EARLY

C H R I S T I A N CREEDS
1

1
R..

Ur

J. I".D. KELLY. D.D

Printipai qf ai km>nmd fiuif,UXJGT~

DL4VID 14cKAY COMPAAT, INC.

New York

First giibtf&d r950

d i ~ $ r a r i o n 1952
Semnd rd:/l:iwn

PREFACE

Swmd mpesrion

T m book represem rhe reults of more than

Sist. a 3 5 a, 6 d - ~
Reg. ~374a
roa&
Proc
- - 3,
Data i;
13 2 . ,-.
J

a decade of
research an Iecturing in the Oxford FacuIp of Theolo.~lr,.
In publishing it I have heen prompted not only by the conviction that I have something to contribute, hut also by the
consciousness that a systematic treatment of the subject is
urgently required. Since the first world war the creeds have
been keenly investigated and discussed in specialist urcles; yet,
apart from the late Dr. F. J. Eadcock's Hirtoy of t h Creeh,
na full-dress work devoted to them has seen the light. Such
books as are available, moreover, are mainly conccmed witIi
thc detyeloprnent of the historical texts, and hardly attempt to
meet the heightened interest in the theolqg of the crecds
which rnanifests itself toda?-. It is my hope that this serics of
studies w i I I do sirnething, however modest, to i31 both thcse

ws.

OR two rnatters an explanaton is perhaps c d e d for. First,

since one rif my objectives has been to cater for the needs of
students, J have felt it esirable, for the sake of completeness,
to cover afresh ertain well-worn tracts of pound, and at thv
same time to lirnit rny treatrnent of severa1 irnpartant and
cantroversial topics more narrowly than I should have liked.
Secondly, I Iiave dclibcrately abstaincd from inluding a proper
bibliography. hty reason is that, as the book was nearing compietion, Pre J. de Ghcllinck's astonishingly cemprehensive
sun-ey of literature dealinq with the Apostles' Creed (Pafris t f p rf mgwn p , I : Brussels and Paris, 1946) reached this
country. As this should bc accessible in a11 great librari=, E have
secn no priint in printing what could only have been a drastic~ I l ycurtaiIed version of it here. -4tthe same time, t h e exarnple
set bv Pre de Ghellinck su_eqeststhat, if a bibliogaphy of the
Sicene Creed is to bc cornpiled, it shouId he on a cornparable
scale. The footnotes sshorild supply referenes to practialIy a11
the useful authorities.
Every writer on crceds, however eager to be original, mmt
be acutely conscious of entering into a rich inheritance. Here
I would acknowledge rny indebtedncss to such scholars as, oF
v

%i
PREFACE
the older generation, C. P.Caspari, F. Kattenbusch, and A. E,
Burn, and, of more recent times, G . Moi-in, H, Lietzmann
(under whom I had the honour of working in Berlin for a
period), E. Schwartz, and B. Capelle. The reader wi]] come
across the names of these, as of many others, on alrnost every
page. For more direct assistance I must express rny gratitude
to the Rev. Dr. F. L. Cross, Lady Margaret Professor in this
University, who read and criticized a large portion of the book,
and to the Rev. E. W. Kemp, Fellow of Exeter College, who
hdped me with a difficult hapter. Two other friends deserve
rny particular thanks-Mrs. C. F. W. R. Gullick, who, though
busy with many more important things, has taken the whoIe
burden of making the index upon her competent shouldecs;
and my sometime pupiI Mr. D. L. Thawley, who, despite the
pressure of his own studies, has read a11 the proofs with a more
accurate eye thn I can Iay clairn to, and at numemus points
has laid a warning finger on minor inconsixtencies and errors
which might orherwise have eluded me.

CONTENTS
PREFACE

PAUE

SHORT BIBLIOGRAPRY
ABBREVIATIONS

PTER

CREDAL ELEMENTS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT .

r . The Ancien t Legend
.
2 . The Apostolic Tradition .
.

.
.
.

I;rtgmcnts of Crfleds
b, The Original Paitem
j.

EDS AND BAPTISM

i . T h Role ofDeclaratoy Creed~.
!. The Bajfismal lnh-wugatiom
1. Ths- Cafacheticul Setting of Creeds
,. The Name " Symbolum "

FHE S E C O K D E D I T
is gratifying that a second edition of a book of this k
,hould be called for. In preparing it I have availled mysel
the oppnrtunity to make an irnmense number of minor cor..-tions, und also incorporate referentes to new and more up-todate editiuns and texts. In a few pssages I have modified pci ints
of view cxpressed in the earlicr edition, but I have nowEiere
felt i t necessary to alter rny rnain thesis.
T

Xi

. THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FIXITY .

