Issues, Etc. Journal - Spring 1997 - Vol. 2 No. 3
Infant
Baptism in Early Church History
by Dennis
Kastens
From the beginning of New Testament
Christianity at the Feast of Pentecost (Acts 2: 38-39) to
our time, unbroken and uninterrupted; the church has
baptized babies. Entire households (Jewish, proselytes and
Gentiles) were baptized by Christ’s original 12 Apostles (I
Corinthians 1: 16; Acts 11: 14, 16: 15, 33, 18: 8) and that
practice has continued with each generation.
The Early Church
Polycarp (69-155), a disciple of the
Apostle John, was baptized as an infant. This enabled him to
say at his martyrdom. "Eighty and six years have I served
the Lord Christ" (Martyrdom of Polycarp 9: 3). Justin
Martyr (100 - 166) of the next generation states about the
year 150, "Many, both men and women, who have been Christ’s
disciples since childhood, remain pure at the age of sixty
or seventy years" (Apology 1: 15). Further, in his
Dialog with Trypho the Jew, Justin Martyr states that
Baptism is the circumcision of the New Testament.
Irenaeus (130 - 200), some 35 years later
in 185, writes in Against Heresies II 22: 4 that
Jesus "came to save all through means of Himself - all, I
say, who through him are born again to God - infants and
children, boys and youth, and old men."
Church Councils and
Apologists
Similar expressions are found in
succeeding generations by Origen (185 - 254) and Cyprian
(215 - 258) who reflect the consensus voiced at the Council
of Carthage in 254. The 66 bishops said: "We ought not
hinder any person from Baptism and the grace of God.....
especially infants. . . those newly born." Preceding this
council, Origen wrote in his Commentary on Romans 5: 9:
"For this also it was that the church had from the Apostles
a tradition to give baptism even to infants. For they to
whom the divine mysteries were committed knew that there is
in all persons a natural pollution of sin which must be done
away by water and the Spirit."
Elsewhere Origen wrote in his Homily on
Luke 14: "Infants are to be baptized for the remission
of sins. Cyprian’s reply to a country bishop, Fidus, who
wrote him regarding the Baptism of infants, is even more
explicit. Should we wait until the eighth day as did the
Jews in circumcision? No, the child should be baptized as
soon as it is born (To Fidus 1: 2).
To prevent misunderstanding by rural
bishops, perhaps not as well-schooled as other or even new
to the faith, the Sixteenth Council of Carthage in 418
unequivocally stated: "If any man says that newborn children
need not be baptized . . . let him be anathema."
Augustine
Augustine (354 - 430), writing about this
time in De Genesi Ad Literam, X: 39, declares, "The
custom of our mother church in baptizing infants must not be
. . . accounted needless, nor believed to be other than a
tradition of the apostles."
He further states, "If you wish to be a
Christian, do not believe, nor say, nor teach, that infants
who die before baptism can obtain the remission of original
sin." And again, "Whoever says that even infants are
vivified in Christ when they depart this life without
participation in His sacrament (Baptism), both opposes the
Apostolic preaching and condemns the whole church which
hastens to baptize infants, because it unhesitatingly
believes that otherwise they cannot possibly be vivified in
Christ."
Specific directions, with detailed
instructions, for the baptizing of infants were given by
bishops to pastors and deacons during this era of Christian
history. In the year 517, seven bishops met in Gerona,
Catelina, and framed 10 rules of discipline for the church
in Spain. The fifth rule states that ". . . in case infants
were ill . . . if they were offered, to baptize them, even
though it were the day that they were born . . . " such was
to be done (The History of Baptism by Robert
Robinson, [London: Thomas Knott, 1790], p.269.).
The foregoing pattern, practiced in both
East and West, remained customary in Christianity through
the Dark and Middle Ages until modem times. Generally, the
infant was baptized during the first week of life, but in
cases of illness this took place on the day of birth. An
example of this already comes from about 260 in North Africa
in an inscription from Hadrumetum (Inscriptiones Latinae
Christianae Veteres II, 4429-A):
Arisus in pace
natus ora sexta
bixit supra scriptas VIIII
This Latin inscription indicates that a
child who died nine hours after its birth was baptized. Such
practice of Baptism within the first days of life, or on the
day of birth in an emergency, remained for both Protestants,
Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox.
The Witness of the
Catacombs
The witness of the literary texts of the
early church fathers, councils and apologists for the
practice of infant Baptism in the first Christian centuries
receives valuable confirmation from the catacombs and
cemeteries of the Middle East, Africa and southern Europe.
Below are epitaphs from the 200’s of small children who had
been baptized. It is interesting to note that there are no
Christian epitaphs in existence earlier than 200. As soon as
the era of Christian inscriptions begins, we find evidence
for infant Baptism. [editor's note- the two referenced
epitaphs are in the original document].
In that century there are attributes and
symbols in tombstones inscriptions of little children which
allows us to clearly infer we are dealing with baptized
children. The following is as early as 200 or shortly
thereafter: [editor's note- the referenced epitaph is in the
original document].
