The Problem With Jesus’ Baptism (Mark 1:9–11) ABS EP #8

In this episode of the Agnostic Bible Study, we take a closer look at Mark 1:9–11 and one of the most interesting moments in the New Testament… the baptism of Jesus.

At first glance, the story seems simple. But the more you slow down and read it carefully, the more questions begin to surface.
Why would Jesus be baptized at all?

How do the Gospel accounts compare?

And what do these differences potentially tell us about how the story was told?

We walk through the passage piece by piece, then compare it with the accounts in the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke, and briefly look at how the Gospel of John presents it differently.

If you want a deeper breakdown of how the Synoptic Gospels relate to each other, check out my full episode on the Synoptic Problem.
This is not about telling you what to believe.

It’s about slowing the text down, looking closely, and asking honest questions.


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Transcript

The Sinless Baptism Problem

SPEAKER_00 0:00

If you already believe Jesus is sinless, this raises an obvious question. Why is he participating in a repentance baptism? This is where things can get a little uncomfortable because John's baptism is not just symbolic. It is described as a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Because it puts Jesus in a position that could be read as submission to John the Baptist. John is the one doing the baptizing. Jesus is the one receiving it. At least in this moment, John appears to be the active figure, and Jesus is stepping into his movement. And what makes this even more interesting is what happens when you compare this to the other accounts. Today is going to be a fun one. We're going to talk about one of the most interesting stories in the entire New Testament, Jesus being baptized by John. This will be a verse-by-verse breakdown of Mark 1, 9 through 11. It's going to be fun. Remember, we are approaching the Bible from a neutral, curious perspective. The show is not about trying to convert anybody or deconvert anybody. It's about slowing down, opening up the text, and asking honest questions. So whether you believe or you don't believe or you don't know what to believe, you are welcome here at the Agnostic Bible Study. Let's get into it. All right, let's get into the breakdown. I hope y'all can bear with me on my voice. My son had a T-ball tournament this weekend. I was a third base coach for three T-ball games in a row and also a soccer game. So my voice is gone. But we have a goal, we have a mission, and most importantly, we have questions to ask. So when I used to read passages like these when I was a Christian and when I was a youth pastor, they didn't really jump out at me. I would take a lot of stuff like this at face value. Jesus was baptized by John. I never really slowed down to think about why that needed to happen or the implications for that. But once I started going through this section again here recently, especially after all the studying into history, all the research I've been doing, and all the prepping for this specific episode, I'm like, man, this is big stuff. This is huge. Jesus got baptized. Why? What are the implications of that? Typically, the person being baptized is subordinate. Why does Mark tell it one way? Why does Matthew tell it one way? Why does Luke tell it one way? Why does John tell it a whole different way? These are all really important questions, and we are going to think about them today. Now let's get into our verses. I'm in Mark chapter 1, verses 9 through 11. In those days, Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart, and the spirit descending like a dove upon him, and a voice came from the heavens. With you I am well pleased. All right, so the approach we'll be doing for the breakdown portion of this episode is going phrase by phrase. So we're going to start with the first phrase, which is in those days. Now that might sound like a throwaway line, but it's actually doing something important. In true Mark fashion, he is not giving us a precise date here. He's not trying to tell you exactly when this happened. He's connecting this moment to what we just read in the verses prior, which is John the Baptist out in the wilderness preaching and baptizing. So when Mark says in those days, what he really means is something like around the same time when John is active. This is important because it places Jesus inside John's movement, not before it, not long after it, but right in the middle of it. And that sets the stage for everything that follows. Because Jesus is not introduced in isolation. He's introduced in connection to something already happening. John already has a movement. And the very next thing Mark tells you is what he does when he arrives. All right, let's get to the next phrase. Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee. Now, this might sound like just a basic detail, but this is actually one of the most grounded lines in the entire scene. Nazareth is not impressive. It is small, it's obscure, it is not a religious center, it is not politically important. We are likely talking about a village with maybe a couple hundred people at most. Also, it is not mentioned in the Old Testament, and it does not show up with major historical sources like Josephus, who writes extensively about towns and regions in Galilee. That doesn't mean Nazareth didn't exist. It just means it was small enough to fly under the radar of the sources we do have. So this is not Jerusalem. This is not Rome. This is not a well-known Jewish center. This is a tiny place in Galilee. And Galilee itself had a bit of a reputation. It was more rural, less elite, and a little more mixed culturally. Later on in the Gospel of John, someone even says, Can anything good come out of Nazareth? That gives you a sense of how people viewed it. So when Mark says Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, he is placing him in a location that most people would not associate with anything significant. And that creates an interesting tension. Because if you're building a story about a Messiah, especially one connected to the line of David, you would expect something tied to Bethlehem or at least closer to Jerusalem. But Mark doesn't do that. He introduces Jesus for Nazareth. No explanation, no attempt to elevate it. And that actually makes the detail feel more grounded. It feels less like a polished setup and more like a simple point of origin. Now that doesn't prove anything on its own, but it does raise a fair question. Is this the kind of detail you would expect if someone was inventing a story to convince people? Or is this the kind of detail that sticks because it's simply where that person was from? And this is exactly why many historians think Jesus was really associated with Nazareth, because it's not the kind of place you would pick if you were trying to build a convincing story. And what's interesting is that later on in the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke, you start to see a shift. Both of those Gospels introduce birth narratives that connect Jesus to Bethlehem, which lines up much more closely with messianic expectations, which would make Jesus look like more of a Messiah if you were coming up with the story. So now you have to ask, are they just adding more detail? Was Jesus actually born in Bethlehem and then end up in Nazareth? Or are they at least in part making adjustments to the account for a tradition that placed Jesus in Nazareth? Either way, Mark doesn't try to resolve that tension. He just starts the story here. When Jesus enters the scene, Jesus comes from Nazareth. And then the very next thing Mark tells you is that Jesus is out in the wilderness getting baptized like all these other people. Which brings us to our next phrase. And he was baptized by John. This is where things can get a little uncomfortable because John's baptism is not just symbolic, it is described as a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. So if you just read this straight without importing any later theology, Jesus is stepping into a line of people who are coming to repent. And Mark does not explain that. He does not pause, he does not defend it, he does not qualify it, he just says it happened. And that creates real tension. Because if you already believe Jesus is sinless, this raises an obvious question. Why is he participating in a repentance baptism? And this is where things get interesting from a historical perspective. This is one of those moments, kind of like the Nazareth thing, that scholars often point to what is called the criterion of embarrassment. The idea is simple. If you are making this story up later, especially as your beliefs about Jesus develop, this is probably not the kind of detail you add because it puts Jesus in a position that could be read as submission to John the Baptist. John is the one doing the baptizing. Jesus is the one receiving it. At least in this moment, John appears to be the active figure, and Jesus is stepping into his movement. And what makes this even more interesting is what happens when you compare this to the other accounts. In the Gospel of Matthew, the tension is addressed directly. John resists and says he should be baptized by Jesus instead. That flips the dynamic and protects Jesus' status. In the Gospel of Luke, the moment becomes less direct. John is not clearly shown performing the baptism. And in the Gospel of John, the baptism itself is not described at all. It is just gone. So when you line them up, you start to see a pattern. Mark presents it simply. Matthew explains it. Luke softens it. John removes it. And that raises a question worth thinking about. Is Mark preserving an earlier, more difficult tradition? And are the later gospels at least in part trying to account for the tension that creates? Or is there another way to understand it? Either way, Mark leaves you with the raw version. Jesus shows up and instead of standing apart from the crowd, he steps into the water with them. All right, let's move to the next phrase in the Jordan. At first glance, this just sounds like a location, but this is not just any river. This is the Jordan River. And for people familiar with Israel's story, that name would carry some weight. This is the river that Israel crosses in the book of Joshua when they enter the