I . % Creative Period
.
r. Th Apostolic Fathers
.
;. The Creeds of St Justin .
.
.. St Irenaeus and his Rule of Faith
, . Tertullian's Creeds .
.
The Growth of Fixd Forms .
. Some Conclusiom .
OLD ROMAN CREED .
.
. The Evidencefur R
.
, The Tradition Defended .
.
3. The Original Language of R. .
.
.
q. R, Tertullian and St H$polytus
.
.
5. The Holl-Harnmk HypothesZF .
.
Comlusion .
.

6
13
23

30
30
40
49
52

I.

r p T Y D

-S.

vii

100
100

104
TII

ar3
119
126

CONfENTS

1. THE TEACHING OF THE OLD ROMAK

CREED .
r . The Fissi Ariiclr
2. T ~Core
P of fhe Smnd Ariitie .
3. Ti18ChrisfologicadIwertion
.
4. The Holy Sfimt .

.
-

5 . TheSpiritinActiotr

.
.

r31
r32
139

ST. LHE TE-ACHING AND HISTORY OF C 332

r . C and Apollinarianim
- 332
2. Th Haly Spt'nfliin C
.
938

3. 7-h Baplismal Use of C .

4. C in I ~ Holy
P
E~~charist.
j. 77te Filioqu~
.

144
152

XIT. THE APOSTLES' CREED .

r . The Receirred Text
2. ChangesintheFirstArticfr
3. Some Mincir 124adtfiations

155

VI. CREEDS WESTERN ,4ND EASTERN

I . The Pauci9 of Cretds
,

Daughter-creeds of R
.
3. Easi~rnCretds
.
4. Comparison of E O S I and
P ~ IVestern Cre~ds
j. The Desttnt of Easkrn G'reeds .
.
6. Relation af Easlem and TITesffrn Creeds
\'II. THE CREED OF SIChEA
.
r . Creeds m Tesfsof Orihodoxq. 2. Jhc Prmulgation of N .
3. Cinnporison of N and CAES.
.
4. Thc Letter of Ew~biw .
5. T ~Bmi.r
P af N
VI1 I. THE MEANING AND USE O F T H E NlGENE
CREED .
r . Tht Arian T h o l o ~ .
.
2, Ths Reply of the Nitm Ci-eed .
3. Th Homoomion .
.
4. A f h ~ ' i ~ i c a a .
IX. THE .4GE OF SITODATA CREEDS .
.
r. Tkc Dedkation Coilncil .
.
2 . From $&a
fo Sirmium .
.
3. T h r Triumph of Arionhi
.

PAQE

CHAP~R

PAGE

2.

34-4
348

358

Th Descent io Hell
.
5 . T h Third Artirle Aeinkrprtfrd nnd Kevi~eii.
.
Ci. The Coommuniori of SainLs
4.

XI1I. THE ORXGISS OF THE -4POSTLES' CREED

I. Tfxts ,3ppxaxirnaling to T
2. J's Redaction .Kor R a m
3. T s Hisprmo-Gallic Origin
.
4. Chrlmngrte and ihe Creed
.
5. The Accepiatrce of T nt Romt .

XNDEX
I

231
ngr
234
nqn
154
263

263
274
283

X. 'I'HE C:OXSTLhTLIYOP0TTITT4Y
CREED . 296
I . TJ~P
Trradition aboul C .
.
. 296
2. Comparison ef C with N .
. gor
3. The Case Against ttie Tradition .
.
305
4. Tlze T~aditionRe-catisiciered
.
3x3
5. Towards a Solution
.
322

I'
I

435

ABBREVIATIONS

S H O R T BTBLIOGRAPHY
d.F.0.

~adc~ck

.?.:e.

"421.
H. J . CARPENTER,
Crerdr ond BaptixmaI Hites ui the First Fmr C'cntwies
(J.T.S.xliv, 1943).
O. CULLWAN-I,
'rhc I:urlirsl Chnjiian C'onfessi~?~ (E.T. by 3. K. S.
Rcidi, London, I 349.
;p F. T. DOLCEA,
Dir Eingliedmng der Ta.fgmboLs in den T ~ f b d i l l r i r g
(Antike und Clmrfrn!trm iv, I 934).
I).VAX DENEYNUE,
L*s nmmes dc f'meignnnent c h r k , Paris, r 933.
J. DE G ~ L L T N CPdfiTliqw
K,
~i mTrefo ge, Tom. I, B m e I s and Paris,
r 946 ; 2nd ed. r 949.
A. HARUP~CK,
Apns/olistlies .$rn bolum (Hau&s Reaien~k.I, 74 I 8.).
A. WACK,
K m l a n t i n ~ p u c h e sS d o l {Hauck's Renlni~yk.X,
12

ff.).

F.J. -4. HORT,Tw+oDis~ntutiom,Cambdge, I 876.

