Sunday, October 28, 2018

Daniel C. Arichea and Eugene A. Nida on water baptism in 1 Peter 3:21

In their translator’s handbook for First Peter, Daniel C. Arichea and Eugene A. Nida render 1 Pet 3:21, a popular text supporting water baptism being the instrumental means of regeneration, thusly:

which was a symbol pointing to baptism, which now saves you. It is not the washing off of bodily dirt, but the promise made to God from a good conscience. It saves you through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Commenting on this passage and the theology thereof, they write:

The text as it stands makes baptism (or the water of baptism) as the agent who saves. A careful reading of the whole verse, however, indicates that which now saves you should perhaps go with through the resurrection of Jesus Christ at the end of the verse (compare 1.3), and the TEV has made this clear (compare Brc “It is the resurrection of Jesus Christ that that makes this saving process possible”; NEB “It [baptism] bring salvation through the resurrection of Jesus Christ”). Understood in this matter, baptism is clearly not the agent but the instrument of salvation (for example, NEB “water of baptism through which you are now brought to safety”), and the implicit agent of salvation is God (compare 1.3-5). To express it in another way, it is because Christ is risen from the dead that baptism becomes an instrument through which God can make known his saving activity. If Christ were not raised, then baptism remains only a symbol not of life but of death. But since Christ is indeed raised from death, then the Christian is also enabled to rise from the water of baptism into a new life (compare Rom 6.1-11). (Daniel C. Arichea and Eugene A, Nida, A Translator’s Handbook on the First Letter from Peter New York: United Bible Societies, 1980], 121, emphasis in original)


 For more on 1 Peter 3:19-21 and other texts that support baptismal regeneration, see: