Claudia Setzer, Manhattan College
 

A profound ambivalence characterizes Tertullian's attitudes towards Jews and Judaism. His hostile remarks about Jews are well-known. He calls the Jews "the seed-plot of all the calumny against us" (Nat. 1.14.1, CCSL 1.32-33)[1] and calls the synagogues "fountains of persecution" (Scorp. 10.10, CCSL 2.1089). Yet he emphasizes the closeness of Judaism and Christianity when it suits him (Apol. 16.11, 19.2, 21.1), defends Christianity against pagan attacks by defending Judaism (Apol. 16.3), and justifies Christian practice by likening it to Jewish practice. Nor does he simply superimpose biblical history on contemporary Jews. He knows the difference between Biblical Israel and contemporary Jews since he makes a point of distinguishing them.[2] Tertullian and other North African Christians reject Judaism with one hand, while pulling it towards them with the other.[3] A representative example of this mixed feeling towards Jews and Judaism is Tertullian's discussion of baptism.

In defending and explaining the practice of Christian baptism, Tertullian uses whatever weapons are at hand. Part of his panoply is Christianity's origin in the history of Israel and rootedness in her Scripture. Yet another part of his defense is Christianity's supersession of Israel and appropriation of her symbols and history. Moreover, the Jews and Judaism of his own time provide a foil for Christians and their practices. In two references he defines Christian baptism over against the practices of Jewish lustration, denigrating Jewish practices in the process. In a later work he defends Christian baptism by comparing it to current Jewish customs. Furthermore, his defense of baptism against gnostic and pagan challenges leans heavily on its connection to the story of Israel. In this paper, I will examine how Tertullian's discussion of baptism illustrates the complexity of his attitudes towards Israel's scripture and history, Jewish tradition and Jews and Judaism of his own time.
 

I The Inadequacy of Jewish Lustration

Tertullian's treatise On Baptism is written fairly early, after the apologetic works, but before the disciplinary and theological treatises. It is a polemical work, against gnostics or others those who question the necessity of the physical act of Christian baptism. He refers to "a female viper of the Cainite sect," who convinced many of her doctrine, "making a particular point of demolishing baptism" (1). In chapter 12 he argues against "those who deprive the apostles even of John's baptism, hoping to abolish the sacrament of water." In 13, he complains about "those scoundrels, those raisers of unnecessary questions," who argue against baptism and make a case for salvation by faith alone. They use Abraham as a model, as Paul did in his argument against circumcision in Galatians 3. Tertullian is trying to answer a series of questions raised by these troublemakers. He is also confronting certain inherent questions, such as the absence of any mention of the apostles' being baptized, the meaning of John's baptism, and Jesus' apparent failure to baptize others.. Whether these are voiced by outsiders or arise independently is not always clear.

In two different treatises Tertullian contrasts baptism in his community with Jewish practice. In On Baptism 15 he raises the issue of once and for all baptism, an issue he expects to become controversial. He notes that he treated the question elsewhere in Greek, but frustratingly enough, that work has been lost. He rejects the idea of multiple baptisms on the basis of Jesus' baptism in the gospels, as well as Ephesians 4:4-5, which states that there is one God and one baptism and one church. Heretics may follow the practice of more than one baptism, but this follows from their having a different God and a different Christ:

...So then we enter into the bath once only, once only are our sins washed away, because these ought not to be committed a second time. Jewish Israel, on the other hand, washes every day, because every day it is defiled. That this might not become the practice among us is the reason why the rule was laid down. about a single washing. Happy is that water which cleanses once for all, which is not a toy for sinners to amuse themselves with, and is not tainted with repeated applications of filth, so as to defile once more those whom it cleanses (Bapt. 15.3, CCSL 1.290).

Tertullian's mention of the Jewish custom of daily washing is gratuitous, since his opponents in this work are not Jews. In the work as a whole he seems to be battling other Christians whom he sees as heretics, people who reject baptism altogether. In this particular passage, he is arguing against groups that might be more stringent, those who advocate more washings. If a single baptism is good, they imply, multiple ones are better. More lustration equals more piety.

