Infant Baptism

The following quote is from the book The Reformers and their Stepchildren, pages 198-201, by Leonard Verduin, published in 1964. The endnotes are in the original - we have added the explanations in the square brackets.

“Stepchildren” is Verduin’s term for those followers of God in the time of the Reformation (about 1525) who contended that the Reformers, Luther and Zwingli etc. were really departing from the truths of the Bible and retracing the footsteps of the Catholic Church. In our words, they, the Stepchildren, were maintaining that the Reform movement was actually a “daughter” of Babylon, not the wife of God. See Revelation 17:5. (Verduin does not make this statement in his book, nor come to this conclusion, however.)

This quote is NOT used here to condemn Zwingli for his stand - we leave that judgment to God.

It IS used to show WHAT all the individual Reformers faced in their battle with Satan (for we do not fight the pope or the catholic church regardless of what some people think. Ephesians 6:12; 2 Corinthians 10:3-5). It also underlines the importance that such a little thing as infant baptism actually had in that conflict, and how each parent of that time came into the front line of the war. It may even give some of us more courage to stand for what is right today.

This sequence [the retreat of the reformers from their call] is most clearly traceable in the case of Huldreich Zwingli, on whose doorstep infant Anabaptism [rebaptism] was born [came into existence]. Early in his career as a Reformer he was, to put it too mildly, rather lukewarm towards the baptism of little ones. He confessed in those early days: “Nothing grieves me more than that at the present I have to baptize children, for I know it ought not to be done.”[1] This was plain talk. Here was a man who was deeply aware that the renewal of the Church called for a radical break with “christening.” He knew that this was pretty central in the Reform, so central that it weighed more heavily on him than any other matter.

We cannot help asking why Zwingli, if he was so sure that “christening” was wrong, did not let it be known that he was desisting. To answer this question, one must remember that the civil rulers of the city were sacralists [they believed in a church/state combination with outward signs]; they saw in sacrament [church rituals] the cement that bound society together; they would therefore be loathe to part with infant baptism. This meant that if Zwingli were to act on his insight he would immediately come under their displeasure. This would imply the drying up of the spring from which he drank, the loss of his stipend [wages]. That it was this consideration that caused Zwingli to draw back is quite apparent from the words with which this utterance of his ends: “If however I were to terminate the practice then I fear that I would lose my prebend [salary].”

On another occasion Zwingli wrote, “I leave baptism untouched, I call it neither right nor wrong; if we were to baptize as Christ instituted it then we would not baptize any person until he has reached the years of discretion; for I find it nowhere written that infant baptism is to be practiced …” [this ellipsis is in the original]. This again is clear enough. Although Zwingli begins by saying that he wishes to refrain from cutting the knot, he certainly gives his opinion and expresses his conviction. It is that “christening” has no foundation in Scripture and that the right baptism is believer’s baptism.

Again we are driven to ask why he then hesitated, why he drew back from the course which he felt had Biblical warrant, and why he continued in the way that lacked such warrant. To find the answer to this question, one must remember that the former course was frightfully radical. To propose to terminate “christening” in a sacral society, which had for a millennium been held together by it, was to propose a pretty radical thing. It was very similar to reading some men out of society [an “us and them” situation]. That is why Zwingli added: “However one must practice infant baptism so as not to offend our fellow men.”…. [our ellipsis].

One is led to ask once more why this Reformer then dragged his feet, why he allowed himself to be party to the perpetuation of a practice which as he saw things lacked Biblical warrant. And again Zwingli answers our question. It is again the matter of offence. He adds specifically: “But on account of the possibility of offence I omit preaching this; it is better not to preach it until the world is ready to take it.”

It is quite apparent that what restrained Zwingli from introducing believers' baptism was the consideration that such a thing would tend to divide society – the one thing that men of sacralist conviction cannot allow. Anything that results in composite society is for the sacralist an intolerable evil. That it was this that kept Zwingli back is altogether apparent. Baptism, said he, is “a visible sign wherewith a man makes himself responsible to God and makes this apparent to his neighbor with the outward sign, without faction-making, otherwise it brings into being a sect and not one faith.” Zwingli, like so many of his generation, was blissfully unaware that the Church of Christ is by definition a sect. [2] They were mortally afraid of everything that so much as smacked of Rotterei or faction-making [offshoots?] – forgetting that the Church of Christ as set forth in the New Testament is by definition a faction, in any given situation, a party, a segment of society – never the totality…. [our ellipsis].

In passing, it may be useful to recall that Luther went to the same extreme in his attempt to get away from the Anabaptist doctrine that baptism is in place only where faith is presumably present. With his customary rashness he cried out:

How can baptism be more grievously reviled and disgraced than when we say that baptism given to an unbelieving man is not good and genuine baptism! … [this ellipsis is in the original]. What, baptism rendered ineffective because I do not believe?… [this is in the original also]. What more blasphemous and offensive doctrine could the devil himself invent and preach? And yet the Anabaptists and the Rottengeister [agitators] are full up to their ears with this teaching. I put forth the following: Here is a Jew that accepts baptism, as happens often enough, but does not believe, would you then say that this was not real baptism, because he does not believe? That would be to think as a fool thinks not only [sic], but to blaspheme and disgrace God moreover.

[1] In the Reformed Church at Nordlingen, in the earliest times (in 1525, when the polarity between the Reformers and their Stepchildren had not yet reached a critical stage therefore), it was left to the parents whether they wished to have their children baptized or not. We read: … [what follows is a quote in Dutch.] On the usual assumption, namely that all who rallied to the Reform were children of 1517, it is quite impossible to explain the situation at Nordlingen [so where did they come from?]. Here were people, members of the Reformed Church, who were far from enthusiastic supporters of infant baptism, with a sensitivity so pronounced that the leaders of the Reformed Church accommodated themselves to it. Whence this sensitivity? Certainly not from any of the Reformers in their final phase. We are obliged to look to pre-Reformation conditioning to explain this situation.

[2] The word sect is not from the Latin secare, to cut, as is often said, erroneously; it is from sequor, of which the root idea is follow. This etymology [meaning] of the word sect was known to literate men in Reformation times…