What do calvinists believe about baptism

In his more systematic works—his catechisms and various editions of the Institutes —Calvin always treated infant baptism at the very end of his discussion of the nature and purpose of baptism in general. In the Institutes , for example, his explanation of infant baptism was confined to a few paragraphs at the end of his general treatment of baptism in chapter 4.

Does the act of baptizing an infant do anything special to the child or for the child? These are questions that only a few in the past have addressed, especially from a diachronic perspective. Beckmann observed in that in the first edition of the Institutes , Calvin assumed that a child, like an adult, must have faith to receive the blessings of baptism.

In polemicizing against the Anabaptists in subsequent editions, however, Calvin dropped the idea of infant faith and replaced it with the more Augustinian notion of infant regeneration by the Holy Spirit. The real point of departure is the insight that infants are among the elect by virtue of being the children of believers. Calvin does not even say that the planting of what he calls the seed of future repentance and faith occurs through the instrumentality of baptism.

But this, according to Grislis, only adds to the tension between election and infant baptism as a means of assurance:. If the baptism of infants depends upon their election and perseverance, then baptism is a sure and certain seal of election only as long as the election of these infants can be unconditionally affirmed also in regard to their later life; since in the final analysis Calvin is unwilling to affirm the election of all the infants of believers, baptism itself appears to be in real danger of ceasing to be a sure seal!

He may indeed assert that God does not mock men through the sacramental promise, but he does not demonstrate that this is actually the case. According to Riggs, in the , , and Institutes , Calvin backed away from the Lutheran notion of a fides infantium infant faith that he had defended in the edition and took a more circumspect approach to the possibility of such faith.

Grislis was correct, says Riggs, that Calvin never stated that this seed is bestowed via the instrumentality of baptism, but Calvin did imply that it occurs at the baptism of a child, perhaps in a kind of sacramental parallelism.

It is only then 4. What we shall find p. However, the integration of his teaching on infant baptism into his broader baptismal theology was more than just structural. Strikingly, Calvin begins his explanation of the first ground by pointing to children who die in infancy. Why could he not be seen in a mirror and obscurely by those, by whom he will one day be seen face to face?

What they will then know fully in the presence of God, he suggests in an allusion to 1 Corinthians , they can now be given in part. This does not seem a very cogent reason for infant baptism, especially since Calvin makes no attempt here to demonstrate that infants have faith in common with adults; he simply asserts it.

But that would make faith a benefit of infant baptism rather than a basis for administering it. Furthermore, at this stage of his thinking Calvin still regarded faith more as fiducia trust, confidence, assurance than cognitio knowledge. This is confirmation that the status of the children of Christian believers is the same as that of covenant children in the Old Testament.

It is only proper, then, that baptism, which has replaced circumcision, should be administered to these children just as circumcision was to Jewish children of old. It both explains the meaning of the promises of God and confirms their authenticity. But can and does it do so to tiny infants? Calvin does aver that this sign is something communicated or imparted to infants illis.

In other words, here we might have another indication that for Calvin infant baptism can sometimes also be an instrument of grace. First, he attempts to integrate his teaching on infant baptism with the broader sacramental and baptismal theology that precedes it—connecting it to his definition of sacraments at the beginning of the chapter and stressing again the importance of faith for all who participate.

Second, he seems to operate with three categories of children: nonelect infants, elect infants who possess faith from the time of conception often those who die in infancy , and elect infants who come to faith at some point after conception.

With respect to the second category, he provides several hints that the baptism of these infants, like that of adults, is efficacious as a means of knowledge and perhaps even a means of assurance and grace. In the third category, he seems to work with a distinction between the valid administration of baptism to an infant and the realization at a later stage of life of the promises guaranteed at baptism. Finally, Calvin briefly introduces a covenantal defense for infant baptism that is also connected to a theme he had discussed earlier in his introduction to the sacraments—the common purpose and meaning of the sacraments in both testaments.

Nevertheless, in the first few paragraphs, he does allude to this general definition and twofold purpose by reaffirming baptism as both a divine sign and seal to us what we have been calling a means of knowledge and assurance and a symbol of our profession before others.

The external signs of circumcision and baptism are different, but the things that they signify and the promises they offer—divine favor, forgiveness, and eternal life—are the same. Circumcision and baptism are also seals. This raises the question, however, whom the instruction and confirmation are intended for when these signs and seals are applied to infants—the adults in the community or the infants themselves?

Certainly, says Calvin, the parents of these children receive certain benefits from the ceremonies. Whether and how for Calvin infant sacraments benefit the children, too, is less clear. With respect to knowledge, in he had countered the objection that infants could not be taught anything by the sacraments by arguing that God can give elect infants who die in infancy a small taste of the knowledge of himself, presumably through their baptism.

Much the same is true of faith. This was probably less of a ground for infant baptism than an attempt to refute an argument against it. In any case, in the Institutes Calvin loosens the ties between infant faith, infant salvation, and infant baptism. First, he no longer regards faith as the sine qua non for salvation. Those who are to be saved are plagued with an innate corruption from which they must be cleansed and born anew in order to enter the Kingdom of God. In a way that defies human understanding, God can accomplish this work of regeneration by his power in even the tiniest of infants.

