Getting Water Baptized Twice?

[abysmul]

It a violation to be baptised twice as stated in the Westminster confessions.

The original question by the OP was:

I am just curious if there is a prohibition in scripture or the very early Church (before 300 AD). I look forward to everyone's wisdom!

Let's see.... the Westminster confession....

The Westminster Confession of Faith is a Reformed confession of faith. Drawn up by the 1646 Westminster Assembly as part of the Westminster Standards to be a confession of the Church of England,

...

 

[Albion]

It is probably impossible to prove this beyond all doubt, but the practice of REbaptizing heretics who returned to mainline Christianity seems to have developed in the third century or so, and the majority of church Fathers, teachers, bishops, etc. considered it to be contrary to the Apostolic way and wrong to do, so the practice was ended. The Westminster Confession IOW appears to be correct about this.

 

[bbbbbbb]

It a violation to be baptised twice as stated in the Westminster confessions.

Yup. That settles it for all time. The Westminster divines have spoken.

 

[abysmul]

Yup. That settles it for all time. The Westminster divines have spoken.

 

[PaladinValer]

I strongly disagree with that illogical result.

1. It isn't illogical; it is based on a factual understanding of what sacramental theology actually teaches. Disagreeing with sacramental theology doesn't negate its logic.
2. Please do not reply within a quote. Not only does it not work, it creates additional work for the people who are replying back to have to copy and paste. Color-coding doesn't help; it how the coding works.
3. Sacramental theology is ancient, so I have no interest in loosing the ancient belief over a Radical false idea of psuedohistory.

Only to one who doesn't understand the fundamentals of what baptism is all about.

Then I suggest changing theology. The Didache and other ancient Apostolic and Ante-Nicene witnesses are all the proof I need.

Again, that is an illogical conclusion. No one is saying that God did it wrong. The overarching question is whether the one being baptized did it right.

It is implicit. Baptism isn't based on comprehension because it is always based on salvation and regeneration, from its predecessors of the Deluge and the Drowning of the Egyptians in the Sea of Reeds to Jesus' proclamation that we must be baptized and, as the author of 1st St. Peter rights, its salvific nature. To disagree with this is to embrace Gnosticism and depart the theology of the Christian religion. I have no such interest in accepting a theology that condemns those too unintelligent, the immature of mind, and the mentally disabled. It is a base and barbaric theology.

Wrong again, my friend.

Sorry; I'm right.

Another unsound argument.

Quite sound actually.

Not so, but it is obviously what you believe to be the truth.

I have no interest in arguing historic documentation.

You have no right to say that my baptism is more or less valid than anyone else's, not here not anywhere.

Christianity is a religion of community, not hyperdividualism. The Church is a visible, organic institution that emphasizes the whole that individual members are vital parts of. As such, emphasis on an individual over others is a fundamental disagreement with the historic, classic theology and is therefore not orthodox.

Since all are to hold their part to maintain the whole, they are to hold up each other as part of it. To each is given gifts to provide, and if someone suddenly rejects the whole, they've departed. As such, whether one person thinks is inconsequential because it is what the community does.

Your claims are false as well. Most of what you wrote is not in the Bible, and even contrary to the Bible so it is totally invalid from the perspective of Biblical Christianity, of which you are not an authority by the way.

Actually, I am right. The word "baptize" doesn't automatically mean submersion but merely to dip or soak. I can soak anything by pouring water on it, and the Disciples and their immediate successors were fully aware of that in the 1st century Didache, arguably the most important document relevant to show 1st and 2nd century Christian belief on baptism, Holy Communion, and how they were practiced and believed in.

Personal interpretation ignoring the collective understanding of the entire Christian community, present and past, is something foreign to the orthodox, Biblical faith. It didn't matter what each independent Disciple or other major figure in the Church thought in Acts 15; it is what they decided upon as a community.

If you want to show that you are right in the future, use sources other than 'because you say so' Your proclamation does not make it so.

I gave the Didache as a reference. Obviously it was ignored.

I certainly wasn't expecting such a heated response on this issue...I don't have time to reply to everyone but I assure you all I am reading it.

Just to clarify, because I already see some people have not read or understood (by my own fault) what I originally wrote...I am NOT saying both baptisms are valid. I am saying ONE is valid and ONE isn't. Because I don't know which side of the argument has it right (infant vs. believers), it seems logical to me to get baptized twice, even though one (I don't know which one) will be valid and one will not.

Because believer's-only is a Gnostic theology. Salvation isn't comprehension/knowledge-based. If it was, we're all doomed. Salvation is by grace alone by living faith alone, and the most fundamental aspect of faith is not so much an active belief but the trust that must come first. Newborns trust their mothers; they don't fully understand why, but they do anyway. They trust that their mothers will feed, nurse, and protect them. So must our faith be.

