The current interest in the ministry of the Holy Spirit among Christians in the Wesleyan, Keswickian, and Pentecostal sectors of the Church has evoked numerous studies on the subject of the Holy Spirit in personal experience.¹ Pentecostalism, or neo-pentecostalism in particular has focused sharply on the New Testament’s teaching on the baptism with the Holy Spirit. By no means is this a new subject; it has been treated in depth many times in the past. However, the influence of the parties promoting the experience of the baptism with the Holy Spirit accompanied with certain gifts has driven some New Testament scholars to take a fresh look at the biblical material which speaks of the Spirit.

The major NT saying on this subject springs from the ministry of John the Baptist and reappears at two places in the book of Acts. According to Mark 1:8, John announces, "I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit" (RSV). Mathew and Luke also record this prophecy but add "and fire." In Acts 1:5 Jesus uses the statement but does not use the words "and fire." In Acts 11:16 Peter reminds his Jerusalem hearers that Jesus spoke of the Spirit’s baptism which he reported the Gentiles at experienced at Caesarea.

Even a casual view of this logion would suggest its importance to the Early Church’s view of salvific experience. John the Baptist, Jesus, and Peter quote it in contexts which uniquely relate to an experience of the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, the episode in Acts 19, in which the Ephesian disciples are queried by Paul regarding the Holy Spirit, has distant relevance to the issues raised in the interpretation of this tradition.

In this paper I shall analyze textually this distinctive logion and explore again the question: Is the baptism with the Holy Spirit a baptism of grace or judgment? I am not prepared to offer a new solution to an old problem, but I hope to update our thinking on it and thus enrich our long-standing position on the Spirit’s baptism.

Significant differences appear in the several recordings of this tradition. Assuming Mark’s gospel to be the first one written, we begin there. Mark 1:8 reads: ego ebaptisa humas hudati, autos de baptisei humas en pneumati hagio. Two variations from other texts are to be noted: (1) en does not appear with hudati and (2) Mark admits kai puri.²

The Matthean account reads: ego men humas baptizo en hudati eis metanoian; ho de opiso mou erchomenos ischuroteros mou estin … autos humas baptisei en pneumatic hagio kai puri. The variations here are several but not all of them are significant. (1) The affirmative particle men is used correlatively with de, obviously to emphasize the contrast between John’s baptism and the Coming One’s baptism. (2) Mathew uses the present tense in speaking of John’s work (baptizo) where as Mark employs the aorist tense (ebaptisa).³ (3) En is added to hudati. (4) The experiential result of John’s baptism is expressed in the phrase eis metanoian. (5) The statement of deference to the Greater One (s) power and position intercepts the contrast between John’s ministry and that of the Coming One. (6) The addition of kai puri is perhaps the most important difference and, interestingly, there are no textual variance in the extant manuscripts of this Gospel related to this addition. (7) Mathew follows the statement with the dramatic picture of the Coming One’s act of spiritual threshing. "His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the granary, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire" (3:12).

Luke’s record of the baptism logion also contains some significant variations. (1) The crowds that came out to hear him are not identified as to religious persuasion; he simply refers to the multitudes (3:7, 10). (2) The people are responsive to his message to the degree that they want to know what "fruit" would befit the required repentance (3:10-24). (3) John’s word on the two baptisms is an answer to the expectation of the crowds that he might be the Christ (3:15-16). (4) Luke’s rendering of the tradition is identical to Mathew’s with the exception of the word order in the first part and the omission of en before hudati: Ego men hudati baptizo humas … autos humas baptisei en pneumati hagio kai puri (3:16). Then follows the special threshing analogy. (5) It is noteworthy that the next pericope leads with the word, "So, with many other exhortations, he preached good news (euengelizeto) to the people" (3:18).

Strange things happen to this saying when the Fourth Evangelist records it. It appears in a principal section of the first chapter in which John the Baptist is compelled to identify himself to priests and Levites who had been sent from Jerusalem by the Pharisees. The issue of identity arises within the context of messianic interests (1:19-34). When the Baptizer denies that he is the Christ, Elijah, or the Prophet, his inquisitors then want to know why he is baptizing, since he does not carry the authority of one of these messianic persons. Strangely, John replies, "I baptize with water (ego baptizo en hudati); but among you stands one whom you do not know, even he who comes after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie" (1:26-27). The contrast of John’s baptism with the Coming One is missing. In fact, at this point the writer adds a geographical note and introduces another pericope the substance of which is an event which occurs the following day. Time will not permit an exposition of this unique paragraph; suffice it to say, the Baptizer declares that his coming to baptize with water was to the end or revealing "the Lamb of God" (1:30-31). John further asserts that he did not know this One until the Spirit descended on Him. God had instructed John: "He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit" (houtos estin ho baptizon en pneumati hagio, 1:33). As we all know, the purpose of the writer of the Fourth Gospel is multifaceted and this passage shares in that purpose. Nevertheless, for our interest, it is sufficient to point out that John makes it clear that the Ones who possesses the Spirit is the One who rightly can baptize with the Spirit. The Lamb of God is the Baptizer with the Spirit because the Spirit has authenticated Him as the Son of God.

John definitely identifies the Coming One as the Son of God "who baptizes (baptizon, present tense) with the Holy Spirit" (1:33-34). In referring to Christ’s ministry of baptism the Synoptic writers use the future tense. Jon employs the present tense but with a future denotation, the baptizing by Christ not having taken place yet but being so certain that it may be contemplated as already happening.

Moving to the book of Acts we discover two instances of this logion, both of which follow the Markan abbreviated version. The first one appears in the opening pericope of the book. This opening paragraph was intended to link the new document with Luke’s Gospel (1:1-2), to authenticate the resurrection of Christ to the reader (1:3), and to assure the reader that what happened at Pentecost and subsequently in the life of the embryonic Christian community was promoted and predicted by the risen Lord (1:4-5). The supportive word for this last note is the baptism logion.

Christ charges the disciples not to leave Jerusalem "but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, ‘you heard from me, hoti Joannes men ebaptisen hudati, humeis de en pneumati baptisthesesthe hagio ou meta pollas tautas hemeras’" ("for John baptized with water, but before many days you shall be baptized with the Holy spirit," 1:5, RSV).

Along with a slight change in word order there are five significant notes in this appearance of the baptism tradition. First, Christ associates "the promise of the Father" with the baptism with the Spirit. Second, He reminds the disciples that He has spoken of this matter previously (hen ekousate mou), in all likelihood referring to Luke 24:49. However, in that case nothing is said about baptism. Third, Christ indicates that their baptism with the Holy Spirit will occur shortly (ou meta pollas tautas hemeras,) literally, "not after these many days"). Fourth, Christ does not say explicitly that He will baptize them with the Holy Spirit. Fifth, the risen Lord acknowledges the propriety of John’s baptism, and for that matter, the whole ministry of John, which was focused in the waster baptism, but Christ’s disciples stand at the entrance of the new age of the Spirit in which they will see the fulfillment of the promise of the Father and be baptized with the Holy Spirit.

The last reference to the logion appears in the speech of St. Peter in which he recounts the story of the amazing ministry of the Spirit in the house of Cornelius (Acts 11:16). He tells his Jerusalem brethren, "And I remember the word of the Lord, how he said, Joannes man ebaptisen hudati, humeis de baptisthesesthe en pneumati hagio" ("John baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit"). With the exception of a correction in the placement of the phrase "with the Holy Spirit," the two Acts accounts are identical. Noteworthy, however, is Peter’s recognition of Christ as the source of the logion.

Why does Peter employ the saying? Evidently it is to authenticate to the Jerusalem critics the experience of the Gentiles. Peter is responding to criticism from the circumcision party in having gone to the house of Cornelius (11:2). His answer includes not only his testimony to divine direction by means of the housetop experience but also the fact that the Lord had spoken of the baptism with the Spirit. Confidently and rhetorically Peter asks, "If then God gave the same gift to them as he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God?" The gift is the same as that received by the disciples at Pentecost, namely, the Holy Spirit.

