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The United Free Church of Scotland General Assembly 2001 Panel on Doctrine Report on Baptism, chapter 4.

This page is a copy of the text of www.ufcos.org.uk/ga01/panel04.htm

The baptism of children: Old Testament evidence

Those who argue against the baptism of children have one major advantage: the brevity with which their case can be stated. Some have stated the case in a single sentence, e.g. "There is no concrete evidence for infant baptism in the New Testament." Others may wish to add something along the lines of, "Baptism is for those who have repented and placed their trust in Jesus Christ and cannot, therefore, be for infants." The position is simple and therefore attractive. Colin Buchanan has summarised the case against infant baptism in a slightly longer and certainly more scholarly and careful form [A Case for infant Baptism, Grove Books 1973, p4]. His purpose also is to illustrate the attractiveness of a brief statement and the difficulty of countering a brief statement with a more complex argument. Having presented his summary he observes, "There is no 30-second short statement of the paedobaptist case. But that of itself does not pre-judge the result of the hearing – in many a court a deceptively simply plea of innocence by the defence has to be met, and is successfully met, by a far more detailed and complex case for the prosecution" [A Case for infant Baptism, Grove Books 1973, p4].

The matter of infant baptism must be resolved not on arguments from silence, nor on difficulties we confront in the practice of child baptism (there are many Christian beliefs which present greater difficulties), but by looking at the evidence of the whole Bible. The evidence should include circumstantial evidence, i.e. we seek to ascertain the truth by looking at all the known facts and by drawing inferences from those facts which would be difficult to explain otherwise. ("Circumstantial" here means "tending to establish a conclusion by inference from known facts hard to explain otherwise".) Moreover we must take on board that the case for the baptism of children is of a cumulative nature and that it is none the worse for it. We should certainly not reject it for the sake of brevity or simplicity. If we are to "rightly divide the word of truth" we must gather all the evidence and present it as the evidence itself demands that it be presented, as a consistent whole.

Old Testament evidence

The New Testament is the fulfilment of the Old. Twice in the same verse Jesus tells us that he had not come to abolish the law and the prophets but to fulfil them. Chrysostom stated: "(Jesus') sayings were no repeal of the former, but a drawing-out and filling up of them" [Homilies on the Gospel of Matthew Part I (trans. George Prevost), Oxford 1843, p229]. To introduce a dichotomy between the two Testaments was the heresy of Marcion. Jesus' relationship with the Old Testament is one of "organic continuity" [Christian Counter-culture IVP p 72]. New Testament theology has its roots in the Old Testament. This is true for every aspect of theology. Any attempt to develop, for example, a doctrine of Christ or of the Trinity without reference to the Old Testament would be inadequate. Every doctrine has to be seen in context, and every doctrine has its roots. That is as true with Baptism as it is with the Trinity. To consider it without reference to the Old Testament would be irresponsible. As G W Bromiley has expressed it: "Christ did not come, nor did Christian faith arise, in a vacuum. A particular background and context had been prepared. Our Lord and the disciples already had the Word of God. They were steeped in it, and they appealed to it. They were not setting it aside but consciously fulfilling it" [Children of Promise, Wipf and Stock Publishers 1998 (Eerdmans), p12].

There are at least two elements of the Old Testament revelation which have a bearing upon our consideration of infant baptism: the Old Testament understanding and experience of "family" and the Old Testament understanding and experience of "covenant". The two are closely related, as C J H Wright has observed: "religiously, the household had a crucial role in maintaining the covenant relationship between the nation and God and in preserving its traditions throughout succeeding generations" [God's People in God's Land: Family, Land and Property in the Old Testament, Paternoster 1997, pp1f].

Family

Family life in the days of the patriarchs was semi-nomadic and families were especially large. John Bimson tells us: "Although the narrative often says that Abraham, Isaac or Jacob 'pitched his tent' in such-and-such a place (e.g. Gen 12.8; 26.25; 33.19), we must not imagine that one tent housed the whole group. The Old Testament itself speaks in places of several separate tents (e.g. 31.33). As well as the patriarchs' large families, there were also herdsmen and male and female servants attached to the household … When Lot's family needed rescuing from an alliance of invading kings, Abraham was able to gather 318 fighting men from among his household (Gen 14.14). This suggests a total of several hundred people for the whole group … The tents of the patriarch's families and servants must have comprised a very extensive encampment. The wives of the patriarchs evidently had their own tents (Gen 24.67; 31.33), probably next to, and perhaps connected with, those of their husbands" [Ibid, pp 48f].

