In their
recent book on Pauline theology, Catholic scholars Brant Pitre, Michael P.
Barber, and John A. Kincaid wrote the following about “faith” and its
relationship to (water) baptism in Paul’s epistles:
In stark contrast to some proponents of the “Paul
within Judaism” perspective who insist that Paul maintained that Jews must “remain
Jews,” Paul seems to presuppose that both
Jews and Greeks are called to “put on Christ” through faith and baptism. This is no small point. One
often gets the impression that scholars aligned with the “torah-observant” view
of Paul assume he did not believe Jews needed to be baptized. But Paul speaks of “faith” and being “baptized
into Christ” as two ways of referring to the transfer from being “under the law”
to receiving the freedom of being “sons” of God “in Christ” (see Gal 4:1-7).
Paul does not speak of new covenant Jews as those who simply believe in the
messiah. For Paul, members of the new
covenant have been baptized into the
messiah, and, therefore, are no longer under the Mosaic torah. Through faith
and baptism, one not only becomes an heir of Abraham and a son of God but also a child of the new Jerusalem who is no
longer bound to the “slavery” of the present Jerusalem. In other words,
they are free with respect to the torah of Moses . . . nothing suggests that “baptism”
was “non-rational” or “magical” for Paul. Instead, baptism should not be
separated. James Prothro makes the following astute observation:
In every undisputed letter in which dikaioō [“to justify”] occurs, it occurs
in proximity to baptismal traditions (1 Cor 6:11; Gal 3:24, 27; Rom 6:3-4, 7).
This connection extends beyond Paul’s Law-polemic, which is not prominent in 1
Cor and is certainly not the impetus for his justification-talk there.
Especially given that in these letters Paul assumes his audiences have been
baptized, it is unsurprising if Paul assumed they would have been familiar with
his vocabulary. (Prothro, “The Strange Case of Δικαιοω in the Septuagint and in Paul,”
67).
To be
justified is to be conformed to the image of the Son. For Paul, justification and
conformity to Christ begin at baptism. (Brant Pitre, Michael P. Barber, and John
A. Kincaid, Paul A New Covenant Jew:
Rethinking Pauline Theology [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2019], 52, 205,
italics in original, emphasis in bold added)
Elsewhere,
in a section entitled “Baptism and Justification,” we read:
Paul himself ties justification to baptism.
This is evident, for example, in 1 Corinthians:
You were washed,
you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ and in the Spirit of our God. (1 Cor 6:11)
In this verse, Paul makes a direct connection
between being “washed” [apolouō] and
being “justified” [dikaioō]” (1 Cor
6:11). Some commentators dispute a baptismal reading, insisting that the
language is simply intended as a metaphor rather than an allusion to ritual
immersion. This is unlikely. First, not only does the New Testament indicate
that baptism was widely practiced in the early church, we know that the ritual
had an important place in the communal life at Corinth. Its significance was
apparently so well established that it became the basis of quarrels that Paul
felt forced to address at the very outset of this epistle (cf. 1 Cor 1;11-17).
Second, the language of 1 Corinthians 6:11 uses terminology employed in other
Pauline texts where baptism is in view. Believers are said to be “washed . . . in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ,”
language which envokes the baptism controversy Paul addressed in 1 Corinthians
1, which specifically swirls around the “name” into which believers have been “baptized”
(1 Cor 1:13-14). In addition, the washing described in 1 Corinthians 6:11 is
also associated with the “Spirit,” who is identified with baptism later in the
same epistle: “For in the one Spirit we
were all baptized into one body” (1
Cor 12:13). As other interpreters recognize, 1 Corinthians 6 even goes on to
use the language of “members” (1 Cor 6:15), anticipating the discussion of
Christians as “members” of Christ’s body later in the letter (cf. 1 Cor 12:14-27).
Given these connections to baptismal passages, to insist that the language of
washing involves a mere metaphor seems like special pleading. Finally, physical
baptism is linked to spiritual washing in other texts (cf. Acts 22:16; Eph
5:26; Titus 3:5; Heb 10:22). First Corinthians 6 is thus best read as an early
Pauline expression of this theology.
Paul also talks about baptism in other places
where justification is in view . . .we noted Paul’s teaching that “whoever has
died is justified [dedikaiōtai] from sin” (Rom 6:7 NRSV,
slightly adapted . . . this “justifying death” appears related to baptism:
What then are we to say? Should we continue
in sin in order that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin
go on living in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized
into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the
dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.
For if we have been united with him in a death like this, we will certainly be united
with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might
be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. For whoever has died is justified from sin. (Rom 6:1-7 NRSV,
slightly adapted)
This is an extremely significant passage, for
it shows that baptism not only causes one to be “in Christ” but that Paul also
views the sacrament in terms of co-crucifixion and justification. For Paul, baptism justifies because it is a
real participation in the crucifixion, death, burial, and resurrection of
Christ. (Ibid., 202-3, emphasis in bold added)
