Scotus Academicus, Tomus decimus: De Baptismo, De Poenitentia, De Extrema Unctione

Baptism, in Greek, is in Latin the same as washing, dipping, cleansing, and immersion. Hence it has chiefly three meanings in Scripture. First, “to baptize” means the same as “to wash.” Thus, concerning Judith, we read in ch. 12: “At night she would go out into the valley of Bethulia and wash herself in a spring of water.” And Mark 7 says: “For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they frequently wash their hands, observing the tradition of the elders; and when they return from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash themselves; and there are many other things they have received and observe, such as the washing of cups, pitchers, bronze vessels, and beds.” Second, it denotes an abundance of something by which people are so filled that they seem to be overwhelmed and immersed in it. Thus a severe affliction, which like an overflowing flood tends to overwhelm and engulf a person, is sometimes also called a baptism. Hence, in Luke 12, the Lord Christ, foretelling all the waves of calamities that were to pour over him when his Passion came, calls it a baptism, saying: “I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and how I am pressed until it is accomplished!” Therefore, speaking to the sons of Zebedee in Mark 10, he says: “Can you drink the cup that I shall drink, and be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” Third and finally, baptism signifies the first of the seven sacraments of the New Law, which is frequently mentioned in Sacred Scripture. This sacrament has now claimed that name for itself, derived from the Greek language, and theologians commonly use it in this sense. In this meaning it is also described by various periphrases. With reference to its matter it is called “the bath of saving water,” “the life-giving wave,” “the sacred and life-giving bath,” and “the stream of living water,” as may be seen in St. Cyprian, especially ep. 2. With reference to its form, Tertullian, bk. On Penance, ch. 6, calls it the seal and sealing of faith, because through it God marks the faithful like sheep of his pasture and consecrates them as his children. With reference to its effects, it is called regeneration or spiritual birth, John 3: “Unless someone is born again of water and the Holy Spirit,” etc.; or illumination, because through it the light of faith is conferred. Hence the Greeks called the feast of Epiphany the “feast of lights,” since Christ is believed to have been baptized on that day. St. Basil, in his Oration to Those Being Baptized, calls it “the badge of Christ’s soldiers, a shining garment,” etc. Optatus of Milevis calls it an unfading tunic and a heavenly marriage: “O tunic,” he says, “ever one and unfading, which fittingly clothes every age and form, is not wrinkled on infants, stretched on young people, or altered on women. Surely that day will come when the heavenly marriage begins to be celebrated.” This is as if the soul, pure through baptism and adorned with the beauty of baptismal grace, were married to God for fruitfulness in good works. Hence, in the same place, he says that baptism is “the life of virtues, the death of crimes, immortal birth, the acquisition of the heavenly kingdom, the harbor of innocence, the shipwreck of sins.”

Concerning this wondrous sacrament, then, it is asked when its institution and precept began, and what its matter and form ought to be. Since John was a forerunner not only of innocence but also of baptism—“We too,” says Tertullian, bk. 4, Against Marcion, ch. 23, “recognize a certain boundary, John, appointed between the old and the new, at whom Judaism was to cease and from whom Christianity was to begin”—therefore, so that what we are about to say concerning the baptism of the Lord Christ may be clearer, a few things must first be considered about the baptism of John, following the method of the Doctor, who begins with it in the same question of his treatise On Baptism.

NOTE 1. It was the opinion of many heretics, both ancient and recent, that the baptism of John was the same as the baptism of Christ the Lord. Petilian, bishop of Constantine and a Donatist, was among the first to affirm this. For St. Augustine writes of him in book II of Against the Letters of Petilian, ch. 32: “Although, he said, there is one baptism, it was nevertheless consecrated in three stages. John gave water, without the name of the Trinity, as he himself professed, saying, I baptize you in water, etc. Christ gave the Holy Spirit; the Paraclete, fire itself, blazing with crackling flames, came upon the Apostles:” By these words he distinguishes those three baptisms only in that John gave water, Christ the Lord the Holy Spirit, and the Paraclete fire. But more recent heretics, especially Zwingli, in On True and False Religion, ch. “On Baptism”; the Centuriators, Centuries, century 40, title “On Baptism”; and Calvin, Institutes, bk. IV, ch. 15, no. 7, more boldly declare that there is absolutely no difference between the baptism of John and that of Christ the Lord. Calvin says: It is most certain that the ministry of John was precisely the same as that later entrusted to the Apostles: for different hands by which baptism is administered do not make it different; the same teaching shows it to be one and the same. John and the Apostles agreed in one teaching, and both baptized unto repentance, both unto the remission of sins, and both in the name of Christ, from whom repentance and remission of sins were to come. A little later he writes most shamelessly: Why, then, should anyone be disturbed that the Fathers strive to distinguish one from the other? Their judgment ought not to count so much with us as to shake the certainty of Scripture. For who would rather listen to Chrysostom, who denies that remission of sins was included in John’s baptism, than to Luke, who asserts the contrary, that John preached a baptism of repentance unto the remission of sins? Nor should we accept Augustine’s quibble that sins were remitted in hope through John’s baptism, but are actually remitted in Christ’s baptism, etc. But who should rather be listened to: Calvin, who distorts the true sense of Scripture by perverse interpretations, or all the holy Fathers, whom, as the Eighth Council says, Action 1, Canon 1, God has set before us to follow as lamps that cannot be extinguished and that illumine our steps?

NOTE 2. Just as John was the Forerunner of Christ the Lord, preparing people by word and example to receive the grace to be spread by the Incarnate Word, so his baptism was preparatory and disposed people toward the baptism of Christ, as the holy Fathers teach. Origen especially says in Commentary on John, tome VIII: I came to prepare, as it were, a people made ready, and to prepare a place of repentance through baptism for the one who was to come after me, etc. Athanasius calls John’s baptism “introductory” (Question 134); Basil, in his Exhortation on Baptism, calls it “initiatory”; Cyril of Alexandria, On John, bk. I, ch. 26, calls it “preparatory,” and in bk. II, ch. 57, “introductory”; as does John of Damascus, The Orthodox Faith, bk. I, calling it a “rudiment,” etc. Finally, Cyprian, in On the Baptism of Christ and the Manifestation of the Trinity, writes: John prepared the way for the Lord by washing bodies outwardly, so that the outward washing might precede the baptism that was to follow, in which the washing of souls and remission of sins would be conferred, etc. Augustine likewise writes in the Enchiridion, ch. 49: Those who were baptized with John’s baptism were not to be reborn … but by a certain ministry of forerunning preparation they were prepared for that one in whom alone they could be reborn, as he said, “Prepare the way of the Lord.” etc. Hence the Doctor rightly concludes in In IV Sent., d. 2, q. 2, n. 2, that John’s baptism benefited people only by disposing them toward Christ’s baptism: both by stirring them through the outward washing with water to receive Christ’s baptism, and by preaching faith and repentance, through which they would become worthy to receive the grace of the New Law.

NOTE 3. According to the same Doctor in the same place, it is certain that the matter of John’s baptism was water and washing; this is explicitly stated in Matthew 3, Luke 3, Mark 1, and John 1 and 3. The form, however, is not so certain. Some Doctors maintain that John baptized with a determinate form, namely, in the name of the Christ who was to come. So say Hugh of St. Victor, On the Sacraments, bk. II, part 6, ch. 6, and the Master of the Sentences, d. 2; they are followed by the more celebrated leaders of the Church, especially Alexander of Hales, Summa, part IV, q. 6, member 3, a. 11, and St. Thomas, Summa, III, q. 58, a. 6, ad 6. The Doctor therefore adopts this opinion in the earlier place as the more commonly received one. Many of the holy Fathers also support it, especially St. Ambrose, On the Holy Spirit, bk. I, ch. 7, where he says: John baptized in the name of Jesus who was to come, not in his own name. St. Augustine says the same in Questions on the New Testament, q. 29: John’s baptism was not without mention of Christ. St. Jerome teaches the same on the words of Joel: I will pour out my Spirit, etc. The passage in Acts 19 also supports it: John baptized with a baptism of repentance, telling them to believe in the one who was to come after him. It also seems to follow from Matthew 3, where St. John addresses the Pharisees and Sadducees: I indeed baptize you in water, unto repentance; but the one who is to come after me … he will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire. Nevertheless, Durandus, in the same place, q. 3, Gabriel, q. 2, and some others object, holding that John baptized without any verbal form, or at least not with the one just mentioned. First, they say that this form would be false: Christ had already come when John baptized, and John knew this; consequently, Christ was not “to come.” Second, John administered the same baptism to Christ as to others, and it would not have been fitting for him to use this form when baptizing Christ. Nevertheless, I think the former opinion should be preferred, because the grounds for the opposing opinion can easily be answered. To the first argument, one may readily reply that the word to come is understood with reference to Christ’s manifestation through the preaching of the Gospel and the ministry of baptizing: for by baptizing, John was disposing people to receive Christ’s baptism. The second argument is likewise easily refuted: when John learned by revelation that Christ was coming to him to be baptized, either he used no form when baptizing him, as Paludanus teaches, or he used another form, as Maiorinus holds.

With these points established, it remains to determine whether John’s baptism was the same as Christ’s baptism, and, second, whether it had the power to remit sins and confer sanctifying grace.

First conclusion. — THE BAPTISM OF JOHN WAS DIFFERENT FROM THE BAPTISM OF CHRIST. This is a matter of faith, defined by the Council of Trent, sess. VII, can. 1: If anyone says that the baptism of John had the same power as the baptism of Christ, let him be anathema. The Fathers of the Council of Nicaea held the same opinion. For in its Acts, bk. I, near the end, the Fathers, answering the Philosopher through Macarius of Jerusalem, speak thus of Christ: Then he came to baptism while John, son of Zechariah, was preaching to the people a baptism of penance, but not conferring a baptism for sins or for adoption as sons of God; for it was not John’s to give this, but belonged only to the incarnate Word of God himself.

The holy Fathers defend the same truth. Tertullian preceded them in bk. On Baptism, ch. 10, where, after saying that John’s baptism was divine by reason of its command, but human by reason of its condition, he adds: For it provided nothing heavenly, but served beforehand for heavenly things; namely, it was set over repentance, which is within human power. And further: Thereafter we find in the Acts of the Apostles that those who had John’s baptism had not received the Holy Spirit, whom they had not even heard of: therefore what did not bestow heavenly things was not heavenly. He concludes: Thus a baptism of penance was administered, as a candidate for the remission and sanctification in Christ that would follow. For when he preached a baptism of penance unto the remission of sins, it was announced to God as a remission yet to come: repentance precedes, remission follows, and this is what it means to prepare the way. But one who prepares does not accomplish the same thing; he makes ready for another to accomplish it. In these words Tertullian explains the difficulty at hand most clearly. St. Chrysostom teaches the same in Homily 10 on Matthew, as Calvin himself acknowledges, and St. Augustine in many places, especially Homily 5 on John, where he says: If John baptized some, they must be baptized again—certainly again, but not with baptism repeated. For those whom Judas baptized and Christ baptized, and those whom John baptized, did not, etc. Also, in bk. V of On Baptism, ch. 9: Christ cleanses the Church with such a baptism that, once received, another was not necessary. John, however, brought people to a baptism after receiving which the Lord’s baptism was necessary.

The same holy Doctor proves this truth by various arguments drawn from Sacred Scripture. First, because in Matthew 21 John’s baptism is called the baptism of a man: for Christ asks, The baptism of John, where was it from? From heaven or from men? Yet Christ’s baptism is nowhere called the baptism of a man. “We read,” says St. Augustine in bk. Against the Letters of Petilian, ch. 56, that in some places the Apostle said “my Gospel,” but he never said “my baptism,” nor did anyone say this of another through whom it is administered. For that baptism alone which John gave was called John’s baptism. — Proof, second, from John 1: John bore witness, saying: I saw the Spirit descending like a dove from heaven, and it remained upon him, and I did not know him, etc. St. Augustine explains these words in bk. V of On Baptism, ch. 3: “He knew him in one respect, but in another he did not yet know. He knew the Bridegroom, the Son of God, from whose fullness all would receive; but because he had himself received from his fullness the power to baptize, so that it was called John’s baptism, he did not know whether he would give it to others in the same way.” But if John’s baptism were the same as Christ’s, it could not be said that John did not know him. Therefore, etc. — Proof, third: although the law and the prophets lasted until John, John was not the end of the law; for, as the Apostle says, Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. But if John’s baptism were the same as Christ’s, John could in some way be called the end of the law, since one would have to remain with his baptism. Hence St. Augustine says in bk. V of On Baptism, ch. 9: If the end were in John, Christ’s baptism would not be needed. But because Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes, John showed the one to whom we should go; when we have reached him, we should remain with him.

Finally, the same truth is proved by this argument: a baptism whose form and effects are different is a different baptism; but the form and effects of Christ’s baptism were different from those of John’s baptism; therefore, etc. The major premise is established. It is proved that the minor premise is true as to the first part: Christ’s baptism is performed in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. John’s baptism was not performed in this way, as is clearly gathered from Acts 19, where Paul came to Ephesus and found some disciples. He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” They said to him, “We have not even heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.” He said, “Into what, then, were you baptized?” They said, “Into John’s baptism.” Paul said, “John baptized the people with a baptism of repentance, telling them to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, in Jesus.” When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. From these words two things may be inferred: first, John did not baptize in the name of the three persons, since those baptized by him had not even heard whether there was a Holy Spirit; second, he baptized them only in the name of the Christ who was to come. The same minor premise is proved as to the difference in efficacy: first, from Matthew 3, where John himself speaks thus to the Jews: I indeed baptize you in water, unto repentance, but the one who is to come after me is mightier than I; he will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire. Then from John 3, where we read that John’s disciples complained that Christ was baptizing: Look, he is baptizing, and everyone is going to him. For if Christ’s baptism had been the same as John’s, John could easily have answered their complaint by saying that Christ’s baptism was the same as his in efficacy, and therefore they should be glad rather than complain, since Christ would then have learned it from John as a disciple. But John does the opposite and implies how great the difference is between his baptism and Christ’s, by pointing to Christ’s superior dignity: John answered and said: A man can receive nothing unless it has been given to him from heaven. You yourselves bear me witness that I said, “I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.” He who has the bride is the bridegroom, etc. Finally, those baptized with John’s baptism were baptized again by the Apostles with Christ’s baptism; therefore the two baptisms were not one and the same.

HERETICS OBJECT: Where there is the same sign, the same signification, and the same ministry, there is the same sacrament. But all these are the same in both baptisms. First, there is the washing with water, as is clear from Matthew 3 and Mark 1; the ministry is the same, because both wash outwardly; and the signification is likewise the same, namely, remission of sins. For it is said of St. John’s baptism in Mark 1: John was in the desert, baptizing and preaching a baptism of repentance unto the remission of sins. Similarly, Matthew 3 says: Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region around the Jordan went out to him, and they were baptized by him in the Jordan, confessing their sins. — I grant the major premise and the first two parts of the minor premise, but I distinguish the latter: that in both baptisms the same remission of sins occurs in the same manner and by the power of the outward sign applied, I deny; that it occurs in a different manner, and in one by the work performed, in the other by the work of the one acting, I grant. For John’s baptism remitted sins only by the power of repentance, stirred up by that sign and the prior preaching. Hence it is not simply called “a baptism unto the remission of sins,” but “a baptism of repentance unto the remission,” etc. Christ’s baptism, however, is called absolutely by Peter in Acts 2: Let each of you be baptized unto the remission of sins. And in the Constantinopolitan Creed: I confess one baptism unto the remission of sins. Hence Tertullian, in On Baptism, ch. 10, said that St. John’s baptism was a candidate for the remission and sanctification to follow in Christ. Nor does it matter that Peter says in the passage just cited in Acts, Repent, and let each of you be baptized, etc. For there remission of sins is not joined with “repent,” as it is in the case of John’s baptism, but with “be baptized.” Peter says that they must repent because he is addressing adults, who, in order to receive baptism worthily, had to form some sorrow for their sins.

HERETICS OBJECT, SECOND: If John’s baptism were not the same as Christ’s, those baptized with John’s baptism ought to have been baptized again. But this was not done, as Zwingli proves in On True and False Religion, ch. “On Baptism,” by three arguments. First, St. Andrew was a disciple of John and consequently was washed with his baptism, yet we read nowhere that he was baptized after becoming a disciple of Christ. Second, John’s disciples reported to him that Christ was baptizing; if Christ had baptized with a different baptism, they would have reported that too. Third, John 4 says that Christ’s disciples were baptizing, and therefore they had been baptized with the baptism they conferred. Yet it cannot be said that they had been baptized by Christ, since the same passage explicitly says that Christ himself did not baptize. Therefore they had been baptized with John’s baptism, which they themselves conferred. Consequently, since Christ is said to have baptized through his disciples, it follows that Christ’s baptism was the same as John’s. Fourth, the same may be proved by the authority of the holy Fathers. For St. Ambrose, bk. I of On the Holy Spirit, ch. 3, teaches that those baptized with John’s baptism fell into two groups: some were baptized in the name of Christ, as John was accustomed to baptize, while others were baptized by John’s own disciples, neither in the name of Christ nor in faith in the Holy Spirit. He says that the former were not baptized again, but the latter received baptism a second time: “Those who said that they did not know the Holy Spirit, Acts 14¹, when they declared that they had been baptized in John’s baptism, were baptized afterward, because John baptized unto the remission of sins in the name of Jesus who was to come, not in his own name. They did not know the Spirit because they had not received baptism in Christ’s name, as John was accustomed to baptize. For although John did not baptize in the Spirit, he nevertheless preached both Christ and the Spirit.… Therefore these people, because they had been baptized neither in Christ’s name nor in faith in the Holy Spirit, could not receive the sacrament of baptism; so they were baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Their baptism was not repeated but renewed, for there is one baptism.” Eulogius also embraces and defends this opinion in part II of Against the Novatians, in Photius’s Library, where he proves two things: first, that one baptized with John’s baptism did not need another baptism; second, that such a baptism cleansed those who approached it. “Nowhere is it recorded,” he says, that those baptized by John before Christ’s Resurrection were baptized again, etc. — I answer that it can be gathered that those already baptized with John’s baptism were inaugurated again with Christ’s baptism. First, from Scripture: in Acts 2 we read that three thousand people were baptized by the Apostles, at Peter’s command, in the name of Jesus Christ. It is evident from Matthew 3—Jerusalem and all the region around the Jordan went out to him, and they were baptized by him in the Jordan, confessing their sins—that many of them had already been washed with John’s baptism. Moreover, in Acts 19, when Paul learned that some disciples had been baptized only with John’s baptism, he ordered them to be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. The holy Fathers likewise affirm this: Jerome, Epistle 83 to Oceanus and Dialogue Against the Luciferians, says: John’s baptism was so imperfect that it is clear that those baptized by him were afterward baptized with Christ’s baptism. St. Augustine says the same in Tractate 4 on John, near the middle: Lest what Christ himself received from John be put forward as Christ’s baptism, others were also permitted to baptize. But those baptized by John were not satisfied with it: they were baptized with Christ’s baptism, because John’s baptism was not Christ’s baptism. Those who receive Christ’s baptism do not seek John’s baptism; those who received John’s baptism sought Christ’s baptism. Hence the arguments by which the heretics seem to support and prove the minor premise, which we deny, are easily answered. First, the heretics infer that Andrew was baptized with John’s baptism because he was his disciple. By the same reasoning, it must be inferred that he was baptized with Christ’s baptism because he followed Christ the Lord and became his disciple. To the second, I say that the contrary rather follows: John’s disciples would not have announced to him as something new that Christ the Lord was baptizing, unless they had seen him baptizing with a baptism different from John’s. To the third, I likewise say that the contrary of the heretics’ assertion follows. By the argument with which they try to prove that the Apostles were washed with John’s baptism—because they conferred John’s baptism—we can conversely prove that they were baptized with Christ’s baptism, since, as St. Augustine teaches in bk. III of Against Petilian, ch. 55, the Apostles administered not John’s baptism but Christ’s. The aforementioned testimonies of the Fathers do not favor the heretics either. For St. Ambrose does not seem to rely on any evidence for the distinction he proposes between two baptisms of John, one duly and validly conferred in Christ’s name with faith in the Holy Spirit, the other conferred otherwise and therefore needing to be repeated. No trace of this distinction appears in Sacred Scripture or in the holy Fathers who preceded him. Hence the Master of the Sentences, who uses the same distinction in In IV Sent., d. 2, is rejected by all theologians on this point. Nor does Eulogius support them: to show John’s baptism to be perfect, contrary to the common opinion of the holy Fathers, he attributes more to it than is warranted. After the words quoted above, he adds that many Fathers show John’s baptism to have been wholly imperfect.

Second conclusion. — THE BAPTISM OF JOHN DID NOT HAVE THE POWER TO REMIT SINS OR CONFER GRACE. This is the more common opinion among Catholics and follows from the preceding conclusion. The Doctor proves it in the passage cited above, where he shows that those baptized by John had to be baptized again with Christ’s baptism: “For, he says, after receiving preparatory medicine, it is fitting to receive curative medicine; once a disposition has been introduced, it is fitting that the principal form should still be introduced. John’s baptism was like a merely preparatory disposition toward Christ’s baptism, so that through that washing people would be more readily inclined to receive the washing that brought them salvation, and would not find it burdensome, having already become accustomed to something similar. John the Baptist indicates this reason when he says in John 1: “I baptize you with water”—that is, with water only—“but one stands among you whom you do not know”; he is the one who “baptizes you not in water only, but in Spirit and truth.”” Thus the Doctor.

YOU WILL OBJECT: Many holy Fathers affirm that John’s baptism had the power to remit sins. Thus Basil, in Homily 2, On Baptism, before the middle, says: By the grace of God and of Christ himself, as soon as anyone approached and confessed his sins, whatever their number or kind, he was baptized in the river Jordan and immediately received remission of sins. Similarly, St. Augustine says in bk. V of On Baptism, ch. 10: Nevertheless, lest anyone contend that sins were also remitted in John’s baptism, but that some greater sanctification was conferred upon those whom the Apostle Paul ordered to be baptized again with Christ’s baptism, I will not argue stubbornly. St. Peter Chrysologus, too, says in Sermon 137 that John’s baptism removed guilt but did not confer grace. — I answer that St. Basil may be understood as speaking of remission of sins which the baptized person would obtain by the work of the one acting, through the efficacy and merit of repentance. To St. Augustine, I say that although he does not wish to argue stubbornly with someone who would contend that sins were actually remitted in John’s baptism, it does not follow that he thought they were remitted by the work performed, but only by the work of the one acting. Since, however, through Christ’s baptism they obtained remission of sins by the work performed, they received far greater sanctification. Finally, concerning St. Peter Chrysologus, I say that he does not mean that sins were remitted through John’s baptism without the infusion of grace; for this does not occur under the ordinary law. Rather, perhaps through that bodily washing the Jews were cleansed from those legal impurities. For, explaining Luke 3, He came into all the region around the Jordan, etc., he says: He came to the Jordan, because the hydra could no longer wash away Jewish stains, but the river could. Then, explaining the following words, preaching a baptism of repentance unto the remission of sins, he adds: John had forgiveness, but not without repentance; remission, but joined with grief; a healing of the wound with pain; a baptism that removed guilt but did not cleanse the conscience. And why say more? Through John’s baptism a person was purified unto repentance, not advanced unto grace, etc.

