The Sacraments

O n T ru e a nd Fal s e R elig i o n a t b "

' see below pp .

T HE SACRAM ENTS

I promised to speak of the Sacraments after having con sidered the Church .

I heartily wish this word sacrament had never been adopted by the Germans without being translated into German .

" they think of some thing great and holy which by i ts own power can free the con science from sin .

Others again , seeing the error of this , have said it was the symbol of a sacred thing .

This , indeed , I should not entirely disapprove , unless they also insisted that when

"sacrament For when they hear the word

you perform the sacrament outwardly a puriﬁcation is certainly performed inwardly . \ A third group h as asserted that a sacra ment is a sign which is given only when atonement h as been made in the heart, but is given for the purpose of rendering the recipient sure that what is signiﬁed by the sacrament has now been accomplished .

I do not like to diﬂ 'er from great men , * especially at this time when they are so ﬂourishing and are writing wi th such success that they seem to have clothed the world in a new guise and to have changed it from a rude to a very reﬁned state .

But I beg them to consider what I am here going to adduce in the same manner in which I always weigh their own writings .

The on e thing upon which I ﬁx my attention in reading the writings of others is the spirit in which the author seems to have written ; for all his purpose becomes plain in his very language .

If I see that a thing was written from love of God and one 's neighbor , I overlook many errors , just as many persons , no doubt, considerately overlook mine . Wh en , however, occasion Offers , I ﬁll in the gaps , reverse th e order, unravel the knots , connect wandering thoughts , with out, however, discourteous strictures on anybody by name , that peace may be preserved, which some are so bent upon di sturb ing .

I make two exceptions , Emser and Eck , for they are p ests D — a to tt LChrist.

Their own wanton recklessness h as fO ' rced me to write pretty sharply against them and by name .

For the former without any warning so arrogantly attacked me unawares that I shoul d have been a renegade to Christ

's teach 'Luther and hi s a ssoci at es .

1 80 Th e Wo rks of Huldreich Zwi ng li ings ( for it is His work , not mine , in which I am engaged) , if I had retired before a man singing hi s song of victory before he had come into my sight .

For he wrote against me in such a way (and published the book) that he tricked me into waiting for si x months to see if he were going to send me a copy . * The other laid a snare for my destruction , and sending most absurd and lying Slanders to the assembly of the Swiss tried to get the start of me, so that, if his scheme succeeded , I might seem to have been rightly slain , and that he might sell himself for a high price to the Romans and the tyrants of Germany .

When I disclosed his crime] (and it could n ot 'be denied) , good gods , h ow he raved !

So I beg all the readers of this Commentary to judge it with a free mind and without passion , and to remove what they see is foreign to the purest teachings of Christ, employing not decrees and condemnations of their own but the spear of the heavenly word drawn from the writings of both Testaments .

With your good permission , then , I will end my prefatory remarks , and tell what I have found as to the signiﬁcation and force of this word .

" for V arroI is a pledge which litigants depos "Sacrament ited at some altar ; and the winner got back his pledge or money .

" is an oath , and this use of the word is still found among the populace Of France and Italy .

"sacrament Again , a "military sacrament, by which soldiers are bound to obey their general according to

Finally, there is also the so-called the rights or laws of war .

For wars also have laws, but laws of their own , for the regular laws are silent in the midst of arms .§ It does not appear that the word was used among the ancients to mean a sacred and secret thing .

Hence I have given no space to this acceptation of the term , n or to the one which the Latin translation of the New Testament h as , of s D efens e of the Ca non of th e M ass ag ai ns t "Th e prefac e of Emeer '

Huldr eich Zwi ng bi was dated April 1 5 , 1 524 .

The preface of Zwi ngl i 's R epby wa s dated Aug ust 20, 1 524 . tIn the second half of 1 524 Zwi ng li i s sued two pamphl ets ag ai nst Eek .

IDe l/ i/ ng u a L a ti n a , V, § 180.

§Cicero P r o M i l one 1 1 .

1 82 The Works of H uld reich Zwing li "

And lest anyone should wonder about this latter testimony, I will remark that testimony from an Opponent is alone ? the strongest .

