In Part 1, I briefly mentioned how the early church did not teach the Roman Catholic doctrine of Baptismal Regeneration. As I covered in some detail during my series on “The Eucharist,” this is closely related to the development of the sacraments. Regular readers here know that I regularly quote Timothy F. Kauffman. He grew up fully Roman Catholic, steeped in its practices, before converting away as an adult. He did a 6-part series on baptismal regeneration and the early church fathers called “That He Might Purify The Water“.

During my research, I ran into a rebuttal of Kauffman’s series. In general, Kauffman does not seem to do rebuttals of rebuttals, so I thought I would go over it.

A brief clarification is required here. Roman Catholics take history and insist that it must be—and always has been—interpreted in light of whatever Roman Catholicism teaches today.

There are various ways to describe this, such as the “Presumption of Apostolic Continuity” in which each Roman Catholic novelty is presumed to be Apostolic. This is also known as the “Hermeneutic of Continuity.” I’ve described the Roman Catholic Axiom as “The recent explicates the older,” identifying it as the logical fallacy known as begging-the-question (or circular reasoning). It has also been described as sola ecclesia (“the church alone”).

What we will find below is that Waltz is implicitly and explicitly using the Axiom here. I believe you’ll be forced to conclude that the reason he thinks that the early church fathers believed in baptismal regeneration is because that’s what his church currently teaches. He finds what he wants to find.

Interestingly, Waltz is currently examining the Eucharist/Lord’s Supper and the liturgy. While I won’t discuss that in depth, he makes one important comment:

That’s the Roman Catholic Axiom, hard at work finding what isn’t there but was a later novelty. So it is ironic that he is complaining about Kauffman’s supposed novelties while promoting the novelties of Roman Catholicism. But at least, unlike the other Roman Catholics that I’ve interacted with, he doesn’t deny that doctrine is developed. This is a refreshing change!

Note that Waltz joins Roman Catholic John C. Wright in asserting that the doctrine of the Trinity was, essentially, not attested to by the early writers before the fourth century. Rather than become a Unitarian Monotheist, he does what most people do which is to use the existence of “restorationist” anti-trinitarianism to reject the early fathers in favor of the whatever the church teaches now, having developed its doctrines over time. They do not acknowledge that allowing the development of doctrine as a hermeneutical method is the root cause in the proliferation of many different denominations. Such is the power of the Roman Catholic Axiom.

You don’t have to take my word for it. We’re going to examine this together like calm, rational men.

Unlike many of the blogs in The Red Pill, Waltz shares my open policy. I appreciate that! While I’m going to be quite critical of the ideas that Waltz presents, I am not going to be critical in any way of Waltz the person. I will not presume that his motives are negative. The worst thing I will say about him is that he is mistaken (and I will defend that claim with evidence).

Now, let’s dive in.

The First Presupposition

I believe that Waltz is in error.

Kauffman has explicitly stated that God can, and does, provide “other” (beware the loaded term) means to regenerate. Indeed, he cited two examples from the book of Acts where men and women received water baptism, but only received the Holy Spirit by the laying on of hands. This included both cases: receiving the Spirit both before and after water baptism.

So we have the situation where water baptism did not regenerate. It’s not merely the case that regeneration is possible without water baptism, it’s that (1) regeneration happened before water baptism; and (2) a proper water baptism overseen by Paul didn’t regenerate. Notably, the latter was an entirely ordinary baptism in the name of Christ, but it wasn’t associated with the Holy Spirit.

And, to be clear, Tertullian associated the regenerative work of water baptism with the presence of the Holy Spirit:

What gives water “sacramental power” of sanctification according to Tertullian? The supervention of the Holy Spirit. When does this come? Immediately after the invocation of God (“in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit”).

In Acts, we saw water baptism with the required invocation of God in the ordinary way. Yet, the Spirit did not immediately supervene from heavens and sanctify them. This waited until Paul laid his hands on them.