Promised Land. It is tied to movement, to transition, to stepping into something new, and is also connected to prophetic activity. This is the region where figures like Elijah and Elisha operate. So the Jordan has a history behind it. Now, this is where we have to be careful. Mark doesn't stop and explain any of that. He doesn't say this is a symbolic reenactment or anything like that. So we can't say for sure that he is intentionally pointing back to those moments, but we can say this. For an audience familiar with these stories, this location could carry those associations. So at the minimum, this is a real place where something is happening. And at the most, it may also echo a larger pattern in Israel's story: water, crossing, transition, a new beginning. And now Jesus steps into that same space. He goes into the water and then comes out. And what happens next is where everything shifts. Moving on to the next phrase, and just as he was coming out of the water. Now most English translations say just as, but in the Greek, Mark actually uses the word immediately. And that is a word he uses a lot throughout the Gospel of Mark, somewhere around 40 times. So what Mark is saying is this Jesus goes into the water, he comes up, and immediately something happens. The timing matters because Mark is tightly connecting the baptism to what comes next. There is no space between. Now the phrase coming up out of the water is simple, but it's important. It shows movement. Jesus goes down into the water and then comes up out of it. It is a physical action. And at the very least, it suggests something like immersion. This was more than likely an immersion baptism. Jesus was actually immersed into the Jordan River and comes up. But more importantly, for the flow of the story, this is the transition point. Up until now, everything has been grounded, a real place, a real person, a real act of baptism. But the moment Jesus comes out of the water, the scene shifts. What started as something human is about to become something much more. And Mark doesn't slow it down. He speeds it up. Immediately as he comes out of the water, something happens. We'll move to our next phrase. He saw the heavens torn open. This is one of the most important lines in the entire scene because Mark is using a very strong word here. He doesn't just say the heavens opened, he says they were torn open. This is forceful language. It is kind of word you would use for ripping something apart. So at the very least, Mark is not describing a gentle moment. He is describing something breaking through. Now, when you compare this to the other accounts, there's an interesting difference. In the Gospel of Matthew and Gospel of Luke, the wording is softer. They both say the heavens were opened. Now we can't say for sure that they are intentionally softening Mark. It could just be a difference in wording or style, but the difference in tone is noticeable. Mark sounds more dramatic. Matthew and Luke sound more controlled. And that fits with a pattern we have already seen in other parts of the story. Now there may also be an echo here. In the book of Isaiah, there is a line that says, Oh, that you would tear open the heavens and come down. This is a call for God to act, to break into the world. But again, we want to be careful because Mark doesn't directly quote that passage. So we can't say for sure that he is intentionally referencing it. At the minimum, we can say this. Mark is presenting this moment as a kind of breakthrough. The boundary between heaven and earth is not just opening, it is being torn. And here's another detail that is easy to miss. Mark says he saw the heavens torn open. He does not say everyone saw it. Up until this point, he keeps this from Jesus' perspective. So now you're left with a question. Is this something everyone witnessed, or is this something Jesus personally experienced? Mark doesn't tell you. He leaves that open. But either way, the point is clear. There is no longer just a baptism. Something is happening here that goes beyond the ordinary. All right, let's move to the next phrase and the spirit descending like a dove on him. Now, this is one of those lines that people often pictured very clearly. There was a painting of this at the church I grew up as Jesus was coming out of the water and there was a dove between him and the sky. But that's not exactly what the text says. Mark says the spirit descending like a dove. So this is comparison language. It is not necessarily saying a literal bird came down, it is describing what the spirit's movement was like. Now, what does that mean? Well, there's a few possibilities, and this is where we want to be careful to not overstate it. It could be visual. Something about what Jesus saw may have resembled a dove, the way it moved, the way it descended. It could also be more about the manner, gentle, controlled, not chaotic. Or it could be symbolic. Some people connect this to the book of Genesis, where the spirit is hovering over the waters at creation. But again, Mark does not explain that. So we cannot say for sure that he is intentionally making that connection. What we can say is this the author of Mark says the spirit is coming down