On Baptism, against the Donatists 5.20–5.37

It is strange, however, how it can be said that “baptism and the church cannot at all be separated and divided from each other.” For if baptism remains inseparably in the baptized, how can the baptized be separated from the church and baptism not be? But it is plain that baptism remains inseparably in the baptized, since, into whatever depth of evils and whatever horrible abyss of sins the baptized falls, even to the ruin of apostasy, he does not lack baptism; and so it is not given back to him when he returns through repentance, since he is judged to have been unable to lack it. And who would doubt that a baptized person can be separated from the church? For from there all the heresies went out which deceive with the Christian name. Therefore, since it is plain that baptism is in the baptized, when the baptized is separated from the church, the baptism that is in him is certainly separated with him. And so not all who hold baptism hold the church too, just as not all who hold the church hold eternal life too. Or if we say that only those hold the church who keep the divine commandments, we grant that there are already many who hold baptism and do not hold the church.

So a heretic does not “seize baptism first,” since he took it from the church and could not lose it when he withdrew; we say he no longer has the church and yet grant that he has baptism. Nor does anyone yield the first place and give it to a heretic by saying that he took away with him what he would not give lawfully but would still give as lawful, and would no longer have lawfully but would still have as lawful. For the first place is only in holy conduct and a good life, to which belong all of whom, as members, that bride without spot or wrinkle consists, and that dove groaning among the wickedness of many crows; unless perhaps, since Esau lost the birthright through desire for a dish of lentils, defrauders, robbers, usurers, the envious, drunkards, and others of this kind, such as Cyprian groaned over in the church of his time, even in his letters, are to be thought to hold the first place. Therefore, either holding the church is not the same as holding the first place in divine things, or, if everyone who holds the church also holds the first place, all those wicked men do not hold the church, who yet seem to be within and are denied by none of us both to give and to have baptism. For who would say that they have the first place in divine things, unless one who has no taste of anything divine?

But now, having considered and treated everything, we have come to those peaceable words of Cyprian, that is, to the end of the letter, which do not satisfy me, though I read them and often go back over them, so great a delight of brotherly love breathes from them, so great a sweetness of love overflows. “We have written this back to you,” he says, “very briefly, dearest brother, according to our small ability, prescribing to no one and prejudging no one, so as to prevent each of the bishops from doing what he thinks, since he has the free power of his own judgment. We, for our part, do not quarrel over heretics with our colleagues and fellow bishops, with whom we keep divine concord and the Lord’s peace, especially since the apostle also says: ‘But if anyone is inclined to be contentious, we have no such custom, nor has the church of God.’ Love of heart, the honour of our college, the bond of faith, and the concord of the priesthood are kept by us patiently and gently. For this reason too we have written, as far as our small ability could, with the Lord’s permission and inspiration, a little book on the good of patience, which we have sent to you out of mutual love.”