NOTE 1. Catholics and heretics alike agree without controversy that baptism is a true sacrament of the New Law; for those who acknowledge any sacraments of the Gospel Law count baptism as the first of them. Hence the Subtle Doctor considers this truth something to be assumed rather than proved. For he writes in In IV Sent., d. 3, q. 4, n. 2: “The question assumes that baptism was instituted in the New Law, which is true and reasonable. This is evident from many authorities of the New Testament, both of Christ and of the Apostles, in which the necessity of baptism is proved; that would not be so unless it had been duly instituted in that Law.” And below, n. 3: “This assumption is also reasonable: for the principal sacrament of the Gospel Law, by which one enters into its observance, ought to be new and proper to that Law.… This sacrament also ought to be evident in its signification, because this is the Law of truth that does away with the shadow. And it ought to be abundant in the conferral of grace, because this is the Law of grace.” John 1: “Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” “It also ought to be easy, because Christ’s yoke is sweet and his burden light,” Matthew 11. “Likewise, it ought to be common, because God chose only one people for the Law of Moses, but the whole world for the New Law: ‘Their sound has gone out into all the earth,’ etc. These four qualities are found in one thing, namely, a washing with words: for this clearly signifies the cleansing of the soul, which is its chief effect, and it gives grace abundantly; hence in the Psalm it is said, ‘He led me beside refreshing water.’ It is easy, because it is in no way dangerous, as circumcision was; and it is common to every sex and age.” Catholics likewise agree that baptism is first of all the sacraments by reason of its institution, as the Council of Florence teaches in the decree of Eugenius, in these words: “Baptism holds the first place among all the sacraments.” To show what kind of priority he means, he adds: “For it is the gateway to spiritual life; through it we become members of Christ and part of the body of the Church.” The Doctor speaks in the same way: “by which one enters into its [the Church’s] observance.” The Roman Ritual likewise says at the beginning of the title On the Sacrament of Baptism: “Holy baptism, the gateway of the Christian religion and of eternal life, holds the first place among the other sacraments of the New Law instituted by Christ,” etc. Reason also supports this: the first thing in anything is the thing’s very being; but being faithful and Christian is given through baptism, for it is “the sacrament of regeneration,” Titus 3, and, according to St. Dionysius, Ecclesiastical Hierarchy 2, “the most ineffable formation of our divine state,” or a kind of divine birth. For just as we must exist in nature before we act or receive what belongs to nature—motion and the like—so, before we suffer or do what is divine, we must possess a certain divine being. This comes about through baptism. For, as the illustrious teacher Hierotheus says, the first movement of the mind toward divine things is love of God; the first progress of sacred love in the holy observance of the divine commandments is the most ineffable formation of our divine state. This formation comes about through baptism: for, according to Pachymeres’ paraphrase, baptism is a commandment, an introduction, a way to intimacy with God and to the heavenly inheritance. Hence a person is formed toward a better and salutary disposition and toward the ordering of God’s words and works. It reshapes our natural dispositions and effects, impressing a kind of formative power upon our nature: to desire, but heavenly goods; to move, but toward every good; to reason or think, but about what eye has not seen nor ear heard; to covet, but better things; to be angered, but against the enemies of our salvation. For the formation of us that comes from seed, although it is from God the Creator, is natural; but the formation that comes through baptism, by which we take on a divine state, is divine. John 1: “Those who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”

NOTE 2. All Catholic Doctors agree that the Lord Christ did not institute his baptism before he himself was baptized by John in the Jordan, since he did not begin to preach the Gospel and promulgate the Law of grace before then. They likewise agree that this institution took place before he was received into heaven through his triumphant Ascension. But they disagree about when, in the interval between Christ’s baptism and his Ascension, it was instituted. On this point there are three principal opinions. The first maintains that baptism was instituted after Christ’s Passion, at the time when, about to ascend into heaven, he said to his disciples: “Go, teach all nations, baptizing them,” etc. Such seems to have been the teaching of our Alexander of Hales, pt. 1, q. 8, memb. 2, art. 3, and Albert the Great, In IV Sent., d. 3. Many of the holy Fathers support them, especially St. Chrysostom, hom. 28 on John, who writes: “Both baptisms, that of John and that of Christ’s disciples, were alike without the Spirit and had one and the same purpose in baptizing: namely, to win the baptized for Christ,” etc. St. Leo likewise, ep. 4 to the Bishops of Sicily, ch. 3, writes: “After he had risen from the dead, Christ gave his disciples—in whom all the prelates of the Churches were being instructed—both the form and the power of baptizing, saying, Matthew 2¹: ‘Go, teach all nations,’ etc. He could indeed have instructed them in this before the Passion, unless he had wished it to be understood specifically that the grace of the Resurrection began from his Resurrection.” Tertullian teaches the same, bk. On Baptism, ch. 11: “Thus his disciples were then baptizing as ministers, just as John had earlier been a forerunner with the same baptism of John, lest anyone think it was another baptism, since there is no other than Christ’s, which could not then be given by his disciples, because the Lord’s glory had not yet been fulfilled nor the efficacy of the washing established through his Passion and Resurrection. For neither could our death be dissolved except through the Lord’s Passion, nor life restored without his Resurrection.” The second opinion belongs to those who assert that Christ’s baptism was instituted when he was baptized by John in the Jordan: thus the Master of the Sentences, d. 3, St. Thomas, q. 66, art. 2, and all their disciples. The third, and true, opinion is that of the Subtle Doctor, q. 4, n. 2. Rejecting the two earlier views, he argues that “the time of the institution of baptism was before the time when Christ’s disciples were baptizing, although the precise hour of its institution is not read in the Gospel.”

NOTE 3. There is also considerable controversy among theologians about the time when baptism came under a precept and began to oblige people to receive and practice it. Some, mentioned by St. Bernard, ep. 77, once asserted that the precept of baptism began to bind from the time the Lord Christ said to Nicodemus: “Unless someone is born again of water and the Holy Spirit.” Others think the obligation of baptism was in force immediately after the Passion and Resurrection of the Lord Christ. St. Thomas, Suarez, Vasquez, and others defend this opinion above all. The rest, with the Subtle Doctor, hold that baptism was not under a precept until the Gospel had been sufficiently and solemnly promulgated, which took place on the day of Pentecost. “For,” says the Doctor, q. 1, n. 5, “this sacrament may be distinguished as having been promulgated in two ways: in the manner of a counsel, and in the manner of a precept. The former took place before the death of the Lord Christ. For it was fitting that baptism first be proposed as a counsel”—first, because, as the Doctor says, the Gospel Law, which is most perfect, ought not to have been imposed precipitately; rather, the New Law, which is most perfect, had to be introduced in due time. Second, because the Old Law, since it was not evil like idolatry but had been excellent in its own time, ought not to have been abrogated precipitately either, but gradually and after proper instruction, along with its authority and observance. Hence the Synagogue had to be buried with honor, to show that it had been good for its time. We can add a third reason: the passage from the Mosaic Law to the Gospel, and from circumcision to baptism, was not so easy, especially for the Jews, who clung more tenaciously to the traditions of their fathers and could be torn away from them only with great difficulty. It was therefore fitting that baptism first be proposed as a counsel, so that later it could be imposed as a precept on those already practiced in it.

First conclusion. — BAPTISM IS RIGHTLY DEFINED BY THE DOCTOR, IN IV SENT., D. 3, Q. 1, N. 3, IN EITHER OF THESE TWO WAYS. First: Baptism is the washing of a person who consents in some manner, performed by another in water while that person utters certain words together with the proper intention, and effectively signifying by divine institution the removal of sin from the soul. In a second way it can be defined differently: Baptism is the sacrament of the washing of the soul from sin, consisting in the washing of a person who consents in some manner, performed in water by the one washing, and in certain words uttered together by that same minister with the proper intention. The Doctor observes in the same place, n. 1, that either definition can be defended as legitimate. “For there is no difference between these accounts such that the things required for baptism are not necessarily the same according to both; rather, one places in the definition only the washing itself in the direct sense, while the other places both the removal and the words on an equal footing as belonging to that account. This difference arises from the differing opinions about the foundation of this relation: whether it is only the washing as qualified by circumstances, or the washing and the words together.” For the rest, I would judge the second definition more fitting: both because it is given through a genus and a difference—the sacrament has the character of a genus, while the remaining terms indicate how baptism differs from other sacraments in its matter, form, and effect—and because it most closely accords with the definition given by the Roman Catechism under the title On Baptism: “Baptism is the sacrament of regeneration through water in the word,” that is, through the washing of water and the invocation of the Holy Trinity.

The parts of this definition will become clear from what is said in this Disputation, and are readily understood in themselves. First, it is called “the sacrament of washing”: for although baptism, according to its original institution, meant the same as a washing, nevertheless ecclesiastical writers have now established the usage by which it signifies something beyond the washing, namely, the invocation of the Holy Trinity. Second, it is called “the washing of the soul from sin,” to distinguish it from any washing of bodily things and to indicate its chief effect, namely, the soul’s cleansing from absolutely every sin. Third, it is called “the washing of a person who consents in some manner”—that is, either through an act of that person’s own will, as an adult to be baptized must consent, or through an act of another’s will, as infants are considered to consent through the will of those under whose direction and authority they are governed, such as their parents or rulers. The remaining terms indicate the minister of that sacrament, who must be distinct from the person being baptized, utter the sacramental words, administer the washing, and do so with the proper intention.

From this it follows that the definition of baptism given by the Apostle in Ephesians 5, when he calls it “the washing of water in the word of life,” and the definition given by the Master of the Sentences, d. 3, in these words, “the outward washing of the body performed under a prescribed form of words,” are descriptions by something like physical parts rather than metaphysical definitions: namely, the washing of water and the word of life. It is as though someone defined a human being through the parts that physically constitute him, saying: “A human being is a body and a soul united together.”

It likewise follows that the definition given by Hugh of St. Victor, bk. 2, On the Sacraments, pt. 6, ch. 2, in these words—“Baptism is water sanctified by the word of God for washing away crimes”—is not precise either. For a sacrament is a sensible sign of sanctifying grace insofar as it sanctifies; but water, however much it may be sanctified, is not such a sign. Therefore that definition does not fit it, unless it is taken perhaps in a causal sense: namely, insofar as water contributes to the external washing, which is a sign of the soul’s interior cleansing.

The definitions offered by heretics are much less acceptable, especially Melanchthon’s in Theological Commonplaces of 1559, where he defines baptism as “a sign by which God deals with us and receives us into grace.” For this definition fits all the sacraments, and even the word of God, which is not a sacrament. The definition given by Calvin, bk. 4, Institutes, ch. 15, must likewise be rejected, where he says: “Baptism is the sign of initiation by which we are enrolled in the fellowship of the Church, so that, grafted into Christ, we may be counted among the children of God.” For this definition is given only through a secondary effect, namely, being marked among the children of God. This takes place only through sanctifying grace, which is the primary and more excellent effect of baptism itself, by which we are justified and reborn in Christ.

Second conclusion. — IT IS MORE PROBABLE THAT BAPTISM WAS INSTITUTED BEFORE THE PASSION OF CHRIST. This is the more common opinion among the Doctors, and the Doctor teaches it in In IV Sent., d. 3, q. 4, n. 2, where he says: “It is uncertain when baptism was first instituted. Certainly not when Christ was baptized by John, for that was not Christ’s baptism—that is, in Christ’s form—but John’s. Nevertheless, Christ then dedicated water as suitable matter for his baptism through contact with his most pure flesh; for in the Lawgiver its use was confirmed, that is, as a ministry. Nor was it in the word spoken to Nicodemus in John 3, ‘Unless someone,’ etc., because it is not likely that a sacrament so necessary was instituted in a private room and before a private person, who ought not to have been the herald of its institution. Nor was its institution delayed until the time of the Ascension, Matthew, last chapter; for Christ’s disciples baptized with Christ’s baptism before the Passion. In John 3 John’s disciples say to him: ‘Rabbi, the one who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness, behold, he is baptizing, and everyone is coming to him.’ The time of its institution, then, must have been before the time when Christ’s disciples were baptizing, although the precise hour of its institution is not read in the Gospel.” So the Doctor.

The conclusion is therefore proved by the argument given by the Doctor: the Lord Christ baptized together with his disciples before his Passion; but he did not baptize with the baptism of John; therefore he baptized with a baptism instituted by himself. The major premise is established from Sacred Scripture, for we read in John 3: “After these things Jesus and his disciples came into the land of Judea, and there he stayed with them and was baptizing.” A little later, when John’s disciples noticed Christ baptizing together with his disciples, “they came to John and said to him: ‘Rabbi, the one who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness, behold, he is baptizing, and everyone is coming to him.’” And in ch. 4: “When Jesus therefore knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John”—although Jesus himself was not baptizing, but his disciples were—“he left Judea.” The minor premise is proved, first, as follows: if Christ had baptized with the baptism of John, John’s disciples would not have been jealous or complained that Jesus was baptizing. For a baptism conferred by the Lord Christ would rather have been an occasion of joy and congratulation for them than of jealousy and envy, when they saw that he whom John had declared greater than himself, and whose sandal strap he was not worthy to untie, nevertheless enrolled himself among John’s disciples, as it were, by performing his baptism and ministry. Second, Christ is said there to have baptized through his disciples. But if Christ’s disciples had baptized with John’s baptism, or with another baptism not instituted by Christ, Christ would not be said to baptize through his disciples; rather, John or that other author of the baptism they administered would be so described. Therefore, etc. Finally, John’s baptism did not confer the Holy Spirit or remission of sins; it prescribed only penance for obtaining that remission. But the baptism with which Christ baptized conferred both benefits, as St. John the Baptist teaches in John 1: “I baptize in water, but one stands among you whom you do not know.… This is the one who baptizes in the Holy Spirit.” There he speaks not only of Christ’s future baptism, but also of the baptism then present, that is, to be instituted and conferred by the Lord Christ a short time later. Hence in Luke 3 John answered everyone, saying: “I indeed baptize you with water; but one mightier than I is coming, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to untie; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” St. Augustine confirms and presses this argument, Tractate on John 5: “It is said of the Lord before he suffered: ‘He was baptizing more than John,’ although he himself was not baptizing but his disciples. Judas was still there among the disciples. Those whom Judas baptized were not baptized again; those whom John baptized were baptized again, because the baptism given by Judas was Christ’s, while that given by John was John’s.” And in Tractate 15: “Was Jesus baptizing more than John, although Jesus himself was not baptizing but his disciples? Are both statements true, that he baptized and did not baptize? He baptized because he himself cleansed; he did not baptize because he did not himself immerse. The disciples supplied the ministry of the body; he supplied the aid of his majesty.” But this aid is sanctifying grace, which John’s baptism did not confer. Therefore, etc. Second, the conclusion is proved as follows: according to the law prescribed by the Lord Christ, baptism is a prerequisite to the other sacraments, for it is the gateway of the Church and the entrance to participation in the sacraments and all the benefits conferred in the Church. But before Christ’s Passion the Apostles were incorporated as members of the Church and received some sacraments: for at the Last Supper Christ gave the Eucharist to his Apostles and initiated them into the priestly Order, as defined by the Council of Trent, sess. XXII, ch. 1. Therefore, etc. St. Augustine approves this argument, ep. 163: “How could the Apostles receive the Eucharist when they had not yet been baptized? How, when Peter did not want Christ to wash him entirely, did Christ answer him: ‘One who has bathed does not need to wash again, but is entirely clean’?” Yet a complete cleansing was not found in John’s baptism, but in the baptism of the Lord Christ. Therefore, etc.

YOU WILL OBJECT 1. The institution and efficacy of the sacraments of the New Law derive from Christ’s ordinance and command; but Christ commanded and ordered the Apostles to administer baptism only after his Resurrection, when he said in Matthew 28: “Go, teach all nations,” etc. Therefore, etc. — I DENY the minor premise: for that command does not contain the first institution of baptism, but its extension to the Gentiles, so that the Apostles, who previously had authority to confer Christ’s baptism only upon Jews, were then to administer it to all the nations to whom they were going to preach the Gospel.

YOU WILL OBJECT 2. The Holy Spirit is conferred through the baptism of Christ, but he was not given before Christ’s Ascension, as is clear from these words of John 7: “The Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus had not yet been glorified.” And in Acts 1 the Lord Christ said to the disciples after his Resurrection: “You will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” — I DISTINGUISH the minor premise: the Holy Spirit had not been given absolutely and invisibly, I deny; for it is certain that before Christ’s Passion the Apostles, and all those to whom Christ said that their sins were forgiven, had been justified and consequently received the Holy Spirit, that is, sanctifying grace. He had not yet been given visibly, as happened on the day of Pentecost, I grant. For on that day the disciples were again baptized with the baptism of desire and filled, of course, with gifts of every charism. For, as St. Cyril of Jerusalem says: “Just as one who is submerged and baptized in water is surrounded on every side by water, so they were perfected by the Holy Spirit.” For, as St. Gregory says, hom. 30 on the Gospels: “The Holy Spirit came upon the disciples with a sudden sound, changed the minds of carnal people into love of himself, and, while tongues of fire appeared outwardly, made their hearts inwardly aflame; for when they received God in the vision of fire, they burned sweetly with love.”

YOU WILL OBJECT 3. If Christ had instituted his baptism before the Passion, he would have commanded the Apostles to administer it, especially when in Luke 9 “he gave them power and authority over all demons, to cure diseases, and sent them to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick.” But there is no mention there of conferring baptism; therefore this is a sign that it had not then been instituted. — I answer the minor premise: it should not seem surprising that Christ made no mention there of conferring baptism, since that authority was not new for the Apostles, but they had exercised it already.

YOU WILL OBJECT 4. The holy Fathers praised in the second note, especially St. Leo, seem to teach that the sacrament of baptism was instituted by Christ only after his Resurrection. — I answer that those holy Fathers said this only in passing, while engaged in another matter; therefore it is no surprise if their opinion is not proved on a point of lesser importance, especially when other holy Fathers are found defending the contrary opinion, as many support our assertion together with St. Augustine. As for St. Leo, I say that he defined nothing in that letter, but only treated the matter doctrinally with the Bishops of Sicily, to whom he intended to prove that baptism ought not to be conferred on the feast of Epiphany, but deferred until the Resurrection and Pentecost.

YOU WILL OBJECT 5. A cause precedes its effect; but the Passion of Christ is the cause of all the sacraments of the New Law, for it operates in them and especially in baptism, since Romans 6 says: “All of us who were baptized in Christ Jesus were baptized into his death.” Therefore the Passion had to precede baptism. — I DISTINGUISH the minor premise: the Passion of the Lord Christ as accomplished, only, I deny; as foreseen and accepted by God for that purpose, I grant. Therefore the conclusion must be denied. For even before Christ’s Passion baptism had efficacy from the Passion, because it prefigured it, unlike the Mosaic sacraments, which were only ineffective figures. Baptism was efficacious because it had the power to justify from Christ, through whose power the Passion itself was in fact salutary as well. The Doctor explains how the merit of Christ’s Passion could pour forth its power upon those who lived before that Passion, in In III Sent., d. 19, q. 1, n. 10, where he writes that Christ’s merit was foreseen from eternity, and as so foreseen was accepted as conferring some good upon the elect on its account before it was offered; that is, original sin would be remitted and grace conferred upon those who lived before the offering of his Passion. He proves this by an example from St. Anselm, bk. 2, Why God Became Man, ch. 16: “Suppose,” he says, “that many have offended one king and are exiled for the offense. One innocent man of their lineage comes and promises to perform for the king a service pleasing to him on a certain appointed day, so that the king may pardon their offense and be reconciled to them. By accepting the promised service, the king pardons the offense; and if any of them should sin, if he wishes to make satisfaction and repent, the king promises to pardon that offense again. Yet he declares that none of those who were enemies shall enter his palace until the innocent man’s service has been performed. So here: the Passion of the innocent man Christ, foreseen from eternity as to be offered at a certain time, was greatly accepted by the Trinity; on its account he remitted for all who believed it would be offered in time the offense they had contracted from Adam and later committed, if they repented. Yet he did not accept it to such a degree that anyone would enter his eternal palace before the Passion was actually offered. In this way he remitted the offense to the Fathers through circumcision, as he does to us through baptism; but no one entered the palace before the Passion was offered.”

Third conclusion. — BAPTISM WAS NOT INSTITUTED WHEN CHRIST WAS BAPTIZED IN THE JORDAN, NOR DURING HIS CONVERSATION WITH NICODEMUS IN JOHN 3, BUT A LITTLE AFTER THE ELECTION OF THE APOSTLES. So the Doctor, as is clear from the preceding conclusion; Gabriel, d. 3, q. unica, a. 3, and Richard, a. 5, q. 1, agreed with him, saying that Christ indicated the matter of baptism when he was baptized in the Jordan and designated its form in his conversation with Nicodemus, but instituted it only after the election and appointment of the Apostles.

That he truly did not institute his baptism when he himself was baptized is clear, because the institution of sacraments is an act of a lawgiver. But when Christ was baptized, he was not acting in the person of a lawgiver, but rather of a penitent. Hence the Church sings on the feast of Epiphany: “Today Christ willed to be baptized by John in the Jordan, to save us”—that is, to fulfill the office of one doing penance and making satisfaction for us; for, taking up and sustaining the cause of human nature, he willed to receive the baptism of penance. Also, the sacraments of the New Law ought not to have been instituted before the New Law itself had been inaugurated. But the New Law began above all through the preaching of the Gospel, for a law had to be promulgated before it could bind and exercise any force. Therefore, since when the Lord Christ was baptized he had not yet promulgated the Gospel, nor consequently begun the New Law, he should not be considered to have instituted baptism. Finally, the Lord Christ should be considered to have instituted his baptism in the manner in which he wished it to be applied and administered. But he commanded the Apostles, before administering baptism to anyone, first to instruct and teach them the mysteries of faith. By the same reasoning, then, it seems that he himself first taught before he instituted and administered baptism.