In summary, this unique logion on the Spirit’s baptism apparently is one of the major kerygmatic and didactic guides for the early church’s ministry. The salient features are several, and they all in one way or the other govern the interpretation of the saying across the centuries. First, in each instance a contrast is intended between the baptism with water and the baptism with the Holy Spirit. Two different baptizers perform these baptisms. This contrast comes through succinctly in the emphatic use of the pronouns ego and autos. Second, the Synoptic accounts speak of the Coming One who will baptize with the Spirit, but John’s Gospel specifically identifies Christ as the baptizer. However, when Christ uses this traditional saying, He does not refer to himself as the administrator of the Spirit baptism. Third, only Mathew and Luke add the phrase kai puri to the saying and follow it with the threshing analogy. Fourth, Jesus unites "the promise of the Father" with "the baptism with the Holy Spirit."

According to James D.G. Dunn, the history of exegesis has followed essentially four lines of thought. I shall review these four interpretations in a slightly different order for reasons germane to my interests.⁴

In 1894 C.A. Briggs published a monograph entitled The Messiah of the Gospels in which he propounded the view, after an attempt to reconstruct the Aramaic behind the Mattean and Lukan saying, that we are not to read "with the Holy Spirit" but simply "with fire." The original contrast was not between water and Holy Spirit but between water and fire. Numerous prominent scholars have accepted this interpretation, among whom are Wellhausen, J. Weiss, Bultmann, Creed, Flemington, T.W. Manson, and V. Taylor. Taylor concludes that this view is strongly supported by the saying about the fan, the wheat, and the chaff which is found immediately following the logion in Mathew and Luke. "in this context a reference to the fire as judgment is natural. Probably, then, the reference to the Holy Spirit has introduced under the influence of the Christian practice of baptism."⁵ Based upon the usage of fire in I Cor. 3:13, Creed suggests that the "baptism be fire" can also carry the thought of fire as a testing as well as a destructive force, which would more readily relate the baptism to believers.⁶

Ernest Best asserts that there is no reference in the Jewish tradition to the Holy Spirit as the gift of the Messiah. The Testament of Levi, 18, and the Testament of Judah, 24, are exceptions; but they are not conclusive since it cannot be established that they are free from Christian influence. Also while we cannot press the passage because of its peculiar difficulties, Acts 19: 1ff. Suggests that the disciples of John the Baptist at Ephesus had not even heard about the Holy Spirit.⁷

The conjecture is that a transformation from a fire baptism to a Spirit baptism took place, and Best conceives the process as follows:

This interpretation places heavy weight upon the "back projection" of later Christian thought, so that Mark’s statement represents a recasting of the original saying of baptism by fire. Mathew and Luke’s source, on the other hand, simply conflates the fire and Spirit traditions. Dunn’s reaction to this view is deft and sound, "But the fact remains that we have no text which speaks of baptism in fire; it is a purely hypothetical construction."⁹ Moreover, if we grant the priority of the Matthean and Lukan source, and if we conceive Mark as having access to it, we might justifiably conclude that Mark "abbreviated the fuller saying (pneumati kai puri) in the light of the Christian fulfillment." This would also account for his omission of John’s emphasis on judgment, especially in the threshing analogy.¹⁰

Origen took the prophecy of John to denote that those who repented were to be baptized with the Holy Spirit but those who failed to repent were to be baptized with the fire of everlasting punishment. In this view Mathew and Luke give the full rendering of the prophecy, whereas Mark typically abbreviates it.

