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Albert’s exegesis of Jn 1:19-28 presents the philosophical and theological problem of the function of material mediations in the act of baptism. Albert’s commentary on the Gospel of John allows for a comparison of his treatments of this question in his exegetical works and in his treatises on sacramental theology. In his Super Iohannem Albert insists on the difference between the baptism of water conferred by John the Baptist and the baptism of grace instituted by the passion and death of Christ. Lacking to the matter (water) and the ritual action of John is the form, specifically the sanctifying Trinitarian formula. As for his commentary on the fourth book of the Sentences, which goes further in highlighting the interdependence of the elements constitutive of the sacrament of Baptism and the continuity between certain traits of the Gospel narrative and their fulfillment in the baptism instituted by Christ, Albert makes a point of recalling that the baptism given by John announces in figure the baptism instituted by Christ, in which it is fulfilled. The relation between the two baptisms is thus distinguished from that of the voice (of John the Baptist), another material mediation, which, in enunciating the Word, fulfills its coming by action, without postponing it to a future fulfillment.