The Doctrine of Regeneration in Church History
is the faithful hearing and reception of Jesus's words.
Sometimes the other side comes more clearly to the fore. Then it is the unfolding and development of that new life that stands out. The two are most intimately intertwined, however, and belong inseparably to the one concept of regeneration. There is one verse, however, in which the word "rebirth" is given a much broader meaning. In Matt. 19:28 Jesus says that at the "renewal of all things," when the Son of Man sits on his glorious throne, the twelve disciples who had left everything behind and followed him would also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. The absence of all further detail is proof that the word that Jesus used in the Aramaic must have referred to something that was well known. And that was in fact the case. Old
Testament prophecy, focusing on the end time, already expected a renewal of heaven and earth (Isa. 11:1–9; 65:17–25; 66:22; etc.). This expectation carried over into apocryphal literature and into the faith of the entire Jewish people.25 The messianic kingdom would also bring with it a metamorphosis in nature and all earthly relations. Jesus confirms this expectation, as also the apostles do later (2 Pet. 3:10–13; Rev. 21:1, 5), and describes the change as a "rebirth." If we link this meaning with the above, it turns out that Scripture speaks of rebirth mainly in three ways: (1) as the principle of the new life planted by the Spirit of God in humans before they believe, (2) as the moral renewal of humans manifesting itself in a holy walk of life, and finally (3) as the restoration of the whole world to its original completeness.
Thus rebirth encompasses the entire scope of re-creation from its very first beginning in the heart of people to its ultimate completion in the new heaven and new earth.
The Doctrine of Regeneration in Church History
In the first period of the church, the conversion that was triggered by the preaching of the gospel in the world brought with it a huge external change in the life of everyone who accepted that gospel. It was accompanied by, and revealed its seriousness and truth in, a complete break with either Judaism or paganism and [involved] the act of joining a poor and unsophisticated church of Christ. Baptism cut a deep trench between the past and the present. Hence many people testified again and again to the great turnabout that took place in their lives. They rejoiced in the redemption from their earlier empty walk of life and the freedom of their being children of God, in which they had now been put by Christ. Christians felt themselves to be a unique, chosen people, a new kind of people, new creatures, who in Christ had obtained communion with God and a new and authentic life.26 Rebirth was an event that they had lived through in their own lives and souls, but the moment they began to think and write about it, the explanation was inadequate. As a rule people confined themselves in their theoretical reflections to the demands of the gospel, faith, and repentance, but did not push through to the inner, hidden workings of the Spirit that lay behind them. Over against the fatalism of paganism, they highlighted the independence and freedom of humans and downplayed their corruption. The work of salvation was confined on God's part to his calling, and when people on their part listened to that call, repented, and believed, they received in baptism the forgiveness of all their past sins.
From the very beginning that baptism was central. No distinction was made between the sign and the thing signified.
There was little reflection on, and theorizing about, the connection between the two. It was enough for them that the cleansing of the body was at the same time a cleansing of the heart from a bad conscience. Baptism was the great turning point, the radical change, the decisive passage from a sinful past into the holy present. In some sense it was the rebirth itself.27
When, having gradually stopped being a missionary church, the church gained its members more from its own children than from among Jews and pagans and for that reason universally introduced infant baptism, people continued to maintain this close connection between baptism and regeneration but had to modify it in important ways. In the case of persons who converted to Christianity as adults, the church could maintain the requirement of preceding repentance and faith, but in the case of children born of Christian parents, this was impossible.
They were therefore baptized on the basis, not of their personal faith, but of the faith of the church in whose fellowship they were born. Further, when baptism was administered to adults upon confession of faith, it was a mighty turning point on their life journey, a mortification of the old and a rising to a new and spiritual life. In the case of children, this striking significance of baptism naturally receded into the background, and the regeneration that took place in it was more or less detached from the past and the future. It was no longer a break with the old and the principle of a new life but an infusion of supernatural power that, as the children grew up, could be used for good or for ill. Finally, in looking at regeneration one could more readily focus on the negative than on the positive side of it.
For since the infants were not guilty of actual sins, forgiveness, which occurs in baptism and only applies to past sins, could not bear on these either but only on original sin. However, to the extent this original sin was also viewed as guilt, or only as pollution, or even—more tenuously still—exclusively as a deficiency, the meaning of forgiveness in infant baptism shifted its focus to an infusion of a new supernatural power.
In the East, accordingly, baptismal regeneration was especially associated with the implantation of a seed of immortality.28 In the West, though original sin was first viewed more seriously by Tertullian, Cyprian, and Augustine (et al.), it gradually assumed a negative character as a result of the doctrine of the superadded gift. Hence regeneration lost its real meaning and changed into
Justification. The doctrine of regeneration in Catholicism, consequently, took the following form. To adults after the seven preparations, and to children of believers without any preparation (excepting the negative one of not posing an obstacle), the church, in the sacrament of baptism administered by the priest, imparts infused grace, both justifying and sanctifying grace. This grace delivers the baptized person from guilt and eternal punishment insofar as they rest on him or her on account of past sins, and mortifies the original pollution insofar as it restrains lust and only allows it to continue as a stimulus to sin. Concretely, it consists in a divine quality inhering in the soul, a quality that is materially identical with the superadded gift that has been lost. Hence, it fashions a person into conformity to God, incorporates one into the church as the body of Christ and hence into Christ himself, and enables him or her to perform supernaturally good works and to merit eternal life. Aside from a number of extraordinary cases, this infused grace can only be obtained through the sacrament of the church. Baptism is therefore strictly necessary for salvation and people, consequently, are absolutely dependent on the church and its priest. This is true not only at the beginning but throughout life. For not only do they need the sacrament of penance for venial sins committed later, but they can also again lose the grace received in baptism as a result of mortal sins and regain it only through the mediation of the church. Regeneration is not an enduring good but is continually dependent on human effort, both for its existence and development.29
By asserting the principle that humans are justified by grace through faith alone, the Reformation pushed the church aside as mediatrix of salvation and restored the direct connection between the soul and God, subject only to the mediation of Christ and his Word. Consequently, it gave Scripture priority over the church, and the Word priority over the sacrament. But this principle brought with it special dangers and difficulties.