They are wrong, therefore, by the whole width of heaven wh o think that sacraments have any cleansing power .

The second group , * seeing this , taught that sacraments are signs which when they are performed make a man sure about what is performed within him . But this was a vain i nven tion ; as if, forsooth , when a man is wet with the water some thing happens i n him which he could not possibly have known unless water had been poured over him at the same time ! They did not know , if they will allow me to say so, what faith is or how it is born in a man .

I said some time back that faith is a matter of fact, _ n ot of knowledge or Opinion or imagi nation

A man , therefore , feels faith within , in hi s heart ; for it iS ' hO ' rn only when a man begins to despair of himself, and to see that he must trust in God alone .

And it is perfected when a man wholly casts himself off and prostrates himself before the mercy of God alone , but in such fashion as to have entire trust in it because of Christ who was given for us .

What man of faith can be unaware of this ?

For then only are you free from sin when the mind trusts itself unwaveringly to the death of Christ and ﬁnds rest there .

And if meanwhile you had been deluged with the whole Jordan and a sacred formula been repeated a thousand times , your mind would yet have had no feeling of being in a better state , except in so far as this trivial and ﬂeeting

notion that the sacraments purify , so persistently beaten into it, gave a false impression of having persuaded it .

For they that have not faith gape with wonder at anything applied to them that is said to have any power , and fancy they have found, nay, actually felt , salvation , when they have n ot felt . anything at all within , as is shown by their subsequent lives .

For if we become new men , that is to say , if we l ove God and our neighbor, we Shrink from si n , put on Christ and daily grow more and more into the perfect man , are changed by the action Of the Holy Spirit .

But who would not feel this change ?

If, however, pleasing ourselves for a time with the freedom from guilt we have acquired , we presently , when this hallucination has worn off, return to the Old life , like a dog to "The Luthera ns .

O n T ru e and Fal s e R elig i on h is vomit [ cf. Prov . 26 : it is evident that we have not felt any change of heart, but only the awe of the water .

Many are baptized , therefore , who during baptism feel nothing beyond awe of the water, and not also remission of sins, that is , th e deliverance of the heart .

And this was generally the case with those who were baptized by John and those who after the ascen sion of Christ at the preaching of the Apostles and disciples received baptism before they were sure of salvation through Christ or were fully taught in regard to it, as in Acts 1 9 : 2 -6 and Cornelius and hi s house had received the Holy

Spirit before they were baptized : they had , therefore , been sure of the grace of God before baptism .

Therefore this second view h as no value , which supposes that the sacraments are signs of such a kind that, when they are applied to a man , the thing signiﬁed by the sacraments at once takes place within him .

For in this way the liberty of the divine Spirit which dis tributes itself to individuals as it will , that is , to whom it will , when it will , where it will , would be bound .

For if it were compelled to act within when we employ the signs externally , it would be absolutely bound by the signs, whereas we see that really the opposite takes place , as has been made clear by the testimony above .

Consequently , in the third place , there came forward men * who , seeing clearly that the sacraments cannot purify, nor the operation of the divine Spirit be such a slave to the sacraments that, when they are performed, it is com pelled at the same time to Operate within ( for it is established that the Holy Spirit was sometimes given before baptism , sometimes afterwards, as in Acts 1 0: 44-48 and 1 9 : 2 -6 ) taught that the sacraments are Signs which make a man sure of the thing that h as been accomplished within him .

Hence, for example, they refuse baptism to all who have not previously so well learned and confessed the faith that they can respond to all its articles .

Their view is just as far from the truth as was the precedi ng .

For those who have so learned and confessed the faith have been sure for some time already Of salvation

, as was made plain a little while ago in the refutation of the error of the second group .

For if the heart already trusts , it cannot be unaware of i ts trust .

What need, therefore, has he * Th e Anabapti sts .

1 84 Th e Works Of Huld reich Zwing li of baptism who has already for some time been sure through his faith in God of the remission of his sins ?

The sacraments

ig ns or ceremonials— let me say it with the good permission of all both of the new school and the old— by which a man proves to the Church that he either aims to be, or is , a soldier of Christ, and ' which inform the whole Church rather than yourself of your faith .