The scholarly support of this interpretation is extensive, including such names as Buchsel, Easton, Michaelis, Lohmeyer, Lang, Brownlee, Leenhardt, R. E. Brown, Bornkamm, J.A.T. Robinson, Ray Summers. Most recently, Eldon Ladd has taken this view. Depending heavily on the context, he asserts that John announces a single baptism that involves two elements. "The Coming One will baptize the righteous with the Holy Spirit and the wicked with fire."¹¹ The novel element in John’s message is that the Messiah will pour our the Spirit upon God’s people. But there will also be a baptism of fire. The wheat will be gathered into the granary but the chaff will be burned up with unquenchable fire (Matt. 3:12; Luke 3:17). "Unquenchable" points to an eschatological judgment, "for it extends the limits of the ordinary means of consuming chaff (cf. Isa. 1:31; 66:24; Jer. 7:20)."¹² The coming of the kingdom, therefore, means radical separation: "some will be gathered into the divine granary – theirs will be a baptism of the Spirit; others will be swept away in judgment – theirs will be baptism of fire."¹³

The major argument against the twofold view rests with the preposition en and the pronoun humas. With respect to the preposition, it is not repeated before puri, which if included, would have carried the implication of a second dimension of the baptism. En embraces both elements, so "there are not two baptisms envisaged, one with Spirit and one with fire, only one baptism in Spirit-and-fire."¹⁴ The repeat of humas in the saying indicates that both John’s and the Christ’s baptisms are to be administered to the same people. "Spirit-and0fire baptism is not offered as an alternative to John’s water-baptism, nor does one accept John’s baptism in order to escape the messianic baptism. Rather one undergoes John’s water-baptism with a view to and in preparation for the messianic Spirit-and-fire baptism."¹⁵ As we shall assert later, fire carries the purificatory meaning for the baptism which is a ministry by the Coming One in behalf of believers. Moreover, John the Baptist viewed the Coming One’s baptism as a complement or fulfilment of his own baptism which was a gracious act.

This view is a modification of the previous one and it asserts that pneuma does not refer to the Holy Spirit but to the fiery breath of the Messiah which will destroy his enemies,¹⁶ or the wind of judgment which will blow across the threshing floor and separate the wheat from the chaff.¹⁷ Writing in the Expositor’s Greek Testament, A. B. Bruce concludes that "the whole baptism of the Messiah, as John conceives it, is a baptism of judgment… I think that the grace of Christ is not here at all. The pneuma hagion is a stormy wind of judgment, holy, as sweeping away all that is light and worthless in the nation… The fire destroys what the wind leaves."¹⁸ Bruce thinks that John’s prophetic imagination led him to think that the three elements of water, wind, and fire represent the functions of himself and of the Messiah. He baptizes with water but the Messiah will baptize with wind and fire.¹⁹

The major weakness of the "wind not Spirit" theory relates to the message of John the Baptist. Unquestionably, John thundered judgment: "Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?" he asked the multitude which went out into the wilderness to hear him (Matt. 3:7; Luke 3:7). He also declared, "Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire" "Matt. 3:10; Luke 3:9). What often goes unnoticed in this discussion are the positive values in John’s preaching. He offered a "baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins" (Mark 1:4; Luke 3:3). Moreover, the threshing analogy promises that the grain will be brought into the granary (Matt. 3:12; Luke 3:17). A. E. Airhart catches the thrust of the passage. "Only the chaff is burned, and this only in order that the wheat – the genuine values in personality – may be garnered and set to use." He goes on to speak of "the chaff of an unsanctified nature."²⁰ Interestingly, Luke adds a heartening word, "So, with many other exhortations, he preached good news to the people" (3:18).

Dunn severely and justly criticizes T. W. Manson’s view of John’s message as asserting a last chance of escaping the coming judgment. "There is no ‘or else’ linking the two arms of the Baptist’s antithesis. The recipients of John’s baptism are not threatened with messianic baptism as a fearful alternative, nor is John’s baptism a way of escaping from the Coming One’s baptism."²¹ At the heart of John’s proclamation was a promise of grace and not judgment. People readily received baptism from him in preparation for the greater blessing of the Coming One’s baptism. All this gives credibility to the Gospel accounts which retain the idea of a Spirit-baptism.