He is not clear which Jews he refers to or what kinds of washing. "Israel washes daily" could mean full immersion, or lesser washings, say of the hands or vessels. The latter he could extrapolate from Mark 7:3-4. Nor is it clear what he means by the quotidian nature of these washings. Does he mean every Jew washes every day, or on any given day, some members of Israel are bathing themselves? Tertullian implies these washings are for some kind of ritual purification, though they are not efficacious. Nor is it entirely unlike Christian baptism, since he fears Christians might imitate this practice and he must firmly denounce it.

Could Tertullian be extrapolating entirely from Scripture and know nothing about local Jewish practices? Daily immersion is not biblical, but the codes of Levitical purity suggest frequent washings for purification, which Tertullian could translate as daily. Similarly, Tertullian could read Mark's description of frequent rites of purification by the Pharisees and all the Jews[4] and understand them as daily rituals, "for the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands" (Mark 7:3). Presumably Jews ate daily so would wash their hands ritually every day. Furthermore, when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they "baptize themselves." Mark also alludes to other traditions of the washing of cups and vessels.

While it is possible for Tertullian to be extrapolating from Scripture, I think

Tertullian has some Jews closer to home in mind. He gives us more information in a second work, written about the same time as his work on baptism:

Albeit Israel washed daily all his limbs over, yet is he never clean . His hands, at all events, are ever unclean, eternally dyed with the blood of the prophets, and of the Lord himself; and on that account, as being hereditary culprits from their privity to their fathers' crimes, they do not dare even to raise them unto the Lord, for fear

some Isaiah should cry out, for fear Christ should utterly shudder. We, however, not only raise, but even expand them; and, taking our model from the Lord's

passion even in prayer we confess to Christ (On Prayer 14, CCSL ).

Several points emerge. First, the Jews Tertullian speaks of are washing the whole body, probably ritual immersion. Tertullian really wants to talk about hands, to enlarge on his theme of Israel with the blood of Christ and the prophets ever on its hands. But he must work his way into that from the custom that he, and presumably his readers, know of Jews immersing themselves daily. Second, Tertullian is not talking about biblical Israel, neither from the Hebrew Bible nor the New Testament, since the Jews he refers to are inheritors of their ancestors' crimes, above all the death of Jesus, so he is referring to Jews after the first century.[5] Third, the washing that Israel does daily, as in the previous reference, is for purposes of purification. This ritual is not, then, a ritual of initiation or incorporation. Last, he claims to know something about their prayer, that Jews do not raise their hands, as opposed to Christians who raise and expand their hands. This last piece of information is surely from contemporary Jews and is not biblical. In fact it goes against the examples of David (Ps 28:2; 62:4; 143:6) and Solomon (1 Kings 8:54), who did raise their hands in prayer. [6]

How much does Tertullian actually know about local Jewish practices? I have suggested elsewhere[7] that Tertullian betrays some knowledge of contemporary Jews in Carthage, but that is no guarantee that he always got his facts straight. Immersion and other forms of washing are a demonstrable strain in post-biblical Jewish piety: at Qumran, among the Pharisees, in the movement around John the Baptist, mentioned by Josephus,[8] and featured in a number of later Jewish sects about which we know little, including the Jewish-Christian Elchasites and Ebionites.[9] These groups knew the Levitical purity laws and took them one step further. J. Thomas argues that ritual immersion was often a substitute for Temple sacrifice and worship.[10] Ritual immersion is part of the rabbinic conversion ceremony by the second century,[11] though not mentioned as such in the Mishnah. The Rabbis seem to domesticate biblical notions of ritual purity, subordinating it to their overall agenda of Torah study and observance. In Jewish piety, ritual immersion seemed more commonly performed for reasons of purity, stringency, or repentance than for initiation. Naturally, these categories do not exclude one another.

In On Baptism Tertullian balances between answering those who want to do away with baptism altogether and those who might think multiple baptisms are better. He assures his readers that the message of the one baptism and one church in the scriptures was addressed to then alone and excludes heretics. "It was to us the announcement was made: Whereas heretics have no part or lot in our regulations" (Bapt. 15, CCSL 1.290).

