thereof it flows through the valley down to the Dead Sea, into which it empties, in lat. 31° 46'. The distance from the lake of Galilee to the Dead Sea is about 56 geographical miles, but the many windings of the channel make about 150 miles between these points. Its width will average, according to Schaff, from 60 to 100 feet, and its depth from 5 to 12 feet.' The valley of the Jordan runs from five to six miles in width, and is inclosed by mountains; in many places it is remarkable for its luxuriant fertility. The exact spot where John first used this Divine baptistry cannot now be positively identified. Anciently, it was known as 'Bethabara,' supposed to be about three miles from Jericho, and his second baptismal scene was farther north, being known as 'Enon, near Salem.' Each eminent writer and traveler now fixes upon some picturesque locality, often selected largely on poetical taste; but all conjecture fails to point it out definitely. Some pitch on a line between Gilgal and Jericho, and some still farther north, at the ford where Gideon threw up fortifications against his foes. But as the whole valley was filled with crowds of candidates, from the Salt Sea to the head-waters, it is most likely that he used various places, especially as John, x, 49, speaks of the place where he first baptized.' Frequently, reckless writers rush into random statements, and assert that its depth would not allow of immersion, utterly regardless of all topographical exploration, such as that made by Lieutenant Lynch, of the United States Navy. Yet, Jehovah found it necessary to divide the waters for Israel and Elijah, while Pococke and other explorers estimate its daily discharges into the Dead Sea, to be about 6,000,000 tons of water. 18

Dr. Schaff (Through Bible Lands, 1878) speaks thus: At the bathing place of the Pilgrims, the traditional site of Christ's baptism, the river is 80 feet broad and 9 feet deep. . . . After the salt bath in the lake of death it was like a bath of regeneration. I immersed myself ten times, and felt so comfortable, that I almost imagined I was miraculously delivered from rheumatism. I have plunged into many a river and many a lake, and into the waters of the ocean, but of all the baths, that in the Jordan will linger longest in my memory.'

Was John's baptism a burial in water or not? Candid minds can scarcely doubt what this action was, when they weigh the meaning of the Greek word baptizo, the places where he administered it, and all its attendant circumstances. John, as well as all other sacred speakers used words in their commonly accepted sense, of their times, and this is as true of this word as of any other. Its sense is easily found. Conant, the great philologist and translator, gives a complete monograph of the root word, in his 'Baptizein' taken from the best known Greek authors, running from B. C. 500 to the eleventh century A. D.; and, in 168 examples from the Greek literature, covers both the literal or physical, and the tropical or figurative, sense of the word. Their whole scope shows that the ground meaning of the word is: To immerse, iminerge, submerge, to dip, to plunge, to imbathe, to whelm. A few of these examples, taken from objects already in water, will clearly illustrate its sense:

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21

MEANING OF BAPTIZO.

Pindar, born B. C. 522 years, in likening himself to a cork floating on the top of a net, says: When the rest of the tackle is toiling deep in the sea, I, as a cork above the net, am unbaptized (undipped) in the brine.' 19 Aristotle, born B. C. 384, speaking of discoveries made beyond the Pillars of Hercules, says, that the Phenician colonists of Gadira, 'came to certain desert places full of rushes and sea-weed; which, when it is ebb-tide, are not baptized (overflowed), but when it is flood-tide are overflowed.' 20 Polybius, born B. C. 205, speaking of the sea-battle between Philip and Attalus, tells of one vessel as 'pierced, and being baptized (immerged) by a hostile ship. Again, in his account of the naval engagement between the Romans and Carthaginians, he accords the greater skill to the latter. Now sailing round and now attacking in flank the more advanced of the pursuers, while turning and embarrassed on account of the weight of the ships and the unskillfulness of the crews, they made continued assaults and "baptized" (sunk) many of the ships.' 22 Strabo, born B. C. 60, says that about Agrigentum, in Sicily, there are 'Marsh-lakes, having the taste indeed of sea water, but of a different nature; for even those who cannot swim are not baptized (immersed), floating like pieces of wood.' 23 In the same work he speaks of Alexander's army marching on a narrow, flooded beach of the Pamphilian Sea, in these words: Alexander happening to be there at the stormy season, and, accustomed to trust for the most part to fortune, set forward before the swell subsided; and they marched the whole day in water; baptized (immersed) as far as to the waist.' Diodorus, who wrote about B. C. 60-30, reports the Carthaginian army defeated on the bank of the river Crimissus; and that many of them perished because the stream was swollen: The river rushing down with the current increased in violence, baptized (submerged) many, and destroyed them attempting to swim through with their armor.' 25 He also describes the annual overflow of the Nile thus: Most of the wild land animals are surrounded by the stream and perish, being baptized (submerged); but some, escaping to the high grounds, are saved,' 26