From the earliest centuries of the Church, the phrase kai puri has been viewed by many as being not only syntactically but theologically related to "the Holy Spirit" in the Matthean and Lukan versions of this logion. Chrysostom made this connection when he understood John "to be speaking of the fire of the Holy Spirit – an inflaming, purifying, but essentially gracious outpouring of the Spirit." Throughout the centuries his interpretation has prevailed for the most part, and there are substantial reasons. John’s word as given in the Gospels was taken as prophecy. In Acts 1:5 the Lord picks up this prophetic word and applies it explicitly to Pentecost when the Spirit will be outpoured, the experience being symbolized by tongues of fire descending on the disciples’ heads. Furthermore, the prophecy with its fulfillment in Pentecost receives interpretative reinforcement by the word of Peter in Acts 11:16.²²

Several lines of evidence need to be pursued in support of this interpretation of the logion. First, in response to the question "What led John to administer his baptism?" Jeremias says we need to begin from the Jewish doctrinal statement that on Sinai Israel was prepared for receiving salvation by means of a bath of immersion (cf. I Cor. 10:1f.). Israel in the wilderness was regarded as a type of the eschatological community of salvation. The tenet of their bath of immersion included the expectation that in the end-time Israel would again be prepared for salvation by a bath of immersion. Jeremias concludes, "John the Baptist may have felt this purification of the people of God at the eschatological hour to be his task."²³ While Jeremias views Ezekiel 36:24ff. as giving guidance to John with respect to immersion, I am more inclined to say that John, like others in his religious society, drew heavily upon the Old Testament in interpreting what God was about to do through the Messiah as the Age of the Spirit was introduced. Peter’s amazing insight into and application of Joel at the time of Pentecost suggests that a residual expectation of salvation through the ministry of God’s Spirit existed at that time. It seems reasonable to assert that John’s unique contribution was the prophecy of the Spirit’s baptism. One need not look for a strange contextual or textual conflict here. The heart of John’s proclamation was indeed the baptism with the Spirit.

Second, does "fire" mean judgment, or, is it a symbol of refining grace? Such extensive studies of pur as Lang’s in the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament clearly show that fire broadly refers to judgment, immediate or eschatological, in both the Old and the New Testaments.²⁴ Eldon Ladd also assumes this understanding of fire in his twofold view of John’s baptism.²⁵

Despite the positions of these formidable witnesses, it can be shown that fire in the prophetic thought of the OT is used to denote both destruction and purification. Several passages indicating purification are worth quoting. Isa. 1:25: "I will turn my hand against you and will smelt away your dross as with lye and remove all your alloy." Zechariah prophecies that God will purify one third of the land with fire: "And I will put this third in the fire, and refine them as one refines silver, and test them as gold is tested" (13:9). Malachi’s famous prophecy about the Messenger who will sit as "a refiner and purifier of silver" to "purify the sons of Levi" is related to John the Baptist’s ministry (Mal. 3:1-3; cf. Mark 1:2).²⁶

The Dead Sea Scrolls provide further evidence that the Spirit was conceived as a cleansing agent. In the Manual of Discipline it is said that "God will cleanse by His Truth all the members, and purify him by all wicked deeds by the Spirit of holiness; and He will cause the Spirit of Truth to gush forth upon him like lustral water" (1QS 4:20f.). Spirit and water are used in parallel in another statement. "By the Holy Spirit of the Community, in His truth, shall he be cleansed of all his sins; and by the Spirit of uprightness and humility shall his iniquity be atoned; by his soul’s humility towards all the precepts of God shall his flesh be cleansed when sprinkled with lustral water and sanctified in flowing waters" (1QM 7:6.; 17:26; see also 16:12). We need not assume that the Baptizer derived his views from the Qumran theology, but we must acknowledge that he shows conceptual affinities with that particular sector of the Judaistic religious scene.²⁷

