We must now in this place speak of
Baptism. In the matter at present to be considered the whole question consists
in this, that you have dared to do violence to Baptism—that you have repeated
what Christ has commanded to be done but once.
And this, my brother Parmenian,
you do not deny, since at the beginning of your treatise you have said many
things which are on our side, and tell for us, but against you. Thus with reference
to Baptism, you have mentioned that there was only one Flood, and only one
Circumcision for the people of the Jews. But although you dealt with these
subjects at the beginning of your oration, as the sermon was developed you soon
forgot all about them, and introduced two waters; so you made a silly
commencement to your argument, for you knew that you were going on to discuss
the true water and the false.
You strengthen the oneness of Holy
Baptism, when trying to weaken it; for you have wished to lay as it were a
foundation, with regard to the Jewish circumcision, that the Baptism of
Christians had been foreshadowed in the Circumcision of the Hebrews. In this
way you have defended, whilst attacking, the Catholic Church. As your treatise
progressed, you claimed to empty of value one kind of Baptism, that you might
fill the other to the full. By saying that (apart from the Baptism of heretic),
there is one Baptism and yet a second, you could not deny—although you have
tried to show that they are different—that they are two; when you endeavoured
to remove one of these, you laboured to treat the second as though it were the
first. But before the coming of Baptism, Circumcision was sent forward in
advance in a figure. Yet you have maintained that there are amongst Christians
two waters. Show then that there are also two Circumcisions amongst the Jews—of
which one was the better, the other the worse. If you search for this, you will
not be able to find it. The family of Abraham—by descent from whom men are
judged to be Jews—glory in being marked with this seal. Therefore the truth
ought afterwards to follow, like in character to its figure, which was sent on
before. For God, too, who wished to show that the reality to come (when the
truth should follow the type) must be something unique, willed not that
anything should be removed from the ear, nor from the finger; but that part of the
body was chosen where what had been once cut away should leave them with a sign
that is to our point, because it cannot be removed a second time. For when this
is done once it preserves health; if done again, it may do harm. Similarly,
Christian Baptism, effected by the Trinity, confers grace; if it be repeated it
causes loss of life.
What then has come over you, my
brother Parmenian, to bring forward a thing which is one, and over against it
to compare two Baptisms (even though you allege that they are different)—the one
true, the other false? For in this way you have proceeded to argue that there
are two waters, and claiming one as true for yourselves, wished to ascribe the other
to us as false.
After this you have made mention
also of the Flood. This was indeed a figure of Baptism, inasmuch as the whole
sin-stained world, after the sinners had been drowned, was, through the
intervention of washing, restored—cleansed—to its former appearance. But since
you were going to say that (besides the muddy foundations of the heretics)
there was another water—that is a lying water in opposition to the true—to what
purpose have you thought well to refer to the Flood, which happened but once?
But as you will have it so, show first two Arks unlike one another, and two dissimilar
doves, bearing different branches in their mouth—that is, if you are to prove
that there is a true water and another which is false.
That water alone is true which has
been sanctified not from any place, nor by any [human] person, but by the
Trinity. And, as you have said that there is a water which is lying, learn
where you may find such—with Praxeas, the Patripassian, who totally denies the
Son, and maintains that the Father has suffered. (On the Schism of the
Donatists Against Parmenian, Book 5, paragraph 1, in The Works of St.
Optatus: A Catholic Church History, Wherein a Saint and Early Church Father
Condemns the Donatist Schism After the Persecution of Christians by Roman
Emperor Diocletian [trans. Oliver Rode Vassall-Phillips; Adansonia Press,
2018], 117-18)
It is clear that in the
celebration of this Sacrament of Baptism there are three elements, which you
will not be able either to decrease or diminish, or put on one side. The first
is in the Trinity, the second in the believer, the third in him who operates.
But they must not all be weighted by the same measure. For I perceive that two
are necessary, and that one is quasi-necessary. The Trinity holds the chief
place, without whom the work itself cannot be done. The faith of the believer
follows next. Then comes the office of the ‘Minister,’ which cannot be of equal
authority. . . . understand that it is God who cleanses each man, whoever he
may be; for no one can wash away the defilement and stains of the mind, but God
alone, who is also the Maker of the mind. Of, if you think that it is your
washing [that cleanses], tell us what is the nature of this mind, which is
washed through the body, or what ‘form’ it has, or in what part of a man it
dwells. To know this has not been granted to any. How, then, do you think that
it is you who cleanses, when you do not know the nature of that which you
cleanse? It belongs not to man, but to God to cleanse, for He has Himself promised
that He will cleanse through the Prophet Isaiah, when He said:
‘Even though your sins are like
scarlet, I will make you white as snow.’
He said:
‘I will make you white,’
and not:
‘I will cause you to be made
white.’
If this has been promised by God,
why do you wish to give that which is not permitted to you either to promise,
or to give, or to have? Behold by Isaiah God has promised Himself to wash those
stained by sin, not through a man. (Book 5, paragraph 4, in ibid., 121, 122-23)
Note to the above:
As St. Optatus has said already,
man is by God’s appointment, the necessary (or rather the quasi-necessary)
minister of the Sacrament. But God gives His Grace in Baptism directly to the baptised.
He does not give it through a man—that is to say, He does not give it first to
the ‘Minister,’ making him holy, so that this ‘Minister,’ by his own holiness,
gives grace—though this would follow logically from Donatist principles. (Ibid.,
134 n. 141)
For a book-length discussion of the topic of baptismal regeneration, see:
"Born of Water and of the Spirit": The Biblical Evidence for Baptismal Regeneration
[*] for those who want a PDF copy of the book, drop me an email at ScripturalMormonismATgmailDOTcom