Baptism by immersion and deaconesses

[chevalier]

I’ve been trying to post a thread on this but I got an error and it didn’t appear. Posts appear after I get such an error, but the topic apparently hasn’t. In case it shows up, I apologise in advance.

So, one of the roles of female assistants to the clergy, who were called deaconesses despite not having diaconial orders, is said to have been to assist in the baptism of women.

However, baptism by immersion was performed on adults even in the middle ages. Those being baptised were instructed not to feel any shame about their nudity in front of the whole congregation, men and women alike. So there doesn’t seem to have been any modesty issue.

Also, if a male clergyman performs the baptism by immersion, what does female assitance change? I don’t see anything. However, such assitance has been termed necessary.

So, what was the reason and the purpose of such assitance and what difference did it make, if any?

 

[Br.Rich_SFO]

chevalier:

So, one of the roles of female assistants to the clergy, who were called deaconesses despite not having diaconial orders, is said to have been to assist in the baptism of women.

However, baptism by immersion was performed on adults even in the middle ages. Those being baptised were instructed not to feel any shame about their nudity in front of the whole congregation, men and women alike. So there doesn’t seem to have been any modesty issue.

Also, if a male clergyman performs the baptism by immersion, what does female assitance change? I don’t see anything. However, such assitance has been termed necessary.

So, what was the reason and the purpose of such assitance and what difference did it make, if any?

Baptism by imersion in the early Church was not done in the church, but in a Baptistry. A person was Baptized, anointed, and clothed in the white garment, before entering the church building. Those present would be the Bishop, those assisting the Bishop (Priests and Deacons), those being Baptized and those (deaconesses) assisting the females being Baptized.

 

[chevalier]

Thank you, Brother. But what did the deaconesses’ assitance actually change? Was it just in case the women being baptised needed help with their clothes, or did the assistance have some special meaning which escapes me? Guarding against potential abuse is non-issue since they were all saints. The male clergy saw everything anyway. White robes received at baptism didn’t really need any help putting on. The necessity of the female deaconesses being there escapes me. I’m not saying they were superfluous, but why necessary?

 

[Arwen037]

They helped the women into the water. I’m guessing they held up a cloth or something to shield the women until they got into the water. But the second part I don’t know for a fact.

 

[puzzleannie]

chevalier:

However, baptism by immersion was performed on adults even in the middle ages. Those being baptised were instructed not to feel any shame about their nudity in front of the whole congregation, men and women alike. So there doesn’t seem to have been any modesty issue.
?

source for this statement, please

 

[chevalier]

It’s depicted in catacombs and mentioned in early writings. Note also that public baths in ancient Israel were pretty much coed and without any separate cells, anyway, such as in the Roman empire after the strict views of the break of the republic and the empire faded, and even in mediaeval cities (although it’s not like these were used for baptisms, anyway), although baptism by pouring water on someone’s head was also proper since the very beginning. Early works of art depict even Jesus Christ baptised in the nude. Tertullian and Irenaeus mention nude baptisms, so does Saint Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem.

Immediately, then, upon entering, you remove your tunics

You are now stripped and naked, in this also imitating Christ despoiled of His garments on His Cross

How wonderful! You were naked before the eyes of all and were not ashamed! Truly you bore the image of the first-formed Adam, who was naked in the garden and was not ashamed.

John the Deacon:

They are commanded to go in naked, even down to their feet, so that [they may show that] they have put off the earthly garments of mortality. The church has ordained these things for many years with watchful care, even though the old books may not reveal traces of them.

Saint Hippolytus (priest):

let no one go down to the water having any alien object with them,"

Another point is that, if coed baths were approved (Jovinianus), I don’t see why the early Church would separate men and women for group baptism (apart from positive accounts of not doing that). I understand that if touch contact had been required - such as in helping someone with his or her garments, perhaps a same gender assistant could have been found necessary, but this is still hardly sure - as the clergyman administering baptism was always male, whether it was immersion or just pouring (or both combined, or the individual standing ankle or knee deep in water and having more water poured on his head by the clergyman).

Historians such as Roy Bowen Ward, Margaret Miles, J.C. Cunningham, Jonathan Smith, Taylor, Bingham write about this. I haven’t seen much of their works, however, so I can’t speak for their credibility or intent or anything, as I simply don’t know.

Works of art dating later than the catacomb paintings, as in mediaeval paintings in Rimini or Ravenna or even early renaissance ones such as Giovanning di Paolo’s “The Baptism of Christ” show that disrobing for baptism was the norm. Those paintings were approved by the Church. No female assistance is recorded during female coronation annointment and depending on the rite, it couldn’t always have been performed on a clothed person (they were using the standard rite normally designed for males).

There seems to have been some Adam and Eve sort of symbolics (Saint John Chrysostom gave such an explanation), or washing away sin, or rejecting the temporal world’s social convenances, or whatever.

From what I know, some Orthodox and occasional Protestant communities practice this form of baptism up until the present day and I’m not aware of any deaconesses specifically designated for assitance in female baptism.

Any sources on the role of those deaconesses, i.e. if some ancient sources actually affirm their role in baptisms or if they in fact had some different role to perform?

 

[chevalier]

Hmm… I’ve just found some accounts (Apostolic Constitution plus something else, I don’t remember the name) saying that some kind of annointing of the body was included (I didn’t know that before) and “receiving” of the just-baptised person and it was done by the deaconess, while the male clergyman only dipped the head and annointed the forehead.

There are accounts of those deaconesses actually baptising women, but they tend to be cited by people who call them “female deacons”, which seems to be a hint that they received Holy Orders, which looks like another movement for ordination of women, so I don’t know if it can be trusted for any part, although in grave necessity someone without Holy Orders or even unbaptised could baptise validly, so why not a female clergy assistant in such circumstances as there were.