ing of Christianity to this day they have always baptized, and do yet baptize, by immersion. This is an authority for the meaning of the word baptize infinitely preferable to that of European lexicographers; so that a man, who is obliged to trust human testimony, and who baptizes by immersion, because the Greeks do, understands a Greek word exactly as the Greeks themselves understand it; and in this case the Greeks are unexceptionable guides, and their practice is, in this instance, safe ground of action.

The English translators did not translate the word baptize, and they acted wisely, for there is no one word in the English language, which is an exact counterpart of the Greek word, as the New Testament uses it, containing the precise ideas of the evangelists, neither less nor more. The difficulty, or rather the excellence of the word is, that it contains two ideas inclusive of the whole doctrine of baptism. Baptize is a dyer's word, and signifies to dip, so as to colour. Such as render the word dip, give one true idea, but the word stood for two, and one is wanting in this rendering. This defect is in the German Testament, Matt. iii. 1. In those days came John der tauffer, John the dipper; and the Dutch, in those days came John een dooper, John the Dipper.

This is the truth, but it is not the whole truth. The Saxon Testament adds another idea, by naming the administrator John Se Fulluhtere, John the fuller. The Islandick language translates baptism skirn (1), scouring. These convey two ideas, cleansing by washing; but neither do these accurately express the two ideas of the Greek baptize; for though repentance in some cases accompanies baptism, as it does prayer, yet not in every case. Jesus was baptized in Jordan, but he was not cleansed from any moral or ceremonial turpitude by it, nor was any repentance mixed with his baptism. Purification by baptism is an accident; it may be, it may not be, it is not essential to baptism. The word then conveys two ideas, the one literal, dipping, the other figurative, colouring, a figure however expressive of a real fact; meaning that John by bathing persons in the river Jordan conferred a character, a moral hue, as dyers by

3

(1) Kristni Saga, Hafnia 1773. Skirn, baptism, from skir, clean, skire, to cleanse.

dipping in a dying vat set a tinct or colour; John by baptism discriminating the disciples of Christ from other men, as dyers by colouring distinguish stuffs. Hence John is called, by early Latins, John tinctor, the exact Latin of Joannes baptistes, John the Baptist.

Tertullian, the first Latin father, observes, that baptism was administered with great simplicity (2), homo in aqua demissus, et inter pauca verba tinctus. The mode seems to have been this. The administrator standing in the water, and putting his hand on the back part of the head of the candidate, standing also in the water, bowed him forward till he was immersed in the water, pronouncing in the mean time the baptismal words, by which he characterized him a Christian. Every body knows how the Romans understood demisso capite, demisso vultu, demissis oculis, and the like.

The Syrians, the Armenians, the Persians, and all Eastern Christians have understood the Greek word baptism, to signify dipping, and agreeably to their own versions, they all, and always administer baptism by immersion, but Mohammed in the Alcoran has most fully translated the original word. He calls baptism sebgatallah, that is divine dying, or the tinging of God, from sebgah dying, and Allah God. A celebrated orientalist says, Mohammed made use of this compound term for baptism, because in his time Christians administered baptism as dyers tinge, by immersion, and not as now [in the West] by aspersion (3). Mohammed every where expresses great respect for the rites of Christians, and being asked why he set aside baptism, he answered, because the true divine tinct, which is true baptism, is faith and grace, which God bestows on true believers. This inward tinct is half the meaning of baptism, the other half is immersion in water.

The very learned Dr. John Gale (4), whose accurate knowledge of Greek was never doubted, hath traced the original word in profane writers, and hath proved that with the Greeks bapto signified I dip, baptai dyers, baphia a dye house, bapsis dying by dipping. Bammata dying drugs, baphikee the art of dying, dibaphos double dyed, baptisterion a dying vat, &c. Tertullian

(2) De Baptismo, cap. ii.
(3) Herbelot. Bibliot. Orient.
(4) Reflections upon Wall's History of Infant Baptism. Let. iii.

preserves both the ideas in the few words quoted above, demissus in aqua is the first, dipped, and tinctus the other, coloured, or characterized, so that the single word baptism stands for both dipping, the mode, and a person of real character, the only subject of baptism. There is a propriety in acknowledging a believer in Christ a real character by baptism. It is giving him the name who hath the thing. To this sense of the word all circumstances and descriptions agree, as baptizing in the river Jordan-going down into the water-coming up out of the water, buried in baptism, and the rest, so that the proper answer to the question, how did John administer baptism, is, By immersion.