Perhaps it is unnecessary to add that he excludes Jews as well. In The Apology, however, he underlines Israel's continuing possession of the Scriptures.
 

II Israel's Possession of Scripture and the argument from Custom.

In his defense of baptism, Tertullian relies heavily on the Hebrew Bible and Israel's history. He promotes the essential holiness of water against those who would reject the use of any material substance, by reminding them that God's spirit moved over it at Creation(3).[12] Similarly, the Flood is the baptism of the world, "...The waters of the Flood, by which the ancient iniquity was cleansed away, after the baptism (so to express it) of the world" (8). The typology for baptism is the Exodus, "when the people are set free from bondage in Egypt and by passing through the water are escaping the violence of the Egyptian king, the king himself with all his forces is destroyed by water. This is a type made abundantly clear in the sacred act of baptism: I mean that the Gentiles are set free from this present world by means of water, and leave behind, drowned in the water, their ancient tyrant the devil" (9). For this reason, perhaps, Tertullian says the ideal day for baptism is Passover (19). Furthermore, the practice of anointing follows the practice of Aaron's anointing by Moses (7) and the imposition of hands recalls Jacob's blessing of Ephraim and Manasseh (8).

Tertullian is openly typological in these instances, and might entirely dissociate the Hebrew Bible from Jews and Judaism of his own time. In other contexts, however, he recognizes Scripture as the shared heritage of contemporary Jews and Christians, and assumes a continuity from ancient Hebrews to the Jews of his time, "that book in which is seen summed up the treasure of the whole Jewish religion, and in consequence of ours as well" (Apol. 19.2). Even when anxious to dissociate his group from local Jews, "we have nothing to do with the Jews," Tertullian admits it would be understandable that outsiders might confuse them, since Christianity "rests on the very ancient books of the Jews," (Apol. 21.1).

He relies on the fact of local Jews' continuing possession of Scripture in his defense of baptism in De Corona 3-4. In this curious line of argument. he defends baptism against the charge that it is not commanded in Scripture by citing common Jewish custom. In Cor. 3 he argues, "If no passage in Scripture has prescribed it, assuredly custom, which without doubt flowed from tradition, has confirmed it. For how can anything come into use, if it has not first been handed down?" Baptism is the first example he brings of practices enshrined by custom, and he describes the rite in detail. In the next chapter he continues to defend baptism in spite of the absence of a Scriptural command by arguing for the legitimizing effects of tradition, "If for these and other such rules, you insist on having positive Scriptural injunction, you will find none. Tradition will be held forth as the originator of them, custom as their strengthener, and faith as their observer..." For support he turns to the customs of the Jews.

Tertullian does not, however, use Jewish washing or immersion as his examples. He has denigrated those customs already and perhaps does not want any mistake that multiple washings are desirable. Instead he chooses the custom of women being veiled, a custom he claims is characteristic of the Jews, "I add still one case more, as it will be proper to show you how it was among the ancients also. Among the Jews, so usual is it for them to have the head veiled, that they may be thereby recognized." He then disposes of the examples of Rebecca and Susanna by arguing that they veiled themselves voluntarily, not by law. Paul's remarks in 1 Cor he temporarily avoids, "The apostle I put aside." So no biblical law commands Jewish women to be veiled, yet it is a well-known custom, "If I nowhere find a law, it follows that tradition has given the fashion in question to custom...these instances, therefore, will make it sufficiently plain that you can vindicate the keeping of even unwritten tradition established by custom; the proper witness for tradition when demonstrated by long-continued observance" (Cor. 4.1-4).

Whether Jewish women in Carthage did veil themselves or not, and whether Tertullian has adequately represented the biblical instances are arguable questions, but beside the point. What is striking is that he claims an acquaintance with a coexisting Jewish practice and relies on it to bolster his argument for Christian baptism. If Jews take on practices that are not commanded by Scripture, but authorized by custom, he argues, Christians may do the same with baptism.
 