The second and third parts are also evident: namely, that he did not institute baptism during his conversation with Nicodemus. For, as the Doctor teaches most soundly, it is not likely that a sacrament so necessary and ordained for absolutely all people was instituted and commanded in a private room and with a private individual. It was more fitting for that institution to take place publicly, especially before those who were to be the propagators and ministers of such a sacrament. The institution of a sacrament ought to be public and directed to the Church. Therefore it appears more probable that this sacrament was instituted only a little after John had baptized Christ and the Apostles had been called.

YOU WILL SAY: Many of the holy Fathers consistently assert that the waters of baptism received the power of sanctifying when Christ was baptized by John in the Jordan. So especially St. Ambrose, bk. 2, On Luke: “The Lord,” he says, “was baptized not wishing to be cleansed, but to cleanse the waters, so that, washed by the flesh of Christ, which knew no sin, they might have the right of baptism.” Nazianzen, Oration 59: “John baptizes; Jesus approaches, perhaps to impart holiness even to the one by whom he is baptized, but certainly to bury the whole old Adam in water.” Hilary, On Matthew, canon 2: “Christ, by the authority of his example, brings the sacraments of human salvation to completion, sanctifying humankind both by his assumption of it and by the washing.” Jerome, Dialogue Against the Luciferians: “Jesus was not so much cleansed in the washing as he cleansed all waters by his washing.” Augustine, serm. 36, his first on the baptism of Christ, after saying that God arranged Christ’s affairs so that at the same season of the year there would be something like a continuous feast, adds: “So that just as we then marvel at him born of an inviolate Mother, so now we may receive him plunged beneath pure water and glory in both events: that a Mother bore the Son and is chaste, and that water washed Christ and is holy. The purification of the water after baptism was not established as Mary’s chastity was glorified after childbirth; except that the wave was enriched with an almost greater gift than Mary. She merited chastity for herself alone; it bestowed sanctification upon us. She merited not to sin; it, to purge sins. She repudiates her own offenses; it, by God’s grace, forgives the offenses of others in itself. Virginity was granted to her; fruitfulness was given to it. She bore one and is pure; it has borne many and is a virgin. She knows no son besides Christ; it is, with Christ, the mother of peoples.” And later: “From the time the Savior plunged himself into water, through the ministry of baptism he consecrated the courses of all streams and the veins of every spring.” In serm. 37, On the Time, believed to be by St. Maximus, not Augustine: “When Jesus is baptized in the streams of the Jordan, they are consecrated for our baptism.” And later: “Jesus is baptized, not for himself but for us; he is baptized not to be purified by the waters, but to sanctify the waters himself. Now a man is baptized so that he may institute the sacrament of the new baptism.” — I answer that by all these statements the holy Fathers mean only that when the Lord Christ received baptism he did not impart to the waters of the Jordan a sanctifying power by which they would become capable of producing grace and remission of sins, as happens through baptism—for otherwise baptism would have to be conferred only in the water of the Jordan, since only that water would retain the power to sanctify—but only that at that time the water was designated in the baptism of the Lord Christ to serve in sanctifying people through baptism. For the common manner of speaking among the holy Fathers is that water appointed through the priest’s blessing for the sacrament of baptism is sanctified and imbibes the power to sanctify. So St. Clement speaks, bk. 2, Apostolic Constitutions, ch. 24, and Tertullian, bk. On Baptism, ch. 1, where he says: “All waters, by the privilege of their original source, receive the sacrament of sanctification when God is invoked; for the Spirit at once comes down from heaven and rests upon the waters, sanctifying them from himself, and thus, once sanctified, they imbibe the power of sanctifying,” etc. Cyprian, ep. 70: “The water must first be cleansed and sanctified by the priest, so that through its baptism it may wash away the sins of the person being baptized.” These words are not to be understood as if water so blessed had, through its contact, a power to sanctify; rather, it is ordered and appointed as suitable matter for the making of the sacrament. The same must be said, with the proper proportion, of the water of the Jordan. Thus the sacrament of baptism was mystically prefigured in the baptism received by the Lord Christ from John in the Jordan, both as to form and as to matter; both were in fact designated. The form was designated by the manifestation of the three divine persons: the Father manifested himself by a voice, the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove, and the Son in the humanity he had assumed. The matter was likewise designated, because through contact with Christ’s flesh the water was sanctified and appointed to become the matter of the sacrament. This sanctification of the water is rightly said to have given it the right to cleanse from sins—not because the sacrament was then instituted, but because it was outlined and designated.

Fourth conclusion. — BAPTISM WAS USEFUL AND SUFFICIENT FOR EXPIATING ORIGINAL SIN BEFORE THE PASSION OF THE LORD CHRIST. This is the Doctor’s opinion, contrary to St. Thomas, who, q. 66, art. 2, distinguishes two periods of baptism: the first, when it was only under counsel, namely from its institution until Christ’s death; and the second, when baptism was under a precept, namely immediately after Christ’s death. He likewise establishes three periods of circumcision. The first lasted until Christ’s death, when circumcision was not only under counsel but also under precept, because the Mosaic Law had not yet been abrogated. The second period was from Christ’s death until the solemn promulgation of the Gospel Law, which took place on Pentecost; during that intervening period, he says, circumcision was lawful but useless, since all its power, like that of the other sacraments of the Old Law, had ceased to be in force at the death of the Lord Christ. Finally, he establishes the third period from the solemn preaching of the Gospel itself, after which circumcision was not only useless but altogether unlawful and deadly.

The Doctor therefore teaches first that baptism was a sufficient remedy for the salvation of infants from the very time it was instituted. “For if,” he says, “one imposed precept entirely revokes another, a counsel or admonition concerning one act makes the other unnecessary. For the command to perform one act is a prohibition of the other, while a counsel to perform one act is permission not to observe the other. Therefore, if the precept of baptism prohibited circumcision with respect to its fruit, then a counsel concerning baptism also made circumcision unnecessary.” That is, the precept imposed to receive baptism nullifies circumcision with respect to its fruit and obligation; therefore a counsel concerning baptism also removes the obligation of circumcision. Everyone admits the antecedent. The Doctor proves the consequence by a moral argument drawn from the nature of a law and a precept: whenever one law abrogates another law concerning something, even a counsel to do something other than what the law commands removes the obligation of that law. Consequently, the counsel to receive baptism, which acquired force from its institution, nullified the obligation of the Law of Circumcision. Hence the Doctor rightly concludes, n. 8, “that if before the Passion a Jew had baptized his infant in response to the preaching of Christ or Peter and had not circumcised him, the infant would have been saved had he died, because he would have received grace in baptism: for from its first institution baptism conferred grace.”

THE ADVERSARIES REPLY that the Doctor’s argument applies only when two acts—one of which must be performed by precept, on account of the law that orders it, while the other may be performed by counsel, on account of a ruler who recommends it—are of such a nature that they cannot coexist. Thus a counsel to preserve virginity removes the precept to enter marriage, because virginity and consummated marriage cannot coexist. But circumcision and baptism are different, since both can coexist. For the Doctor admits that before Christ’s death both circumcision and baptism were beneficial. Therefore their acts were not incompatible, and consequently a counsel to receive baptism did not remove the obligation of circumcision. — Against this: a precept to receive baptism does not introduce any more incompatibility between the acts than does a counsel to receive it. Yet everyone admits that the precept to receive baptism removed every obligation of circumcision, which ceased to be in force from the time baptism was commanded. Therefore the same must be said of a counsel. The major premise is proved: a precept to receive baptism does not of itself entail any incompatibility with the precept of circumcision, for it does not formally or virtually contain the latter’s revocation. Both precepts could have remained in force together, if God had decreed that Christians were still bound by precept to receive circumcision after baptism. Therefore the precept of baptism has no power to remove the obligation of circumcision from any source other than the will of Christ the Lord and Lawgiver, by which he decreed that baptism should succeed circumcision, insofar as baptism is a profession of the New Law and the gateway of the Church, in which, as truth dawned, the shadows of the figures of the Old Law had to vanish. But the same follows from the will of Christ, who instituted baptism, administered it, and counseled its reception as an entrance and passage for beginning the New Law. Therefore, by the same reasoning that the precept of baptism removes the obligation of circumcision, a counsel to receive baptism likewise revoked that obligation.

This is confirmed: someone who has vowed to enter a less strict religious order satisfies his vow and obligation by entering a stricter and more perfect order. In like manner, therefore, Jews who were bound by precept to observe the divine Law satisfied it by professing faith in the Gospel and receiving the means of salvation ordained by Christ. The consequence is evident: both because the Gospel Law contains explicitly and perfectly whatever was foreshadowed in the Old Law, and is far more perfect; and because the Jews were bound to receive the promised Christ, follow his teaching, and observe his law. For, as John 15 says: “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin,” etc. Therefore they did sin by not receiving Christ and following his teaching. Finally, what the Lord Christ taught and instituted was the completion of the Old Law, and baptism was therefore the fulfillment of circumcision. Accordingly, just as one who attains an end no longer needs the means leading to its attainment, so one who had received baptism no longer needed circumcision.

YOU WILL SAY: The Mosaic Law remained in force at least until the Passion of the Lord Christ, as is clear from various passages of Scripture. For while the Lord Christ was alive he said in Matthew 5: “I have not come to abolish the Law, but to fulfill it.” Hence in Matthew 23 he said: “The scribes and Pharisees have sat on the chair of Moses.… Whatever they tell you, do.” The Apostle therefore says in Hebrews 8 and 9 that the Old Testament was brought to completion at Christ’s death. Thus all the precepts of the Old Law, and consequently the precept of circumcision too, remained in force until the Passion of Christ; and consequently baptism at that time was not a sufficient means of salvation. Moreover, the Subtle Doctor says in Reportata, d. 3, q. 1, 5, n. 2: “The promulgation of baptism took place in two ways: first, as a counsel, when Christ came in the flesh, but not as a precept; second, as a precept. In the first way it was not necessary to receive baptism, because circumcision was then necessarily imposed upon the Jews until Christ’s Passion, together with the observance of the Mosaic Law. Some prove this because Christ ate the Paschal Lamb before his Passion, which he would not have done unless the Jews still had to observe the Mosaic Law. It is therefore clear that this is so.” — I DISTINGUISH the antecedent: the Mosaic Law remained in force until the Passion of Christ with respect to those matters whose contrary was not counseled, I grant; otherwise, I deny. For it is not necessary that a law remain in force with respect to each and every one of its precepts for it to be said to remain in force and endure. Some of its precepts can be derogated from when the Ruler counsels the contrary, as Christ counseled the reception of baptism before his Passion. Hence the Old Law was not brought to completion in every respect at Christ’s death; rather, it remained in force until the New Law was publicly promulgated, as we shall say shortly. Therefore at Christ’s death it must be said to have ceased only with respect to the prophecies of the Prophets that foretold that Passion, and also with respect to the sacrifices and sacraments whose entire power was nullified through Christ’s death. As for the Doctor, I say that by those words he means only that circumcision remained necessary for Jews until the Passion of Christ by necessity of precept, because the precept to receive it still remained in force for Jews who had not received baptism. He does not judge it necessary by necessity of means, such that someone who had been baptized was still bound to be circumcised; for, as he said above, baptism was then a sufficient means of salvation. There is therefore no contradiction between saying that circumcision was nullified as a necessary means from the time baptism was instituted and saying that at the same time it continued to be necessary by precept for adults and infants as a sign of profession of the Mosaic Law, which had not yet entirely ceased to be in force. That this was all the Doctor meant is clear from what he adds, n. 1, In I Sent., d. 3. After the words we cited above, n. 7, he immediately raises the objection that one could indeed say that baptism had been sufficient for an infant, but that the father sinned by not circumcising him. He answers: “On the contrary, since he could baptize the infant before the eighth day, and since the child already had a remedy against original sin, and the father believed this—for he believed baptism effective for this purpose—it then seems that he was not bound to provide the child necessarily with another remedy, namely, against original sin.” There he does not excuse the father from sin if on the eighth day he failed to apply the circumcision commanded by the Law as a sign of the covenant; rather, he excuses him either from every fault if the infant died before the eighth day, or only from the sin against filial piety, which obliges a father to provide his children with a remedy against original sin, whatever that remedy may be. He explains and insists on the same point in nearly the same words in Reportata, the passage already cited, n. 7: “If a Jew had been baptized, and afterward had baptized his son born later, and that child had died before the Passion of Christ, it is certain that he would have been saved, because baptism then had the same efficacy as it has now. Therefore it was not necessary to circumcise that child”—understand: in order that he be saved and exempted from transgressing the Law, which commanded circumcision on the eighth day.

Final conclusion. — BAPTISM WAS NOT NECESSARY BY PRECEPT IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE DEATH OF THE LORD CHRIST, BUT ONLY AFTER THE GOSPEL HAD BEEN SUFFICIENTLY PREACHED, WITH RESPECT TO BOTH JEWS AND GENTILES IN THEIR RESPECTIVE CASES. So the Doctor in the passage cited above, n. 11, where he says: “I say that in the case of baptism we must distinguish only two periods: the time when it was under counsel and the time when it was under precept. The first lasted from the beginning, from the time when the Gospel or baptism was preached by Christ or by the Apostles, until its solemn and authoritative preaching after Christ’s Ascension. Thus the first period has no distinction based on Christ’s death or the time after it, merely because baptism proceeded differently afterward than before. The second period, I believe, begins on the day of Pentecost in Jerusalem, because until that day the Apostles had not preached publicly, in accordance with Christ’s words in Luke 24: ‘But you, remain in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.’ On the day of Pentecost, however, after the Holy Spirit had been sent, they preached solemnly, and about three thousand were added that day and were baptized, Acts 2. From then on, in other cities and according to the order of each place or people, the second period began when the Gospel Law was preached publicly and solemnly there; thus the period did not begin at the same time for everyone: ‘From Zion the law would go forth, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem,’ according to Isaiah’s prophecy. For some the period began a month after Pentecost, for others a year later, for others ten years later, and so on, as the Gospel was preached to them.”

As for circumcision, however, I distinguish four periods. In the first it was necessary; in the second useful but not necessary; in the third neither useful nor necessary, yet lawful; in the fourth altogether unlawful and deadly. — The first period of circumcision preceded both periods of baptism. — The second period of circumcision coincided with the first period of baptism. For, as was argued earlier, from the time baptism was first counseled, circumcision was not necessary for anyone who wished to be baptized; instead, both rites were then available alternatively, so that a Jew could choose whichever he wished. For if he wished, it was lawful and beneficial for him to be circumcised; circumcision had not yet been revoked with respect to its usefulness or its lawfulness. It was also lawful, and even praiseworthy, for him to be baptized. It was fitting too that during the intervening period between two laws—when the first is not removed all at once and the second is not imposed—the two should operate together as alternatives. — The third period of circumcision coincided with the second period of baptism, with respect to the Jews, until the time of Paul discussed earlier; indeed, it is likely that it continued well beyond then, because at the time of Paul’s purification the brothers in Jerusalem seemed to approve observance of the Law and to consult Paul about it.

As for the Gentiles converted to the faith, the second period of baptism and the fourth period of circumcision coincided, at least some fourteen years after Christ’s Passion, or thereabouts, when Paul went up to Jerusalem to the elders to consult about the question recorded in Acts 15. Peter first recounts the events of the council described in Acts 10. Then James, as Bishop in Jerusalem, gives his judgment, according to the Master of the Sentences, saying: “I judge that those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles should not be troubled, but that we should write to them to abstain from pollutions,” etc. Of those four requirements, two—abstaining from food sacrificed to idols and from fornication—are necessary. So the Doctor. Note that he wrote these final words only in accordance with the historian’s account: for St. Peter presided over the council itself, as the Doctor also holds, since below, n. 15, he says that the messengers sent by James were subject to Peter.

THE ADVERSARIES REPLY 1. The divine Law does not require its own promulgation in order to have binding force. — But we have clearly taught the contrary in the treatise On Laws, and proved with very strong arguments that every law, even divine law, must necessarily be promulgated. For divine law cannot impose an obligation to do what is impossible; it would do so if it imposed the necessity of observing things that are unknown and have not been sufficiently disclosed. Therefore, etc.

THE ADVERSARIES REPLY 2. The Old Law expired at Christ’s death, as we too have taught in the treatise On Laws when discussing the Mosaic Law; therefore the New Law had to impose an obligation, especially with respect to baptism, which is the entrance to the Gospel Law. — But I answer by denying the consequence: for no one is bound to observe a Law now in a different way than before except because the Law has been promulgated differently. But baptism was not promulgated as a precept any differently after Christ’s death and before Pentecost than it had been before the Passion. Therefore at that time it was only under counsel, just as it had been before Christ’s death. This is confirmed: the obligation to receive baptism and embrace the New Law ought not to have come into force earlier, especially for the Jews, before it was clear to them that the Mosaic Law, which they were bound to observe, had been revoked. But that revocation took place only through the solemn promulgation of the New Law on the day of Pentecost. Therefore the obligation of the New Law was not yet in force before that time. The minor premise is established: promulgation of a Law stands in relation to a community in the same way as revocation of the prior Law through the subsequent one. Therefore, just as the promulgation of the Mosaic Law was public, so its revocation had to be solemn and public. The Doctor proves the major premise, n. 9: the Jews were bound to observe the Law of Circumcision until it became known to them that it was altogether useless and vain, and no longer necessary for their salvation. This had to become clear through a public revocation of that obligation, by which it would be clear to the Jews that the Law of Circumcision was no longer in force. Therefore, etc.

YOU WILL SAY: When dying, the Lord Christ said, “It is finished,” John 19, by which he meant that the whole Old Law had been brought to completion and entirely abrogated. This is confirmed by the Apostle in Romans 7, where he says: “My brothers, you too have been put to death to the Law through the body of Christ.” There he must be understood to mean the crucified body of Christ. — In reply to the first objection, n. 18, the Doctor says that by those words the Lord Christ meant only either that what had been foretold about his Passion had been accomplished, as he had predicted in Luke 18: “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything written by the Prophets about the Son of Man will be accomplished”; or, he says, if the words refer to the Old Law, they should be understood to mean that the Mosaic Law was brought to completion and abrogated in its cause. For the death of the Lord Christ was the cause of the confirmation of the Gospel Law; but that Law was not confirmed as necessary to observe before its public preaching, which did not begin with the Passion but at Pentecost. During the intervening period the disciples sat in the upper room, preaching solemnly or publicly to no one. As for the Apostle, I say that his words must be understood in this way: we have been put to death to the Law through the body of Christ because the Law was extinguished in its cause through the crucifixion of the Lord Christ. For the death of the Lord Christ was the confirmation of the Gospel Law and, consequently, the extinction and revocation of the Mosaic Law. Nor is it an obstacle that the Apostle there uses the example of a woman who is released from her husband’s law through his death. For the Apostle does not there compare Christ’s death to a husband’s death. Thus he did not say, “You have been put to death to the Law in death,” or “in the body of Christ,” but “through the body of Christ”—that is, through the death and crucifixion that caused the Mosaic Law to cease binding.

NOTE 1. Theologians commonly distinguish three kinds of baptism: of water, of desire, and of blood. Baptism of water is that which is conferred in natural water with the explicit invocation of the Most Holy Trinity. Baptism of blood is martyrdom; baptism of desire is contrition with the purpose of receiving baptism by water. These two are called baptisms because, just as we are washed by baptism with water, so the martyr is drenched with his own blood and the penitent watered with his own tears. — The Lord Christ signified baptism of blood in Mark 10, when, addressing the sons of Zebedee, he said: Can you drink the cup that I am to drink, and be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized? St. Cyprian commends this baptism in his Letter to Jubaianus. Speaking of catechumens who underwent martyrdom, he says that they are not deprived of the sacrament of baptism, since they are baptized with the most glorious and greatest baptism of blood; of this the Lord also said that he was to be baptized with another baptism. Those baptized in his own blood and sanctified by his Passion are brought to perfection, and the same Lord declares in the Gospel that they attain the grace of the divine promise, when he speaks to the thief who believed and confessed him in the very Passion, and promises that he will be with him in Paradise. The holy Fathers also commend baptism of desire many times, especially St. Augustine, bk. IV of On Baptism, ch. 21, where he says: I do not hesitate to prefer a Catholic catechumen burning with divine love to a baptized heretic; indeed, within the Catholic Church itself we prefer a good catechumen to a bad baptized person. Yet we do no injury to the sacrament of baptism, with which the latter has already been imbued and the former not yet, nor do we think the sacrament of baptism should be preferred to a catechumen, when we find a catechumen more faithful and better than some baptized person. For the centurion Cornelius, not yet baptized, was better than Simon Magus, who had been baptized: Cornelius was filled with the Holy Spirit even before baptism, while Simon was filled with an unclean spirit even after baptism.

