Tertullian · a new plain-English translation from the original language
'But look,' they say, 'the Lord came and did not baptize — for we read: "Yet Jesus himself did not baptize, but his disciples did."' As if John had actually predicted that the man himself would baptize with his own hands! That is certainly not how it's to be understood; it's simply said in the common way, as when we say for instance 'the emperor issued an edict' or 'the governor flogged him with rods.' Does the emperor himself post the notice, or the governor himself swing the rods? The one to whom the service is rendered is always said to be the one doing it. So "He will baptize you" is to be taken as meaning "you will be baptized through him," or "into him." Nor should anyone be troubled that he himself did not baptize. Into what, after all, would he have baptized? Into repentance? Then why send a forerunner ahead of himself? Into the remission of sins, which he was already granting by his word? Into himself, whom he was concealing in humility? Into the Spirit of Holiness, who had not at that time ascended to the Father? Into the church, which he had not yet built upon the apostles? And so his disciples baptized as ministers, as John had been the forerunner before him — with that same baptism of John, lest you think it was some other; for none other is on record except, later, that of Christ, which of course could not yet be given by the learners, since the Lord's glory had not yet reached its fullness, nor had the washing's power yet been fitted out through his passion and resurrection — because our death could not be dissolved except by the Lord's passion, nor life restored without his resurrection.