Recent events turned my attention again to the issue of paedobaptism, a subject I have not really thought about since 2008, when I debated credobaptist Gene Cook on the subject. However, a friend, Bnonn Tennant, recently posted a simple argument which he takes to conclusively prove credobaptism. Steve Hays then gave a good reply. This lead me to collate some old files – notes, really – that I had written in 2008 as I prepared for my debate with Gene Cook. I’m posting it here in PDF format for those interested. However, caveat lector: I wrote these, as I said, circa 2008. The writing is very rough (most of it was written for notes, stream-of-consciousness style!), and though I think my writing has improved over the years, I did not want to take the time to do what would amount to an entire rewrite of 40 some odd pages! I’d also like to think that I agree with most of what I wrote, though by now I may reject some of the arguments I made back then. I did not want to spend the time going through the arguments with a fine-toothed comb. However, despite the poor(er) writing and clearness of arguments, I think there are several unique arguments here, arguments I have not seen made elsewhere by paedobaptists. Finally, a note on structure. The file consists of three parts. The first is basically my opening argument for my debate with Cook. The second part is a unique argument I developed, using the arguments of Brian Rosner on Paul’s teaching on excommunication in 1 Cor. 5. This argument is very rough and far from finished, but the nuts-n-bolts are there. The final section is a dozen (or so) very detailed responses to several (a dozen or so!) popular arguments credobaptists have either used to argue for credobaptism or against paedobaptism.

PDF link below

On Baptism and its Proper Subjects