J . KVYZ
E, Das nic~ni.rch-~onns~an~in(~paIi~rmi~cke
Gmbul, Leipzig, I 898.
J. LEBOS,Lcs ancinu ~ m b o i c s2 Cfralcdnine (R.H.E.&i, 1936).
H. LIETZ>%ANN,
Symbu/$trditn (2-.iif.T.f~'.
- ~1922;
,
1923;
xxiv, 1925; xxvi, 1927).
H. LETZMANN,
Ctschichtc der alten Xirch, Bd. TI. Berfin, r936
(Ch. 41.
F. Looi-s, Simboiik, 'Ribingerr, 1902.
F. Loo~,Ilns .,4ricanum (Festgabcf i r A-. MirIIcr, Tiibingen, r 922).
Ev. SCHWARTZ.,
Das .Vicoenum und dar Comtuntnopolitmum mf der
Syriode oon Chalktdon (<..N.
M/. xxv, r 926).
H.B. SWTE, T/w Apostles' Creed, London, 1894.
C . H. ' T u n ~ a n ,Thie fXiiriov fltlic UUreof Cyeeds and Annthemm, London,
I 906 ; 2nd cd. I g i o.

r.

Ed. Schwartz, Acta contilimuni oeciimicmirm, Berlin and

Leipzig, ~ g r qFf.
F. j. Badcock. T h Hiirtmy of th C m d ~2nd
,
td., London,
1938A. E. Burn, AR h ~ o d u c t w nto thc Crrtd-t, London, 1%.
Burn
spari A. md C. P. Caspari, Alie d ntw QwIicn zw Gt~chKhk dts
T q f i p b o l ~md dcr Glaubmsrcgrl, Christiana, I 879.
capari Qiulltn c. P. caspari, L'?tgcdmckrt, mbcarhtcic tutd ~0912b e ~ h b b
Q-uc!!lm zur Gcshirhk du Toqf!imholrImddrr Glaubmr~rgcl,
Christiana, r866-g.
Cwpm Chrrrri~nmuni.St-rirs Lofino.
C. C.1,.
Dictbmairt d'mcliclogic rliritirmc t i d t liturgit.
D.A.C.L.
E. j.G d q x e d . Dia lttstrn : l ~ o l o ~ e i m .
E.J.G.
.-i. and G. L.Hahn, Bihlioihrk d~ S~wSolcmd ClmhsregeIn
Hahn
drr a l t a Kirrb, 3rd cd., Breslau, i 897.
&<tine
E"q l e d i a of Rtt'i~ronand Eihics.
H.ER.E.
J m l of Tkfologiiacol Studics.
J. T.S.
F. Kanenbusch, Der o$etialische $doi, Leipzig, I 894.
Kaitenbwh
J. B. Lightfmt, The Aposiolic Fafkcrs (lhe nne-voiume
Lightfmt
editioo), h n d o n , 1891.
J. D. Marni, Sacronmi conrilimm nozm et ampiLrrim colicctra.
Xlansi
FIorence and Venice, r 759 ff.
-lha.G m . Hisf. .%fm~mrentoGermmrior Hisforico.
.trachriEhi. Gt!. ,\rakrichtm m drr Ap6nigl. Ge~eII~cho)
drr Wss~~~hnJlm
=a

B. C:APELLE, Le s y n l l ( ~ l erurnuin ou w o n d kdcde (R. Bn. x n i x , r q q } .

3.APELLE,
L$ori,qines du ~ymbolfrnmain (&h. tiriol. anc. mid. ii,
'930).
H. J. C A R P E N ~"SjwtboEirtn"
K,
a Title of fhe Creed (J.T.S. xliii'

Giittiop.

Opitz L i [ .

H.G. Opitz. Crkundm zw Grschichk drs nnunkchm Siret-fin L1. 111 OS the Beriin hcadcmy's Afhnnusiirr IZ'erk

i1

14b f
I

(r ,:I

P.C.
P./R. Bh.

1934-51-

j.P.

Wgne's Pa!~oEo~ia,
Scrier Ernrcn.
J. P. Migne's PutraEagfa, $cries Lnlmn.
Reilrre Binidicliizc.
&(h. Ihol. um. Reckches dc thdoologip ancimne c1 ddic'uole.

mtd.

Y.E.

1.L.z.
ftir

KG.

.L.N*
T. W.

h d'hhtoirc ccc1Csias~iqzu.
Tholagische LitProiurrsiiwig.
,&+schrift&
Kirchcngeschichk.
~eitscliriiftfirdie nnrtesdamenlliche Whnschnfi.

