(163) Therefore has Christ ordained or instituted the Baptism or New Birth or Regeneration of the Holy Ghost, in the water, because the birth of the light riseth up in the sweet water in the heart.

(49) But the astral birth is in its body very sharp; yet the new birth, which riseth up in the water of life, and presseth through death, mitigateth it. But the new birth cannot alter the kernel of the sharp birth, but is generated out of it, and keeps its own holy new life to itself, and presseth through the angry death, and the angry death comprehendeth it not.

(30) Behold the water in the deep above the earth, which qualifieth, mixeth or uniteth with the elementary air and fire, that is the water of the astral birth or geniture, wherein stands the astral life, and wherein especially the Holy Ghost moveth, and through which the third and innermost birth does generate incomprehensibly as to the wrath of God therein: That water to our eyes seemeth like the air.

We are born again through the holy spirit, and we are conceived through Christ in baptism with two elements. We are anointed through the spirit, and when we were conceived, we were united. No one can see oneself in the water or in a mirror without light, nor can you see yourself in the light without water or a mirror. So it is necessary to baptize with two elements, light and water, and light is chrism.

(9) This initiation, then, of the holy birth in God, as in symbols, has nothing unbecoming or irreverent, nor anything of the sensible images, but (contains) enigmas of a contemplation worthy of God, likened to physical and human images. For how should it appear misleading? Even when the very divine meaning of the things done is passed over in silence, the divine Instruction might convince, religiously pursuing as it does the good life of the candidate, enjoining upon him the purification from every kind of evil, through a virtuous and Divine life, by the physical cleansing through the agency of water in a bodily form. This symbolic teaching then of the things done, even if it had nothing more divine, would not be without religious value, as I think, introducing a discipline of a well-regulated life, and. suggesting mysteriously, through the total bodily purification by water, the complete purification from the evil life.

(96) Now, as the original and beginning of the life is, in a creature, so is the first regeneration of the nature of the new life in the corrupted body of this world. He that denieth it has not the true understanding, nor any knowledge of nature; and so his knowledge is not generated in God, but he is a mocker of God.

(2) Therefore, when the womb of the soul, by the father's will, turns itself inward, she is baptized and immediately cleansed of external pollution forced upon her, just as dirty clothing is soaked in water and stirred until the dirt is removed and it is clean. So the cleansing of the soul is to recover the freshness of her former nature and to become as she was.

(3) "O Shem, they are deceived by manifold demons, thinking that through baptism with the uncleanness of water, which is dark, feeble, idle, and disturbing, the water will take away sins. And they do not know that from the water to the water there is bondage, error, unchastity, envy, murder, adultery, false witness, heresies, robberies, lusts, babblings, wrath, bitterness. . . . Therefore, there are many deaths that burden their thoughts. For I foretell it to those who have understanding. They will refrain from the impure baptism. And those who have understanding from the light of the spirit will not have dealings with the impure rubbing. And their heart will not grow faint, nor will they curse, nor will they give honor to the water. Where the curse is, there is the deficiency. And the blindness is where the honor is. For if they mix with the evil ones, they become empty in the dark water. Where the water has been mentioned, there is nature, and the oath, and the lie, and the loss. For only in the unconceived spirit, where the exalted light rested, has the water not been mentioned, nor can it be mentioned.

(32) There are some, who upon entering the faith, receive a baptism on the ground that they have it as a hope of salvation, which they call the "seal", not knowing that the fathers of the world are manifest (in) that place. But he himself knows that he is sealed. For the Son of Man did not baptize any of his disciples. But [...], if those who are baptized were headed for life, the world would become empty. And the fathers of baptism were defiled.