In these words there are many things to consider, in which the brightness of Christian love shines out in this man, who loved the beauty of the Lord’s house and the place of the dwelling of his tabernacle: first, that he did not keep silent what he thought; next, that he expressed it so gently and peaceably; that he kept the church’s peace with those who thought otherwise; that he understood how great a health there is in the bond of unity; that he loved it so much and guarded it so soberly; that he saw and felt that even those who thought differently could do so with love preserved (for he would not have said that he kept divine concord and the Lord’s peace with the wicked; a good man can have peace toward the wicked, but cannot keep with them a peace which they themselves do not keep); finally, that, “prescribing to no one and prejudging no one, so as to prevent each of the bishops from doing what he thinks, since he has the free power of his own judgment,” he gave even to us, such as we are, room to treat these matters peaceably with him. For he is present not only through his letters but also through that love itself which was strongest in him and could never die. Desiring, then, to cling to him and be joined to him, if I am not hindered by the unfitness of my sins, helped by his prayers I would learn, if I can, through his letters with how great peace and how great comfort the Lord governed his church through him; and, clothed through the feeling of his words with the heart of humility, if I think something truer with the whole world, I will not put my heart above his, not even in this point, that, though thinking otherwise, he was not torn away from the whole world. For a greater strength of virtue stood out in him, while this question still wavered undiscussed, in that, thinking otherwise than many colleagues, he kept such moderation as not to mutilate the holy fellowship of the church of God by any stain of schism, than if he had thought everything not only truly but also as they did, without this virtue. For I do not please him if I aim to put his talent, his power of speech, and the richness of his learning above the holy council of all nations, at which he was certainly present through the unity of the Spirit, especially as he is now placed in such light of truth, where he most surely sees what he sought here most peaceably. For from that richness he laughs at these words of ours, which seem eloquent, as childish rudiments. There he sees by what rule of piety he acted here, so that nothing in the church was dearer to him than unity. There too he beholds with unspeakable delight with what provident and most merciful dispensation the Lord, to cure our swelling pride, chose the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and arranged everything so wholesomely in the ranks of the members of his church that men should not say they had been chosen to help the gospel because of their talent or their letters (not yet knowing by whose gift they had them), and so be puffed up with a deadly pride. How Cyprian rejoices, how much more serenely he sees in that light for what great salvation of the human race it came about that something is found that can rightly be blamed even in the Christian and devout writings of orators, and is not found in the writings of fishermen! Fully secure about this joy of that holy soul, I in no way dare to think or say that my own writings are free of all error; nor against that opinion of his, in which he thought those coming from heretics should be received otherwise than they either were received in the past, as he himself testifies, or are received now, as the reasonable custom has been confirmed by a plenary council of the whole Christian world, do I set my own opinion, but that of the holy Catholic Church; which he so loved and loves, in which he bore such rich fruit with patience; of whose universality he was not himself the whole, but in whose universality he remained; whose root he never deserted, but in whose root, being fruitful, he was pruned by the heavenly husbandman so as to be more fruitful; for whose peace and salvation, lest the wheat should be rooted up with the tares, he both refuted with the freedom of truth and bore with the strength of love so many evils of men placed with him in unity.

From which the same man reminds us most abundantly that many who are dead in their offences and sins, though not belonging to the fellowship of Christ and to the members of that only dove, innocent and simple (which, if she alone baptized, they certainly would not baptize), yet in appearance are seen to be within and are baptized and baptize; and that in them, though dead, the baptism lives of him who does not die and over whom death no longer has dominion. Since, then, there are both dead men within, and not hidden ones (for Cyprian would not have said so much about hidden ones), who either do not belong or do not yet belong to that living dove, and dead men outside who more plainly either do not belong or do not yet belong to it, and it is true that no one can be made alive by one who is not himself alive, it is plain that those who are baptized within by such men, if they come with true conversion of heart, are made alive by him whose baptism it is; but if they renounce the world in words and not in deeds, such as Cyprian testifies were within too, they themselves are not made alive unless they are converted, and yet they have true baptism even if they are not converted. Hence it is equally plain that the dead outside, though they neither live nor give life, still have a living baptism, which will profit them for life if they are converted to peace.

So when those who then received people coming from heresies in the same baptism of Christ which they had received outside, as the church receives them now, said that they were following the old custom, it was said against them in vain that “among the ancients heresy and schism were still in their first beginnings, so that those who were there were people who had withdrawn from the church and had previously been baptized here; and these, when they returned to the church and did penance, there was then no need to baptize.” For as soon as each heresy arose and went out from the congregation of Catholic communion, it could baptize some who rushed to it, I do not say on another day, but on that very day. And so, if this was the old custom, that people were received in this way, which even those who argued against it could not deny, no one who pays a little closer attention can doubt that those too were received in this way who had been baptized outside in heresies.

