THE CHURCH QUARTERLY REVIEW. No XLIX. OCTOBER 1887. ART. I.-LAY BAPTISM. 1. Lay Baptism Invalid: to which is added Dissenters' Baptism Null and Void. By R. LAURENCE, M.A. Reprinted from the Fourth Edition, 1723. With Additions. and Illustrations, arranged and edited by WILLIAM SCOTT, M.A., Perpetual Curate of Christ Church, Hoxton. (London, 1841.) 2. Letters on Lay Baptism. By the Rev. DANIEL WATERLAND, D.D., and the Rev. E. KELSALL. Vol. vi. of The Works of Waterland, Edited by WILLIAM VAN MILDERT, D.D., Lord Bishop of Llandaff. (London, 1843.) 3. A Scholastical History of the Practice of the Church in reference to the Administration of Baptism by Laymen. By the Rev. JOSEPH BINGHAM, M.A. Vol. viii. of The Works of Bingham. (London, 1844.) 4. A Matter of Life and Death: A Letter to all who profess and call themselves Christians. By EDWARD C. BALDWIN, M.A. (London, 1879.) IT is often assumed that all baptism with water in the Name of the Blessed Trinity is valid, by whomsoever administered. This is to place Holy Baptism in a peculiar position among the Sacraments in this respect, that it treats the ordination of the minister as not essential to its validity. How entirely this is taken for granted may be illustrated from the writings of two great modern divines. The late Bishop Forbes of Brechin says, without any qualification: 'In case of necessity anyone, having the use of reason, who baptizes with water in the Name of the Holy Trinity is accepted— priest, deacon, layman, male, female, heretic, or excommunicate. Persons are not to be re-baptized who are baptized with the proper VOL. XXV.-NO. XLIX. B form and words by heretics, even by Calvinists who deny that baptism remits sin, unless there be a doubt of the sufficiency of the administration.'1 And, more recently, Canon Liddon has said : 'If the non-episcopal bodies have no true orders, they have unquestionably a true baptism, supposing the matter and words of that Sacrament to be duly administered; since lay baptism is of undoubted validity.' 2 When such expressions fall from men who are as eminent for their loyalty to the doctrine of the apostolic ministry as for their theological learning, it cannot be wondered at that the certain validity of lay baptism is constantly asserted, as though it were a question which had been decided by the consentient voice of Christendom. A book like Mr. Baldwin's, which openly challenges this position, and argues the subject on its own merits, is not only rare, but is in danger of receiving scant attention from those who imagine that the popular view is endorsed by the authority of the Church. But, as a matter of fact, no general council has ever decreed the validity of baptism by any except the Church's ordained ministers, and at no period has the laxer view been universally received. There can be no proper dispute as to who originally received the authority to baptize, for it was explicitly given to the Apostles. Indeed, it seemed to be reserved exclusively to their ministry by the terms of the commission. For our Lord said to the eleven, 'All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth. Go ye, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. . . . And, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.' As man, Christ had received 'power,' or authority (§ovoía), and 'therefore' they were to go forth and baptize-that is, because His delegated authority was communicated to them by ordination. And so Laurence argues : 6 3 Christ does not here say, Lo, I am with baptizing; lo, I am with teaching, alway, &c., but Go ye, baptizing, teaching, and lo, I am 1 Forbes, Thirty-nine Articles, p. 495. But in another place he does not speak so decisively; and only concludes, after briefly mentioning the arguments for and against the validity of lay baptism, that in all cases where immediate death is apprehended before a lawful minister can be called, it is the safer side for any sufficiently informed person to administer it.'-Short Explanation of the Nicene Creed, p. 300. 2 Liddon, A Father in Christ, 3rd edit. p. xxxix. 3 St. Matt. xxviii. 