Patristic r e f m n c e are aImost always to Mignc, P.G. or P.L., or to ti

BtrIin series Die g r i e ~ k b ~chrdlithn
h
Schr$sfellm der erstm drei Jahrhmdo
and the Vienna Cmpirs scriptmurn eccl~siaslirmmlatimnorum.
'

xi

CREDAL ELEME-JTS I K T H E
NEW TESTAMENT

FOR hundreds of years Christians have been ciccusromed to

understand by the word creed a fixed formula surnmarizing t11e
mentia1 articles of their religion and enjoyinq the sanction of
cdcsias~cd authority. It seems fitting tliat the opening
hapter in a study of the 0ris.n and developrnent of the chief
:hristian credal confessiom should consist of an attempt ta
artermine whether, and if so in what scncc, it can reasonably
be claimed that a creed clxisted in X e w Tcstament times. For
more than halfthe Church's history no one Iiad any doubts on
this score : it -rsraconlidently assumed that the ttvelve .\potles
had themelves composed and authorized the firt sumrnary of
belief. The title '',lpostle? Creed'" oor ~ r n b o l u mapos~o!ortrm,
which fust ocurs in a Ietter 1 sent by the synod oF 31ilaa (3goj
to Pope Siriciiis and prohably drafted by St iimbrose (he t ~ a s
one uf its signatories), is symptornatic of an attitude which w a ~
qenera1. A gmd illustration of the picture people had of the
ieginning of creeds is pmvided by the circumstantial story told
iy Tyarinizis Rufinus, once thc friend and now the cmbittered
3eof St Jerome, in the expositian of the crccd (aIrnoss the earliest
ve possess from the IVest) which he wrotc towards 404. The
ipostles, he relates,= having bccn equipped at Pentecost with
he abiiity to spcak different lanpages, were instructed by the
Lord to journey forth and pioclaim God? word to the severa1
nations of the world :
As they were therefore on the poitit of tnking leave oT each other,
hey first settIed an agreed norm for their future preaching, so that
hey might not frnd themselves, widely separatcd as tl-iey would he,

S t Ambrose, E#.42,5

P Comm.

E.C.C.-E

in symb. apost.

(P.L. t6, r 174).

(P.L. n t , 337).
I

giving out different doctrines to the pcople they invited to believe iti
Chnst. So they met to~etherin one s p t and, beinq filled ~ i t thc
h
HoIy Spirit, compiled this brief token, as I ha-r-esaid, of tlieir futurc
preachin~,each rnakinq the contrihution he thouetit fit; and they
decreed that it should I>e handed out as standard tcaching to believers. I

Rufinus did not invent the story he quotes. On the contrary,

it represented in his eyes an ancient and hallowed tradition. As
a mattcr of fact, thc tradition makes its first apprarance in
another North Italian document of the same period, the
Explanatio symboli ad initiandos,' which probably consists of notes
based on an extemporary discourse by St hmbrose,%nd in the
Apostolical Conrrituiiom,3 wbch also belongs to the latter haIf of
the fourth century.;In the latter the nameless compiler depicts
the Twe1t.e as recdling how, to meet the-menace of heresy and
to strengthen the hands of the episcopate, they had conferred
together and had written out "this Catholic teaching", excerpts from which they then proceed to cite. When and where
the story assumed the shape it here exhibits, we can only guess
now. Much earlier, in the second haIf of the second>en~ry,it
was taken for granted in Catholic circles that what was coming
to be called " the rule of'faith" (an outline summary of Chriistia teaching, used for catechetical instruction and other
purposes)gwas ultimately traceable to the Apostles. The rule of
faith must not be confused with the creed, but (as we shall later
discover) the relationship between them was close. FZThen
recapitulating it, St Irenaeus, for example, expIains4 that it has
been handed down from " the Apostles and their disciples";
and his remark6 that if the Apostles had not bequeathed us any
writings we should have Iiad to follow "the rule of faith which
they delivered to the leaders of the Church" is typicd of the
period. TertuUian similarly speakss of " &e rule of truth which
descends from Christ, transmitted through His companions".
Exactly the same assumption rnarked the thought at an earlier

' P.L.

1ig3-6.
R. H. Connollv qeatlv strrnmhmed thr rasr for an .%mbrosian authonhi~.
Cf. J.T.S. xl\.ii, 1946. 185 ff,
a 6, 14.
Adv. hacr, I , 10, I (P.G. 7, 549 E.).
Adv. buer. 3,4, I (P.G.7, 858).
Apof. 47: cf. Dcpracisn. 21; 37 (C.C.L.I, 164; 202 f.; 217).
17,

'THE ANCiENT LEGEND

CREDAL ELEMENTS IN T H E NEIt' ~ ' E s ~ A ~ ~ c s T

date still of St Justin, St Ignatius and the author of the

~idachc.
~ufinus'shint that each of the Apostles rnade his personal
contributi~nto the formula is Iater elaborated with picturesque
detag. IYe see the legend in a developed f o m in the series of
sermons De yrnboZo2 falsely attributed to St Augustine. Thus we
in the first of them :3