For the Anabaptists extended this principle to the point where
they completely rejected the church and the sacraments as means of grace, made regeneration as new life dependent on an active faith and repentance, and therefore admitted people to baptism only on the basis of a personal confession. Luther then backtracked halfway, and Lutherans later unanimously taught that the sacrament indeed presupposes faith and repentance but that, since in the case of children this cannot be expected, baptism operating through the power of the Spirit, which unites itself with the water of baptism, confers on them in advance the grace that the sacrament actually demands and presupposes.
Hence, in their polemic against Anabaptists, they turned the argument around. Instead of deciding that infants, inasmuch as they cannot as yet exercise faith and repentance, had to remain unbaptized, they reasoned that they in fact had to be baptized in order to obtain faith and salvation. "Therefore they must be baptized in order that faith and salvation may follow."30
According to Titus 3:5, after all, baptism is the washing of regeneration, which is especially for children because as a means of grace the Word cannot yet be effective.31 The grace granted in baptism consists in the gift of faith, the forgiveness of sins, and eternal life, and it is entirely adequate for children who die in infancy. But in the case of children who grow up to the years of discretion, that grace is tested. For when a person does not appropriate this grace by acts of faith and repentance, it is lost.
And even when, through faith and repentance, that person experiences rebirth in the sense of renewal, this new life, along with all the grace received, remains amissible to the end. Thus also for children as a rule (exceptions were made for extraordinary cases),32 Lutherans on their part made regeneration dependent on baptism and, by implication, on the church. They, too, break up the continuity of the spiritual life by consistently making rebirth amissible and by positing a distinction and a dualism between the primary regeneration, which precedes faith and repentance, and the subsequent secondary regeneration (renewal). In so doing, they ran the danger of reducing the former to a power that enabled people to
believe but that left it in doubt whether they would ever in fact believe.33
The theologians of the Reformed persuasion naturally faced the same difficulty and, in addition, found no solution that was satisfactory to everyone. Like the gospel when it was preached in the beginning, and every religious movement that later surfaced within the boundaries of Christianity, the Reformation also had to turn first to adults and hence make the preaching of faith and repentance a priority. By that faith one received regeneration: the new spiritual life. "Our regeneration by faith" is the title of the third chapter of book III of Calvin's Institutes. But by taking this route, one got into difficulties with the children of believers and their baptism. To escape them, theologians adopted a variety of approaches. They grounded the baptism of the children of the church in the faith of the parents or of the church, in the faith children would exercise in the future, or in a largely undefined covenant of grace in which children were included with their parents. Another approach, illustrated by the examples of John and Jesus, held that the Holy Spirit can work in the hearts of children before they become self-conscious and before their birth. Others based it on the reality, assumed to exist by faith in the promise of the covenant of grace, that the Holy Spirit had wrought in their hearts an established disposition of faith and hence of rebirth (in the narrow sense, as the very first life principle).34 In the works of theologians,
Calvin among them,35 several of these lines of argument occur side by side, and not one of them is made dominant.
The last-mentioned opinion of a prebaptismal regeneration receives additional support from the thought that the moment faith and repentance are considered in connection with the deep corruption of human nature, one has to go back to a secret internal operation of the Holy Spirit from which they could arise and in light of which they could be explained. In that connection regeneration and repentance had to be distinguished, at least
logically, and the former placed before the latter. But theologians had scarcely expressed the opinion that in the case of infants regeneration precedes baptism before still other objections arose. No one dared to say that this was always and without exception the case; theologians therefore confined themselves to saying that this was usually how it happened.
Moreover, one could still with some ground say this of children of the covenant who died in infancy, but the confession of election already made many people speak with caution concerning these children. And with respect to children who stayed alive and grew up, reality frequently offered a different picture from what their baptism would lead one to expect.
Theologians, in any case, were forced to adopt the restriction that only elect children were as a rule regenerated before their baptism. And in view of the fact that many baptized persons only come to faith and repentance at a much later age and after years of living in bondage to sin, even this last opinion was too bold for many people. They therefore confined themselves to the general statement that regeneration could take place before, during, or at some time after, baptism.36
But beyond this, if regeneration occurred in infancy before or after baptism, in what did it consist? Most Reformed theologians maintained the continuity of the spiritual life.
Rebirth in infancy, they said, planted that vital principle in the heart that was continually kept alive by God, later manifested itself in deeds of faith and repentance, and then continued in sanctification. But a fairly large group of Anglican theologians gradually began to make a distinction between "baptismal regeneration" and the later renewal that followed upon faith and repentance. By the former they meant the infusion of spiritual power that in later years enabled the baptized to believe and repent and was therefore dependent on faith and repentance for its continuation.37 And when the church increasingly fell into decline and conformity to the world, many sought to rescue themselves by making a sharp distinction between an "internal"