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The Jewish Jesus & Baptism

Baptism is a very important Christian ritual today, but different denominations do it different ways and for different reasons. All of their reasons are based on verses from the New Testament. One of the most famous New Testament characters is even named after it – John the Baptist. I have met some members of Baptist denominations that believe John the Baptist was the founder of their church—The First First Baptist Church in the World.

I grew up attending a Baptist church too and could picture John the Baptist standing in the Jordan River, a huge crowd standing on the bank, and John dunking them one after the other – after he spoke the same words our preacher spoke when he baptized anyone. However, after I became a minister and baptized people in the same manner, I realized that it would be physically impossible for one man to dunk hundreds (or thousands) of people one after the other. I also realized that Bible verses I based my reasons for baptism on did not exist when John the Baptist or any of the apostles lived. The books of the New Testament wouldn’t be written until decades later – and they wouldn’t become “Scripture” until centuries later.

In this article we will discuss what baptism meant to John the Immerser (his last name wasn’t “Baptist”), Jesus and the apostles. The goal is to answer these questions: 

(1) Why was baptism done? 
(2) Where were people baptized?
(3) How were they baptized?
(4) What did the one baptizing people do?
(5) Were people only baptized once?

What will you do with the information you learn from the answers to the above questions? I created the following guideline to help members of our study groups answer that question. I hope you will also use it.

My belief system will be large enough to include all of the facts; it will be open enough to be tested; and, it will be flexible enough to change when errors are discovered or I become aware of new facts.

Consider the alternatives of not following the above guideline:

(1) I will ignore facts that disagree with my beliefs.
(2) I will refuse to allow others to question my beliefs.
(3) I will refuse to change my beliefs when errors are discovered.
(4) I will refuse to change my beliefs when new facts are discovered that disagree with them.


Now let’s find out what baptism meant to the Jewish Jesus and his followers. After you finish reading the article below, it will be up to you to decide which of the above options you will choose to follow. Read the article The Jewish Jesus & Baptism at -- http://www.biblicalheritage.org/Jesus/Jesus%20Baptism.pdf

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