"One baptism for the forgiveness of sins"

[spl_cadet]

I'm curious: How do those who do not believe in baptismal regeneration interpret the statement of First Nicea that "We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins"?

[Solly]

Acts 2.38, 10.43

[spl_cadet]

Hebrews 6:1-3 cf the statements of First Nicea and the Early Church Fathers.

[Solly]

Unlike scripture, we are not obliged to accept the interpretation placed upon the words by the original authors - cf John Henry Newman and the articles of the Church of England. Since the creeds have to be based on scripture, then we go back to it, and correct our understanding, and in the "descended in hell" clause.

[spl_cadet]

How else are we to interpret Scripture outside of the living tradition handed down from the apostles, shown in a written form in the writings of the ECFs?

[bar Jonah]

One baptism for the forgiveness of sins...

You mean in contrast to the two that are professed by the Roman Catholic Church?

1) Water baptism

2) Baptism of the Holy Spirit


(Which is, of course, what is described in early Acts, btw. This issue is covered with a great deal of scripture in a very recent article from GODISNOWHERE, which can be found in our subforum here at Tweb. Links to this and other articles are in my signature. "The Dispensations of Water Baptism.")

[smilax]

I'm curious: How do those who do not believe in baptismal regeneration interpret the statement of First Nicea that "We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins"?

Very incorrectly.

[Solly]

How else are we to interpret Scripture outside of the living tradition handed down from the apostles, shown in a written form in the writings of the ECFs?

Right.
So the ECF never got it wrong?
So John Cassian and Augustine agree? So Clement Alex. and Basil agree?
Scripture is scripture, it is the Word of God, and everything else is footnotes. The only way to test the veracity of our statements is to go back to the word again and again and again.
Read Calvin, Luther, and other Reformers, you will see them knee deep in the ECF, drawing upon them, correcting them, applauding them. The same goes for the Puritan era where divines such as John Owen and John Gill had a command of the ECF (and Rabbinical writings) that was encyclopedic, and which we can only marvel at. But scripture is the canon, not men's writings. Creeds are the writings of men. so are sermons and homilies and tractates, etc.
I am sure we could drag up some howlers from ECF doctrine and exegesis to show that they had feet of clay.
Yes, there is a living tradition; but RCC/EO's too often fossilize that tradition - as Reformed churches can do with their own tradition, you aren't alone in that - because they raise the writings of men above scripture. I am pretty sure the ECF had no thought of encasing scriptural theology in the strait jacket of Thomist Aristotelianism for a start. And that is still official theology in the RCC, as the Pope's encyclical on Fides et Ratio shows.

[Ulmo]

Right.
So the ECF never got it wrong?
So John Cassian and Augustine agree? So Clement Alex. and Basil agree?
Scripture is scripture, it is the Word of God, and everything else is footnotes. The only way to test the veracity of our statements is to go back to the word again and again and again.
Read Calvin, Luther, and other Reformers, you will see them knee deep in the ECF, drawing upon them, correcting them, applauding them. The same goes for the Puritan era where divines such as John Owen and John Gill had a command of the ECF (and Rabbinical writings) that was encyclopedic, and which we can only marvel at. But scripture is the canon, not men's writings. Creeds are the writings of men. so are sermons and homilies and tractates, etc.
I am sure we could drag up some howlers from ECF doctrine and exegesis to show that they had feet of clay.
Yes, there is a living tradition; but RCC/EO's too often fossilize that tradition - as Reformed churches can do with their own tradition, you aren't alone in that - because they raise the writings of men above scripture. I am pretty sure the ECF had no thought of encasing scriptural theology in the strait jacket of Thomist Aristotelianism for a start. And that is still official theology in the RCC, as the Pope's encyclical on Fides et Ratio shows.

Spot on!

[Rusty T]

Scripture in Eastern Orthodoxy is not supplanted by Tradition. They are not opposed, nor are they separate. Fr. Hopko gives a good, short explanation of this that I'd like to quote:

The Bible is the book of sacred writings for God's People, the Church. It was produced in the Church, by and for the Church, under divine inspiration as an essential part of the total reality of God's covenant relationship with His People. It is the authentic Word of God for those who belong to God's chosen assembly of believers, to the Israel of old and to the Church of Christ today and forever.
The Bible lives in the Church. It comes alive in the Church and has the most profound divine meaning for those who are members of the community which God has established, in which He dwells, and to which, through His Word and His Spirit, He has given Himself for participation, communion and life everlasting. Outside of the total life and experience of the community of faith, which is the Church of Christ, "the pillar and bulwark of the truth" (1 Tim 3:15) no one can truly understand and correctly interpret the Bible.

Ro 6:3 Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?

[Solly]

Can't disagree with that Tizzidale; it's just that some exalt the authority of the church over scripture, and given innate human laziness, that usually means everyone doing what those in authority say, rather than learning for themselves, so that faith in Christ degenerates into faith in what the church teaches. Not the same thing. The ECF, and every other teacher, were men and women at best, and made mistakes like we do: Origen, Tertullian, for example. God is living and active in his church, and new times require a new look at his Word. Too often, as I mentioned, church theology has become enslaved to the very worldly philosophy it has used to explicate its views.

[Mujibur]

Scripture is scripture, it is the Word of God, and everything else is footnotes.

Very well said, Solly.

[Abigail]

Ephesians 4:4-6 "There is one body and one Spirit just as also you were called into one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all."

[Abigail]

"We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins"?

[spl_cadet]

St. Irenaeus

"‘And [Naaman] dipped himself . . . seven times in the Jordan’ [2 Kgs. 5:14]. It was not for nothing that Naaman of old, when suffering from leprosy, was purified upon his being baptized, but [this served] as an indication to us. For as we are lepers in sin, we are made clean, by means of the sacred water and the invocation of the Lord, from our old transgressions, being spiritually regenerated as newborn babes, even as the Lord has declared: ‘Except a man be born again through water and the Spirit, he shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven’" (Fragment 34)