Baptismal Account in Hebrew Matthew

In the Hebrew Matthew, there are two variants to the baptismal account which are different from the Greek text tradition. The first adds "today I have begotten thee."

After saying many things, this Gospel continues: “After the people were baptized, Jesus also came and was baptized by John. And as Jesus came up from the water, Heaven was opened, and He saw the Holy Spirit descend in the form of a dove and enter into Him. And a voice from Heaven said, ‘You are my beloved Son; with You I am well pleased.’ And again, ‘Today I have begotten You.’ “Immediately a great light shone around the place; and John, seeing it, said to Him, ‘Who are you, Lord? And again a voice from Heaven said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.’ Then John, falling down before Him, said, ‘I beseech You, Lord, baptize me!’ But He forbade him saying, ‘Let it be so; for thus it is fitting that all things be fulfilled.’” (Epiphanius, Panarion 30.13.7) [Wikipedia]

The second has God refer to Jesus as his "first-begotten Son."

In the Gospel written in the Hebrew script that the Nazarenes read, the whole fount of the Holy Spirit descends upon Him, for God is Spirit and where the Spirit resides, there is freedom. Further in the Gospel which we have just mentioned we find the following written: “When the Lord came up out of the water the whole fount of the Holy Spirit descended upon Him and rested on Him saying, ‘My Son, in all the prophets was I waiting for You that You should come and I might rest in You. For You are My rest. You are My first begotten Son that prevails forever.’ ” (Jerome, Commentary on Isaiah 4) [Wikipedia]

Historical Evidence That "This Day I have begotten thee" is Correct

A. Old Mss. of Matthew

Also, “this day I have begotten thee” appears in the following Greek of Matthew: D (Greek) and the Old Latin. (E.B. Nicholson, The Gospel according to the Hebrews (1879) at 40.) Also, in "Codex Bezae and most of the old Latin manuscripts...the voice instead cites Psalm 2:7: 'This day I have begotten thee." (Barbara Aland, Joël Delobel, New Testament textual criticism, exegesis, and early church history (Peeters, 1994) at 120.)

B. Luke 3:22 In Old Manuscripts

The baptismal account of Jesus in Luke 3:22 in old manuscripts likewise had this account that the Father spoke from heaven to Jesus: "This day I have begotten you."

A modern study Bible comments on Luke 3:22: "Other ancient authorities read You are my Son, today I have begotten you." (Wayne A. Meeks, Jouette M. Bassler, The HarperCollins Study Bible: New Revised Standard Version (HarperCollins: 1997) at 1962.)

The New American commentary reads: “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased: this is the best attested reading in the Greek manuscripts. The Western reading, ‘You are my Son, this day I have begotten you,’ is derived from Psalm 2:7.” http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/luke/luke3.htm (last accessed 2005.)

This reference to a "Western" text that reads "begotten thee" is because it appears in the Greek Western type text known as Codex D. It also appears in many other texts of Luke 3:22.

Throckmorton in Gospel Parallels (1992) explains that  this variant (“this day I have begotten thee”) exists in some of the oldest versions of Luke such as P4, meaning Paris Papyrus, “third century” (id., x, xviii, 14); S, meaning Sinaiticus, “middle fourth century” (id., xiv, 14); A B, Codex Alexandrinus, “5th century” and Codex Vaticanus, “4th Century” (id., x, 14), and W Manuscript (5th century).

Interestingly, Matthew’s version of the baptism at Matthew 3:17 in the same Codex reads differently than it does today. It mentions the Holy Spirit descending as a dove upon Jesus. It is interesting that Epiphanius says the Hebrew version of Matthew of the Ebionites had that language too. This reading is also present in the DuTillet Hebrew Matthew. Hence, Codex D which contains Luke's 'begotten thee' language also contains other language in Matthew that matches the Hebrew Matthew but varies from our current Lucan language, i.e., the mention of the dove in the Matthew tradition.

C. The Epistle to the Hebrews

The original baptism language of "this day I have begotten thee" is quoted in the NT in Hebrews 1:5 and 5:5.

For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son? (Heb. 1:5, KJV)

So also Christ glorified not himself to be made an high priest; but he that said unto him, Thou art my Son, today have I begotten thee. (Heb. 5:5, KJV)

A more vague allusion is seen in Acts. “God hath fulfilled the same unto us their children, in that he hath raised up Jesus again; as it is also written in the second psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.” (Acts 13:33 KJV.)

