepares you for the Holy Spirit to come and clean out our insides on a spiritual level.

That is a pretty good way to put it.

Baptism is the outward sign of an interior event.

But the two usually occur simultaneously.

How can that be? The majority of people who repent and accept Christ as their savior are not around a body of water. I agree htat it is an outward sign of an inward event, but I disagree with them usually occurring simultaneously.

[leoxiii]

I don't really have any specific scripture to quote on the subject, but it does seem to me from everything I have read, that Baptism is a ritual cleansing as was done when giong into the temple, and this cleansing prepares you for the Holy Spirit to come and clean out our insides on a spiritual level.

That is a pretty good way to put it.

Baptism is the outward sign of an interior event.

But the two usually occur simultaneously.

How can that be? The majority of people who repent and accept Christ as their savior are not around a body of water. I agree htat it is an outward sign of an inward event, but I disagree with them usually occurring simultaneously.

You are basing that on the erroneous assumption that Baptism does not produce an ontological change in the person.

That is why Jesus says in Mark 16:16 that one must believe AND be baptized in order to be saved. He then states that whoever does not believe cannot be saved. Jesus procl;aims to us that there are two conditions for salvation: belief and Baptism, but only one condition for condemnation: unbelief. Belief without Baptism cannot save a person just as Baptism without belief cannot save a person, even though they undergo that ontological change (cf. Romans 6:3-7). That is the clear meaning of the text.

[OneLight]

I don't really have any specific scripture to quote on the subject, but it does seem to me from everything I have read, that Baptism is a ritual cleansing as was done when giong into the temple, and this cleansing prepares you for the Holy Spirit to come and clean out our insides on a spiritual level.

That is a pretty good way to put it.

Baptism is the outward sign of an interior event.

But the two usually occur simultaneously.

How can that be? The majority of people who repent and accept Christ as their savior are not around a body of water. I agree htat it is an outward sign of an inward event, but I disagree with them usually occurring simultaneously.

You are basing that on the erroneous assumption that Baptism does not produce an ontological change in the person.

That is why Jesus says in Mark 16:16 that one must believe AND be baptized in order to be saved. He then states that whoever does not believe cannot be saved. Jesus procl;aims to us that there are two conditions for salvation: belief and Baptism, but only one condition for condemnation: unbelief. Belief without Baptism cannot save a person just as Baptism without belief cannot save a person, even though they undergo that ontological change (cf. Romans 6:3-7). That is the clear meaning of the text.

Salvation only comes through Christ, not baptism. What happens is when you make an outward profession or profession, your faith increases, so this can happen when baptized. As you can tell from my previous post, I was under the thought that You were referring to salvation and baptism were simultaneously. For that, I apologize if I was wrong ... was I?