Modes of Baptism

Catholics and many Protestants teach there are three modes of baptism, there are three ways to bring a person into a state of immersion. Dipping, pouring, and sprinkling. This isn't really biblical in authority as we will discuss, but it is classical Greek. The word baptize meant to immerse, and objects could be immersed in all three ways. A cloth in a pan could be immersed by pouring dye into a pan. A person could be buried by digging a hole and then sprinkling dirt on the body until covered. Both of these examples could bring an object to immersion. There are many valid ways to immerse in Greek without it fitting the Biblical idea, you can hollow a hole in a mountain, place a body into the cavern, then roll a stone to fill the hole. The body would be buried or immersed, as Christ was. Those baptized in the cloud and sea were actually surrounded on all sides by water though never getting wet, they were surrounded by walking into the midst and then covered in a cloud. The Holy Spirit filled the room in Acts 2:2, so that all in the room were baptized or immersed fully, by pouring forth. So we see that how one gets to a state of immersion is possible several ways. A person can self immerse by jumping off a boat and into the water.

Catholics and Protestants used Greek to build the case for modes of baptism, but water baptism isn't with dirt, or self-immersed, or even a Spirit baptism. So that all of these possibilities are meaningless and don't fit the scriptural description of baptism. Water baptism.

Matt. 3 quotes John the baptist, "I baptize you in water".  Though English versions say with water the Greek is "in water". In water requires with water, but 'with 'expands the possibilities of modes to allow the broadest latitude, by translating "In" it limits the possibilities. The KJV was translated to view Unity in Diversity in the Church of England, allowing many views, but the Greek isn't as wide. This means the examples of cloud or dirt or rock aren't fitting examples. Water requires a container like a lake, river banks, baptistry, etc Baptism is in the water held by those boundaries.

The Catholics got the idea of dipping, pouring, and sprinkling from these other types of immersion from simply studying usage of language, not from the Bible, they developed their theory of modes after the Bible was written.

Three modes couldn't be from the New Testament because there are only two baptism examples in the New Testament. Christ's baptism by John and the Ethiopian Eunuch in Acts 8. Since there are no recorded differences in those two baptisms we really only have one example, not three.

So it is numerically impossible for Catholics to have gotten their theology about modes from the New Testament. It can't be demonstrated. It is obvious they used language to twist the idea.

Paul told Timothy not to argue about words to the harm of the hearer. Catholics violated this precept.

Modern dictionaries now list all three modes when defining baptism, but originally it wasn't so, the word baptize had a single meaning, it meant to immerse without any reference to how the object got to that state. Yet the examples in scripture do give some good references that show it wasn't sprinkling or pouring.

Some notes from Matthew 3 and Acts 8.

1. "he baptized him", the action is on the person themselves, not action on a bucket or on water. Baptism could only be completed by fully covering the person, even though possible if you sprinkled for a long time, the only practical solution was dipping. Unless you accept a partial immersion. The scriptures give us no such examples.

2. "to be baptized of John" , this implies a single source named John, there weren't three authorities but one, since the word baptize is singular and the authority is singular, quoting later dictionaries doesn't prove any new authority.

3. "in (EV) the Jordan" We know in both baptisms it was into the body of water.

4. I indeed baptize you in water (the KJV uses with water, but that isn't the best Greek, perhaps a theological compromise was used, EV is used so in water is appropriate. )

5. Both went down into the water in Acts 8, Jesus came up out of the water in his baptism.

The word EV is used when at rest, which completes the act of baptism as a final state. Being simply beside the water as the final state would not be used in Greek to my knowledge. In cases where motion brings one into the state, EV would be used to illustrate the state was achieved not a particular mode,

John's statement "I indeed baptize you in the water" settles the matter. There is no other biblical New Testament baptism.  It seems the KJV was allowing people the broadest latitude, with water vs in water. In Jordan vs in the Jordan, leaving out the definite article so it sounds like a region vs the river itself

Since we have no record of John using three modes of baptism, it is doubtful he did. Wouldn't John use the same mode for all as recorded in Mark 1:5. John doesn't use the excuses Catholics and Protestants use today, there is no record of it. Changes to biblical baptism can make baptizing easier and faster, if John thought it to be appropriate, he would have. HMMMM I wonder why he didn't? He was the authority. In the Bible we don't have three modes. Even if there were that possibility, sprinkling and pouring wouldn't achieve actual baptism, they would be figurative acts, since the person wouldn't be covered, being wet doesn't baptize, the cloud and sea baptism they were dry, but surrounded. All biblical baptism resulted in immersion, baptized in water. There was actual baptism, not symbolic partial immersion.

Later authorities recognized three modes of baptism as historical, but not biblical. No one quoted an authoritative source from scripture.

All baptism can start with pouring or sprinkling, rain pours or sprinkles into a valley, the water is collected in a lake or river, so it requires pouring to fill the container, but that isn't the baptism. Pouring in that case would only facilitate the later baptism. The concept to fill the container first, then bring the person into the container for baptism. We aren't baptized by the rain. Even if we stood in a river and it rained on us it wouldn't be the baptism of John, requiring the 2nd person. "He baptized him in the Jordan", the baptism occurs with the help of a man, a person. Even the ark wasn't a baptism until water was on all sides via flood, cloud, and rain. In that baptism a man wasn't required, but with John's a man was required. Sprinkling and pouring couldn't make it "IN the Jordan". Even the pouring forth of the Spirit isn't baptism until they were influenced to speak in tongues and prophesy. The Spirit was poured forth into the entire world, but not all received direct influence.

Keep in mind there is a definite article before Jordan, "the Jordan". Jesus was baptized "in water", not just with water. 

MARK 1:5

And there went out unto him all the land of Judaea, and they of Jerusalem, and were all baptized of him in the river of Jordan, confessing their sins. 

Notice there is not an exclusion to "in the river", this verse only presents one option, not three. So despite modern authorities, they do not follow scripture.

Would Jesus argue with John about doing it a different way? Would his Father be well pleased if he had argued about it? Jesus asked for it John's way, not a simplified symbolic method. Would Jesus accept a false history of John's baptism, claiming three biblical modes? 

The Greek is 100% clear, the baptism was completed "in the river", not just standing in the river, not just unto the water, in Greek the Baptism was consummated with water on all sides, in water, "in the River". There is no other example of biblical baptism. The Greek tells us where baptism was completed. In water is the place of rest for the action.