But I do not see what reason there is that one who, seeking Christian salvation, happens to fall into the error of heretics and to be baptized among them is not yet called a straying sheep, while one who, in the Catholic Church itself, renounced the world in words only and not in deeds and received baptism in that falseness of heart is called a sheep already made. Or if even such a one does not become a sheep until he turns to God with a truthful heart, then, just as this man is not baptized when he becomes a sheep, if he was already baptized but was not yet a sheep, so too the one who comes from the heretics to become a sheep is not then to be baptized, if he was already baptized among them with the same baptism, though he was not yet a sheep. Therefore, since all the wicked even within, the greedy, the envious, drunkards, and those living against Christian discipline, can rightly be called liars and dark and dead and antichrists, do they nevertheless not baptize, because “nothing can be common to falsehood and truth, darkness and light, death and immortality, antichrist and Christ”?

So one who says that God’s sacrament, which is declared to be even in the perverse, is not made perverse by the perversity of any men relies not only on custom but also on the reason of truth. Certainly the apostle John says most plainly, “He who hates his brother is in darkness even until now,” and again, “He who hates his brother is a murderer.” Why then do such men baptize within, whom Cyprian himself records to have been in malicious envy? How does a murderer cleanse and sanctify water? How does darkness bless oil? But if God is present to his sacraments and words, through whomever they are administered, then God’s sacraments are right everywhere, and wicked men, whom they do not profit, are perverse everywhere.

And what sort of argument is it that a heretic is thought not to have baptism because he does not have the church? And certainly, when he is baptized, he is also questioned about the holy church. As if one who within renounces the world not in deeds but in words were not questioned about this in baptism! So just as his false answer does not cause what he receives not to be baptism, so the other’s false answer about the holy church does not cause what he receives not to be baptism. And just as the former, if afterward he truly fulfils what he had answered falsely, does not have his baptism repeated but his life corrected, so too the latter, if afterward he comes to the church about which, when questioned, he had answered falsely, because he thought he had it while he did not, is given the very church he did not have; what he had received is not repeated. But why God can sanctify oil at the words that come from the mouth of a murderer, and cannot on an altar that heretics have set up, I do not know; unless perhaps he whom a man’s heart, falsely converted within, does not hinder is hindered outside by wood falsely set up, so that he does not deign to be present to his sacraments, he who is hindered by no falsehoods of men. If then what is said in the gospel, “God does not hear a sinner,” avails so far that sacraments are not celebrated through a sinner, how does he hear a murderer praying, whether over the water of baptism, or over the oil, or over the eucharist, or over the heads of those on whom hands are laid? Yet all these things are done and are valid even through murderers, that is, through those who hate their brothers, even within the church itself. Since no one can give what he does not have, how does a murderer give the Holy Spirit? And yet he too baptizes within. So God gives the Holy Spirit even when such a man baptizes.

And as for his saying, “One who comes to the church must be baptized and renewed, so that he may be sanctified within by the holy,” what will he do if even within he falls in with the unholy? Or is a murderer perhaps holy? And if he is baptized in the church so that he may put away this very thing too, that “coming to God and seeking a priest he fell, by the deceit of error, upon a sacrilegious one,” where will he put it away afterward, if perhaps in the church itself, while seeking a man of God, he falls by the deceit of error upon a murderer? If “part of it cannot be void in a man and part prevail,” why can the sacrament be holy in a murderer and his heart not be holy? If whoever cannot give the Holy Spirit cannot baptize either, why does a murderer baptize within? Or how does a murderer have the Holy Spirit, since everyone who has the Holy Spirit is enlightened, but he who hates his brother is in darkness even until now? If, because there is one baptism and one Spirit, those who do not have one Spirit cannot have one baptism, why within do the innocent and the murderer have one baptism and not have the same Spirit? So then a heretic and a Catholic can have one baptism and not have one church, just as in the Catholic Church the innocent and the murderer can have one baptism and not have one Spirit; because just as there is one baptism, so there is one Spirit and one church. So it comes about that in each person what he has is to be acknowledged, and what he does not have is to be given him. If “nothing can be valid and firm with the Lord that is done by those whom the Lord calls his enemies and adversaries,” why is the baptism that murderers give firm? Or do we not call murderers enemies and adversaries of the Lord? But “he who hates his brother is a murderer.” How then did they baptize who hated Paul, the servant of Christ Jesus, and so hated Jesus too, who himself said to Saul, “Why do you persecute me?” when he was persecuting his servants, and at the end will himself say, “As you did not do it to one of the least of mine, you did not do it to me”? Therefore all who go out from us are not of us; but not all who are with us are of us; just as, when the threshing floor is threshed, whatever flies off from it is not wheat, but not everything that is there is wheat. And so John too says, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would surely have remained with us.” Therefore God gives the sacrament of grace even through the wicked, but grace itself only through himself or through his saints. And so he works the forgiveness of sins either through himself or through the members of that dove to whom he says, “If you forgive anyone, they will be forgiven; if you retain anyone, they will be retained.” But baptism, which is the sacrament of the forgiveness of sins, since no one doubts that even murderers can have it, who are in darkness even until now because hatred of their brothers has not been shut out of their hearts (whether no sins were forgiven them, if they were baptized without their heart changed for the better, or the forgiven ones returned at once), we recognize to be holy in itself, because it is God’s, and not violated by the perversity of any, whether it is given or received by such men, whether within or without.

