contrary to the present understanding of scientific historical investigation to use documents of much later age as the main proof for facts of a long prior period. The Talmud in its kernel, the Mishna, is from two hundred to four hundred years later than the New Testament; and in its commentary on the Mishna, the Gemara, it is from four hundred to eight hundred years after the period of John the Baptist. The Mishna and the Gemara are good witnesses of Jewish opinion in their day; but they are not proper witnesses for long prior centuries, and for this purpose nothing can be gained from them but probabilities without proof.

Let us see if literature, history, and archæology agree on these points of discussion.

THE BATHS AND JOHN'S BAPTISM.

The laws of Jehovah, as we find them in the Pentateuch, like the laws of Christ, as we find them in the New Testament, were of old truly followed only by those who "with their whole heart" sought to do the will of God. Those who faithfully followed these Pentateuch laws would be scrupulously clean in person, in clothing, in house and all its furniture, especially in utensils for cooking, and in all articles of food. When they went abroad they would seek to avoid everything that would render them ceremonially unclean, and, because they never could be certain that they had not touched some of the very numerous polluting things (Lev. v. 2), the bath for cleansing followed by sacrifice for cleansing was a constant prescription and duty (Lev. v. 2; xi. 8, 24-28; xv. 5-13, 21-27; Num. xix. 11– 22; Deut. xiv. 8-20). These laws prescribing cleanness surrounded especially the altar of Jehovah, and barred from it, under penalty of death, the unclean in priest, in Levite, in offerer, in sacrifice (Ex. xl. 12 f.; Lev. viii. 6; xxii. 3— 9; Num. viii. 7-21; Ex. xxviii. 36-38; xxix. 37; xxx. 29;

Lev. vi. 18, 27; xxi. 1–8, 17–23; Lev. xv. 1-33; Num. ix. 9-13; xix. 13, 20; Lev. xi. 1-47; xx. 20-25; Deut. xiv. 4-21; XV. 21-23; xvii. 1). Only the clean could come to the altar (Lev. xv. 31; Num. xix. 20); only the clean were to eat of the sacrifice within the temple enclosure (Lev. vii. 19-21); and only the clean were to eat of that sacrifice, the passover, where once a year every Israelite became his own priest (Num. ix. 6-14; comp. 2 Chrom. XXX. 17-20).

There were numerous causes for ceremonial uncleanness enduring only for a day. This uncleanness was to be put away by washing the clothes and bathing the flesh and at evening he was clean (Lev. xv. 1-33; xvii. 15). In some instances this procedure is mentioned by only one of its parts (either by "washing the clothes," as Ex. xix. 10, 14; Lev. xi. 25, 28; xiii. 6, 34; or by "bathing the flesh in water," Lev. xxii. 6); while the other part is presupposed as well understood. But there were three uncleannesses which could be put away only by ceremonies lasting through eight days: leprosy (Lev. xiv. 1-10); issue in the flesh (Lev. xv. 13-15, 28-30); touching a dead body or parts of it, and its home, the grave (Num. xix. 11-20). These ceremonies are constantly misunderstood, because a part is taken for the whole; as, for instance, it is said (Lev. xiv. 7, 8) that the healed leper is to be sprinkled with blood and pronounced clean; and he shall wash his clothes, and bathe his flesh, and be clean; as if either of these constituted his cleansing. But he is only in process of being cleansed, as we see from the following verses (9, 11, 14, 17, 18, 19); and not until the sacrifice had been offered on the eighth day was he fully cleansed. So in the cleansing from contact with a dead body or human bones or a grave, on the third and the seventh day the water for impurity, i.e., with the ashes of the red heifer (Num. xix. 9, 11, 13), was to be sprinkled on the unclean, and afterwards the un

clean must "wash his clothes, and bathe his flesh in water, and he shall be clean at even"; that is, as in the case of the leper, he was so far, but not fully, cleansed, for the sacrifice must be offered for his complete cleansing on the eighth day (Lev. v. 2−6).

