Introduction
The role which baptism played in first century Christianity is unclear. We know that the ritual—in which Christians were fully immersed in water—was practiced, but what it meant, and where it came from, are unknown. Our earliest sources on baptism appear to be Paul’s letters in the New Testament. In his letters, he mentions that people are baptized ‘into the Messiah Jesus’ (Gal 3.27; Rom 6.3; cf. 1 Cor 1.13–17), and this act unites them as ‘one body’ (1 Cor 12.13). These details imply that baptism was an initiation ritual, and he claims that baptism unites a person into Jesus’ death and burial (Rom 6.3–4).
Other New Testament literature reiterates what little Paul says (Col 2.12). Some texts refer to baptism as a ‘basic teaching’ (Heb 6.1–2; Eph 4.5). This may explain the lack of information in the early literature: as an initiation ritual, the people whom these authors were addressing likely had already undergone baptism, and so did not need it explained to them in writing.
Why did Christians decide that submerging a person in water was one of their primary rituals? I will explore a small line of evidence to suggest one possible explanation for where baptism may have come from.
Hebrew Bible
In biblical law, the people of Israel had to wash their bodies before they approached Yhwh’s mountain to receive his law code (Exo 19.10, 14). After this, the high priest and his sons were required to be washed before serving Yhwh in his tent (Exo 29.4), and this ritual washing was further required anytime they approached Yhwh’s altar (Exo 30.18–21; 40.12, 30–32; cf. Lev 8.6; 16.4, 23–28; Num 19.7–8).
However, there were other laws which applied to everyone, priest or not. A person could be made unclean in many ways. Some of these could be extremely taboo situations, such as touching an unclean animal. Other times, they could be normal circumstances in life, such as touching a corpse, contracting a skin disease, or experiencing any bodily discharge. Being ritually unclean (or ‘impure’) was not synonymous with having sinned, though the two categories of uncleanness and sin could overlap. The large majority of these cleanliness laws are thought to have come from the ‘Priestly’ school, one of the primary contributors to the Torah, sometime in the sixth century BCE.
Some biblical texts include idols and idolatry as a source of uncleanness (Ezek 7.20; 36.25; Psa 106.36–39; 1 Macc 1.44–49; 3 Bar 10.5). Other texts indicate that gentiles are unclean (Isa 52.1; Ezra 9.11).
Dead Sea Scrolls
Sometime in the second century BCE—about four centuries after the Torah had been compiled—a sect which opposed the religious establishment in Jerusalem separated from the broader population and settled at Qumran, near the Dead Sea. One of their sectarian documents, titled the Community Rule, survives among the Dead Sea Scrolls. It addresses how to initiate ‘all those who have freely devoted themselves to the observance of God’s precepts’. The document says that all members from the sect must assemble to participate in an antiphonal ceremony.
In this ceremony the leaders of the community condemn, among other things, anyone ‘who enters this covenant while walking among the idols of his heart’. The text states that such a person ‘shall neither be purified by atonement, nor cleansed by purifying waters, nor sanctified by seas and rivers, nor washed clean with any ablution. Unclean, unclean he shall be’. In contrast to such a person, sincere members of the community have their sins ‘expiated’. The purifying effect of water was immensely important for the sect, because water does for a person’s body what the holy spirit does for their soul.
Community Rule 3
He shall be cleansed from all his sins by the spirit of holiness … And when his flesh is sprinkled with purifying water and sanctified by cleansing water, it shall be made clean by the humble submission of his soul to all the precepts of God.
Community Rule 4
God will then purify every deed of man with his truth. He will refine for himself the human frame by rooting out all spirit of injustice from the bounds of his flesh. He will cleanse him of all wicked deeds with the spirit of holiness. Like purifying waters, he will shed upon him the spirit of truth (to cleanse him) of all abomination and injustice.
The closely related Damascus Document outlines how this ritual washing must be done. Among a few other requirements, the water must be enough to submerge the initiate, and must not be held in an artificial container. The Qumran sect reaffirms that idols and idolatry make a person ‘unclean’ (CR 3; cf. Jubilees 20.7). Likewise, ‘sin’ and ‘wickedness’ go hand-in-hand with the ‘ways of uncleanness’ (CR 5; DD 3). A person may not submit their offerings or sacrifices to God without first being cleaned through washing. Otherwise they contaminate the altar itself with their uncleanness (DD 11; cf. Jub 21.16; Testament of Isaac 4.19; Testament of Levi 9.11). They cannot even assemble with their peers without first being clean (Messianic Rule 2).
