Grame Clarke

The focus of this paper is narrow: to draw out what we can from the Cyprianic corpus of the processes of initiation into the Christian community. That will give us the view of a moment in North Africa in the mid-third century and provide some basis for tracing continuities, developments and innovations in later periods of North African practice.
 

General Background

Cyprian's view of his church was notoriously bounded. Not that he came to view it as an exclusive coetus sanctorum, but that did not preclude him, either, from still regarding the (true) church as the one and only source of salvation (extra ecelesiam nulla salus). This church formed a hortus conclusus, and, as such, entry into it, it logically followed, needed to be strictly policed and regulated, whether through the process of readmission (the discipline of penance for sinners, the re-entry of heretics once orthodox) or through initiation (baptism) as well as by drawing strict doctrinal and disciplinary lines (the formal differences between schism [discipline] and heresy [doctrine] were of lesser moment, therefore, than the fact of being outside). The church, itself being holy, in order to preserve that holiness, was obliged to monitor and regulate scrupulously the sources of potential pollution and contamination that might infect it (for Cyprian these weren't idle metaphors): baptism, as the ceremony of (at once) purification and initiation, marked the crucial point of entry into that holy church.
 
 
 
 

Section 1 Preparation
 

Cyprian's church has a catechumenate preparing candidates for baptism but the details of its organization are almost entirely lacking (age of candidates, duration, ceremonies, content). Cyprian can use of these candidates either the Latin audiens or the Greek derivative catechumenus (Epp. 18.2.2, 29.1.2, 73.22.1, Test. 3.98): the words themselves suggest listening to biblical readings or to doctrinal instruction. For this latter (instruction) there are attested doctores (Ep. 29.1.2 doctores audientium, Ep. 73.3.2 doctores [in both cases not given clerical ranking]) i.e. lay catechists; Ep. 29.1.2 also attests presbyteri doctores , but were they more for training candidates for the clergy? For the former (readings) the doctores could be assisted by lectores (Ep 29.1.2) - but these were not formal clerics either. And they could be assisted by exorcists (Ep. 69.15.2 - the run of the paragraph implies this is referring to prebaptismal exorcism(s); cf. Sent.Episc. 37 primo per manus impositionem in exorcismo, secundo per baptismi regenerationem, Sent.Episc. 8 qui ad catholicam ecclesiam voluerint venire non ante ingredi nisi exorcizati et baptizati prius fuerint, Sent.Episc. 31 haereticos....censeo....exorcizandos et baptizandos [all on the reception of heretici]). The Roman clergy write to their Carthaginian counterparts clearly assuming that conditions for catechumeni similar to their own prevail in Carthage (Ep. 8.3.1): may we presume that the Roman and Carthaginian regimes were (within local variations) roughly parallel? As in Rome, some professions were ipso facto excluded from candidature (Ep. 2 [actors]), but, by contrast with Rome, exorcism, on our evidence, was carried out by specific clerics (Ep. 69.15.2) rather than the bishop (Trad. Apost.20).

Catechumens might lapse under pressure of persecution, but in Rome (Ep. 8.3.1.) as in Carthage (Ep. 18.2.2) they could be admitted into the church if in danger of death through illness. This must mean they were given (emergency?) baptism at the least (cf.Ep.69.12ff.). Contrariwise, catechumens might also die under persecution as sanctified martyrs, deemed by their heroic actions to have reached the moral and theological level of the duly baptised, thus being blessed with "baptism of blood" (Ep. 73.22.2: "such catechumens do hold the faith and truth of the Church complete, they march forth from the camp of God to do battle with the devil possessed of a full and sincere knowledge of God the Father and of Christ and the Holy Spirit; and in the second place, they are not in fact deprived of the sacrament of baptism, inasmuch as they are baptized with the greatest and most glorious baptism of all, that of blood.")