So we agree with Cyprian that heretics cannot give forgiveness, but that they can give baptism, which avails for the ruin of both givers and receivers, as men who use so great a gift of God badly; just as the malicious and envious, whom he too testifies are within, cannot give forgiveness of sins, while we all admit that they can give baptism. For if it was said of those who had sinned against us, “If you do not forgive men their sins, neither will your Father forgive you your sins,” how much more impossible is it that sins should be forgiven those who hate the brothers by whom they are loved and are baptized in that very hatred! Yet when they are afterward corrected, baptism is not given them again, but the very pardon they did not deserve to receive then is granted in true conversion. And so both what Cyprian wrote to Quintus, and what he wrote with his colleagues Liberalis, Caldonius, Junius, and the rest to Saturninus, Maximus, and others, if well considered, are in no way to be brought forward against the consensus of the whole Catholic Church, whose members they rejoiced to be and from which they neither cut themselves off nor allowed those who thought differently to be cut off, until at last, by the Lord’s will, through a plenary council, though after many years, what was more correct should shine out, not by instituting some novelty but by strengthening antiquity.

Cyprian also wrote to Pompeius on this same matter, where he plainly indicates that Stephen, who we have learned was then bishop of the Roman church, not only did not agree with him on these points but even wrote and gave instructions to the contrary. That Stephen certainly did not hold communion with heretics because he did not dare to reject Christ’s baptism, which he knew had remained entire in their perversity. For if those who think wrongly about God do not have baptism, it has, I think, been argued enough that this can happen within too. The apostles, indeed, gave no instruction on this; but the custom that was set against Cyprian must be believed to have taken its beginning from their tradition, as there are many things which the whole church holds and which are therefore rightly believed to have been commanded by the apostles, though they are not found written.

“But it is written of heretics that they are condemned by themselves.” What then? Were not those also condemned by themselves to whom it was said, “For in judging another you condemn yourself”? To them the apostle says, “You who preach that one must not steal, do you steal?” and so on. And such certainly were those who, being bishops and placed in Catholic unity with Cyprian himself, “seized estates by treacherous frauds,” while preaching to the people, no doubt, the words of the apostle who says, “Neither will robbers possess the kingdom of God.”

So I will not delay briefly to run through, by the same rules, the remaining statements of his letter written to Pompeius. That it is against God’s command that those coming from heretics are not baptized, if they have already received Christ’s baptism there: by what passage of the holy Scriptures is this shown? But it is plainly shown that many false Christians, though they do not have the same love as the saints, without which whatever holy things could be possessed profit nothing, still have baptism in common with the saints; and this has already been shown sufficiently and most abundantly. He said that the church and the Spirit and baptism cannot be separated from one another, and therefore he wants those who are separated from the church and from the Holy Spirit to be understood as separated from baptism too. If that is so, when anyone has received baptism in the Catholic Church, it remains in him as long as he himself remains in the church; but if he departs from it, he departs from baptism. That is not so. For it is not given back to him on his return because he did not lose it when he departed. And just as wicked sons do not have the Holy Spirit as beloved sons have him, and yet have baptism, so heretics do not have the church as Catholics have it, and yet have baptism. For “the holy Spirit of discipline will flee the deceitful,” yet baptism will not flee him. So just as baptism can exist even where the Holy Spirit withdraws himself, so baptism can exist where the church is not. As for the laying on of hands, if it were not applied to one coming from heresy, he would be judged as if outside all fault; but hands are laid on corrected heretics for the sake of the bond of love, which is the greatest gift of the Holy Spirit, without which whatever other holy things are in a man do not avail for salvation.

