John 1:25 questions

christianmomof3 · #1 8th November 2009, 11:56 PM

John 1:25 And they asked him and said to him, Why then are you baptizing if you are not the Christ nor Elijah nor the Prophet?

I have some questions about this verse.
Apparantly, John was baptising people in a river.
This was not, to my understanding, a practice of the Jewish religion at that time.
As far as I know, there were ritual baths called Mikvah's, but they were done to oneself and not by anyone to someone else.

So, the first question, was the baptism that John was doing something entirely new to the Jewish people?

Then, the second question - why did they think that because John was baptising people he must have been Christ, or Elijah or the Prophet?
Where did that concept come from?
Is it from somewhere in the Bible or from some writings outside of the Bible?

I did find reference to the prophet in Deuteronomy 18:15- it refers to a Prophet like Moses who will be raised up but that does not mention baptism.

Thank you.

Rainie · #2 10th November 2009, 03:49 PM

These are good questions!

I think that perhaps part of what the Leadership was saying when they asked John if he was the Christ, Elijah or a Prophet is because they were essientially saying "Who do you think you are, luring people out to a river to be baptized?"

You see, "Mikveh's/Baptisms" were supposed to be conducted in a certain way, with certain blessings/readings, in a certain place, by certain people with certain attire (or lack thereof) etc.

You see, according to Religoius leaders of John's time (and even to this day), there was/is a "proper way" to baptize people and here was John... shattering the mold, breaking the rules of MEN, standing in the mud, in a river and saying "...Make straight the way of the Lord." (1 John 1:23)

Read the following and take special note of what is happening, it may give some more insight into the passage you are curious about in John 1:25.

Matt 3
1 In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, 2 and saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!” 3 For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah, saying:

“ The voice of one crying in the wilderness:

‘ Prepare the way of the LORD;
Make His paths straight.’”

4 Now John himself was clothed in camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist; and his food was locusts and wild honey.5 Then Jerusalem, all Judea, and all the region around the Jordan went out to him 6 and were baptized by him in the Jordan, confessing their sins.
7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “Brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, 9 and do not think to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. 10 And even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 11 I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.12 His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

John is making a profound statement "make His paths straight" (they had become twisted). John is dressed in camel's hair in a river and scripture tells us that A LOT ( I think "All") the people from Jerusalem and Judea came out to be baptized by John in the river and to confess their sins (instead of going to the "proper places")...

It seems the Religious leaders with all the "right stuff" were wondering where everyone was flocking too to get baptized. So they went out and confronted John and in my opinion, they essentially say "who do you think you are?" (Are you the Christ, Elijah or a Prophet)?
Do you see what John says to the "leadership" who came out to see what all the "hoop-la" was about.... John calls them "Brood of vipers... etc. etc."

These leaders were not sincere God fearing men who innocently came out and said "Hey are you the Messiah or a Prophet? We've been diligelntly awaiting your arrival and we're a little confused as to why you're out in the wilderness, do you realize we have some nice Mikveh's down the hill? You are welcome to use our facilities if you need more... ummm, appropriate accomidations?"
Oh no, these "leaders" were corrupt and they were twisting God's ways and they were not too happy that all these people abanoned their facilities in favor of a man in camels hair and a river.

Those leaders must have been pretty frustrated and perhaps even embarressed.
Can you imagine... all of Jerusalem and Judea had gone out into the wilderness to be baptized by John in the river, in nature. There was probably a decent sized crowd gathered around when John starts quoting Isaiah and calling the leaders "Broods of Vipers." What a sight!!!!!!!!!!!!

Food for thought as they say.
Blessings
Rain

Heber · #3 10th November 2009, 05:25 PM

“ The voice of one crying in the wilderness:

‘ Prepare the way of the LORD;
Make His paths straight.’”

Ah, the latter testament mis-quote of Isaiah. It should read: "The voice of one crying, 'In the wilderness*, prepare the way of the Lord; make his paths straight'" according to Isaiah!

