Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

THE MISSION OF JESUS §11.3
stood in a prophetic tradition which offered an effective encounter with the divine,
an effective alternative to that focused in the Jerusalem Temple.
Josephus also gives a pointer to how the phrase used by Mark (baptisma
metanoias eis aphesin hamartiön) should best be understood. Was the baptism
conceived as the effective agent in achieving the forgiveness or excusing the sins
confessed? 103 That is less likely. It is more likely that the key factor was understood
to be the repentance expressed by the baptisand. The phrase metanoia eis
aphesin hamartiön is almost a single concept — 'repentance-for-theforgiveness-of-sins'.
So at least Luke understood it (Luke 24.47; cf. Acts 5.31).
According to Acts 13.24 John had preached 'a baptism of repentance'. Very
striking, also, is the fact that Matthew drops the whole phrase. Instead, he describes
John's baptism as 'for repentance' (eis metanoian) (Matt. 3.11), and
leaves his only reference to 'forgiveness of sins' till his account of the last supper:
the 'effective agent' 'for the forgiveness of sins' is the outpouring of Jesus'
blood 'for many' (26.28). This theological ambivalence is echoed by Josephus'
aesthetic unwillingness to regard John's baptism as a kind of (cultic) manipulation
of God's acceptance: 'They must not employ it to gain pardon for whatever
sins they committed, but as a consecration of the body implying that the soul was
already thoroughly cleansed by right behaviour' (Ant. 18.117). 104 Josephus' emphasis
obviously correlates well with Q's account of John's call for 'fruits worthy
of repentance' (cf. Acts 26.20) and 'good fruit' (Q 3.8-9). 105 The best way to
read Mark's phrase, therefore, is probably as 'a baptism which brought to expression
the repentance-seeking-forgiveness of sins'. 106 This leaves open the ques-
'replace' the existing structures (160)? F. Avemarie, 'Ist die Johannestaufe ein Ausdruck von
Tempelkritik', in B. Ego, et al., eds., Gemeinde ohne Tempel/Community without Temple
(Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1999) 395-410, concludes that not so much criticism as indifference
is indicated in regard to the Temple.
103. For H. Thyen, 'Baptisma metanoias eis aphesin hamartiön', in J. M. Robinson, ed.,
The Future of Our Religious Past, R. Bultmann FS (1964; ET London: SCM, 1971) 131-68, the
phrase 'characterizes John's baptism as an eschatological sacrament which effects both repentance
and forgiveness' (132; similarly 135, 167); 'eschatological sacrament' was a popular description
of John's baptism in the first half of the twentieth century (Schweitzer, Quest 1 339-42;
Bultmann, Jesus and the Word 23; Ernst, Johannes der Täufer 335 n. 219; still in Strecker, Theology
225, and Theissen and Merz, Historical Jesus 203-204, 210, 436).
104. Cf. again 1QS 3.8-9 cited in n. 94 above; contrast 1QS 3.3-6 and 5.13-14, which
make clear that ritual purifications were of no avail without repentance (5.14) and membership
in the community.
105. Luke adds some illustration of what would constitute 'good fruit' (Luke 3.10-14).
106. 'Repentance-baptism' (Taylor, Mark 154; R. A. Guelich, Mark 1-8 [WBC 34A;
Dallas: Word, 1989] 18-20; Webb, John the Baptizer 186-89, though he also accepts that 'in
some way it mediated the forgiveness' [191]); similarly Webb, 'John the Baptist' 191-92; 'baptism
of conversion' (Beasley-Murray, Baptism 34, 43); 'the seal on the declaration of willing-
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