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Joh_3:5. Jesus now explains more fully the ἄνωθεν γεννηθῆναι onwards to Joh_3:8.
ἐξ ὕδατος κ . πνεύματος ] water, inasmuch as the man is baptized therewith (1Jn_5:7-8; Eph_5:26) for the forgiveness of sins (Act_2:33; Act_22:16; 2Co_6:11), and spirit, inasmuch as the Holy Ghost is given to the person baptized in order to his spiritual renewal and sanctification; both together[152]—the former as causa medians, the latter as causa efficiens—constitute the objective and causative element, out of which (comp. Joh_1:13) the birth from above is produced ( ἐκ ), and therefore baptism is the ΛΟΥΤΡῸΝ ΠΑΛΙΓΓΕΝΕΣΊΑς (Tit_3:5; comp. Tertullian c. Marc. i. 28). But that Christian baptism (Joh_3:22; Joh_4:2), and not that of John (B. Crusius; Hofmann, Schriftbeweis, II. 2. 12; Lange, who, however, generalizes ideally; and earlier comm.), is to be thought of in ὕδατος , is clear from the Κ . ΠΝΕΎΜΑΤΟς joined with it, and from the fact that He who had already appeared as Messiah could no longer make the baptism of His forerunner the condition, not even the preparatory condition, of His Messianic grace; for in that case He must have said ΟὐΚ ἘΞ ὝΔΑΤΟς ΜΌΝΟΝ , ἈΛΛᾺ ΚΑΊ . If Nicodemus was not yet able to understand ὝΔΑΤΟς as having this definite reference, but simply took the word in general as a symbolical designation of Messianic expiation of sin and of purification, according to O. T. allusions (Eze_36:25; Isa_1:16; Mal_3:3; Zec_13:1; Jer_33:8), and to what he knew of John’s baptism, still it remained for him to look to the immediate future for more definite knowledge, when the true explanation could not escape him (Joh_4:2, Joh_3:22). We are not therefore to conclude from this reference to baptism, that the narrative is “a proleptic fiction” (Strauss, Bruno Bauer), and, besides Mat_18:3, to suppose in Justin and the Clementines uncanonical developments (Hilgenfeld and others; see Introduction, § 2). Neither must we explain it as if Jesus were referring Nicodemus not to baptism as such, but only by way of allusion to the symbolic import of the water in baptism (Lücke; Neander, p. 910). This latter view does not satisfy the definite γεννηθῇ ἐξ , upon which, on the other side, Theodore of Mopsuestia and others, in modern times Olshausen in particular, lay undue stress, taking the water to be the female principle in regeneration (the Spirit as the male)—water being, according to Olshausen, “the element of the soul purified by true repentance.” All explanations, moreover, must be rejected which, in order to do away with the reference to baptism,[153] adopt the principle of an ἓν διὰ δυοῖν , for water and Spirit are two quite separate conceptions. This is especially in answer to Calvin, who says: “of water, which is the Spirit,” and Grotius: “spiritus aqueus, i.e. aquae instar emundans.” It is further to be observed, (1) that both the words being without the article, they must be taken generically, so far as the water of baptism and the Holy Spirit are included in the general categories of water and Spirit; not till we reach Joh_3:6 is the concrete term used;—(2) that ὕδατος is put first, because the gift of the Spirit as a rule (Act_2:38) followed upon baptism (Act_10:47 is an exceptional case);—(3) that believing in Jesus as the Messiah is presupposed as the condition of baptism (Mar_16:16);—(4) that the necessity of baptism in order to participation in the Messianic kingdom (a doctrine against which Calvin in particular, and other expositors of the Reformed Church, contend) has certainly its basis in this passage, but with reference to the convert to Christianity, and not extending in the same way to the children of Christians, for these by virtue of their Christian parentage are already ἅγιοι (see on 1Co_7:14). Attempts to explain away this necessity—e.g. by the comparative rendering: “not only by water, but also by the Spirit” (B. Crusius; comp. Schweizer, who refers to the baptism of proselytes, and Ewald)—are meanings imported into the words.
[152] Weisse, who does not regard the rite of baptism by water as having originated in the institution of Christ, but considers that it arose from a misapplication of His words concerning the baptism of the Spirit, greatly errs when he declares that to make regeneration depend upon baptism by water “is little better than blasphemy” (Evangelienfrage, p. 194).
[153] Krummacher, recently, in the Stud. u. Krit. 1859, p. 509, understands by the water the working of the Holy Spirit. How untenable! for the Spirit is named as a distinct factor side by side with water.