NOTE 2. Although the holy Fathers call baptism of blood and of desire sacraments—as is clear from the holy Cyprian and Augustine just cited—they do not in truth claim for them the dignity and definition of a sacrament. For neither martyrdom nor contrition is a certain and sensible sign divinely instituted to signify and confer grace effectively, as has already been said of martyrdom when treating the number of the sacraments; we shall speak of contrition in the next disputation. They are called sacraments because of the analogy they have with baptism by water, especially with respect to its effect, which they are said to supply. The truth of baptism of desire is quite clear in Sacred Scripture from all those oracles in which God promises pardon and grace to the repentant sinner who asks for divine mercy. Thus Ezekiel 18: When the wicked man turns away from his wickedness, he shall give life to his soul. Likewise, in Acts 10:22, Cornelius the centurion, not yet baptized with water, is called a just man and one who fears God. And there the Holy Spirit fell upon the contrite Gentiles, who had not yet been baptized. Hence St. Peter says: Can anyone forbid water, that these should not be baptized, who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have? For this reason St. Ambrose says in his Funeral Oration for the younger Emperor Valentinian, a catechumen who was killed before he had been baptized: He received the grace of baptism, which he had asked for. This is most firmly established by the Council of Trent, sess. VI, ch. 4, where, speaking of justification through baptism, it says that justification is a transfer from the state in which a person is born a child of the first Adam into the state of grace and adoption as children of God through the second Adam, Jesus Christ our Savior; this transfer, after the Gospel has been promulgated, cannot take place without the laver of regeneration or its desire. By desire it means contrition, which in urgent necessity suffices to obtain the grace of baptism; for this is how the Lord Christ's words are interpreted: Unless someone is born again, etc. St. Bernard therefore rightly observed in Letter 77 that when the Lord Christ said in Mark 16, Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, he did not repeat, But whoever is not baptized; he said only, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. He thereby intimated that faith alone, sometimes burning with charity, suffices for salvation. St. Augustine teaches this very well in bk. IV of On Baptism, ch. 24. After saying that faith formed by charity sometimes justifies outside the sacrament, and proving it by the examples of the good thief and Cornelius the centurion, he adds in ch. 25: All these things show that the sacrament of baptism is one thing and conversion of heart another; but a person's salvation is completed by both. If one of them is lacking, we should not therefore think that the other must be lacking too: for the former can exist without the latter in an infant, and the latter without the former could exist in the thief, God supplying in either case what had not been lacking by choice, etc. Thus the only remaining difficulty concerns baptism of blood. Therefore…

NOTE 3. Baptism of blood, or martyrdom, by its meaning is the same as testimony given to God or Christ by death; in truth, however, it is a death violently inflicted on a person who does not resist, for the faith of Christ or for true virtue. These words set out four conditions necessary for perfect martyrdom. The first is that it be a death inflicted: for complete and perfect martyrdom requires that a person truly lay down his life for the faith or religion, so that death actually follows, or at least would naturally follow unless life were divinely preserved, as it was for the three boys in the Babylonian furnace, for St. John the Evangelist when he was put into a cauldron of boiling oil, and for many others whom the Church counts among the martyrs. Indeed, when death is prevented by God, this increases the character of martyrdom: it makes clear to everyone that God approves the cause of the one who suffers. Thus accepting death is as effective a testimony of faith as if death itself had followed. Therefore the Subtle Doctor, In IV Sent., d. 1, q. 6, n. 1, does not hesitate to assert that someone can become a martyr more than once. He says: A person baptized with the baptism of blood, if afterward he is a wayfarer among us, is bound in affection, and according to place and time, to receive in fact the sacrament, that is, baptism of water. What is supposed here is quite possible, as we read of some who became confessors twice: they endured punishments for the faith twice, but did not die from them. — The second condition is that the death be inflicted violently. For even if someone died for God's glory and the salvation of his brothers, he would not on that account be considered a perfect martyr. Hence those who lay down their lives for their brothers, whether while serving the plague-stricken or in a just war, are not properly called martyrs. Thus in the Martyrology on February 28 we find written: Commemoration of the holy priests, deacons, and other lesser clerics who, when a most savage plague was raging in the time of Valentinian, gladly met death while ministering to the sick; the devout faith of the pious is accustomed to venerate them as martyrs. They are called as it were martyrs of heaven, though they are not such: they died for their brothers, but death was not violently inflicted on them for their brothers. To die is one thing; to suffer death for one's brothers is another, and the latter seems to be required, according to the Church's common understanding, for martyrdom properly so called. — The third condition is that death be inflicted in hatred of the faith or of true virtue. For, as St. Augustine says on Psalm 38: It is not the punishment but the cause that makes a martyr. Hence in Letter 50, to Boniface, he says: Those are true martyrs of whom the Lord says, “Blessed are those who suffer persecution for justice's sake.” Therefore those who suffer for iniquity and for the wicked division of Christian unity are not martyrs; those who suffer persecution for justice are true martyrs. I said, or of true virtue, because the Church venerates as true martyrs not only those who undergo death for confessing the true faith, but also those who die because of some other violence. Thus Thomas of Canterbury is numbered among the martyrs, killed for defending the liberty of the Church, as are many virgins killed for guarding chastity. — The fourth and final condition of true martyrdom is that death be inflicted on a person who does not resist. Hence the familiar saying: A martyr does not fight but suffers. He must be conformed to the Lord Christ, who bore witness to the truth not by contradicting but by suffering: when he suffered, he did not threaten; like a sheep led to slaughter, and like a lamb silent before its shearer, he did not speak or open his mouth. Hence soldiers who bravely fall in a war undertaken to defend the faith and religion, though they deserve very great merit, are not to be considered true martyrs: soldiers ordinarily fight in the hope of escaping death, and even of killing the attacker, since the end of battle is victory. Accordingly, they suffer death more from necessity than from choice.

With these points established, two principal matters remain to be determined in this Question: first, whether baptism of water is one in number, so that it cannot in any way be repeated; second, whether baptism of blood truly has the power to erase every sin and justify a person.

First conclusion. — BAPTISM IS SO ONE IN NUMBER THAT, ONCE VALIDLY CONFERRED, IT CAN IN NO WAY BE REPEATED. This is defined as a matter of faith in all those Councils that strictly prohibit rebaptizing those who have been duly baptized by heretics; it is stated expressly in the Council of Trent, sess. VII, can. 11: If anyone says that a baptism duly conferred must be repeated for one who, among unbelievers, has denied the faith of Christ when he returns to penance, let him be anathema.

Some prove this truth from Ephesians 1: One Lord, one faith, one baptism. St. Leo does so in Letter 37, ch. 1: We know that the crime is expiable whenever, in keeping with the institutions of heretics condemned by the holy Fathers, someone is compelled to undergo twice the laver bestowed once for regeneration; this is contrary to the apostolic teaching, which proclaims for us one Godhead in the Trinity, one confession in faith, and one sacrament in baptism. Hence in Letter 79, ch. 7, he writes: We proclaim that this rule, as you know, is to be observed by all the Churches: the laver once begun must not be violated by any repetition, since the Apostle says, “One Lord, one faith, one baptism.” Yet one might reply that the unity of baptism of which the Apostle speaks is specific, not numerical, just as St. Augustine explains the unity of faith in bk. XIII of On the Trinity, ch. 2: The faith of believers is said to be one in the same way as the will of those who will the same thing is one: even in those who will that same thing, each person's own will is evident to him, while another's remains hidden, though he wills the same. Hence, with the Doctor, it is enough to assert that no argument a priori can be offered for this truth other than the very will of Christ, who instituted baptism so that, once validly conferred on the same person, it could in no way be repeated. Yet fitting reasons a posteriori support this, and the Doctor considers them in In IV Sent., d. 6, q. 7, n. 3, where he says: I say that the reason baptism is not repeatable is its divine institution, for which there is no prior cause except his will. Nevertheless, this institution is reasonable, both because of the disease against which it is principally instituted—for this remedy is instituted chiefly against original sin, which is unique—and because of its principal end, since it grants full remission of punishment and guilt. If a person could often receive such full remission of both, there would be a great incentive to sin. For that which is instituted as a remedy for those who fall again, namely penance, is not without a great penalty to be paid for sin. Third, through this sacrament, since it is the beginning and gate by which one enters the Christian Law, a person is enrolled in Christ's family and becomes a member of him and of the Church militant. Someone who has entered a college may, if he offends after entering, be reconciled to the college and its head; but he does not enter the college frequently.

By these words the Doctor means that no reason a priori can be assigned for why baptism, once conferred, is not repeatable except the divine will, which so established and ordered it. Nevertheless, some fitting reasons a posteriori can be assigned for this divine ordinance. The first is drawn from original sin, for the cleansing of which baptism was instituted principally. Since this disease, once healed, does not return, its remedy should not be repeated either. The second may be drawn from its effect, namely, the full remission of sin. Once a person has obtained this, it was fitting that it not be offered again, lest it provide an occasion for sinning more often, if a sinner could obtain full forgiveness of his sins without any effort on his part at all. Hence St. Paul also says in Hebrews 6: For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, who also tasted the heavenly gift and became partakers of the Holy Spirit, who nonetheless tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then fell away, to be renewed again to penance. According to the common opinion of interpreters, he thereby signifies that the full remission of sins once received through baptism cannot be obtained again without satisfaction on the sinner's part, although it can be obtained through frequent and laborious penance. The third reason, finally, is that through baptism a person is enrolled in Christ's family and becomes a member of his body. Thus, if someone enrolled in the society of a kingdom offends, he can indeed be reconciled to its head and members, but this does not mean he is inserted into it again: by sinning he does not lose the rights of the kingdom or the city, but merely becomes liable under its laws. So too, one baptized who offends God can be reconciled through penance, but cannot become a Christian again, since he is already presumed to be one.

Others prove the same truth from the fact that the sacrament of baptism imprints an indelible character, and thus cannot be repeated. The Council of Florence uses this reason in the decree of Eugenius, where, speaking of the sacraments of the New Law, it says: Among these sacraments are three—baptism, confirmation, and order—because they imprint on the soul an indelible character, that is, a certain spiritual sign distinguishing it from others; hence they are not repeated in the same person. The Council of Trent agrees, sess. VII, can. 7: If anyone says that a character is not imprinted on the soul in the three sacraments, namely baptism, confirmation, and order … and hence they cannot be repeated, let him be anathema. Some claim the Doctor rejects this reason, but he does not: he assumes it to be true in q. 9. In q. 7, n. 2, he says only that the argument does not proceed from what is better known, since it is more evident that a sacrament cannot be repeated than that it imprints a character: For from the beginning, from the time baptism was instituted, it was manifest that it was not permitted to repeat it; but that a character is imprinted is not known from its original institution, from all of Scripture, or even from many authorities of the Saints. Therefore no more effective reason can be offered for asserting this truth than the constant and universal practice of the Church, which has always taught that baptism is not repeatable. St. Clement of Rome is an early witness to this tradition, bk. VI of the Constitutions, ch. 15: In the same way, all those things are contained in the one baptism, which is delivered into the Lord's death … The baptism of the impious is not received, nor should that administered outside the holy ones be made void by another baptism: for as there is one God, one Christ, and one Paraclete, so there is one baptism given in his name. A little later he says: Those who attempt to baptize again people already initiated by baptism crucify the Lord, kill him again, mock divine things, make light of holy things, insult the Holy Spirit, regard the holy blood as common, and sin against him who sent, suffered, and bore witness. Canon 47 of the Apostles agrees: If a bishop or presbyter rebaptizes someone who truly had baptism, or does not baptize one polluted by the impious—that is, one baptized by heretics who do not preserve the true form of baptism—let him be deposed as one who mocks the cross and death of the Lord. Why is this? Because baptism represents Christ's death, burial, and resurrection, as the Apostle testifies in Romans 6:3–5: Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized in Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? For we were buried with him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ rose from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall also be so in the likeness of his resurrection. Thus, just as Christ died for our sins only once and rose only once, so we, buried with him once through baptism and rising through it, cannot be buried again, lest we signify that Christ can die and be buried again. This is the best fitting reason for the will of the one who instituted it.

The Doctor objects in the same place: Baptism is not a more excellent sacrament than the Eucharist and penance; but these are repeated often; therefore baptism too can be repeated. — The Doctor replies, n. 3, that the comparison with the Eucharist holds only in this respect: just as the same host cannot be consecrated several times, so the same person cannot be baptized several times. I say in answer to the argument that the utterance of the words by which the Eucharist is consecrated is not the sacrament but the sacramental consecration, and it is not permitted to repeat it over the same matter; if it is repeated a second time, nothing is done, because it has already been done.… Although the same person could receive Communion or the Eucharist frequently, the words of Eucharistic consecration cannot frequently be spoken over the same matter; nor is the Eucharist to be repeated in the sense that some matter of this sacrament receives its form twice. Therefore, by analogy, it is not permitted to pronounce the words of the form of baptism several times over the same person.

Second conclusion. — BAPTISM OF BLOOD TRULY HAS THE POWER TO SUPPLY THE PLACE OF BAPTISM OF WATER BY THE WORK PERFORMED. This is the more common and truer opinion, and…

It is proved first from all those passages of Scripture in which the Lord Christ promises eternal life to one who loses temporal life for God's glory. Thus Matthew 16: Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. Or, as Mark has it in ch. 8: Whoever loses his life for my sake and the Gospel will save it. Hence in Matthew 10 the same Lord Christ testifies: Whoever confesses me before men, I too will confess before my Father who is in heaven. These statements are no less general than Christ's threat: Unless someone is born of water, etc. St. Augustine therefore reasons in bk. On the City of God, ch. 2: it is as certain that a perfect martyr obtains grace and remission of all sins through his passion, on the basis of Christ's testimony, Whoever confesses me, etc., as it is certain that no one can be saved without baptism, on the basis of the words, Unless someone is born again, etc. But the latter is certain; therefore so is the former. That martyrdom produces this effect as it were by the work performed is proved by the Church's judgment. St. Augustine says in bk. III of On Free Choice, ch. 23: Not without reason does the Church also commend those infants, received in honor among the martyrs, who were killed when King Herod was seeking to kill the Lord Jesus Christ. Hence in the Collect for the feast of the Holy Innocents the Church sings of them: O God, whose praise the innocent martyrs confessed on this day, not by speaking but by dying. And in the hymn: Hail, flowers of the martyrs, whom Christ's persecutor cut down at life's very threshold, like a whirlwind of newly opening roses.

It is no answer to say that the Church venerates only those martyrs who had first been cleansed of original sin by circumcision. I say that this answer is wholly useless, both because St. Augustine, in bk. On the Creed for Catechumens, ch. 4, states generally of these infants that they were cleansed of original sin through martyrdom: Those who died were by nature children of wrath, like the rest; but what did grace grant them except to rescue them from the power of darkness? Christ granted them to die for Christ; he granted that they be washed from original sin in their own blood. They were born for death, but immediately he restored them to life. St. Leo agrees in Sermon 1, On the Epiphany, ch. 3: The impious king removes them from the world; Christ inserts them into heaven. To those for whom he had not yet paid the redemption of his blood, he already granted the dignity of martyrdom. Who could doubt that many of them had not yet been justified from original sin? For the offspring of unbelievers mingled with the Jews in various ways, and many were not yet eight days old, and thus had not been circumcised. Furthermore, even if they had all been justified beforehand, why would the Church specially venerate them as saints more than other infants who die in grace, if they received no special grace or holiness on account of the death inflicted on them? They are not honored for circumcision but for enduring death for Christ. — The same applies to the Holy Innocents and to other children, if they happen to be killed for the faith of Christ or for true virtue. What special feature could be conceived in these that would not apply to the others? Hence St. Leo says in Sermon 2 on Epiphany: Thus Christ, so that no time of his might be without a miracle, silently exercised the power of the Word before he could use his tongue; as if he already said, “Let the little children come to me, for of such is the kingdom of heaven,” he crowned infants with a new glory and preserved the first beginnings of children from their very beginnings, so that it might be learned that no human being is incapable of the divine sacrament, since even that age is suited to the glory of martyrdom. The holy Fathers likewise assert this efficacy of martyrdom, as supplying the place of baptism by water, for adults. Cyprian says in the preface to his exhortation to the martyrs: We, who by the Lord's permission first gave baptism to believers, should also prepare each one for another baptism, instructing and teaching that this is a baptism greater in grace, higher in power, more precious in honor: a baptism in which angels baptize, a baptism in which God and Christ rejoice; a baptism after which no one sins again; a baptism that brings the growth of our faith to completion; a baptism that immediately joins us to God as we depart from the world. Likewise, distinguishing the three baptisms of water, desire, and blood, St. Ambrose says in Psalm 118, Octonary 3, around the middle: There is one baptism that the Church administers here through water and the Holy Spirit, with which catechumens must be baptized. There is another baptism of which the Lord Jesus says, “I have a baptism to be baptized with,” though he had already been baptized in the Jordan; this is the baptism of the Passion, by which each person is also cleansed in his own blood. St. Bernard expressly proves the same from the authorities already cited, in Letter 77 to Master Hugh of St. Victor, where he calls those who assert the contrary inventors of new assertions and assertors of inventions. He says: I am with difficulty torn away from these two doves—I mean Augustine and Ambrose. With them, I say, I confess either to err or to think rightly, myself believing that a person can be saved by faith alone, with the desire to receive the sacrament.

YOU WILL SAY 1: St. Cyprian and the Fathers of the African Council had previously decreed in one of their councils that those who had fallen away should not be admitted to peace until they had done penance for a long time, unless danger from illness pressed; when a new persecution was pressing, they decreed in another council that peace should be granted to all who had done penance, so that they might be stronger for the battle of martyrdom. This is clear from their Letter 54 in Cyprian's collection, addressed to Pope Cornelius. It says in n. 16: Let no one say, “He who takes away martyrdom is baptized in his own blood; nor is peace from a bishop necessary to him who will have the peace of the Church and will receive a greater reward from the Lord's favor.” It is as if they said that martyrdom does not suffice for those who have fallen unless they receive peace and absolution of sins from a bishop. — I answer that the Fathers speak there only of the case in which those who had fallen could receive the benefit of absolution before undergoing martyrdom. For, they say there, this omission is judged a kind of presumption and contempt for absolution on the part of those who fell; on the part of the prelates it is a certain slothful negligence and cruel harshness, which will be laid to our charge on the day of judgment, because we were unwilling to care for the sheep entrusted and committed to us either in peace or to arm them for battle. From this it follows that the Fathers do not hold that these people fail to obtain pardon for lack of martyrdom, but for lack of prior disposition; for St. Cyprian, as cited above at ample length, sufficiently indicates that martyrdom is beneficial.

YOU WILL SAY 2: The Council of Braga, can. 35, prohibits offering the Mass for catechumens who die without baptism; therefore it considers that neither martyrdom nor contrition benefits them. — I DENY this: the Council speaks only of those catechumens who die through grave negligence or contempt for baptism. It would be pointless to pray for them, since contempt for so great a remedy makes them unworthy of pardon. This is the Council's intention, as can be inferred from its decree in the preceding canon that no commemoration should be made in the sacrifice of the Mass for those who died in a state of mortal sin.

YOU WILL SAY 3: Although the martyrdom completed by an adult seems able to remit sins, the same is not true of children or those asleep, since it is not an act of any virtue, charity, fortitude, or religion: for an act of virtue must be free and elicited by a free will, conditions that neither infants nor those asleep possess; nor is it a sacrament, as will be clear below. — I answer that martyrdom, precisely as such, is nothing other than an actual death accepted for God's glory; as such, it is abstracted from whether it is an act of virtue or not. In its particular instances and with regard to the subject, it can be distinguished in two ways: insofar as adults endure it voluntarily, it is an act of the virtue of charity or fortitude, etc.; insofar as it occurs in infants, the insane, or those asleep, it is simply an act endured for God's glory according to his ordinance. God willed justifying grace, or an increase of it, to be joined to both kinds, as the Church testifies concerning the Innocents in their prayer and in the office of their feast: O God, whose praise the innocent martyrs confessed on this day, not by speaking but by dying, etc.

INSTABIS: This answer counts against St. Bernard. In the Letter 77 cited above, after saying that at the approach of death a person can be saved through faith and the desire to receive baptism, even if he cannot actually receive it, he adds: See also whether perhaps the Savior intended this when he said, “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved”: carefully and vigilantly he did not repeat “but whoever is not baptized,” but only “whoever,” he says, “does not believe will be condemned”—plainly intimating that faith alone sometimes suffices for salvation, and that without it nothing suffices. Therefore, although it is granted that martyrdom can supply the place of baptism, punishment itself does not do so, but faith; for without it, what is martyrdom but punishment? — I deny the antecedent. St. Bernard speaks there only of adults and those with the use of reason, who, I grant, must consent to martyrdom, not undergo it unwillingly. This consent must be elicited both by faith and by charity. For St. Bernard, in his Sermon On the Holy Innocents, divides all martyrs into three classes. In the first he places those who complete martyrdom by will and outward deed. In the second he places those who achieved martyrdom by will alone, such as St. Martin and the Seraphic Father Francis, for whom not the will lacked martyrdom, but martyrdom lacked the will. In the third he orders those who are martyrs by outward deed alone. The martyrdom of the first and second orders must be an act of virtue, otherwise it would be fruitless; the latter kind need not be. Bernard speaks of the former in the Letter cited, not the latter, since he himself declares that the Innocents were true martyrs by deed alone.

YOU WILL PRESS: This answer is contrary to the Apostle's teaching in 1 Corinthians 13: If I hand over my body so that I burn, but do not have charity, it profits me nothing. Therefore martyrdom has no efficacy unless it comes from an act of charity; consequently those incapable of eliciting such an act will also be incapable of receiving the grace conferred through martyrdom. — I deny the antecedent, since St. Paul was speaking of himself as an adult, and therefore as someone able to determine himself freely to martyrdom. I grant that an adult living in mortal sin, who neither desired martyrdom nor determined himself to it, would not be saved if he were killed in his sleep out of hatred for Christ: since mortal sin is committed by one's own will, it cannot be erased without one's own movement of the will. Or I distinguish: martyrdom without antecedent and accompanying charity is of no benefit to one who can have either antecedent or consequent charity, I grant; it is of no benefit to one who can have neither, being incapable of freedom and reason, or to one who did not have antecedent charity but has accompanying charity, I deny. It is impossible for a faithful adult to will to shed his life for Christ and in fact expose himself to death without having charity. I said faithful, because if a heretic were killed for one article of the faith while believing another, he should not be called a martyr, since he would not be united to Christ in any way either through charity or through infused faith. I said for Christ, because if he died for vainglory or for a motive other than Christ, he would not be a martyr.

YOU WILL SAY 4: If martyrdom confers first grace, it does so either before death, at the instant of death, or after death. Not the first: because, since death is of the formal character of martyrdom, it would follow that martyrdom confers grace before it exists and is thus more efficacious than the sacraments; also, operation follows being, so martyrdom must first be complete¹ before it produces grace; finally, many have fallen away from the faith and grace even at the very instant of death in their torments, and thus have not attained the grace of martyrdom, from which no one falls away, since it is the final disposition for glory. Nor the second, nor the third: for the instant of death is the first instant in which a person no longer exists, and is therefore outside the state of a wayfarer and, consequently, outside the state of salvation. Therefore, etc. — The Doctors commonly reply, with Verga and Isambert, that first grace or its increase is conferred through martyrdom when the martyr, having received a mortal wound and being held in torments, reaches a state in which no power of secondary causes can preserve his life or restore his former health, whether he then dies or by a miracle preserves his life and recovers his health. The Church's practice of venerating as martyrs those who, after receiving a grievous wound for Christ, did not fall away from the faith, although they survived the torments and blows inflicted on them, confirms this. It is no objection that, physically, they could still sin freely and thus fall away from the grace of martyrdom; for, they say, their will is so morally anticipated that it will never fail in charity. I answer that, since God is the most discerning searcher of hearts, he infuses grace into adults when the martyr's will, through a free act, determines itself to undergo torments and death steadfastly for Christ. If death does not follow, this is not due to any defect in the martyr, who has already voluntarily determined himself to undergo it, but to the persecutor, who desists from the torments and blows he began. For then the martyr truly lays down his life for Christ and confesses him before men.

YOU WILL PRESS: It follows from this that anyone who truly desires martyrdom and determines himself to undergo it, if a persecutor were present, may truly be called a martyr and obtain the grace of martyrdom, even if he never suffers any torments. The consequent is false; therefore so is the antecedent. — I deny the inference, because desiring martyrdom is one thing, and determining oneself to it when the occasion is actually present is another. The Apostles had resolved to die for Christ when they said, “Let us also go, and die with him”; yet when the Jews sought Christ, all the Apostles left him and fled. Hence I judge that the so-called martyrdom of the will does not produce grace formally insofar as it is martyrdom, but insofar as it is the most excellent act of charity, by which a person loves God even to the point of holding his own life in contempt.