'

k a d

O n the tenth day after the Ascension, when the disciples were
,thered together for fear of the Jews, the Lord sent thc promised
P:~racleteupon them. At His cornine;thev were infiarned like red-hot
iri3n and, being filled with the knois-Iedge of a11 languages, they comc:reed. Peter said "I beliex-e in God the Father almighty4
Pwedmthe
. . . ,.,r a k ~of heaven and carth " . . . Andrew said " and in Jesus
Chriit His Son
our only Lord" . . james said "Who was
conceived hy the Holy Spirit . . . bom rom the Virgh 33iiary"
. . John said "suffered under Pontius Pilate . was crucified,
dcsad anci buried"
. Thomas said
to hell . . on
t?le third day rose again from the dead " . , James said " ascend~dtc1 heavet1 .
sits on the right hand of God the Father a i h t y "
. . P,h iip said "thence He will come to judge thc living and the
ead" . . Bartholomew said " X beiieve in the Holy Spirt"
Iatthew said "the holv Catholic Church . . . the communion of
lints" . . Simon said " the remission of sim"
Thaddaeus said
'<
the resiurrection of the flesh" . . . Slatthias said "eterna1 life". t

...

. .

..

...

..
"u.
.

...

...

7h e setting, it should be noted, is deliberately borrowed from

-ative of John 20, 19, according to which o d y the
tlle
nari
.
TWelve rcbceived the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The presti.ge of the creed was thus skilflly enhanced by attributing
it: to the direct action of the Spirit using the ApostIes as
...
insrruments.
Thus diressed out the legend yon aImost universal acceptance
il1 the micIdle ages.4 This is all the more remarkable because it
feat to squeeze exactly twelve articles out of the
M-3
creed. St Thomas Aquinas, for example, found it a somewhat
73-

irri

s r

Thr c\idcncc \\.as WPI!

trl OUI by D, van drn Evnde in t s nmmcr dr l'msnprPar-, 1933. 5 1 ff.
In thr hppcndix to vol. of blipe's edirion.
Jrrrn. 240 i probably of thr riqhth centun-) in P.L. 39. 2 189.
' Most writers, Iike St Mnximus of Turin (Hom. 83: P.L. 57, 433 E.),Cassiar)
(Con.Ne~est.6,3:Petsclienig I, 328),St Isidorc of Seville (Decccl. 4 c . 2 , 23: P.L. 83,
815f.), ctc., were co~itcnt to assert the apostolic authorship; a few (e.g. St
Priminius) assignod each clausc tu a separate Apostlc.

mi chriitm.

\v

CREDAL ELEMENTS M THE NEW TESTAMENT

THE ANCIENT LEGEND

embarrassing requirement, and prefersed to distinpish severi

articles relatiug to the Godhead and seven to Christ's
humanity.' For the purposes of popular instrucion, however,
the Church found thc story of the creed's apostolic orien,
embellished with imaginative details, usefiil as reinforcing the
authority of what had bccornc a acred formula. Sometimes it
was given pictorial expresson, as in rhe -&$fiaake$ki&k
at
Trier, where the twelve slender colurnns sirpportinq the vaultfing were in tbe fifteenth century adorned with representations
of the Apostfes and tIic articles thcy had setferally contributed.
It was a favourite subject for illuminations in psalteries and
hoks of hours, and for rvindou\i of painred gls, cach Apostle
being depicted a q i n g an emblem emblazoned ~ 6 t hhis
particular clause of the creed. -4 set of nine hexarneters, alIeged
to be the work of St Bernard, has alo survived%ssigning tweIve
of its afirmations (thc dumsy poet was obliged to omit two
beeause hc could not make them fit) to their presurned inventor.
The verses evidentIy enjoyed a considerable vogue, no doubt
because of their aptncss for impressing the teaching of the
creed ou people's rnemories.
Tliough accepted as a piece of history rght dmm to tlie
fifteeni ccntury, the story had a11 the nir of being a pious
ficbon. t t \i.= not ro be expected that it tvould stancl up to tbe
reawakcning of the critical m e , The fim serious questicmings
of the edifying tale becarne audiblc a t the council of Florence
(1438-45)~which atrempted a reunion between thc hurches
of East and West. At the heinning of thc neg~tiations,~
in 1438,
when the fathers were stiI1 sitting at Ferrara, the 1,atin representatives invoked the ilpostles' Crecd. The Grccks wouId have
nothin of this, and their leader, Marcus Eugenicus, rnetropolitan of Ephesus, peremptorily ssclaimed, " Li'e do not possess and have never seen this creed of tlie Apostles. Ifit had ever
misted, the Book ofAcis iiould hal-c spoken of t in its description OC the first apostolic s~ziodat Jerusdem, to
you
appeal." For on renon ar another no further licadivay was
made in the matter at the council. A little Iater, hoivever, the