Kauffman’s “presumption” is that the failure of water baptism to regenerate constitutes evidence against the doctrine of baptismal regeneration and evidence for regeneration by the Holy Spirit. If this “presumption” is disallowed, then what you have is special pleading, which plainly begs-the-question. I submit that this is exactly what the Roman Catholic Axiom is.

The rather plain conclusion is that the Holy Spirit regenerates. Neither the laying on of hands nor being baptized with water are “sacraments” (in the modern sense). Indeed, of the seven Roman Catholic sacraments, the laying on of hands is conspicuously missing. Where is “Laying On of Hands Regeneration,” I wonder?

Water baptism is a symbol, which we’ll address in the next presupposition.

The Second Presupposition

Having read and reread Kauffman’s work, I don’t believe this is a correct assessment either.

When Tertullian wrote about water baptism as a sealing act or clothing, those were figures of speech. But all figures of speech are signifiers that signify that which is signified. This means that the thing signified is not the same thing as the signifier.

Tertullian wrote about the sacrament of faith and used those two figures—sealing and clothing—to explain the addition of water to the sacrament. In those two examples, he made water the signifier of that which is signified. To quote myself:

The reason Tertullian couldn’t believe in baptismal regeneration is not because he used figures and symbols. Rather, it is because the meaning of his figures (i.e. what was signified) excludes this possibility. This is what Kauffman says:

In other words, a figure-of-speech is made up of the signifier and the signified and the latter (sealed; regeneration) is not the former (seal; water baptism).

There are two figures at play here, not just one. The first is that a literal seal (e.g. on a letter) figuratively represents (among other things) authority and authentication. This figure is inherent in what a seal is, its purpose. The second is the figurative analogy associating sealing with water baptism. Thus, we have a figure of a literal figure.

Water baptism associated by analogy with the sealing, that is, with what the sealing represents. It’s not the fact that figurative language is used, it’s what that figurative language means. Or, put plainly, water baptism signifies to the sacrament of faith by the blood of the cross, by analogy, what a seal signifies to a letter.

Just as the seal on a letter is not the written work itself, neither is the water of baptism the regenerative work of faith through the baptism of the blood of Christ. In fact, it explicitly cannot because of the meaning of the figure.

The figurative language says, figuratively, that water baptism regenerates. But of course it does! It is a figurative representation, so we can rightly call the thing that is represented by the representation. That’s one of the points of using figurative language in the first place: to refer to the signified by the signifier. We speak of the seal, but what we are actually talking about is the person who wrote the letter and placed the seal.

Let me illustrate this:

By flipping the accusation around, we can clearly see the problem with this kind of argument. It is self-refuting. If Tim’s argument fails because of his presupposition, then so does Waltz’.

Kauffman’s position relies on the meanings of the figures, not the figures themselves. Thus, this presupposition even if true is not relevant. But I suggest that Waltz has no such easy out. His presupposition is a definite problem.

But beyond mere presuppositions, Tertullian’s father was a Roman centurion and that Tertullian wrote this within the framework of the Roman sacramentum, which (at that time) was a one-time binding initiation oath of military service to the Roman State. The sacramentum was just as much an authenticating oath as the seal on a letter was. The language of sealing was not a one-off figure-of-speech, but integral to the sacramentum.

The language of sacraments has changed over the centuries (see here, here, and here). What Tertullian meant by sacramentum was not the same thing that it meant in the late 4th-century. Nor is not the same thing that a modern Roman Catholic means when he says sacrament. This is the Roman Catholic Axiom at work. Waltz’s operating definition of sacrament—from his own church’s definition—is different from the one Tertullian was using, but his Axiom requires them by fiat to be identical anyway.

The water baptism of regeneration is no more regenerative than the oath of military service is the military service itself. That’s why regeneration happens with or without water baptism. While an unsealed letter is still a letter, it is, nonetheless, ordinary for one to be sealed.