Third, no other Christian term has received more attention from scholars than the word "baptize," for a number of reasons but not least of which is its sacramental importance in the Church. Recently I. Howard Marshall has explored this transliterated term with the expectation of demonstrating that the notion of immersion or dipping is less than satisfactory for water baptism.²⁸ Be that as it may (a view which is not congenial to my own thought), he raises the question of whether or not it is proper to speak of a person being dipped in the Holy Spirit. He searches for a more appropriate translation for "baptize." The first clue he finds in passages in the OT and Jewish literature which describe a river or lake as consisting of fire (cf. Isa. 34:9f.; Gen. 14:10; Dan. 7:10 [NEB]; 4 Esdras 13:10f.; 1 QH 3:29:32). In Revelation John speaks of the "lake of fire" (19:20; 20:10; 14; 21:8). Marshall concludes that "the verb ‘baptize’ can be used with the concept of fire, since ‘fire’ can be regarded as a stream or liquid. There was, therefore, no incongruity in using a verb that had a literal reference to water with a metaphorical reference to fire."²⁹

Marshall then raises the question, Can the Spirit also be regarded as a "liquid"? "At first sight this is unlikely, since the word for ‘Spirit’ also means ‘wind’."³⁰ We need not belabor a point that verbs suggesting a liquid are frequently used of the Spirit in the OT, e.g., Isa. 32:15; 44:3; Ezek. 36:25-27; 39:29; Joel 3:28f.; Zech. 12:10. In the NT we have the clear case of Jesus speaking of the Spirit as water which may be drunk and which may flow as a stream from the inner being of the believer (John 7:37-39). "By the one Spirit we were baptized into one body," writes Paul, "and all were made to drink (epotisthemen) of one Spirit" (I Cor. 12:13). The "liquid" concept appears also in Acts. Peter declares in 2:33: "Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out (execheen) this which you see and hear."³¹ Marshall finally determines that "both fire and Spirit are capable of being conceived in liquid terms, and therefore can be used in parallel with water in regards to baptism."³²

Each of these lines of evidence lends support to the view that John indeed related "Spirit" and "fire" in this logion. We need not assume a breakdown in the transmission of the tradition nor postulate a form-critical reading back of a later view of the Church. The ingredients for this understanding of the ministry of the Holy Spirit are available in the old scriptures and the current thought patterns of John’s day. Thus, it is proper to interpret the Baptism with the Holy Spirit as a fiery baptism in which we must be immersed as it were or one which results from the "pouring out" of the Spirit upon us. As Dunn observes, it is "a smelting furnace" which burns up all impurity.³³

The terminology of John’s prophecy conveys essentially the promise of grace and not of judgement. It is the grace of purity, cleansing from all sin. To be sure, the coming of the Holy Spirit means judgment upon all our ways and the ways of all men. The impact of that judgment arises out of its eschatological character. The end-time evaluation of all things is proleptically being realized in the Spirit’s address. Every new divine intervention has had its comic and ecclesiastical effects. The world and God’s people are judged. But essentially the word of John, reasserted and specified as to a moment in history and personal experience by Jesus, related to the lives and ministry of the early followers. The Spirit’s baptism would result in a remarkable inward cleansing. "He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit, even with fire." That speaks of a baptism of grace rather than judgment.

All of us have wrestled with the shift from the pre-Pentecostal language of baptism to the Pentecostal language of infilling with respect to the Spirit’s ministry. Acts 2:4 does not declare, "And they were all baptized with the Holy Spirit." Rather, it employs the word "filled" (eplesthesan). The verb derives from pimplemi which suggests saturation, as in the case of a sponge thoroughly infiltrated with water, or drenching. This verb does not convey the notion of the total occupation of one object by another, as in the case of water which completely fills a cup (cf. Acts 2:2: eplerosen). What seems more proper here is the notion of pervasion of permeation. In Luke 5:25, this verb is used to express pervasion with fear. To be filled with the Spirit means to be pervaded with the Spirit’s love and power. To be filled means "to be touched in every dimension of the person by the love and purity of the divine."³⁴ To the degree that the disciples were "filled" with the Spirit at Pentecost, as understood in the usage of pimplemi, to that degree they were baptized with the Spirit. The concept of baptism may justifiably be considered a synonym of "filling."

