CROSS Spirit- and Water-Baptism 129
being baptized'.^25 The importance of the metaphorical use of baptism must
not be overlooked, and, while I can accept that baptism is used metaphori-
cally of Jesus' death in Mk 10.38-39 and Lk. 12.50, and the baptism into
Moses in 1 Cor. 10.2, that does not demonstrate that the references to
baptism in Rom. 6.3, Gal. 3.27 and 1 Cor. 12.13 are also metaphorical in a
way which precludes them from referring at a secondary level to the water-
baptism which they all shared in common. While there is undoubtedly a
metaphorical use of baptism in the New Testament, there, nevertheless,
has to be an underlying reality which makes the metaphor appropriate.
That this reality is both real and an experience and one that is associated
with baptism is made clear by Paul in both Rom. 6 and Gal. 3. Dunn rec-
ognizes this when he acknowledges that the 'Spirit-baptism' metaphor is
drawn from the ritual act, though it is not identical with it. 'We may assume
that the two moments (ritual act and metaphor) were regularly experienced
as one—hence the vitality of the metaphor, and the force of the subsequent
theology of sacrament (a spiritual reality in, with and under the physical
action).' He then adds: 'But we cannot assume that this was always the
case' (cf. Acts 2.4; 8.12-16; 10.44-48).^26 It is difficult not to see an incon-
sistency in his thought when elsewehere he categorically states that in
1 Cor. 12.13 'Paul is thinking of baptism in the Spirit; he is not speakingabout water at alV,^27 He continues:
It is their experience of the Spirit (not of water-baptism) which provides the
jumping-off point for Paul's appeal to the Corinthians for a right attitude
towards the exercise of spiritual gifts. It is their experience of the one Spirit
(not water-baptism) which is the basis of their unity.^28But if the metaphor originates from the rite of water-baptism it is difficult to
conceive how Paul's use of the Spirit-baptism metaphor would not have
called to the Corinthians' minds the water-baptism which 'regularly' coin-
cided with the reception of the Spirit. Dunn, however, supports his position
with his contention that 'in the six other explicit references to Spirit-baptism
the contrast is always made with the rite of the Baptist. Paul himself does
not repeat the antithesis but speaks only of the Spirit-baptism which God or
Christ administers. '^29 Dunn takes issue with Lampe's argument that 'Pauline- Dunn, '"Baptized" as Metaphor', p. 294.
- Dunn, Galatians, p. 203.
- Dunn, Baptism, p. 129, italics added.
- Dunn, Baptism, p. 130, italics original.
- Dunn, Baptism, p. 130.