The liturgical-sacramental experience of baptism is understood amongst a great deal of Christian denominations[1] to be a transformative experience of salvific reality, necessary for the Christian participant. Containing within itself a nearly universal recognition of importance amongst Christians, the liturgical form of baptism is often debated as to how one should receive this sacrament: weather by sprinkling, pouring, or immersion of water.
Each of these three forms[2] in their practice contains substantially deep historical roots contributing to a potential validity through their continuity. However, such differentiation in practice is claimed by some to spark differentiation in theologies[3], primarily between the common “Eastern” practice of immersion and the, perhaps, more common “Western” practice of sprinkling/pouring. The common discrediting of sprinkling/pouring found in the Orthodox East as a desired practice seems to stem from a multiplicity of ecclesiological processes and claims (such as lex orandi lex credendi, and the fear of compromising an “Eastern ethos”). This paper will examine whether or not validity is found in such claims of discrediting towards sprinkling/pouring within the baptismal service by examining (granted, briefly) the mystical Eastern Orthodox understanding of liturgics, the history and development of the early Church’s practices of Baptism, and the theologies that have potentially developed as a result of said different practices. This will be done with the hope of addressing the central question, “Could the embrace of sprinkling or pouring as a liturgical practice in baptism be appropriately administered in continuity with the theology of the Eastern Orthodox Church?”
“It is this world (and not any ‘other world’), it is this life (and not some ‘other life’) that were given to man to be a sacrament of the divine presence, given as communion with God, and it is only through this world, this life, by transforming them into communion with God, that man was to be.”[4] Having become incarnate, the Lord God made clear and confirmed the reality of creation (that was, at times, veiled by false perception)[5], that the world/matter/creation is “good.”[6] God both created the material and, having taken upon Himself matter in the Incarnation, sanctified creation in His action of birth, death, and resurrection. The expression of life itself as a gift is presented to man in a liturgical manner, presenting to humanity that the most natural way in which man communicates reality is through liturgy, and the intimate connection between the divine and the created is made manifest in action. Having been endowed by God to sanctify the world,[7] mankind carries out action in faith; mankind preforms liturgy. Because liturgy is the manifestation of faithful action in the Church toward sacrament and communion, a study of the rite of initiation offers a glimpse into the sacramental life of the Church Herself.
[i]n its essence the Church is the presence, the actualization in this world of the “world to come,’ in this aeon–of the Kingdom. And the mode of this presence, of this actualization of the new life, the new aeon, is precisely… The leitourgia… is the action of the Church itself, or the Church in actu, it is the very expression of this life.[8]
What is done, the actions that take place in the church are important and play a significant role in the development of the theology therein. Understanding the theology of the church as derived from liturgical practice is something that becomes possible because the natural development of the liturgies are not only in concordance with, but also help to express the theology of the Church. This understanding of liturgy becomes hinged upon the fact that the lex orandi is clearly influenced by the lex credendi, and vice versa.
In the experience of the Orthodox Church, liturgy is always the expression of the faith, life and teachings of the Church, and, therefore, a sure path to learning these. “Lex orandi lex est credendi.’ “The rule of prayer is the rule of belief.’ And only insofar as we return to this rule, can we recover the true foundations of the Orthodox Christian Education.[9]
The incomprehensibility of the heavenly reality presented to the participants of liturgy is expressed through the comprehensible in its completeness. As mankind attempts to communicate within their temporal and limited perception of God’s revelation to the world, the limited tools and objects[10] given by God become transfigured and worked through by the Holy Spirit in what the Church has come to know as symbol. Each symbol has a role in delivering the message or revealing what God is doing while we are actively participating with/in them. Each of these symbols is a visible sign[11] of divine grace, which has an inner reality, a heavenly reality in the Kingdom of God. The liturgical experience allows for the invisible to be accessed through the visible, the uncreated through the created, the immaterial through the material. These material symbols are mystically transfigured and contain the whole of what they point to.[12] Therefore, the objects that are used within the liturgical services are important, because through the example of the tradition of the Church, along with Scripture, specific forms and objects are instructed to be used in a specific manner. Otherwise, one becomes immersed in a contrary perspective to reality where relativism becomes rampant and Gnosticism takes precedence.
