3. Teaching of Jesus in John iii, 3-8. The most direct and positive teaching in the New Testament on this subject is found in the gospel of John (iii, 3-8), where Jesus says, "Except a man be born from above (ävwdev), he cannot see the kingdom of God." The word åvedev in this connection seems to mean from above rather than again, as frequently translated. It occurs again in verse 31 of the same chapter in the statement, "He that cometh from above is above all." In John xix, 11, Jesus says to Pilate, "Thou wouldest have no power against me, except it were given thee from above." The word has also this meaning in the epistle of James, where it is said that "every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights" (i, 17), and where the wisdom is extolled "which cometh down from above" (iii, 15, 17). And so we understand that the new birth, of which Jesus speaks in John iii, 3-8, is the originating of a new life in the soul by the infusion of a living germ from above, that is, "from God," "from heaven," or "out of heaven," whence Jesus himself came (comp. vers. 2 and 13, and John vi, 38, 41, 42, 50). The mystery of this generation from above is deepened by the statement of verse 5: "Except a man be born of water and Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." The common interpretation which makes the words born of water mean the outward performance of baptism in water has never been able to make itself thoroughly satisfactory. It seems inexplicably strange that our Lord should have thus spoken of Christian baptism to "a ruler of the Jews" at the time and under the circumstances supposed.' That he should have aimed to set him thinking deeply on "heavenly things” (rà ¿ñoʊpávia, ver. 12), is every way supposable, and accords with his remarkable spiritual language to the woman of Samaria and to others. But for him, in a conversation with Nicodemus, to declare most solemnly that the outward ceremony or rite of baptism with water is essential in order to enter into the kingdom of God, is certainly amazing. It is not only out of harmony with the profound spiritual teaching of John's gospel, but it also stands in conflict with the letter and spirit of Jesus's words against the "blind Pharisee," who seeks only to "cleanse

1 Bernard Weiss, in his edition of Meyer's Handbook on John, affirms that "it is historically inconceivable that Jesus should have spoken to Nicodemus of Christian baptism." In his own exposition Weiss maintains that the two factors, water and spirit, "are simply coördinated, the water being conceived in its essence as a purifying factor, the spirit as the efficient creative principle of the new life." But the main trouble is to recognize the water of ritual baptism as a "coördinate" factor along with the creative power of the Spirit. We would rather regard the words idaros kai, water and, in verse 5, as an early interpolation; for they do not occur again in verses 6 and 8, where of the Spirit is repeated, and, taken in the sense in which they have generally been explained, they savor of the ritualistic and sacramental sentiment which infected Christian teaching at an early period.

the outside of the cup and the platter" (Matt. xxiii, 25, 26; Luke xi, 39; Mark vii, 4). That baptism with water is indeed a symbol of the "washing of regeneration" (Titus iii, 5) is true enough, but to coördinate it with regeneration, so as to make it a necessary condition of entrance into the kingdom of God, is to teach "baptismal regeneration" and a "sacramentarian salvation," which ought to be repudiated by all Protestant Christendom.

4. Significance of Titus iii, 5, and Ephesians v, 26. Post-apostolic connotations of baptism and of other external ordinances have been so long read into words and phrases of the New Testament that to question a current interpretation is to expose oneself to the charge of a lack of candor. So it has come to pass that the phrases, "washing of regeneration" (Titus iii, 5), and "the washing of the water in the word" (Eph. v, 26) are claimed with an air of authority to refer necessarily to Christian baptism.' But in the first passage it is said that "God our Saviour, not by works in righteousness which we did ourselves, but according to his mercy saved us through washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit which he poured out upon us richly." Now this washing of regeneration is no more an outward washing with water than is the "purifying unto himself a people for his own possession" by "our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ," in Titus ii, 14, an external act or ceremony. To a New Testament writer the conjunction of the two ideas of "washing of regeneration" and "renewing of the Spirit" would be far more likely to suggest the language and thought of Ezek. xxxvi, 25, 26, than any form or ceremony of baptism. As little can we believe that there is any direct reference to the outward rite of baptism in Eph. v, 26, where Christ is said to have "loved the church, and to have given himself up for her, in order that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of the water in the word, that he himself might present to himself the church glorious, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish." Here it is the church (n έkkλŋola), not the individual believer, that is held before the mind. Christ himself does the cleansing and the washing, though, according to John iv, 2, “Jesus himself baptized not." To suppose that Christ's own cleansing and sanctifying of his church is done by the water of baptism is to magnify an outward ordinance above the word and the Spirit. Those who suppose "the washing of the water" (Eph.