D. Patristic Sources 95-325 AD Repititiously Quote 'this day I have begotten thee'

There is no doubt how the original baptism-of-Jesus once read to include the quote from Psalm 2:7. As quoted at length below, the original version is quoted numerous times in the following early ‘patristic’ writings between 96 A.D. and 325 A.D.: First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians; Dialogue of Justin with Tryphon, A Jew; The Instructor; The Banquet of the Ten Virgins; or, Concerning Chastity; and Acts of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul. The Luke version is specifically quoted in the 300s by the heretic Faustus but without dispute on the validity of the Lucan quote when Augustine does a point-by-point rebuttal to Faustus. Faustus also insisted it was in Matthew's account, which indeed it was clearly in the Hebrew Matthew.

Let's review these proofs, and provide a link to the online versions of the original sources.

160 AD, Clement

First, the original baptism-of-Jesus account is quoted in Book One, Chapter VI of The Instructor, a work of 160 A.D. by Clement of Alexandria: “For at the moment of the Lord’s baptism there sounded a voice from heaven, as a testimony to the Beloved, ‘Thou art My beloved Son, to-day have I begotten Thee.’” “Ante-Nicene Fathers/Volume II/CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA/The Instructor/Book I/Chapter VI,” at wikisource

300 AD, Methodius

Methodius (A.D. 260-312), in Part 9, chapter IX in his work, The Banquet of the Ten Virgins; or, Concerning Chastity, is similarly quoting the original baptism-of-Jesus account when we read: “Now, in perfect agreement and correspondence with what has been said, seems to be this which was spoken by the Father from above to Christ when He came to be baptized in the water of the Jordan, ‘Thou art my son: this day have I begotten thee.’” “Ante-Nicene Fathers/Volume VI/Methodius/Banquet of the Ten Virgins/Thekla/Part 9,” wikisource (Schaff)

300 AD, Lactantius

Again, in the words of Lactantius (A.D. 260-330), in his The Divine Institutes, book IV, chapter XV, he quotes the original uncorrupted version of the baptism-of-Jesus account: “Then a voice from heaven was heard: ‘Thou art my Son, today have I begotten Thee.’ Which voice is found to have been foretold by David. And the Spirit of God descended upon Him, formed after the appearance of a white dove.” .“Ante-Nicene Fathers/Volume VII/Lactantius/The Divine Institutes/Book IV/Chap. XV,” wikisource (from Schaff).

234 AD, Acts of...Peter and Paul

In the Acts of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul (234 A.D.), it says: “Him therefore to whom the Father said, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten Thee, the chief priests through envy crucified.” .“Ante-Nicene Fathers/Volume VIII/Apocrypha of the New Testament/Acts of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul/Acts of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul,” wikisource

230 AD (est.), Origen

The same verse also once apparently existed in John’s gospel. In Origen’s Commentary on the Gospel of John, section 32, Origen (died 254) writes evidently quoting John’s gospel upon which he was commenting: “None of these testimonies, however, sets forth distinctly the Savior’s exalted birth; but when the words are addressed to Him, ‘Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee,’ this is spoken to Him by God.” (Early Christian Writings)

96 AD, Clement

In the First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians from 96 A.D., written by Clement—a man who was a direct disciple of the Apostle Peter—it says: “But concerning His Son the Lord spoke thus: ‘Thou art my Son, to-day have I begotten Thee.’”  (Ccel.org)

165 AD, Justin

Lastly, in a writing by Justin (died 165 A.D.) known as the Dialogue of Justin with Tryphon, A Jew, in chapter LXXXVIII, Justin writes about Jesus, clearly referencing the Gospels’ baptism accounts:

He was in the habit of working as a carpenter when among men, making ploughs and yokes; by which He taught the symbols of righteousness and an active life; but then the Holy Ghost, and for man’s sake, as I formerly stated, lighted on Him in the form of a dove, and there came at the same instant from the heavens a voice, which was uttered also by David when he spoke, personating Christ, what the Father would say to Him: ‘Thou art My Son: this day have I begottenThee.’ (Justin, Trypho)

Justin then goes on to explain to Trypho the Jew—once more obviously quoting the original form of Matthew 3:17 and Luke 3:22:

For this devil, when [Jesus] went up from the river Jordan, at the time when the voice spake to Him, “Thou art my Son: this day have I begotten Thee,” is recorded in the memoirs of the apostles to have come to Him and tempted Him, even so far as to say to Him, “Worship me;” and Christ answered him, “Get thee behind me, Satan: thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve.” Id., ch. CII.