As for the temple of God, and how “As many of you as were baptized in Christ have put on Christ” is to be understood, I remember having discussed it enough. For the greedy are not the temple of God, since it is written, “What agreement has the temple of God with idols?” and Cyprian took up Paul’s testimony that greed is idolatry. But men put on Christ sometimes as far as receiving the sacrament, sometimes as far as sanctification of life as well. The first can be common to good and bad; the second is proper to the good and devout. Therefore, if baptism cannot exist without the Spirit, then heretics too have the Spirit, but for ruin, not for salvation, as Saul had him (for demons are cast out through the name of Christ in the Holy Spirit, which that man too could do who was outside the church, of whom the disciples told the Lord), as the greedy have him, who yet are not the temple of God, since “what agreement has the temple of God with idols?” But if the greedy do not have the Spirit of God and yet have baptism, baptism can exist without the Spirit.

If heresy cannot beget sons to God through Christ because it is not Christ’s bride, neither can that crowd of the wicked placed within, because it too is not Christ’s bride. For Christ’s bride is described as without spot or wrinkle. So either not all the baptized are sons of God, or even one who is not the bride can beget sons of God. And just as it is asked whether one who received Christ’s baptism among heretics was spiritually born, so it can be asked whether one who received Christ’s baptism in the Catholic Church, not turned to God with a truthful heart, was spiritually born; and yet he did not therefore fail to receive baptism.

Now I do not wish to go back over what he poured out against Stephen when provoked, because there is no need. For the same things are said that have already been discussed enough, and it is better to pass over things that carried the danger of ruinous dissension. For Stephen had thought that those should even be excluded from communion who tried to overturn the ancient custom of receiving heretics; whereas Cyprian, moved by the difficulty of the question itself and endowed most richly with the holy heart of love, thought one should remain in unity with those who thought differently. So, though he was indignant with some heat, yet in a brotherly way, the peace of Christ still won in their hearts, so that in such a dispute no evil of schism arose between them. Nor have heresies and schisms grown more abundantly from this, that what is Christ’s in them is approved and what is theirs is disapproved. Rather, those who held this law of rebaptizing have been cut into more fragments.

Now when he says that a bishop must be teachable, and adds, “And he is teachable who is mild and gentle in patience for learning. For bishops ought not only to teach but also to learn, since he teaches better who grows daily and advances by learning better things,” by these words the holy man, endowed with devout love, shows well enough that we need not fear to read his letters in such a way that, if the church has afterward confirmed something found out by more numerous and longer inquiries, we do not hesitate; because, just as there were many things which the learned Cyprian could teach, so there was something which the teachable Cyprian could learn. And his advice to us to go back to the spring, that is, to apostolic tradition, and to direct the channel from there into our own times, is excellent and to be done without hesitation. It has been handed down to us, then, as he himself recalls, from the apostles that there is one God and one Christ and one hope and one faith and one church and one baptism. Since, then, we find that in the very times of the apostles there were some who did not have the one hope and had the one baptism, the truth is so led to us from that very spring that it appears to us that it can happen that, though there is one church as there is one hope and one baptism, those who do not have the one church still have the one baptism; just as in those times too it could happen that those had one baptism who did not have one hope. For how did those have one hope with the holy and righteous who said, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die,” saying that there was no resurrection of the dead? And yet they were among those to whom the same apostle says, “Was Paul crucified for you, or were you baptized in the name of Paul?” For he writes to them most plainly, saying, “How do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?”