Todays Gospel reading (Dec. 11, 2005)

[Brenda_V]

Okay, this isn’t actually an apologetics type question about Scripture but it is a question about Scripture.

While preparing for Mass today I had time to read the readings and Gospel. Something that struck me was the fact that after John the Baptist told everyone who he was, the Pharisees asked him why he baptized.

Here is the pertinent part of the readings which were John:6-8,19-28 if you want to read it all: …He said: “I am the voice of one crying out int he desert, make straight the way of hte Lord, as Isaiah the prophet said.” Some Pharisees were also sent. The asked him, “Why then do you baptize if you are not the Crist or Elijah or the Prophet?” John answered them, “I baptize with water; but there is one among you hwom you do not recognize, the one who is coming after me, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to untie.”…

Okay, now my question is why would they ask why he (John the Baptist) was baptizing if he wasn’t the Christ etc. if they did not expect it. Is there some prefiguring of Baptism (not circumcision) in the OT?

Brenda V.

 

[Ghosty]

Baptism is the Sacramental version of the Jewish mikveh, a bath for ritual cleansing and purification. John the Baptist was making a very big movement out of the mikveh, and was making a lot of predictions about the Messiah coming and the need for purity due to the upcoming events. Basically the Baptism is nothing more or less than the holy mikveh ritual with the Grace of God as an incorporated and inseperable part.

You can read about mikveh’s here, though I recommend finding some authoritative Orthodox Jewish resources as well.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Ghosty]

I followed a link on the Wiki entry, and found a great, if long, article on mikvehs on an Orthodox Jewish (Chassidic) website. The article can be found here.

 

[Todd_Easton]

Some consider this an OT prophecy concerning Baptism:25I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. 26A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will take out of your flesh the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to observe my ordinances. (Ezekiel 36:25-27)

 

[Brenda_V]

Thank you Ghosty. When I have time and not in the midst of helping my adult daugther with her party I will check these out.

I knew there must be something I was missing but after 47 years of going to Mass and probably hearing this reading every third year for most of my life it just struck me this year

 

[Fidelis]

Brenda V.:

Okay, now my question is why would they ask why he (John the Baptist) was baptizing if he wasn’t the Christ etc. if they did not expect it. Is there some prefiguring of Baptism (not circumcision) in the OT?

From the Navarre Bible Commentary on this verse:

John’s baptism laid marked stress on interior conversion. His words of
exhortation and the person’s humble recognition of his sins prepared
people to receive Christ’s grace: it was a very efficacious rite of
penance, preparing the people for the coming of the Messiah, and it
fulfilled the prophecies that spoke precisely of a cleansing by water
prior to the coming of the Kingdom of God in the messianic times (cf.
Zechariah 13:1; Ezekiel 36:25; 37:23; Jeremiah 4:14). John’s baptism,
however, had no power to cleanse the soul of sins, as Christian Baptism
does (cf. Matthew 3:11; Mark 1:4).

The pertinent verses read:

On that day there shall be open to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, a fountain to purify from sin and uncleanness. (Zechariah 13:1)

I will sprinkle clean water upon you to cleanse you from all your impurities, and from all your idols I will cleanse you.

No longer shall they defile themselves with their idols, their abominations, and all their transgressions. I will deliver them from all their sins of apostasy, and cleanse them so that they may be my people and I may be their God. (Ezekiel 36:25; 37:23)

Cleanse your heart of evil, O Jerusalem, that you may be saved. How long must your pernicious thoughts lodge within you? (Jeremiah 4:14)

 

[Brenda_V]

Thank you everyone. I had a feeling there was some pre-figuring of Baptism in the OT but what Ghosty came up with was rather interesting too. If you all haven’t checked it out, do so. Interesting.

Brenda V.

 

[sruyle]

Okay I still have a questions concerning the Gospel reading from the 10th.

In Saturdays (12-10) Gospel Matthew 17: 9a, 10-13. It says “Then the disciples understood that he was speaking to them of John the Baptist.”

Then in Sundays (12-11) Gospel John 1: 6-8, 19-28 John the Baptist says he **isn’t ** Elijah. "Are you Elijah?”And he said, “I am not.”

Why do the disciples of Jesus “understand” that John the Baptist is Elijah when John the Baptist says he isn’t? Am I misunderstanding Matthews Gospel?

Who’s Elijah?? Everyone in the Bible wants to know who Elijah is and so do I?

 

[Ghosty]

It’s the difference between being the Resurected Elijah, and doing the job of Elijah in announcing the Messiah. Some thought that Elijah would literally come back from the dead to announce the Messiah, but we know through Jesus that what was meant is that a prophet just like Elijah would come along, calling on the Israelites to repent and prepare for the Messiah. John was Elijah in the figurative sense, just not the literalist sense that some thought he would be.

Peace and God bless!