Baptism And The Munus Triplex

The munus triplex, or threefold office of Christ, has been a standard Reformed means of delineating the work of Christ as prophet, priest, and king ever since Calvin formulated it in the Institutes of the Christian Religion (II, xv, i-vi). Among Reformed confessional statements, the Heidelberg Catechism (1563) defines “Christ” in terms of the threefold office and “Christian” as participation in the munus triplex. Thus, Jesus is called “Christ,” i.e., the “Anointed One,” “because he is ordained by God the Father and anointed with the Holy Spirit to be our chief Prophet and Teacher, fully revealing to us the secret purpose and will of God concerning our redemption; to be our only High Priest, having redeemed us by the one sacrifice of his body and ever interceding for us with the Father; and to be our eternal King, governing us by his Word and Spirit, and defending and sustaining us in the redemption he has won for us” (Q. 31). A “Christian” is so called, “because through faith I share in Christ and thus in his anointing, so that I may confess his name, offer myself a living sacrifice of gratitude to him, and fight against sin and the devil with a free and good conscience throughout this life and hereafter rule with him in eternity over all creatures” (Q. 32). Curiously, the Heidelberg Catechism, as well as Zacharias Ursinus’s Commentary on the Heidelberg Catechism (1591) and most subsequent expositions of Reformed theology, fail to connect this “sharing in Christ” and “anointing” with baptism.1

The threefold office is generally introduced in Reformed theology texts under the rubric of the death and atoning work of Christ.2 How does one participate in the death of Christ, however, except by baptism? “All of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death” (Rom 6:3). Baptism serves as an apt metaphor of Jesus’ death (Luke 12:50), though Reformed theology, following Calvin, has generally viewed baptism more in terms of washing than of death, burial, and resurrection.3

The significance of baptism also includes identification with and submission to God’s Word, anointing with God’s Spirit, and confirmation as God’s son. Each of these three aspects of baptism may be subsumed under the threefold office of Christ to include those who “share in Christ and thus in his anointing” through baptism as prophet, priest, and king, respectively. It will be maintained here that Jesus’ baptism served just these three functions. While Jesus’ baptism uniquely served to identify him with God’s Word and submission to it as a prophet, to anoint him with God’s Spirit as a priest, and to confirm him as God’s Son and thus king, the Christian shares in each of these callings by means of baptism.

1. Baptism as Identification With and Submission to God’s Word: The Calling of a Prophet

Each of the synoptic gospels portrays John the Baptist “preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (Mark 1:4; Luke 3:3; cf. Matt 3:6-11). When Jesus came to receive this baptism, however, John “tried to deter him” (Matt 3:14), saying it was he who needed baptism by Jesus, not vice versa. Jesus had no need of repentance or forgiveness, being without sin according to the tradition (Acts 3:14; 2 Cor 5:21; Heb 7:26; 1 Pet 1:19); thus, Jesus’ baptism may not have signified for him precisely what it did for all others who came. Since Jesus was not coming for baptism to receive forgiveness of sin, it is difficult to accept the common view that Jesus’ purpose in baptism was to identify with the people in their need.4

Furthermore, if Jesus was without sin and thus the need of repentance, it is also difficult to see how his being baptized could set an example for his followers.5

Jesus’ reply, “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness” (Matt 3:15) suggests his baptism was necessary for that particular point in time (“now”) in fulfillment of a divine command. The command was not that he be baptized per se, but rather that he “fulfill all righteousness.” Baptism identified Jesus with John and the culmination of the entire prophetic line (cf. Matt 11:11-15), marking Jesus out as a disciple of John and serving as Jesus’ public call to be the consummate prophet.6 In baptism, Jesus identifies himself as an adherent of John and the entire prophetic line, embracing the law and the prophets which he came not to abolish, but to fulfill (Matt 5:17).

