194 Dimensions of Baptism
The inclusion of children with minimal dislocation in a rite constructed
for persons able to answer the baptismal questions for themselves is clear
from the Apostolic Constitutions, compiled probably in Syria around 400
CE. At the end of its instructions for baptism, which patently presuppose
recipients of responsible years, comes the direction, 'Baptize also your
infants, for its says, "Let the children come to me and do not prevent
them" \^22 This citation of Lk. 18.16 (or possibly Mk 10.14) is the first
occasion in patristic literature when this Synoptic passage unambiguously
supports the baptizing of babies. The text tells us nothing, however, about
the content of the rite, but it is significant in its simple clarity of baptismal
reference.
The only other patristic writer before Augustine to reveal a connexion
between our Gospel passages and paedobaptism is an opponent of pae-
dobaptism, Tertullian of Carthage, very early in the third century. His trea-
tise on baptism, after counselling its deferment in the case of children,
acknowledges that the Lord said (ait quidem Dominus), 'Do not prevent
them coming to me', but responds, 'So let them come when they grow up
(adolescuni), when they learn, when they are taught what they are coming
to'.^23 The citation is nearest to Mt. 19.14, but the inferences to be drawn
from the passage are far from clear. Tertullian is interpreted more often as
opposing established practice than as resisting an innovation. Pocknee
argues that he places the meaning ofparvuli at the upper end of its breadth
of meafiing—which encompasses 'any child from a babe in arms to an
adolescent'. He furthermore claims that the North African church at thetime did not employ any of the three Synoptic narratives as a warrant for
infant baptism, since 'otherwise Tertullian's argument is meaningless'.^24 If
Pocknee's first point simply highlights Tertullian's virtuosity in contro-
versy, there may be more to the second than at first sight appears, although
more often than not the citation of Mt. 19.14 has been assumed to attest
precisely the opposite—that it was deployed as justifying the baptism of
infants. Pocknee may well be right to the extent that it cannot have been a
regular lection in an infant-baptizing rite, for then Tertullian's rejoinder
- Apostolic Constitutions 6.15.7 M. Metzger (ed.), (SC, 329; Paris: Cerf, 1986),
II, pp. 344-45. Pocknee, 'The Gospel Lection', p. 497, by a strange confusion credits
the work with recording Augustine's initiation into the catechumenate as a baby. - Tertullian, Baptism 18.5, Ernest Evans (ed.) (London: SPCK, 1964), pp. 38-39,
adopting the translation given in his note, p. 105. - Pocknee, 'The Gospel Lection', p. 497.