62 Dimensions of Baptism
the early Church, if Acts is anything to go on: 'Before his coming John
had preached a baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel' (Acts
13.24, attributed to Paul); 'John baptized with the baptism of repentance'
(Acts 19.4, attributed to Paul).
It has been conventional to assume that John's disciple Jesus also
preached repentance, by virtue of his association with the Baptizer, but
also by virtue of dominical tradition itself. In Mark Jesus' message is
summarized: 'The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand;
repent, and believe in the gospel' (Mk 1.15). Likewise, Jesus appointed
apostles: 'So they went out and preached that people should repent' (Mk
6.12). Q also testifies to Jesus' call to repentance: 'Woe to you, Chorazin!
Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works done in you had been
done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth
and ashes' (Mt. 11.21 =Lk. 10.13); 'The men ofNineveh will arise at thejudgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the
preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here'
(Mt. 12.41 = Lk. 11.32); and possibly: 'if he sins against you seven times
in the day, and turns to you seven times, and says, "I repent", you must
forgive him' (Lk. 17.4 = Mt. 18.21-22, but without 'I repent'). Material
special to Luke, perhaps from the evangelist's L source, also attests the
theme of repentance in Jesus' teaching: 'I have not come to call the right-
eous, but sinners to repentance' (Lk. 5.32, with the parallel in Mk 2.17
and Mt. 9.13 lacking the phrase 'to repentance'); 'I tell you, No; but
unless you repent you will all likewise perish' (Lk. 13.3, 5); 'Just so, I
tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents
than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance' (Lk.
15.7, and similarly in v. 10); and 'No, father Abraham; but if someone
goes to them from the dead, they will repent' (Lk. 16.30).^26
E.P. Sanders has challenged this conventional understanding, proposing
that Jesus himself did not require repentance, or at least did not emphasize
it.^27 Sanders reasons that the repentance theme is insufficiently attested in
the dominical tradition and that the charge that Jesus associated with sin-
ners is evidence that he did not in fact require repentance. Sanders's analy-- It may be admitted that some of the material that is special to Luke probably
reflects the evangelist's interests and redaction (as in Lk. 5.32 and 17.4, and perhaps
also in 16.30). - E.P. Sanders, Jesus and Judaism (London: SCM Press, 1985), pp. 106-13,332;
cf. idem, 'Jesus and the Sinners', JSNT19 (1983), pp. 5-36.