Did the Apostles Baptize in the Name of the Holy Ghost? by Dudley Marvin Canright

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 22, 1871

Did the Apostles Baptize in the Name of the Holy Ghost?

By Dudley Marvin Canright

In Christ’s great commission in Matt. 28: 19, 20, he instructed his apostles to baptize men in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. This seems very plain and decisive that the names of all three should be used in baptism; yet because in several places it is said that men were baptized in the name of Jesus, therefore it is concluded by some that Jesus’ name was the only one of the three used in that act. On this point there is one thought suggested in Acts 19: 1–3. Paul came to Ephesus, “and finding certain disciples, he said unto them, ‘Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost. And he said unto them, Unto what, then, were ye baptized?’” Why did he ask about their baptism when they said they had not heard of the Holy Ghost? Manifestly as much as to say thus: How can it be that you have not so much as heard of the Holy Ghost, while yet you have been baptized? How could you be baptized and yet not hear of the Holy Ghost, when it is named in the very act of baptism? Unto what, then, were ye baptized? With the idea that Christians were baptized in the name of the Holy Ghost, this was the first and most natural question that would arise in the mind of Paul; whereas, if this name was not heard in baptism there seems little or no reason for his asking the question about their baptism. To my mind this seems quite a strong point.

D. M. CANRIGHT.