The Third Presupposition

Waltz is not attempting to refute the alleged apostasy of the late 4th-century, which has been heavily documented. Strictly speaking, it’s not a presupposition at all. It’s a well-developed and detailed set of arguments supported by dozens or hundreds of sources with many different lines of reasoning. Rather than presupposing the 4th century apostasy, Kauffman has evidenced and supported it. There is no need to presuppose it, because the arguments are published and freely available. They can be examined not as presuppositions, but as first-order arguments (without a refutation).

Waltz is presupposing that Kauffman’s position is a presupposition because Waltz doesn’t have the time or effort to address it. That’s not Kauffman’s fault, it’s Waltz’ choice. The burden of proof, as it were, is on Waltz.

Waltz considers the view to be highly detrimental without actually addressing the evidence itself. Thus his claim is unsubstantiated, and if we wanted to we would be justified to simply ignore this and move on. It’s not a valid objection.

But we can flip this accusation around.

To which I say, “So what?” If Kauffman and Waltz really hold these presuppositions, then they are epistemological equivalents. You’d be equally justified in concluding that Waltz’s presupposition is detrimental.

But the Roman Catholic Axiom and Kauffman’s position are not actually equivalent. As we saw in the opening, Waltz explicitly subscribes the the idea that valid doctrines develop over time and so he takes those developed doctrines and finds “seeds” of them in the past. Kauffman explicitly denies the validity of anyone doing this for any reason, including himself. Waltz is the only one here who is affirmatively demonstrating the “detrimental” behaviors that Waltz is raising. Given that Kauffman denies doing so, Waltz’s unsubstantiated claim is no longer merely unsubstantiated, but turns into a personal attack, an ad hominem.

Recall in my opening above that I said that I value men who can be critical of ideas without being critical of the person? Well here was an example of Waltz engaging in an unsubstantiated ad hominem judgment. It’s not merely that he’s ignoring the evidence that Kauffman has presented, it’s that he’s doing so while assigning to Kauffman the same motivation that he himself has freely admitted to. If Waltz is wrong in his accusation, and I’m sure that Kauffman would continue to deny it, then he’s projecting.

I suspect this personal attack is at least one reason why Kauffman has not bothered to respond to Waltz’ rebuttal. Assigning motives to another person is unwise. If Waltz ever reads this and decides to interact with it, it will be interesting to see if he personally attacks me as well or if instead he takes the personal attack on Kauffman seriously and removes it from his original article.

Anyway, I’m going to continue interacting with Waltz’ material, because I think this ad honimen is notable, but likely inadvertent. If he ever reads this, perhaps he will realize his mistake and edit his post to remove the ad hominem, or at the very least change it from the “detrimental” language to the neutral claim that they Kauffman and Waltz are operating on mutually exclusive epistemological assumptions.

On the Presuppositions

I’ve found no merit in any of the three presuppositions. If anything, the only conflict that arises from Kauffman’s presuppositions are that they conflict with analogous ones that Waltz holds. So I’m going to approach this objection, but not armed with those presuppositions.

So, what do we do about the fact that scholars do not support Kauffman’s view? Well I think that Waltz and Kauffman would more-or-less agree. Of course scholars interpret the early fathers in light of their general assumption that the church later succeeded through Roman Catholicism. That’s just the Roman Catholic Axiom, and yes, Protestants routinely assert the Roman Catholic Axiom. Kauffman has spent a lot of time illustrating this, so it’s not surprising that it occurs.

But, here’s the thing. Many of Kauffman’s scholarly citations come from Roman Catholics and those Protestants who support Roman Catholic positions. What Kauffman often does is use Roman Catholic’s own scholars to refute Roman Catholicism. In doing so he demonstrates that the foundation of the patristic scholars is one of sand. The fact that Kauffman can and does cite authorities on the subject to defend his claim only proves that he isn’t “void of any support.”

One should always be suspicious of anyone who claims that all the support for something is one-sided. While this is possible, it is quite rare and generally occurs when a thing is actually or unambiguously true. Thus, by saying “void of any support from patristic scholars” Waltz is making the implicit claim that Kauffman can’t be right no matter what he says. But that’s not an argument, that’s a (circular) statement of belief. By saying that Kauffman is “void of any support” he’s just declaring himself the victor by fiat.