For if your faith is n ot so perfect as n ot to need a ceremonial Sign to conﬁrm it, it is n ot faith .

For faith i s that by which we rely on the mercy of God unwaveringly, ﬁrmly, and singleheartedly, as Paul shows us in many passages .

So much for the meaning of the name( Christ left us two sacraments and no more, Baptism and The Lord

's Supper . By these we are initiated, giving the name with the one, and showing by the other that we are mindful of Christ 's victory and are members of His Church .

In Baptism we receive a token that we are to fashion our lives according to the rule of Christ ; by the Lord 's Supper we give proof that we trust in the death of Christ, glad and thankful to be in that company which gives thanks to the Lord for the blessing of redemption

which He freely gave us by dying for us .

The other sacra ments are rather ceremonials , for they have no initiatory func tion in the Church of God .

Hence it is n ot improper to exclude them ; for they were n ot instituted by God to help us initiate anything In the Church .

\ All this will be made clearer in the sequel .

MARRIAGE *

Of Marriage I am going to say only enough here to prevent anyone 's thinking its dignity impaired when I do not count it among the sacraments , while Paul nevertheless calls it a sacrament, Ephes .

I will say this , therefore , that two errors have been committed as to this passage : the ﬁrst by the [Latin] translator, who, when he should have rendered

" [arcanum] , always translated it " by "secret "sacra ment , "mystery " although the latter word does not correspond to the former ; the second by us , wh o do not examine with due care the meaning of this passage , in which Paul simply wished , by "See, fur ther, S ecti on 2 1 (p .

1 86 The Wo rks of H uld reich Zwi ng li by which those marked themselves out who were going to mend their lives .

I am speaki ng now of baptism pure and simple, in which those who are going to enter upon a n ew life ar e dipped in water ; n ot of baptism as embracing the whole matter of preaching as well as dipping .

Those who today battle so stoutly against the baptism of infants— not seeing this disti nc tion , namely, that baptism is used sometimes for the whole procedure of both teachin g and sacrament, sometimes only for the sacrament, that is , the sign— ﬁght blindfolded , as gladi ators sometimes di d .

Thus , then , the di vine Baptist speaks in Matt .

" What else is this than to say :

"I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance .

"I dip you in water, that you may repent Of your old life , that is , be so ashamed of your former life that you will utterly cast it off and begin a new one?

By this sign I am simply teaching you , wh o are ignorant of h eav enly things, that henceforth , if you wish to be saved at all , you must put on an entirely different life .

As those who are washed come out new, as it were, so I ﬁrst bring you by a visible act to the wiping out of your pas t life .

Mark, 1 : 4 , keeps the same sequence when he says :

"John was in the des ert baptizing and preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins .

Not that I mean that John began to baptize before he taught, but that he readily baptized any who came to him , although he di d not know h ow honestly they had received the word, and did not demand to know .

But when he saw that many of the Pharisees and Sadducees had come to his baptism , and knew through the Holy Spiri t that their hearts were not right and whole with the Lord , he upbraided them Sharply , saying :

"Ya h av e come , indeed, to baptism , not in order to lay aside your old life , but that you may seem to men to belong to the number of those who by the Sign of baptism bind themselves , as by an earnest or an oath , to a change of life , while within ye are not a whit better and make no change in your bad life .

Since ye wish to be counted in the company of the repentant , Show the fruits of repentance ! Do as becomes the repentant !

He meant :

"Ye Oﬂ 'spri ng of vipers , etc .

" From all this it is plain that baptism is an initiatory sacrament by which those who were going to change their life and ways marked themselves out and were enrolled among the repentant .

And

O n Tru e a nd Fal s e R elig i on this was a preparation for the coming of Christ, as Luke , 4 : 1 7, proves from Isaiah For when everybody, having reviewed his whole life , not only found nothing in it on which he could rely for salvation , but also saw at the same time that he lacked the strength to tear loose from his former life and steadfastly to prosecute a new on e, he needed someone to lend a hand in this wretched state of things .

Such a on e i s pointed out not only by the divine Baptist, but also by the Evangelist, as was highly necessary .

