1 Peter 3:21

which also after a true likeness doth now save you, even baptism, not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the interrogation of a good conscience toward God, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ;

After a true likeness ... The figure, pattern, or type in this verse is the salvation of Noah's family "by water." The common misunderstanding that makes baptism the figure in this place is totally wrong, baptism being the antitype, the reality which was only symbolized by the salvation of Noah. How does the salvation of Noah prefigure the salvation of Christians?

(1) It was the water of the flood that separated Noah from the disobedient generation that perished; and it is the water of Christian baptism that separates between the saved of today and the disobedient who perish.

(2) Noah (and family) were borne through the flood for a period of nine months; and as Macknight noted, "Noah's coming forth from the water to live again on the earth, after having been full nine months in the water, might fitly be called his being born of water."[36] Christians too must be "born of water" (John 3:5).

(3) The same water which destroyed the antediluvians was the water which bore up the ark and delivered Noah and his family into a new life. It is the water of baptism that destroys the wicked today, in the sense that they rebel against God's command, belittle and despise it, either refusing to do it at all, or downgrading any necessity of it, even if they submit to it; while at the same time, it is the water of baptism that buries the Christian from his past and "into Christ," from which he, like Noah, "rises to walk in newness of life."

(4) The same element is prominent in both deliverances, that of Noah and that of the Christian, the same being water; and it is exactly the same kind (who ever heard of different kinds of water?) of water that is evident in both salvations, his and ours. The water that caused the flood is one with the water of Christian baptism.

(5) It was the water of the flood which washed away the filth of that evil generation; and it is the water of Christian baptism that, in a figure, washes away the sins of Christians (Acts 22:16). There is a variation in the figure here, which Peter pointed out; namely, that, whereas it was actual filth that was washed away by the flood, it is moral and spiritual filth which are washed away in baptism. The former affected the flesh and not the conscience; the latter affected the conscience but not the flesh.

(6) Only a few were saved through the flood; and (in the relative sense) only a few will be saved in Christ.

Doth now save you, even baptism ... This is as awkward a translation of this as the ingenuity of man could have devised. "Baptism" is the subject of the clause and should be first, reading, "Even baptism doth now save you." This simple statement of truth should upset no one, for Christ himself said, "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved" (Mark 16:16); and Peter here said no more than what the Lord said there.

Not the putting away of the filth of the flesh ... In this clause, Peter pointed out a variation in the figure; whereas it was the polluted flesh that was destroyed and removed by the flood, it is a moral and spiritual cleansing effected in baptism. Some have made this an excuse for saying, "Peter is telling them that it (baptism) is no external rite."[37] It is hard to conceive of a more irresponsible statement by a Christian scholar than this one. All history denies the notion that baptism is not an external rite. On the other hand, it most assuredly is an external rite. Christ was baptized in a river. It took a laver (baptistery) to perform it in the days of the apostles (see Titus 3:5, where the "laver of regeneration" is mentioned, and comment in my Commentary on Titus, pp. 145-147); it was performed in pools of water like those men pass by on the road when traveling (Acts 8:36); and even today there is hardly a church of any name in all Christendom that does not have in its place of worship either a baptistery or the vestige of one (the font); and it may be inquired where did these come from(?) if Christian baptism is not an external rite? Of course, it is also a fact that baptism is not merely, or solely, an external rite.

But the interrogation of a good conscience toward God ... The word of the Lord seems to have been designed in order to give men who will not believe it some kind of crutch upon which to rely in their unbelief. Someone has said, "There is hardly a text in the Bible that does not have a nail in it where the devil can hang his hat." The word here falsely rendered "interrogation" is exactly that. In the Greek language, as in the English, there are many words that have multiple meanings, some of those meanings being actually contradictory, and this is such a word. In English, for example, the word "fast" may be applied to a horse that wins the Derby, or to one that is tied fast to a post. Take the English word "cut": (1) It means a mountain pass; (2) a wound inflicted by a knife; (3) to skip, as when one cuts a class; (4) the cut-off in golf tournaments; (5) to adulterate, as when hard drugs are cut, etc., etc.

Similarly, the Greek word here rendered "interrogation" has a number of meanings: "answer," "interrogation," "appeal," "inquiry," "craving," "prayer," and "pledge."[38] Three of these meanings, appeal, craving and prayer, if used in the translation would indicate that baptism is submitted to as a craving, appeal or prayer for a good conscience, whereas the others would be something that a good conscience already received before baptism does. These meanings are antithetical, and the true meaning must be determined by Peter's teaching elsewhere. Did he mean that Christians before they are baptized have already received a good conscience and that their baptism is only the response that a good conscience gives; or did he mean that in order to receive a good conscience one must be baptized? It is the conviction of a lifetime, on the part of this writer, that it is the latter meaning which is true. No man, as long as he has not obeyed the divine commandment to be baptized, can ever have, even if he should live 200 years, a good conscience as long as he is unbaptized. Therefore, full agreement is felt with Nicholson's endorsement of the New American Standard Bible's rendition thus:

And corresponding to that, baptism now saves you - not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience - through the resurrection of Jesus Christ (NASB).[39]

Peter's great Pentecostal sermon has the same meaning, where he declared that believers should repent and be baptized in order to receive the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38). There is further comment on this in my Commentary on Hebrews, pp. 200-201.

Through the resurrection of Jesus Christ ... Peter kept coming back again and again to the fountain source of all blessing. Even the obedience of the gospel by sinners is not the source of their redemption, despite being one of the conditions of its bestowal. The resurrection of Christ is everything in the Christian religion. Both in 1 Peter 1:3 and here, Peter did not fail to stress this.

Zerr was faithful to point out that there is also in this text an effective argument for immersion as the action that truly is baptism in the New Testament sense. "Had the rite been performed by sprinkling, all would have known that such an act could not cleanse anything,"[40] certainly not any filth from the body.

[36] James Macknight, op. cit., p. 483.

[37] A. J. Mason, op. cit., p. 422.

[38] Archibald M. Hunter, op. cit., p. 134.

[39] Roy S. Nicholson, op. cit., p. 292.

[40] E. M. Zerr, op. cit., p. 261.