Within the scope of leitourgia is the understanding of lex orandi lex credendi; conformity amongst liturgical practices throughout the Orthodox world in fear of differentiation amongst theologies seems to be a legitimate response. However, this response poses a multitude of issues pertaining to the necessarily organic structure of the Church as a living and ever-growing body. The complete conformity of all liturgical practice would have no such tolerance for any unique or localized traditions to organically develop, directly interfering with the charism of the Church.
“Tradition is not a principle striving to restore the past, using past as a criterion for the present. Such a conception of tradition is rejected by history itself and by the consciousness of the Orthodox Church… Tradition is the constant abiding of the Spirit and not only the memory of words. Tradition is a Charismatic, not a historical event.”[13]
The history of the Church has shown that it has developed liturgically and has necessarily adapted in response to developing circumstances around, outside of, and within the church.[14] The view of a stagnant, mechanical, and universal practice of a specific liturgy has never occurred or been encouraged within the history of the Orthodox Church, for the very reason that an aspect of Orthodox eschatology is undoubtedly that of it’s universality.[15] This liturgical theology of universality and potential differentiation in rites stems from the holy work of the saints and biblical commentators who expressed their experiences while dwelling in this theology.[16] Liturgical theology and its development within the Eastern Orthodox Church is hinged upon and inspired by the techniques of the biblical exegetes before them. Understanding the experiential reality of the Divine in liturgy to have infinite depth, the liturgists of the church too understood that the continuity therein is not found in a stagnant, unchanging, form of ritual.
All healthy liturgical interpretation depends on a ritual symbolism determined not arbitrarily, but by the testimony of tradition rooted in the Bible. Like the scriptures, the rites of the Church await an exegesis and a hermeneutic and homiletic to expound, interpret, and apply their multiple levels of meaning in each age… It is no wonder, then, that the commentators on liturgy used a method inherited from the other tradition of biblical exegesis.[17]
The origin of a practice and the intention behind its usage plays a significant role in the adoption of the practice, carrying with it a specific history that shows to compliment the active liturgical flow of the Church. This being said, the history of the liturgical tendencies of the Church as unfolding expressions of the same ever-eternal reality of the Heavenly Kingdom necessitates continuity with what the Church is trying to teach and what the Bible proclaims. Scripture, tradition, and experience as an inheritance of the Church provides the Christian foundations of baptism. This sacrament becomes for Christianity a necessity, a commandment, and the experience of reception into the Church by the Holy Spirit, through the Son, and in accordance to the will of the Father.
To give a proper response to those who combat the liturgical practice of sprinkling/pouring, an analysis of its development and usage is necessary, along with an understanding of the word “baptism” itself. It is often argued that the word “baptism” in the original Greek (βαπτίζω) as found within the Old and New Testament means “immersion” or “to immerse,” implying that immersion is the only legitimate and appropriate way to baptize. Often immersion is the appropriate translation and intension of the word in accordance to the context in which it is written. For example, at Elisha’s direction, Naaman “went down and dipped himself [βαπτίζω] seven times in the Jordan”[18].
Although “baptism” does include this definition, it too posses a multiplicity of other potential definitions that are not limited to “immersion,” but speak rather of washing and/or sprinkling. When Jesus ate at a Pharisee’s house, “[t]he Pharisee was astonished to see that he did not first wash before dinner.”[19] The word for “washed” within this verse is“ἐβαπτίσθη.” The Pharisees did not “immerse” before dinner, but rather “washed.” In fact, the gospel of Mark emphasizes this aspect: the Pharisees “do not eat unless they wash [νιπτο] their hands, observing the tradition of the elders; and when they come from the market place, they do not eat unless they wash themselves [βαπτισμοὺς].”[20] In light of the multiplicity of meanings behind this word, the argument that all forms of the word “βαπτίζω” imply an immersion becomes weak, especially when reflecting upon its usage in a metaphorical manner.
As Christ reflects upon the future of things to come for Him in His death, he states, “I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how I am constrained until it is accomplished!”[21] The work of Christ’s “Baptism” in this world becomes the cleansing reality of all creation through the sanctification of His death and resurrection. The death of Christ and the shedding of his blood as a sacrifice for the world is dense in terminology that refers to this action as a process of baptism through a pouring out of His life for the life of the world. In reference to the offering up of the life of Christ, the book of Hebrews emphasizes the “sprinkling” of His blood as a cleansing process. “For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?”[22] Here the same action of sacrifice described by Christ as baptism is later described as “sprinkling.”