* of your heart, soul and perversion of the Word

Rainie · #4 10th November 2009, 10:35 PM

Heber, I'm not quite sure what your point is? -Rain

Heber · #5 11th November 2009, 06:50 AM

The Matthew quote has the punctuation in the wrong place according to the version in Isaiah! Matthew has it that there is a someone physically standing in the wilderness crying out... .

Isaiah has it that the person is standing anywhere (ie not necessarily in the desert) crying out, "in the wilderness, prepare the way of the LORD; make His paths straight"

In other words, the words 'in the wilderness' are NOT meant to describe where the person was standing but WERE meant to relate to the wilderness of the heart and soul. So John is crying out to the Pharisees about the wilderness of their hearts and souls - and not where he just happened to be standing at that point in time. That is the sin of repentance to which John was calling people and why he was so outspoken to the Pharisees who were teaching a dry and arrid Judaism - like snakes they lived in a dry and arrid place as far as G_d is concerned and they needed to make the way straight and smooth for people to find him.

visionary · #6 11th November 2009, 11:16 AM

And John also was baptizing in Aenon near to Salim, because there was much water there: and they came, and were baptized.

Rainie · #7 11th November 2009, 01:16 PM

Heber, still not sure where you're going with this? Is there some way that this misquote point from Isaiah helps ChristianMomof3 out with her original questions?

I'm not sure if the Wilderness of Isaiah whether physical or spiritual has any impact on the discussion at hand? John the Baptist was indeed "outside" of Mainstream Religious Institutions of his day, he was indeed baprizing in a River and not in the ways or to the specifications of the leadership of his day.
In Matthew it does say John was in the wilderness 3:1 but I'm still not clear on how this detail helps?
Can you clarify why this misquote plays a role into the original questions?

Thanks, blessings
Rain

Heber · #8 11th November 2009, 03:47 PM

Never mind - wood and trees etc!

ContraMundum · #9 12th November 2009, 10:27 AM

Originally Posted by christianmomof3

John 1:25 And they asked him and said to him, Why then are you baptizing if you are not the Christ nor Elijah nor the Prophet?

I have some questions about this verse.
Apparantly, John was baptising people in a river.
This was not, to my understanding, a practice of the Jewish religion at that time.
As far as I know, there were ritual baths called Mikvah's, but they were done to oneself and not by anyone to someone else.

So, the first question, was the baptism that John was doing something entirely new to the Jewish people?

Yes, I think that is the case. There are clearly ritual baptisms in all the religions of the ancient Near East, but John's baptism is more than ritual cleansing because it has a moral element (Matt 3:2, 6, 8, 11 Lk 3:10-14), thus making it a baptism of repentance in preparation to entering a new life in God.

Because there are ritual baptisms in those ancient religions, it's pretty hard to say that what John was doing was entirely new, but it certainly was new in the moral sense.

Then, the second question - why did they think that because John was baptising people he must have been Christ, or Elijah or the Prophet?
Where did that concept come from?
Is it from somewhere in the Bible or from some writings outside of the Bible?

One thing we know of religions in that region during the Roman occupation- there were a lot of traditions, ideas and expectations around. No doubt the NT is simply alluding to one set of opinions that was around at that time. Often the NT authors speak of one section of the people present in order to regard how Christ answers their needs. Thus during the narratives you notice that it mentions different opinions, different questions from different sects and so forth and demonstrates that Yeshua deals with all those questions, setting them straight and pointing the people to the higher purpose of salvation. It could be argued that the Pharisees associated baptism with the coming of the Messiah (perhaps in reference to Ez. 36:25-27) as indicated by their question and the large crowds that gathered around John. John's Messianic and repentant emphasis in his preaching and the fact that he was the son of a priest seem to strengthen that point of view.

Now, I don't know if I have helped here or not, but those thoughts came to mind. There's quite a number of works written about this topic.

christianmomof3 · #10 12th November 2009, 12:48 PM

Originally Posted by ContraMundum

There's quite a number of works written about this topic.

Thank you. Can you recommend some good books about it that I can look for at the library?