In the long running (and almost certainly never-ending) debate between credo and paedobaptists there are plenty of arguments that both sides should stop using. I recently read one that infant baptists would do well to revise, or better yet, stop using altogether.

In his post In Defense of Infant Baptism: What Baptists Misunderstand About Baptism, Timothy Arnold seeks to set Baptists straight on a good number of things. If you’re a credobaptist as I am, there are plenty of things to argue about all the way through which is all fair in love and debates about church practices. However in a section on the history, Arnold overstates the evidence in some cases, uses outdated research in other cases and finally gets a number of things plain wrong. And Arnold isn’t doing anything I haven’t seen or heard a bunch of times so I thought I’d lay out the problems with his case, and others like it.

I’m focusing primarily on early church and so have cut out a couple of paragraphs from Luther and the 39 articles as they’re not really relevant. Although Luther’s own argument is a particularly weak one for retaining infant baptism. I’ve put in bold the claims that I’ll address and seek to correct.

The historical contention is one that Baptists have to answer for. Both sides make arguments from scripture (especially Acts), but that will be discussed later. Historically speaking, it is likely that infant baptism began immediately upon institution of the Church. The last book of the Bible (Revelation) was written shortly before the beginning of the second century. Already by the late-second century, there were sources which strongly support paedobaptism that still exist (meaning that there were likely earlier documents that were lost).

Hyppolitus [sic] of Rome wrote Apostolic Tradition in A.D. 215, clearly stating “The children shall be baptized first. All of the children who can answer for themselves, let them answer. If there are any children who cannot answer for themselves, let their parents answer for them, or someone else from their family.”

Now Hyppolitus was, at this point, 50 years old, writing down what he was taught as a young Christian as a response to the loss of tradition among Christians at the time. This, especially, would imply that this is a tradition that was handed down by the Apostles. All protestants should revere Hyppolitus because he was a forerunner of the reformers. He disagreed with the new revisions of the contemporary popes and spoke out against them for years in support of the practices of the early Church, only being reunited shortly before his martyrdom.

By the early third century, Tertullian was writing his minority opinion against paedobaptism (though he wasn’t a credobaptist). This means that paedobaptism indisputably existed at this time and was likely the predominant position, since Tertullian was the one writing against it while fathers like Hyppolitus clearly wrote in support of it. Tertullian is sometimes used as an example of a credobaptist, but he is not. His concern is not the validity of the baptism, but that it should be withheld for as long as possible so that the baptismal regeneration washes away the most sins it can. Tertullian’s argument also assumes no original sin….

…Baptists have to answer for the historical contention that this is a practice that was probably begun by the Apostles or their immediate successors, was considered a part of Apostolic Tradition by A.D. 215, and was the accepted practice of the Church for about 1500 years. For at least 1000 of that millennia and a half, it was almost the exclusive practice.

Baptists must account for that thousand years in which the Church did not exist if infant baptism is invalid. It also must explain how the Church was so wrong from the very beginning about a point so important. If infant baptism is valid, Baptists might argue that it is inferior to believer’s baptism, but it nonetheless requires a change from the current view of what Baptism is meant to be.

Did infant baptism begin immediately upon institution of the Church?

Arnold claims it did, but his evidence, in this case, is unproven. Revelation was written around 90 AD and because we have a document in 215 AD (more on that in a bit) that supports infant baptism then, according to Arnold, the practice must have started in the apostolic age.

You’ll notice there is a gap there of at least a hundred years here and Arnold suggests this gap exists because documents have been lost. This misses out a few relevant details.

We have quite a lot of early church documents from the first two centuries that do talk about baptism and none of them mention infant baptism. The assumption in ALL of them is believer’s baptism. But after 180 AD we start to see mentions of infant baptism and the first one that does, Tertullian’s, disapproves. It is not the Baptists but the infant baptists who need to explain why that might be so.

In fact there is a very strong historical theory for why infant baptism came to the forefront of church practice: a deadly plague that killed millions.

Hippolytus and the Apostolic Tradition

There are a few problems here, chiefly that it’s not at all certain that Hippolytus wrote Apostolic Tradition. Even if he did have something to do with it, it’s likely that it is a composite work (the original is lost but translations from the 4th century exist). Even then it’s possible that the passage Arnold quotes is in fact a 4th century addition. Apostolic Tradition (also known by the name Egyptian Church Order) is not necessarily proof of apostolic tradition going back to the Book of Acts, even if it is what the Egyptian church in the third century believed it to be.

Hippolytus was also hardly a forerunner of the reformers or at least not in a good way. It is true that he was schismatic and opposed the pope but not the idea of popes, seeing as he himself became the first antipope!

Speaking for themselves

Arnold quotes a section of Apostolic Tradition on baptism:

“The children shall be baptized first. All of the children who can answer for themselves, let them answer. If there are any children who cannot answer for themselves, let their parents answer for them, or someone else from their family.”

We all know what happens to a quote taken out of context, so it’s worth putting this quote in one. It’s from a much longer section on baptismal practice and there’s no suggestion that any of the stages are optional depending on age for anyone being baptised. This practice included having their lives examined for evidence of good deeds, undergoing daily exorcisms, receiving instruction in the gospel, fasting, spending a whole night in vigil, stripping naked, a further exorcism, before answering questions of faith and then being baptised (immersed as it happens) three times and only then being welcomed to pray with the faithful.

