The Fittingness of Jesus' Baptism

When John the Baptist objects to Jesus’ attempt to be baptized by him, Jesus responds, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness” (Matt 3:15 ESV). Jesus’ response is filled with wisdom and love, and the purpose of this reflection is to focus on the concept of fittingness. After all, Jesus could have said that it was necessary; he could have said that it was, for the sake of appearances, the right thing to do. Something different, though, is communicated when Jesus says that it is fitting. This reflection begins by stepping back to consider what fittingness is, in general, before turning to theological fittingness, and then wrapping up with a return to Jesus’ remarks about his baptism being fitting.

On the subject of beauty, Jonathan King describes fittingness as conformance to certain objective criteria such as “proportion, unity, variety, symmetry, harmony, intricacy, delicacy, simplicity, or suggestiveness.”[1] So, for example, a sculpture is fittingly beautiful when it is a unified, symmetrical whole with appropriate proportions. This does not mean that beauty infallibly coinheres with truth and goodness because there is a subjective perception, and therefore evaluation, of beauty. “The cross of Christ teaches us before and above all that truth and goodness are not always one in a formal sense.”[2] And yet, truth and goodness are not inseparable from beauty, and each bears its own fittingness such that, all things being equal, they converge in relation to the perfections of God.

In the realm of theology, fittingness relates the ideals of truth, goodness, and beauty to God’s essence and works. So, one scholar has said, “Theological fittingness displays the significance of the chosen means among alternative possibilities, and the reasons according to which God, in his wisdom, has effectively realized and revealed, gratuitously and through his love, the mystery of the salvation and glorification of humanity.”[3] When this is turned to the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, we may initially see a conflict between the truth and goodness of Jesus’ words and works, and the seeming lack of beauty in his appearance. After all, even Isaiah prophesied that the suffering servant would have no beauty or form by which the people would desire him (Isa 53:2). But in reality the Lord Jesus Christ brings a more capacious understanding of beauty that ought to help form our subjective experience of aesthetics.

So, returning to the fittingness of Jesus’ baptism, one possible alternative would be that Jesus, the Son of God and Messiah, remains above the people he came to save. In truth, he did not need John’s baptism of repentance, and thus with respect to his own righteousness he did have sins to confess. But when Jesus submitted to John’s baptism, he showed forth a better way, a more beautiful way of salvation in which his words and works were united with prior revelation, his response to the appalling phenomenon of sin was proportional, and his own person was in harmony with those he came to save. It was fitting that he receive John’s baptism of repentance, and that fittingness expands our appreciation of what is ultimately beautiful.

So, while Bavinck is right that truth, goodness, and beauty are not always united in a formal sense, a reflection on Jesus’ being, words, and works points to a material connection and also a formative function. Just as Jesus’ baptism likely overturned expectations in his own day about how the Messiah ought to discharge his office, so we may have our expectations overturned about what is truly and ultimately beautiful. If part of sanctification is the renewal and alignment of our desires, then we should not be surprised if also our tastes change or are broadened out with respect to what is pleasing or delightful. In that case, Isaiah’s prophecy may be able to land the full weight of its critique on us, for perhaps his words are less about the objective form, majesty, and appearance of the suffering servant and more about the subjective failure to assess properly the truly beautiful form, majesty, and appearance of a suffering servant. Furthermore, if the Son of Man is glorified when he is lifted up on the cross, then perhaps the lack of formal correspondence between truth, goodness, and beauty (assuming that beauty and glory are complementary) is a defect in human definitions above all. May we, then, seek to know our savior more that we might understand what is truly fitting.

[1] Jonathan King, The Beauty of the Lord: Theology as Aesthetics, Studies in Historical and Systematic Theology (Lexham Press, 2018), 9.

[2] Herman Bavinck, “Of Beauty and Aesthetics,” in Essays on Religion, Science, and Society, ed. John Bolt, trans. Harry Boonstra and Gerrit Sheeres (Baker Academic, 2013), 256.

[3] King, The Beauty of the Lord, 11, quoting Gilbert Narcisse from Nicholas M. Healy, Thomas Aquinas: Theologian of the Christian Life (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing, 2003), 38.