1 So, for example, Ellicott, Commentary on Eph. v, 26: "The reference to baptism is clear and distinct, and the meaning of 2ovrpov, laver, indisputable." But the word 2ovrpóv is never used in the Septuagint as a translation of the Hebrew word for laver (5). Again, on Titus iii, 5, he writes: "Less than this cannot be said by a candid interpreter."

v, 26) to refer directly to baptism naturally find great difficulty in determining both the meaning and the connection of the phrase ¿v pýμari, in the word. But nothing is clearer than that this phua is God's word (pñμa dɛov) which in chapter vi, 17, is called "the sword of the Spirit"; that is, the mighty instrument with which the Spirit works all cleansing and sanctifying. In chapter i, 13, it is called "the word (λóyos) of the truth, the gospel of your salvation." This word is the "power of God unto salvation" (Rom. i, 16), active, sharp, and penetrating (Heb. iv, 12), sanctifying in the truth (John xvii, 17-19). In view of this clear and uniform teaching of the New Testament, the connection of the phrase in the word with what precedes it need not seem difficult. Both the sanctifying and the cleansing is wrought in, or by the instrumentality of, the word of truth. This being the fundamental doctrine, the use of the metaphor of cleansing by the washing of water no more points specifically to baptism in this connection than does the like metaphor of sprinkling with clean water in the language of Ezek. xxxvi, 25. That the metaphor may suggest the analogy of any kind of external ablution need not be questioned at all. So in Eph. v, 26, there may be, as some maintain, an allusion to the bathing of a bride before marriage.' But whatever the particular source of the metaphor of washing in Eph. v, 26, and Titus iii, 5, the real sanctifying, cleansing, and regenerating in the word and Spirit of God can be no outward washing of the body. No legitimate inference from these texts can warrant the sacramentarian doctrine of "baptismal regeneration," or of the necessity of baptism in order to enter the kingdom of God. 5. The New Birth a New Creation. Recurring now to the statement in John iii, 5, we inquire after the source and significance of the mystic words, "Except one be born of water and Spirit." The concept of birth, generation, a coming into being and life, involves necessarily to some extent the idea of a new creation. It is noteworthy that in the Pauline epistles this new spiritual life which a Christian believer receives from God through faith is called a new creation (Kaivǹ) KTίois). In Gal. vi, 15, the apostle exalts this ideal above carnal ordinances by saying that "neither

1 This is the frank confession of Ellicott in his notes on the passage. But he rejects, as "scarcely probable," that meaning of ev phuare which he calls "the ancient and plausible reference to the words used in baptism." It is amazing to find him writing in the same note that the "idea" of sanctifying in the word “is scarcely doctrinally tenable."

This was an ancient custom, and the presentation mentioned in verse 27, and the adorning of a bride for her husband in Rev. xxi, 2, favor the supposition of such an allusion. But the sacramentarian, who insists that hourpóv must mean laver rather than the washing, and that the reference is to the basin, font, or baptistry rather than to the idea or the act of cleansing, naturally makes more account of the bath tub than the bathing.