For, knowing that repentance begets despair , he immediately shows that one had come who should raise up again the fallen hopes .

He says, John 1 : 26 :

"I bap ti z e with water ; but in the midst Of you is and was born , yea even here among you stands , one whom nevertheless ye know not ; b e it is who will come after me , who yet was before me ; the latchet of whose shoe I am n ot worthy to unloose .

"He will baptize you with the H oly Spirit and with ﬁre , Matt .

John , therefore , at the same time taught repentance, and said that He who Should destroy sin was at hand .

But before we go further I must speak of the baptism of the Holy Spirit, since some men not rightly taught concerning it have put forward in consequence wrong views of baptism .

The baptism of th e HOly Spirit, then , is twofold .

First , there Is th e bapti sm by which all are ﬂooded within who trust

"for no man cometh to him , except the Father draw him , In Christ, " Isa .

Second, there is the external baptism Of the Holy Spirit, just as there is the baptism Of water .

" John 6 : 44 .

"And all shall be taught of God, - Drenched wi th this , pious men once began at once to speak in foreign tongues

[Acts 2 : 4

This was a sign to others rather than to the speakers, for the speakers felt within themselves faith and enlightenment of soul , but the others did n ot know this of them .

It, therefore , turned their tongues into foreign speech , that others might know that what was taking place was done by the divine Spirit . And this latter baptism of the Holy Spirit is n ot necessary , but the former is so very necessary that no one can be saved without it ; for no on e is saved except by faith , and faith is n ot born save at the instance of the Holy Spirit .

John said that both baptisms were to come, when he said [Lk .

3 : 1 6] "He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit, and with

1 88 Th e Wo rks of H uldreich Zwing li

ﬁre .

Now, we are n ot all imbued with the Sign Of tongues , but all of us who are pious have been made faithful by the enlightenment and drawing of the Holy Spiri t .

The baptism of John , therefore , preceded both baptisms of the Holy Spirit, as far as Christ is concerned ; for otherwise it is evident that repentance cannot begin without the Holy Spirit .

Yea, the baptism of John even antedated repentance , as has been made plain in the case of the Pharisees and Sadducees , and in Luke

3 : 7.

The ﬁrs t is plain fromthe fact that John sent those whom he had frightened to Christ, of whom they were still ignorant, and promised that they woul d ﬁnd salvation in Him .

For thus i s it recorded in John 1 : 28

"These things were done in Bethabara where John was baptizing .

The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him , and saith, Behold the Lamb of God , that taketh away the si n of the world !

This is he of whom I said to you , After me will come a man who was before me , because he was ﬁrst in regard to me, and I knew

-31 : him not ; but that he should be made manifest to Israel , for this cause came I baptizing with water .

Behold h ow John baptized with water those whom he sent to Christ, and baptized them in order to send them to Christ !

The second point, namely, that Pharisees and Sadducees also were baptized by John is made manifest thus .

In Luke 3 : 7 we read :

"He said therefore to the multitudes that went out to be baptized of him , Ye offspring of vipers, who warned you to ﬂee from the wrath

And the same thing that Luke says here of the multitudes that went out to be baptized of John , Matthew, 3 : 5 , to come ?

"Then went out unto him Jerusalem , and all Jndasa, and all the region round about Jordan ; and they were baptized of him in Jordan . expressed thus :

It is, therefore, logical for us to understand the words, "But when he saw many of the Phar isees and Sadducees coming to his baptism , he said , etc . , in the sense that both Pharisees and Sadducees were baptized .

For as Luke says those went out to be baptized who Matthew explicitly writes were baptized , so also Matthew said

"came to his baptism" for "

This view will be plainer if "were baptized .

"Ye offspring of vipers . on e considers closely the words that follow :

But what is written in Luke 7: 29-31 took place on another occasion and had to do with other persons, as Matt.

1 90 Th e Works of H uld reich Zwi ng li earlier of the two events he describes after the other .

Having pointed out the Lamb that destroys the sins of the world, he then , in order n ot to seem to anyone to have spoken with more boldness than truth , proves that the world can be washed clean through Him for this especial reason , that He is the Son of God .