For Cyprian, candidates for admission who had been previously "baptised" in heresy (and schism) joined the venientes, required to become catechumens before admission to baptism, for in his view (staunchly upheld) baptism could not be administered validly outside, and this without exception. We do not know if such venientes were treated differently but their sins of heretical pollution seem to have demanded special penance - Cyprian habitually links penance with the admission of former heretics eg. Ep. 73.22.3: "we who preside over the faith and truth must not deceive or mislead those who come to the faith and truth and who do penance, begging that their sins be forgiven (eos qui ad fidem et veritatem veniunt et agentes paenitentiam remitti sibi peccata deposcunt). Rather, we must correct them and reform them and educate them in the teachings of heaven for entering the kingdom of heaven". And compare Sent.Episc. 7,9,15,29,39,40,41,53.

As for the content of that "education in the teachings of heaven" Ep. 73.5.2 suggests some of the basic articles of faith that were part of the theological formation of the catechumen - the doctrines of the Trinity, Incarnation, Redemption, Resurrection: "When the Lord was sending forth His disciples after His resurrection, He taught them how they were to baptize, instructing them with these words: All power is given me in heaven and on earth. Go, therefore, and teach all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. There He makes known to them the Trinity in Whose sacred name the nations were to be baptised. But surely Marcion does not hold this Trinity? Surely he does not confess the same God the Father and Creator as we do? Does he recognise the same Christ His Son, born of the Virgin Mary, the Word which was made flesh, who bore our sins, who by dying overcame death, who initiated the resurrection of the flesh, beginning with His own person, and who revealed to His disciples that He had risen again in the same flesh?"

Whilst the newly-born might also be baptised (Ep. 64.2ff), we know nothing of sponsors for such initiands nor anything of their subsequent religious formation, but we do know that they were admitted, literally, to full communion with the community (de laps.25).
 

Section II Baptismal Rite

We are not told anything of the usual day or hour for the baptismal ceremonies (Easter vigil? Cyprian stresses the need for bishops to be with their flocks to celebrate the Pascha, council assemblies being held post Pascha).

(i) Cyprian (and his episcopal colleagues) emphasize unusually the essential sanctification of the waters to be used in the baptismal cleansing (though the details of that process of sanctification are lacking). It is not running water but (?literally) in ecclesia i.e. in a baptismal basin.

Ep. 70.1.3 (a conciliar letter): "Now if it is to be possible for water to clean away by its baptismal washing the sins of a man who is being baptized, then it is essential that that water should first be cleansed and sanctified by a bishop (oportet vero mundari et sanctificari aquam prius a sacerdote)." Cf.Sent.Episc. 18 aqua sacerdotis prece in ecclesia sanctificata.

The bishop (sacerdos) is the officiand of this ceremony, as he appears to be for baptism under normal circumstances cf. Sent.Episc.17 Iesus Christus potestatem baptizandi episcopis dedit (contrast the presbyters and deacons, under emergency conditions, Ep.18.2.2). At some preliminary stage there is also purging by exorcism, especially in the case of repentant heretics, the devil's antichristi cf.Sent.Episc. 7 eos qui a contrariis baptizati inquinati sunt primo purgari et tunc demum baptizari.

(ii) The next rite attested is a verbal renunciation of the devil and an abjuration of the world by the candidate, very closely associated by Cyprian with baptism itself (was the candidate upon the point of entering or already standing in those sanctified baptismal waters?).Ep.13.5.3: saeculo renuntiaveramus cum baptizati sumus. This renunciation is echoed in a number of passages suggesting a sacramentum along the lines Renuntio diabolo et pompis eius et saeculo. It does not seem to have been in question-and-answer form, but rather an affirmation.

Compare, inter alia:

de laps. 8: Stare illic potuit Dei servus et loqui et renuntiare Christo qui iam diabolo renuntiaverat et saeculo?

de orat.dom. 19 qui saeculo renuntiavimus et divitias eius et pompas....abiecimus.

de bon.pat. 12 qui diabolo et mundo renuntiavimus

ad Fort. 7 .... ne ad diabolum rursus et ad saeculum quibus renuntiavimus.... revertamur

(iii) What followed, a profession of faith (symbolum), was indeed couched in question-and-answer form (the baptismal interrogationes). Good evidence comes from a number of passages:

(a) Ep .69.7.1 "Here someone may interpose with the following objection: Novation, he may contend, observes the same law as the catholic Church, he baptises using the same credal formula (symbolum) as we also do, he acknowledges the same God the Father, the same Christ the Son, the same Holy Spirit, and, therefore, he may claim the power to baptise, seeing that, it would appear, his baptismal interrogation is no different from ours.
 

