The phrase εἰς τὸν
Μωϋσῆν may be patterned after the similar New Testament phrase εἰς τὸν Χριστόν,
but it can never be taken in the sense of “into Moses” or Christ. No baptism
nor anything else could in any conceivable sense carry the Israelites “into”
Moses. The idea expressed is one of union: “to,” “unto,” or “for Moses.” This
symbolical baptism united the Israelites to Moses as God’s representative to
them, the Old Testament mediator, in whom was foreshadowed Christ, the New
Testament eternal Mediator, Deut. 18:18. The deliverance from the Egyptian
bondage through Moses by this symbolical baptism through the cloud and the sea
likewise typifies our deliverance from the bondage of sin and of death through
Christ by means of Christian baptism. (R. C. H. Lenski, The Interpretation
of St. Paul’s First and Second Epistle to the Corinthians [Minneapolis,
Minn.: Augsburg Publishing House, 1963], 391)
