Westminster on sprinkling. Hebrews 9

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Weston Stoler

Weston Stoler

Puritan Board Sophomore
When the Westminster writers use this verse to prove sprinkling baptism

HEB 9:10 Which stood only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation. 19 For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats, with water, and scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book, and all the people, 20 Saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you. 21 Moreover he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry. 22 And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission.

I'm not seeing the parallel to baptism their.

---------- Post added at 10:16 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:14 PM ----------

Or this one MAR 7:4 And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, and pots, brasen vessels, and of tables.
 
Ohhhh I was missing a line in Hebrews 9. Silly me. I was so confused. Could someone flesh out Mark 7:4 some more?
 
How does one baptize a table (or couch, bed; the Gk. term can refer to various furniture)? The incongruity with a mandated immersion seems obvious (as if solely to preserve a full-body-at-one-instant notion at any cost).

Hence, an alternate application of water to the object seems far from artificial.

The textual variant at this place removes the term for "table" from the list. But why? If it never were present, how/why did it get inserted in Mark? (what is the explanation?) If it belongs there, what possible reasons could there be for its gone missing?
 
I just don't understand why some people are *against* immersion. The word baptize, from what I have heard (I am not a scholar on the languages used in the Bible in the very least) means "to immerse"... I can understand some instances when immersion wouldn't work well (say, an elderly person is confined to a wheelchair). But I also think the WCF may not have referenced the scriptures properly on this.. I don't see what the washing of pots and pans and stuff has to do with baptism..
 
Shannon the point of the reference verses is in one part to show that the word has meanings out side of the word immerse. Baptists will argue the word can only mean immerse but as we see in these passages and others such as 1 Corinthians 10:2 the word can have a more broad meaning. Paul as well as other writers use the word baptized in ways that would go beyond mere immersion
 
black_rose said:
I just don't understand why some people are *against* immersion. The word baptize, from what I have heard (I am not a scholar on the languages used in the Bible in the very least) means "to immerse"... I can understand some instances when immersion wouldn't work well (say, an elderly person is confined to a wheelchair). But I also think the WCF may not have referenced the scriptures properly on this.. I don't see what the washing of pots and pans and stuff has to do with baptism..
Click to expand...

Shannon - It helps to look to the original languages and the context that is being presented. All of the "washings" (for all of which the word baptizo is used, but all of them obviously are not "immersings") that are spoken of in these two places are ceremonial cleansings. THAT is "what the washing of pots and pans and stuff like that has to do with baptism". The WCF was absolutely right in citing those Scriptures, since the context clearly speaks to what the word "baptizo" means. The authors of the WCF were simply looking to define baptism as to its nature and mode. Based on these texts and others that the WCF authors cite, I think it's hard to justify the 'baptism = immersion' position.

By the way, immersion is fine with me as long as inappropriate meaning is not attached to it (i.e. if I were a pastor and someone was wishing to be baptized but insisted upon immersion as the only appropriate mode - i.e. that their baptism wouldn't "work" unless it was by immersion - I'd be uncomfortable without long discussion to baptize him).
 
I definitely don't see in the bible the mandate for immersion. I just haven't yet seen the preference to sprinkling. I don't think it is wrong to sprinkle however I don't see the new testament preferring it. I do trust though the the WCF writers where smarter then I and could put things together that I could not.
 
You may count me as one who has "mellowed" a bit from my once "bitter" stance against immersion-baptism (call my old view "reactionary" to ordinary Baptist intransigence). Although, I still agree with Todd's expression (above) that insistence on a particular mode without which baptism is not, seems very much like adding to the gospel to me; and I would have almost insurmountable objection to performing an immersion at the request of someone who asked for it on that basis.

I think baptism belongs in worship whenever possible, and so I promote sprinkling or pouring as the simplest (least elaborate) and least logistically challenging modes, not to mention how appropriate such modes are to practically any person in any situation--from infants, to old people in wheelchairs, to the bedridden, and everyone in between; from churches in the ice-bound poles, to churches in the practically waterless wastes. No special facilities are required, no special clothing, no changing rooms, etc.... The more minimalist the rite is, the more catholic (that is, universal) the expression may be shared across cultures.
 
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