For he says :

"And I have seen , and have borne witnes s that this is the Son of God .

Furthermore , that He is the Son

of God he proves by the fact that the heavenly Spirit descended upon Him in the form of a dove, and rested upon Him .

Thus , what had taken place before , the Evangelist narrates afterwards .

For a visible Sign had been given to John , that by it he might recognize Christ .

Having recognized Him , he proclaimed to others also that He was the Lamb that destroys the sins of the world .

For there follows a little later the statement that on the next day he pointed Him out again to two of His disciples , who left him and followed Jesus [Jn . 1 : 35

All thi s makes it manifest that John led to Jesus Christ, and as soon as it could be done sent his own followers to Him .

While this is all so, another point meets us , namely, that Christ was not unknown to John when he baptized Him ; for we have it plainly put in Matt . 3 : 1 4 that when Jesus came to John to be baptized by him John said :

I have need to be baptized of thee , and comest thou to me ?

" These words apparently cannot have been said to on e unknown ; hence it seems possible to infer that Jesus was known to John even before he saw the Spirit descending upon Him .

Since it would take too long to disentangle this knot here, I refer you to Augustine "The Agreement of the Evan Book 2 , Ch . 1 5 .

My object is Simply to make plain that there i s but one baptism , whether we call it of John or of Christ .

For there is "on e faith , on e baptism , 's " Eph . 4 : 5 .

This can also be inferred from the fact, Matt .

3 : 1 4, that John pleaded that he needed rather to be baptized by Christ, mean ing, of course, "I send to Thee those whom I initiate with water, because I , too , ought to be sent to Thee , and comest Thou to Me ?

Christ, therefore , solved his difficulty thus :

"Suffer it : for whatever is right, that i s, whatever ought to be done , we will fulﬁl .

Thus Jesus was baptized in just the same way as other men , for nothing is said of any change) and mention of that

"D e oonaenw eva ng eI/ ista rum .

O n Tru e a nd Fal s e R elig i o n would not have been omitted if any had been made ; nor indeed would Christ 's being baptized have had any great Signiﬁcance if it had been done by a method different from the common on e.

But now, as the Son of God was baptized by John , by whom sinners were baptized , it is a wonderful thing that the spotless Son of God accepted that Sign which is given to those who have to be changed , though He is Himself the unchange able God .

Finally , and this is the strongest point of all , men who had already heard Christ and justiﬁed Him , were still bap tized with the baptism of John , Luke 7: 29 .

If you maintain that Ba m wﬁéw eg in this passage clearly signiﬁes that they h ad already been baptized before , I have no objection , for my conclusion follows just the same , namely, that the baptism of John and the baptism Of Christ are the same thing ; for unless they were on e and the same , Jesus would have rebaptized these persons through His disciples .

Since , therefore , even here He was satisﬁed with the baptism of John , we must agree that it was the same as the baptism of Christ .

Still , the ﬁrst -mentioned meaning appeals to me more , namely, that after hearing Christ they were baptized with the baptism of John ; or, what is much

"bapti zati " is used in this passage for nearer the truth , ' had hitherto been taught by John , but having heard Christ, about whom they had heard much while with John , they justiﬁed Him ,

"imbuti , so that the meaning is that these men

that is , they had an exalted Opinion Of Him such as we are wont to have of a just man .

That the disciples of Christ were washed in the baptism only Of John is plain from this :

In John 1 : 37 we read that two disciples of John the Baptist had heard the heralding of Christ by their master ,

"Behold the Lamb of God , " etc .

One of these was Andrew , brother of Simon .

Now, if he was a di sciple of John he was undoubtedly baptized ; for there were bapti zed by him even those who di d n ot care to be his disciples , much more, then , those who fol lowed him as their leader .

Again , in John 3 : 26 we read that John "Rabbi , he that was with thee beyond Jordan , to whom thou hast borne witness , behold,

's disciples brought him word :

From this it appears that Christ through His attendants baptized in I say, the same baptizeth , and all men come to him .

1 92 The Works of Huldreich Zwi ng li the same way and form as John did ; for if He had baptized otherwise, the disciples of John could not have failed to men tion it .