In the second last line is the phrase
Dei Serv(u)s which means slave of God followed by the
Chi Rho symbol for Christ. The last line is the Greek
ichtheos familiar as the "fish symbol" - an anagram for
Jesus Christ God’s Son Savior. These words and symbols mark
the one-year, two months, and four-day-old child as a
baptized Christian.
From the Lateran Museum, also from the
200’s, is a Greek inscription that gives information about
the religious status of the parents. It reads, "I, Zosimus,
a believer from believers, lie here having lived 2 years, 1
month, 25 days."
Also from this era are headstones for
children who received emergency baptism with ages ranging
from 11 months to 12 years. Since the patristic sources of
the third century, as those earlier, give us to understand
that the children of Christian parents were baptized in
infancy, we must conclude that these emergency baptisms were
administered to children of non-Christians. The inscriptions
themselves confirm this conclusion. In the Roman catacomb of
Priscilla is reference to a private emergency baptism that
was administered to the one-and-three-quarter-year-old
Apronianus and enabled him to die as a believer. The
inscription reads:
Dedicated to the
departed.
Florentius made this inscription
for his worthy son Apronianus who
lived one year and nine months and five days.
As he was truly loved by his grandmother
and she knew that his death was imminent,
she asked the church that he might depart from the world as
a believer.
The fact that it was the grandmother who
urged the baptism makes it very probable that the father of
the child, Florentius, was a pagan. This is confirmed by the
formula in the first line which is pagan and not found on
any other Christian epitaphs. We have thus in this
inscription evidence for a missionary baptism administered
to a dying non-Christian infant.
Sole Opponent - A Heretic
In the 1,500 years from the time of Christ
to the Protestant Reformation, the only bonafide opponent to
infant Baptism was Tertullian (160 - 215), bishop of
Carthage, Africa. His superficial objection was to the
unfair responsibility laid on godparents when the children
of pagans joined the church. However, his real opposition
was more fundamental. It was his view that sinfulness begins
at the "puberty, of the soul," that is "about the fourteenth
year of life" and "it drives man out of the paradise of
innocence" (De Anima 38:2). This rules out the belief
in original sin.
Tertullian’s stance, together with other
unorthodox views, led him to embrace Montanism in 207.
Montanism denied the total corruption and sinfulness of
human nature. With its emphasis upon the supernatural gifts
of the Holy Spirit, it was the precursor to the modern
Charismatic Movement.
Except for Tertullian’s heretical views,
marking his departure from mainstream Christianity, the only
other opposition to infant Baptism came during a brief
period in the middle of the fourth century. The issue was
the fear of post-Baptismal sin. This heretical view also
denied Baptism to adults until their death-bed. It was not
in reality a denial of infant baptism in and of itself. In
fact, the heresy encouraged the Baptism of infants when
death seemed imminent, as it also did for adults.
The Anabaptists
Not until the 1520s did the Christian
Church experience opposition specifically to infant Baptism.
Under the influence of Thomas Muenzer and other fanatics who
opposed both civil and religious authority, original sin and
human concupiscence was denied until the "age of
accountability." Although there is no basis in Scripture for
this position, a considerable number of Swiss, German and
Dutch embraced the Anabaptist cause. So offensive was this
position that Roman Catholics, Lutherans and Reformed alike
voiced strong warning and renunciation. It was considered a
shameless affront to what had been practiced in each
generation since Christ’s command in the Great Commission
(Matthew 28: 18-20) to baptize all nations irrespective of
age.
Regeneration for All Ages
Who would be so blind as to limit this
expression of God’s grace and mercy to adolescents and
adults and to exclude infants and children?. If John the
Baptizer could be filled with the Holy Spirit from his
mother’s womb (Luke 1: 15), and if Jesus could say (Matt.
18: 6), "Whoever offends one of these little ones
(Gk."toddlers") who believe in Me, it were better that he
were drowned in the depth of the sea," and if the Apostle
Peter could say on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2: 39), "The
promise is unto you and to your children," what mere mortal
dare declare so gracious an invitation to be invalid for
infants, or forbid the continuance of the Baptism of infants
for coming generations?
If the entire families and households of
the Philippian jailer, Lydia, Cornelius, Crispus and
Stephanas of the New Testament were incorporated into the
household of faith through Baptism, surely that testimony is
immutable and established for all time.
Yes, we baptize babies. Unmistakably
Scriptural proof substantiates that doctrine. Christian
history, unbroken and uninterrupted. reflects such practice
in each generation. Conscientious Christians do not delay
but hasten with their children to Baptism that they may
received the gift of salvation and regeneration and
gratefully embrace the Apostle’s affirmation extended to
those of all age groups: "For as many of you as have been
baptized have put on Christ" (Galatians 3: 27).
Dennis Kastens is pastor of Peace
Lutheran Church in St. Louis, Missouri.
|