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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A53334	A brief defence of infant-baptism with an appendix, wherein is shewed that it is not necessary that baptism should be administred by dipping / by John Ollyffe ...	Ollyffe, John, 1647-1717.	1694 (1694)	Wing O287; ESTC R32212	67,029	72

29. For the Gifts and Calling of God are without Repentance He will never repent of any Favour that he hath ever by Promise conferred upon any of Abraham's spiritual Seed or their Children So that when those Jews that are now Unbelievers and so cast out and broken off from the Church shall at length be brought to believe they shall then partake of the same Privileges and Benefits as they have ever done that continued in it and as they should have done if they had so continued and so also their Children For ver 16. If the first Fruits be holy the Lump is also holy and if the Root be holy so are the Branches Where the Parents are in Covenant or Church-Members so are the Children till they sall off through their own Unbelief So that here is no Alteration diminishing or repealing of any Church-privilege or Promise that ever did belong to the rightful Subjects of it And this is further clear from the Apostle Rom. 15.8 9. Now I say that Jesus Christ was a Minister of the Circumcision for the Truth of God to confirm the Promises made unto the Fathers and not to lessen or abolish them And so also a Saviour through his Mercy to the Gentiles that the Gentiles might glorify God also for his Mercy because partaking of the same Benefits and Privileges that were confirmed unto the Jews So that as the Apostle saith Eph. 2.12 13. they that were Aliens from the spiritual Commonwealth of Israel and Strangers from the Covenants of Promise and were sometime afar off are now in Christ Jesus made nigh And Eph. 3.6 the Gentiles are now Fellow-heirs and of the same Body with the believing Jews and Partakers with them of God's Promise in Christ by the Gospel So that belonging to the same Church and partaking of the same spiritual Promises and Privileges those that did belong to Jews and the Jewish Church and their Seed formerly do likewise belong to Christian Believers now and so in the same Extent and Latitude to their Children also there being no Alteration made in that respect more than in any other As the spiritual Seed of Abraham were ever holy and God's Covenant-People so were their Children and so it is now still with Gentile Believers and their Seed To this purpose speaks the Apostle concerning the Seed of Gentile Believers even where but one of the Parents are such 1 Cor. 7.14 For the unbelieving Husband is sanctified by or to the Wife and the unbelieving Wife is sanctified by or to the Husband that believes to the holy Use of such an one in the Sight of God for to the Pure all things are pure else were your Children common or unclean as the rest of the World are now in their Heathenism to whom therefore God hath no Regard as to his Children but now are they holy relatively and of a Religious Consideration before God as separated and dedicated to God and so are part of his Covenant-People It is not a Matrimonial Holiness that the Apostle intends or that the Children of Believers are therefore holy because they are no Bastards for the Children of Pagans are as well holy in that Respect that were born in Wedlock though the Parents neither of them were Believers So that this Interpretation would make the Apostle speak impertinently and untruly It is a relative or federal Holiness therefore that the Apostle must intend and by this he shews that such Children are of an holy Consideration in the Sight of God and are of the Number of his Holy and Covenant-People So that we can no where find any Dissolution or Discontinuance of the Church-membership of Infants under the Gospel which they once had but it still remains the same as ever and is rather more confirmed It being the same Church Covenant spiritual Privileges and Members as ever and these still keeping by the same Grant the same Place and standing in the Church as ever they did And as this therefore was once the Privilege of Infants of Abraham's spiritual Seed to stand in an holy Relation to God as his peculiar Covenant-People and Children so it is still But for a further Confirmation and clearing of this Matter we may observe also from our Saviour some such Indications of the same Respect had to them in choosing calling and esteeming of them as ever To this purpose we find Mark 10.14 They brought young Children to him that he should touch them or as St. Matthew hath it Matth. 19.13 that he should put his Hands on them and pray and his Disciples rebuked those that brought them but when Jesus saw it he was much displeased and said unto them Suffer the little Children to come unto me and forbid them not for of such is the Kingdom of God And he took them up in his Arms put his Hands upon them and blessed them All which sheweth Christ's good Will and Respect and dear Affection to them as Members of his Church and part of his Kingdom And which way soever the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Heaven as St. Matthew expresseth it be here taken which they are said to be of either for Heaven it self or the Church on Earth their Church-membership in the visible Church will hence be concludable For if it be meant of the Church on Earth as that Phrase is often taken for that then it is the next and immediate Sense of the Words of our Saviour Or if it be to be understood of Heaven properly yet then it will follow from it For if the Kingdom of Heaven receive them and they have a Portion in that the visible Church on Earth then may not exclude them For none are of the Kingdom of Heaven above that are not first of the Church on Earth Acts 2.47 There were daily added to the Church such as should be saved And our Saviour's Reason here for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven sheweth that he meant this of such Infants properly taken and not only of Men like them in Humility For that could be no Reason why they should be brought unto him because others that are like them in Humility are of the Kingdom of Heaven unless they are also of the same And his pronouncing this as a Reason why they should be brought unto him and his imbracing them also in his Arms and his laying his Hands upon them and blessing them sheweth a great deal more Respect to them than what was required for the healing them of any bodily Distemper for neither was this Reason nor all that Demonstration of Affection to them needful for that when if they had not been of the Kingdom of Heaven they should no doubt have been healed by him if they had been brought unto him and when they had been brought a Word or a Touch would have effected that without so much imbracing praying and blessing them So that what can we conclude from all this but a more than ordinary Respect of our Saviour to little Children