Within Baptism the mystical reality that is being imparted to the participant is man’s participation in the event of Easter. It is a ‘new birth by water and the Holy Spirit’ into the Kingdom of God (Jn 3:5).”[23] Christian baptism too is taking that which has been sanctified by the Holy Spirit (water), and receiving the participant in the name of the Holy Trinity.The experience of the Holy Spirit is extremely descriptive throughout the history of the Church, using specific terminology to appropriately and symbolically express this contained, yet uncontainable experience. Throughout Scripture the action of the Holy Spirit is often times described as being received as a pouring forth from God.[24][25] “Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”[26]
In Acts 1:4–5 Jesus charged his disciples ‘not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, ‘you heard from me, for John baptized with water, but before many days you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’ Did this mean they would be “immersed” in the Spirit? No: three times Acts 2 states that the Holy Spirit was poured out on them when Pentecost came (2:17, 18, 33, emphasis added). Later Peter referred to the Spirit falling uponthem, and also on others after Pentecost, explicitly identifying these events with the promise of being “baptized with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 11:15–17). These passages demonstrate that the meaning of baptizo is broad enough to include ‘pouring.’[27]
The question still remains as to whether or not sprinkling/pouring of water in baptism can be received within the Orthodox Church without harming the organic development, theological integrity, or Biblical continuity of the sacramental reality therein. It is not within the interest of the Church to produce nuanced understandings of liturgical action that are simply created for a convenient return back to theology. Because, for the Orthodox, it is from the liturgy that theology is derived. In liturgy the infinitely beautiful tradition manifests its containment of holy scripture; from whence one comes to experience the heavenly.
A rich history of pouring/sprinkling in both Eastern and Western Christendom has been preserved within the memory of the Church. The variety of modes in the baptismal practice within the early Church and continuing to this day has been understood to be, “a compelling argument”[28] among many liturgists, because there seems to be no apprehension towards the use of pouring/sprinkling in the early Church when immersion was not made possible.
“Concerning baptism, baptize in this manner: Having said all these things beforehand, baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit in living water [that is, in running water, as in a river]. If there is no living water, baptize in other water; and, if you are not able to use cold water, use warm. If you have neither, pour water three times upon the head in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”[29]
Immersion is the preferred form of baptism within the Early Church,[30] “Immersion was probably the norm, but that at various times and places full immersion, partial immersion and affusion were probably in use”[31] however,in cases where pouring/sprinkling was administered, there was no doubt in the validity of the sacrament in its entirety. Although it is well known that some form of immersion was likely the most common method of baptism,[32] there are many writings from the early Church that view the mode of baptism to be inconsequential to the sacramental reality contained therein.[33] This topic revolving around the sacramental validity of water being sprinkled/poured as opposed to the action of immersion during baptism was raised and directly addressed as early as the 3rd century in Saint Cyprian’s 75th Epistle.[34]
As far as my poor understanding conceives it, I think that the divine benefits can in no respect be mutilated and weakened; nor can anything less occur in that case, where, with full and entire faith both of the giver and receiver, is accepted what is drawn from the divine gifts. For in the sacrament of salvation the contagion of sins is not in such wise washed away, as the filth of the skin and of the body is washed away in the carnal and ordinary washing, as that there should be need of saltpetre and other appliances also, and a bath and a basin wherewith this vile body must be washed and purified. Otherwise is the breast of the believer washed; otherwise is the mind of man purified by the merit of faith. In the sacraments of salvation, when necessity compels, and God bestows His mercy, the divine methods confer the whole benefit on believers… Whence it appears that the sprinkling also of water prevails equally with the washing of salvation; and that when this is done in the Church, where the faith both of receiver and giver is sound, all things hold and may be consummated and perfected by the majesty of the Lord and by the truth of faith.[35]
The differentiation of liturgical practice is an organic process embraced by the Church in accordance to theological, experiential, and social developments. The Eucharistic celebration becomes a perfect example of differentiation in continuity. The continuity of the actual body and blood of Christ as the anchor of all theological and traditional influences and the counter to relativistic tendencies becomes the fullness of that which it points to.The objection to relativism within the Eucharistic celebration is not hindered by the variety of liturgies that have been preformed in the organic and growing knowledge of the Church, nor has there remained a strict continuity in the manner which the Holy Body and Blood are partaken.[36] For, even this pinnacle of sacraments, this one true sacrament, has a history of reception that proclaims variety, yet remains in perfection, and in accordance to the natural flux and response to and of the world.