Others who found the same passage in Matthew are Juvencus, Evangeliorum Libri Quattor, I 360-64 and Hilary, De Trinitate, VIII, 25, Tyconius, Reg. 1

E. Christians Quote Matthew and Luke Against Church Orthodox Views But Quote Accepted As Fact From Luke

Similarly, the phrase ‘this day I have begotten thee’ was quoted by Faustus ca. 400 AD from both Matthew and Luke’s Gospel as having been uttered at Jesus’ baptism. Faustus was unorthodox in his view that Jesus, the Son of David, was not born Son of God but became Son of God at his baptism.

This ran afoul of the late doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church that Jesus was the 'eternal' Son of God, which doctrine emerged at Nicea in 325 AD under Emperor Constantine's influence. (His goal was to alter Jesus to match Constantine's favored deity - Sol Invictus. See our "Council of Nicea".)

Augustine in his point-by-point rebuttal in 400 A.D. does not dispute this is how Luke read. In 400 AD approximately, he disputes only how Matthew then read. (Remember, however, the Hebrew Matthew originally had the 'This day I have begotten thee" at Jesus' baptism. See above.)

We find this Faustus-Augustine exchange in Schaff’s Augustin: The Writings Against the Manicheans and Against the Donatists, in Book XXIII (1890) at 313. Schaff recounts Faustus’ points about the Matthew passage when read in light of Luke:

Faustus recurs to the genealogical difficulty and insists that even according to Matthew Jesus was not Son of God until His baptism. Augustin sets forth the Catholic view of the relation of the divine and the human in the person of Christ.

[Faustus wrote]

2. I will, for the present, suppose that this person was right in saying that the son of David was born of Mary. It still remains true, that in this whole passage of the generation no mention is made of the Son of God till we come to the baptism; so that it is an injurious misrepresentation on your part to speak of this writer as making the Son of God the inmate of a womb. The writer, indeed, seems to cry out against such an idea, and in the very title of his book to clear himself of such blasphemy, asserting that the person whose birth he describes is the son of David, not the Son of God. And if you attend to the writer’s meaning [i.e., Matthew's meaning] and purpose, you will see that what he wishes us to believe of Jesus the Son of God is not so much that He was born of Mary, as that He became the Son of God by baptism at the river Jordan. He [i.e., Matthew] tells us that the person of whom he spoke at the outset as the son of David was baptized by John, and became the Son of God on this particular occasion, when about thirty years old, according to Luke, when also the voice was heard saying to Him, “Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten Thee.”

Schaff provides Augustine’s complete reply. Id., at 318 et seq. Augustine disputes only how Matthew read but not how Luke read. However, he quotes Matthew back at Faustus: “when He was baptized by John, a voice from heaven, saying, ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.’” Augustine says these words do not “imply that He was not the Son of God before.” Id., at 315. Augustine ignores the quote from Luke which made Faustus’ case. (For further discussion of this portion of Faustus, see Barbara Aland, Joël Delobel, New Testament textual criticism, exegesis, and early church history (Peeters, 1994) at 121.)

Based on Epiphanius and Jerome's account of the Hebrew Matthew, it must have been altered instead of Luke. Only after Augustine did not want to cope with Faustus's argument any longer, Catholic authorities also erased the Luke 3:22 version as well.

When And Why Did This Change Happen?

It takes no genius to figure out why this text was deleted about "this day I have begotten thee." It conflicted with a doctrine first adopted in 325 AD at Nicea that Jesus was the 'eternal son of God.' While no verse expressly supports that idea, it became fixed dogma. Hence, it is no coincidence that all the texts prior to that era have 'this day I have begotten thee' in the baptism account and all those after 325 AD are missing it.

This is demonstrable simply by examining Charles Hodge's SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY (1871) Vol. 1. He addresses what would be the problem if this verse were in Scripture. He says if this language from Psalm 2:7 could be applied to Jesus, it is a "more plausible" objection to the 'eternal son' doctrine. He says:

More plausible objections are founded on certain passages of the Scriptures. In Psalm 2:7, it is said, “Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee.” From this it is argued that Christ or the Messiah was constituted or made the Son of God in time, and therefore was not the Son of God from eternity. (Vol. 1 section 6 at ccel.org.)

Initially, notice that Hodges only has to address that it exists in a Psalm. He does not have to cope with the fact that Matthew's Gospel ascribed this to the voice of Yahweh from heaven at Jesus' baptism.

Hence, certainly this verse once was present in Matthew, and most certainly it was deliberately removed.

But this is not an isolated incident.