Other Literature
Paul briefly suggests that gentiles outside of the Jesus Movement are a source of uncleanness (1 Cor 7.12–14). The Revelation of John makes a similar allusion to gentiles as unclean (21.24–27). Did they think this uncleanness was inherent for gentiles?
In Jubilees 22.16–24, Abraham provides instructions to his son Isaac, warning him to remain separate from gentiles, to not eat with them, and to not befriend them, because ‘their actions are something that is impure’ (22.16). Abraham elaborates by drawing attention to improper sacrifices and idolatry (22.17–18). He then suddenly prophesies about the future genocide of the Canaanites, as well as the past annihilation of Sodom, justifying both events because they ‘worship idols’ (22.22).
The tale of Joseph & Aseneth tells how Abraham’s great-grandson met and married the daughter of an Egyptian priest. At first, Joseph physically holds Aseneth at a distance, claiming that her participation in worshiping idols has ‘anoint[ed]’ her with ‘destruction’ (8.5). The next several chapters (9–13) show Aseneth in distress because of her idolatry. She destroys the uncountable number of idols in her possession, throws out all of her food because it was dedicated or sacrificed to idols, and fasts for seven days. She then offers a lengthy prayer to God concerning her newfound rejection of idolatry, and repeatedly mentions that eating idol-sacrificed food has made her mouth unclean. After this, an angel—implied to be the archangel Michael—descends from heaven to talk with Aseneth. He instructs her to ‘wash your face and hands with living water’ (14.12). While this is not a whole-body cleansing, it does focus on the parts of her body which made direct contact with the idol-contaminated food.
Rabbinic literature records a variety of opinions on the matter. It is said a house, and everything inside it, become unclean merely when a gentile enters it (M Tahorot 7.6). Some passages argue that gentiles are neither inherently unclean nor obligated to the Torah’s laws (e.g. M Negaim 3.1; M Mikvaot 8.4; M Niddah 7.3), but are still considered unclean because they participate in activities which make them so. These are primarily the consumption of forbidden foods, engaging in forbidden sexual acts, and idolatry. So little as touching the dust from a neighboring building where idolatry was committed makes a person unclean (M Avodah Zarah 3.6). Some passages are ambiguous on the source of gentile uncleanness, whether it is inherent or comes by their actions (M Oholot 18.7–10).
John the Baptizer
We also have the question of a man named John. According to the historian Josephus (Judean Antiquities 18.5.2), this John was known as a ‘good man’ who encouraged Judeans to practice ‘justice and reverence’ (alleged categories for the Ten Commandments). In addition to this, he told them to be baptized/washed ‘not for the putting away of some sins, but for the body’s purification’. Josephus is unclear on when John was active, other than that he was executed by Herod Antipas sometime before a certain battle in 36 CE.
The evidence is extremely slim, but some scholars have drawn a connection between John and the Qumran sect: they were active in the same region at the same time, performed similar ritual washings, lived ascetically, and were associated with the same specific passage from Isaiah.
The earliest Christian text to mention John is the Gospel of Mark. While Mark’s account was written before the one from Josephus, sometime around 75–80 CE, Mark is more obvious in how he reinterprets the historical person of John to fit into the theology of his gospel. There, John fulfills Malachi’s prophecy about Elijah (Mark 1.6; 9.11–13; cf. 2 Kings 1.8; Mal 4.5–6), making his role in the gospel narrative little more than a self-aware precursor to Jesus, whom John considers his superior (Mark 1.7–8). All of Mark’s references to baptism are interpreted through his theology, which is that salvation from sin is accomplished through Jesus’ death. He flatly contradicts Josephus, saying that John’s baptism was an act ‘of repentance, for the forgiveness of sins’ (Mark 1.4), and associates baptism with Jesus’ death (10.38–39).
The later gospels embellish Mark’s picture. John is more vocally submissive to Jesus (Matt 3.14; John 1.29–31), and Jesus incorporates baptism into his own movement (John 3.22–30; 4.1–2). Yet, well into the second century CE, the author of Luke-Acts acknowledges the existence of an independent John Movement, complete with a baptism practice which must be re-interpreted by the author (via Paul) as anticipatory of the superior baptism of the Jesus Movement (Acts 18.25; 19.1–5).