When I claimed “No Early Evidence for Roman Catholic Doctrine” I was making this kind of exclusive claim. To the best of my knowledge, it’s the only time I have ever done so. If Roman Catholicism did indeed arise in the latter fourth century, then it is impossible to find Roman Catholicism before it arose. This is an inherently exclusive claim, and there is no way around it. It’s also subject to falsifiability, so it’s not really a declaration by fiat.

When I made this claim, what did I do? I cited (mostly) Roman Catholics who admitted that the doctrines they were seeking were not found before the late fourth century. In other words, I defended my claim with the historical evidence by citing the evidence provided by Roman Catholics. For example:

Newman couldn’t find Papal Supremacy before the late 4th century, but he just assumed that the seeds of it must have been there because Papal Supremacy is dogmatically true. It’s already been declared true by fiat, so whatever is in history must confirm it. That’s the Roman Catholic Axiom. It’s exactly equivalent to Waltz’ (admitted) presupposition.

The reason Newman couldn’t find Supremacy is because as late as 358AD, Rome was not even the chief metropolis in its diocese, let alone having primacy. That’s the history. That’s the evidence. That left Newman to grasp at phantoms (Waltz’ “seeds”), trying to find what can not actually be there as a matter of the historical record.

But, besides all that, ultimately Waltz’ objection is just an argument from authority. It’s fallacious. Even if it were true that “99.985% of scientists/scholars/experts agree,” it wouldn’t make it true that Kauffman was wrong. That’s not how objectivity works. It’s not a popularity contest. What would make Kauffman wrong would be his ideas shown to be wrong. These “presuppositions” do not do this. Indeed, they avoid doing this.

Baptism of Blood

In the first thread, he says this:

Notice what Waltz has done.

First, he has cited a 1997 encyclopedia of Catholic Doctrine that claims that the Baptism of blood is “the martyrdom of an unbaptized person.” This appears to be an example of the Roman Catholic Axiom: citing recent doctrine in order to explain what the patristic writer meant, rather than the other way around. Since he is citing this against Kauffman’s historical claim, rather than directly addressing the claim being made, this appeal to doctrine just begs-the-question.

Second, while Tertullian describes both the Baptism of Blood and the Baptism of Water, he acknowledges that they can both occur together in either order. Since water baptism must occur before death, the baptism of blood cannot be martyrdom if water baptism follows blood baptism. Tertullian must be describing something other than martyrdom. As with sacramentum, the modern usage of the term by the Roman Catholic Church does not strictly conform to the way that Tertullian used the term. This is a failure of the Roman Catholic Axiom.

Third, Tertullian does mention the baptism of blood in the context of matyrdom in Chapter 12 of Scorpiace and Chapter 22 of On Modesty. But he says nothing of martyrdom in On Baptism. As Kauffman notes, there Tertullian cites Matthew 22:14 as the demonstration of the two baptisms, where each Christian is called by water and chosen by blood. Since those who are not chosen are cast out, this would have Jesus making martyrdom a requirement for salvation, which is absurd.

The problem is trying to associate the baptism of blood (that is martyrdom) in Scorpiace and On Modesty with the baptism of blood (that is the cross) in On Baptism. Though they employ the same words, they are not describing the same thing. The context is different.

Just before writing the above, Waltz had quoted from the same paragraph where Kauffman made this very point. We know he read the argument, but Waltz chose not to respond to it. How can Waltz then cite from Catholic Doctrine while completely ignoring the substance of Kauffman’s rebuttal? I do not know. I found myself disappointed that Waltz could not refute Kaufman’s point.

Fourth, one of the follies of arguing that Tertullian promoted Roman Catholic doctrine is the fact that Tertullian’s martyrdom “baptism of blood” implicitly denies what the Church assigns to Mary:

This is the problem with Watz’ allowance for doctrinal development. It creates contradictions, forcing one to cherry-pick what the patristics were correct or wrong about according to whatever current doctrine dictates. It’s plainly circular.

