3647 - Infant Baptism by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Jan 23, 1912

3647 — Infant Baptism

By Editor

Will you please tell me who was the author of infant baptism, and how did it originate? P.

It is impossible to tell the origin of infant baptism. Its origin is lost in the mists of the early centuries. In the first place, we have no warrant for it in the Scriptures, and as expressed by the quaint Henry D'Anvers: "Where the Scripture hath no tongue, we ought to have no ear. According to that known maxim, to practise anything in the worship of God as an ordinance of His, without an institution, ought to be esteemed will-worship and idolatry." In his "Treatise on Baptism," he quotes Luther as saying, "Young children hear not, nor understand the Word of God, out of which faith cometh; and therefore if the commandment be followed, children ought not to be baptized." And Calvin, from his "Fourth Book of Institutes," chapter 16, "That it is nowhere expressly mentioned by the evangelist that any one child was by the apostles' hands baptized." And very many more to the same effect. That it was not founded in Scripture is indicated by the decrees of popes and councils in the fifth century. The Milevitan Council declared, "That it is our will that all that affirm that young children receive everlasting life, albeit they be not by the sacrament of grace, or baptism, renewed; and that will not that young children, which are new born from their mothers' womb, shall be baptized to the taking away original sin, that they be anathematized."

The fifth general Council of Carthage, in the year 416, decreed, "We will that whoever denies that little children by baptism are freed from perdition and eternally saved, that they be accursed."

It existed as early as Tertullian, because he contended against it. He lived about the year 200. The very ones, however, who teach it, teach other traditions and superstitions that are certainly not Christian, and have no basis in Scripture. As men forgot God, they turned to superstition and ritualism, and endeavored erroneously to continue the rite of circumcision in baptism. The words of our Saviour ought to be sufficient for all: "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved."