In my paper, Baptism, Salvation, and the New Testament: John 3:1-7, I wrote:
Baptism was known
among the Jews at the time of Jesus, and ritual immersions were done, often for
Gentile converts to various Judaisms. For a book-length treatment, see Jonathan
Lawrence, Washing in Water: Trajectories of Ritual Bathing in the
Hebrew Bible and Second Temple Literature (Society of Biblical
Literature, 2006). The concept of immersion is part-and-parcel of the
Hebrew Bible; for example, the Hebrew verb meaning “to wash” רחץ appears 74
times in 73 verses in the OT; often having the meaning of a full immersion of
either a person or an object (e.g., Exo 2:5; 1 Kgs 22:38).
Another Hebrew verb,טבל appears 16 times in the OT, having the meaning
of "to dip" or "to immerse," all part-and-parcel of
"baptism" (e.g., Gen 37:31; Num 19:18; 2 Kgs 5:14; Job 9:31).
With respect to 2 Kgs 5:14, the LXX translates טבל using the Greek
verb meaning “to baptise” βαπτιζω that appears three other times in the LXX
(Isa 21:4 in the proto-canonical texts; Judith 12:7; Sirach 34:35 in the
Apocrypha)
For those who wish to see scholarly lexicons discussing these two Hebrew terms, I decided to present the following from TDOT and NIDOTTE:
TDOT on רחץ
III. Cultic Ablutions. The various commandments governing cultic
and ritual ablutions grew increasingly elaborate and detailed in the course of
history. Their retention of stereotyped formulaic language suggests an element
of persistent conservatism.
1. Language.
The expression rāḥaṣ bammayim occurs
21 times (Ex. 29:4; 40:12; Lev. 1:9, 13; 8:6, 21; 15:5–8, 10, 11, 18, 21, 22,
27; 17:15; Nu. 19:19; Dt. 23:12; Ezk. 16:4, 9). According to Elliger, this
expression reflects “legal usage,” because other texts using rāḥaṣ “do not mention the water as being
self-evident” (cf. Ex. 29:17; Lev. 9:14). This formula is expanded by addition
of the object (ʾeṯ) beśārô
in Lev. 14:9; 15:13, 16; 16:4, 24, 26, 28; 22:6; Nu. 19:7, 9; without bammayim, Lev. 17:16). All these
passages may be assigned to Priestly circles. “Stylistically unique in P is the
section Ex. 30:17–21, together with the corresponding section Ex. 40:30–32.
Here the object, when specified, is ‘hands and feet’ (30:19, 21; 40:31); it is
not specified in 30:18; 40:30, 32.… Only in Ex. 30:20 do we find the totally
unique rḥs mayim.”
2. Obligatory
Ablutions. The ablutions required of every Israelite and hence as a rule of
every priest can be listed according to their occasion. In first place stands
washing to remove uncleanness. Because uncleanness comes through touching or
external contact with something unclean, it can be removed by washing or
rinsing, following which the person in question is again allowed to visit the
sanctuary (2 S. 12:20) or partake of sacred donations (Lev. 22:6). In both the story
of David and the story of Ruth, the individual steps in the process—washing,
anointing, changing clothes—are identical; but Ruth prepares herself in this
way to meet Boaz, whereas David prepares to visit the sanctuary. This
observation accords with the general principle that cultic and ritual practices
are rooted in the everyday life of the people.
The only directive in the OT given to a group
may go back to an archaic “magical procedure”44 to avert the
possible consequences of murder by a person unknown: the elders of the town
nearest the scene of the crime kill a heifer, then wash their hands over it and
attest: “Our hands did not shed this blood” (Dt. 21:6–7). Von Rad rightly
comments that we should picture the hand washing “as originally to be a real
and not a symbolic action.”
The rituals required of individuals should be
understood analogously. The person who sets free the goat for Azazel (Lev.
16:26) or removes the carcass of the sin offering (16:28) must bathe, as well
as the one who burns the red heifer (Nu. 19:7–8). Here too the original
motivation was “more likely actual uncleanness than the menace of the holy.”
This category also includes the directives of the ritual law concerning
ablutions to remove the uncleanness consequent to disease. We begin with
leprosy, because the story of how Naaman the Syrian was cured by washing seven
times in the Jordan (2 K. 5:10–14) furnishes a welcome reference to the
curative power of water, then conceived in miraculous and magical terms. The
“cleanness of the flesh” achieved by washing is more than a simple outward
cleansing, and comes to pass without any understanding on Naaman’s part of the
prophet’s command.48 Lev. 14:8–9 specifies what someone who has been
healed of leprosy must do next: wash his clothes, shave off all his hair, and
bathe (rḥṣ) in water; then he is
clean (v. 8; v. 9 is an involved repetition).
A very similar procedure is required of one
who has eaten what dies of itself or has been torn by wild animals: “He shall
wash his clothes and bathe himself in water” (Lev. 17:15–16).
Finally the uncleanness arising from a sexual
discharge is removed in the same way: the person affected must wash his or her
clothes and bathe his or her body (Lev. 15:5–8, 10–11, 13, 16, 18, 21–22, 27).
The camp ordinances have adopted a variant of this procedure: a soldier made
unclean by a nocturnal emission must go outside the camp and wash himself with
water in the evening; then he may come back into the camp (Dt.
