“Marcion, of Smyrna, who has written a work on the virtues of simples, informs that the sea scolopendra will burst asunder if spit upon; and that the same is the case with bramble frogs, and other kinds of frogs. Opilius says that serpents will do the same if a person spits into their open mouth; and Salpe tells us that when any part of the body is asleep the numbness may be got rid of by the person spitting into his lap, or touching the upper eyelid with his spittle. If we are ready to give faith to such statements as these, we must believe also in the efficacy of the following practices: upon the entrance of a stranger, or when a person looks at an infant while asleep, it is usual for the nurse to spit three times upon the ground; and this, although infants are under the special guardianship of the god Fascinus, the protector, not of infants only, but of generals as well, and a divinity whose worship is entrusted to the vestal virgins, and forms a part of the Roman rites.”[125]
CHAPTER VI.
PAGAN WATER-WORSHIP TRANSFERRED TO CHRISTIANITY.
Testimony from Tertullian, Barnabas, Justin, Methodius, the Apostolic Constitutions, etc.—Holy Water, or Repeated Baptism, Borrowed without Change—Magical Effects of Holy Water, the Same in Christian as in Pagan Cult—Baptism of Animals by Holy Water, to Produce Magical Results—Holy Water Prepared after the Pagan Method—Consecration of Baptismal Waters Borrowed from Pagan Combination of Sun- and Water-Worship—The Church Filled with Baptized but Unconverted Pagans, and so Passed under Pagan Control.
Baptism in the Early Church.
Turning to the earlier Church fathers, who formulated much which has come to us as Christian doctrine, we find the pagan idea of baptism repeated in all its essential characteristics. We have seen that the Greek fathers came to Christianity by way of Neo-Platonism rather than the New Testament. They accepted Christianity as containing many excellent things, but not as the only authoritative system of faith. They followed the popular syncretic tendency, and combined Christianity with the pagan faith in which they had been educated.
Tertullian wrote a special treatise on the question of baptism, which represents the pagano-Christian creed in fulness and in detail. I transcribe his words in part, and call attention to the similarity and the points of identity between these and the pagan theories already presented. Chapter i. of the treatise opens with these words:
“Happy is the sacrament of our water, in that, by washing away the sins of our early blindness, we are set free [and admitted] into eternal life!... But we, little fishes, after the example of our Ιχθυς, Jesus Christ, are born in water, nor have we safety in any other way than by permanently abiding in [that] water.”[126]