Learned men have inquired whether John used any set form of words in baptizing, and, if he did, what words? Some think he used no form (5). Others think he baptized in the name of the Trinity (6); but a passage in the book of Acts seems to say, that he baptized in one of the names of Jesus (7). When Paul went first to Ephesus (8), he found some disciples, who had not received, or even heard of the extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost. The apostle inquired, into what then were ye baptized? They said into John's baptism. Paul described John's baptism, and said, John verily baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying unto the people, that they should believe on him which should come after him, that is, added Paul, on Christ Jesus. And when they, the disciples of John, heard John say this, they were baptized by John in the name of the Lord Jesus. This paraphrastical reading is given in a few words to express the supposed true sense of the passage, and it seems to convey the opinions of those divines, who affirm, that there was but one baptism-that the Ephesians were not rebaptized-that the baptism of John was true christian baptism—and that he baptized in some one of the names of Jesus, and most likely in that of Messiah, or Christ, or him that was

to come.

(5) Bellarmin. Probabile est, Joannem nulla verborum formula usum fuisse.

(6) Daniel Chamieri Panstratiæ, tom. iv. lib. 5. cap. 13.

(7) Joan. Ecci Homil. 7. (8) Acts xix. i, &c. Beza... Gill, &c.

CHAP. III.

OF THE PLACES WHERE JOHN BAPTIZED.

DIFFERENT writers for different purposes have represented Palestine as a track of bleak and blasted mountains, always burnt up with excessive droughts, and from age to age a land of perpetual barrenness. Some have done this in order to discredit the writings of Moses, and others, with a design to disprove the baptism of immersion, as if the country could afford no more water than would suffice by pouring or sprinkling. This makes it proper to examine the places where John administered baptism.

That Palestine hath been declining in fertility ever since the Babylonish captivity is true; that in the time of Jerom, who lived there, it was ill supplied with water, and subject to great droughts, (1) and that it is now desolate, must be allowed; but that it formerly answered the description of Moses, and deserved all the commendations he gave it, must also be granted, if any credit is to be given to the ancient inhabitants of it, to good historians of adjacent countries, or to modern credible travellers (2). It was a good land, a land for cattle, a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig-trees, and pomegranates; a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that sprang out of vallies and hills; a land flowing with milk and honey (3). Its present condition may easily be accounted for. It is not now the home of industrious owners, who divided it into manageable family estates, where every exertion was employed to make it productive; but it is a small inconsiderable part of a vast despotical empire, where the state of property, and the spirit of govern ment, serve rather to depopulate than to improve a country. For ages, the land hath been a prey to successive plunderers, and the owners themselves defaced it to abate the rage of crusaders for invading it. It hath been damaged too by droughts and earthquakes. The opulent and fruitful island of

(1) Com. in Amos, cap. iv.

(2) Joseph. de bel. Jud. lib. iii. cap. 3. Aristeas. Taciti Hist. lib. v. Shaw. Maundrell, &c.

Strabo. Lib. xvi.

(3) Deut. viii. 7, 8. &c. Num. xiii. 17, &c. xxxii. 4, &c.

Cyprus was burnt up and nearly depopulated for want of rain; for, about the time of Constantine, there was none for six and thirty years; but this did not make histories of its ancient fertility incredible; and the present condition of Palestine serves to render respectable the ancient Jewish prophets who foresaw, and foretold it.

John, setting out from the place of his birth, Hebron, a city in the hilly part of the tribe of Judah, two and twenty miles from Jerusalem, travelling northward, and leaving Tekoa, Bethlehem, and Jerusalem, on the left, went towards Bethhoglah, Engedi, Gilgal, and Jericho, taking his road through the wilderness of Judah, near the banks of the lake Asphaltites, and crying or preaching to the inhabitants of the towns, arrived at that part of the wilderness which is bounded on the East by the river Jordan, which met him, as it were, running a-long-side full south, and hereabouts fixed his first baptismal station. The word wilderness did not signify in Judea, an uninhabited country, but woody, grazing lands, in distinction from arable fields, which were champaign or open, and vineyards, olive-yards, orchards, and gardens which were enclosed. There were, in the time of Joshua, six cities with their villages in this wilderness, and the inhabitants of those parts were graziers and sheep-masters (4.)

When Balaam, from the top of an adjacent hill, sur veyed that part of the country toward which John travelled, he was charmed with the beauty and fertility of the scene, and he observed that the spot was adorned and perfumed like Paradise: the vallies were like gardens spread forth by the river's side and the banks rising from the waters were ornamented with aromatick timbers and fruit trees (5). The description was exact, for that end of the wilderness toward Jericho hung sloping down a valley fifteen miles in width, all along which the Jordan, from north to south, rolled its waves; in some places deep and rapid, overhung with wood growing on banks four or five feet above the water, formerly thickets and lodgments of lions; behind these other banks rising to the height of fifteen feet;

(4) Blas. Ugolini Thesaur. Antiquitat. Sacrarum. Vol. vi. Venetiis, 1746. Reland. lib. i. cap. lvi. De locis incultis et sylvis Palestine. Solitudo Jude. (5) Num. xxiv. 6. Poli Synops. in loc.