As we have seen, for Calvin God can also work in an extraordinary way, endowing infants with the rudiments of faith or knowledge by the illumination of the Holy Spirit apart from the preaching of the Word. But their children were circumcised immediately. If infant circumcision and baptism do not function as direct means of knowledge or assurance for these children, does Calvin regard them in any p. In several places in the appendix he comes tantalizingly close to saying so.

If they grasp the truth, why shall they be driven away from the figure? He simply does not say. When God periodically called his chosen people to repentance in the Old Testament, he did not require that those who responded should undergo a second circumcision. The same holds true for baptism. And because learning the meaning of their baptism and meditating on it throughout their lives generate in these children an ongoing zeal for piety and worship, the sacrament also seems to function as a means of instruction and confirmation.

In both cases, however, these are efficacious means with a delayed fulfillment. When we compare the and Institutes on infant baptism, therefore, we notice a certain continuity between them but an even greater discontinuity. In Calvin still integrates the discussion of pedobaptism into his treatment of baptism in general, but he no longer explicitly connects it to the definition and twofold purpose of a sacrament that he had introduced in the previous chapter.

He still defends the existence of infant knowledge and faith but now treats them as almost equivalent terms and no longer employs them as grounds for pedobaptism. He still operates with three classes of children, but the categories now are nonelect infants, elect infants who are regenerate rather than have faith from the time of their conception, and elect infants who are regenerated rather than come to faith at some point after p.

To support infant baptism, he still appeals to a trans-testamental covenant in Scripture, but now—with the addition of an extensive polemic against the Anabaptists—he treats it in much greater detail and as the primary, if not sole, basis for the administration of the sacrament.

Finally, he still suggests that pedobaptism is a means of knowledge, assurance, and grace but now only in those contexts—greatly expanded in —where the efficacy of the sacrament is apportioned between the administration of baptism to an elect child and the fulfillment of its promises at a later time.

Once again, there are hints that the baptism of infants serves as a means of assurance. Calvin also suggests here that infant baptism is a means of grace. One reason that infants should now be baptized just as babies in the Old p.

Of course, Calvin views infant baptism as a means of grace in this way only with respect to those individuals who live beyond infancy. When elsewhere he discusses children who die in their infancy, he proceeds in a different direction by challenging the necessary connection between baptism and saving grace that one finds in the Roman Catholic tradition.

In the Institutes and in his published responses to the Council of Trent and Augsburg Interim in the late s, he criticizes the Catholic position on the necessity of baptism for salvation and the concomitant practice of emergency baptism by laypeople. The s, then, saw some change and development in the position on the efficacy of pedobaptism that Calvin had outlined in the Institutes , but not on a large scale. Still present are a covenantal grounding of the practice of infant baptism, certain indications that baptism is a means of both assurance and grace for infants, an efficacy of infant baptism that encompasses both the initial administration of the sacrament and the later manifestation of its fruit, and a presumption of the prebaptismal regeneration of infants who die in infancy.

Skip to main content. Jim Cassidy. August 22, Baptism As Means of Grace. Calvin's teaching on how the preached Word is a means of grace parallels how the sacraments in general - particularly baptism - are effectual.

Like the preached Word, baptism is also a means of grace. And as such it communicates grace. It confers that which it signs and seals: adoption, regeneration, and the washing away of sins2. Not, of course, in an automatic or ex opere operato fashion; but with - and only with - the below mentioned qualifications.

Firstly, baptism is a means of grace, by conferring what it seals and signifies, only for the elect. What Calvin says about the sacraments in general is also true of baptism in particular: "The Holy Spirit, whom the sacraments do not bring promiscuously to all, but whom the Lord specially confers on his people, brings the gifts of God along with him, makes way for the sacraments, and causes them to bear fruit.

But in such instances it is far from being a means of grace. In fact, it is a means of judgment. This is not to say, however, that it does not provide some external and outward benefit to the reprobate persons. It does in some ways. It initiates them into the life of the church. And there they receive many benefits due to the "common operations of the Holy Spirit"4. If they're neither purely memorial, nor sacerdotal, as Rome teaches, then what are they?

What kind of grace do they impart, and is it possible to partake of that grace without actually partaking of the sacraments? Answer by Ra McLaughlin. Advanced Search Go. Search Term Type any of these words all of these words exact phrase. Results should display: full details author names only. More search tips. Calvin, Salvation, Baptism Question I haven't read a whole lot of Calvin, but I do enjoy looking at his bible commentaries from time to time.

Answer On the specific issue of Calvin's view of baptism and that represented in the Westminster Standards, the two are basically the same. Also, just as a side note, Calvin himself said that his Commentaries and Institutes sometimes disagreed, and that when this occurred his Institutes were to be understood as presenting his actual view.

I believe, however, that on this subject his Commentaries tend to be consistent with his Institutes. In any event, I'll provide quotes from the Institutes rather than from the Commentaries in order to demonstrate Calvin's view. Both Calvin and the Westminster Divines taught that baptism is the typical means through which God applies certain benefits of salvation to us. Actually, in my estimation, the Westminster Divines ascribed more benefits to baptism than did Calvin cf.