III Jewish Washing Practices

Tertullian tells us little, only that the Jews he knew of washed daily, and in the second reference, that they washed the whole body. He uses the language of defiling and cleanliness from sin, so he is likely talking about washing for religious purposes, not the frequenting of bathhouses (where many of the stories about the Rabbis take place). He does not mention women particularly, so he is not talking about purification after menstruation. Nor does he seem to be discussing a ritual of initiation for the convert to Judaism, since, like Christian baptism, this was a once and for all affair.

The Levitical laws of purity related to the Jerusalem Temple and the kohanim(priests), so theoretically they were irrelevant after 70 CE. Corpse impurity, which virtually everyone was exposed to, required purification by sprinkling with the ashes of the red heifer, which was no longer possible after the demise of the Temple. Yet we know certain groups took on additional stringencies of ritual purity before and after 70, possibly as an augmentation or substitute for Temple practice. The practices of ritual purity survive today in immersion after menstruation, the immersion of the proselyte, ritual hand-washing before eating bread, and the washing of the hands of the kohanim by Levites before pronouncing the Priestly Blessing on the congregation.
 

Archaeological Evidence

Mikvaot, or ritual baths, sometimes in or near synagogues, have been discovered from periods both long before and after Tertullian. They are distinguished from cisterns by their size, large surface area, steps (sometimes 2 sets, presumably to separate the impure and the pure) and the fact they could not be drained. With the possible exception of one on Delos, [13] all of these are within Israel. The first example of a mikva connected to a synagogue in the Diaspora is in Worms in the 12th century. Ritual baths are found very early at Jericho, at a synagogue at Gamla, at Herodium and Masada in Herodian fortresses taken over and made into synagogues by Jewish rebels (all pre-70). At Qumran are deep pits and channels which could collect rain pouring into the wadis. Immersion pools are also found at private homes in Sepphoris and Jerusalem and at the recently discovered synagogue at Sepphoris.

A separate mikva might not have been necessary, since L. Levine tells us "...whenever possible the building (synagogue ) was erected near a source of water to facilitate ablutions."[14] Josephus affirms this for the Jews of Halicarnassus, who "may build places of prayer near the sea, in accordance with their custom," (Ant. 14. 258). So we do not know if there are more examples of ritual pools in Palestine because they were more stringent or simply more landlocked. Certainly the Jews Tertullian knew would have had access to the sea. He offers a curious tidbit himself when he mentions the Jewish fast, universally celebrated "throughout all the shore, in every open place, they continue long to send prayer up to heaven." (On Fasting 16.6).

Material evidence of hand-washing connected to synagogue activity appears in the discovery of laver-basins near the entrance to synagogues in Palestine at Gush Halav (3-4th cent.) and Ein-Gedi (Byzantine period) as well as the Diaspora at Priene in Asia Minor. Two examples of inscriptions attesting to the donation of ablution basins are found at Philadelphia in Lydia (Asia Minor).[15]

There are also several examples of basins or fonts in the forecourt of synagogues, at Sardis in the 2nd century[16]and at Stobi.[17] Could Tertullian's famous complaint that synagogues were "fonts of persecution" refer to this feature of the synagogue that would have been most visible to outsiders?

Both the outside fonts and the washing basins may not have always been used for religious purposes. Since synagogues had many functions, as schools, hostels, dining halls, as well as places of prayer and study, the distinctions between ritual and hygienic functions may not have always been clear. A weary traveler washing hands before entering a synagogue or children before studying may have not thought much about the difference.

Literary Evidence

Scattered literary evidence from the diaspora supports the idea of some kind of ritual washing associated with prayer, and or eating. In addition to Josephus reference to the custom of building places of prayer near water, or Tertullian's description of prayer in the open near the shore, Sanders notes that in Acts 16.13, Paul and his companion in Philippi go to the river looking for a synagogue. E.P. Sanders assembles a variety of references and concludes that some sort of ritual ablution is associated with Jewish prayer:[18]

1) The Letter of Aristeas (150 BCE) 305-306 reports that Jews washed their hands in the sea while praying.

2) The Sibylline Oracles 3.591-93 (160-150 BCE) report "At dawn, they (the Jews) lift up holy arms towards heaven, from their beds, always sanctifying their flesh (var. hands) with water."

