ANTITYPE, a Greek word, properly signifying a type or figure corresponding to some other type.
The word antitype occurs twice in the New Testament; viz. in the epistle to the Hebrews, ix. 24. and in St Peter, 1 Ep. iii. 21. where its genuine import has been much controverted. The former says, that "Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are σκινοί, the figures or antitypes of the true—now to appear in the presence of God for us." Now τυπός, signifies the pattern by which another thing is made; and as Moses was obliged to make the tabernacle, and all things in it, according to the pattern showed him in the mount; the tabernacle so formed was the antitype of what was shown to Moses: any thing, therefore, formed according to a model or pattern, is an antitype. In the latter passage, the Apostle, speaking of Noah's flood, and the deliverance only of eight persons in the ark from it, says, ὡς καὶ πρὸς ἀνθρώπους τῶν οὐρανῶν, ἡ βαπτισμὸς, being an antitype to that, now saves us; not putting away the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience towards God, &c. The meaning is, that righteousness, or the answer of a good conscience towards God, now saves us by means of the resurrec-
tion of Christ, as formerly righteousness saved those eight persons by means of the ark, during the flood. The word antitype, therefore, here signifies a general similitude of circumstances; and the particle οὐ, whereunto, refers, not to the immediate antecedent, ὡς, water, but to all that precedes.