YOU WILL PRESS: An external act adds no goodness to an interior act; therefore, if the will to undergo martyrdom does not produce grace, neither will martyrdom itself. — I distinguish: an external act that is not commanded, intended, and ordered in itself to an effect, let it pass; otherwise, I deny. Baptism and the other sacraments, since they are ordered in themselves to grace, produce something, for example a character and grace by the work performed, which an interior act or the will alone does not produce. Martyrdom, however, or the proof of the will through torments, is ordered in itself to grace. Hence Christ says: Whoever confesses me—not only before God by the will, but also before men through enduring torments—I too will confess before my Father.

YOU WILL ASK: Is baptism of blood more worthy than baptism of water?

The Seraphic Doctor, In IV Sent., d. 4, part 2, a. 2, q. 2, replies that the preeminence of dignity in these baptisms is seen by considering their effects. The effect of each, baptism of blood and of water, consists both in freeing from evil and in directing toward good; in both respects they stand as surpassing and surpassed. A greater effect, or efficacy, in freeing from evil can be either extensive or intensive. If extensive, baptism of water surpasses it, because it frees more people and from more diseases, since it frees from mortal and venial sin. Baptism of blood frees few, and frees only from venial sin, not mortal sin, because it presupposes charity; otherwise it would have no power for salvation. Similarly, greater direction toward good can be considered in two ways, either extensively or intensively. If extensively, baptism of water excels because it gives freely given grace, namely, character, and grace that makes one pleasing to God, which disposes one for glory and essential reward. Baptism of blood does not confer grace that makes one pleasing to God but brings it to completion; nor does it confer a character by which the soul is distinguished and prepared for grace. In both these respects baptism of blood surpasses intensively just as it is surpassed extensively. For it frees more efficaciously and better from the evil of guilt and punishment, because it cuts off all of it both in potency and in act. Likewise it directs more efficaciously toward good, because it immediately leads to glory, and one baptized with this baptism obtains a more perfect and glorious palm of victory.

NOTE 1. According to the Doctor, d. 3, q. 3, n. 2, the matter of the sacraments is spoken of analogically and by a certain proportion: sensible things serving in the celebration of the sacraments bear a relation to matter, which is a part of a physical composite. For, he says, in that whole sensible thing, one element is more principal, as ultimately determining it, and is therefore called form; another is less principal, or determinable, and is called matter. That is, just as in a physical composite matter is in itself indifferent to various forms and is determined by a particular form to constitute some specific composite, so in a sacramental composite that obtains the name and character of matter which is in itself indifferent to various applications and functions, but is determined to signify and effect a sacred reality by the sacramental words and the intention of the minister conferring the sacrament.

NOTE 2. According to the same Doctor in the same place, the matter of sacraments that consist in the use of a sensible thing and in the minister's action, such as baptism, is twofold: proximate and remote. Remote matter is the sensible thing itself, taken as the sign and cause of grace for celebrating the sacrament, such as chrism in confirmation. Proximate matter is the use and application of the sensible thing itself, such as anointing or the application of baptismal matter to the forehead of those being confirmed. We are now asking what the remote matter of baptism is; we shall speak of its proximate matter in the next Question.

NOTE 3. Heretics have erred in various ways concerning the remote matter of the sacraments. The Manichaeans, as St. Augustine attests in Heresy 46, believed and asserted that all elements and bodily things were created by an evil god; they also said that baptism in water contributed nothing to salvation. For this reason they never used water, or anything of that kind, when baptizing their followers. Although the Marcionites held the same belief about the production of bodily things by an evil principle, they nevertheless used water in their baptism because of the command of the Lord Christ, as Theodoret reports in bk. I of Heretical Fables, the chapter on Marcion. The Seleucians and Herminians did not accept baptism in water, wrongly interpreting the words of John the Baptist: I baptize you in water … but he will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire, as St. Augustine reports in Heresy 39. The Jacobites, likewise taking those words of John perversely, did not use water in their baptism. Instead, with a red-hot iron in the form of a cross, they burned the sign of a cross into the foreheads or cheeks of infants, as Sanderus reports in bk. III of On the Visible Monarchy, Heresy 113, and Prateolus under “Jacobites.” There were also certain heretics called Flagellants who wandered in bands through streets and public squares, especially in Germany. Scorning all the world's riches, they boasted that they professed evangelical poverty, and said that baptism by water had ceased in their time and that all who wished to be saved had to be baptized with their own blood and gore by scourging, drawing blood from their bodies through various inflicted wounds, as Bernard of Luxembourg reports, along with all those who have compiled lists of ancient and recent heretics. — Yet, on closer inspection of their errors, none of these seems to have erred so much about the matter of baptism itself as about baptism, which they thought was not necessary for salvation. Those who directly repudiated the necessity of water as the matter of baptism were certain more recent heretics, especially Luther, who, in his Table Talk, that is, his dinner conversations, ch. 17, was asked whether, if water were lacking, one might baptize in milk, wine, or beer. He replied that this should first be left to and reserved for God's judgment; then he added that, if water were lacking, whatever can be called a bath is suitable and sufficient for baptism. Beza also held this erroneous view in Letter 2 to Thomas Thilius: It seems to me that, if water is lacking and someone's baptism cannot and should not be postponed without scandal, I would certainly baptize just as rightly with any other liquid as with water.

Against all these errors, two points must be established here: first, that natural water is the lawful matter of baptism; second, that all and only natural water suffices for it.

First conclusion. — THE REMOTE MATTER OF BAPTISM IS NATURAL WATER. This is expressly defined as a matter of faith in the Councils, especially the Lateran Council under Innocent III, where it is decreed: The sacrament of baptism, which is consecrated by the invocation of God and of the undivided Trinity, namely, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, in water, is for children as well as adults, etc. The Council of Florence, in the decree of union under Eugenius IV, says: The matter of this sacrament, baptism, is true and natural water; it makes no difference whether it is cold or warm. Most recently, the Council of Trent, sess. VII, can. 2, On Baptism, declares: If anyone says that true and natural water is not necessary for baptism, and therefore twists those words of our Lord Jesus Christ, “Unless someone is born again of water and the Holy Spirit,” into some metaphor, let him be anathema.

But what sounds clearly in the sacred Scriptures, says St. Augustine in bk. III of On Christian Doctrine, ch. 10, should not be referred to something else as though it had been said figuratively. What sounds more clearly than the words of the eunuch to Philip in Acts 8:36: Look, here is water; what prevents me from being baptized? Verse 38 follows: He ordered the chariot to stop, and both went down into the water, Philip and the eunuch, and he baptized him. The words of Peter in Acts 10 clearly indicate the same: Can anyone forbid water, that those who have received the Spirit just as we have should not be baptized? Hence the Apostle says in Titus 3: He saved us through the laver of regeneration. And in Ephesians 5: Cleansing it, the Church, by the laver of water in the word of life. This had indeed been foretold in Ezekiel 36, where God promises the Jews: I will pour clean water upon you, and you will be cleansed from all your impurities.

This truth can be confirmed from the perpetual practice and tradition of the universal Church, and from the constant teaching of all the holy Fathers, who unanimously teach that natural water is the necessary and lawful matter of baptism. Thus St. Clement of Rome, Letter 4; St. Justin, Address to Antoninus Pius; St. Irenaeus, bk. III of Against Heresies, ch. 19; St. Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 10; and all later Fathers. Hence St. Cyprian, in Letters 65 and 76, adduces and examines various oracles of the Old Testament in asserting this truth. St. Jerome, in Letter 83 to Oceanus, recounts various mysteries that God first performed in water, as if already consecrating and dedicating it to baptism.

Tertullian proves this truth most clearly of all, in ch. 3 and following of On Baptism, where he says: “You have, first of all, reason to revere the age of waters, for their substance is ancient; then their dignity, since they are the dwelling of the divine Spirit and are therefore more pleasing than the other elements were at that time. For while all was still dark, without the worship of the stars, shapeless, and the abyss gloomy, the earth unprepared, the heaven crude, liquid alone, always perfect in its material, expansive, simple, pure in itself, offered God a worthy vehicle. Moreover, did not the ordering of the world in some way come about through waters as its directing force, under God? To suspend the heavenly firmament in the middle, he did so by dividing the waters; to lay bare the dry land, he did so by separating the waters. Then, once the world had been ordered through its elements, when inhabitants were to be given to the first waters, they were commanded to bring forth living creatures. The first liquid produced what would live. It should not be surprising, then, if waters know how to give life in baptism: even the work of fashioning humanity was completed with the waters cooperating, from the material of earth, which was not suitable unless moist and fertile, having been tempered with moisture by the waters that were separated before the fourth day and rested in their own station.” In ch. 9, recounting the more famous miracles of God performed in water in both the Old and New Testaments, he writes: “How many, then, are the protections of nature, the privileges of grace, the solemn rites of discipline, figures, preparations, and prayers that have ordered the religious use of water! First, when the people were set free from Egypt, they escaped the power of the king of Egypt by crossing through water, while water destroyed the king himself with all his forces. What figure is clearer for the sacrament of baptism? Nations are freed from the world through water, leaving behind in the water the devil, their former ruler, overwhelmed. Likewise, the defect of bitterness in water is remedied for its usefulness by Moses' wood: that wood was Christ, who by himself remedies the most unhealthy veins of the poisoned and formerly bitter nature—that is, the waters of baptism. This is the water that flowed from the rock that accompanied the people. If the rock was Christ, without doubt we see baptism blessed in Christ, the water. How great is the grace of water with God and his Christ for confirming baptism! Christ is never without water: he too is immersed in water. When he is invited to a wedding, he begins the first signs of his power with water. When he preaches, he invites those who thirst to his everlasting water. When he teaches about the agape, he counts the cup of water offered to a brother among works of love. At a well he recovers his strength; he gladly walks on water, crosses it, and serves water to his disciples. The testimony of baptism continues up to the Passion, when he is given over to the cross: water intervenes, as do Pilate's hands. When he is wounded, water gushes from his side; the soldier's spear knows this,” etc. St. Cyril of Jerusalem says similar things in Catechesis 3.

According to the Doctor, n. 2, there is no other effective reason for this truth than the will of the Lord Christ, made known through the oracles of Scripture. Why was it instituted? he says. There are evident fitting reasons: water is cold, fluid, clear, necessary, and common. All these properties suit the fluid in which baptism must take place: it is for repressing the heat of concupiscence, bending the rigidity of disobedience, illuminating the brightness of faith, and leading into the way of salvation. And this is common to all, just as this Law, of which this sacrament is the beginning, is common to all for salvation.

OBJECTOR 1: The water that flowed from the side of Christ as he hung on the cross was a symbol and pledge of the sacrament, as St. Cyprian teaches in his Sermon On the Passion of Christ; St. Jerome in his Letter to Oceanus; St. Augustine in Tractate 120 on John; and others. But that water was not true, natural, elemental water; it was a kind of phlegmatic humor, because pure and elemental water is not found in mixed bodies such as Christ's body. Therefore baptism should not be conferred absolutely in natural water. — The Doctor replies, n. 7, by denying the minor premise: Innocent III clearly teaches the contrary, he says, in his Letter to the Bishop of Ferrara, found in the Extravagant, On the Celebration of Masses, ch. “In quadam,” etc., where he writes: “Moreover, just as there was true Spirit and true blood, so without doubt there was true water, since Christ is truth and every falsehood is wholly alien to truth. For if it had not been water but phlegm that came from the Savior's side, the one who saw and bore witness to the truth would certainly have said not water but phlegm. Nor would the true sacrament of regeneration have been shown in this, since through the sacrament of baptism we are regenerated not in phlegm but in water. Nor could this provide a true argument that water should be mixed with wine in the sacrament of the Eucharist, if not water but phlegm had flowed from Christ's side with the blood. Nor would the figure that preceded this in the Old Testament have been true, when Moses struck the flinty rock with his staff and water, not phlegm, flowed from it. It remains, therefore, that whatever that water was—whether natural, miraculous, newly created by divine power, or in part resolved from its components—it was without doubt true water, since a composite can naturally be resolved into its components and an elemental thing into its element, just as its flavor is true, like a drop of blood running down to the ground.” These are Innocent's words. By them, the Doctor says, he proves that the water flowing from the Savior's side really was natural water, whether produced by resolution or newly created. He proves this, I say, a priori from the Evangelist's testimony; a posteriori from the matter of the sacrament of baptism; second, from the water to be mixed in the sacrament of the Eucharist; third, from the figure that preceded it in the Old Testament, when Moses struck the rock and water, not phlegm, flowed from it. — This answer is confirmed by the Council of Trent, sess. XXII, ch. 7, which says: The Church commanded priests to mix water with the wine offered in the chalice, both because it is believed that the Lord Christ did so, and because water flowed from his side together with blood, a mystery recalled by this mixture.

OBJECTOR 2: When St. John the Baptist says of the Lord Christ in Matthew 3, He will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire, fire metaphorically signifies the Holy Spirit, who visibly descended upon the Apostles on Pentecost and also invisibly enters those baptized with Christ's baptism. This indicates the difference between Christ's baptism and John's: John's was only in water and did not confer the Holy Spirit; Christ's, however, effected the consumption of sin, the illumination of the mind, and the kindling of the heart, so that people might courageously do what pertains to God's glory and salvation. Therefore, by the same reasoning, when the Lord Christ says in John 3, Unless someone is born again of water, etc., he uses water not literally but metaphorically, namely, for the Holy Spirit, insofar as he washes the soul clean of the stain of sin through sanctifying grace, etc. — I answer first that the antecedent can be denied. Many of the holy Fathers understand fire to mean real fire, namely, the sensible fire that descended upon the Apostles in the form of tongues. It was, as it were, a sacrament and a sacred sign of that mystical fire of charity by which the Holy Spirit's descent set the disciples' hearts ablaze. For, as St. Gregory says, when fiery tongues appeared outwardly, hearts were made to burn within. Thus those who had earlier been sluggish through weakness of spirit and faintheartedness, freed from this, boldly proclaimed the glory and divinity of the Lord Christ, as St. Jerome and Bede explain in bk. I of On Luke, ch. 9, and St. Cyril of Jerusalem in Catechesis 3. Or by fire St. John meant the fire of purgatory, as the same Jerome explains on Matthew 3 and Bede in the passage just cited. For this reason, St. Jerome says, the Apostle states in 1 Corinthians 3: Each one's work, of what sort it is, the fire will test, etc.; here the subject is the fire of purgatory. That interpretation is certainly not foreign to the meaning of St. John the Baptist, since he adds there: His winnowing fan is in his hand, and he will cleanse his threshing floor and gather his wheat into his barn; but he will burn the chaff with unquenchable fire. Or, finally, by fire he signified the effect of baptism, namely, that fervent charity with which the children of the nascent Church burned after receiving baptism and confirmation, as St. Chrysostom explains in Homily 11 on Matthew.

OBJECTOR 3: Nicephorus recounts in bk. III, ch. 17, that in the time of Emperor Aurelian a certain Jew, traveling while in distress, was suddenly seized by an illness from which he was thought to be about to die. He asked for baptism, but because the region was dry and water was lacking, he was baptized with sand alone, invoking the name of the Most Holy Trinity, and immediately recovered from his illness, a sign that this baptism had been approved by God. Cedrenus also mentions the story in his Compendium, n. 97. Therefore, when necessity presses, one may use something else instead of water for baptism. — I deny the inference. As to the antecedent, first, the truth of this story is not sufficiently established, since those authors report it differently, and Cedrenus says it happened under Antoninus Pius; thus Baronius, under the year of Our Lord 181, does not give it complete credence. Next, even if it were true, it still would not follow that in a case of necessity something other than true, natural water can be taken as the remote matter of true baptism. For the Church did not approve the Jew's baptism; indeed, it was rejected by Dionysius, Bishop of Alexandria—or, as Baronius prefers, of Corinth—who later ordered the Jew to be baptized again. The miracle should therefore not be attributed to the sand sprinkled on him, as if the restoration of the Jew's health were proof that he had truly received baptism. Rather, God, pleased partly by the Jew's devotion and partly by that of the other Christians, wished to restore the Jew to full health so that afterward he might have the opportunity to fulfill his desire by receiving true baptism.

OBJECTOR 4: Pope Stephen, the second or third of that name, was asked by the monks of the British monastery whether, in urgent necessity when water was lacking, baptism conferred in wine was valid. He answered affirmatively. For in his reply, found in volume II of the Councils of Gaul among various answers to various questions, ch. 12, he responds to the inquiry as follows: If anyone baptized an infant in imminent danger entirely in wine because he could not find water, no fault is attributed to him on that account; let the infants remain in that baptism. Therefore something other than water, at least in a case of necessity, can be used for valid baptism. — I deny the inference. As to the antecedent, first, this authority is not altogether certain, since the documents for this reply are not sufficiently certain and authentic. Second, even if it is admitted as a genuine reply, the response merely touches on the point in passing and does not have such firm authority that it deserves credence. In the replies of Roman Pontiffs, one must distinguish what they answer directly to the question put to them from what they often touch on only incidentally, as if in passing and while attending to something else. The first, says Isambert, disputation 2, a. 2, on q. 64, supplies a valid argument founded on the highest authority of the Pontiffs; the second, he says, does not carry so much weight, any more than the reasons that Councils insert into their decrees and definitions. Pope Stephen had been asked not about the validity of this sacrament, but about the sin and penalty that a priest who had baptized in that way would incur. This is clear both from the title and from the fact that he distinguishes two situations for the priest: one in which, with such danger pressing, he had no water at hand, and another in which he had water. In the first case he replies that the priest is free from sin and penalty because, through ignorance, he was uncertain whether wine was sufficient matter for baptism in a case of necessity; in extremity it is better to use a doubtful remedy than none. Thus, with a right conscience, that priest could baptize in that way to do what he could for the infants' salvation. But if he had had water at hand, the Pontiff declares that he had sinned gravely and therefore must be punished severely. Hence he adds: If water was at hand, say that the priest is to be excommunicated and subjected to penance, because he presumed to act against the judgment of Christ. By this he signifies that the question proposed concerned not the validity of baptism, but the fault and penalty of the one baptizing. Hence the words of that reply should be emended as follows: no fault is attributed to him, if the infants baptized in this way remain so.

Second conclusion. — ALL AND ONLY NATURAL WATER IS SUFFICIENT MATTER FOR BAPTISM. This is the common opinion among Catholics, who consider baptism conferred in any water—whether from a river, a spring, or the sea—equally valid and effective. Tertullian signified this long ago in ch. 1 of On Baptism, writing: There is therefore no distinction whether someone is washed in the sea or a pool, a river or a spring, a lake or a channel; nor does it matter whether John dipped some in the Jordan, Peter others in the Tiber, or Philip that eunuch in some chance water along the road: he obtained neither more nor less salvation. Therefore all waters, through the ancient privilege of their origin, receive the sacrament of sanctification when God is invoked; for the Spirit immediately descends from heaven, rests upon the waters, sanctifying them from himself, and, once sanctified, they absorb the power to sanctify. By these words Tertullian signifies that absolutely any elemental water, whatever it may be, suffices for valid baptism, even if it has not been blessed by the Church, because, he says, the Holy Spirit descends upon the water taken for baptism, sanctifying it and conferring the power to sanctify. The reason is certainly clear: when Scripture, the Councils, and the holy Fathers speak of the matter of baptism, they simply call it water, without qualification. But water simply called is nothing other than natural, elemental water, not artificial or excrementitious substances, which are called water only equivocally. Therefore, etc.

From this it may first be inferred that any water suffices for validly conferring baptism, provided it is considered natural and commonly so called. It makes no difference whether the water is cold or warm, from a well, river, or sea, from rain, or melted from snow, hail, or ice; whether it is muddy or clear, dyed with color, or has passed through sulfurous channels or ashes. In general, baptism conferred with any liquid commonly called water is valid, since every such liquid is true natural and elemental water, commonly so called.

SECONDLY, it follows that no baptism is conferred in beer, well-cooked broth, sweat, milk, urine, tears, spittle or saliva, phlegm, rosewater, or water distilled from other herbs. The Subtle Doctor explains all this clearly above, n. 3: I reply that those waters commonly called artificial are certain mixed bodies, and are called waters only equivocally. He proves this first because as a whole species they have some quality unlike elemental water. Second, because they are made by the action of fire, which cooks and resolves; but fire does not seem to have sufficient active power to corrupt or convert any mixed body whatsoever into elemental water. Therefore, he says, it can be conceded universally that those waters called artificial are not suitable matter for baptism, since they are not of the species of elemental water.

IT FOLLOWS THIRD that muddy, sandy, and even impure water also suffices for valid baptism, provided the impurity is not so great that the water ceases to have the nature and condition of natural, elemental water. The Doctor explains this very well in the same place, n. 4, saying: “Impurity in water can be understood in two ways: either through mixture by juxtaposition, as muddy water is called impure; or through a mixture that alters its species, as a mixed humor is said not to be pure water. The first kind of impurity is no impediment, provided it does not deprive the water of its suitability for washing or cleansing. There is no other reason than that this is how it was instituted. Hence water absorbed by flour in dough, or by a sponge while it remains there, or absorbed in thick mud, and so on, is not suitable matter for baptism if such things touch the flesh, because such contact is not washing; rather, washing consists only in contact with flowing water freely joining or separating the skin from another body. As for the second kind, I say that some impurity can exist while the water remains within its species, as would happen if it began to thicken, tending toward the generation of a denser element. This does not prevent it, provided it remains fluid. I say this because baptism cannot be performed in ice, snow, or hail while they are still imperfect or on their way to becoming a mixture, since no washing is possible in them, just as none is possible in something solid. If by that alteration it has already passed outside the species of water, it is altogether not matter for baptism. Some alterations clearly constitute something outside the species of water, such as humors naturally resolved through digestion, like saliva, urine, and the like, in accordance with the passage Extravagant, On Baptism and Its Effect, ‘Non ut apponeres’. For other cases it is not so clear, such as decoctions and mixtures that appear to the senses, where it is not evident that the species has been altered; this is seen in meat broth¹, gruel, and the like, and in beer and mead. For it is not evident that some agent is present there that corrupts the species of water. Yet examining this does not belong to the theologian determining the matter of baptism insofar as it can be known from the Canon of Scripture, nor to the canonist determining the conditions of matter as established by the Church's ordinance. It belongs to the natural philosopher, whose task is to inquire what kind of alteration transfers water out of its species and what does not. If there is doubt about other things and baptism has been performed with them, the three chief principles set out in the solution to the preceding question should be used for dealing with those about whom there is probable doubt.” This is the Doctor's view.