Whoever thinks he should raise such an objection has to realise first and foremost that there is no one binding credal formula common to us and to schismatics, neither is there any common baptismal interrogation. 7.2 For when they say "Do you believe in the forgiveness of sins and life everlasting through the holy Church?" they are being fraudulent in putting such a question, since they have no such church. Then again, out of their own mouths they admit that forgiveness of sins can only be granted "through the holy Church", and seeing that they do not have that Church, they demonstrate that with them there can be no forgiveness of sins"
 

(b) Ep 70.2.1 "Moreover, the very questions put during the baptism provide us with evidence of the truth. For when we say: "Do you believe in everlasting life and the forgiveness of sins through the holy Church," we mean that forgiveness of sins is only granted within the Church, whereas there is no forgiveness of sins among heretics, where there is no Church. Hence supporters of the heretics either should change the questions they put at baptism or else they should keep to the truth; unless, that is, they are prepared to go so far as to ascribe the Church also to those who, according to their contention, have the power to baptise."
 

(c) Ep. 73.4.2 And if they confess (confitentur) the same Father with us, the same Son, the same Holy Spirit, and the same Churchwhether they be Patripassians, Anthropians, Valentinians, Apelletians, Ophites, Marcionites, and all the other heresies which plague and poison the truth, which seek to slay and destroy itthen they may also have the one baptism, seeing that they have the one faith as well.
 

Cyprian's phrasing in Ep. 69.7.1. eodem symbolo quo et nos baptizare definitely implies that these interrogationes (plural) were integrated into the actual baptismal rite (which was "immersion" under normal circumstances). We should probably imagine a triple set of questions and answers ('credo"), each one followed by "immersion", but that is not directly attested by Cyprian (but it may be suggested by Ep. 73.4.2). Ep. 69.12ff. attests that being fully washed (loti) rather than merely sprinkled (perfusi,aspergi) was standard, the sick being sprinkled and thus incurring suspicion of inefficacy as being without the full washing with those holy waters (an habendi sint legitimi christiani eo quod aqua salutari non loti sint sed perfusi). Cyprian's language nowhere suggests submersion however.

(iv) Notoriously Cyprian regarded three rites that followed this washing as integral to the baptismal ceremony - anointing, laying-on of hand(s) and sealing (signatio) although it is not altogether clear what was their precise sequence.

(a)unctio Ep. 70.2.2 "Likewise a person who is baptised has also to be anointed so that by receiving the chrism, or anointing, he may become the anointed of God and receive within him the grace of Christ. And, moreover, it is through the Eucharist that the oil with which the baptised are anointed is sanctified upon the altar. But someone who has had neither altar nor Church could not sanctify the material substance of oil. It follows that neither can there be any spiritual anointing among heretics, since it is manifest that oil cannot possibly be sanctified and the Eucharist cannot be celebrated among them".

Three things are clear (whatever the correct construing of the text).

(1) anointing was considered an essential part of the baptismal ceremony: ungi....necesse est eum qui baptizatus est ut....habere in se gratiam Christi possit could hardly be a less uncompromising statement.

(2) This anointing took place after the baptismal washing (qui baptizatus est)

(3) The oil used in this particular anointing is consecrated oil (oleum in altari sanctificatum) - though the details of the consecration ceremony involved are obscure: at the least it occurred on the altar where the Eucharist was also consecrated.

(b) manus impositio

Ep. 73.9.1 "Consequently, there was no further need of baptism for those [Samaritans] who had received the lawful baptism of the Church. Peter and John made good only what they lacked: after prayers had been said for them and hands were laid upon them, the Holy Spirit was invoked and poured out upon them.

