[MENTION=394]MennoSota[/MENTION]
MennoSota said:
Please acknowledge that the paedobaptism view is not supported by the early church.
The earliest reference we have in all Christian history to Anti-Padeobaptism or Credobaptism comes from the late 16th Century. The dogmas you parrot are late 16th Century inventions, unheard of and indeed denounced before that.
The earliest explicit record of a baby being baptized is from the year
140 AD and it comes from one of the greatest and most esteemed Church Fathers, Irenius who states in A.D. 189 that he was baptized shortly after birth and was born in A.D 140. The Second Century is earlier than the late 16th Century, I'm sure you will yield.
Here are some statements from the Early Church since you specifically asked:
Hippolytus:
“Baptize first the
children, and if they can speak for themselves let them do so. Otherwise, let their parents or other relatives speak for them” (The Apostolic Tradition 21:16 [
A.D. 215]).
Origen:
“Every soul that is born into flesh is soiled by the filth of wickedness and sin. . . . In the Church, baptism is given for the remission of sins, and, according to the usage of the Church, baptism is given also to
infants. (Homilies on Leviticus 8:3 [
A.D. 248]).
“The Church received from the apostles the giving of baptism also to
infants. The apostles, to whom were committed the secrets of the divine sacraments, knew there are in everyone innate strains of sin, which must be washed away through water and the Spirit” (Commentaries on Romans 5:9 [
A.D. 248]).
Cyprian of Carthage
“As to what pertains to the case of
infants: You [Fidus] said that they ought not to be baptized within the second or third day after their birth, that the old law of circumcision must be taken into consideration, and that you did not think that one should be baptized and sanctified within the eighth day after his birth. In our council it seemed to us far otherwise. No one agreed to the course which you thought should be taken. Rather, we all judge that the mercy and grace of God ought to be denied to no man born” (Letters 64:2 [
A.D. 253]).
“If, in the case of the worst sinners and those who formerly sinned much against God, when afterwards they believe, the remission of their sins is granted and no one is held back from baptism and grace, how much more, then, should an
infant not be held back, who, having but recently been born, has done no sin, except that, born of the flesh according to Adam, he has contracted the contagion of that old death from his first being born. For this very reason does an infant approaches more easily to receive the remission of sins: because the sins forgiven him are not his own but those of another” (ibid., 64:5
A.D. 253).
Gregory of Nazianz
“Do you have an
infant child? Allow sin no opportunity; rather, let the
infant be sanctified from childhood. From his most tender age let him be consecrated by the Spirit. Do you fear the seal of baptism because of the weakness of nature? Oh, what a pusillanimous mother and of how little faith!” (Oration on Holy Baptism 40:7 [
A.D. 388]).
“‘Well enough,’ some will say, ‘for those who ask for baptism, but what do you have to say about those who are still children, and aware neither of loss nor of grace? Shall we baptize them too?’ Certainly I respond. Better that they be sanctified unaware, than that they depart unsealed and uninitiated” (ibid., 40:28).
A.D. 388
John Chrysostom
“You see how many are the benefits of baptism, and some think its heavenly grace consists only in the remission of sins, but we have enumerated ten honors it bestows! For this reason we baptize also
infants, though they are not defiled by [personal] sins, so that there may be given to them holiness, righteousness, adoption, inheritance, brotherhood with Christ, and that they may be his [Christ’s] members” (Baptismal Catecheses in Augustine, Against Julian 1:6:21 [
A.D. 388]).
Augustine (Admired especially by Calvinists)
“What the universal Church holds, not as instituted by councils but as something always held, is most correctly believed to have been handed down by apostolic authority. Since others respond for
infants, so that the celebration of the sacrament may be complete for them, it is certainly availing to them for their consecration, because they themselves are not able to respond” (On Baptism, Against the Donatists 4:24:31 [
A.D. 400]).
“The custom of Mother Church in baptizing
infants is certainly not to be scorned, nor is it to be regarded in any way as superfluous, nor is it to be believed that its tradition is anything except apostolic” (The Literal Interpretation of Genesis 10:23:39
[
A.D. 408]).
“Cyprian was not issuing a new decree but was keeping to the most solid belief of the Church in order to correct some who thought that
infants ought not be baptized before the eighth day after their birth. . . . He agreed with certain of his fellow bishops that an
infant is able to be duly baptized as soon as he is born” (Letters 166:8:23 [A.D. 412]).
“By this grace baptized
infants too are ingrafted into his [Christ’s] body,
infants who certainly are not yet able to imitate anyone. Christ, in whom all are made alive . . . gives also the most hidden grace of his Spirit to believers, grace which he secretly infuses also into
infants. . . . If anyone wonders why children born of the baptized should themselves be baptized, let him attend briefly to this. . . . The sacrament of baptism is most assuredly the sacrament of regeneration” (Forgiveness and the Just Deserts of Sin, and the Baptism of Infants 1:9:10; 1:24:34; 2:27:43 [
A.D. 412]).
Council of Carthage V
“Item: It seemed good that whenever there were not found reliable witnesses who could testify that without any doubt the abandoned children were baptized and when the children themselves were not, on account of their tender age, able to answer concerning the giving of the sacraments to them, all such children should be baptized without scruple, lest a hesitation should deprive them of the cleansing of the sacraments. This was urged by the North African legates, our brethren, since they redeem many such [abandoned children] from the barbarians” (Canon 7 [
A.D. 401]).
Council of Mileum II
“Whoever says that
infants fresh from their mothers’ wombs ought not to be baptized, or say that they are indeed baptized unto the remission of sins, but that they draw nothing of the original sin of Adam, which is expiated in the bath of regeneration . . . let him be anathema [excommunicated]. Since what the apostle Paul says, ‘Through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so passed to all men, in whom all have sinned’ [Rom. 5:12], must not be understood otherwise than the catholic church spread everywhere has always understood it. For on account of this rule of faith also
infants, who in themselves thus far have not been able to commit any sin, are therefore truly baptized unto the remission of sins, so that that which they have contracted from generation may be cleansed in them by regeneration” (Canon 3 [
A.D. 416]).
All of these are from the Early Church and are before the late 16th century when the dogmas of Anti-Paedobaptism, Credobaptism and Immersion-Only Baptism were invented and began to be practiced.
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