Other comparable terms describing the experience are used by Jesus. "But stay in the city until you are clothed (endusethe, metaphorically, ‘take on the characteristics, virtues of’) with power from on high" (Luke 24:49). "But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon (epelthontos, metaphorically ‘take control’) you" (Acts 1:8). Finally, it seems quite clear that what happened at Jerusalem and Caesarea was considered by the Early Church a fulfillment of the baptism prophecy of John and Jesus (Acts 1:5; 11:16).

"The tongues like as fire" (glossai hosei puros) often is used to support the Baptist’s reference to fire. Wesley’s comment on Matt. 3:11 carries this idea: "He shall fill you with the Holy Ghost, inflaming your hearts with that fire of love which many waters can not quench. And this was done, even with a visible appearance as of fire, on the day of Pentecost."³⁵ The distributed tongues like fire obviously are signs of the presence of God, much like the Burning Bush in Moses’ experience. Moreover, the firelike tongues resting on each one suggests the unity of the group under the power of the Spirit and the universal gift of the Spirit. Each one was filled with the Spirit. The complete availability of the Spirit to all men, or, to put it in other words, the democratization of the Spirit is intended by this emblematic feature of Pentecost.³⁶

Adam Clarke’s identification of "the cloven tongues" as "the emblem of the languages they were to speak" has merit. The distribution of the tongues "pointed out the diversity of those languages; and the fire seemed to intimate that the whole could be a spiritual gift, and be the means of bringing light and life to the souls who should hear them preach the everlasting Gospel in those languages."³⁷

The firelike tongues of Pentecost is an enigmatic feature, and I feel that the interpretive base is not as firm as we have sometimes thought it to be for explicating the Baptizer’s logion.

The baptism tradition, about which we have spoken, is unquestionably one of the important kergymatic and experiential links between Jesus and the Early Church. While there are serious critical issues related to its explication, it nevertheless provides a strong foundation for our Wesleyan view on the ministry of the Holy Spirit. (1) The logion is an early one and is recorded by each Gospel writer. (2) Two biblically noteworthy persons, namely, John the Baptist and Peter, as well as Jesus himself employ the logion in contexts pertaining to personal, as well as corporate, experience. (3) Jesus associates Spirit baptism with "the promise of the Father" and thereby roots it in the long sweep of holy history. The offer of the Baptism with the Spirit is not a late redemptive measure on the part of God. (4) But at the same time, futuristically, Jesus designates Pentecost as the moment of experience of the baptism. (5) The Fourth Gospel’s emphasis upon the descent of the Spirit upon Christ as identifying the One who shall baptize with the Spirit advances the assurance that this experience is also a post-Pentecostal one because the risen Lord, possessed with the Holy Spirit, is among us to accomplish it. (6) Peter’s recall of the baptism logion in recounting the reception of the Spirit by the Gentiles, according to Acts 11:16, further demonstrates that this is an ongoing promise for all believers. The baptism with the Holy Spirit is a baptism of grace – a fiery cleansing from sin and a constantly remarkable infilling with agape.

