Trine Immersion | AdventAI

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · Jun 14, 1883

Trine Immersion.

The doctrine of trine immersion, or of three baptisms, has been examined at length in this paper. Our views of its claims are contained in our pamphlet on baptism, which is advertised in this week's SIGNS. We have no confidence in that doctrine. We have carefully examined its historical argument, and find it lacking; it is not at all what they claim for it. And a lack on that point is fatal to it, for its historical argument, defective as it is, is its strongest argument; its argument from the Scriptures is weaker still. Perhaps one reason why this appears so is this: History, church history, is not daily before us, and many intelligent readers are not ready to determine whether or not their claims on history are just. But the Bible is in every man's hands, and all may read it every day; and therefore the fallacy of their Scripture argument becomes more apparent.

It is also a fact that trine immersion was introduced into the church at an early age; on this fact they rest with great confidence. But to us this amounts to nothing, inasmuch as we yield nothing in favor of mere tradition. It cannot be traced, as they often affirm that it can, to the days of the apostles. Neither did they who first practiced it derive it from the Scriptures. They did not make any such claim, though the claim is made for them now. In this respect it stands with the Sunday. They who introduced Sunday into the church did not even pretend to found it upon any Scripture authority; that pretense was invented long after its observance came into use. Whenever a practice becomes popular in the church, no matter what its origin may have been, somebody rises up and professes to find a warrant for it in Scripture.

The trine immersionists (some of them) have persistently declared that our remarks on that doctrine, in our pamphlet, do not touch the point. If that is so it is because “the point” is not contained in their own writings. We thoroughly reviewed the publications which were sent to us for that purpose, and not an argument, or anything claiming to be an argument, was left unnoticed. We have received the following, entitled a “Statement of Faith,” with a request to notice it. We publish it entire—not because of any merit as an argument which it contains, but—that we may not be accused of doing it any injustice. Coming to us all the way from Florida it is expected that we shall give it attention:—

“I did not fully understand trine immersion until I received light on the commandments of God. I accepted it because I believed the commission taught it. Matt. 28:19. But when I understood the atonement, I saw how utterly impossible it was to receive the benefit of the dip in the likeness of Christ's death, Rom. 6:5, before I had received the dip unto repentance in the name of the Father, as set forth in John 3:22-28, which Jesus confirms when he says (John 4:1, 2) that he baptized not (or none, McKnight) but John's disciples. Please notice John 3:22—And he baptized. Verse 23, and John was also baptizing. Also the Jews' false charge, verse 26, and John's answer, verse 27, that a man can receive nothing except it be given him from Heaven. Also John 6:37, 38, 44, 45, 65.

“There is no chance without John's work, and that was unto repentance, Acts 19:4, Matt. 3:2, for John says, I am not the Christ, but I am sent before him. Some try to make it appear that Jesus did not baptize but his disciples did. But this is not true as you will find by comparing the verses under consideration, for it reads, he did baptize; but it was only John's disciples, those who repented to God and were pointed to the Son. The same in Acts 19:1-5. Paul baptized John's disciples; not that John's work was invalid, but it was not sufficient in itself for reasons stated.

“I would to God that men would lay down their prejudice and reason together. Let us read the commission. Matt. 28:19. Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in (into) the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Not names but the name of each. In the name of the Father unto repentance, and in the likeness of Christ's death, and in the name of the Holy Ghost, that Spirit which will lead us into all truth, and finally into the kingdom if we keep it abiding with us. 1 Peter 1:3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. What hope? Why, that the Spirit will raise or change us in that day when Jesus makes up his jewels. You have sinned against God and his Son, but if you sin against the Holy Ghost it will not be forgiven. How plain the work of the three.

“Rom. 6:4. This text is supposed to teach the design of baptism, that it symbolizes the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ, and nothing more. As Christ died once, and was buried once, and rose once, so we should die to sin, be buried in the water once, and rise once. Those who teach single immersion in the three names claim this text also, and offer the same argument; but to show the inconsistency of this claim, we need but to mention that we cannot be buried into the death of Christ, into the name of the Father who never died. To say that baptism into the three names symbolizes the death of Christ is virtually to indorse the Catholic dogma of a triune God, and that when Christ died they all died. Bear in mind the text reads, We are buried with him—not with them; for they were never buried into death. Therefore if the name of the Father is to be used, and the name of the Holy Spirit, it must be by another than single immersion.

“Eph. 4:5: One Lord, one faith, one baptism. This text is quoted to prove that single immersion is baptism, and, that baptism is immersion; and that therefore immersion is gospel baptism. Nothing can be more far-fetched than this, as Paul is not speaking of the mode of baptism but of the rite; read Eph. 2:11. He tells the Gentiles that they were without hope, and without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, and without God in the world; but now they are brought nigh by the blood of Christ and made one with Israel, hence one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and father of all, and not one for the Jew and another for the Gentile (see Emphatic Diaglott). Grove defines baptismos, a washing, ablution, purification; baptism the Christian doctrine, depth of affliction or distress.” W. R. P.