by the Learned which will give a great Light to this Matter 1st The first is that which is taken out of the most authentick Records of the Jewish Writings Vid. Dr. Walker's Plea for Infant-Baptism ch 30. and those Authors that are of greatest Note among them And it is this that even before our Saviour's time it was the manner among the Jews to admit Proselytes into the Jewish Church by three things Circumcision Dr. Hammond 's Defence Sect. 3. Sacrifice and Baptism whatever were the Ground or Original of this Custom which is differently accounted for by learned Men And Baptism was thought so necessary that though one was circumcised yet if he were not baptized he was not a true Proselyte which is delivered as a known Axiom by the Gemara Babylonica But if it were a Woman she must only be baptized and bring a Sacrifice And there being a Statute among the Jews Numb 15.15 That one Ordinance should be both for themselves and for the Stranger or Proselyte that sojourned among them therefore what they did to their Proselytes they did also to themselves So that as the Jewish Talmud and Gemara say the Israelites themselves do not enter into Covenant but by these three things Circumcision Baptism and Peace-offering And as this was the Manner and Custom of admitting grown Proselytes so also their Infant-Children if they had any were baptized likewise as the Gemara saith And so also Maimonides an Author of great Account among the Jews upon condition that there was Security given for the Education of the Children in the Jewish Religion that when they came to Age they might not renounce it And this their Reception of Proselytes in this way was esteemed among them to be a kind of Regeneration or new Birth they being brought and engaged thereby to a new Religion and a new Life Now if this be true as the Jewish Records do inform us and we have no Reason to doubt of it may seem less strange that the Baptism of John Baptist was so readily complied with and that there was no more Noise and Stir about it it being in it self for the Matter of it no new Institution but what had been usual and customary among them and John's Design in it being only to administer it to a different End than before that is as a Ceremony demonstrative of and engaging to Repentance against the appearance of the Kingdom of Messiah whereas it was before observed only as an initiating Rite into the Jewish Religion and Covenant And when our Saviour came and baptized or ordered his Disciples so to do it was only a Translation of an old Custom to a new End viz. to admit and receive Persons into the Religion of Messiah who was now come And it being no more for the Matter of it than what was done before it seems probable that our Saviour grounded his Reproof of Nicodemus upon his Ignorance of the Custom of his own Nation and the Sense that they put upon it John 3.10 Art thou a Master of Israel and knowest not these things For that might well seem very strange that a Person of his Condition should not understand the Phrase of his own Nation in which our Saviour spake to him though including also more in it when he said Except a Man be born of Water and of the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God But to conclude this it having been as we see the manner before among the Jews to receive the Infants of Proselytes as well as grown Persons into the Jewish Church by this Ceremony of Baptism unless our Saviour had prohibited the same to them how could the Apostles otherwise understand but when our Saviour ordered them by this Ceremony to admit Christian Proselytes they should likewise receive their Infants as the manner had been before in the Reception of Jewish Proselytes among themselves Which makes it therefore highly credible that it was accordingly done For there is no manner of Appearance of any Alteration made by our Saviour as to the Subjects but only as to the End and Intent of this Practice or Custom which only gave it the Form of a new Institution Nor need it seem at all strange that our Saviour should adopt this Custom and Practice into the Christian Religion and Church that was before in use in the Jewish it being not in the least our Saviour's Design to depart as far as he could from the Jewish Church but rather to build as much as might be with their Materials in the Erection of the Christian and to conform it after their old Platform as hath been shewn by learned Men in several Instances and particularly in the other Sacrament of the Lord's Supper it self Case of Infant-Baptism London 1683. Mede 's 1st Book Disc 51. 2d Book c. 4. And as for those Rites and Customs of the Jews which were abolish'd the Reason thereof was not merely because they were Jewish but either because they were such as were fulfilled in Christ and Christianity as the Antitype and Substance of them or because they were such as were inconsistent with the Nature of a manly free and universal Church such as Christ intended his should be in opposition to the Legal Pedagogy and servile Nature of the Jewish and for the breaking down the Partition-Wall betwixt Jew and Gentile and the abolishing the Enmity of Ordinances that the Religion of Christ might become more passable among the Gentile World to whom if it had been clogged with so many Ordinances as in the Jewish Church it would have become odious and ridiculous Dr. Hammond's Defence of Infant-Baptism p. 25 26. Nor yet can it be said e're the more that the Baptism of John or of our Saviour was of Man and not from Heaven because it was a Jewish Custom forasmuch as the Design of it is now changed and the Form of a new Institution is stamp'd upon the old Matter 2dly Another considerable Point of History relating to this Matter is with respect to the times after our Saviour and the Apostles and that is this It appears by the antient Writings of the Fathers of the Christian Church in the next Ages that Infant-Baptism was then the general Practice of the Christian Church and was so observed as being derived from the Apostles themselves And there is no one Writer in any of the first Ages of the Christian Church that does at all oppose it as unlawful or speak of it as a novel Practice but even those that argue against it as less convenient yet do allow by their Discourse that it was then the general Practice of the Church and do not in the least contradict that or bring any Argument against it as being a new Invention which if it had been had above all other Arguments been most proper for their Purpose Irenaeus Bishop of Lions Adversus Haeres l. 2. c. 39. p. 192. who lived in the next Age after the Apostles saith that