Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: CONS.ELF@AIDA.CSD.UU.SE (Ake Eldberg) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Infant baptism and bible interpretation Message-ID: Date: 9 Jan 91 09:00:08 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Lines: 32 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu Hello from Ake Eldberg. Ron Graham commented on my recent posting, and I want to correct a couple of my own mistakes... It was not my intention to start a debate about baptism. I should have anticipated that my posting would cause some people with baptist sympathies to feel wronged. Sorry, people. I was hasty. My point was to demonstrate that believing in the bible as some sort of "magical" book which needs no connection to history and will automatically interpret itself correctly to anyone who is driven by the Spirit, is a mistake. I chose a certain flavor of baptism as an example. I have met many fundamentalists of the baptist persuasion who have clained - quoting the bible - that: a) there is no salvation without baptism, b) infants cannot be baptized, it's not valid before God. Which would mean exactly that most Christian believers through the ages are damned. It's possible that this is a peculiar Swedish brand of baptism which doesn't exist in America? I am well aware of that most baptists do not claim that those who are baptized as infants and never receive the "believer's baptism" are damned. Sorry if my posting looked like an all-out attack on baptists. Sorry too that my stupid example took away all the attention from my main point about Christianity as a historical religion with a development behind it. Ake Eldberg