In the third place , John 4 : 2 h as , "Although Jesus himself baptized n ot, but his disciples .

Since , therefore , we nowhere see that the disciples were baptized by Christ ( for He baptized n ot) , and at the same time see that His di sciples bap ti zed, it is n ot likely that they baptized others, but had never been baptized themselves .

Since, then , they were baptized, they were baptized with n o baptism but the baptism of John ; for Christ baptized not .

Since, therefore, Christ received the bap tism of John and made no change in it either in his own case or that of the Apostles, it is clearly established that baptism had its beginning under John , and that there was no di ffer

ence between the baptism of John and that of Christ, as far as the nature, effect, and purpose are concerned .

For it is evident that Christ was baptized on our account, in order to commend baptism to us .

What baptism , then , did He wish to commend ?

Some other than John 's ?

Why, then , was He not ﬁrst Him self baptized with that other ?

Since, therefore, He wished by means Of the baptism of John to commend baptism to us and made no change in it, it is apparent that the baptism of John and that of Christ are the same baptism .

But this view seems to be opposed by what is written in Acts 1 9 : 1 -1 0 and Matt .

28 : 1 9 .

For this passage of Acts plainly bears witness that twelve men were baptized over again in the name of Jesus , who yet had been previously baptized with the baptism of John .

But if the baptism of John and that of Christ are the same, there was n o need of their being bap tiz ed with the baptism of Christ .

We must, therefore , consider the character of both baptisms .

John baptized, then , unto the entering upon repentance , as has been said, * and proclaimed that salvation was at hand in Him who was to come after him ; for He was the Lamb that alone took away si n , and he taught trust in Him ; for he said [they Should believe] on Him which Should come , that is, on Christ, Acts The baptism of John , therefore , demanded a new life and made known hope in Christ .

And this was a baptism of teaching ; for the water was the same in both cases .

The baptism of Christ required "See p .

1 86 .

1 94 The Works of H uld reich Zwing li signiﬁcant speech which John the Evangelist sums up in Chap ter 3 : 35 -36 expresses the nature of the gospel most clearly, as given in these words :

"The Father loveth the Son , and hath given all things into his hand .

He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life ; but he that hath n ot faith in the Son " What else i s this , pray, than "He that believeth when the gospel is preached shall be saved ; but he that believeth not shall be con shall not see life, but thewrath of God abideth on him .

" [M k . 1 6 :

Since, then , the baptisms of teaching are altogether the same, how i s it that we suppose a difference in the baptisms of water , when each applied the water to the end that we might come forth new men and might model our lives according to the teaching which each proclaimed? demned We must now come back to the nineteenth chapter of Acts , where there seemed to be something opposed to the view that there i s but on e baptism , whether you call it Christ

's 's or John or that of the other Apostles also .

"When Paul had come to Ephesus and found certain disciples , he said unto them , Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye believed ?

What is Paul asking here ?

Is it whether they have spoken with tongues ?

He seems to be asking this , for afterwards when he "had laid his hands upon them , they spake with tongues .

" What, then , is this new inquiry ?

Was this thing demanded for faith ?

Cer tai nly n ot, for we see that the miracle of tongues rarely occurred .

He was n ot, therefore , asking about the gift of tongues, although this gift followed afterwards , but about the inward strength of their faith .

For he knew that they had been baptized , that is, taught, by Apollos ; wh o, however , was ﬁrst taught " by Aquila and Priscilla [Acts 1 8 : 24 28] after he had come to Corinth from Ephesus . Hence Paul , very properly fearing that these disciples might perhaps be lacking in something , asked whether they had been taught inwardly through the Holy Spirit, so as to have all conﬁdence in salvation through Christ .

They ,therefore , not hav ing yet attained this , tell him that they have never heard any mention of a Holy Spirit .

Paul wondered at these words , and asked into what they had been baptized .

They replied , "the way of God more exactly "Into John " for "

Notice how he here uses "teach ing, "baptism 's baptism .

" as does also Christ, Matt. when He asks the Jews

O n True a nd Fal s e R elig i o n 1 9

Here it is manifest that Christ is not speaking of the baptism of water , The baptism ofJohn , was it from men or from God ?

for that is decidedly of th e earth , whereas the teaching had come down from heaven .