3) Josephus reports on the prophet Bannus, who engaged in frequent cold-water ablutions (Life 2. 11), as well as the Essenes, who washed in cold water before meals, or a senior after inadvertently touching a junior member (War 2.8.5; 129, 149, 150).

4) At Qumran, there are several references to immersion requirements. The uninitiated cannot enter the water, however, unless they have already turned away from wickedness (CD 10.10-13; 1QS 5.13). As with the later Rabbis, for those at Qumran water seems to have no magical properties to wash away sin, unless one has already become righteous through correct behavior. Interestingly, initiation at Qumran does not include a particular ceremony of immersion above and beyond the immersion that all members of the community perform. Ritual immersion seems a privilege for those who have already rendered themselves pure by instruction, council, righteous acts (1 QS 4.25-36; 5.13; 7).

5)Philo presents a series of complex references (Spec. Laws. 3.63, 206) which suggest rules for washing or sprinkling after contact with a corpse or semen. As Sanders notes, it is sometimes hard to tell where Philo is explaining biblical law and where he is describing Alexandrian practices.

6) Justin's Dialogue with Trypho (150-160 CE) reports knowledge of Jewish immersion. He sounds a bit like Tertullian when he compares Christian baptism to Jewish rites, "But the cisterns which you have dug for yourselves are broken and profitless to you. For what is the use of that baptism which cleanses the flesh and body alone?" (14.1). The Jew Trypho argues for rites to be observed, including Sabbath, circumcision "and to be washed if you touch anything prohibited by Moses, or after sexual intercourse" (46.1).

In the rabbinic material, closer to our time period, there is a good deal of discussion about ritual purity. Some of it is clearly theoretical, since it relates to the long-demolished Temple. The Tosefta, a work redacted roughly the beginning of the third century, refers to a group called "The Morning Dippers" (tovlei shaharit), who think the Pharisees are too lax: "'We bring a charge against you, O Pharisees, for pronouncing the Divine Name in the Morning without prior immersion.' The Pharisees answer 'We charge you, O Mornings Bathers, with uttering the Name from a body containing impurity'" (Tos.Yad. 2.20; Ber. 22a).

The Pharisees are the best-known and most disputed example of Jewish groups who worried about ritual purity. Reports about their views appear in Josephus, the NT and rabbinic literature, but the bulk of material abut their purity practices appears in the rabbinic material (save Mark 7:3-4). Neusner argues that they transferred Temple practice to their own homes and ate ordinary food in a state of ritual purity. To accomplish such a feat would quire that the food be kept separate from known sources of impurity (say a corpse or menstruant), as well as the Pharisee himself performing frequent immersions to maintain his own purity. For practical purposes they would form associations to eat with other ritually pure types. For this reason he equates them with the haverim, or Associates, who also appear in rabbinic literature as being finicky about the ritual purity of their food and their dining partners. Sanders dismisses the notion of these "pure food clubs" that reiterated Temple practice as nearly impossible, and he is less sure about the equation with the haverim, but he nevertheless agrees that the Pharisees maintained a level of purity above that of ordinary people, but probably below that of the Temple priests, which would entail fairly regular immersion of oneself, but also one's clothes, bedding, and utensils. As well, the Pharisees apparently instituted the practice of handwashing before handling anything related to the priests and after handling scripture. If the haverim were not identical with the Pharisees, then they represent yet another group with similar stringencies about ritual purity. While the rabbinic material about the Pharisees and the haverim has the advantage of appearing in documents closer to our time period (even if much of the material is about an earlier time), both groups represent Palestinian phenomena, and cannot be transferred to the diaspora.

What this survey suggests is the tendency for many Jewish groups to take on stringencies of ritual purity and practices of immersion and/or handwashing, possibly as an imitation or substitution for Temple practice or out of a simple desire to increase piety.

These Jews share with Tertullian the notion of the unity of the body and soul,[19] that by sanctifying one, the other is sanctified, as well as the role of physical, ritual acts of sanctification.