Secondly, I am not saying that God is incapable of anything. If infant baptism is wrong, it's not because God somehow failed in the baptism, it's because man stopped practicing what God commanded us to do in the first place.

Again, the Didache is proof enough that the 1st and 2nd century Christian community had already come to an understanding of a valid baptism. The fact that the Holy Writ mentions entire households getting baptized (which, given the word's implication back in those days in those cultures, everyone associated, including infants and immature children), means that the practice of paedobaptism is Biblical.

Again, I have no idea which side is right despite a lot of time spent on the issue. So, it seems only logical to me to be safe and get "baptized" twice. Why risk it?

Because it is a grave sin to do so.

The views of the Church were rather consistent since apostolic times. They would have found the notion of getting baptized "again" perplexing. Jesus spoke of being born again, not being born again and then being born again again. And Patristic sources are consistent in attaching the new birth to Holy Baptism.

-CryptoLutheran

I echo this. And I might add that the 1st generation of Protestants....Martin Luther, John Calvin, Jon Hus...all agreed that paedobaptism was ancient and the norm, and both Luther and Hus continued in the believe of baptismal regeneration the same as before. They never questioned it, and they got their theology sola scriptura.

If they got it, so should everyone else.

 

[abysmul]

Hmmm... I wonder why the phrase "tradition of men" keeps popping in my head?

 

[Pteriax]

Hmmm... I wonder why the phrase "tradition of men" keeps popping in my head?

I don't wonder.

 

[Pteriax]

I gave the Didache as a reference.

First off, simply mentioning a book or other text is not a reference. You see in order to look it up and confirm what you claim I need to know where in the Didache it says what you claim. You could even post the relevant section in the forum. Likewise, you cannot simply say "it's in the Bible" - you must establish exactly where it is in there, and how you get such and such interpretation of it.

Secondly, according to Didache,
Since it was discovered in a monastery in Constantinople and published by P. Bryennios in 1883, the Didache or Teaching of the Twelve Apostles has continued to be one of the most disputed of early Christian texts. It has been depicted by scholars as anything between the original of the Apostolic Decree (c. 50 AD) and a late archaising fiction of the early third century. It bears no date itself, nor does it make reference to any datable external event.

Am I invalidating the Didache? No, however it is questionable. And regardless of if it is genuine or not, it is not authoritative in the sense that the Bible is. If you could show me I am wrong from the text of the Bible, I might actually agree with you. But I don't think that will happen, you see the Didache itself says:

7:1 But concerning baptism, thus shall ye baptize.
7:2 Having first recited all these things, baptize {in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit} in living (running) water.
7:3 But if thou hast not living water, then baptize in other water;
7:4 and if thou art not able in cold, then in warm.
7:5 But if thou hast neither, then pour water on the head thrice in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
7:6 But before the baptism let him that baptizeth and him that is baptized fast, and any others also who are able;
7:7 and thou shalt order him that is baptized to fast a day or two before.

The book does not recognize sprinkling as a legitimate baptism, so even by your own source material, my infant baptism was not a baptism at all, therefore I have only been baptized one time.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Speaking of "traditions of men", I wonder if anyone here can point out the Scripture that says Baptism is an outward, public and symbolic demonstration of faith.

The Bible I have says we are buried with Christ in Baptism, being conformed to His death so that we might share in His life; that we are clothed with Christ in Baptism, that there is the promise of forgiveness of sins and the Holy Spirit for those who are baptized, and that it effects our salvation. Those are the explicit words of Scripture. I can't find anything that says it's just a symbolic public profession of faith.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[ananda]

Baptism is simply the repackaged version of the ancient Jewish practice of tevilah in a mikveh. Tevilah was practiced quite often for ritual purity in fulfillment of the requirements of the Torah, so I don't see why baptism can't be done multiple times either.

 

[Unmerited Favour]

Getting rebaptised is not the main issue.The issue is, what prompted it?Is it an instruction from the Holy Spirit?Baptism is a sacred part of christianity, we must be careful that we do not abuse it.

 

[Pteriax]

I have a question related to the OP actually. Say someone is baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy spirit by immersion; but they were coerced to do it by their family and didn't mean it in their heart. This person is also a member of the RLDS a trinitarian sect of Mormonism. Later in life, the person leaves the RLDS sect, accepts the one true Jesus Christ as their Lord and savior, thus becoming Christian. Does that person need to get baptized again or not, and why?

This is a true story, by the way. It is not my story, but someone close to me. I am genuinely seeking an answer to this.

 

[abysmul]

I have a question related to the OP actually. Say someone is baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy spirit by immersion; but they were coerced to do it by their family and didn't mean it in their heart. This person is also a member of the RLDS a trinitarian sect of Mormonism. Later in life, the person leaves the RLDS sect, accepts the one true Jesus Christ as their Lord and savior, thus becoming Christian. Does that person need to get baptized again or not, and why?