OBJECTOR 1: Artificial water is of the same substance as natural water; therefore it is also included under the name of the water necessary for baptism. The antecedent is proved: wherever there are the same accidents, there is the same substance, since substance is known from its connatural accidents. But elemental and artificial water have the same accidents, namely, moisture, coldness, transparency, and others of this kind; therefore they are of the same substance. — The Doctor denies the antecedent, n. 6: “Although,” he says, “artificial water has some accidents generically common with elemental water, it does not have accidents specifically common to them. Consequently, it agrees generically with water as a liquid, but not according to the specific character of elemental water, and therefore it does not have the same substance as elemental water.”

YOU WILL PRESS: If artificial water were not of the same substance as elemental water, it would follow that it is some kind of mixed body; but that is not so. It is proved: a mixed body is denser than an element; artificial water is more subtle, or at least not denser, than elemental water; consequently it is not a mixed body. — The Doctor denies the minor premise, and answers its proof by saying that although some artificial water may seem more subtle than elemental water because it penetrates more, as is clear of spring water or what they call spirits of wine, this subtlety is not subtlety of simplicity but of active power. For this reason wine is called subtle, indeed more subtle than water; but the subtlety appropriate to elemental water is the subtlety of simplicity, in the way that an element is simpler than a mixed body.

YOU WILL PRESS: Every mixed body consists of elements; consequently every liquid consists of elemental water. But that elemental water could be resolved and extracted from a mixed liquid by the art of boiling and distillation, since miscible things can be separated from a mixture, as Aristotle teaches in bk. I of On Generation, text 38. Therefore someone can apply an active agent to a passive subject to effect such a separation; therefore artificial water can be elemental water separated from a mixture. This is confirmed by the passage in Exodus 7 about the frogs, where the art of demons applied an active agent to a passive subject to produce frogs immediately from river water. Therefore it is equally possible, conversely, for art to apply an active agent to a passive subject so as to separate an element from a mixture, especially since resolution is easier than generation or composition. — The Doctor replies in the same place that it is indeed possible for a good or evil angel to apply certain active agents to a mixed body as a passive subject; “but I say that no art can apply the same active agent—for example, fire—to however many different mixtures and passive subjects, in such a way that the agent immediately resolves them into elemental water. For that same agent cannot have the power to change them without intermediate forms, nor can such different things be corrupted in this way into the same term.” By this the Doctor means that no artificial water can be called natural: art cannot immediately transform an element from a mixed body. For just as it acts by an ordered motion through intermediate forms when producing a mixed body, it must use those same intermediate forms when resolving it. Thus it can happen that a mixed body is not resolved into the same element from which it was made, but into another mixed body, as wood is resolved into ashes.

YOU WILL ASK 1: Is salt dissolved in water suitable matter for baptism? — I answer that this seems more probable, since the same reason appears to apply to salt as to ice, snow, and hail. Just as these are nothing other than water thickened by great cold, so salt is nothing other than seawater condensed by the summer sun; hence, when dissolved, it seems to recover its former watery nature. Nevertheless, since some believe that, just as beer is produced from water and barley as a mixed body, so perhaps the sun's heat brings forth a distinct mixed body from salt water, which when dissolved becomes not water but another liquid, I judge that liquid made by dissolving salt is at least doubtful matter and therefore may be used only in a time of necessity. Note, however, that the dissolution of salt, hail, and other such things must either be supposed to have occurred before the baptizer takes them up, or at least must take place in the baptizer's hand, so that drops flow onto the body of the one being baptized. Otherwise, the baptizer would not apply matter suitable for washing if he merely placed snow or hail on the person's head and it melted from the person's natural warmth; in that case the baptizer would not wash the person, but the person would wash himself, just as if someone placed a water-filled pitcher on his head and broke it, or squeezed a sponge soaked in water.

YOU WILL ASK 2: What elemental water is certainly and properly the matter of the sacrament outside a case of necessity? — I answer that no water should be used other than water blessed on Holy Saturday of Easter or Pentecost, as the Roman Ritual teaches in the title On the Sacrament of Baptism, § On the Matter, in these words: The solemn water for baptism should be blessed that year on Holy Saturday of Easter or on Holy Saturday of Pentecost, and should be carefully kept clear and pure in a clean font. St. Dionysius mentions this blessing in bk. On the Celestial Hierarchy, ch. 2; St. Ambrose in bk. I of On the Sacraments, ch. 5; St. Augustine in Homilies 27 and 50; and Basil in bk. On the Holy Spirit, ch. 2, where he indicates that the blessing and consecration of water is an Apostolic Tradition. This can certainly be confirmed by the Church's greatest care that baptism never be solemnly administered outside a case of necessity without such blessed water. Hence the Roman Ritual rightly advises in the place cited above: If the blessed water has changed so much that it seems no longer adequate, some unblessed water may be added, but in a smaller quantity. If it has become corrupt, or flowed away, or failed in any way, the parish priest should pour fresh water into a thoroughly clean and clear font and bless it with the formula prescribed below. But if it has frozen, care should be taken to thaw it. If it is partly frozen or too cold, a little unblessed natural water may be warmed and mixed with the baptismal water in a vessel prepared for that purpose; when it has been warmed, it may be used for baptism, so that it does not harm the infant.

NOTE 1. Theologians agree with one another that the proximate matter of Baptism is the actual washing of the body by water. “For this washing itself,” says the Doctor, q. 3, d. 3, n. 2, “together with the words, signifies the effect of Baptism as its proximate sign.” For the words, which take the place of the form in Baptism, are not truly the form of that Sacrament by being joined to motionless water, but by being joined to water as applied under the aspect of the matter of Baptism. If someone were to pronounce the words “I baptize you” over motionless matter, he would do nothing. Thus, when St. Augustine says, “The word is added to the element, and the Sacrament comes to be,” he is not to be understood as though he meant that the word is added to the motionless element of water, but to water as applied to the body; hence he adds: “What power does water have, that it should touch the body and wash the heart?” For water must touch the body by washing in order to acquire the character and power of Baptism. Hence the Doctor there rightly ridicules Gandulph’s explanation, q. 1, ch. in the gloss on the word detrahe, where Gandulph said that one must beware “lest perhaps a donkey drink the Sacrament. For this doubt,” says the Doctor, “is truly asinine, because that washing lasts only in its coming to be; however much water might be drunk or poured here or there, the washing itself would not.” The same Doctor defines washing there, n. 4, as “the contact of freely flowing water that joins and separates between the flesh and another body.” Or, more clearly: washing is the movement of liquid water around a body, which is ordered of itself to washing away dirt. I say “ordered of itself,” for, as the Doctor observes there, n. 2, “it is not necessary that washing be present in the sense in which it is distinguished from movement and includes the movement of the limbs away from the body through the contact of water; rather, the washing of a body by water, said in general, is enough, with another agent doing this. This means nothing other than that this contact of the body by water must be brought about by another cause. Understanding washing and cleansing in this way, washing is the proximate matter, as it were the per se foundation or part of the foundation of this signification; water, however, is the remote matter, which is applied to the body in this washing.”

NOTE 2. Washing is distinguished into two kinds: one active, the other passive. Active washing is the movement of the water itself insofar as it is brought about by the baptizer upon the baptized; passive washing is the movement of the water itself over the baptized, insofar as it successively touches him. For the contact of water in Baptismal washing must be mobile and successive. Water that stands motionless in a vessel is not said to wash that vessel, even though it touches every part of it when the vessel is full of water; for washing, to be true and complete, must take place with motion, as the Subtle Doctor rightly observed, n. 2, saying: “Washing is understood here not merely as when the body is said to be washed by water, as it were formally, but as when a person is said to wash the body with water, properly and actively: for mere contact of the body by motionless water, as when someone rests in a bath surrounded on every side by water—which is, as it were, formal washing—was not instituted as a sign or part of a sign; rather, what was instituted is the washing effectively performed by someone who washes.” From these words Suárez, disp. 20, sect. 2, concludes that the Doctor holds washing to consist rather in action than in passion, or the reception of water by the body of the baptized person, because, he says, the Sacrament is a sacred action of the minister; therefore Baptism, on the side of its proximate matter, will be washing as performed by the minister. Vasquez, by contrast, disp. 111, ch. 2, contends that sacramental washing is formally passive, insofar as it is received in the person being washed; for the Sacrament is a sacred ceremony by which someone is justified, and so it is a passion insofar as it is received in him. He further confirms this opinion by the authority of the Doctor from d. 6, q. 2, n. 4, where he says: “From this a corollary seems to follow: the Sacrament of Baptism is more passive baptism than active, because when active baptizing is multiplied, passive baptizing is not multiplied, nor is Baptism, since the passive is one. This inference seems probable, because the baptized person properly receives the Sacrament; but he properly receives passive washing, not active washing, unless the two are said to be really the same.” Yet I think it more correct to say that the proximate matter of Baptism consists in washing both actively and passively, since the sacred ceremony of Baptism cannot occur apart from that passion, without the action being received in the subject, nor, conversely, can there be passion without action; consequently, both enter into the essential conception of sacramental washing. Whether the formal character of the Sacrament is to be attributed more to action than to passion, or conversely, or belongs equally to both, Suárez rightly says that this question is of little theological importance and no practical use.

NOTE 3. Sacramental washing can take place in three ways: either by immersion of the person to be baptized, by aspersion, or by pouring water upon the baptized person. For when Christ the Lord established washing as the proximate matter of this Sacrament, he did not determine the manner in which it had to be performed. Accordingly, the Church has used these three ways of baptizing at different times, according to circumstances and convenience. At first, Baptism seems to have been conferred by aspersion by the Apostles. In Acts 2, after Peter’s preaching, in which he proved that Christ was the true Messiah, we read: “Those who received his word were baptized, and about three thousand souls were added on that day.” This surely could not have been done by pouring water over each person’s head or immersing each of them—for how could the Apostles and disciples, so few in number, have washed such a multitude in that way between the ninth hour and sunset? Theologians therefore rightly conclude that they baptized them by aspersion, since by one or at least a few sprinklings they could baptize many at once. Later, the custom spread from the Apostles that Baptism should be performed only by threefold immersion. Finally, for a reasonable cause, the Church decreed that Baptism should be conferred by pouring water upon the head or another notable part of the baptized person’s body. The question, then, is whether these three ways of baptizing are sufficient and valid.

These points having been established, four matters¹ remain to be determined in this Question: first, whether a notable part of the body and a notable quantity of water are required for a valid Sacrament; second, whether a washing that would kill the person to be baptized would truly be a valid Sacrament; third, whether the washing must be single or threefold².

First conclusion. — FOR THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM TO BE VALID, A NOTABLE WASHING IS REQUIRED, BOTH WITH RESPECT TO THE PART OF THE BODY AND WITH RESPECT TO THE QUANTITY OF WATER. So the Doctor says in In IV Sent., d. 4, q. 3, where, determining that a child in the mother’s womb cannot be baptized—but that it is otherwise if a principal part of the child appears outside the womb—he says, n. 3: “I answer the question as follows. Either the child is wholly within the mother’s womb, or some part appears outside the womb. In the first case, I say that the child cannot be baptized—not for the earlier reason, that it would be joined to the cause of corruption, but because Baptism is a washing or cleansing in water, and a child in this condition in the womb cannot be washed, since it cannot be touched directly by water in this way. In the second case, if a principal part appears, such as the head, then the child can be baptized on that part, and in this way be baptized simply; for it is not plausible that on the day of Pentecost, when three thousand were baptized, Acts 2, each person’s whole body was washed with water, but rather that they were sprinkled only on the face or water was poured over the head. In this case, if the child were later born, it would not need to be baptized. But if a less principal part appears, namely a hand or foot, that part is to be baptized, because the whole soul is there, although not every sense, as in the head. And if this lesser washing suffices for the child to be simply baptized, should the child later be born alive, he would have to be baptized conditionally, as is taught in the Extravagant On Baptism and Its Effect, ch. De Quibus. For we must believe that God would supply what incapacity prevented; for even if such a child is born dead, he is to be buried in consecrated ground, for the reason given.”

The Angelic Doctor agrees in every respect with the opinion of the Subtle Doctor. In part III, q. 68, a. 11, ad 4, he says: “To the fourth, it must be said that the child’s complete emergence from the womb should be awaited for Baptism, unless death is imminent. But if the head emerges first, in which all the senses are grounded, the child should be baptized when danger is imminent, and should not be baptized again afterward if it happens that the child is born fully. The same seems to be required if any other part emerges when danger is imminent. Nevertheless, since the integrity of life does not reside in any of the external parts as it does in the head”—therefore he is speaking of parts in which life partially resides, and not of others, which are in no way alive—“some think that, because of the doubt, if any other part of the body has been washed, the child should be baptized after complete birth with this form: ‘If you are not baptized, I baptize you.’”

This assertion is proved by the Church’s common practice. For in the Roman Ritual, title On the Sacrament of Baptism, paragraph On the Form, it is prescribed: “Baptism may indeed be performed either by pouring water, immersion, or aspersion; nevertheless, the first and second methods, which are more commonly used, are to be retained according to the custom of the Churches, so that the head of the person to be baptized is washed by threefold pouring or immersion.” These words prescribe a notable part—indeed, the principal part—and likewise a notable quantity of water, in accordance with St. Augustine’s statement in Homily 3, found in ch. 78, On Consecration, d. 4: “After you professed your belief, we immersed your heads three times in the sacred font.” If the child is so weak that he cannot bear washing of the head, the chest or shoulders should be washed. But that Baptism may be conferred on any part, even a very small one, of an infant when danger of death is imminent is taught by the same Ritual, paragraph On the Baptizing of Infants, in these words: “If he has put forth another limb that shows vital movement in it … let him be baptized; and then, if he lives after birth, he is to be baptized conditionally in the manner stated above: ‘If you are not baptized, I baptize you.’”

YOU WILL SAY 1: If Baptism could be conferred on a less principal part, the chief reason would be—as the Doctor says—that the whole soul is there, although not every sense, as in the head. By this, Vasquez seems to mean, in the place cited above, n. 30, that Baptism is valid even on the smallest part because the soul, which contracted original sin, is wholly in that part said to be washed. But this reason is worthless: for the subject of Baptismal washing is not the soul, but the whole person; therefore, etc. — I deny the minor premise. In proof of it, I say that Vasquez wrongly attacks and interprets the Subtle Doctor. For the Doctor does not say that the whole soul is in a less principal part as though the soul were the subject of washing; rather, as Hyquaeus rightly observes in his Commentary, n. 18, he speaks in relation to the head, on which all agree Baptism may be performed because it is a principal part, where the soul’s senses and vital functions are more vigorous, and without which life cannot subsist in a person. This is the difference between a principal and a nonprincipal part, and it is the basis on which the Doctors conclude that Baptism on a principal part is simply Baptism of the person and is valid. To meet, then, the tacit objection that could be made against Baptism on a nonprincipal part, the Doctor says that the whole soul is in a nonprincipal part, although not all the senses that are in the head are there. This is the Doctor’s true meaning, not the one others have supposed, which is shallow and rather childish in this matter. Baptism performed by a drop on a hair or fingernail, which Vasquez contends is true Baptism, is also excluded. For if the Doctors doubt Baptism on a nonprincipal part, even though it is living, and unanimously say it must be repeated conditionally, as the Rituals also write, how much more is a washing on a hair or fingernail excluded from Baptism, since these do not absolutely designate the person and are not his proper parts? So Hyquaeus.

YOU WILL SAY 2: A wound inflicted on any smallest part whatsoever is enough for a person to be called wounded by it; therefore, by equal reasoning, washing performed on any smallest part will suffice for the validity of Baptism, even without necessity. — I distinguish the antecedent: according to an abusive and improper way of speaking, I grant; according to the proper and strict sense of the word, I deny. For there is no wise person who would not laugh at someone saying he had been wounded because a pin had lightly pricked his finger. Therefore the consequent must be denied; for the truth of the matter and form of a Sacrament must not be governed by an improper and abusive way of speaking, but by the proper sense of language and the usage received and approved by the wise.

From this the proof of the second part of the Conclusion is clear: a tiny drop of water is not sufficient for Baptismal washing, since, by common judgment among the wise, a person cannot properly be said to have been washed, bathed, and immersed by it in the moral sense. For Christ the Lord instituted that washing as the proximate matter of this Sacrament, by which a person can properly be said to be washed and bathed; but a person would not be so called on account of the contact of a drop of water with the smallest part of his body, as is clear. Therefore this cannot suffice as the properly understood matter of Baptism. Nevertheless, since some affirm the contrary with Vasquez, I would not refuse to confer Baptism with a small drop of water if manifest necessity pressed and no greater quantity of water were available. For since the matter and efficacy of the Sacrament depend on the will of Christ the Lord, which is not plainly revealed in Scripture, Tradition, or Councils with respect to absolutely every circumstance and difficulty that may arise in administering the Sacraments, it is not irreligious, to avoid the damnation of a soul, to use a remedy that some Doctors in that case judge would be useful and effective, although other Doctors call this into question.

Second conclusion. — IT IS MORE PROBABLE THAT A KILLING WASHING, THAT IS, ONE FROM WHICH DEATH WOULD FOLLOW, IS NOT SUFFICIENT AND VALID FOR THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM. So the Subtle Doctor says in In IV Sent., d. 1, q. 3, n. 3: “Someone thrown from a bridge is not baptized, because this is ordered not to life or washing, but to death.” And in d. 5, q. 3, n. 1, reporting Richard’s opinion that a child thrown in this way was not baptized, he says: “It is also said that someone thrown in this way would not be baptized, because Baptism is a washing ordered to life after washing, whereas that immersion is not so ordered.” Accordingly, in the Reportata, the same question, n. 2, as he considers the same difficulty, he says: “But if an adult is thrown into a river while someone says, ‘I baptize you,’ etc., I think he is not baptized, because the person throwing him does not have the intention of the Church; for the Church’s intention is to wet him in such a way that, while alive, he could be dried again. Or even if he is baptized, I do not doubt that the person throwing him commits mortal sin.” All of this shows that the Doctor leans more toward the negative opinion.

This assertion is therefore proved by the Doctor’s reasoning: God did not institute as the legitimate matter of a Sacrament something that tends to the injury and harm of human nature, nor did he will that spiritual life ordinarily be obtained at the cost and loss of one’s own life; therefore, he does not approve as the legitimate matter of Baptism a washing from which the baptized person’s death would directly follow. The antecedent is proved: God instituted the matter and form of the Sacraments, especially of this Sacrament, which he willed to be common to every sex and age, as better befitted his gentle providence and had the character of ordinary washing. But a killing washing does not belong to God’s gentle providence, nor does it have the character of ordinary washing. For who would say that God gently provides creatures with the means necessary to attain eternal life if these could be used only at the cost of life? Who, likewise, would say that someone washes and bathes another person whom he throws into a river or sea with hands and feet bound and a huge stone tied to his neck? Who would not hiss at someone who, wishing to wash his filthy livestock, submerged them in a pond or another place from which he knew they could not emerge alive, in the ordinary course of events?

NOR IS IT VALID TO REPLY that God did not establish these things to be done in the ordinary course, or in every case, but only in a case of extreme necessity, when there is no other way to administer Baptism. — This reply, I say, does not succeed, since God is not bound by the common law to provide a means that must be applied extraordinarily when some necessity presses. For this reason he did not will Baptism to be applied to an infant in the mother’s womb, as we shall say below, although no other means was available to him. Therefore there is no basis for claiming that God willed a killing washing to be sufficient matter for Baptism in a case of necessity.

It is further confirmed: It is not plausible that God willed to make that washing the matter of a Sacrament to which homicide and mortal sin are necessarily and intrinsically attached by the nature of the minister’s very action. But it is certain that someone commits mortal sin if he submerges a child or adult to be baptized so that the person cannot be brought out alive, because such a throwing would be the direct killing of an innocent person, as the Doctor teaches in the aforesaid d. 5, where he says: “I say that when death is presumed, one must in no way propel or throw him; for one will sin mortally by killing, and everyone is more bound to avoid mortal sin in himself than to seek the salvation of his neighbor, since ordered charity is directed more to oneself.”

Moreover, the washing that is the matter of a Sacrament must consist in the minister’s action and proceed from him. But such submerging and throwing would not proceed proximately from the minister, nor would it be his action, as received in the patient; therefore, it would not be Baptismal washing. The minor premise is established: for the washing that is Baptismal seems to be the washing determined by the form according to the strict signification of the words “I baptize you.” Hence the action must be signified as performed by the minister, that is, as proceeding from him. Consequently, it seems necessary that he himself, either directly or through a connecting instrument, bring either the person to be baptized to the water or the water to the person. But that would not happen under the present supposition; therefore, etc.

YOU WILL SAY 1: If anything would prevent the child from being thrown in this case, it would be that it is not lawful to kill an innocent person. But this is not so clear, since it can happen that the death of an innocent person ought to be considered blameless, indeed praiseworthy. For this reason the death of Samson is excused: as we read in Judges 16, he killed himself, together with the Philistines standing nearby, beneath the ruins and debris of the shaken house; therefore, etc. — I deny the minor premise. In proof of it, I say that Samson’s act is excused for no other reason than that he seems to have done it at the prompting of the divine Spirit, as St. Augustine says in bk. I of The City of God, ch. 21: “Nor is Samson otherwise excused for crushing himself and his enemies beneath the ruin of the house, except because the Spirit, who performed miracles through him, had secretly commanded this.”

YOU WILL SAY 2: Baptism can be valid even though the baptized person’s death follows from it; therefore, a killing washing can be sufficient for Baptism. The antecedent is proved: If a priest, with sincere intention, were immersing a child in the Baptismal font and were suddenly so weakened by illness that, after pronouncing the words of the form, he could not bring the child out, so that the child was suffocated, it is certain that the infant would in that state truly be considered baptized, although deprived of life by that washing; therefore, etc. — I distinguish the antecedent: when the baptized person’s death follows indirectly, let it pass; directly, I deny it. In that case, however, the baptized person’s death would follow only indirectly from the immersion, since the immersion is of itself ordered to easy emergence, and it happens only accidentally that the person does not emerge. The case is otherwise with an immersion that would be directly lethal, namely, one from which easy emergence would not follow by its nature, such as throwing a person into a river or well from which he could not escape unharmed without a miracle.

Third conclusion. — BAPTISM IS VALIDLY CONFERRED IN ANY ONE OF THE THREE WAYS ENUMERATED IN THE THIRD NOTE. This is now common among all Theologians, and is plainly taught in the Roman Ritual, § On the Form of Baptism. It is not plausible that the Catholic Church would supply and approve invalid matter as legitimate in administering a Sacrament of the highest necessity; therefore, etc.