16, 18-20. with you. The promise of His presence and concurrence is to be with them; not with the acts separate from them, but with them performing and doing those acts; and because it is to be with them baptizing alway even unto the end of the world, and because their particular persons were not to continue here so long, therefore they are necessarily to be in some respect alway, &c. And this can be no otherwise than by succession; and then the succession must be such as that it may be justly called them. . . . If he who baptizes be not one of the you, an apostle or sent of Christ, in a higher or lower degree, to whom the promise was made, his act can claim no right to the promise, and therefore will be a contradiction to this sacred institution. So that it must necessarily follow that this institution requires baptism always to be administered by one vested with apostolic authority, either in whole or in part, to the end of the world.”1 It is urged, on the other side, that the command to baptize is of greater obligation than the command that baptism should be conferred by a duly ordained minister, and that the ordinary rule must therefore give way in cases of urgency. But this does not follow. If God has tied baptism to a particular channel, justice, as much as mercy, requires that its necessity should be limited by the opportunity of receiving it. To extend this principle to those who die unbaptized for lack of a proper minister seems more consistent than to infringe the law of ordination. And so many have contended. Laurence says: 'However He may dispense with the want of a sacrament, yet He has nowhere promised to give efficacy to those administrations which are in any respect contrary to the essentials of His own institutions, and to me it seems a mere foolhardiness and presumption to expect it.' 2 The terms of the baptismal commission, therefore, seem to give no opening for lay baptism. This is not enough, however, of itself. It must be seen how that commission has been interpreted in the life of the Church. And first, of course, it must be considered whether other passages of Holy Scripture modify the apparent restriction. It has been urged, as by Bancroft at the Hampton Court Conference, that 3,000 persons could not have been baptized on the day of Pentecost by the twelve Apostles without assistance, and that therefore laymen must have been employed to baptize under their direction. Neither Bishop Taylor nor Laurence admitted any difficulty in one man baptizing 250 1 Lay Baptism Invalid, pp. 17, 18; comp. Baldwin, pp. 24-26. persons in a single day.1 single day. St. Francis Xavier is reported to have said of himself, that he had baptized 10,000 Indians, with his own hand, in one month, and even greater numbers are sometimes attributed to him.2 But if there is any difficulty in the matter, it does not follow that lay baptism was resorted to, for the 'seventy '-to say nothing of the 'hundred and twenty' were not properly laymen, and might have helped the Apostles without breaking the law of orders.3 6 The next instance is that of St. Philip the deacon.* Bingham uses the leave granted to deacons as a step towards his proof of the validity of lay baptism, because deacons have not received the commission of priests." But they are ordained clergy who hold a real commission, so far as it goes. A measure of the grace of the priesthood,' says Canon Carter, 'extends to the diaconate.' When he baptizes 'the deacon so far acts as a priest.' In the Church of England they certainly baptize not simply as laymen, but as ordained ministers." Maskell, who goes into the matter with great care, is of opinion that when they have been permitted to baptize, it has always been by virtue of their office, and not by express delegation apart from their orders. The question of lay baptism must not, therefore, be prejudiced by reference to the license granted to deacons, and this may be dismissed from further inquiry as not relevant to the discussion. Next, the baptism of St. Paul by Ananias is brought forward as an instance of lay baptism. But, whether Ananias was a layman or not, the express commission by Divine vocation takes it out of the category of ordinary precedents. Again, St. Peter commanded Cornelius and his family to be baptized, apparently by 'the brethren from Joppa.' 10 The Pseudo-Ambrose, supposed to be Hilary the Deacon, took this as an illustration of an assertion, which he does not otherwise support, that at first all Christians indiscriminately were allowed to baptize." But Forbes thought the words need only mean that St. Peter ordered water to be brought to himself, with which he might administer the baptism;12 and he 1 Taylor, Clerus Domini, iv. II; Laurence, Dissenters' Baptism, p. 197. 2 Alban Butler, Lives of the Saints (Dublin, 1866), vol. xii. p. 30; Forbes, Instructiones Historico-Theologica, X. xiii. 13. 3 St. Luke x. 1; Forbes, ibid.; Acts i. 15; Bennet, Rights of the Clergy, p. 233. 4 Acts viii. 12, 38. 5 Bingham, pp. 20–28. 6 Carter, Doctrine of the Priesthood, 3rd ed. p. 31. 7 Book of Common Prayer, ‘Office for making of Deacons.' 8 Marshall, Holy Baptism, 2nd ed. pp. 177-189. 10 Acts x. 23, 48. 12 Forbes, X. xiii. 15. 9 Acts ix. 18. 11 Comm. in 1 Cor. i. 17, and Eph. iv. 11, 12. |