doughty h e af the tempura1 power of the Popes.1 Shortly

aftenvards a less brutal and theoIogicaIIy more skilfl attack
s
,
by Reginald Pecock, bishop oF St h a p h (rw)and
then of Chichester (r450). He denied the apostolic authorship
,f rhe cretd and rejectcd the Dcscent to Rell.2 Though suppressed for thc momcnt (Valla had io recant, and Pecock war
forced to resign his see in 1458)~
and in any case thnist into the
background by thc qreater controversies of the Reformation,
these ideas carne into their oxun in tlie seventecnth century
\chen G . J. T70ss (1G42) and Archbishop 'Cxszher (1647) ina ~ , ~ r a t the
e d rnodern era of creda1 studie. [
Once the question is squarely faced, the extreme unlikdihood
of the Apostles having dcafted an official surnrnaT of faith
scarcely rnerits discussion. Since tIie Refomation the theory
that they did has been quietly se2 aside as leg-endary by practically a11 scholars, the conservative-minded merely reserving
the right to point out that the teachine; of the formula known
as the Apostles' Creed reproduces authentically apostolic
dactrinc. I t hm become plain that what T+-ehave to del ~ 4 t h
k only a particular example of the rccopized tendency of the
early hurch to ttrjibute the whole of its doctrinal, lihirgical
and hierarchical apparatus to the Tw-elve and, through them,
to our Lord HimseIf. So much may he freely conceded without
prejudie to the question uihether or not the spokemen of
second-century Catholicism were correct in their assurnption
that their rule of faith, as distinct from any oficial formula, was
identical with &e faith of the Apostles. During the nineteenth
centmy, however, the critica1 argument was carried severa1
stages further doum the slope of sceptirisrn. Doubts rrrere euprwed whether any creed at all, a- oryanized body of
doctrine, much less one compiled bv the Apostles themselves,
c o ~ l dhave exited in the X e ~ vTestament pcriod. S o unarnbigu01.1~
allusion to one, no plausible quotation from it text
seemed to be discoverable in the apostolic literature. Had the

2 Q. r , art. 8.
For tcxi cf. Hahn 87.
Cf. J. I-Iardnuiii, .+ida cnnsiliurum IX, 842E and H43A. Mansi givm
rbum uf Srwinni XITI and SI\.'.

For thc story see D. C. Monrad, Dit crrte h"onlroucrsc Gbcr dm Ursprtm~drs
aMstafischcn I:I1ubcmbekenntnasscs, Gotha, i 88 I
8aok ofFaith, Pt. 11, ch. V.

F. SURIIR.
thrnl. 11,

e
a

tm

bricf a

aptolic

origin of the creed was rharply- criticized by Lomizo

\-dia, the schola~ly propagator of renaisance ideas and

'

THE APOSTOLIC TRADITION

CREDAL ELEMENTS IN THE PTEW TESTAMENT

Church possesed suh a formula, some trace of it must have

survived, for its authonty would surely have been immeme.
Tn any case, to postulate one would surely make nonstnse ofthe
known development of creeds in the second and third centuries.
Finally, it was pointed out, it would involve a grave anachronkrn to trace creeds and h e d formularies back to the
Church's infancv. The faith itself had not then attained the
pitch of development at which ir could be distjlIed into a
creed, and the very notion of rtereotyped definitions had yet to
emerge.
~ h force
e of these and similar considerations ir at first sight
impressive. It is therefore scarcely surprising that during the
great efflorescence of credal studies between 1860 and rgrq
opinion hardened de&ively against &e tradition of a primitive
creed. The prevailing temper, it must be remembertd, under
the iatluence of men like Hamack, was dominated by a
peculiar theov of Chritian origins. -4sharp antirhesi was often
drnwn between t he Spirit-guided, spontaneou Xetv Testament phae and the second-century epoch of incipient fomalism and institutionalisrn. So long as thk was die accepted histarical frarnework, there was no room fcr anything like a
full-dress creed at the nunery-stage of Christianity. The
majority of schoIan (there were, it is tme, some notable
exceptions) 1 dccided that formulatcd creeds In any adrnissible
sense of the term did not come into existence un til tlie rniddle of
the second century, or possibly a little earlier. Before rhen, if
anything approximating to a crecd was in use in the Church, it
can have been nothing more elaborate than the simple baprismal confession "Jesus is h r d " or "Jesus is the Son of G d " .
The history ofcreeds was the history of the enlargernent of these
brief asseverations through the exigencies of controversy and
the evolution of the rnature theolo*g..of Catholiisrn.

I.