If you’re going to claim Apostolic Tradition then go for the full-fat version.

But Arnold’s point seems clear: there are children who can answer for themselves and there are children who cannot and in their case then a parent or family member should speak for them. Now what kind of child can’t speak for themselves? A toddler or infant of course!

Not so fast.

Professor David F. Wright, who was Emeritus Professor of Patristic & Reformed Christianity at the University of Edinburgh, in his book What has infant baptism done to baptism? (p.40) says the following:

Is a child’s physical and mental capacity in view, or is the ability more juridical, implying the Roman recognition that at the age of seven children entered into certain rights to speak for themselves? Augustine and Jerome would later treat seven as a new age of Christian responsibility, Augustine in connection with the baptism of a boy speaking for himself. In what terms a parent or other relative spoke for a non-responding child we do not know, and no source tells us until ca 400.

In this reading then all the candidates can do all the activities involved in baptism preparation but some are not yet seven and so they have a proxy. This would make Hippolytus an advocate of child baptism but not necessarily infant baptism. If it is not clear to a paedobaptist Professor of Patristics whether this passage refers to infants or not, then we should at the least be somewhat humble ourselves in suggesting otherwise.

Was Tertullian in the minority?

This is Arnold’s claim.

By the early third century, Tertullian was writing his minority opinion against paedobaptism (though he wasn’t a credobaptist). This means that paedobaptism indisputably existed at this time and was likely the predominant position, since Tertullian was the one writing against it while fathers like Hyppolitus clearly wrote in support of it.

How does he know that Tertullian’s view is the minority one and Hippolytus’ the majority? He doesn’t say. Could it have been the other way around? Quite a lot of church historians seem to think so. No one is arguing that it didn’t exist early (and we’ve already suggested why it appeared) but if the claim is that infant baptism was unequivocally and universally the practice of the early church then we have some questions. Not least of which if this was so clearly apostolic, why either Tertullian didn’t know that or if he did, why he felt free to question it?

When Tertullian describes baptism with its instructions, fasting, prayers, vigils and washings and then immersions because the whole body needs washing of sin he is describing the pattern we have the greatest evidence for in the early church and that is baptism on profession of faith.

And when it comes to children this is what Tertullian said in his treatise On Baptism,

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.

To which all the Baptists give a hearty amen.

And if it was so obvious that infants of believing parents were to be baptised is it not slightly strange to learn that several major 4th-century church fathers — Augustine, Basil, Gregory of Nazianzus, Gregory of Nyssa, John Chrysostom, Ambrose — were all born to Christian parents and were not baptized as infants?

In fact very few historians today think that infant baptism was the dominant position until the 5th century. Professor Henry Chadwick said of Augustine in the 4th century that, “At this period it was still rather unusual for infants to be baptised.”

Professor Wright goes further saying,

It is indeed seriously misleading to view the age of the Fathers simply as an era of infant baptism. In fact, of known, named individuals in those centuries who were both of Christian parentage and baptized at known dates, the great majority were baptized on profession of faith.

The exclusive practice?

For at least 1000 of that millennia and a half, it was almost the exclusive practice.

This is completely wrong.

All churches everywhere and all at times have practised baptism of believing (or at least converting) adults. This is still what the church does. Even in Europe between 496, when King of the Franks Clovis I was baptised, and 1387 AD when Grand Duke Jogaila of Lithuania converted, the church baptised adults and then (from the 5th century onwards) proceeded to baptise their children.

In fact the liturgy of the early church, and still today, presupposes professed faith, with a proxy speaking for infants. Peter Leithart says, ‘the earliest baptismal liturgies…were constructed on something like Baptist assumptions, even when children were included.’¹

When the Anabaptists came along at a time when everything received was being questioned they protested on the ground of sola scriptura against infant baptism. In response Zwingli went searching for a different explanation than Augustine’s and framed it in terms of covenant theology. It was this crisis of theology that led to the idea that only one practice was possible or even biblical.

A suggested timeline of baptism

An honest assessment of the weight of historical evidence suggests something like the following:

33AD-165 AD: mainly baptism on faith
165-180 AD: the Antonine plague is a massive crisis and infant baptism becomes widely practised in response
180-430 AD: mainly baptism on faith but with significant and growing acceptance of infant baptism
430-1525 AD: mainly infant baptism but with baptism on faith in missionary and conversion contexts
1525-present: either dual practice or solely on baptism by faith (fastest growing practice)

In summary

That infant baptism arose early (ish) is not the same as being the sole or even predominant practice in the early church. Not only that but the church has evolved in its teaching as to the ‘why’ of infant baptism. It has moved from the cleansing of sin and regeneration, to the removal of original sin (Augustine), to sacramental effectiveness. Then comes a reformation parting of ways with either infant faith not proxy faith, or covenant sign.

By contrast the main baptist point (whatever else may have changed) has remained remarkably stable and consistent with church practice throughout: repent, believe and be baptised.

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Further reading

I’ve written a fair amount on baptism, so you might want to check out these posts:

• How infant baptism came to be
• Was infant baptism the standard in the early church?
• The pandemic roots of infant baptism
• The early church fathers: on baptism
• Be baptised
• Baptism: bibliography

1. quoted in Wright’s What has infant baptism done to baptism? p.6 [↩]