circumcision is anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature." In 2 Cor. v, 17, he says that "if any man is in Christ, he is (or there is) a new creature; the old things are passed away; behold, they are become new." In Eph. ii, 10, we read: "We are his workmanship (Toínua), created in Christ Jesus for good works"; and in iv, 23, 24, we have the exhortation to "be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, which after God hath been created in righteousness and holiness of truth." So again in Col. iii, 9, 10, the constant putting away of all kinds of sinfulness is based upon the consideration "that ye have put off the old man with his doings, and have put on the new man, who is being renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him." In all these passages the result of the mighty working of God in the soul of man, whereby one is brought from the death of sin into the life of righteousness, is conceived as a new creation. It is, accordingly, most natural to associate this idea of creation with being "born of God." It may be that the truest, clearest concept of creation in the highest sense is that of a begetting, a genesis, and to understand the real import of John iii, 5, we should recognize in the mystic and metaphorical language of Jesus an allusion to the primeval creation as read in the first chapter of Genesis. There we have the picture of a series of creative acts set forth as a succession of births produced by the word of God, and they are called "generations of the heavens and the earth." At the beginning "darkness was upon the face of the deep and the Spirit of God was brooding upon the face of the waters." And when "God said, Let there be light; and there was light," we get our first and sublimest concept of a divine creative birth § vdaтoç kaì πveúμaros, from water and Spirit. As in that primeval creation light came forth out of the darkness by the word of God, begotten as it were from the waters and the Spirit that brooded over them, so the new life and light of God are brought forth in the heart of man by the working of the same Spirit from above. The "being born of water," therefore, in John iii, 5, is not the ceremony of baptism, but a mystic allusion to the brooding of the Spirit over the waters and the breaking of the light out of the "darkness that was upon the face of the deep,"

1 The new creation of the spirit into fullness of knowledge and truth, is regarded by the apostle as analogous to man's first creation. As he was then made in the image of God, so now; but it was then naturally, now spiritually in iniyvwois. It is not to restore the old, but to create the new, that redemption has been brought about.-Alford, Greek Testament, notes in loco.

2So in fact many interpreters translate the word Krios, which may mean either creature or creation. According to Schöttgen, Hora Hebraica, vol. i, pp. 328, 704, the proselyte who was converted from idolatry to Judaism was called 2, a new creation.

and the significance of the allusion is in the fact that the new birth from above is like the creation of a new heaven and earth. This seems to have been the thought of Paul when he says that "God, who said, Light shall shine out of the darkness, shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" (2 Cor. iv, 6). Here we have a true concept of the new birth and the new creation in Christ Jesus. Such generation, or regeneration, is necessarily a work of God in man. It is the gracious product of the life of the Spirit from above (åvwdev). Conviction of sin, repentance, and faith are essential conditions of this transition into heavenly life, and in all these conditions the human soul coöperates with the life-giving Spirit; and so we read in John i, 12, 13: "As many as received him, to them gave he power (éžovoiav, authority, right) to become children of God, even to them that believe on his name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God."

6. Mystery of Spiritual Life. The mystery of this new birth is recognized in John iii, 8, and compared to the wind' which blows where it will, and makes itself heard, but no one knows whence it comes nor whither it goes. There is mystery connected with "that which is born of the flesh," as such scriptures as Eccl. xi, 5, and Psa. cxxxix, 14, 15, confess; much deeper is the mystery of spiritual and heavenly things. This much, however, seems to be beyond contradiction, that in all the world of living things no form or kind of life is known to come into existence except as the outgrowth of some antecedent germ of life. No changing of substances, no modifications of environment, no chemical compounds, no forces of electricity or of any kind of energy known to man, can endow one atom of the material world with the principle of life. And so we may say of any form of inanimate matter in the world, Except some germ of life be imparted to it from above, that is, from some higher power or nature having life in itself, it cannot enter the realm of life at all.' In accordance with this analogy, so invariable and universal in the world of nature, there can come no spiritual element of life in man, who is "dead in

1 Bengel (Gnomon of the New Testament, in loco) does not allow the meaning of wind to rò πveïμa in this verse but translates: "The Spirit breatheth where it will, and thou hearest its voice, but knowest not whence it comes and whither it goes; so is every one who is born of the Spirit." The Sinaitic MS. reads in the last sentence: "So is every one who is born of water and Spirit." The fact that Vevμa is used, like the Hebrew, both for wind and spirit, occasions ambiguity. The illustration drawn from the mystery of the wind may have been suggested by Gen. i, 2:, "The Spirit of God brooded upon the face of the waters," where some render D, a wind of God. Comp. Gen. viii, 1.

'See Henry Drummond's suggestive chapter on "Biogenesis" in his Natural Law in the Spiritual World, pp. 61-94. New York, 1887.