Note: The second portion of the paper on baptismal symbolism. Part Three will be here; the full version will be here at the end of the month. Sources and the article this is a response to are listed here, at the bottom of the post.

Previously: (Part One)

Galatians 3 Response:

The nature of baptism as a fitting symbol for death thus established, the first of Lusk’s five bullet-points comes into contention: his interpretation of Galatians 3:27. Lusk contends that, “It is hard to see how putting water on someone’s head ‘pictures’ clothing with the priestly garment of Christ.” While there is certainly some similarity between garments and washing with water- they both involve the placing of something upon a person’s exterior and the changing (for the better, hopefully) of their appearance-, Lusk is correct to note an apparent lack of strong correspondence between baptism and garments; the above correlations are tenuous at best. The problem with his argument does not lie here but in the hidden assertion: that baptism should share symbolism with the putting on of the garments. Leviticus 8 and Galatians 3, after all, imply no such thing. The garbing of the priests and the washing of the believer (or the priest) are kept separate from each other, both explicitly and implicitly, in both passages.

The central verse of Lusk’s argument runs (in the ESV), “For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ” (Galatians 3:27). This passage, insofar as it speaks of physical baptism, does not equate it with the putting on of Christ, as will become obvious upon evaluation of spiritual baptism and its relationship to the putting on of Christ. First, the meaning of ‘baptism’ in this context must be examined. Baptism is in this passage qualified as being ‘into Christ’. Thus, if this is taken to refer to physical baptism, the only physical baptisms to which it actually refers must be those accompanied by either previous or subsequent spiritual baptism, as those are the only physical baptisms to actually be ‘into Christ’. If, however, this is taken as a reference to spiritual baptism, the entire passage is simplified. This taken as granted, all physical baptisms which correspond to spiritual baptism, being baptisms of the elect (unknowable to man in this world), would be included but not causal. Second, the relationship between baptism (spiritual, and physical only by consequence) and ‘putting on Christ’ must be understood. In spiritual baptism, man dies; in its cessation, man is resurrected, both being in Christ, as per Romans 6:5. In this resurrection, man puts on Christ’s righteousness, garbing Himself in the eyes of God with the merit of the second Person of the Trinity, this being the second part of double imputation and essential to justification. Thus, the putting on of Christ follows spiritual baptism as being a part of the same process, as being a different part of the same process; insofar as they overlap, in symbolizing respectively regeneration and the resurrection in which regeneration is accomplished, they remain still separate symbols, partially united in meaning but not in identity (two symbols can symbolize the same entity, usually with differing emphases, e.g. a national flag and a country’s name). ‘Different’ and ‘separate’ are here the operative words. This relationship can be seen in how Galatians 3:27 relates the two without equating them. Paul, after all, does not use a ‘to-be’ verb (ειμι) to indicate that baptism and putting on Christ are identical; he indicates instead that the second correlates to the first, implying the connection to strongly as to nearly state it, a connection not causal or of congruency but definition, in that they are both integral parts of the same process, justification. They are related but separate.

Lusk notes, with undoubted merit, that Galatians 3 should be understood in light of the Levitical priesthood’s purification and cleanliness code, particularly as found in Leviticus 8. If Leviticus in that passage equates washing and the putting on of garments, it would provide sufficiency ground to ask where in baptism this putting on of Christ is symbolized. Again, however, Leviticus 8 presents a clear distinction between the washing and the garbing to the priests. The only verse in Leviticus 8 to indicate washing is verse 6, “And Moses brought Aaron and his sons and washed them with water.” Additionally, if ‘washing’ is extended to cover ‘smeared with blood’, a related if distinct symbol, verses 15, 19, 21, and 23-24 could be included, although this would be a dubious procedure at best, given that they are different symbols. At any rate, neither washing nor blood-smearing appears in verses 7-9 or 13, or in sentences connected to those; in other words, the verses and sentences containing ‘washing’ and the verses containing ‘robing’ are quarantined from each other (7-9 and 13 being the only verses to mention the act of robing the priests). The order of operations is clear and provides no reason to blur the different parts of the ceremony into each other: Aaron and his sons are washed with water by Moses, then first Aaron and second his sons receive the ceremonial garments of his position. The garments and the washing are sequential, not simultaneous, and no reason is provided to weld them together. They are related, certainly, but they are distinct.

Lusk argues that Galatians 3:27 and Leviticus 8, taken together, indicate a necessity of (physical) baptism symbolizing the garbing of the believer in Christ if it is to symbolize anything, basing this argument off of a proposed equation between the act of being baptized and the putting on of Christ. In that premise, however, the argument finds its first fatal flaw, as no such equation can be discovered in either Galatians 3:2 of Leviticus 8. Galatians 3:27, first, indicates a correlation between two phenomenon or characteristics, a correlation which, in context of the rest of the Bible, arises from the fact that baptism and the putting on of Christ are respectively a symbol (a sign and seal, as this verse specifically defines the baptism as hand as the baptism of those actually saved, using the words ‘into Christ’ to do so) and an image (not entirely different from a symbol, but different enough to warrant distinction, as the putting on of Christ is not a ceremony or procedure physically undertaken by the believer) of two parts of the process of redemption, death (resulting from imputation of sin) and the imputation of Christ’s righteousness (resulting in resurrection). As Romans 6:5 says, those who died with Him, a process symbolized in baptism, are also raised with Him, a process proceeding from the imputation of His righteousness, a.k.a. the happening which the putting on of Christ images. Meanwhile, Leviticus 8 separates the washing and the robing of the priests: the two events are clearly distinct, non-equated. Lusk’s argument here has no merit due to a fundamental mischaracterization of the verses it relies upon, even discounting the shaky validity of saying that two symbols for the same phenomenon must overlap to the extent of including each other.