This is a true story, by the way. It is not my story, but someone close to me. I am genuinely seeking an answer to this.

In my humble opinion: we need to believe and repent... that story doesn't sound like that happened initially, so I'd say that person should be baptized now if they believe and repent.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Every single baptism depicted in scripture follow the same pattern: believe->be baptized. It is the same pattern in Patristic sources.

Tertullian, the only example we have of someone who believed children and infants shouldn't be baptized from the Patristic period, doesn't deny the efficacy of Baptism, just the opposite. It is because Tertullian believes Baptism is efficacious for infants and children that he says it shouldn't be done--because Tertullian considers sins committed after Baptism as risking one's soul to hell, and thus Baptism should be postponed for as long as possible. Tertullian also recognizes the baptism of infants and children as an ancient and common practice in his own time.

"And so, according to the circumstances and disposition, and even age, of each individual, the delay of baptism is preferable; principally, however, in the case of little children. For why is it necessary— if (baptism itself) is not so necessary — that the sponsors likewise should be thrust into danger? Who both themselves, by reason of mortality, may fail to fulfil their promises, and may be disappointed by the development of an evil disposition, in those for whom they stood? The Lord does indeed say, "Forbid them not to come unto me." Let them "come," then, while they are growing up; let them "come" while they are learning, while they are learning whither to come; let them become Christians when they have become able to know Christ. Why does the innocent period of life hasten to the "remission of sins?" More caution will be exercised in worldly matters: so that one who is not trusted with earthly substance is trusted with divine! Let them know how to "ask" for salvation, that you may seem (at least) to have given "to him that asks." For no less cause must the unwedded also be deferred— in whom the ground of temptation is prepared, alike in such as never were wedded by means of their maturity, and in the widowed by means of their freedom— until they either marry, or else be more fully strengthened for continence. If any understand the weighty import of baptism, they will fear its reception more than its delay: sound faith is secure of salvation." - Tertullian, On Baptism, ch. 18

And, further, Patristic sources readily acknowledge infants and young children as being joined to the Church,

"For He came to save all through means of Himself--all, I say, who through Him are born again to God--infants, and children, and boys, and youths, and old men." - St. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book 2, ch. 22:4

"And they shall baptize the little children first. And if they can answer for themselves, let them answer. But if they cannot, let their parents answer or someone from their family." - St. Hippolytus of Rome, Apostolic Tradition, 21

"Therefore children are also baptized." - Origen, Homily on Luke, XIV

"For this reason, moreover, the Church received from the apostles the tradition of baptizing infants too." - Origen, Homily on Romans, V:9

-CryptoLutheran

 

[PaladinValer]

First off, simply mentioning a book or other text is not a reference.

Doing research is half the fun.

You see in order to look it up and confirm what you claim I need to know where in the Didache it says what you claim.

See my above.

You could even post the relevant section in the forum. Likewise, you cannot simply say "it's in the Bible" - you must establish exactly where it is in there, and how you get such and such interpretation of it.

Let's see...I mentioned "Deluge," which almost always refers to the Great Flood....I mentioned "Drowning of the Egyptians in the Sea of Reeds" which is fairly obvious as well...I mentioned Jesus' Proclamation that we must be baptized, which is usually in refers to St. John 3, and I also mentioned 1st St. Peter and Acts 15.

Are my posts actually being read? Or is there picking and choosing going on? It seems the latter...not surprising.

Secondly, according to Didache,
Since it was discovered in a monastery in Constantinople and published by P. Bryennios in 1883, the Didache or Teaching of the Twelve Apostles has continued to be one of the most disputed of early Christian texts. It has been depicted by scholars as anything between the original of the Apostolic Decree (c. 50 AD) and a late archaising fiction of the early third century. It bears no date itself, nor does it make reference to any datable external event.

Actually, most scholars date it in the 1st century; the idea that it could be later has been largely rejected according to the Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church.

Am I invalidating the Didache? No, however it is questionable.

Hardly questionable; it is the best window we got outside the Holy Writ into what was believed, taught, and practiced.

And regardless of if it is genuine or not, it is not authoritative in the sense that the Bible is.

It shows how the Holy Bible was interpreted.

If you could show me I am wrong from the text of the Bible, I might actually agree with you.

Already have.

But I don't think that will happen, you see the Didache itself says:

7:1 But concerning baptism, thus shall ye baptize.
7:2 Having first recited all these things, baptize {in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit} in living (running) water.
7:3 But if thou hast not living water, then baptize in other water;
7:4 and if thou art not able in cold, then in warm.
7:5 But if thou hast neither, then pour water on the head thrice in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
7:6 But before the baptism let him that baptizeth and him that is baptized fast, and any others also who are able;
7:7 and thou shalt order him that is baptized to fast a day or two before.