All levels- Old Testament preparation, Last Supper, accomplishment on Calvary, eternal heavenly offering, present liturgical event- must be held in dynamic unity by an interpretation of the Eucharist. To separate these levels, then parcel out the elements bit by bit according to some chronologically consecutive narrative sequence, is to turn ritual into drama, symbol into allegory, mystery into history.[37]
A differentiation in the reception of the Eucharist is found even to this day within the liturgical structure of the Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom and Basil. As the Priest receives elements of Eucharist separately, laypeople receive by intinction distributed via a spoon. While in the Liturgy of Saint James holds to the more ancient tradition[38] of all receiving the holy body and blood separately. “When you approach communion, do not come with your hands outstretched or with your fingers open, but make your left hand a throne for the right one, which is to receive the King.”[39] However, the continuity of the Eucharist is not compromised despite this differentiation in reception. In fact, this differentiation in reception became necessary due to cultural and sociological phenomena that was happening. “Factors which contributed to this refusal to entrust the Eucharist to the laity included a rise in superstitious attitudes about the consecrated bread (e.g., some people took the Eucharist home and preserved it as a good luck charm.)”[40] Variance in symbolism and differentiation of a symbol’s usage is a beauty of the Church that is understood to be beneficial for it’s people.
There is something to be said of the depth and rich theology behind the action of immersion. As the participant is immersed he/she is actively participating in the death and resurrection of Christ through their rising and falling in and out of the water. “It is true that immersion best represents death and resurrection, bringing out more fully the meaning of the sacrament than pouring or sprinkling (cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church 1239).”[41] The significance of this liturgical action is not something to be disregarded, nor is this the intension of those who sprinkle/pour, rather within the act of pouring/sprinkling this too is being experienced, but perhaps not emphasized. “On the other hand, pouring best represents the infusion of the Holy Spirit also associated with water baptism. And all three modes adequately suggest the sense of cleansing signified by baptism. No one mode has exclusive symbolical validity over the others.”[42]
The action of pouring/sprinkling is not a defiance of this calling to die and resurrect with Christ (as those who solely approve immersion may attempt to accuse), rather, it is a sign of the action of the Holy Spirit in a manner that is emphasized throughout the Bible. The action of sprinkling/pouring does not take away from the ecclesiological reality of one dying and rising again with Christ, just as the act of immersion does not delineate the reality of receiving the Holy Spirit. “The idea that baptism is valid only when practiced in the one method of immersion can scarcely be looked on as anything else than a ritualistic idea.”[43]
NOTES
This article by Nicholas G. Mamey was originally published on 5/7/2015
[1]Some Christians, do not see this sacrament as necessary. Most notably among these denominations are: Christian Scientists, Quakers, The Salvation Army, and Unitarians.
[2]The three “modes” of baptism that will be discussed within this paper are the following: sprinkling, pouring, and immersion.
[3]Some accusation are often aimed towards those who practice “sprinkling” or “pouring” in fear of embracing an “gnostic” approach to the sacramental life of the Church.
[4]Aleksandr Schmemann, “Trampling Down Death by Death,” in For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1973), 100.
[5]See. Charles George. Herbermann and Edward Aloysius. Pace, “Gnosticism,” in The Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church, vol. 6 (New York: Appleton, 1909)“[The Gnostics] held matter to be a deterioration of spirit, and the whole universe a depravation of the Deity, and taught the ultimate end of all being to be the overcoming of the grossness of matter and the return to the Parent-Spirit, which return they held to be inaugurated and facilitated by the appearance of some God-sent Savior.” Although this definition seems quite incomplete and simplistic, the vast array of Gnostic practices and thought through the centuries hardly allow for another.
[6]“Genesis 1:10” The New King James Bible: New Testament. (Nashville: T. Nelson, 1979).“And God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters He called Seas. And God saw that it was good.”
[7]Alexander Schmemann, “For the Life of The World” in For the Life of the World:Sacraments and Orthodoxy (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1973), 16-17.
[8]Ibid., 16-17
[9]Alexander Schmemann, Liturgy and Life: Christian Development Through Liturgical Experience(New York: Department of Religious Education, Orthodox Church in America, 1974), 22.
[10]Limited in and of themselves.