2718 Apostolic Tradisiun

If the problern is posed in the form of the question, Did the
apostolic Church possess an official, textually determined conE.g., A. Steberg, whose much neglccted Dcr Kub~hAnn~
der Urchrirfo&jt
(hipzig, tg03) Paid thc foundations of an tntircly new and much more profitable
approah to the subjcct.

fes,;,n 01 faith or did it not?-there can be l i d e doubt that the

ne,rrative answer returned by the older investiyators of credal
ofigins 1'"s well qounded. J\'hat is Tas certain is that the
cboice of altemativcs thus offered is a fair and reasonable one.
T~ put the matter in another wav, one wonders 1%-hetherthe
dilemma proponnded does not obscure tlie real k u e . Neither
general probability nor the eridence of the documents gves any
coIous to the supposition that tcreotvpcd, tperbaIiy sacrosnnct
crecds of the kind that were later to become current existed in
New Testament days. As a matter of fat, they did not make
rheir appearance until severa1 generations later: even the
theory tl-iat they cannot be dated before the rniddIe of the
secnnd century can be shown to be unduly optimistic. But
qrecrnent on that point does not in the least exclude the
possjhilit~rthat creeds of a Iooser sort, Iacking the fixity and the
oficial character of the later fomularies but none the less
forehadorckg thern. were in use cornparativel- ear2y. Ef the
Churh had a creed at a11 in the Sew Teststament epoch, it can
only have been sornethinq like t*. It Es worth examining what
can be said in favour of thjs hypothesis.
In discussing this therc are two considerations w-hich should
be borne in mind. First, the early Church wa from the start a
beieving, onfessing, preaching Church. Nothing could be
more artificial or more irnprobable than the contrast so frequently drawn between the Church of thc first entirry, with
its pure religion of the Spirit and its alrnost complete abscne: of
organjzation, and the nascent Catholic Church, with all its
institutional appurtenances, of the late second centuv. Had the
Christians of the apostolic are not conceityed of themselves as
possesin,q a h d y af distinc&e, conciously hdd beliefs, they
tk70uld scarcely have separated themselves from Judaism and
undertaken a n immense prigamme of missionary expansion.
Evenrthing goes to show that the infant cornmunities looked
upon tbernselves as the bearers of a unique story of sedemption.
1t was their faith in this gospel which had called them into
being, and which they felt obliged to communicate to newcomem. It wouId have been surprising i they had not given
~ i s i b l eexpression to it in their preachjng as well as in their
corporate life and organjzation. Like other rellgious groups wi th

TNE APOSTOLIC TRXDITION

a saving message, tlicy muqt have been driven by an inward

irnpuls& to emhody it in their Iitur,gy, their institutions and
their propaganda, and to seize cve.
opportunity of harpinq

on it.
SecondIy, the character of tht: apostolic iirerature. as scholarship since the begjnning oC tl-ic twentietl-i century has come
increasingly to acknowledge, linrmonizes with this assurnption. The day has passed when the GosprIs and EpistIes could bc
treated as objective bi~~graphies
and detached comrnentaries on
topical happcnings. The S e w Testarnent is a thoroughl~.
propagandist misccllany, written "froni Eaith to faith ". Thc
Gospels thernselres are carefullv claborated expositions of
certain d o p a t i c beliefi ahout Jesus which they seek to ekrplain
and justi-.. Thc other documents equdIy presuppose a hackground of faitli shared by the autlior and those for whom he is
writing. For a11 thc cliffercncesof nuance and standpoint which
they adrnittedly eshibit. they comprise a hodv of li
~vhichcaa~lcl only have spning fram a communi>
strnngly marked outlook of its own.
In the light of these considerations it is impossible to overlook
thc emphasis on ihe transrnission of authoritative doctrine
~vliichis to be found even~vherein &c Se\?: Testament. In thc
later strata the referentes to an inherited corpus of teaclhiny are
clear eno~igh.I n Jadc 3, for example, we reacl of "the faitli one
de'livered ta the saints" ; later (verse zn) the author s,peaks of
'* your most holv faith ", again using the word in the sensc of an
accepted body of beliefi. S i d a r l y in tIie Pastoral Epistles such
phrases as ' h o d e l of sound words" (2 71m. 1, 13). " the EicaIthy
doctrine" (2 Tim. 4 , 3 ; Til. r , g), "the dcposit (+v n C i p a 8 4 ~ ~"v )
and "the nobIe dcposit" ( I TIRI.6, 10; 2 Tzm. I , q),"thc
faith I?in its concrete acceptation { r Tim. r, rg ; Til. r, 13). and
"the splendid teachin~;"( j r Tim. 4, 6) form a conrant rrfrain.
Thc writer- af &tebr~ws,too, is frequent in his allusions to " the
confession ( 6 s PoXoylap) '' to wliich Iie advises his readcrs to
hold fast at irhatetrcir cosc (3, r ; 4, 14;10, 23). Xn another
passtige (li, z), concerncd with catechctical ~ractice.Iie refm
unmistakably to ali ~Iementarystage in Cliristian education
wl~ichincludes instruction i11doctrine as well as in etliics and the
sacramirnts.

