“It is useless to object that the present Codex was written centuries after the direct apostles of John preached. So were our Gospels. When this astounding interview of Paul with the “Baptists” took place, Bardesanes had not yet appeared among them, and the sect was not considered a “heresy”. Moreover, we are enabled to judge how little St. John’s promise of the “Holy Ghost”, and the appearance of the “Ghost” himself, had affected his disciples, by the displeasure shown by them toward the disciples of Jesus, and the kind of rivalry manifested from the first.
Nay, so little is John himself sure of the identity of Jesus with the expected Messiah, that after the famous scene of the baptism at the Jordan, and the oral assurance by the Holy Ghost Himself that “This is my beloved Son”, (Matthew 3:17), we find “the Precursor”, in Matthew 11, sending two of his disciples from his prison to inquire of Jesus: “Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?”
This flagrant contradiction alone ought to have long ago satisfied reasonable minds as to the putative divine inspiration of the New Testament. But we may offer another question: If baptism is the sign of regeneration, and an ordinance instituted by Jesus, why do not Christians now baptize as Jesus is here represented as doing, “with the Holy Ghost and with fire”, instead of following the custom of the Nazarenes?
In making these palpable interpolations, what possible motive could Irenaeus have had except to cause people to believe that the appellation of Nazarene, which Jesus bore, came only from his father’s residence at Nazareth, and not from his affiliation with the sect of Nazaria, the healers? This expedient of Irenaeus was a most unfortunate one, for from time immemorial the prophets of old had been thundering against the baptism of fire as practiced by their neighbors, which imparted the “spirit of prophecy”, or the Holy Ghost.
But the case was desperate; the Christians were universally called Nazoraens and Iessaens, (according to Epiphanius), and Christ simply ranked as a Jewish prophet and healer – so self-styled, so accepted by his own disciples, and so regarded by their followers. In such a state of things there was no room for either a new hierarchy or a new God-head; and since Irenaeus had undertaken the business of manufacturing both, he had to put together such materials as were available, and fill the gaps with his own fertile inventions.”
H. P. Blavatsky
The Mark Of God: Understanding Your "I AM Presence" 