This assertion is proved as follows: every washing by which a person is truly said to have been washed is sufficient for Baptism; but a person is said to have been washed by each of the aforesaid kinds of washing; therefore, etc. St. Cyprian presses this reasoning in Epistle 76, addressed to Magnus. Although he leaves it to others to judge freely whether Baptism conferred by aspersion would be valid, he himself defends the affirmative side: “The breast of the believer is washed in one way, the mind of a person is cleansed in another through the merits of faith in the saving Sacraments, when necessity presses and God grants his forgiveness; divine means of relief bring everything to believers.” By “divine means of relief” he understands a small washing, such as that performed by pouring water, in comparison with washing by immersion.

YOU WILL SAY: Baptism is a sign of Christ’s burial and resurrection, according to the passage in Colossians 10³ and Romans 6: “All of us who were baptized in Christ Jesus were baptized into his death; for we were buried with him through Baptism into death, so that, just as Christ rose from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.” But this representation of Christ’s death and resurrection can be made only by immersion and emergence; therefore, that alone is a lawful rite of baptizing. — I answer first, with St. Thomas, q. 66, a. 7, ad 2: “The figure of Christ’s burial is represented more expressly in immersion … but in the other ways of baptizing it is represented in another way, though not so expressly. For whatever the manner of washing, the person’s body, or some part of it, is placed under water, just as Christ’s body was placed beneath the earth.” — I answer second, Baptismal washing is ordered only secondarily to signify the burial of Christ the Lord; for primarily and of itself it is ordered to signify the washing of the soul from sin, through which we mystically die to sin and live to God, as St. Ambrose aptly teaches in bk. On the Good of Death, ch. 2. There, distinguishing three kinds of death, he describes the second as follows: “Another is mystical death, when someone dies to sin and lives to God; of this the Apostle says, ‘We have been buried with him through Baptism into death.’” Likewise, St. Augustine writes in Sermon 9, On Time, shortly after its beginning: “When Christians are immersed three times in the saving laver, then the Egyptians”—that is, original sins and actual crimes—“are buried, as it were, in the Red Sea, while the sins of the children of Israel, as they pass through toward the service of God, alone suffer shipwreck.”

YOU WILL SAY 2: That washing alone is sufficient proximate matter for Baptism which the word baptizo directly conveys and signifies. But it does not signify every contact of water with the body, only that which takes place by immersion; therefore, etc. — I distinguish the minor premise: the word baptizo signifies nothing other than immersion according to its grammatical derivation from the Greek language, I grant; according to the usage and practice of the Church, I deny it. For the Church uses it to signify every true washing by water, whether performed by pouring, aspersion, or immersion. This is all the more clearly established by the fact that the Church has nowhere rejected Baptism conferred by pouring or aspersion of water as null and invalid.

Fourth conclusion. — IT MAKES NO DIFFERENCE TO THE VALIDITY AND SUBSTANCE OF THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM WHETHER IT IS PERFORMED BY A SINGLE OR THREEFOLD WASHING. This is common among Catholics, and St. Gregory the Great long ago defined this truth in bk. I, Epistle 41, addressed to Leander, bishop of Hispalis; the Fourth Council of Toledo cites and approves the decree in that letter, canon 5, where it says: “Concerning the Sacrament of Baptism: because in Spain some priests perform a threefold immersion and others a single one, some regard this as a schism, and the unity of faith seems divided … Gregory, of blessed memory, the Pontiff of the Roman Church, who enlightened not only parts of Italy but also taught by his doctrine Churches far away, at the request of the most holy bishop Leander, wrote back to him, among other matters, about this diversity in Spain and what should rather be followed, saying: ‘As for the threefold immersion at Baptism, nothing truer can be answered than what you yourselves have perceived: in one faith, the diverse custom of the holy Church is no hindrance. We, however, by immersing three times, signify the mysteries of the three-day burial, so that when the infant is brought up from the water for the third time, the Resurrection after three days is expressed. If someone thinks it should also be done in honor of the highest Trinity, nothing prevents this either: to baptize by immersing once in the water. Since there is one substance in three subsistences, it cannot in any way be reprehensible to immerse the infant in water for Baptism either three times or once, since the threefold immersion can signify the Persons of the Trinity, and the single immersion the unity of the Divinity. But if until now an infant was immersed three times at Baptism by heretics, I do not think this should be done among you, lest, by counting immersions, they divide the Divinity and boast that they have overcome your custom by their actions.’ The Council immediately adds: ‘Therefore, since a reason has been given by so great a man concerning both rites performed in holy Baptism, and both are held to be right and irreproachable in God’s holy Church, let us, to avoid the scandal of schism or the practice of heretical doctrine, retain a single immersion in Baptism, lest those among us who immerse three times seem to approve the heretics’ assertion by following their custom.’” So says the Council. But it is not plausible that the Holy Pontiff and the Council, gathered from the most distinguished bishops of the Spanish Church, erred in the solemn and essential administration of the Sacraments. Therefore, it must be admitted that either a single or a threefold washing suffices for the valid administration of Baptism.

YOU WILL OBJECT: The Apostolic Canon 50 decrees as follows: “If any bishop or presbyter does not celebrate the threefold immersion of the one mystery, but immerses only once in Baptism, which is given in the Lord’s death, let him be deposed.” Moreover, Pope Pelagius, in his letter to Gaudentius, asserts that threefold immersion was commanded by the Lord: “There are many,” he says, “who assert that they were baptized in the name of Christ alone, with a single immersion. But the Gospel command, given by God himself and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, instructs us to confer holy Baptism on each person in the name of the Trinity and also with three immersions, since the Lord says, ‘Go, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father,’ etc.” Likewise, Tertullian, bk. On the Soldier’s Crown, ch. 3; Jerome, Dialogue Against the Luciferians, n. 15; and Basil, bk. On the Holy Spirit, ch. 27, say that threefold immersion is to be counted among the unwritten traditions. Indeed, Theodoret, bk. IV of The Heretical Fables, ch. “On Eunomius,” says: “He overturned the rite of holy Baptism, handed down from the beginning by the Lord and the Apostles, and openly introduced the opposite law, saying that the one being baptized ought not to be immersed three times or invoke the Trinity, but should be baptized once into Christ’s death.” Moreover, Eunomius seems to have been condemned for this reason by the First Council of Constantinople, canon 7.

I answer that none of these things is against us. The Apostolic Canon is not against us, for there it does not decree that a single immersion is contrary to the Lord’s command, but rather condemns Baptism conferred with invocation of the death of the Lord, as is clear from the reason it gives: “For the Lord does not say,” etc. Pelagius is to be understood in the same way: the Gospel command refers not to threefold immersion but to the invocation of the three Persons, for he adds, “Go, baptize the nations in the name,” etc. Moreover, from the preceding words of his letter it is clear enough that he is speaking of those who, following the heresy of Eunomius, baptized not in the name of the Trinity but, as he says, “There are many who assert that they were baptized in the name of Christ alone, with a single immersion.” Finally, when he later determines that these heretics, on returning to the Church, must be baptized again, he says nothing about threefold immersion, but mentions only the invocation of the Trinity: “You shall baptize those who come to the Catholic faith in the name of the holy Trinity.” — Similarly, I say Eunomius was not condemned specifically for abolishing threefold immersion; nor is this what Theodoret means when he says that Eunomius “overturned the rite handed down by the Lord and the Apostles.” Rather, Eunomius did not use the invocation of the three divine Persons. For, as is reported in ch. 7 of the aforesaid Council of Constantinople and by Epiphanius, Heresy 76, Eunomius did not baptize in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but either only in the name of the dead Christ, or “in the name of the uncreated Father, the created Son, and the sanctifying Spirit, created by the created Son.” The Council therefore rightly judged that those baptized by him had to be baptized again. Thus Eunomius, in removing both threefold immersion and the invocation of the divine Persons, held against both ecclesiastical and divine command: against the Lord’s command, because the invocation of the three divine Persons in Baptism was commanded by Christ; and against ecclesiastical command, because threefold immersion is to be kept as an ecclesiastical tradition. This alone is what the cited Fathers wish to indicate: indeed, from the Church’s beginnings until the time of Gregory the Great, threefold immersion was always customary; Eunomius abolished it, or declared it unnecessary, in order to restrain the error of the Arians, as has already been said.

YOU WILL PRESS: What expressly and distinctly represents the three divine Persons belongs to the essence of Baptism; but that threefold immersion does so. For Tertullian, bk. Against Praxeas, ch. 16, speaking of the command and rite by which Christ ordered the Apostles to baptize, says: “He commanded them to dip into the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, not into one; for we are dipped not once but three times, into each name and each Person.” The particle for indicates that threefold washing is as necessary on the side of the matter as the distinct naming of the divine Persons is on the side of the form. St. John Damascene teaches the same in his letter On the Trisagion, writing: “If one of us were asked why, when we administer Baptism to someone, we immerse him three times, what else should we answer than that we immerse him for each Person?” — I distinguish the major premise: what expressly represents the Trinity on the side of the form, whose role is to signify distinctly, I grant; on the side of the matter, whose role is to represent only confusedly, or less distinctly, I deny. Nor does the particle for mean that the Church then immersed three times because Christ had commanded this, but that it observed the practice because the threefold immersion distinctly signified the three Persons—not in itself, but because one divine Person was spoken of in the Baptismal form at each immersion. This is further confirmed: among other holy Fathers that threefold immersion was performed not to signify the Persons of the Trinity, but Christ’s three-day burial. This is explicitly stated in canon 5 of the Fourth Council of Toledo, where the Fathers say: “We, however, by immersing three times signify the mystery of the three-day burial,” etc.

NOTE 1. Heretics erred in various ways in ancient times concerning the legitimate form of baptism. For in the very beginnings of the nascent Church some baptized “in the name of three unoriginated principles,” or “three Sons,” or “three Paracletes,” as may be gathered from Canon 48, otherwise 49, of the Apostles, where it is decreed: “If any bishop or presbyter, contrary to the Lord’s command, baptizes not in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, but of three unoriginated principles, or three Sons, or three Paracletes, let him be deposed.” Eusebius also relates, bk. 4, ch. 11, from St. Irenaeus, bk. 1, ch. 8, concerning the Valentinians and a certain Marcus, whom he says was versed in magical arts, that “some of them construct a bridal chamber and celebrate a certain impious kind of initiation. As though by certain secret incantations and words, not so much sacred as execrable, they consecrate the one who is brought in, and say that what they do is a spiritual marriage, after the pattern, so to speak, of the heavenly pairings.” Bringing them to water and “baptizing them,” they pronounce these words over them: “In the name of the unknown Father of all, and in the Mother, the truth of all, and in him who descended in Jesus.” Others, however, speak Hebrew names over those whom they initiate, in terrifying fashion, to strike fear into their hearers. The Paulianists, Photinians, Montanists, and Cataphrygians did not baptize with invocation of the Holy Trinity, in which they did not believe; hence the Council of Nicaea, can. 19, and that of Laodicea, can. 8, order that they be rebaptized. Some Arians baptized in the name of the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit, as though there were certain grades in the Trinity. They would not baptize in the name of the Son, however, lest they be compelled to confess him as God, but said “through the Son,” as through an instrument. St. Epiphanius also testifies, in Heresy 76, that the Aetians, like the Eunomians, used this form in baptizing: “in the name of the uncreated God, and of the sanctifying Holy Spirit, and of the Spirit begotten by the begotten Son.”

NOTE 2. Although the heretics of this age do not seem, in practice, to err concerning the form of baptism, since when baptizing they always use this form, or one equivalent to it: “I baptize you in the name of the Father, etc.”—for which reason the Church regards the baptism they confer as ratified and valid—nevertheless, if you attend to their doctrine, you will perceive that on this article, as on many others, they deviate considerably from Catholic truth. For Luther, in his book On the Babylonian Captivity, chapter “On Baptism,” writes that the customary form should indeed be used, yet baptism is valid however it may be conferred in words, and it suffices if it is administered “in the name of the Lord”; indeed, even if it is not given in the name of the Lord, it is enough provided that the baptized person receives it “in the name of the Lord.” Zwingli, in On True and False Religion, chapter “On Baptism,” near the end, permits the customary form to be used in baptizing, but adds that a definite verbal form is not necessary in baptism. Brentius, in his Catechism, chapter “On Baptism,” teaches that baptism would be legitimate if the minister, after the catechumen has recited the confession of faith, were to say: “I have now heard from you the confession of your faith, that you believe in God the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Into this confession, then, I immerse you in water, so that by this sign you may know with certainty that you have been incorporated into Christ.” He nevertheless admonishes that the Church’s form must be observed.

NOTE 3. According to the Doctor, In I Sent., d. 3, q. 2, n. 5, something is said to be necessary in the confecting and administering of the sacraments in two ways. “First,” he says, it is necessary absolutely, on the part of the sacrament, in the sense that without it there would be no sacrament. “Second,” something is said to be necessary in some respect, namely on the minister’s part, without which the minister cannot avoid sin while dispensing the sacrament. The question, then, is which words are so necessary to the form of baptism that, if they are not spoken, there would be no sacrament, and which are necessary only in such a way that they may indeed be omitted without loss of the sacrament’s substance, but not without grave sin on the part of the one baptizing. We shall answer this question in the following subsidiary questions, after first assigning the legitimate form of baptism.

Single conclusion. — THIS IS THE FITTING AND LEGITIMATE FORM OF BAPTISM: I BAPTIZE YOU IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER, AND OF THE SON, AND OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. Thus it was determined in the Lateran Council, ch. Firmiter, and the Council of Florence in the decree of Eugenius. Council of Trent, sess. VII, On Baptism, ch. 4. This is gathered from Matthew, ch. 28, where Christ the Lord commands the Apostles to teach all nations, “baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” For although he does not expressly command there that they pronounce these words while baptizing, the Church’s perpetual Tradition establishes that Christ the Lord’s command must be understood in this way. This is evident not only from the Apostolic Canon cited above, but from the Church’s continual practice. For we read in the ancient Roman Order: “Then the Pontiff takes the infant and says, ‘I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.’” Hence Alexander III, as cited in ch. 1, On Baptism and Its Effect, decretals, book V: “If anyone immerses a child three times in water in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen, and does not say, ‘I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,’ the child has not been baptized.”

The holy Fathers teach the same truth, especially St. Augustine in many places, but above all bk. 3 of On Baptism, ch. 10, where he says: “The baptism of Christ, consecrated by the words of the Gospel, is holy both when administered by adulterers and when administered to adulterers.” Hence he concludes in ch. 15: “Therefore, if Marcion consecrated baptism with the Gospel words, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the sacrament was whole, even though his faith under those same words—since he thought something other than what Catholic truth teaches—was not whole, but tainted with fabulous falsehoods.”

It is also urged by reason: that form is fitting and legitimate by which everything that belongs to baptism is signified; but the form stated above is of this kind. It is proved: four things are distinguished in baptism: first, the sacramental act itself; second, the person receiving it; third, the principal cause; fourth, the minister. But these four are expressed by this form: for the pronoun (I) signifies the minister; you, the person receiving; the verb (baptize), the sacramental act; while the remaining words express the principal cause, namely the most holy Trinity. Therefore, etc.

YOU WILL SAY 1: When Christ, at the end of Mark, conferred on the disciples the power to cast out demons in these words, “In my name they will cast out demons,” he did not command them, while expelling demons, to say, “Demon, I cast you out in the name of Christ.” And when, at Luke 22, he consecrated the Apostles as priests and gave them power to confect his most sacred body, he did not command them to say while consecrating, “I do this in remembrance of Christ.” Therefore, by the same reasoning, when he said, “Teach, baptizing,” etc., he commanded nothing other than that the Apostles teach and baptize in the faith and power of the most holy Trinity. — I distinguish the consequent: that follows from the words of Sacred Scripture if they are taken by themselves alone and separately from Tradition; let that pass. If they are taken together with perpetual Tradition, from which the sense of Christ the Lord’s command must be received, I deny it. For it is established by the Church’s practice and the authority of the holy Fathers that these words are to be used while baptizing.

YOU WILL PRESS: If this had been the Church’s continual practice, it would have been known in every age; but that is not so. For Peter, Bishop of Clermont, reports that in his time this custom prevailed in his diocese: those who baptized in a case of necessity, omitting the ceremonies, did not say “I baptize you,” or anything equivalent, but only, while pouring water (which he there calls undeiare), said “in the name of the Father,” etc. Bishop Peter, doubtful about the validity of such baptism, consulted by letter Maurice, Bishop of Paris, and Stephen, Abbot of Saint-Euverte at Orléans. The bishop’s opinion was that the baptism was invalid, whereas the abbot’s opinion was that it was legitimate. Moreover¹ three letters are inserted in the third volume of the Library of the Fathers. Therefore, at that time it was not established that this form was in practice throughout the universal Church. — I deny the minor premise. For if it had not been known, from the universal Tradition and practice of the Church, that baptism is to be conferred in this way, the Bishop of Clermont would not have been doubtful about the validity of such baptism. Moreover, Maurice would not have written so confidently in his response that this form was received from Scripture and the holy Fathers. “We have,” he says, “from the authority of the divine Scriptures and the testimony of the holy Fathers, how the form of baptism ought to be handed down and received, namely in this way: ‘I baptize you in the name of the Father,’ etc. The force of the words is so great that nothing ought to be changed or innovated; unless all these words are spoken together by anyone, and in any language, we do not believe that it is baptism.” Nor are the reasons by which Stephen tries to uphold his assertion of any weight. His first reason, expressed in these words, is not sound: “I have not yet read ‘baptizing them’ and saying ‘I baptize you in the name of the Father,’ etc.” For this reason relies only on negative testimony; an argument from negative testimony has no weight when what is opposed to it rests on positive and affirmative testimony, namely the Church’s Tradition and the teaching of the holy Fathers. Nor does his second reason press very strongly. He merely repeats that St. Innocent I and St. Augustine say in several places, which he cites there, when discussing the baptism of heretics, that it is valid “provided they were baptized with express invocation of the three persons of the most holy Trinity”; yet they never mention the clause “I baptize you.” For, to begin with, the passage from St. Augustine’s On the One Baptism, which Stephen cites later, proves that “baptism is perfected and consecrated by the words of the Gospel, and that if they are omitted there is no baptism.” But, according to the understanding of the universal Church, those words are not only “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” but also “I baptize you.” Hence both St. Augustine and the other Fathers, when discussing the baptism of heretics, mention only the express invocation of the three persons in God, because many heretics erred only concerning the divine Trinity and did not omit the words “I baptize you” while baptizing: they knew that Christ had willed these words to be used to express the action of baptism and the minister who baptizes. Since, then, no difficulty or doubt concerning these words was known, it was unnecessary for the holy Fathers to mention them. To give a full and clear account of each particular of this baptismal form, it is fitting to examine them in subsidiary questions.

YOU WILL ASK 1: Whether this pronoun, I, must necessarily be spoken in the form of baptism?

The Doctor answers that, for baptism’s validity, it is not absolutely required that the minister be expressed: “For it is not absolutely necessary,” he says, “that the minister be expressed by some word, nor the pronoun of any person, because it is not in Christ’s words.” Matthew, final chapter. Moreover, when this pronoun is omitted, the substantial sense of the form remains intact. For that consists in signifying a washing as performed by the baptizer upon the one being baptized, with express naming or invocation of the three divine persons. But the pronoun I is not necessary for this, because the verb baptize, being in the first person indicative, implicitly includes that pronoun: baptize is the same as I baptize.

YOU WILL ASK 2: Must the verb baptize necessarily be spoken in the active voice in the form of baptism for it to be valid?

I answer that this is not necessary, since the baptism of the Greeks has been approved by the Church, although they do not use this verb in the active voice but only in the passive. For it was thus defined in Eugenius’s decree at the end of the Council of Florence. Speaking of baptism, after saying, “The matter of this sacrament is true and natural water, and it makes no difference whether it is cold or warm; the form, however, is, ‘I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,’” he adds: “Yet we do not deny that true baptism is also effected by these words: ‘Let such a servant of Christ be baptized in the name of the Father,’ etc.” He gives the reason: “Since the principal cause from which baptism has its power is the holy Trinity, while the instrumental cause is the minister, who externally confers the sacrament, it suffices if the act is expressed, through which the sacrament is effected by the minister exercising it, with invocation of the Holy Trinity.” The Doctor had taught the same truth earlier, in the place cited above, nn. 3 and 7, where he writes: “As to the form necessary on the part of the sacrament, it is clear that this [the ordinary form of the Latin Church] is not such in every word, from what has been said: the Greeks truly baptized, yet not under the same form.”

The Doctor explains in the same place, n. 5, why the Greek Church used this form in the passive voice rather than the active, saying that it was done because of certain Corinthians who boasted that they had been baptized by the Apostles, and therefore thought themselves superior to others who had received baptism from disciples. “The Apostle touches on the cause,” says the Doctor, “in 1 Corinthians 1: ‘I mean that each of you says, “I am of Paul,”’ etc. For they boasted about the ministers who baptized, as though baptism were attributed to them; he rebukes them and this contention of theirs, saying, ‘Is Christ divided?’ And because of this a schism arose among them. To remove this schism, it was ordained among them that the minister should not be expressed in his own person, nor the act in the indicative mood, but in the optative; for then the minister is not signified as the author of baptism, but only as the minister desiring and praying for the effect of baptism to be conferred by God. Nor would the recipient be expressed in the second person, but in the third, as though he did not precisely receive what he receives from a form of words addressed to him. Nevertheless, it would have been better for the recipient to be expressed by something other than ‘servant of Christ,’ namely by his proper name. For it is not now a servant of Christ who is being baptized, but one is baptized in order to become a servant of Christ, speaking of that spiritual service by which a Christian is a servant of Christ.”

St. John Chrysostom teaches that this vice really existed among some Corinthians in St. Paul’s time, in Homily 1 on 1 Corinthians, ch. 1, and also in Homily 3, examining the words “or were you baptized in my name?” He says: “He did not say, ‘Did Paul baptize?’ For he baptized many. But that was not what was being asked: by whom they had been baptized, but in whose name they had been baptized; for this too was a cause of schism, that they were called after those who baptized,” etc. Although he does not imply by these words that they had fallen into that error, he says below that there was a danger of it: “For if heresy arose when those who baptized were lowly, insignificant men of no reputation, if I, who preached baptism, had baptized many, it would have been likely that people would gather and be called not only by my name, but also attribute baptism to me,” etc.

