Friday, 29 May 2009

Q. What came before the font and the baptismal pool ?


Answer : One of these.  Its a 4th century Romano-British font-pool-baptistry thing.  Over a thousand miles to the North-West of Rome, a christian church situated in the port settlement of Richborough in Kent built this baptistry in their church located inside the walls of the Roman Fort.  It is big enough for one person to stand in, but not two.  It is floor or ground standing, and its shape and construction suggests that it was not much taller than this when complete, thus an adult standing in it would be thigh-deep in water were it to be completely filled.  However, it has no drain or signs of plumbing of the types associated with Roman buildings.  Which would suggest that it was either left filled, filled when needed, or not filled but used as a basin or recepticle for poured water.

Wall paintings from elsewhere in the empire show baptismal candidates having water poured over them while standing in a large bowl or hollow structure, and given its modest size and dimensions,  that would be a plausible way of using the Richborough Baptistry.  If that is the way it was used, it would add weight to the suggestion that mandating full immersion is a later innovation added to the basic act of baptism, and not an idea felt necessary by those nearer to the New Testament than we.

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