In his promoting baptism, Tertullian is in a delicate position. He is promoting a ritual similar to one many associate with the Jews, so must carefully distinguish baptism from Jewish custom. Yet to answer Marcionites, pagans and others, he must borrow the antiquity of the Jews. Knowingly or not, he has picked up strands of Jewish and Jewish-Christian tradition. In hammering out his theology of baptism, he has illustrated his complex relationship to Israel, its traditions and its contemporaneous representatives.
 
 

1. All translations of Tertullian, except The Apology and On Baptism are from The Ante-Nicene Fathers, vols. 3-4. The translation of The Apology is from the Loeb Classical Library. The translation of On Baptism is by E. Evans (London: SPCK, 1964).
 

2. See the discussion on p. 4 of this paper. Another example where he distinguishes biblical and contemporary Jews is Apology 18.6.
 

3. I argue this in "Jews, Jewish Christians and Judaizers in North Africa," Putting Body and Soul Together: Essays in Honor of Robin Scroggs (ed. V. Wiles, A. Brown and G. Snyder; Philadelphia: Trinity, 1997) 185-200.
 

4. Mark is almost certainly wrong that these rites were practiced by all Jews.
 

5. C. Aziza shows that Tertullian uses the term "Hebrews" when he is clearly talking about biblical history. He uses "Israel," "Israelites," and "Jews" more frequently to mean both historical and contemporaneous Jews, Tertullien et le Judaisme (Nice: 'Les Belles Lettres,' 1977) 280-85.
 

6. Ante-Nicene Fathers on this passage, n.22.
 

7. Setzer, "Jews, Judaizers," 189-90.
 

8. Josephus says he was a disciple of Bannus, who lived in the wilderness and performed frequent ablutions with cold water for purity's sake (Life 2. 11). He also reports that the Essenes performed frequent ritual cleansings (War 2.8.5 129).
 

9. See A.F.J. Klijn and G. Reinink, Patristic Evidence for Jewish-Christian Sects (Leiden: Brill, 1973); and J. Thomas, Le mouvement baptiste en Palestine et Syrie 150 av. J.-C.-300 ap. J. -C. (Gembloux: Duculot [diss. Louvain], 1965), discussed in T. Finn, From Death to Rebirth (New York: Paulist, 1997) 106.
 

10. See Finn, Death to Rebirth, 113, n.51. Finn asserts that ritual immersion was at the heart of initiation to the Qumran community. But the references he points to do not refer to initiation, but purification required for all members of the community.
 

11. S.J.D. Cohen, "The Rabbinic Conversion Ceremony," JJS 41 (1990)177-203.
 

12. A similar idea appears in a rabbinic work, Bereshit Rabbah 2.4, which links water to repentance, "...In the merit of repentance which is likened to water, as it is written, 'Pour out thy heart like water' (Lam 2:19). R. Haggai said in the name of R. Pedath: A covenant was made with water that even in the hot season a breeze (lit. ruah, as in Gen 1:2, wind or spirit) stirs over it." This work is redacted about 200 years after Tertullian, but seems to also express the notion that water, by nature carries God's spirit..
 

13. There seems some question as the whether the pool found at Delos is a mikva, though less about whether the building it is attached to is a synagogue. See P. Bruneau, Recherches sur les cultes de Delos a l'epoque hellenistique et a l'epoque imperiale (Paris: 1970).
 

14. L. Levine, Ancient Synagogues Revealed (Detroit: Wayne State, 1982) 4.
 

15. Levine, Ancient Synagogues, 117, 158.
 

16. This synagogue was not a separate buliding but part of a gymnasium complex, including public baths and shops, Levine, Ancient Synagogues.
 

17. E. Sukenik, Ancient Synagogues in Palestine and Greece (London, 1934) 79. Kraabel notes that the site at Stobi represents several eras, 2 synagogues supplanted by a church, "The Diaspora Synagogue," ANRW 2.19.1, 497.
 

18. I rely heavily upon Sanders' gathering of the evidence, Jewish Law from Jesus to the Mishnah (Philadelphia: Trinity, 1990) 259-71.
 

19. In Resurrection of the Flesh 8, for example, he argues that the flesh ought not to be despised, but is the hinge upon which salvation hangs.