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Dear Yahkanon,
While revered by the Mandaeans as
a Mandaean, John the Baptist was,
according to our Scriptures, a Jew
with no hint of any other teaching.
As my colleague ably pointed out,
John was descended from Israelites,
the son of a Jewish priest, and recognized
as Jewish by Jesus Himself. Mandaeans,
who refer to John as their last prophet,
surmise that they may be descended
from followers of John the Baptist
who fled eastward from the Jordan
valley and ultimately settled along
the lower reaches of the Tigris,
Euphrates, and Karun Rivers. There
is nothing incompatible with Christianity
in this claim.
As for whether John the Baptist was
a Jew, let's look at Luke 1:5-9:
5 In the time of Herod king of
Judea there was a priest named Zechariah,
who belonged to the priestly division
of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was
also a descendant of Aaron. 6 Both
of them were upright in the sight
of God, observing all the Lord's
commandments and regulations blamelessly. 7 But they had no children, because
Elizabeth was barren; and they were
both well along in years. 8 Once when
Zechariah's division was on duty
and he was serving as priest before
God, he was chosen by lot, 9 according
to the custom of the priesthood,
to go into the temple of the Lord
and burn incense."
Luke 1:5-9
- Zechariah was a priest, a descendant
of Aaron. This made him ethnically
a Jewish priest, since Aaron was
the brother of Moses, the founder
of the Jewish people, and Jewish
priesthood was defined in terms
of one's being a descendant of
Aaron (Exodus 28:4).
(I am using Jew in
the Merriam-Webster Unabridged
recognized sense of Israelite, a member of the Hebrew people.)
- Zechariah served in the
temple of the Lord. There
was only one temple of the
Lord, and that was the temple
the Jews worshiped at. While non-Jews
admittedly did worship at the
temple, they would not have served
as priests there.
So we've established that Zechariah
was a Jew, in the broad sense of
being a Hebrew and following the
Jewish faith. Luke 1 Verses 16-17 says of
John the Baptist,
"Many of the
people of Israel will he bring back
to the Lord their God. And he will
go on before the Lord, in the spirit
and power of Elijah, to turn the
hearts of the fathers to their children
and the disobedient to the wisdom
of the righteous—to make ready
a people prepared for the Lord."
Luke 1:16-17
So here John the Baptist was
- sent to minister to and convert the
Jews (Israelites);
- in the power
of Elijah (a Jewish prophet);
- to make ready a people prepared for
the Lord (the Jewish Messiah).
- He
was circumcised on the eighth day
(Luke 1:59) according to the Jewish custom
that confirms the Jewish covenant
(Genesis 17:12).
- Zechariah specifically
refers to the "God of Israel" (verse 68),
along with Abraham (verse 73), the father
of the Jews.
- John the Baptist "lived
in the desert until he appeared publicly
to Israel" (verse 80).
I don't know how much more Israelite
(Jewish) you can get.
It was a Jewish
tradition. There were ceremonial
washings, to be sure, in the Old
Testament (Exodus 29:4, Leviticus
14:8-9, Leviticus 15:5-13, Leviticus
15:21-27, Leviticus 16:26, etc.)
Baptism probably developed from these
washings. In any case, it's a jump
based on this evidence to go from:
John
baptized which was not attested to
as such in the Old Testament
to
John
the Baptist was a Mandaean.
Both
Christianity and Mandaeism acknowledge
that baptism rites existed before
John the Baptist. As Christians believe,
Mandaeism believes that baptism is
a purification rite.
Perhaps this
is one of what Pope John Paul II, who showed respect to Mandaeism
and met with its leaders, called, the
many points of contact between [Mandaeism]
and the Christian faith.
Ultimately much of this depends on
which testimony you believe: the
Mandaean testimony or the Christian
testimony. There is not a lot of
third-party evidence to confirm either
view.
My colleagues may want to consult
the following:
for
information on Mandaeism.
Eric
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