St. Augustine teaches the same in bk. On the One Baptism, ch. 5, where, speaking of the Corinthians who said, “I am of Paul,” etc., he says: “Although they did this not under the names of the impure but of saints, nevertheless they were creating impious schisms: this was their detestable vice,” etc. And in ch. 11 he writes: “Nor do I think that those Corinthians whom he rebukes for splitting into schisms truly believed what they said, ‘I am of Paul’; for this was false. Nevertheless, they had baptism, from whose truth they should correct this falsehood, hearing from Paul himself: ‘Was Paul crucified for you, or were you baptized in the name of Paul?’” etc.

But, once this cause has ceased, is it now lawful for Greek Catholics still to use this form?

The Doctor answers, n. 6: “Concerning this form, one may say that for as long as it was tolerated by the Roman Church, it was lawful for them; and for the time for which it was instituted, it was reasonable while the aforementioned cause lasted. But once that cause ceased, the common form could reasonably have been imposed on them. Either, then, the Roman Church prohibited this form for them, and in that case they sin by keeping it (though no chapter expressly mentioning them is found); or, if it permitted or allowed it, it seems lawful for them to continue this form. And if, while such permission or license stands, they have ordained in their particular councils that this form be observed among them, it seems that their minister is bound to observe it. Just as, while this permission stands, the Church has determined that triple immersion is to be observed, so it must be done, and it is a precept binding the minister to observe the manner of his own Church.”

There is, however, controversy among theologians about how the word baptizetur, used in the Greeks’ form, is to be understood: whether imperatively, as St. Thomas holds, or as a petition, as the Subtle Doctor takes it. The latter is certainly more fitting if we attend to the reason given above for which the Greeks do not express the minister’s person: namely, lest he glory in himself and lest baptism be understood to derive any power from him, as from a principal cause. For the imperative mood signifies the minister’s authority, whereas the petitionary mood does not do so, but rather signifies the authority of the principal cause from which the sacrament has its efficacy, although it is ministerially conferred by the one administering it. Moreover, if this verb were taken imperatively, the command would be directed either to the minister’s person or to the sacrament’s effect. The first cannot be said, because no one properly commands himself. Nor can the second, because an effect that proceeds from a higher cause does not properly fall under the command of an inferior, especially when it is not grounded in the power of communicated jurisdiction, as is the effect of penance, which proceeds from the power of the keys. Therefore it is more fitting that this verb be taken as a petition. Nevertheless, one may say that this verb, as now used by the Greeks in the form of baptism, is neither imperative nor petitionary, but indicative. For the Greeks say while baptizing: “The servant of God, or the handmaid of God, is baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” as Arcadius rightly observes in bk. On Baptism, ch. 7, from the Greek Euchologion.

YOU WILL ASK 3: Must the person being baptized be expressed in the form of baptism by the pronoun you or by something else equivalent to it?

The Doctor affirms this in the same place, n. 7. After saying that for baptism’s validity it is not necessary that the minister’s person be expressed, he adds: “I say that the other two, namely the act and the recipient, must be expressed, but not in a determinate way, in the same manner in which they are expressed by these words—namely the act by a verb in the indicative mood and the recipient by a second-person pronoun. Rather, the act may be expressed by a verb in another mood and the recipient by a word in another person, as the Greeks express them. The reason why these two must be expressed in one way or another is taken from Matthew, final chapter: ‘Baptizing them,’ etc., where the act and the recipient are expressed.” These are the Doctor’s words, by which he means that the person being baptized must be expressed because Christ the Lord sufficiently indicated this when he said, “Baptizing them,” etc.: the act of baptizing and the one receiving baptism must be expressed in the conferral of baptism. — This is confirmed by analogy: for this reason the person to be absolved must be expressed in the form of penance, by saying “I absolve you”; absolution would not be valid under the formula “I absolve” or “absolution is given in the name of the Father,” etc. For when Christ the Lord instituted the sacrament of penance in John 20, he said, “Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven them.” By analogy, then, the person to be baptized must be expressed, since Christ the Lord indicated that the person to be baptized is expressed when he said, “baptizing them,” etc. Add that baptism takes its denomination, determination, or individuation chiefly from the one baptized. Therefore, for the act exercised by the minister to be expressed as an individual act, it is necessary that the person being baptized be expressed in the words.

YOU WILL SAY: The Council of Florence, in Eugenius’s decree, asserts that in baptism, if the act exercised by the minister is expressed together with invocation of the most holy Trinity, the sacrament is effected; there it makes no mention of the person being baptized. Therefore its expression is not necessary. — I deny the consequence. As to the antecedent, I say first that, since the decree requires the act of baptism to be expressed as it is exercised here and now, it at least implicitly connotes the person being baptized, since baptism cannot be performed without a subject capable of it. Second, it is no wonder that Eugenius did not mention the person to be baptized, because there was no controversy with the Greeks concerning the expression of the recipient of baptism, since the Greeks also express that person, saying, “The servant or handmaid of Christ is baptized.”

I said, however, that this pronoun you may be supplied by something equivalent, for example if someone said, “I baptize Peter, or you are baptized by me” as the Greeks say, “The servant of Christ is baptized.” For by this or some similar manner of speaking, the person to be baptized is sufficiently apparent and signified.

YOU WILL ASK 4: Is the particle in necessary to the form of baptism?

I answer that it is not necessary to the essence of the sacramental form, since the same sense would remain if it were omitted. For one who signifies that he does something in another’s name means the same as if he said that he does it in that person’s name. Grammarians know that the absolute ablative has the same meaning as an ablative marked by the preposition in.

YOU WILL ASK 5: What does the particle “name” signify, and is it absolutely necessary to the form of baptism?

I answer first that this particle signifies either the unity of the divine essence subsisting in the three divine persons, as the holy Fathers teach, especially St. Ambrose, bk. 2 of On the Sacraments, ch. 7: “He commanded us to be baptized in one name, that is, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. I would not wonder that he said ‘one name,’ where there is one substance, one divinity, one majesty.” And St. Augustine, bk. 3 of Against Maximinus, ch. 22: “In the name, not in the names; for these three are one, and these three are one God.” Hence the Roman Catechism, chapter On Baptism: “What is plainly declared by the fact that he said ‘in the name,’ not ‘in the names,’ is the one nature and divinity of the Trinity. For here ‘name’ does not refer to the persons, but to the divine substance, power, and authority, which are one and the same, signified in the three divine persons.”

A theological argument supports this explanation: for it is no less necessary to the form of baptism that the unity of essence in God be expressed than that the Trinity of persons be expressed, since both are equally required for the Catholic faith. Moreover, the unity of essence is signified by the particle name. Therefore, etc.

There are, nevertheless, those who think that “in the name” means “in the authority, power, majesty, and might”; in this sense Psalm 19 says: “Some trust in chariots, and some in horses, but we shall call upon the name of the Lord.” And Psalm 53: “O God, save me by your name, and judge me by your might.” Christ the Lord often uses the same manner of speaking in the Gospel, for example when he says: “In my name they will cast out demons,” and “the Spirit, the Paraclete, whom the Father will send in my name,” etc.

I answer second that the particle name is necessary in such a way that if anyone omitted it, saying “I baptize you in the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit,” or changed the singular number to the plural and said “in the names of the Father and the Son,” etc., it would not be considered baptism, as is gathered from St. Jerome, who, explaining “one baptism” in Ephesians 4, says: “We do not baptize in the names of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, but in one name, which is understood to be God.” And from St. Augustine, bk. 3 of Against Maximinus, ch. 22, cited by us just above. Reason also supports this, as we have just touched on: since the form of baptism is a profession of the Christian faith, it must signify the unity of essence of the three divine persons; the word name in the singular rightly signifies the unity of essence of the three persons in God. Hence the Apostle says in Ephesians 3²: “One Lord, one faith, one baptism.”

YOU WILL ASK 6: Must the three divine persons be expressed in the form of baptism under the distinct names of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, so that baptism would be invalid if conferred in the name of the Begetter, the Begotten, and the One Proceeding from Both?

The Doctor affirms this, d. 1, q. 2, n. 9, where he says: “Concerning names that signify properties, and not persons, such as Begetter, etc., I say that the form is not preserved in them. For Christ willed the persons to be called by the names of the persons; and reasonably so, in accordance with what was touched on in the first book, d. 2: just as a certain name signifying the divine essence under its proper aspect was given to the Jews, which they called God’s name Tetragrammaton, so Christ gave the Church names signifying the persons under their proper aspects. Even if he did not give them for this reason, nevertheless it is probable that in some invocation the name of a person has an efficacy that the name of that person’s property does not have. For if one asks something of someone for the love of John, it would be obtained sooner than if, in place of the proper name, a name indicating the property of the supposit were put.” By these words the Doctor means that baptism is invalid if conferred under names other than those of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. For baptism is the sacrament of faith by which the faithful are initiated, invoking and professing God as one in essence and three in persons. Therefore it was fitting that this be done through names that distinctly signify the persons themselves, just as under the Old Law it was customary to invoke and profess God under the aspect of one essence—which alone each person then needed explicitly to believe—by the name Tetragrammaton, which signifies God under the aspect of his proper essence. Hence, since baptism is also the most universal sacrament, to be received by all, it had to be administered under names more common and frequently used both in Scripture and in the Creeds, namely only the names of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, which are known to every one of the faithful. The names “Begetter,” “Begotten,” etc., however, are not known to everyone, but only to theologians. Alensis, In IV Sent., p. 4, q. 8, memb. 3, a. 3, the Seraphic Doctor, d. 3, and St. Thomas, III, q. 66, a. 5, ad 7, uphold the same opinion.

YOU WILL SAY: Those names, “Begetter,” etc., are equivalent to the names “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit”; therefore baptism conferred under such terms would be valid. — The Doctor denies the antecedent, n. 15, where, responding to this argument proposed by himself, he says: “As to the point concerning ‘Begetter,’ etc., one must say that Augustine, bk. 5 of On the Trinity, ch. 7, understands ‘begetter’ and ‘Father’ to be the same insofar as each is said in relation to another, or imports the property of the same person; but they are not the same with respect to the first concept signified by each. For ‘Father’ signifies primarily and in itself the supposit in the divine nature; the other signifies primarily and in itself a property. The force of a proper name and the force of a name of a property are not the same in an invocation of a person for some effect.” These are the Doctor’s words, by which he means that these words, “Begetter,” etc., do not designate the divine persons as divine persons—that is, under the aspect of subsisting—but by way of the origin of one from another. — From this it follows that baptism is also invalid if conferred only in the name of the Trinity, “because,” the Doctor says, n. 9, “when instituting baptism, Christ the Lord willed that the divine persons of the Trinity be explained distinctly; but in the name ‘Trinity’ they are signified only implicitly, and therefore baptism conferred on this basis would not be valid.” Nor would it help to put the name “Jesus Christ” in place of “Son,” because the second person is not sufficiently expressed. It is otherwise if “Paraclete” is added to the word “Spirit,” because that change is only of an epithet, not of substance: “Spirit” signifies a person. Again, baptism conferred “in the name of the first, second, and third person” is invalid, for these do not sufficiently explain the mystery of the Trinity according to the personal properties, nor the emanation of one person from another. The same holds if it is conferred “in the name of the Omnipotent, the Wise, and the Good,” which are not proper names of the individual persons, but only appropriated to them.

YOU WILL ASK 7: Would baptism conferred in the name of Christ alone be valid?

I answer that it seems more probable that it was lawful at some time to baptize in this way, as Alensis, In IV Sent., p. 4, q. 8, memb. 3, a. 3; St. Thomas, III, q. 66, a. 6; St. Bonaventure, d. 3, pt. 1, a. 2, q. 2; and the Subtle Doctor, there, q. 2, n. 9, teach with the Master. There he writes: “Concerning the fifth point, namely the name of Christ: it is clear that at some time it was lawful to baptize in this way, Acts 2, 10, On Cornelius, and 19. But whether someone would be baptized now if baptism were administered in this way is doubtful. It seems that one who baptizes thus would sin mortally; indeed, he would not baptize at all. He proves this as follows: no inferior can revoke the law of a superior, either absolutely or for a time. But the law concerning baptizing in this common form, ‘In the name of the Father,’ etc., was promulgated by Christ, Matthew, final chapter. Therefore no one else can revoke it for a time for which Christ did not revoke it. Although he dispensed from that law for the time of the primitive Church, because there was reason for the dispensation, namely that the name of Christ might be spread abroad, nevertheless, once that reason ceased, he did not dispense from it. Therefore no inferior can in any way be released from that law for the later period.”

The holy Fathers support this teaching and assertion, especially St. Ambrose, bk. 1 of On the Holy Spirit, ch. 3, where he says: “Just as one who is blessed in Christ is blessed in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, because the name is one and the power is one, so too, wherever some divine operation of the Father, or of the Son, or of the Spirit is indicated, it is referred not only to the Holy Spirit, but also to the Father and the Son; nor is it referred only to the Father, but also to the Son and the Holy Spirit.” Finally, “the Ethiopian eunuch of Queen Candace, baptized in Christ, received the full mystery.” And below: “Let us now consider whether, just as we read that the sacrament of baptism is complete in the name of Christ, so too, when it is named in the Holy Spirit, nothing is lacking to the fullness of the mystery.” In support of his answer he adds: “Let us follow reason: for whoever names this one has signified the Trinity. If you say ‘Christ,’ you have signified both God the Father, by whom the Son was anointed, and the Son himself, who was anointed, and the Holy Spirit, by whom he was anointed.” A little later: “Hence Scripture indicates that authority is joined to reason, and that we can rightly baptize also in the Spirit, when the Lord says, ‘You will be baptized in the Holy Spirit.’ And elsewhere the Apostle says, ‘For we were all baptized into one body in one Spirit.’” Theophylact also taught the same, in his commentary on the final chapter of Luke, in response to the question, “How are we to understand baptism taking place in the name of Christ alone, especially since we are taught elsewhere to baptize in the name of the Father,” etc. He answers: “The name of Christ contains within itself the Father who anoints, the anointing Spirit, and the Son who is anointed.” — Further, I say that Nicholas I, in his Response to the Bulgarians, ch. 104, relying on the authority of Scripture and St. Ambrose, dared to assert that baptism in the name of Christ alone is valid even in fact. His words are cited in ch. 24, On Consecration, d. 4: “You say that many in your country were baptized by a certain Jew, whether Christian or pagan you do not know, and you ask what should be done about them. Certainly, if they were baptized in the name of the Holy Trinity (that is, explicitly, as baptism is usually understood in the decretals and by the Fathers to be given in the name of the Trinity) or only in the name of Christ, as we read in the Acts of the Apostles—and, as St. Ambrose explains, these are one and the same—it is clear that they are not to be baptized again.”

Moreover, this truth seems to rest on clear passages of Scripture. For Peter’s discourse in Acts 2 is directed to exalting his name; and in Acts 3 and 4: “There is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved,” etc. In Acts 8: “Philip opened his mouth and, beginning from this Scripture, preached Jesus to him,” etc. “Look, here is water; what prevents me from being baptized?” Philip said: “If you believe with your whole heart, you may.” He answered: “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God,” etc. “And he baptized him.” Earlier it is said of Philip that he preached Christ to the Samaritans: “and men and women were baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.” The instruction and speech of Peter to Cornelius and his household also bear on this. Acts 1, 50³, which ends as follows: “To him all the Prophets bear witness, that all who believe in him receive remission of sins through his name,” etc. And when the Holy Spirit had fallen upon them at this, Peter ordered them to be baptized “in the name of Jesus Christ.” — Many passages in Paul’s letters also indicate baptism given “in the name of Jesus” and the attainment of salvation through him, which I omit for brevity. Hence it follows that this manner and form of baptizing accords with the teaching and preaching of the Apostles that preceded baptism, as is also clear from Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 1: “I thank God that I baptized none of you … lest anyone say that you were baptized in my name,” etc. And later, concerning teaching and preaching: “We preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles,” etc.

Reason also supports this: at the beginning of the nascent Church it was fitting among the Jews that baptism for the remission of sins be given under the name of Christ, since they denied the necessity of redemption and of the Redeemer, placing salvation in the Law alone. Among the Gentiles, too, there was no lack of a similar fittingness, because they believed on account of the miracles that were performed in Christ’s name (as with Simon Magus, Acts 8); and therefore it was also fitting that they be baptized in the name of the one in whom they believed. Thus baptism could be conferred under that form by dispensation, without any error in the form, either practical or speculative. That it was in fact done in this way seems to be gathered from Scripture’s manner of speaking and the authority of the holy Doctors of the Church.

Nevertheless, the contrary opinion, which many defend with our Arnachanus, is not improbable. For they consider that all the passages of Scripture in which the Apostles seem to be said to have baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus should be understood to mean that they baptized by the authority and power of Jesus Christ—that is, with the baptism instituted by Christ the Lord, by which the baptism of Christ would be distinguished from the baptism of John. This answer is confirmed by Acts 19. For when the Apostle found certain disciples at Ephesus, he said to them: “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” They said to him: “We have not even heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.” He said: “Into what, then, were you baptized?” They answered: “Into John’s baptism.” They say that the Apostle’s question would have been wholly strange and entirely beside the point if baptism at that time had customarily been conferred under a form other than in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. For the Apostle thought that they could not have been baptized with the baptism of Christ without having knowledge of the Holy Spirit, in whose name, as well as that of the Father and the Son, they would have been baptized.

I admit, however, that one can answer this basis of their argument by saying that the Apostle was astonished that they had heard nothing about the Holy Spirit because, being adults, they could not have been baptized earlier without first being instructed in the principal mysteries of the faith, and consequently knowing that there are three persons in God. For the mystery of the divine Trinity is the first and chief of all the mysteries of faith.

Nor does the Apostolic Canon 19 stand in the way: “If any presbyter or bishop does not celebrate the threefold immersion of the one Mystery, but immerses once in baptism (as some command it to be given into the death of the Lord), let him be deposed. For the Lord did not say to us, ‘Baptize into my death,’ but, ‘Go, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.’” I say that this does not stand in the way, because in that canon it seems that only the error of certain heretics is condemned: they baptized with a single immersion, and into the death of Christ, in order to exclude the Trinity of persons and the divinity of Christ the Lord. The Bonosians and Cataphrygians defended this error. Gregory writes about them to Bishop Quirinius in Iberia, bk. 9, ep. 61, and it is cited in On Consecration, d. 4, ch. 81: “These heretics, who are not baptized at all in the name of the Trinity, such as the Bonosians and Cataphrygians (for the former do not believe in Christ the Lord, and the latter perversely believe the Holy Spirit to be a certain wicked man, Montanus; and there are many others like them), when they come to the holy Church are baptized, because what they received while in error was not baptism, since they were not baptized in the name of the Holy Trinity.”

Whatever the truth may be concerning either opinion, nothing certain can be defined about it, since on both sides there appear to be not improbable conjectures,

I answer, secondly, with the Doctor in the same place, that it is certain that at the present time baptism may in no way be conferred in the name of Christ alone. “For,” the Doctor says, “it seems that one who baptizes thus would sin mortally. The first proof is this: no inferior can revoke the law of a superior, either absolutely or for a time. But the law of baptizing in this common form, ‘In the name of the Father and of the Son,’ etc., was promulgated by Christ, Matthew, final chapter. Therefore no one else can revoke it for a period during which Christ did not revoke it.” The Doctor adds: “Although he dispensed from that law for the time of the primitive Church, because there was reason for the dispensation, namely that the name of Christ might be spread abroad, nevertheless, once that reason ceased, he did not dispense from it. Therefore no inferior can in any way be released from that law for that later period. The second argument is proved similarly: a form commonly handed down always remains the form, unless the one who instituted the form makes some dispensation for a certain time. But the form was given by dispensation only for the period for which there was a reason for dispensing—that is, in the primitive Church, so that the name of Christ might be spread abroad. Therefore, once the time of that dispensation has ceased, only that form remains which was the form by institution.” In conclusion he asks: “What, then? I do not dare to say that one baptized today in the name of Christ would be baptized, but neither do I dare to say that he would not be baptized, because I do not read where that dispensation was revoked. In this case, therefore, I judge it doubtful whether such a person has been baptized.”

That baptism conferred in the name of Christ would now be invalid is gathered from the letter of Pope Pelagius to Bishop Gaudentius, cited in d. 1 of On Consecration, ch. 81, in these words: “There are many who claim to baptize only in the name of Christ, and with a single immersion. But the Gospel precept, given by God himself and our Lord and Savior Jesus, admonishes us to confer holy baptism on each person in the name of the Trinity and with three immersions, as the Lord says to his disciples: ‘Go, baptize all nations in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.’”

This is confirmed by ch. 83 of the same distinction, which is Pope Zacharias’s letter to Bishop Boniface, beginning Sacris luminibus. In it the Pontiff writes: “It is known that the decree and judgment of the English synod was most firmly prescribed and carefully demonstrated: whoever had been immersed without invocation of the Trinity would not have the sacrament of regeneration. This is entirely true, because if anyone is washed in the font of baptism without invocation of the Trinity, he is not a perfect Christian unless he has been baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. The priests also wished this to be observed in the aforesaid synod: that the baptism could not be true if anyone did not name even one person of the Trinity in baptism. This is certainly true, because whoever has not confessed one person of the Holy Trinity cannot be a perfect Christian. For whoever confesses the Father and the Son, if he has not also confessed the Holy Spirit, has neither the Father nor the Son; and whoever has confessed the Father and the Holy Spirit, but has not confessed the Son, has neither the Father nor the Holy Spirit, but is empty of divine grace.”

Nor does it matter that Nicholas asserts baptism in the name of Christ alone to be valid, which he confirms by the authority of St. Dionysius. For I answer that Nicholas said this only in passing, not expressly; he had not been asked whether baptism was valid by reason of its form, but only whether the fact that the minister was a Jew stood in the way of baptism’s validity. “You say,” he writes, “that many were baptized by a certain Jew, whether Christian or pagan you do not know,” etc. I answer that baptism is valid whether the minister was Christian or pagan, provided that he used the legitimate form. The legitimate form was not in question there. Rather, taking the occasion, Nicholas explains his opinion, which he held about it as a particular Doctor: namely, that this form is valid, “I baptize you in the name of Christ,” guided by the authority of Scripture and of St. Ambrose, whom he cites.

It could easily have happened that Nicholas had not seen the responses of Pelagius and Zacharias, since at that time the decrees of councils and pontiffs had not yet been collected and arranged in Canon Law; or, if he had known them, perhaps he thought they should be explained differently from the way the universal Church now understands them: either as referring to an implicit invocation of the Trinity, against heretics who baptized into the death of the Lord with a single immersion in order to exclude the Trinity and the divinity of Christ; or as referring to an explicit invocation, against those who named one person while positively excluding the others and holding error concerning them.