Didache
The Didache—identified very early in its history as a manual from the apostles for gentiles joining into the Jesus Movement—gives instructions on ethics (chapter 1–5), practices (6–10), and leadership (11–15), concluding with a brief overview of eschatology (16). The section on practices situates the instructions for baptism immediately after instructions for food. On the surface, this order seems arbitrary. Some scholars argue the book has been through multiple stages of redaction, with the earliest edition of the book potentially being contemporary to Paul’s letters. Under theories like this, the passage on baptism appears to have been expanded by an editor to cohere better with a version of the practice from a later time period. Removing the suspected elements provides something like the following:
Didache 6
Now, concerning food. Undertake what you can. But keep strictly away from what is offered to idols, for that implies worshiping dead gods.
Didache 7
Now, concerning baptism. This is how to baptize. Give instruction on all these points, and then baptize in living water. Before the baptism, moreover, the one who baptizes and the one being baptized must fast, and any others who can. And you must tell the one being baptized to fast for one or two days beforehand.
If the Didache is a Judean-authored text for the benefit of gentile converts, chapters 6–7 may be read in context of the previous examples of ritual washing within late Second Temple Judaism, making the sequence of instructions entirely purposeful. (Hebrews 9.10 even refers to the Torah’s ritual washings as ‘baptisms’.) First, gentile converts must abandon their idols, including the total rejection of idol-sacrificed food (contrary to Paul’s instructions in 1 Cor 8.1–13; 10.14–33). Then, the gentile convert must fast for a few days, comparable to the example seen in Joseph & Aseneth. Finally, after learning ‘all these points’ (i.e. everything in Did 1–6) and submitting to them, the gentile convert should then be baptized. This may well have been the function of baptism known in the synoptic tradition. Mark and Luke nowhere have Jesus instruct his Judean followers regarding baptism. (Mark has John claim that Jesus will baptize ‘with holy spirit’, a notion which the other gospels pick up, but such an act is never actually performed by Jesus in Mark and Luke.) Matthew does have Jesus command his followers to baptize initiates to their sect, but this is specifically given in the context of converting gentiles (Matt 28.18).
Conclusion
While Paul’s letters could be our earliest sources on baptism (perhaps with the exception of the Didache), some decades before any of the gospels, it must be kept in mind that his letters are addressed to predominantly gentile communities. To the extent that Paul ever brings up the topic of baptism, he does not indicate it was performed on anyone other than gentiles. Likewise, Paul does not spell out how baptism is performed, nor its literal purpose. His recipients would have already known these details, having learned in-person. Instead, he invokes baptism as an illustration: being submerged in the water is like being buried in death, as Jesus had been. By this analogy, Paul assures his readers, Jesus’ followers can trust they will be raised from death like Jesus was (Rom 6.1–5; i.e. rising up from the water is like rising up from the grave?). Paul derives ‘spiritual’ lessons from other historical or practical elements of his religion (e.g. 1 Cor 10.1–5; Gal 4.21–31). This occasional hermeneutic, taking preexisting ideas as instructive allegory, would not have been mutually exclusive to understanding those ideas by their other, more obvious functions. Yet, without explicit instructions committed to writing, the spiritual interpretation of baptism replaced its practical meaning over time.
Christianity began its life as a sect within Judaism, one which actively sought to proselytize gentiles. Through the Torah’s law code, Judean religion mandated its people must routinely wash themselves of any ritual impurities. When gentiles began joining the Jesus sect, a debate emerged around whether gentiles would be required to observe and obey the Torah. There was no clear answer. People like Paul said gentiles were under no such obligation (or, perhaps, were even prohibited from it), while others said gentiles were required to obey the laws of the Torah.
Regardless of the debate, whichever side had more support or more persuasive arguments, at the time of their conversion gentiles would still have been considered impure by Jesus’ followers (at that point still all ethnically Judeans who obeyed the Torah, or at least an overwhelming majority). This could have been attributed to food they ate or sexual acts they did, but it is at least possible some gentiles were never guilty of those acts. Rather, the one universal trait shared among all gentiles was their ‘idolatry’. A general agreement arose within the Jesus Movement that gentiles were required to undergo (at least) one specific washing, to purify them of the uncleanness they had contracted by worshiping gods other than Yhwh.
Eventually, this changed. Baptism began as a ritual-washing required from gentiles who joined into the Jesus Movement, which declared that the end of the world was near and their faithful members would be saved through this eschaton, receiving eternal life in a new world. However, by the end of the first century, it had morphed into a mandatory rite for all Christians—Judean and gentile—because it came to be understood as the very act which saved them (1 Pet 3.21; Mark 16.16).