FOOTNOTES

0. F. D. Bruner, A Theology of the Holy Spirit (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1970). C. W. Carter, The Person and Ministry of the Holy Spirit (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1974). George B. Duncan, The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit in the Life of the Believer (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1975). J. D. G. Dunn, Baptism in the Holy Spirit (London: SCM Press, 1970). Michael Green, I Believe in the Holy Spirit (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1975). Anthony A. Hoekema, Holy Spirit Baptism (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1972). Norman Pittinger, The Holy Spirit (Philadelphia: Pilgrim, 1974).
1. Some Markan mss. add kai puri. The judgment of Aland, Black, Metzger, and Wikgren that the addition reflects the influence of the parallels in Matt. 3:11 and Luke 3:16 is sound. Cf. A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (New York: United Bible Societies, 1971), p. 74.
2. Cf. Vincent Taylor, The Gospel According to St. Mark (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1966), p. 157: "ebaptisa may be ‘the aorist of the things just happened’ …., but more probably represents the Heb. stative perf. ‘baptize’".
3. "Spirit-and-Fire Baptism," Novum Testamentum, XIV (1972), 81-92.
4. Mark, p. 157.
5. J. M. Creed, The Gospel According to St. Luke (London: Macmillan and Co., 1953), p. 54.
6. Ernest Best, "Spirit-Baptism," Novum Testamentum, Vol. 4 (1960), 236-243.
7. Ibid., p. 85
8. "Spirit-and-Fire Baptism," p. 84.
9. Ibid., p. 85.
10. G. Eldon Ladd, A Theology of the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1974), pp. 36ff.
11. Ibid., p. 37.
12. Ibid
13. Dunn, Baptism in the Holy Spirit, p. 11.
14. Ibid
15. Cf. C. H. Kraeling, John the Baptist (New York: Scribner’s, 1951), pp. 61-63.
16. The Hebrew word ruach, like the Greek pneuma, literally means "wind."
17. "Mathew" (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing House, 1967, reprint), I, 84.
18. Ibid. Cf. C. K. Barrett, The Holy Spirit and the Gospel Tradition (London: S.P.C.K., 1947), p. 126: Barrett finds slight support for this view in the few manuscripts of Luke 3:16 which omit the word hagio. Cf. Also R. Eisler, The Messiah Jesus and John the Baptist, (1931), pp. 274-279; E. Schweizer, Expository Times, 65, (1953-54), 29.
19. "The Baptism with the Holy Spirit," Preacher’s Magazine, XXXVIII (May, 1963), 14.
20. "Spirit-and-Fire Baptism," p. 86; cf. T. W. Manson, "The Saying of Jesus" in Major, Manson, Wright, The Mission and Message of Jesus (New York: E. P. Dutton and Co., 1938), p. 333.
21. Cf. Best, who favors the "wind and fire" view, but who suggests that Jesus may have corrected John’s statement. His disciples "may have asked Jesus about it and he may have replied to the effect that whereas John says ‘wind,’ i.e. Destruction, the true Messiah says ‘Spirit’, i.e. redemption," "Spirit-Baptism," p. 422.
22. Joachim Jeremias, New Testament Theology: The Proclamation of Jesus, trans. John Bowden (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1971), p. 44.
23. VI, 928-952.
24. Cf. A Theology of the NT, pp. 37-38.
25. Dunn points out that ruach also represents judgment as well as blessing in the prophetic corpus: Isa. 4:4; 30:28; Jer. 4:11; Ezek. 39:29; Joel 2:28f.; "Spirit-and-Fire Baptism," p. 87.
26. Cf. Wm. L. LaSor, The Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1972), pp. 150-151, for a contrary view.
27. "The Meaning of the Verb ‘to Baptize’," Evangelical Quarterly, XLV (1973), 130ff.
28. Ibid., p. 134.
29. Ibid.
30. Cf. Acts 10:45, ekkechutai, "poured out."
31. "The Meaning of the Verb ‘to Baptize’," p. 136.
32. Baptism in the Spirit, p. 13.
33. Mildred Bangs Wynkoop, Foundations of Wesleyan-Armanian Theology (Kansas City, Mo.: Beacon Hill, 1967), pp. 106ff.
34. John Wesley, Explanatory Notes on the New Testament (Naperville, Ill.: Alec R. Allenton, Inc., 1950, reprint), p. 24.
35. Cf. Charles Carter’s comments on this feature of Pentecost, The Person and Ministry of the Holy Spirit, pp. 170-171.
36. "Acts," I, 692.

Edited by KimberLee Bingham for the Wesley Center for Applied Theology of Northwest Nazarene University, 2000.