In his Homily II on the Mother of God, Jacob of Serug (a Syrian Christian) wrote the following about John the Baptist:
He anointed the babe with the Holy Spirit in the
womb of his mother
and He gave him Baptism n the womb before birth.
The greeting of Mary was spoken into the ears of the
old woman,
and the Holy Spirit was poured into the soul of the babe.
Thus indeed it had been announced by the angel
that the lad would be filled with the Spirit while still in the
womb of his mother.
Mary’s greeting fulfilled the role of the priest
there
while Elizabeth was like a womb of Baptism.
The Son of God sent forth the Spirit with his
essence,
and the lad was baptized by the Holy Spirit while he was
still in his mother’s womb. (Jacob of Serug, On the Mother of God [trans.
Mary Hansbury; Popular Patristic Series 19; Crestwood, N.Y.: St. Vladimir’s
Seminary Press, 1998], 50)
In
a footnote to the above, we learn that Ephrem the Syrian wrote something
similar to Jacob:
See Ephrem in “Hymn for the Feast of the Epiphany”:
“It is very right that thou shouldst baptize Me—as I bid and shouldst not
gainsay—Lo! I baptized thee within the womb; baptize thou Me in the Jordan”
[NPFN2 13:286] (Ibid., 50 n. 18)
This
is interesting as this fits rather well what the
original text of D&C 84:28 read:
For he was baptised while he was yet in the
womb and was ordained by the Angel of God at the time he was eight days old
. .