from heaven onto him. Now, when you compare this to the other accounts, they all keep the same basic idea. The spirit descends in connection with Jesus' baptism. So unlike some of the other details, this part remains consistent across all the gospels. And just like the previous line, Mark still keeps the perspective focused. He says, He saw. So again, you are left with that same question. Is this something everyone saw, or is this something Jesus experienced? Mark still won't tell us. He just presents the moment. The heavens are torn open, and something from heaven comes down and rests on Jesus. All right, next phrase. And a voice came from heaven. Up until this point, everything has been building. Jesus enters the scene, he is baptized, the heavens are torn open, the spirit descends, and now a voice speaks. And that matters because in this context, a voice from heaven is not just a background detail. This is understood as divine speech. God is not seen, God is heard. The writer of Mark doesn't describe what the voice looks like. There is no figure, there is no form, just a voice. And that fits with how God is often portrayed in Jewish tradition. Present but not visible. Speaking, but not seen. Now, just like the earlier lines, Mark keeps this a little ambiguous. He says a voice came from heaven, but he does not clearly say who hears it. Is this something everyone present hears, or is this something directed specifically at Jesus? We are left to guess at the answer to that question. Next is the moment where everything that just happened is about to be interpreted. The baptism, the tearing of the heavens, the spirit descending, all of it is leading to this. Because now the voice is going to tell you what it means. Moving into our next phrase. This is the moment everything has been building towards. So what we may have here is a blending of ideas, royal language and servant language. But the writer of Mark does not stop and tell us what the voice defines the Son of God as. Now here's a detail that is easy to miss. In the Gospel of Mark, the voice says, You are my son. That is direct. It is spoken to Jesus, but in the Gospel of Matthew, it says, This is my son. That sounds more public. So Mark may be presenting this as more of a personal moment, something directed at Jesus Himself. So the question I naturally thought was, is this the moment of revelation? Or is this something more? Because in Mark's gospel, this is where the story begins. I say it all the time. There's no birth narrative, no angel announcements, no early declarations about who Jesus is. Everything centers on this moment. And that is why some people have looked at this scene and asked a bigger question. Is this the moment where Jesus is being identified as God's son? Or is this the moment where he becomes the son? That view is often called adoptionalism. The idea that Jesus is chosen or adopted by God at a specific point in time. Now, not everyone agrees with that, obviously. Many would say this is not about becoming, it is about revealing what was already true. But the reason that debate exists at all is because of how Mark tells the story. He starts here with a moment of baptism, the heavens opening up, the spirit descending, and a voice declaring identity. Now, this is where the conversation opens up a little more because when you read this scene in the Gospel of Mark by itself, the questions we were just asking, they naturally come up. Is this the moment Jesus became God's son? Or is this simply a moment where Jesus, who is already God's son, is identified? The voice from heaven says, You are my son. So at the very least, this is a moment of declaration. And this is where you start getting into what people sometimes call a lower view of Jesus or a higher view of Jesus. The fancy word there would be Christology, so a lower Christology of Jesus or a higher Christology of Jesus. A lower view focuses more on moments like this, where something happens, where Jesus is identified or revealed at a specific point in time. A higher view would say that this is not a beginning at all. The contrast becomes really clear because in the Gospel of John, the story doesn't start with a moment like this. It starts with in the beginning was the word and the word was with God. So instead of introducing Jesus at a point in time, John places him before everything, before creation, before history. So now you have two very different starting points. Mark begins with a moment where something happens. John begins with a statement about what has always been true. And depending on which starting point you emphasize, the baptism scene can look very different. It can look like a beginning or it can look like a revealing. But Mark doesn't stop to explain which one it is. He just shows you the moment and leaves you to wrestle with what that means. Now, before we finish this off, we need to do my favorite part, which is bringing up Matthew and Luke and doing our synoptic comparisons. Now that we've looked at the story in Mark, we're going to look at that same story in Matthew and Luke and maybe even peek at John a little at the end. So as always, I'll have the verses on the screen so we can do some good comparing. We're going to hop into the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 3, verses 13 through 17. Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me? But Jesus answered him, Let it be so now, for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness. Then he consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were open to him, and he saw God's Spirit descending like a dove and alighting on the water. On him. And a voice from the heavens said, This is my son, the beloved, with whom I am well pleased. Now, when you see them side by side, a few things start to stand out. In Matthew, something is added. John pushes back. He says, I need to be baptized by you. That is not in Mark. So Matthew directly addresses the tension we talked about earlier. Jesus is still baptized, but his status is made clear. Matthew says Jesus came from Galilee, but doesn't mention Nazareth. The writer of Matthew mentions that Jesus came from Galilee, but doesn't mention Nazareth. He does another thing that the writer of Mark does not do. He gives a reason why Jesus needs to be baptized to fulfill all righteousness. If I was just reading Mark and you asked me why did Jesus need to be baptized, I don't know what the answer would be from that. I don't know what I could get from just Mark on why Jesus would need to be baptized. But Matthew steps in and says, for all righteousness. And like we mentioned earlier, in Matthew it says, This is my son, where in Luke and Mark it says, You are my son. So this could be a more public version of the story. Now let's skip over to Luke chapter 3, verses 21 to 22. Now, when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove, and a voice came from heaven. Luke keeps the event, but the presentation is a little different. John is not emphasized the same way in the act itself. The focus shifts more towards what happens after. So again, you see a subtle change in how the story is told. Another interesting detail that sticks out in Luke's version is verse 21, when it says, When Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened. So in Mark and Matthew, it seems like Jesus goes under the water, comes up, and as he comes up, the sky is opened. Right? But in Luke, it says he's baptized, and then he was praying. So when he came out of the water in Luke, did he start praying and immediately the sky opened and he was baptized? Or was Jesus baptized? He comes out of the water, he goes over to the side, starts praying, and then the heaven is open. Luke's version also says the heaven, where Mark and Matthew both say the heavens. But I don't think that's a very major thing. It just kind of shows that the wording can be a little different. Now compare that back to Mark. Mark just gives you the moment. No pushback, no explanation, just the event. Jesus is baptized by John. That's a wrap. Now I want to go ahead and look at John real fast. Let's just look at his account. The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and declared, Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This is he of whom I said, After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me. I myself did not know him, but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel. And John testified, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, He on whom you see the Spirit descended and remains is the one who baptized with the Holy Spirit. And I myself have seen and testified that this is the chosen one. So as you can see, this one is very different. What we get here is the testimony of John the Baptist. He describes seeing the Spirit descending on Jesus like a dove, and he identifies Jesus. But the act of baptism is not shown. It's missing from John scene. Now again, we want to be careful, this is not John denying the baptism. It just means he's choosing to tell the story in a different way. And that choice stands out because in the other three Gospels, the baptism is the central moment. In John, the focus shifts. Instead of showing the event, he emphasizes the recognition. John the Baptist sees something and then testifies about who Jesus is. In John's section, we see Jesus called the Lamb of God. We see him called the chosen one. And here we see another possible reason why the baptism needed to happen. John says, I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed. And so to John, this whole deal is taking place so that Jesus can be revealed. Another interesting part in John's version of this story is that he says, I myself did not know him. Not only once, but twice. And remember, this is supposed to be Jesus' cousin, right? According to Luke, John and Jesus are cousins. But in John's version of the story, John is out here baptizing in the wilderness. Jesus walks up, and John says twice, I myself did not know him. That is very interesting. It's very much like the Gospel of John to be the one that has a little bit different version of the story. The Gospel of John is often called the Maverick Gospel because it doesn't follow the Synoptic Gospels quite so close. So now let's zoom back into the Synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke. This is where things really start to get interesting because once you've seen these accounts