Baptism

such people from the society. In Islamic nations this is still practiced. In fact
they were tried as heretics and executed appropriately. During the reformation
period both the Catholic and the Protestant Churches did the same thing.
Early Church living in the period when "household was the unit", invariably
used the household as their unit and baptized the entire household as is
reported in the Acts of Apostles. Wrangling over whether they contained
infants or not is just splitting hair over the issue. Even in places where it is not
mentioned explicitly it is understood as such in context. This is because the
early church understood baptism not as a rite of full membership but as an
initiation.
This was supported by the concept that this was the New Covenant, which
was the spiritual part of the Old Covenant. Just as Old Covenant symbol of
circumcision was given to the entire household, the symbol of New Covenant
also was given to the entire household.
Acts of Apostles do not give us any instance where the catechumens were
given any period of instruction apart from the first message of salvation.
However during the later period a short period of preparation was probably
introduced to avoid infiltration of spies into the Church during the intense
persecution period that followed. By the time of Hippolytus (c. AD 170-236)
an elaborate system of probation for catechumens had been invented, as
expressed in the Apostolic Tradition [Latin edition by E. Hauler, Leipzig,
1900], Gregory Dix, ed., (London: SPCK, 1937).
Full membership was conferred at all times by the laying on of hands after the
Church was sure of the standing of the individual. Even today our liturgy
reflects this aspect. The first part of the Sunday worship (today called the First
Part: `Liturgy of the Word') was open to all. It starts with adoration, prayers,
supplications, reading of the Word and ends with offering and the Ministry of
the Word. Following this portion of the service they were dismissed while
fully initiated members remained to celebrate the Eucharist.
As for the formal form of baptism, early Jewish Christians must have simply
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