About an ebionite phrase on the baptism

[Giuseppe]

The ebionites were the Judaizers par excellence. Hence they were eo ipso the latest comers. I disagree totally against who argues the contrary.

No wonder they didn't reserve the original tradition about the baptism:

A man called John came, baptizing (of) a baptism (baptizôn baptisma) of conversion.

Note that that form in Greek is very far from the Semitic language, hence revealing that passage as a derivation from a previous Gospel in Greek.

Now, that construct is particularly expected: the people have to hear that there is a baptism of conversion before to go to receive that baptism.

[Giuseppe]

No wonder they didn't preserve the original tradition about the baptism:

Therefore the original reading was:

John preached a baptism of metanoia

And absolutely not:

John baptized of a baptism of conversion.

John was a preacher, not a baptizer.

But the Judaizers argued the contrary.

[Giuseppe]

Marcion/Luke was reluctant to concede that John baptized. They worked in a time when the replacement of a John preacher with a John baptizer was already a fact.

21 When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

(Luke 3:21-22)

A better translation is the following:

And all the people arrived in being baptized ἐν τῷ βαπτισθῆναι , and Jesus having been baptized and praying, heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit was descended

Luke doesn't say expliciter that Jesus was baptized by John. He doesn't say that Jesus was baptized by the disciples of John.

Therefore Jesus baptized himself in that episode, and all the people baptized themselves, not by John, but BEFORE John.

Luke doesn't call John as "the Baptizer" (Luke 3:3-4). Therefore for him John doesn't baptize. He leaves the people baptize themselves before him and not by him.


Codex Bezae (D) reads: "He said to the people came to be baptized before him (enopion autou) " and not "baptized by him" (hup'autou).

The reading "before him" is more primitive than "by him".


Always Luke, puts the arrestation of John before the presumed baptism of Jesus to avoid to say that Jesus was baptized by John.


This baptism of Jesus by himself fits perfectly the Corpus Hermeticum 4:4:

"Baptize yourself". Implicit: "by yourself".

[Giuseppe]

The Gnostic meaning of metanoia is the conversion from the worship of the demiurge (= Satan = YHWH) to the worship of the alien supreme god.

But for the Jews YHWH was the supreme god and was already known.

Hence for the Jews the goal of the conversion (hence: of the baptism) was a continue activity of purification of the more banal sins against a lot of prescriptions to be observed.

The dinamic image of a John preaching the Gnostic metanoia was replaced by the static image of a John baptizing at the Jordan.

[Giuseppe]

Now we can realize finally the sense of the "Baptism of John" worked by Apollos in Acts 18:23-25:

After spending some time in Antioch, Paul set out from there and traveled from place to place throughout the region of Galatia and Phrygia, strengthening all the disciples.

24 Meanwhile a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was a learned man, with a thorough knowledge of the Scriptures. 25 He had been instructed in the way of the Lord, and he spoke with great fervor and taught about Jesus accurately, though he knew only the baptism of John.

here the author shows surprise for the fact that Apollos knows only the baptism of John. In virtue of this surprise, he is an idiot, because Acts 19:4 gives a perfect explanation:

Paul said, “John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. He told the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus.”

This passage is a perfect explanation of the Apollonism since it proves that there was not need of two baptisms, one in the name of John and another in the name of Jesus, since the former and the latter coincided. In other terms, according to the logic of Acts 19:4, Apollos knew already the baptism in the name of Jesus, differently from what the author of Acts thinks about it.

[Giuseppe]

Paul himself received a gnostic baptism of metanoia:

Acts 26:17-18

I will rescue you from your own people (the Jews) and from the Gentiles. I am sending you to them 18 to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan (=YHWH) to God (=the alien Father), so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’

• The opening of eyes is the same of Adam and Eve before the Serpent.

• The metanoia is from the demiurge to the supreme god, the true Father of Jesus.

• And obviously, the Gnostic theme par excellence: the passage from darkness to the light. The same theme behind the choice of the Galilee (Isaiah 8:23-9:1) in the Gospels.

[Giuseppe]

The baptism of metanoia preached by John could be considered originally as a banal Jewish baptism of repentance, but only if the Gospels were a priori "History Remembered".

The Gospels are not History Remembered. They historicize theological views for propagandistic reasons.

[Giuseppe]

Conclusion: in the original story, John preached the belief in Jesus, the Jesus Son of Father ("Bar-Abbas").

When the Father was identified by the Judaizers with YHWH, then John continues to preach the Jesus son of YHWH ("called Christ")

In both the cases the requisite for the baptism of John is a religious conversion (from demiurge/Satan to a supreme god) not the repentance of the sins.