Different modes of baptism

When? While the Apostles were still living.

From the Didache:

"...pour water three times on the head, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."

If you read the whole chapter from the Didache, you will see that while immersion may have been the prefered mode, it was not the only mode allowed by the Apostles.

 

The RCC allows the person who's being baptized to choose the method of baptism. Some choose pouring, some choose immersion. Sprinkling is allowable, but not very popular.

 

No, they traditionally pour water over their heads over a baptismal font.

 

Doesn't this say pouring the water is an alternative if you don't have access to other means?

~Lorelei

 

Below is from the Didache and how the Catholic Church teach what the Apostles were taught, on water baptism. Where does one find this in our KJV?

Chapter 7. Concerning Baptism.
And concerning baptism, baptize this way: Having first said all these things, baptize into 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 into other water; and if you cannot do so
in cold water, do so in warm. But if you have neither, pour out water three times upon the head into the name of Father and Son and Holy Spirit. But before the baptism let the baptizer fast, and the baptized, and whoever else can; but you shall order the baptized to fast one or two days before.

MEE

 

Doesn't this say pouring the water is an alternative if you don't have access to other means?

~Lorelei</font>[/QUOTE]Lorelei,

I would say that you are correct. Having said that, it is important to remember the distinction between doctrine and discipline.

The necessity of Baptism is doctrine.

The mode of Baptism is discipline.

Discipline can change while doctrine does not.

There are Catholic Churches near me that do baptize by immersion.

Ron

 

Does any church actually "sprinkle?"

 

MEE, to be honest, the best that you can say is that you interpret the KJV to say that Baptism is by immersion. I do not recall a specific verse that says to immerse.

 

Ed, my understanding is that the Catholic Church does not allow "sprinkling".

 

Forgive my use of the term "sprinkle", it just best describes the one baptism I saw that was not done by immersion.

As for the scriptural reference for immersion, it's in all of them. Baptize means to immerse.

~Lorelei

 

~Lorelei[/QB][/QUOTE]

"...held by some scholars to mean to dip"

Not exactly definative.

Have you seen any representations of a Baptism existing from the first couple of centuries? Paintings for example. They depict persons standing, with water being poured on the head. If such a Baptism was not validly recognized, why would early Christains preserve the scene in such a manner?

 

Here, this one doesn't say most scholars.

Would you like to show me what other definitions it may mean.

I was just pointing out that someone used the Didache to say this is when the method changed and in it's own writing it didn't actually change the method unless circumstances prevented you.

So I still wait for an answer to the original question. When did it change?

~Lorelei

 

Let's take this one step at a time. Would you then agree that the Didache indicates that, at a minimum, Baptism by pouring was permitted if immersion was not possible or practical?

Ron

 

Make your point please, I don't find the Didache authoritave, for it is not Scripture.

My point was that the source quoted didn't make the point it was intended to make. Not whether or not I agreed with them doctrinally.

~Lorelei

 

Lorelei,

you raise an excellent point. To say that the Didache approved of a change in mode when circumstances did not permit tyher normal method is not the same thing as saying that the procatice changed in the time of the apostles. To say that a change occurred would imply that the swtiching of modes was normal. And the Didache clearly speaks of a change only for exceptional circumstances.

The question, then, has not been answered. When did baptism, by any mode other than immersion, become normal?

 

The original question was "when did it change?"

We know from documents and other historical evidence that it changed within the first century of the Church. You may wish to add qualifiers, but that does not change the fact that Baptism in a mode other than immersion was accepted by the Church within the first century.

[ August 29, 2002, 12:10 PM: Message edited by: trying2understand ]

 

4. Introduction of Pouring or Sprinkling. Tertullian (ca 180) tells us "there is no difference whether a man is baptized in the sea or in a pool, in a river or in a fountain, in a lake or a canal; nor is there any difference between those whom John baptized in the Jordan and those whom Peter baptized in the Tiber.(12) With the introduction of sprinkling water on the candidate instead of immersion as a matter of convenience, the one sprinkled was regarded as a second class citizen of the Kingdom of God: "In the case of illness, one was baptized by pouring. This was the case of Novatus, but one could not then, as a matter of principle become a priest."(13) The very early "Didache" indicates the practice was regarded as a possible alternative of last resort in case of the scarcity of water [quoted above].
The status of sprinkling baptism gradually became the preferred form. One Catholic historian gives the following development: The abbot Corlet sets forth the history thus . . . : "In the Orient in the first centuries, baptism was administered by means of a total submersion in the rivers and probably in the baptistries, and not excluding an immersion mixed with infusion (pouring), which has been preserved to the present day in almost all cases in the oriental region. In the Occident, from the fourth to the eighth century, there was a partial immersion in the baptisteries. . . . From the eighth to the ninth, vertical and complete immersion of children in fonts. During this period, and in the whole course of the Middle Ages, various procedures were used for the baptism of adults, when it was not possible to
submerge in the bottom of the fonts; from the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries, horizontal and complete immersion in fonts. In the thirteenth and fourteenth, sometimes partial immersion accompanied by infusion, rarely infusion alone. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, infusion alone was employed, and immersion was preserved until our time in the Mozarabic and Ambrosian rites; to be noted also the reestablishing of immersion in some religious sects. . . . Nevertheless, in the Latin Church ...along with baptism by immersion, there were employed, if only in exceptional cases, as in case of baptizing a sick or dying person, infusion or sprinkling, which was called baptism of the sick (baptimnus clinicomcm ). If indeed, in the Latin Church, immersion prevailed until the sixteenth century, infusion and sprinkling were adopted from the thirteenth century. The form in use today is infusion."(14)