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These examples bring us down to John's day and fully sustain the learned Deylingius, when he says of him: He received the name ton Baptiston, from the office of solemn ablution and immersion, in which he officiated by a divine command. For the word baptizesthai, in the usage of Greek authors, signifies immersion and demersion.' Josephus, born A. D. 37, frequently uses this word, and always in the same sense. The following are noteworthy examples: Aristobulus was drowned by his companions in a swimming bath, and in relating the murder he says: Continually pressing down and baptizing (immersing) him while swimming, as if in sport, they did not desist till they had entirely suffocated him.'28 He also describes the contest, in his Jewish War, between the Romans and the Jews, on the Sea of Galilee, and says of the Jews: They suffered harm before they could inflict any, and were baptized (submerged) along with their vessels. . . . And those of the baptized who raised their heads, either a missile reached, or a vessel overtook.' Again, in describing his own shipwreck, he says: Our vessel having been baptized (sunk) in the midst of the Adriatic, being about six hundred in number, we swam through the whole night.' Lucian, born about A. D. 135, in a satire on the love of the marvelous, tells of men that he saw running on the sea. They were like hinself except that they had cork-feet. He says: We wondered, therefore, when we saw them not baptized, (immersed) but standing above the waves and traveling on without fear.' Dion Cassius, born 155 A. D., says of the defeated forces at Utica who rushed to their ships and ove: loaded them, that some of them were thrown down by the jostling, in getting on board the vessels, and others baptized (submerged) in the vessels themselves, by their own weight. 30 In the same work he gives an account of the sea-fight between Marc Antony and Augustus, at Actium, when, near the close of the battle, men escaped from the burning ships. He says: 'others leaping into the sea were drowned, or struck by the enemy were baptized, (submerged).' 31

TESTIMONY OF SCHOLARS.

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These citations from classic Greek writers, covering about 700 years, including the Apostolic Age, unite in describing things on which water was poured, or which were partially immersed, as unbaptized; while others, which were dipped or plunged in water and overwhelmed, they declare to have been baptized; showing, that when the sacred penmen use the same word to describe the act of John in the Jordan, they use it in the same sense as other Greek authors, namely: to express the act of dipping or immersion.

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This cumulative evidence fully justifies Calvin in saying: 'Baptism was administered by John and Christ, by the submersion of the whole body.' 32 Tertullian, the great Latin father, A. D. 200, also says: Nor is there any material difference between those whom John dipped in the Jordan, and those whom Peter dipped in the Tiber.' So Lightfoot: That the baptism of John was by the immersion of the body, seems evident from those things which are related concerning it; namely, that he baptized in the Jordan, and in Enon, because there was much water, and that Christ being baptized went up out of the water.' MacKnight says the same thing: Christ submitted to be baptized, that is, to be buried under the water by John, and to be raised out of it again.' 35 Olshausen agrees with these interpreters, says: John, also, was baptizing in the neighborhood, because the water there being deep, afforded conveniences for submersion.' De Wette bears the same testimony: They were baptized, immersed, submerged. This is the proper meaning of the frequentative form of bapto, to immerse.' And Alford, on Matt. iii, 6, says: 'The baptism was administered in the day-time by immersion of the whole person.'

for he

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These authorities abundantly show that our Lord, in requiring the first act of obedience on the part of his new disciple, employed a Greek word in common use for expressing the most familiar acts of every-day life. And the testimony of the Septuagint, the Greek version of the Old Testament, completed B. C. 285, harmonizes exactly with this use. When quoting the Hebrew Scriptures, Jesus and his apostles generally used this version. Here the Greek word 'ebaptisato' is used to translate the Hebrew word 'taval' (2 Kings v, 14), where the English version also renders it by the word 'dipped,' to express the act of Naaman in the river Jordan. The word 'taval' is used fifteen times in the Old Testament, and is rendered in our common English version fourteen times by dip,' and once (Job ix, 31) by 'plunge.' In Gen. xxxvii, 31, the Jewish scholars who made the Septuagint version rendered 'moluno' to stain, the effect of dipping, as in dyeing, this being the chief thought which the translator would express. It is also worthy of note that the preposition 'en' is rendered 'in' before Jordan in all the commonly received versions of the English New Testament (Matt. iii, 6), namely: in that of Wiclif, 1380; Tyndal, 1534; Cranmer, 1539; Geneva, 1557; Rheims, 1582; and King James, 1611. In the last named 'with' was afterward substituted for 'in,' but it is restored by the late Anglo-American revisers.

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CHAPTER III.

THE BAPTIST'S WITNESS TO CHRIST.

