The Baptized

Body

Peter J. Leithart

Peter J. Leithart, The Baptized Body.

Copyright © 2007 Peter J. Leithart.

Published by Canon Press, P.O. Box 8729, Moscow, ID 83843

800.488.2034 | www.canonpress.com

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise, without prior permission of the publisher, except as provided by USA copyright law.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Leithart, Peter J.

The Baptized body / by Peter J. Leithart.

p. cm.

ISBN-13: 978-1-59128-048-4 (pbk.)

ISBN-10: 1-59128-048-6 (pbk.)

1. Baptism. I. Title.

BV811.3.L45 2007

234′.161--dc22

2007010661

Contents

Preface

1. Starting Before the Beginning

2. “Baptism” Is Baptism

3. The “Body of Christ” Is the Body of Christ

4. Apostasy Happens

5. A Tale of Three Servants

Appendix: The Sociology of Infant Baptism

Preface

In addition to being hurried and unpolished, The Baptized Body is a narrow and polemical little book. It is narrow because it focuses on a single question in the theology of baptism—the question of baptismal efficacy: What does baptism do to the baptized? That is an important question, but it’s far from the only important question regarding baptism and, to my way of thinking, far from the most interesting question about baptism. I’d much rather be writing a book about the typology of baptism, or examining the social and political import of baptism, or even considering how post-Reformation changes in baptismal practice helped to forge modern civilization. Perhaps someday I can turn back to those subjects. As it happens, the question of baptismal efficacy is the most contentious question concerning this sacrament in the Reformed world today. Hence this book.

And so to the polemics. The polemical character of this book is somewhat oblique. I only rarely name people I’m disagreeing with, and I spend virtually no time evaluating and refuting their arguments. There is a reason for that: I don’t want to condemn this book to a two-week shelf life. The question of baptismal efficacy is a perennial one in the church, and it will remain an important question when all the current controversies are a dim memory. When all the dust has settled, when advocates of “Federal Vision” or “Auburn Avenue” theology are either expelled from every major Reformed denomination or grudgingly permitted to stay, when goings-on in Moscow, Idaho, are a faint memory even for those who specialize in the arcana of American church history, I’d like this book to remain useful. It would please me if this book made some contribution to resolving today’s disputes. I’m not expecting that to happen (truth be told, I’m expecting the opposite), but it would please me. It would please me far more if a reader with no knowledge of these disputes could happen upon this book in the dusty backroom of a used book shop long after I’m dead and find it edifying.

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