side by side, you can start asking a different kind of question. Not just what happened, but why are the accounts so similar in some places and different in others? If you've seen other episodes of my show, I explain this pretty much every time. This is what people call the synoptic problem. It's basically the question of how the Gospel of Mark, the Gospel of Matthew, and the Gospel of Luke are related to each other. Why they line up so closely in some areas and then diverge in others. If you want a full deep dive on that, I actually have an entire episode I did last week where I break it down in detail. But for now, I just want to focus on a few clues we see right here in this passage. Clue number one, same story, different details. All three Gospels include this baptism scene. That tells you that this moment is important. But they do not tell it exactly the same way. Mark is simple and direct. Matthew adds dialogue. Luke adjusts the presentation. So you have the same core event, but different ways of retelling it. Clue number two, additions and adjustments. Matthew includes John resisting. Luke makes the role of John less direct. Mark does neither. So now you have to ask, are these independent details or are later authors working with an earlier version or shaping it? Clue number three, wording and tone. We saw this with the heavens. Mark says they were torn open. Matthew and Luke say they weren't opened. That's a small difference, but it's still a difference. And when you start stacking small changes like that, they begin to form a pattern. Clue number four, shared structure. Even with the differences, the structure is almost identical. Baptism, heavens opened up, spirit descends, the voice speaks. That level of agreement raises another question. Are these completely independent accounts or are they connected somehow? Clue number five, who depends on who? This is where the theories you always hear me talking about start to come back in. And this is where a lot of people naturally start with a certain assumption that these are just independent eyewitness accounts, three different people, all describing the same event from their own perspective. And that's a fair starting point. This is a very common Christian belief. In fact, almost any time I make any type of posts on the internet about the gospels or any differences within the gospels, I will get a comment that says just that every single time. But when you actually lay the text side by side, it raises some questions because you don't just see the same event. You see very similar structure, similar wording, and then small but meaningful differences. My brain naturally starts asking the questions are these completely independent accounts? Or are they connected somehow? Some think the gospel of Mark came first and others used it. Some think the gospel of Matthew came first. Some think they were shared sources. Some think the author had access to multiple traditions and made choices between them. But what we do have is data. And when you look at that data closely, it at least pushes you to ask the deeper questions and not just assume they are all completely independent. So, for my personal opinion and my personal research, I think that Mark did write first. So what I see here in this story is Mark with the backbone of the story, Matthew and Luke following the story close, but then making adjustments to fit the crowd they were writing to. But to close out the episode, when you put all this together, you have this moment that is simple on the surface. Jesus is baptized. But the deeper you look, the more questions it raises. Thanks so much for hanging out with me on another episode of the Agnostic Bible study. Hopefully I'm doing my best. I'm doing my best to keep this neutral and to keep this curious and question driven. At the bare minimum, I hope you at least had to think, why was Jesus baptized? What did it mean that John was the one that baptized him? Was he God's son before the universe was even made? Was he God's son right at the baptism? All these questions are super fun and the stuff I'd sit around and think about. I hope y'all enjoyed today's episode. On Thursday, you are in for a treat. I'm releasing part one of my interview with Dr. Cole Yeldell. He has his doctorate in apologetics, and we talk about inerrancy. We debate about what 2 Timothy 3.16 means. We debate about the dating of the gospels. I ask him questions about how literal he thinks the Genesis account is. He explains his skepticism of evolution. It's a good conversation. And the Thursday after that, I'll be dropping reflection episodes, breaking down some of the disagreements we had even more in depth. So if you're watching on YouTube, like, share, subscribe, do all that cool stuff. It really helps me out. I want this to get out to a lot of people. Also, if you're listening to the audio version, please rate the show on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, all that. Thanks again for hanging out. Like I said, I just want to put information out there. I want you to study. I want you to deep dive into these things and make your own conclusion. And like always, never stop learning. I will see y'all Thursday. Let's go.