OHN gave a threefold testimony to Christ. As a prophet, he proclaimed the kingdom of God, through the Messiah; as a preacher, he led the people to preparation for the Messiah; and as a witness, he pointed out Christ in person as the Messiah. The people believed that the Baptist was the veritable Elijah. The Sanhedrin was bound to prevent any false prophet from misleading the people, and in order to subject John to a rigid examination, they sent a deputation of officials from Jerusalem to question him. They asked him: Who art thou? The Christ? Elijah? The Prophet?' He answered: 'No.' But his ministry so stirred the people that they found a pledge therein of deliverance from Roman rule, and 'reasoned in their hearts whether he were not the Christ.' The deputation was of the Pharisees, who, stinging under his rebukes, sought to pay him back by entangling him in political difficulties, craftily supposing that they could bring him to account if they could throw his fiery ministry into a false position. Their cunning only succeeded in bringing out the humility and modesty of his character. Bold as a lion before men, he was a timid lamb in the shadow of his Lord, and nonplussed them by saying: 'I am not the Christ, nor Elijah, but simply the voice of a crier.' Unable and unwilling to lead the eager throngs to a contest with their oppressors, he lifted up his voice and proclaimed: There stands one in the midst of you, whom ye know not, the latchet of whose sandal I am not worthy to loose."

Beautiful message-bearer of our God and Saviour. Pure truth, gentle modesty, blushing humility, marked few of his contemporaries; but, while he would not play the rôle of a false Messiah, he longed for the honor of stooping, with suppressed breath and tremulous hands, to do the work of a slave for the true Christ. His glory was to throw himself into the background, to tie the sandals of Jesus when he went abroad, and loose the dusty leathern thong when he returned. His reply rebuked the pride and scorned the vanity of the whole viper-brood. Their haughtiness is censured, and their fawning repelled by the servant of the Son of the Highest prostrate in the dust at his feet. This holy chivalry makes a true muan a broken reed in the presence of Jesus, while it tempers his sinews with steel in dealing with men. 'I am not your Messiah-I go before him-he stands among you-he is mightier than I-I am a stranger to his prerogatives-I immerse your bodies in water to symbolize your soul's purification, but he shall overwhelm your souls in the Holy Spirit.' This sharp distinction brought out for the first time the

THE LAMB OF GOD.

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fullness of Christ's Gospel, or as Mark expresses it, here was 'The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.' This said, and the Baptist delivered from the snare of the fowler, he reasserts himself in new strength. The rulers flattered themselves that they would be the golden grain of Messiah's husbandry, the élite wheat that should fill his garner. John mocks that expectation, casts it to the winds, and tells them that Jesus will treat them as the Palestine farmer treats his harvest, when it is cut down, trampled under the hoofs of oxen, torn by instruments with teeth,' till the kernel is severed from the chaff' and then winnowed that it may be burned. They could never be gathered as the pure grain of the kingdom. Another baptism awaited them, that of repentance in the Jordan, when the Messiah should toss wheat and chaff into the empty air, that the grain might fall back free of refuse, while the wind would take the chaff into quenchless fire. These terrible words express John's cardinal idea of Christ's nature and prerogatives. They attribute to him the scrutiny of motives, the purification of character, and the condemnation of the impenitent; in a word, the prerogatives of God. But this was not all.

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The next day,' the Baptist saw Jesus and cried: Behold the Lamb of God, that takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said: After me comes one who is preferred before me; because he was before me.' I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God. I saw the Spirit descending as a dove out of heaven, and it abode upon him.' Here he affirms Christ's pre-existence. John was born six months before Jesus, yet he says He was before me.' The Greek terms here, both translated before,' express not only pre-eminence in rank and dignity, but priority of time. This enigma was to the startled Jews the first hint given by any New Testament speaker of Christ's personal pre-existence, and unveils him in the Bosom of the Father, before he became flesh. Then follow Christ's attestation by the Holy Spirit,-his mediatorial character and his divine Sonship. And he gave grandeur to his testimony in that he cried,' with vehemence in their avowal. He tells us that the Holy Spirit justified these claims as he set them forth. Indeed, the most remarkable thing in the Baptist's ministry is the prominence which he gives to the doctrine of the Spirit, in its new form.

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He introduced the second Person in the Trinity to the world, and held relations to the Third which no man before him had filled. Next to the coming of Christ, his ministry held a place and formed an epoch of the highest possible importance in the history of redemption. It was, in the Gospel sense, the beginning of the Spirit's administration in the personal salvation of men, as it first brings out his separate personality with great clearness. The Dove came from the Father, and on the banks of the Jordan remained upon the Son, making him thenceforth the sole Baptizer in the Holy Spirit, the one source through whom he has since acted in administering salvation to men. All this was directly opposite to the history and tendencies of Judaism, but it identifies John with the very soul of the Gospel as nothing else could. It was not the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan which anointed