13. Matthew’s account focuses on the encounter between Jesus and John, and on the personal experience of Jesus, so that it might suggest a purely private baptism. But the setting (see vv. 5–6) and the wording of Luke’s account (Luke 3:21) indicate that Jesus was one among many who were baptized by John, whether by a personal act or by self-immersion together under John’s direction (so Jeremias, NTT, p. 51). To be baptized indicates that Jesus deliberately chose
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