Titus 3 Response:

Lusk offers this interpretation of Titus 3:5: “In Titus 3:5, Paul calls baptism ‘the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit.’ Baptism is the sacrament of the new birth. But it will not do to say that baptism ‘pictures’ this new birth. I have had the joy of watching my wife give birth three times now, but never in the delivery room did I witness anything that looked remotely like a baptism. In no obvious way does baptism picture regeneration.” Lusk’s interpretation rests both upon an equivocation between ‘washing of regeneration’ and ‘(physical) baptism’ and upon an un-Biblical reading of new birth and regeneration. In truth, this passage speaks of spiritual baptism (so called by analogy, not because it is reliant upon the physical baptism) and of the spiritual new birth of a man whose nature is changed, who once was dead but now lives (Luke 15:24).

In Titus 3:5, Paul’s words (“the washing of regeneration”) do not refer to physical baptism. They refer instead to a washing equated to or qualified as ‘regeneration’ (one of the secondary uses of the ‘of noun’ formulation). This can be shown in several ways. First, the word ‘washing’ here is not the word for baptism (Studylight). It is, in fact, a word used of the washing which Christ applied to the church in Ephesians 5. That it is related to baptism is, of course, not disputed, but ‘washing’ is not in this passage equated with ‘baptism’ by the words used. Second, the context rules out the interpretation of ‘washing of regeneration’ as physical baptism. The earlier part of this same verse says this: “He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy”. Physical baptism is a work done in righteousness (as later portions of this paper will explain, the only ways to avoid this run into grave errors). That salvation is accomplished through the ‘washing of regeneration’ therefore disqualified physical baptism, a work done in righteousness. Third, attempting to substitute ‘physical baptism’ for ‘washing of regeneration’ here produces an odd implication: that baptism saves man by His grace (Titus 3:5-6). After all, what else could the verse refer to? This interpretation therefore would support baptismal regeneration in the strongest sense possible (short of immediate glorification, possibly), given the truth of the perseverance and divine preservation of the saints. All in all, ‘washing of regeneration’ cannot refer to physical baptism.

What then does Paul mean by ‘washing of regeneration’? Put simply, he refers here to the death and resurrection of the saint in Christ by His grace. In death the Christian is cleansed (washed) of his sin, by its imputation to Christ, and in resurrection alongside Christ, the Christian is re-born, made anew, regenerated; furthermore, the righteousness of Christ is imputed to Him, rendering Him not only sinless but truly perfect in the eyes of God, a regeneration not only of his current state but of his eternal record. This death which leads into resurrection is the beauty which physical baptism represents; this death is spiritual baptism. The washing herein accomplished has the quality ‘of regeneration’ in that it is through this death and resurrection that regeneration is accomplished.

Lusk, however, is not content with this single grievous error. Even if physical baptism were to be identified with the actual happening of regeneration, Lusk’s argument would be wrong, for one simple reason: this is a re-birth of the spirit, not the flesh. This error is fatal to Lusk’s argument because he demands baptism resemble physical birth, when it symbolizes rather spiritual birth. How so? Christ says in John 3:5, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” While at first glance this may seem to be an endorsement of physical baptism as a means of salvation (a patently heretical idea, at least taken at face value, given its introduction of works of man’s righteousness in a manner akin to the philosophy of the Judaizers), the section reading ‘born of water’ should be read rather as a reference to spiritual baptism (in symbolic language), to that which the water represents, to the death and resurrection of the Christian in Christ. If physical baptism were here indicated, Nicodemus’s skepticism would be well warranted. Regardless, in demanding that baptism resemble physical birth, Lusk commits the error of Nicodemus, who asked, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” (John 3:4). The birth which physical baptism symbolizes, the resurrection (a changing from not-life to life, just as birth is a changing from not-life to life; that the initial state differs is a product of resurrection’s nature as a second birth, a re-birth, and is therefore not a problem for the equation of resurrection to new birth), this birth is spiritual (John 3:6). That Lusk commits this error, therefore, should prompt the reader to ask not only, “Are you [Lusk] the teacher of Israel and yet you do not understand these things?” (John 3:10) (bracketed section added), but whether Lusk has considered how his requirement that baptism reflect physical birth directly contradicts the entirety of John 3:1-15. Physical baptism reflects spiritual baptism (washing), reflect resurrection (which is the second birth and the happening of regeneration); it does not reflect the birth of the flesh which Lusk asks it to picture.

Lusk’s denunciation of baptism as a symbol requires that physical baptism picture physical birth. Both terms of this requirement, however, fall apart under inspection, rendering the whole argument null. The baptism which Paul here speaks of is not physical baptism primarily but spiritual baptism, the washing which attends and produces regeneration. The birth which Paul here alludes to is, as per John 3:1-15, not a physical but a spiritual birth, a resurrection. Thus, when Lusk argues that baptism is not a symbol, when he says so on the grounds that physical baptism is the primary concern in play and that physical birth is what ought to be symbolized and not spiritual (which is resurrection), he plays with multiple false presuppositions. Physical baptism is not indicated, and physical birth is explicitly disinclined (albeit by another passage). With these two failures, Lusk’s argument cannot stand; it turns only to the grave for its ending.

Part Three will be published here next week.

Context:

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All verses, unless stated otherwise, are taken from the ESV.

This website was used to provide information on the words of the original text.

The paper as a whole is a answer to a section of the article found here. My anti-virus dislikes this webpage, but it has yet to cause issues. If you are worried, I advise copy-and-paste to move the article into a Word document- it makes taking notes easier. The rest of the paper seems to be of similar quality to the section this paper examines, though I’ve not inspected it as closely.