Friday, February 14, 2020

George T. Montague on Baptismal Regeneration in 1 Corinthians 12:13 and Titus 3:4-7



1 Cor 12:13

For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. (RSV)

A wealth of teaching is concentrated in this brief line. For one thing, it is perfectly clear that the Holy Spirit is given in Christian baptism. Whether the Greek is translated “by one Spirit” or “in one Spirit” it is obvious that Paul is referring to the baptism by which his readers became Christians and members of the one body. It is clearly a “baptism in the Spirit” or a “baptism of the Spirit”—but there is no reason for thinking it is not identical with water baptism. When Pentecostals, then, use the term “baptism of the Holy Spirit” for the deep spiritual experience of the release of the Spirit, ordinarily accompanied by the laying on of hands, it would be wrong to imply that the Spirit is given only then, as if he were not already with the Christian from the moment of his initiation into the Christian life. In Titus 3:5 the sacrament of baptism is called “the bath of rebirth and renewal by the spirit” According to Luke, the conferring of the Spirit was ritualized, it seems, by the gesture of imposing hands on the newly baptized (Acts 8:17; 19:6), though other passages in the Pauline literature suggest that the rite of anointing signified this (2 Cor 1:22; Eph 1:13; 1 John 2:26-27). We are not certain exactly what was the full Christian ritual of baptism in the early decades, nor how the rites of water and anointing and laying on of hands were interrelated, nor even whether there was a generally uniform practice in the matter, nor how exactly they verbalized the relationship of the various elements of the ritual to the name of the Lord Jesus and to the gift of the Spirit. But for baptized, conformed Christians today who are seeking a deeper experience of the Holy Spirit in their lives through the laying on of hands, it would seem preferable to speak of a re-awakening or a release or a yielding to the Spirit already given, after the fashion of the exhortation given in 2 Tim 1:6: “I remind you to stir into flame the gift of God bestowed when my hands were laid on you” (the next verse makes it obvious that the gift of God is the Holy Spirit). (George T. Montague, The Holy Spirit: Growth of a Biblical Tradition—A Commentary on the Principal Texts of the Old and New Testaments [New York: Paulist Press, 1976], 157, emphasis in bold added)

Titus 3:4-7

But when the goodness and loving kindness of God and Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of deeds done by us in righteousness, but in virtue of his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal in the Holy Spirit, which he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that we might be justified by his grace and become heirs in hope of eternal life. (RSV)

This passage is so dense that it makes analysis difficult, especially at the point that interests us most, vs. 5, which reads literally in the Greek: “through the bath of regeneration and of renewal of the Holy Spirit.” let us begin with what is most certain. When we were lost in our own sinful selfishness (3:3), God manifested his goodness and loving-kindness (vs. 4). He saved us not because of any righteous deeds we had done (a strong Pauline thought) but because of his own mercy (vs. 5). At this point we would expect a mention of Jesus Christ, but this is delayed until vs. 6 in order to give prominence to the moment and the rite of Christian initiation. The bath of regeneration is clearly baptism in which we are reborn. The idea of “rebirth” is not a Pauline way of referring to baptism. It sounds more Johannine (“born again of water and the Spirit,” Jn 3:5). In Matthew the word “rebirth” or “regeneration” is used for the final inbreaking of the new age when the Son of Man shall be enthroned in glory (Mt 19:28), a usage that is probably more primitive than the one here. As the tradition developed it was seen that, for all that really mattered, the regeneration took place in each Christian at his baptism when he became a son of God. (It certainly did not happen at some advanced stage, as in Gnostic doctrine, where the rebirth was thought to take place through the mystic and magic formula of the “regenerating word.”)

The word “renewal” is however, a key word in Paul’s pneumatology. The Psalmist had said that when God sends forth his breath (ruah or pneuma) all nature is renewed (Ps 104:30). The noun ”renewal” (anakainōsis), however, appears nowhere in the Greek language before Paul and is apparently a word of Paul’s own coning. This part of Titus 3:5 is therefore echoing a strong Pauline tradition.

How is the “renewal of the Holy Spirit” linked with the preceding? It is a separate and subsequent moment or is it identical with the “bath of regeneration”? The word “renewal,” unlike “regeneration, is a favorite one of Paul’s. The verb and the noun always occur in contexts in which Paul speaks of the development of the Christian life subsequent to baptism. The inward man is being renewed day by day (2 Cor 4:16); he must walk in newness of life (Rom 6:4) and be renewed in the spirit of his mind and put on the new man (Rom 12:2; cf. Eph 4:23f); who, according to Col 3:10, is being renewed unto knowledge. Here, in Titus 3:5, however, there is every reason to believe that the renewal is linked to the bath as much as regeneration is, for not only is the Spirit constantly presented in Paul as the Christian’s birthright in baptism (1 Cor 12:13; Rom 8:10) but here the verb “poured out” refers equally well to the waters of the bath as to the Holy Spirit which is the closer antecedent.

Is there then no difference between “rebirth” and “renewal”? There is a difference; for while rebirth corresponds to the once-done instatement as God’s sons, the work of renewal is a process which, while beginning at baptism, continues in the Christian until the divine image, Christ himself, is perfectly achieved (2 Cor 4:16; 3:18). “Rebirth” is a word taken from the realm of nature; “renewal” is taken from the realm of art. Like an artist carefully restoring a faded or damaged masterpiece, the Holy Spirit works upon the Christian until the divine image is restored (2 Cor 3:18). (Ibid., 230-32)