No, while baptism doesn't confer Salvation and isn't required for it, Jesus still did command us to be baptized as an external representation of an inward transformation. That can't apply to an infant, so infant "baptism" isn't truly baptism, but just a baby getting wet.
Also, there's no Biblical precedent for sprinkling in a baptism. A baptism should be a full immersion.
Dr. Jordan B. Cooper does a great job describing why he finds the Baptist view on this misguided, and I encourage you to check it out. There’s very clear evidence the early Church - which still had men who had known the apostles - was liturgical and baptized infants. This whole “true Christianity was lost for a bit until WE figured it out” attitude that Baptists have on this is very … Mormon-esque. There’s a reason ZERO of the Protestant Reformers disagreed with infant baptism.
I come down narrowly in favor of infant baptism and I mostly don't think it's a big deal either way. However, there is actually a pretty reasonable "originalist" case for credobaptism. It relies on Didache, dating to around 100 AD and the oldest surviving Christian text not in the Bible. It was rediscovered in the 1870's after having been lost since the Middle Ages in the East and likely much earlier than that in the West (perhaps as early as the fall of Rome?), which could fit right into a restorationist narrative.
Didache instructs the person being baptized to fast beforehand, implying they are old enough to choose when and what to eat. Taken literally, it also states that the individual being baptized must first understand a list of teachings that includes prohibitions against rape, abortion, and fornication. While it is open to pouring water as a backup plan (it is thought to have been written in a desert environment), it indicates a preference for baptism in a flowing river if possible.
The Catholic/Orthodox/high church Protestant counterargument would be that the procedures in Didache were specifically for adult converts from pagan religions. Ironically, most modern Baptists would not assign Didache any doctrinal authority while the infant baptism denominations hold it in the highest regard.
Poll