REMARKS. 1. No one can possibly draw anything from the doctrine of the atonement in favor of three baptisms, or three immersions. But an individual with prepossessed opinions or a strong bias will always be able to strengthen his prejudices from any imaginable source. We heartily join in the wish that people would lay aside prejudice and candidly reason, with the firm conviction that such a course would speedily do away with this trine-immersion fallacy. We have always marked this strange mixing up of things in their professed reasoning on John's baptism, or the baptism unto repentance. We raise the inquiry, Was John's baptism a complete or only a partial baptism? In other words, Did he at all perform the rite of baptism unto repentance? If he did, then, according to the theory we are calling in question, he immersed three times, for its advocates claim that the rite is never complete without three immersions. Again, were the disciples at Ephesus, Acts 19, completely or only partially baptized? The record says they were baptized. Our trine-immersionist friends tell us this was the complement of John's baptism; John's was the first, and Paul's the last part of the one same work. But in both operations, how many times were the persons immersed? They were baptized on two different occasions. W. R. P. makes a distinction between baptism and immersion—between the rite and the form of the action—and so do all of his belief. We deny the distinction. But if they are right, John must have immersed them three times unto repentance; without this they would not have been baptized. And Paul must have had them immersed three times in the name of the Lord Jesus, without which they were not baptized. Do they now follow this example? Are they baptized (three times dipped) in the name of the Father unto repentance? And are they baptized (three times dipped) into the likeness of the burial and resurrection of Christ? We are able to answer for them: they are not. Remember that Paul says we are baptized into the likeness of his death. By making a distinction between the rite of baptism and the act of immersion, and claiming that it takes three acts of immersing to once perform the rite of baptism, they make it necessary to be three times immersed or buried to be baptized into the death of Christ. But that is an error. The difference in the two baptisms was not in regard to one being unto repentance, and the other not, for Jesus inculcated repentance as directly as John did, Mark 1:15, and so did his apostles, for Peter on the day of Pentecost prefaced his commandment to be baptized with that to repent. But John baptized in the faith of him who was to come; that he had come those disciples at Ephesus were not informed; they had not heard of the descent of the Spirit on that day of Pentecost, or that it was yet given. They were not at all believers in the risen and glorified Saviour. They needed to be baptized according to the terms of the commission.

2. The language of the commission does not justify three immersions. It is contrary to the analogies of Scripture language to make such a claim as the trine immersionists do. We read that Jesus will come in his own glory, and in the glory of his Father, and of the holy angels. How many comings are foretold in that text? According to their theory he will come once in his own glory; he will come once in the glory of the Father; and he will come once in the glory of the holy angels. There are three comings as unmistakably as there are three baptisms in the commission. Again, we ask how many Gods are mentioned in Ex. 3:6? “The God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Will our trine-immersion advocates answer this?

3. The position of W. R. P. on Rom. 6, should hardly be dignified with the title of an argument. He says our claim that the rite is a burial into the likeness of Christ's death, is defective because it includes the name of the Father, who never died! This would answer very well for those who made baptism a mixed ordinance as the early sprinklers did. It would better suit his argument to sprinkle in the name of the Father, and bury in the name of the Son! But he buries once for each. The truth is that we do not get the full force of the Scripture or the full intent of the ordinance from one text. It is possible that but one baptism should be required into the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and that that one baptism should be in the likeness of the burial and resurrection of our Saviour. It certainly is not required to have three forms of baptism, as the argument of W. R. P. would demand, because the Father was not buried or raised.

4. His doctrine of repentance is faulty in the extreme. He says we are baptized in the name of the Father unto repentance, and that we have sinned against the Father and the Son. If we have sinned against both we should repent toward both. But the special error is in the intimation that our sins are against the Father and the Son, but not against the Holy Ghost, or else we could not be forgiven. There is no Scripture to justify such a declaration. Every sin committed while the Spirit is striving with a man, is a sin against the Holy Ghost as much as it is a sin against the Son of God. If no sin against the Holy Ghost could be forgiven, we do not believe anybody, or any adult, would ever be saved. We do not believe any one sins against the Father who does not sin against the Holy Ghost. But the Saviour said that blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven. This was said because they called the work of the Spirit of God the work of Beelzebub. But not every sin against the Spirit of God is blasphemy. Such random declarations show a lack of careful consideration of the Scriptures.

5. The inference of all trine-immersionists on John 4:1, 2, is altogether without warrant. No Version contains such an idea; no writer worthy of the name of a critic ever hinted it. The reference to chap. 3:22 does not help their case, because the second verse of chapter 4 can explain or qualify that verse (3:22) as easily as it does the verse preceding (4:1). Notice the construction of the language: “Though Jesus himself baptized not, but his disciples.” The contrast is not of the persons who were and who were not baptized, but of the persons who did and who did not baptize.

But this point needs no argument; it is simply a matter of fact which needs only to be stated. In verse 1, in the Greek, the word disciples is in the accusative, as it must be when speaking of those who were baptized. Now if verse 2 speaks of John's disciples, or of those who were baptized, the word would also be in the accusative. But it is not; it is in the nominative, thus showing positively that it refers to those disciples who did the baptizing, not to those who were baptized. We do not wish to accuse the trine-immersionists of either ignorance or willfulness in this matter, but if they persist in placing such a false construction on this text we cannot tell in what other light to hold them.

The statement of W. R. P. that chap. 3:26 contains a “false charge,” made by the Jews against Christ, is most singular. There is no charge in it, and the reply of John shows that there was no falsehood in it. John's answer, “He must increase, but I must decrease,” is pertinent to the fact that Jesus then had more followers than John. The latter was on the wane. He understood that he was but the forerunner, destined to drop out of sight as the claims of the Messiah were recognized. We cannot imagine why it should be called a “false charge,” or a charge in any sense, that Jesus made disciples or had followers.

When we commenced the publication of the articles on trine immersion which were afterward placed in our book, “Thoughts on Baptism,” the organ of the trine-immersionists promised a review of them. We carefully watched the paper for a long time but saw no review. We are sure that the argument contained in that book, both on Scripture and history, cannot be overthrown. We are happy to say that some have renounced the doctrine of a triple baptism on reading that book. Many others would do so if they would renounce their prejudice, and be guided by fair argument and correct reasoning.