Who should be baptized?
Earliest statement of each found so far: Believers and their infants, Julian of Eclanum, c. 418.
What the early Church said, in their own words →
- Oriental Orthodox placements rest mainly on Coptic and Ethiopian church texts. The Armenian texts checked so far are brief, and Syriac and Indian Orthodox texts are not yet checked.
a passage teaches it a passage rejects it authorship uncertain formally defined defined after this timeline ends
Believers and their infantsCatholicOrthodoxOriental OrthodoxChurch of the EastLutheranReformedAnglicanMethodist1 teaches it · Confession 1530 →
Professing believers onlyBaptistAnabaptist1 rejects it · Confession 1527 →
The positions
Believers and their infants CatholicOrthodoxOriental OrthodoxChurch of the EastLutheranReformedAnglicanMethodist
What it holds: Infants of Christian parents should be baptized, before they can profess faith themselves.
Born with a fallen human nature and tainted by original sin, children also have need of the new birth in BaptismCatechism of the Catholic Church, 1250
children are to be baptized who, being offered to God through Baptism are received into God's grace.Augsburg Confession, Article IX (1530)
Not only those that do actually profess faith in and obedience unto Christ, but also the infants of one, or both, believing parents, are to be baptized.Westminster Confession of Faith, 28.4 (1646)
The Baptism of young children is to be retained in the Church.Articles of Religion of the Methodist Church (UMC Book of Discipline, para. 104)
the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahido Church baptizes male infants at the age of 40 days and female infants at the age of 80 daysEthiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, The Faith of the Church (text by V. C. Samuel, 1970)
both the Catholic and the Assyrian tradition practice the baptism of adults and the baptism of infants.Common Statement on Sacramental Life, Catholic Church and Assyrian Church of the East (2017)
Formally defined: Council of Carthage (418); Augsburg Confession (1530); Westminster Confession (1646)
Earliest statement: Julian of Eclanum, c. 418
Professing believers only BaptistAnabaptist
What it holds: Only those who personally profess repentance and faith should be baptized; infants should not be.
Those who do actually profess repentance towards God, faith in, and obedience to, our Lord Jesus Christ, are the only proper subjects of this ordinance.Second London Baptist Confession, 29.2 (1689)
Christian baptism is the immersion of a believer in water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.Baptist Faith and Message, Article VII (2000)
This excludes all infant baptismSchleitheim Confession (1527)
water baptism is to be reserved for those old enough to make such a pledge.Confession of Faith in a Mennonite Perspective (1995)
Formally defined: Schleitheim Confession (1527); First London Confession (1644); Second London Confession (1689)
No early passage in the works searched so far states it yet.
Common ground
These are affirmed by more than one position, so a passage saying only this counts for none of them.
- Adults who come to faith are baptized after instruction (catechumenate)
- Baptism in the name of Father, Son and Holy Spirit
- Repentance and faith are expected of adult candidates
- Advice to delay baptism for prudential reasons (e.g. Tertullian) without saying infant baptism is invalid (compatible with both)
Every deciding passage, earliest first
Julian of Eclanum, c. 418
Baptism is necessary at every age, so that the creature may be adopted among the children of God, not because it inherits anything from its parents that must be cleansed by the washing of rebirth (Titus 3:5; John 1:12–13; Romans 8:15).
- Teaches: Believers and their infants
- Rejects: Professing believers only
Translation in progress
Julian of Eclanum, c. 418
We confess that Christ's grace is necessary for everyone, adults and infants alike. We condemn those who say that a child born to two baptized parents does not need to be baptized.
- Teaches: Believers and their infants
- Rejects: Professing believers only
Translation in progress
Julian of Eclanum, c. 418
Augustine says that the authors deny that infants inherit original sin needing remission in baptism. They nevertheless affirm, and indeed proclaim, that the washing of rebirth adopts them from being children of human beings into being children of God (Titus 3:5; John 1:12–13; Romans 8:15).
- Teaches: Believers and their infants
- Rejects: Professing believers only
Translation in progress
Julian of Eclanum, c. 418
Having defended these points as far as the present passage allowed, let us return to where we left off. We will discuss this very subject more fully wherever an opportunity arises. See with what a clear confession I rejected both those who would deny baptism to infants and you who dare to stain God's justice by what you claim baptism presupposes. I testified that I hold nothing other than this: the established mysteries must be administered at absolutely every age in the same words in which they were handed down, and must not be changed to suit different cases. But the sinner becomes completel…
- Teaches: Believers and their infants
- Rejects: Professing believers only
Translation in progress
Julian of Eclanum, c. 418
We acknowledge that the grace of baptism is beneficial to every age, so completely that we pronounce an eternal anathema on all who think it unnecessary even for infants. But we believe this grace to be rich in spiritual gifts. Abundant in its many favors and worthy of reverence for its powers, it heals the different kinds of weakness and the different conditions of human beings by one power that bestows both remedies and gifts. When it is administered, it does not need to be changed to suit particular cases: it distributes its own gifts according to the capacity of those who approach. No craf…
- Teaches: Believers and their infants
- Rejects: Professing believers only
Translation in progress
Julian of Eclanum, c. 418
“You see how many gifts baptism gives. Some people think that heavenly grace consists only in the forgiveness of sins. We, however, have counted ten honors. This is why we baptize infants too, although they are not stained by sin: so that holiness, righteousness, adoption, inheritance, and brotherhood with Christ may be added to them, and so that they may be his members.”
- Teaches: Believers and their infants
- Rejects: Professing believers only
Translation in progress
Julian of Eclanum, c. 418
Here is my brief answer: far from denying Christ’s medicine to infants, whom we know to be innocent, we acknowledge that they especially need it in greater abundance. They are born tiny and weak, unable not only to feed themselves through their own labor but even to ask their parents for help. They are exposed to so many accidents that even milk that is too thick, and often the sleep of those nursing them, can cause their death.
- Teaches: Believers and their infants
- Rejects: Professing believers only
Translation in progress
How this was made
Every whole work in the library on 21 October 2026 was searched for this question. Works added since then are not searched yet. The short excerpts on the topic pages (many from Tertullian, Justin, Irenaeus and Ignatius) join the search once their English has been checked against the Greek or Latin original: 94% of them (1,814 of 1,925) have passed that check, and the rest are still held out, so an early witness may occasionally be missing from these lanes. Two AI models from different labs judged each passage against all the positions at once, seeing them only as letters, without names or churches. A third model settled disagreements, and Claude reviewers then checked every deciding verdict against the passage and, for the earliest dates, against the Greek or Latin. A writer's silence is never counted.
The evidence is only as deep as the works searched: 1st century: 5 writers, 2nd century: 23 writers, 3rd century: 22 writers, 4th century: 18 writers, 5th century: 11 writers, 6th century: 5 writers, 8th century: 1 writer. The lanes are redrawn when the search is run again.