23:11–12[10–11]).
3. Priestly
Ablutions. In most of the laws, cleansing serves to enable someone to
return to the normal social life of the community; the last example, however,
is more concerned with the irreconcilable conflict between uncleanness and
holiness: the military camp with Yahweh in its midst (v. 15[14]) is holy.
Wellhausen gives classic expression to this situation: “The military camp, the
cradle of the nation, was also the earliest sanctuary. There was Israel, and
there was Yahweh.”
The taboo character of holiness explains the
requirement that “all who have participated in making the substance used for
cleansing … are rendered ‘unclean’ for the day in question … and … must perform
certain ablutions”—the priests according to Nu. 19:7, laypeople according to v.
8 (see also v. 19). But because the priests as cultic functionaries spend
substantial time in the sanctuary and are in contact with the holy, they have a
particular need to perform punctiliously the appropriate ritual ablutions.
First of all, the investiture of Aaron and
his sons is preceded by “a washing, obviously a plunge bath, of the priestly
candidates,” performed by Moses, making the priests ritually clean (Ex. 29:4;
40:12; Lev. 8:6). The fundamental process here described is repeated every time
the priests enter the tent of meeting with Moses and Aaron (Ex. 30:19ff.;
40:31–32) and when Aaron by himself enters or leaves the sanctuary on the great
Day of Atonement (Lev. 16:4, 24): before putting on the sacred vestments, he
must wash his body with water. The same language appears in the requirement
that he remove the sacred vestments before leaving the sanctuary, bathe, and
put on other clothes before offering the burnt offering. Yahweh’s appearance in
the temple has made the sacred vestments so holy that they may not leave the
temple, and thorough ablutions are required before putting them on and after
taking them off, lest their holiness imperil the priest who wears them. To this
end, “a basin” (kîyôr) or “the sea” (hayyām) was installed in the temple
(Ex. 30:18; 40:30; 2 Ch. 4:6). We note, however, that Ex. 30:19, 21; 40:31
speak of washing only the priests’ hands and feet in this basin.
The Testament of Levi assembles all these
requirements in a single passage devoted to priestly ablutions (35:1–8). First
comes a bath, after which the priest puts on the vestments and washes his hands
and feet. The washing of hands and feet is repeated whenever something is to be
placed on the altar.
For the sake of completeness, we shall also
mention the priest’s washing of the entrails and legs of the burnt offering, an
action perhaps carried out originally by the person providing the animal,
because nothing unclean may be offered to Yahweh (Ex. 29:17; Lev. 1:9, 13;
8:21; 9:14; cf. 2 Ch. 4:6; T. Levi 35:22–38).
IV. Dead Sea Scrolls. The many basins discovered in the
excavations at Qumran suggest that ritual ablutions and baths “played a central
role” there—possibly in part because of the climate. If we may rely on
Josephus’s information about the Essenes, members of the community washed daily
before the common meal.59 Because Josephus says that the dining room
was considered to be “like a sacred precinct,” this meal may have had a sacral
character, so that ablutions before and after eating appeared appropriate.
The texts describe a cleansing process
required after battle, in which those who fought washed their clothes and
washed from their bodies the blood of the slain (1QM 14:2–3, wrḥṣw mdm pgry hʾšmh). This description
fits with the instructions in Nu. 8:7; 19:19; 31:19. The Community Rule speaks
of a “water of washing/ablution” (1QS 3:5, my
rḥḥ) that cleanses and washes away guilt.
The prohibitions in CD 10:11 and 11:1,
although consonant with the late P texts of the OT, go beyond them: the former
prohibits bathing with water that is dirty or less than the amount needed to
cover the bather; the latter stipulates that “one who goes down to bathe may
drink where he stands, but may not fill a vessel.” Here we recognize casuistic
elaboration. (Hans-Jürgen Zobel, “רָחַץ,” in G. Johannes Botterweck, Helmer Ringgren, and Heinz-Josef Fabry,
eds., Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament, Volume 13 [Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2004], 463–466)
NIDOTTE
on טבל
ANE The Arab. muṭabbal, moisten; ṭamala,
ingrain (as in painting).
OT 1. Joseph’s brothers dip his coat in blood (Gen
37:31); leaders on the march dip their feet into the Jordan (Josh 3:15); Boaz
dips bread in vinegar to give to Ruth (Ruth 2:14); Jonathan dips his staff into
a honeycomb (1 Sam 14:27); Naaman dips in the Jordan (2 Kgs 5:14); and a cloth
dipped in water suffocates a king (2 Kgs 8:15).
2. Most of the remaining uses of the word are
ceremonial. Hyssop, a plant whose leaves were tied into bunches to be used as a
brush, was dipped into a basin of blood in conjunction with the Passover (Exod
12:22), and priests dipped their fingers in blood to sprinkle it before the
tabernacle (Lev 4:6, 17). As part of the ceremony for the readmission into the
community of a person with an infectious skin disease (צָרַע, suffer from a skin disease;
#7665), the officiant dipped his finger into blood (Lev 14:6), at other times
into oil (14:16; cf. Num 19:18). Some see baptism as a ritual linked with
ceremonial dippings or immersions. (Willem VanGemeren, ed., New
International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology & Exegesis, Volume 2
[Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1997], 337)