Professor Bart D. Ehrman (a Christian) catalogs a whole series of similar alterations (some small, but some big) to the New Testament in his book The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture (Oxford University Press, 1993). There he warns us that: “...theological disputes, specifically disputes over Christology, prompted Christian scribes to alter the words of scripture in order to make them more serviceable for the polemical task. Scribes modified their manuscripts to make them more patently ‘orthodox’ and less susceptible to ‘abuse’ by the opponents of orthodoxy.” Id., at 4.

The Fourth Century church became embarassed that Jesus's sonship took place at his baptism. Proof of this embarassment comes from Jerome. Even though he is aware of the variant 'this day I have begotten thee,' Jerome appears to believe it is the valid version, but then in Enchiridion 49 Jerome "explains that Jesus did not really become God's 'Son' on that day; the 'today' is instead an eternal day." (Barbara Aland, Joël Delobel, New Testament textual criticism, exegesis, and early church history (Peeters, 1994) at 121 n. 14 (quoting Jerome.)

Thus, from some misapprehension of what it meant to say Jesus was begotten by God as His Son at Jesus’ baptism, pious Fourth Century Christians rewrote Luke 3:22. They also removed the original ‘begotten’ language from the baptism account in Matthew. (Our oldest complete versions of Luke and Matthew date to the Fourth Century.)

The fact this verse was originally present is too well-attested from too many sources, including the Epistle to the Hebrews in our very own NT of today, to deny it once was what it originally said. Accordingly, it matters little that the oldest surviving manuscripts do not agree. All of the original texts pre-existing the Fourth Century have been lost (or were deliberately destroyed). Only fragments survive. We thus can recover the original and older text by resort to the much earlier sources such as the Epistle to the Hebrews and the ‘patristic’ writings.

What can we say of those early church leaders who did not think it wrong to change the text? They were forgerers and hence sadly willing to use guile. They deserve our censure. As the orthodox church leader Tertullian said about Marcion in 200 AD and his followers who changed the earlier gospel accounts:

[W]e take up arms against heretics for the faith of the gospel, maintaining... that a late date is the mark of forgers, and...truth must needs precede the forgery, and proceed straight from those by whom it has been handed on. (Tertullian, Agains Marcion, Bk. 4, ch. 5.)

Arian Controversy and Council Of Nicea Explains Alterations

It was only post 325 A.D. that the standard texts of Matthew and Luke were revised to omit "today I have begotten thee" from Jesus' baptism by John-the-Baptist. You will not find it any longer in the KJV, ASV, NIV, etc. This was because of the controversy with Arius in 306 A.D. who claimed the 'begotten' passages meant Jesus was not the "Eternal Son of God." However, the Roman Catholic church by 325 A.D. felt it was imperative to assert this about Jesus even though no verse in the NT ever calls Jesus the 'eternal Son of God.' For background, see Wayne A. Grudem, Systematic theology: an introduction to biblical doctrine (Zondervan, 1994) at 243.

Hence, words from the original account were let slip in reproductions, to the point we do not any longer see them in our NT.

But it never made any sense. To say Jesus was the "Eternal Son" begotten of God, as was developed in the 300s and beyond, was a contradiction in terms. As Adam Clarke, a Methodist, explained in his commentary:

"…it is demonstrated that the doctrine of the eternal Sonship of Christ is absolutely irreconcilable to reason, and contradictory to itself. ETERNITY is that which has had no beginning, nor stands in any reference to time: SON supposes time, generation, and father; and time also antecedent to such generation: therefore the rational conjunction of these two terms, Son and eternity, is absolutely impossible, as they imply essentially different and opposite ideas" (Adam Clarke Commentary).

Hence, at Jesus's water baptism, God-the-Father gave Jesus a new birth as Son of God (a unique status), declaring from heaven "This day I have begotten thee." This was an example of how baptism would have similar effects on ourselves although obviously we would not become Divine as Jesus uniquely was indwelled by the Father/Word. (John 1:1, 14:10.)

Email On This Topic

Amy wrote me on November 3, 2010 as follows:

The original gospel of Matthew clearly had Jesus being told by YHWH "this day I have begotten thee" and the holy spirit in the form of a dove descended, and entered Jesus. At that point, Jesus became the Son of God indwelled in a unique SHekinah sense by God Himself. Jesus was a man, and continued to be a man despite that experience. Every word or act he saw heard from the Father, he repeated / acted out, as Jesus says in John's Gospel. God knew our feebleness and used a man whom we can see in person, hear in person, who would uniquely be filled by God whom we would listen to....Daniel in Daniel 7 speaks of the Son of Man (a human) coming to earth in time of judgment on clouds of glory, holding God's power in his hands.....but his title and the passage makes it clear this is a MAN -- a man on "clouds of glory" (a synonymn for God's presence)