Assuming that John had indeed recognized Jesus as the Coming One, we would wonder what other response he could have made than to object, “I need to be baptized by you,” that is, “I need to become your disciple.” Jesus’ counter-argument that he needed to fulfill all righteousness (Matt. 3:15) is congruent with this interpretation, since “doing righteousness,” in the Old Testament sense meant “carrying out the will of God.” Jesus, as the righteous man, would naturally see alignment with and submission to God’s prophet as necessary in order to do God’s will.7

“Now” thus signifies the transition then occurring from the old covenant culminating in John, the last of the great OT prophets, to the new covenant and the ministry of Jesus “the prophet.” “Jesus regarded his ministry as in continuity with, and bringing to a climax, the work of the great prophets of the Old Testament, culminating in John the Baptist.”8 Inasmuch as a particular call was necessary to be a prophet, as well as continuity with the teaching of the great prophetic tradition, it would have been necessary for Jesus to receive baptism by John to indicate his continuity with the OT proclamation of God’s Word and will. That Jesus received at baptism a vision of heaven being opened is in keeping with the prophetic call (Matt 3:16; cf. Ezek 1:1; Acts 10:11), as is his endowment with the Spirit.9

In his baptism, then, Jesus identifies not so much with sinners, but rather with God, submitting to the call of God to proclaim his righteousness, “to be our chief Prophet and Teacher, fully revealing to us the secret purpose and will of God concerning our redemption.” Similarly, when sinners repent, they change their perspective (metanoeō) from the fallen human will to sin by taking the holy divine will to righteousness. Their baptism thus signifies and seals the call of God upon them to “share in Christ and thus in his anointing” so they “may confess his name” in lives of faithful obedience.

Those who are Christians merely in appearance are those who have been baptized, and who are in the company of those who are called, and profess the Christian faith; but are without conversion…. Those are true christians [sic] who are not only baptized and profess the doctrine of Christ, but who are also possessed of a true faith, and declare this by the fruits of repentance; or, they are those who are members of Christ by a true faith, and are made partakers of his anointing.10

Baptism is thus a public identification with and submission to God’s Word in Jesus Christ. As the Directory for Worship (W-2.3006) of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) says, “baptism calls to repentance, to faithfulness, and to discipleship. Baptism gives the church its identity and commissions the church for ministry to the world.” It is thus the responsibility of all who have been baptized, who have identified themselves with God and his Word, to take on the prophetic role to speak on behalf of God and his righteous will in both word and deed.

2. Baptism Signifies Anointing With God’s Spirit: The Calling of a Priest

Jesus’ baptism was accompanied by the descent of the Spirit of God upon him, anointing, consecrating, and gifting him for the ministry to which God called him. Baptism is a consecration to service precisely because of the working of the Holy Spirit in and through the water. Anointing was a ceremony by which prophets, priests, and kings were set apart by God for their offices in the OT. As Ursinus notes,11 anointing signified: 1. “An ordination, or calling, to the office for which they were thus set apart.” Luke’s observation that Jesus was “about thirty years old when he began his ministry” (Luke 3:23), occurring as it does right after his baptism, may suggest his anointing at baptism was a call to priestly ministry, since that is the age at which Levitical priests began their ministries (Num 4:3, 23, 30, 35, 39, 43, 47). 2. “It signified the promise and bestowment of the gifts necessary” for their calling. In his baptism, Peter says, “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power” (Acts 10:37-38). That power was immediately demonstrated in Jesus’ overcoming the devil in the wilderness and ultimately in his triumph on the cross as “our only High Priest, having redeemed us by the one sacrifice of his body and ever interceding for us with the Father.”

Although Martin Bucer’s reform of the baptismal rite at Strasbourg in 1524 eliminated “the prebaptismal and postbaptismal anointings” as a primitive church superstition,12 there was never any question for the Reformers that, as a sacrament, baptism is a means of grace because of the work, or anointing, of the Holy Spirit. The Westminster Confession says, “the grace which is exhibited in or by the sacraments is not conferred by any power in them,” but instead is contingent “upon the work of the Spirit.” Christ and the benefits of the new covenant are represented, sealed, and applied to believers and their children by the working of the Spirit.

As disciples of the Christ, Christians share in Jesus’ anointing. Just as Jesus in his baptism was “anointed with the Holy Spirit to undertake the way of the servant manifested in his sufferings, death, and resurrection” (Directory for Worship 2.300), so Christians are in their baptism anointed with the Holy Spirit to take up their cross and follow Jesus as God’s servants. Just as the Spirit furnished Jesus at baptism with gifts for his priestly offering up of himself, so the Spirit furnishes believers and their children with the gifts necessary to offer themselves as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God (Rom 12:1). Baptism thus signifies anointing with God’s Spirit to serve sacrificially in the ministry of the “royal priesthood” (1 Pet 2:9).