[11]See. Schmemann, Alexander. “On Sacrament and Symbol.” For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy(Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary, 1973), 141. For Schmemann, sign is not merely that which points to otherness or a gesture towards reality, rather, the sign is a manifestation of the divine reality experienced. “Sign” is an epiphany that visibly reveals the invisible insofar as the integrity of its ontology is not “dissolved” in the other. “We call this relationship an epiphany. ‘A is B’ means that the whole of A expresses, communicates, reveals, manifests the ‘reality’ of B…”
[12]Ibid.
[13]Georges Florovsky, “”The Catholicity of the Church”” in Bible, Church, Tradition: An Eastern Orthodox View (Belmont, MA: Nordland Pub., 1972), 47.
[14]Hughes, Edward, Fr. “Western Rite History.” Personal interview. 10 Oct. 2013.
[15]Ibid.
[16]Within Saint Gregory Palamas letter to Dionisious Epitle 7 “We hold fast to all traditions of the Church, written and unwritten, and above all to the most and mystical and sacred celebration and communion and assembly (synaxis), whereby all other rites are made perfect.”
[17]Robert S.J Taft, “The Liturgy of the Great Church: An Initial Synthesis of Structure and Interpretation On the Eve of Iconoclasm,” reading, Dumbarton Oaks Symposium on Byzantine Liturgy, May 10-12, 1979 (Dumbarton Oaks), 59.
[18]“2 Kgs. 5:14” The New King James Bible: New Testament. (Nashville: T. Nelson, 1979.)
[19]Ibid. “Luke 11:38”
[20]Ibid.“Mark 7:3–4” emphasis added.
[21]Ibid. “Luke 12:50”
[22]Ibid. “Hebrews 9:13-14”
[23]Thomas Hopko, “The Sacraments,” in The Orthodox Faith: Worship, vol. II (New York: Dept. of Religious Education, the Orthodox Church in America, 1976).
[24]See.“Acts 2:33” The New King James Bible: New Testament. (Nashville: T. Nelson, 1979.)“Therefore being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He poured out this which you now see and hear.”
[25]Ibid. “Acts 10:45” “And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also.
[26]Ibid. “Romans 5:5”
[27]Robert H. Brom, Bp., “Tracts,” Baptism: Immersion Only?, August 10, 2004, section goes here, accessed May 07, 2015, doi:Bernadeane Carr, STL, Censor Librorum.
[28]Stanley E. Porter and Anthony R. Cross, Dimensions of Baptism: Biblical and Theological Studies (London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002), 2.
[29]Alexander Roberts, A. Cleveland Coxe, and James Donaldson, “Didache” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 7 (Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans Pub., 1965) Chapter 7.
[30]William Chambers and Robert Chambers, Chambers’s Information for the People: A Popular Encyclopedia (Philadelphia: Zieber, 1847), 676.
[31]Laurie Guy, Introducing Early Christianity: A Topical Survey of Its Life, Beliefs, and Practices (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2004), 224-225.
[32]See. Wiersbe (1997), Expository outlines on the New Testament, pp. 466–67, New Testament scholars generally agree that the early church baptized by immersion.”
[33]See. Translated by S. Thelwall. From Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 3. Edited by Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1885.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight. Within the 17thsection of Tertullian’s “On Baptism” he presents a large variety of circumstances and practices of baptism that show to be extremely variant from what many today would consider in the Orthodox Church to be the “norm.”
[34]Geoffrey William. Bromiley, “Baptism: Aspergus,” in The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, vol. A-D (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 1979), 119-120.“There is evidence to show that those who received the rite in this form [sprinkling] were somewhat despised; for the nichnames clinici and grabatorii were (unworthily, Cyprian declares) bestowed on them by neighbors…The question was even raised in the middle of the 3rdcent. Whether baptism by aspersion was a valid baptism, and Cyprian was asked for his opinion on the matter. His answer is contained in his 75thepistle (69 in Hartel’s ed.). There he contends that the ordinance administered this way is perfectly valid, and quotes in support of his opinion various OT texts that assert the purifying effects of water sprinkled.”
[35]Alexander Roberts, A. Cleveland Coxe, and James Donaldson, “Cyprian’s Epistle 75 ” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 5 (Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans Pub., 1965) Epistle 75.
[36]By saying “the manner in which the Holy Body and Blood are partaken.” I mean to emphasize the form of eating/drinking that is carried out by the participants. The liturgical history of the East has emphasized two main forms in which this practice is carried out: (a) by intinction. (b) by distributing the body and blood (bread and wine) separately.