Analysis

“The ordinary means which brings those graces to fruition.” What is Waltz even talking about? This is coded and loaded Roman Catholic language, that’s what. He’s not simply referring to baptism being the normal initiation right for new Christians. There is a lot of undeclared baggage in that statement.

Here’s the thing. The conflation of sacraments, mysteries, and grace is a late fourth century innovation. I’ve written extensively about this. You can see the list in the bottom section of “Divisions.”

Waltz’ statement can be rephrased like this:

How am I supposed to take that seriously?

It’s an anachronism. It’s not actually possible for Tertullian to have affirmed those things if those things were not yet developed. There can’t be a plain reading of Tertullian that corresponds to things that did not yet exist. Kauffman’s denial is entirely rational. Of course Kauffman denies those things! Tertullian clearly didn’t affirm them, because he had no concept of the later Roman Catholic terms-of-art.

For example, in the New Testament the grace of God is always singular, but Waltz refers to a plurality of “graces” because that’s what his church teaches. It is coded and loaded specialized language corresponding to a variety of later developed doctrines. He’s using the same words, sort of, but he’s not talking about the same thing that scripture is talking about. Of course Kauffman is going to refuse to affirm that! Waltz’ own presuppositions have no bearing on what Tertullian said or didn’t say.

Yes, I too affirm that Tertullian said what he said, and I also affirm that Tertullian was not affirming the much later Roman Catholic doctrinal developments. One can have a plain reading of Tertullian and assert both of these things at the same time.

Waltz certainly can take issue with this if he wants, but it’s not clear at all why he has any justification for doing so. After criticizing Kauffman for his “presuppositions” where Kauffman supposedly brings in his later conception onto the lips of Tertullian, it’s pretty clear that Waltz should not be permitted to do the same thing. So we are going to disregard this objection unless he can show that it is free of Roman Catholic bias. Considering he is using heavily Roman Catholic coded language, it’s going to be hard to show that!

Waltz is referring the developed Roman Catholic concept of “the ordinary means of grace” in a discussion of Tertullian. But the the doctrine was developed, in part, out of Tertullian who first introduced the language of sacraments. Using the later doctrine that was developed from Tertullian to interpret and prove what Tertullian believes is plainly circular reasoning. Even calling baptism a sacrament begs-the-question, as the concepts of sacraments didn’t even begin to develop (outside of Tertullian’s unusual and distinct formulation) until the latter part of the fourth century, mostly in conjunction with the Latin mistranslations of the Greek terminology.

It is absolutely essential that Tertullian be interpreted without considering later doctrines or traditions, including and especially the ones that we hold today. To do otherwise is plainly logically fallacious.

Tertullian noted two kinds of baptism: the baptism of blood and the baptism of water. He also noted that there were two sacraments of baptism:

Notice the citation of Tertullian that Waltz provided:

I’m not sure why Waltz thinks that the sacrament of faith which regenerates proves that baptism by water regenerates, when it is faith alone that Tertullian identified as securing salvation. To wit:

The reason baptism could be delayed is that salvation could then first be proven before water baptism was administered. In other words, proof of regeneration would, ideally, precede water baptism. Tertullian said that it was preferable to wait because it is better prior to water baptism to have proof of regeneration rather than simply assume it based solely on a public profession.

Notice that, according to Tertullian, it is the Holy Spirit who seals and washes into the sacrament of salvation. It is the Holy Spirit that plunges that flesh. As Scripture attests, it is the Holy Spirit that regenerates, through faith, regardless of the literal water.

Well, I’ve taken notice. The “tree” is the cross. So the “baptismal water of the cross of the passion of Christ” is equivalent to “Christ’s passion as the ‘baptismal water’.” This is just a minor rearranging the words. They mean the same thing. I’m not following Waltz’ argument at all. Perhaps he’ll explain it more clearly.

How is drinking no longer a metaphor for Christ? I don’t see how this follows logically.

