Note 83 — Chapter IV · THE EVOLUTION OF THE CULT

Such Messianism may have either preceded or proceeded-on an adoption of the rite of baptism. Given a resort to Messianism by the Jesuists after the fall of Jerusalem, the alleged testimony of the Baptist to Jesus as the Appointed One might be the first step; and the resort to the baptismal rite would follow on the myth that Jesus had been actually baptized by John. In Acts, i, 5, Jesus is in effect made to represent John’s baptism with water as superseded by a baptism in the Holy Ghost.83 In the Pauline epistles we have trace of a conflict over this as over other Judaic practices, Paul being made to declare (1 Cor. i, 17) that “Christ sent me not to baptize but to preach the gospel,” though he admits having baptized a few.84 All that is clear is that the Jesuists were not primarily baptizers; that they began to baptize “in the name of Jesus Christ,”85 with a formula of the Holy Ghost and fire, but really in the traditional manner with water; and that long afterwards they feigned that the Founder had prescribed baptism with a trinitarian formula.86