9.2 And this same practice we observe today ourselves: those who are baptised in the Church are presented to the appointed leaders of the Church, and by our prayer and the imposition of our hands they receive the Holy Spirit and are made perfect with the Lord's seal".

We do not know the formula of the prayer (oratio) used in this ceremony but there are many passages that echo this procedure eg. Epp. 69.11.3, 72.1. 2, 74.5.1. For Cyprian this same liturgical gesture was used both in imparting the Holy Spirit and in forgiving sins (and was, confusingly, not always therefore distinguished) eg. Ep. 72.6.2 "And if someone is able to receive baptism and to obtain forgiveness of sins according to his perverted faith, then he can obtain the Holy Spirit as well by virtue of that same faith. In that case, when he comes to us, there is no need for hands to be laid upon him so that he may receive the Spirit and be sealed. Either he can obtain both outside through his faith or, being outside, he receives neither of them.

7.1 But it is perfectly obvious where, in fact, and through whose agency forgiveness of sins can be granted, which is certainly granted in baptism. For Peter is the one upon whom, the Lord built the Church, establishing him visibly to be the source of its unity: and it was to Peter in the first place that the Lord gave the power to loose whatever he loosed".

(c) The 'sealing with the sign of Christ' appears to follow on immediately (cf Ep. 73.9.2 cited above: ut ...per nostram orationem ac manus impositionem spiritum sanctum consequantur et signaculo dominico consummentur). ad Demet. 22 makes it clear that this 'sealing' consisted of tracing the sign of the cross on the forehead of the newly baptised: "in another passage God declares that they alone can escape who have been born again and sealed with the sign of Christ (renatii et signo Christi signati).....and what is this sign and in what part of the body it is placed God makes clear in another passage, saying.... you will mark the sign on the brows of men [Ez.9.4]".

(v) Ep. 64.4.1f (discussing the baptism of neonates):

"We now turn to your claim that the foot of an infant in the very first days after his birth is not clean, every one of us still recoiling in repugnance at the thought of kissing it. In our view this too ought to be no reason for blocking the bestowal of heavenly grace. For it is written: To the clean all things are clean. 4.2 Nor should anyone of us shudder in repugnance at that which God has deigned to make. The infant may indeed be still fresh from its birth; yet he is not such that anyone should shrink in repugnance from kissing him in the course of bestowing grace and conferring peace upon him (in gratia danda adque in pace facienda horrere debeat osculari).When we kiss an infant, piety should tell each one of us that we ought to be thinking of the very hands of God from which that infant has so freshly come; in a sense, therefore, in a human being recently formed and newly born we are kissing those hands of God when we embrace what God has made".
 

A kiss (of peace) is implied (although explicating the kissing of a vestigium infantis remains perplexing): such a kiss would appear to conclude the ceremonies.
 

(vi)Ep. 63.8.3 rather suggests that the newly baptised then proceeded to join the community in the eucharistic service:.

"For it is through baptism that we receive the Spirit and that is why it is only after we have been baptised and have obtained the Spirit that we proceed to drink the cup of the Lord".
 

Certainly combination with evidence from other third-century sources from North Africa (Tertullian, Martyr Acta) - as well as from Rome (especially Traditio apostolica) - helps to suggest a fuller context for some of the ceremonies we can detect in the pages of Cyprian; even so, as a matter of method, we ought not to conflate such evidence. But I find it still surprising that we can reconstruct so much of the actual baptismal rites from the Cyprianic corpus even though Cyprian never directly composed a de baptismo. The centrality of baptism in his view of the scheme of salvation, as the only portal that might give entry into paradise, meant he had to argue (and argue hotly) from the meaning of his church's liturgical practice when his view of legitimate baptism came to be challenged (Epp. 69-74).

Graeme Clarke

Cyprian's own religious formation and instruction is put down to lectio divina/sacrae litterae (Pont vit. Cyp..2) and the guiding knowledge of the aged presbyter Caecilianus (Pont. vit. Cyp. 4: a presbyter doctor, therefore?)