The Priest's New Clothes: Exploring Zechariah 3:1-7 and Paul’s Doctrine of Baptism

Paul’s imagery of baptism as “putting off” the old man, “putting on” the new man, and being “clothed” in Christ seems to allude to Zech 3:1-7, where Joshua the high priest is re-clothed by Yahweh into clean garments. While Paul does not quote Zechariah directly, his teaching has linguistic and thematic parallels which echo Zechariah’s vision by describing baptism as a re-clothing occasion. The baptismal imagery is enhanced as it seems to echo further back to the priest- ly garments of Exodus 28, suggesting Paul’s metaphor is an “echo of an echo.”