"Now if some of them are 'baptized for the dead,' can we not assume that they have a reason for it. Certainly he[Paul] is maintaining that they practiced this in the belief that the ordinance would be a vicarious baptism and as such be advantageous to the flesh of others, which they assumed would be resurrected, for unless this referred to a physical resurrection there would be no point in carrying out a physical baptism."
(Tertullian, De Resurrectione (On the Resurrection) 48, in PL 2: 864.)
This belief that Christ decended into hell is also captured in Peter's Pentecost sermon in Acts 2: 27, 31. Consequently, the early Apostle's Creed had the, eventually controversial, mention of the descent into hell:
I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.
and in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.
who was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit
born of the Virgin Mary.
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried.
He descended into hell.
On the third day he rose again from the dead.
He ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand
of God the Father Almighty.
From thence he shall come again to judge the living and the dead...
The Nicene Creed, which followed the Apostle's Creed, removed the mention of the decent into hell.