The book does not recognize sprinkling as a legitimate baptism, so even by your own source material, my infant baptism was not a baptism at all, therefore I have only been baptized one time.

Again, proof that what I said earlier was simply ignored. I said, and I quote, "Asperges baptisms are valid in so long as water rolls down the skin. The Didache may not mention that method by name, but it does make it clear that the water must be living, which has the double meaning of not only being holy but flowing. That fact that affusion (pouring) is declared valid is proof that submersion was never considered the only way. Immersion was preferred, but not necessary, and many were baptized immersion but by affusion, and many icons and pictures of Christ's own baptism actually depict this."

Living has a double meaning in its use: it means not just holiness but in its flowing. Affusion (pouring) is specifically mentioned, even outside an immersive environment, which means the 1st century Christian Church did not automatically equate baptism with immersion only but with the idea of soaking or dipping.

In so long as the water flows, it is living, for it runs down. An aspersing can flow if water is of sufficient quantity on the forehead. It may not be the most preferred method as it isn't directly stated in the Didache, but its intention and its result is.

Speaking of "traditions of men", I wonder if anyone here can point out the Scripture that says Baptism is an outward, public and symbolic demonstration of faith.

The Bible I have says we are buried with Christ in Baptism, being conformed to His death so that we might share in His life; that we are clothed with Christ in Baptism, that there is the promise of forgiveness of sins and the Holy Spirit for those who are baptized, and that it effects our salvation. Those are the explicit words of Scripture. I can't find anything that says it's just a symbolic public profession of faith.

-CryptoLutheran

Bingo.

 

[Pteriax]

You are free to take other texts over the Bible, paladinValer, but I will not. I don't think you have proved anything of merit. I quoted you stating that the Didache was your source and I refuted that source (in as much as it applied to this topic), and you are free to take it or leave it. But I am not wrong. Sprinkling is not baptism. Never was, never will be. And even if it was, it is a decision we make, not a decision made for us by our parents. Good day.

 

[Unmerited Favour]

I have a question related to the OP actually. Say someone is baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy spirit by immersion; but they were coerced to do it by their family and didn't mean it in their heart. This person is also a member of the RLDS a trinitarian sect of Mormonism. Later in life, the person leaves the RLDS sect, accepts the one true Jesus Christ as their Lord and savior, thus becoming Christian. Does that person need to get baptized again or not, and why?

This is a true story, by the way. It is not my story, but someone close to me. I am genuinely seeking an answer to this.

If that person is not convinced about his first baptism.You said he was forced, but now he has accepted Jesus as his personal Lord and Saviour.He has found himself out and desires a change.He can rebaptise because the first one he did was not from his heart, and I'm sure he went back into sin afterwards.Baptism requires total repentance and change from our old life to a new one which Jesus gives.

 

[Pteriax]

If that person is not convinced about his first baptism.You said he was forced, but now he has accepted Jesus as his personal Lord and Saviour.He has found himself out and desires a change.He can rebaptise because the first one he did was not from his heart, and I'm sure he went back into sin afterwards.Baptism requires total repentance and change from our old life to a new one which Jesus gives.

That was my thinking as well, but I wanted some other opinions on it. Thanks!

 

[bbbbbbb]

I have a question related to the OP actually. Say someone is baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy spirit by immersion; but they were coerced to do it by their family and didn't mean it in their heart. This person is also a member of the RLDS a trinitarian sect of Mormonism. Later in life, the person leaves the RLDS sect, accepts the one true Jesus Christ as their Lord and savior, thus becoming Christian. Does that person need to get baptized again or not, and why?

This is a true story, by the way. It is not my story, but someone close to me. I am genuinely seeking an answer to this.

I was faced with that exact question some years ago when a young man decided to reject the heresies of the RLDS and wholeheartedly embrace orthodox Christianity. He did intense Bible study, coupled with prayer, and concluded that he needed to be baptized. As a result he was baptized and continues well in his walk with God.

 

[PaladinValer]

You are free to take other texts over the Bible, paladinValer, but I will not.

Correction: I am free to take 1st century interpretations over your particular 21st century interpretation over the Holy Bible.

That's what is truly happening, and I will continue to do it because it is only Christian to do so.

I don't think you have proved anything of merit.

Again, hyperindividualism.

I quoted you stating that the Didache was your source and I refuted that source (in as much as it applied to this topic), and you are free to take it or leave it.

A refutation that was quashed due to a misreading of what "living" actually means and by proven evidence that baptism=submersion was not believed in by 1st century Christians who were taught directly from the Twelve themselves.

But I am not wrong. Sprinkling is not baptism. Never was, never will be.

This is not orthodox.

And even if it was, it is a decision we make, not a decision made for us by our parents. Good day.

This is Gnosticism.