How has Kauffman erroneously gotten rid of one of the two baptisms? I don’t see that either.

Waltz says that the water of baptism is efficacious through the cross of Christ. Neither myself nor Kauffman would disagree with that. That Christ, not the water of the literal baptism, is the ‘font of the water of life’ is something we can freely agree with!

Honestly, I just see Waltz affirming what Kauffman said. If he means this as a rebuttal, he is doing a poor job explaining it. Or maybe I’m just too stupid to understand it. Whatever the case, I find myself nodding along, seeing Waltz confirm what Kauffman has said.

Remember all those presuppositions above where Waltz objects that Kauffman is supposedly negating the possibility of two different things being true at the same time? Waltz seems to be doing the same thing here, reading Kauffman as if by calling the water “Christ’s Passion” that there can’t be a literal baptism of water. But it’s very, very clear that Kauffman believes that Tertullian mentions both a figurative water (of Christ’s Passion) and a literal water (of baptism). It doesn’t follow that it has “become solely faith in Christ’s passion.” Or if I does, I’m not smart enough to see it.

I’d appreciate a clarification, because as it stands this is just confusing at best.

What? This makes no sense. Here is what Kauffman wrote:

It is rather obvious to this reader that the ‘laver of revivification’ (or, the baptismal water of Christ’s Passion) is regeneration following true repentance. There is no replacement. Does Waltz think that Kauffman believes that one can demonstrate regeneration without true repentance? If so, then he’s deeply misunderstood Kauffman’s argument.

The whole point is that one must demonstrate true repentance—through regeneration—before one receives the literal water baptism.

Tertullian specifically qualified what he meant by the “sacrament of baptism.” Part of it was faith, and part of it was literal water. The latter part, the literal water, was identified figuratively as the seal (by way of analogy through a double figure-of-speech). Neither Tertullian nor Kauffman ever insisted that the unqualified “sacrament of baptism” was only a sign. The seal was the water baptism.

Why would Tertullian give such stern warnings? That’s simple: because water baptism was a seal. This has nothing to do with “efficacious effects” (i.e. regeneration) and everything to do with being a sealing act. The sealing itself is the point of water baptism, and it’s important all on its own.

I’d like to see some citations.That framing sounds like something a Roman Catholic would say because he found it in an encyclopedia of Catholic Doctrine.

The fact is, water baptism only occurs once because once God seals you the deed is done. You don’t need to be sealed twice. In particular, once you’ve received the Holy Spirit, being baptized again wouldn’t have any purpose. All of this is true without implicitly affirming that water baptism regenerates, forgives sins, etc.

I’m not a Calvinist, so I feel no compulsion to defend it, but even I have to throw the red challenge flag on this one. Let’s see some citations! These unsupported claims are not convincing at all. As an observer, if this is the best Waltz can do, it’s not very good. Kauffman is clearly going to win this round.

Even beyond the unsubstantiated claim, the logic just doesn’t even work. The alleged reason Tertullian said that it was preferential to wait was to ensure that people who had not actually repented of their sins were not baptized by mistake. In other words, water baptism can’t seal the unbeliever. It would be baptism in vain.

This has nothing at all to do with Calvinism. Nothing at all.

As a non-Reformed, I find this whole line of argument off-putting. It seems like Waltz is taking shots at Calvinism without sufficient grounds to do so.

To which we reply:

…and…

…and…

So we agree with Tertullian that prior to water baptism, our sound faith has secured our salvation because in our heart we have been bathed already. And furthermore, as Tertullian argues, it is the water of the Passion of Christ by which we were already saved prior to being washed in the literal waters.

See also:

• Craig Truglia, “Tertullian, Baptismal Regeneration, and the Danger of Presuppositions” (2016-05-07) [PDF]
• Craig Truglia, “Baptismal Regeneration”
  • Part 1: Justin Martyr
  • Part 2: Theophilus
  • Part 3: Irenaeus
  • Part 4: Origen
  • Part 5: Tertullian