[37]Robert S.J Taft, “The Liturgy of the Great Church: An Initial Synthesis of Structure and Interpretation On the Eve of Iconoclasm,” reading, Dumbarton Oaks Symposium on Byzantine Liturgy, May 10-12, 1979 (Dumbarton Oaks), 73.
[38]William J. Belford, Special Ministers of the Eucharist (New York: Pueblo Pub., 1979), 9. “For nearly the first millennia of the Church in both East and West it was the norm was to receive the Eucharist by hand… there is general agreement that all people of Church- priests, deacons, and laity- received the Lord in their hands as the normal custom for the first nine centuries of the Church.”
[39]Philip (Ed.) Schaff, “Catechetical Lectures (Cyril of Jerusalem) Lecture 23,” in Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers, II ed., vol. 7 (S.l.: Wm B Eerdmans Pub).
[40]William J. Belford, Special Ministers of the Eucharist (New York: Pueblo Pub., 1979)9-10.
[41]“Part 2: Section 1:THE CELEBRATION OF THE CHRISTIAN MYSTERY,” in Catechism of the Catholic Church (Liguori, MO: Liguori Publications, 1994), article 1239.
[42]Geoffrey William. Bromiley, “Baptism: Aspergus,” in The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, vol. A-D (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 1979), 120.
[43]Geoffrey William. Bromiley, “Baptism: Aspergus,” in The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, vol. A-D (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 1979), 420.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Belford, William J. Special Ministers of the Eucharist. New York: Pueblo Pub., 1979. 9.
Brom, Robert H., Bp. “Tracts.” Baptism: Immersion Only? August 10, 2004. Accessed May 07, 2015. doi:Bernadeane Carr, STL, Censor Librorum.
Bromiley, Geoffrey William. “Baptism: Aspergus.” In The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, 119-20. Vol. A-D. Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 1979.
Chambers, William, and Robert Chambers. Chambers’s Information for the People: A Popular Encyclopedia. Philadelphia: Zieber, 1847. 676.
Florovsky, Georges. “”The Catholicity of the Church”” In Bible, Church, Tradition: An Eastern Orthodox View, 47. Belmont, MA: Nordland Pub., 1972.
Guy, Laurie. Introducing Early Christianity: A Topical Survey of Its Life, Beliefs, and Practices. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2004. 224-25.
Herbermann, Charles George., and Edward Aloysius. Pace. “Gnosticism.” In The Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church. Vol. 6. New York: Appleton, 1909.
Hopko, Thomas. “The Sacraments.” In The Orthodox Faith: Worship. Vol. II. New York: Dept. of Religious Education, the Orthodox Church in America, 1976.
Hueghs, Edward, Fr. “Western Rite History.” Personal interview. 10 Oct. 2013.
“Part 2: Section 1:THE CELEBRATION OF THE CHRISTIAN MYSTERY.” In Catechism of the Catholic Church. Liguori, MO: Liguori Publications, 1994.
Porter, Stanley E., and Anthony R. Cross. Dimensions of Baptism: Biblical and Theological Studies. London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002. 2.
Roberts, Alexander, A. Cleveland Coxe, and James Donaldson. “Cyprian’s Epistle 75: To Magnus, on Baptizing the Novatians, and Those Who Obtain Grace on a Sick-Bed.” In The Ante-Nicene Fathers. Vol. 5. Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans Pub., 1965.
Roberts, Alexander, A. Cleveland Coxe, and James Donaldson. “The Didache: Chapter 7.” In The Ante-Nicene Fathers. Vol. 7. Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans Pub., 1965.
Roberts, Alexander, A. Cleveland Coxe, and James Donaldson. “Didache: Chapter 7.” In The Ante-Nicene Fathers. Vol. 7. Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans Pub., 1965.
Schaff, Philip (Ed.). “Catechetical Lectures (Cyril of Jerusalem) Lecture 23.” In Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers. II ed. Vol. 7. S.l.: Wm B Eerdmans Pub.
Schmemann, Aleksandr. For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1973.
Taft, Robert S.J. “The Liturgy of the Great Church: An Initial Synthesis of Structure and Interpretation On the Eve of Iconoclasm.” Reading, Dumbarton Oaks Symposium on Byzantine Liturgy, May 10-12, 1979. Dumbarton Oaks. 59.
Thelwall S. Trans. From Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 3. Edited by Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1885.)
Wiersbe, Warren W. Wiersbe’s Expository Outlines on the New Testament. Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1992.