3. Baptism Signifies Confirmation as God’s Son: The Calling of a King

At his baptism, Jesus hears a voice from heaven confirming him as God’s Son, in whom God is well pleased (Matt 3:17; Mark 1:11; Luke 3:22). This confirmation is a quote from Ps 2:7, a royal psalm used in the coronation of Davidic kings, confirming their place as the Lord’s “Anointed One” (Ps 2:2), his “King installed on Zion” (Ps 2:6), God’s “Son” (Ps 2:7). As God’s representative and vicegerent, the Davidic king was spoken of as God’s son (cf. 2 Sam 7:14).

In the case of Jesus, God the Son incarnate, the titular significance of “son” applied to previous Davidic kings is heightened by the ontological significance of his being of one essence with God. In John’s gospel, after Jesus is baptized and anointed with the Holy Spirit, he makes his first disciples in Galilee. In response to Jesus’ prescience, “Nathanael declared, ‘Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel’” (John 1:49). Similarly, in Matt 4:17 and Mark 1:15, after Jesus’ baptism and victory over the devil in the wilderness, he comes forth preaching “the kingdom of heaven [God] is near.” In Jesus, God’s Son the King, the kingdom is near.

The whole point of it was that Israel’s dream was coming true right now. Equally important, it could never be divorced from the person and deeds of the proclaimer. This will have been as true for John the Baptist as for Jesus. This baptism is the ‘getting-ready-for-the-kingdom’ baptism; this proclamation is the one that is actually inaugurating the kingdom.13

In his baptism, then, Jesus is already declared God’s Son and thus “our eternal King, governing us by his Word and Spirit, and defending and sustaining us in the redemption he has won for us.”

Those who follow Jesus in baptism and share “in his anointing” are responsible to “fight against sin and the devil with a free and good conscience throughout this life and hereafter rule with him in eternity over all creatures.” As heirs together with him, it is the Christian’s duty to rule over all things, not just “hereafter” “in eternity,” but here and now, according to the stewardship given humanity in creation to rule over all things as God’s representatives. Traditionally known as the cultural mandate (Gen 1:26; Ps 8:4-8), Christians have, by virtue of their baptism, a calling and a responsibility to bring all things under the Lordship and dominion of Jesus Christ. As “the disciples were empowered by the outpouring of the Spirit to undertake a life of service and to be an inclusive worshiping community, sharing life in which love, justice, and mercy abounded” (Directory for Worship 2.3002), so Christians in all ages are to work for the reconciliation of humanity that is testified in “the bond of unity” they have in baptism (Directory for Worship 2.3005). Believing adults confirm this regal calling personally in their baptism; their baptized children confirm it when they become adults. For Calvin, baptism necessitated instruction in the faith unto proper Christian living.

The purpose of catechetical instruction was to prepare the child to make an intelligent profession of faith. It was the profession of faith implied, even demanded, by the baptism of the child. Just as the living of the Christian life was demanded by baptism, so was the profession of Christian faith. The solemn profession of faith was the logical working out of the sacrament of baptism.14

The confirmation of Jesus as God’s Son and thus as King is a calling those baptized in Jesus’ name confirm and share as heirs together with him.

Conclusion

The baptism of Jesus by John signals the public commencement of Jesus’ calling as prophet, priest and king. Karl Barth rightly noted that Jesus was born to the ministry of prophet, priest, and king; this “does not mean that He was not yet the Messiah, Prophet, Priest and King, that He had not yet begun His ministry, that He received and entered upon His office only with His baptism in the Jordan.”15 Indeed, Reformed theology has maintained that “Christ was never not a prophet, as he was never not a saviour and mediator. But he was chiefly so when he appeared in the flesh.”16 He was publicly validated as prophet, priest, and king in his baptism.

As this act of His, the baptism of Jesus was, in a typical and decisive way for His whole history, the first and basic act of His self-proclamation as the mediator between God and men. In it the ministry of reconciling the world to God began to take place, and to do so indeed as His own history. In it He came forward as the One in whose person and work all that John had announced—the kingdom, judgment and forgiveness of God—was now to take place.17

It is worth noting that the three aspects of John’s preaching Barth sees fulfilled in Jesus’ baptism, the kingdom, judgment, and forgiveness, correspond well to the munus triplex and the functions of king, prophet, and priest, respectively. It was to these offices that Jesus was born and publicly acclaimed in his baptism. It is to these offices that followers of Jesus are born and publicly acclaimed in their baptism.

This article first appeared in Theology Matters, Vol. 13, No. 4 (Sep/Oct 2007).