And in John 3 : 26 the disciples of John say :

"Behold , the same baptizeth , and all men come to him "

; when nevertheless He did not Himself baptize , as later on we see in the fourth chapter .

But Christ did baptize wi th teaching, since He taught just what John also taught, as far as the substance of it was concerned ; for in other respects no one so taught, as one having authority .

In the same third chapter, a little before the passage already quoted , John says

"After these things came Jesus and his disciples into the land of Judaea ; and there he tarried with them , and bap

[3 : 22] " While there is here no mention at all of teaching , it is manifest that the Evangelist uses ti zed .

" for " Here I warn those persons who do not interpret this passage quite correctly to give careful attention .

What now follows Paul said not for the purpose of belittling the dignity of John "teach .

"baptize 's baptism or th e estimation in which it was held , as we have generally believed , but in order to bring out its character plainly, for when this had been explai ned these disciples coul d

tell whether they had come to repentance and Christ in the way John had preached .

S O he says [Acts 1 9 : 4

"John verily baptized the baptism of repentance "

—what else i s this than " ?

- "saying unto the people , that they Shoul d believe on Him that Should come after him , that is, on Christ Jesus .

And when they heard this, they were baptized into the name Of the Lord Jesus .

"preached repentance "

If, therefore , these men had the form of bapti sm which Paul tells of here , what, pray, was lacking to them ?

For if they repented of their former life and set all their hope on Christ, they were already born again .

It becomes manifest, therefore , that they were not adequately instructed i n the teaching of John , however far they thought they had progressed therein .

For what one of the Apostles preached the Gospel of Christ more clearly than John , as was seen a little while ago ?

But Apollos himself had been somewhat deﬁcient, as we see in Acts 1 8 : 24 28, so that it is not likely that disciples still new to the faith were better equipped than a master so famous for his knowledge of

1 96 Th e Wo rks Oi H uld reich Zwing li the law and the prophets .

Having, therefore, believed up to this ti me that they held the teaching Of John correctly, they found, as Paul recited its es sentials, that they were still far from the complete teachi ng .

They are baptized , t herefore , that is, led by Paul into Christ .

For I must n ot fail to note that, however the Latin translators render it, the Greeks uni formly have in this passage [Acts "Into what were ye baptized , "

° and agai n , "

"Into John " n ot "in what 's baptism ,

"baptized the baptism of repentance , "in John 's baptism .

Also, a little later , not " n ot "wi th the baptism "

; and, ﬁnally, They were baptized into the name of the Lord Jes us , " not "in the name .

I am well aware that ﬁgurative expres sions of this kind are sometimes translated in that fashion , but in this passage the recurrence of the locution warns us not to think it used casually .

Nay, n ot to waste time with such critics , what the Greeks have in Matt .

— "Baptizing them into the name of the Father, and of the S on , and of the Holy Ghost

"in the name, as the Latins have it .

For to be is much more vivid than

" is to be grafted into faith in God .

That "name "baptized into the name

" in this place signiﬁes "power, majesty , grace, is nothing new , for Christ Himself says, Mark

" that is "in my strength "In my name shall they cast out demons, ; for the Apostles had naught either of words or of deeds that they could fairly attribute to themselves , as Paul tells us , Rom . 1 5 : 1 8 ; and in the fourth chapter of Acts Peter says that there is no other name under heaven than that of Christ whereby we can be saved , that is, it can be done only through the grace of Christ .

However , as far as the external baptism of water is concerned, I still would not oppose using these sacred words as we dip a man , or initiate him wi th bap ti sm , although to "

"baptize into the name of the Father, and of the Son , etc . , is in reality nothing else th an to dedicate , devote , consecrate, those who were previ ously of the world and the ﬂesh

to the Father, Son , and Holy Spirit .

From what h as been said , answer can easily be made also to the second Objection , in which it was said that Christ 's baptism was different in form from John 's ; for these words that are written in Matt . 28 : 1 9 ,

"Baptizing them into the name of the Father , were not said simply for the purpose to which the theologians have con

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