Inevitably, with the passing of several hundred years and their prolonged enslavement in Egypt, significant changes had taken place for the descendants of the patriarchs by the time of their return to Palestine. One significant change was their numerical growth. From being a large and powerful family they had become a nation of people subdivided into smaller units: tribes, then clans and finally families (Jos 7.14). The clan was a territorial unit as well as a group united by ties of blood. It often corresponded to a whole town or village community. So, for example, in a list of clans in the tribe of Manasseh we find names which were also the names of towns (Num 26.28-34) [Ibid, p 119]. The family or household unit remained, however, the basic unit of Israelite society. The Hebrew word bayith in Jos 7.14 is translated 'family' in most modern translations (e.g. NIV, NEB, Good News) and 'household' in most older translations (e.g. AV, RV, RSV). It is used both of a family (2 Kings 8.1f ) and of the building in which the family lived (2 Kings 4.2).

Another significant change for Israelites living in Palestine was that the semi-nomadic life of the patriarchs had largely given way to village or town life. Archaeological excavations have revealed that village houses were small and basic. Bimson describes two typical villages: "Most houses at Khirbet et-Tell and Raddana were rectangular with only two or three rooms at ground level and a sleeping loft … A family of four or five probably slept together in the one sleeping loft … houses were cramped by modern standards … A typical family unit occupying a village house probably consisted of a father and mother and two or three children … the houses were arranged in compounds. Each compound consisted of usually three (sometimes two) houses and a shared courtyard. These compounds represent multiple or extended families, each with about a dozen members. A typical multiple family might consist of a father and mother, their married sons with their wives and children, as well as any unmarried brothers, sisters, sons and daughters of the original couple. There might also be a surviving great-grandparent in the family …" [The World of the Old Testament, Scripture Union 1988, pp52-57].

In a family of, say, three generations, "the head of the household would have been the grandfather. In the event of his death, his married son and their families may have remained together as a single household, in which case the head of the family would have been the eldest son …" [Ibid, p 57]. Although headship of the family was normally male it was not unknown for a widow to become head of a household. So, for example, the woman of Shunem who gave hospitality to Elisha acted as the head of her household, took her family to Philistia for seven years and reclaimed the family estate on their return (2 Kings 8.1-6).

Important for us is the role of the head of the household. Whether he was the grandfather or father (more common with the passing of time) he had "complete authority over the family, not just in practical matters but in religious ones too" [J Drane, in The New Lion Encyclopedia of the Bible, J Drane (Ed.), Lion 1998, p 94]. Bimson describes the influence and responsibility of the head of the family in Israelite society:

"Within his family he exercised a kind of judicial authority. It was expected that a man would use his authority to ensure the responsible and godly conduct of his sons (1 Sam 2.22-36; 8.1-5) … The family head was also the protector of the whole household. No one suspected of an offence could be seized by his accusers without the authority of the head of the household (Jud 6.30f; 2 Sam 14.7). Only a fool failed to protect his family from injustice (Job 5.4). The responsibility of a family head in this respect is only fully appreciated when we remember the scope of a household. The household was naturally responsible for the care of those of its members who were sick, elderly or disabled, and for its servants … Those who did not belong to households of their own, such as foreigners, widows and orphans, faced destitution (which could ultimately mean death from starvation) unless society made some provision for them. The Mosaic code therefore contained laws to ensure that people in those categories were cared for (e.g. Deut 24.19-21; 26.12-13). Heads of households would have been responsible for putting such concerns into practice (cf. Job 29.13-16). In short, the family was the institution which cared for the sick and thepoor, and the family head was the protector of all those under his roof. It is not surprising that Israel saw God as its 'father' (Is 64.8; Mal 1.6; etc.)" [The World of the Old Testament, Scripture Union 1988, pp 120f].

A crucial aspect of the family in the Old Testament was its spiritual solidarity, an aspect which we find also in the New Testament. As Pierre Marcel states, "The family forms a collective entity … In God's eyes parents and their children are one. By divine right parents are the authorised representatives of their children; they act for them; they engage in spiritual obligations because of them and for them, and also in their name. Such is the order of God. It is for that reason that in every case when parents enter into the covenant in the capacity of proselytes they do so together with their minor children" [The Biblical Doctrine of Infant Baptism, James Clarke 1953 (trans. PE Hughes), p117]. The excessive individualism of our modern era is, of course, completely alien not only to the Old Testament concept of family life and of parenthood, but also to the New Testament concept of the same. It is this biblical emphasis of family solidarity that lay at the very heart of the covenant which God established with Abraham and his descendants.

Second half of this chapter: The covenant of the Old Testament.

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This web page was last updated on 15th April 2004.