It is in this cleansing from contact with a dead body, etc., that is found the only sprinkling with water mentioned in the Old Testament. The leper was sprinkled with blood and the leprous house with blood and water; the unclean from contact with a dead body, etc., was sprinkled with water in which were the ashes of the red heifer. It is to this sprinkling, an initiatory rite that marked one as in process of being cleansed by the following bath and sacrifice, that Jehovah, speaking in the first person, makes reference in Ezek. xxxvi. 24, 25: "The house of Israel had profaned his name among the nations whither they went." For his own name's sake he will bring them back, and "I will take you from among the nations, and gather you out of all the countries, and I will bring you into your own land. And I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness [uncleannesses, as in verse 29, and so commonly rendered in Num. xix. and elsewhere], and from all your idols, will I cleanse you." And (ver. 29) "I will save you from all your uncleannesses." That is, Jehovah himself will be the ministrant to cleanse them according to his appointed rites for putting away uncleanness (Num. xix. 1-21), where sprinkling began the ceremonies of eight days, and the bath and sacrifice closed them.

No Israelite was to come to the tabernacle or temple or passover to sacrifice without being first cleansed. The ceremonies of cleansing are specified, and are to be performed under penalty of death. So far all is clear. it is said that there were no provisions made for initiation of converts from the nations. On the contrary, there were

But

just as specific directions for the cleansing of the converts as for the born Israelite. Again and again it is prescribed that there shall be one and the same law respecting the passover and the sacrifices for the Israelite and for "the stranger," "the alien," "the sojourner" of other nations (Ex. xii. 49; Num. ix. 14; xv. 13-16, 19). All the males must be circumcised and those coming from the uncleanness of heathenism "to take refuge," like Ruth, "under the wings of Jehovah, the God of Israel," were cleansed by the sprinkling of the water for impurity on the third and the seventh day, followed by the washing of the clothes and the bathing of the flesh on the seventh day, and by the sacrifice on the eighth day. Jehovah himself sets before us this cleansing by his own hand from the uncleannesses of the nations.

The bath, then, was the constant prescription, the frequent duty, of every sincere follower of Jehovah's will. It cleansed one for the following sacrifice. Without it he could not come to the temple. It was so important in the ritual of Israel that on the great day of atonement, the supreme day of the whole year, the high priest, cleansed by the bath before entering the temple, must "bathe his flesh in water” just before putting on the holy linen garments (Lev. xvi. 4), and, again (Lev. xvi. 24), before putting on his usual garments "he shall bathe his flesh in water."

This bath for ceremonial cleansing, in living, running water (Lev. xv. 13), not limited as to place, was far more common in Israel than baptism is with us. Baptism is performed but once, but the bath for cleansing before going to the temple was required frequently of the same perThis bath was to the pious, repentant Israelite the speaking type of the cleansing of the soul, from the uncleanness of sin, by him who alone could cleanse. Listen to the heart repentance of the great sinner of Israel. "Wash [comp. Lev. xiv. and xv.] me thoroughly from

son.

mine iniquity, and cleanse [Num. xix. 19] me from my sin." "Purge [same word as, ver. 2, "cleanse" and Num. xix. 19, 20, where R. V. "purify"] me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash [as ver. 2] me, and I shall be whiter than snow" (Ps. li. 2, 7). And Jehovah's exhortation, "Wash you [bathe yourselves], make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes . . . though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool" (Isa. i. 16-18). "When Jehovah shall have washed [bathed] away the filth of the daughters of Zion" (Isa. iv. 4).

What the word translated "bathe" meant to the oriental we learn from Elisha's direction to Naaman, the Syrian, to "bathe in Jordan seven times," and "he went down and dipped himself seven times in Jordan according to the saying of the man of God"; from the Apocrypha (Judith xii. 7), where she dips herself in the flowing water1 to cleanse herself from the defilement of the heathen camp; from the continued Jewish use and from the innumerable quotations of these baths in the Old Testament by early oriental Christian writers as the precedents of baptism by immersion.

With this bath constantly before the Hebrews, speaking to every thoughtful man of the uncleanness of his sin and of the need and way of his cleansing, it is not at all surprising that, when John was sent by God to call the repentant to the running (living) water of the Jordan to be baptized in it unto the remission of sins (Matt. iii. 2, 8, 11; Mark i. 4; Luke iii. 3, 8), there should have been no astonishment on the part of the Jews either as to the place or mode. Their query was only, "Who art thou?" "Why

1It has been suggested that Judith could not find a secluded spot where she might bathe within the camp of the Assyrians. Since the lines of the camp are given as eighteen miles by five miles in a mountainous and well-watered country, the difficulty suggested seems most improbable.