Consider the following passage from the first epistle of St. Peter, 3.21:
εις ην ολιγαι τουτ εστιν οκτω ψυχαι διεσωθησαν δι υδατος. ο αντιτυπον νυν και ημας σωζει βαπτισμα
What is αντιτυπον modifying here? The 'water' passage or the 'baptisma'?
Thanks!

Hard to greet you with this difficult and incomprehensible name "Valaraukarsbane" (how did you choose it?!!). Βάπτισμα is ἀντίτυπον of the salvation of the eight souls in the Ark.

Thanks for bringing this line to our attention, where we see a most interesting and characteristic shift in meaning: the ark saves from the water, but Baptism saves spiritually in and through the water.

But note also that Peter speaks about ἀντιτυπία by interpreting the ark's saving from the water as saving through the water (δι' ὕδατος), which means that even then, in Noah's time, salvation was something to follow the ark's crossing of the water, not itself the obvious act of escaping the water.