An illrimjiiating example u l this irisistence on tradiiinnal

doeeine may perl~apsbe discerned in the first of tlie Jolianiiine
J?pic<lcs.In his tortuously exprared, bafflin~opening rcntnirc
I \ tlie \\+ter uses the phrase "the I\-ord of life r& hdyov
,+r cWiC)
". T h e most common interpreration of i t has bren that
ji iefea to the Incnrnatc Logos, thus iaking up rhe theme of fhe
Fourth G o ~ p c l To
. ~ another schoal of exegeterz the analogy of
ph>hi[.2, r6 holding fast to the word of 1il'c"i and of drii 5, 20
-.al] the i<-ordrof thk life") has suq~ertcdthat the rcference
really is ito the mcssage of salvation announed by the Church.
The solu tion of the difficriltylies in the recognition that ncithcr
Iofthese aspccts of Word excludes the other. The Incarnate Lord
\,.as asuredly, n the eyes of Christians, thc m e \l'ord of God;
$\-hile the gospel v.+iich they prorlaim~dwas precisely thar
Word shown forth in His Person and His saving exzploits. What
St John ir doing ir to recai1 his readcn, faced as they are with
the caricatures of ChrEstianiiy prescnted by heretics. to the
pme and prirnitive messaFe handed doirii in the Church. that
messarc of which He wa? the ernbodimcnt. This givrs point to
the appca1 to them to continue steactfast in the teaching they
had hcai-d from tl-ic beyinninq (r, 2 . c ~ .
T L - -.
L I I S bqqe-~tion
has mmctinies been made that teirts like these
merely prove that the faith was tending; to assume a hard-andkist outline towards the end ofthc first century. St Paul himself.
Iiowevcr, is a witness to the fact that i-lie. process was a t wnrk at a
much carlier taTec-R~ernomtraiing~vitiithc Galritiam (Cal. 3, r),
reminds tIiem that bcfore alieir eyes Jesus Ctirist lnad bccn
<c
openly set forth crucifrcd ". 1n 2 T?ZF.TX.
2, r 5 he cxhorts I& correspondents to " hold fast to the traditions ( T ~ T ~ ~ u ~ ~which
E I )
You h n w been taught'' {the latter verb hints that he lias doctrine
mind \, and in Rnm. 63 r 7 hc speaki explicitly oF "&e pattern
nf doctrinc ( i i x o t . 8 ~ 6 a f i ~ ) to
" 1,-liich they have becn committed. In I Cor. r r , 23 and r Cor. 15, 3 thc same idea of iradil i ~ npassed down (cf. thc kcy-words -aphaFov and ~api8wua)
"nd rcceived recup, in the one case wth refcrence to the
Eucharist and in t h r other to the narratire of t h e Rmurrection.

!,,

c''

' Cf., c.g., J. Chainc, Lcs Qilii'trcs cafhoiiqties, Paris, 1939, T + 1 .

c.

I%. F. LVestcott and h. E. Brmkc in their coni1ne11ta~ie.s. H. Dodd

SuPWrkdthe samc exegfsis i n his edition in ttic b10Ilatt senes ( i946).
I
a So

has

I0

CKEDAL ELEMENTS IPI THE NEW TESThMENT

Ner are these, though arnong the best knom, the only insrances
of uch Ianguage in St PauI. What, for example, is " the gospel
(-r8 dayy&ov) " which he declares that he preaches among the
Gentiles (Gol. 2, 21, and which he rnentions on other ocasions
(e.g. Rom. 2 , r6 ; 16, 25 ; I Cor. I j, I ) , unlm the saxing story of
redemption? Ariother title by which he designata the same
fai th-one which has tended to monopolize attention in recent
years-is "the preahins oor " tthe preaching of Jesus Christ "
(TOKtjpqpa: CE R m . 1 6 ~ 2 j5I Cor. r, zr]. E-et another,and more
general, descriptix-e t e m is " the faith (4.rrlrrr~s) and the
rclated verb. Thus in Gol. 2, 7 he admonishes his readers to " be
establishcd in the faith as you have been taught It" ;in Cal. r , ng
he reports the curches as saying that "the man who once
persecuted us is now preaching the faith which he once
ravaged'" and ifi. Eph. 4, 5 hc clinches his argument about the
unity of the body by pointing out that there is "one T,osd, une
faith, one baptism". Finally, it is wjth an eye t o the Gospel as
the Church's witness that he sptaks so frequentIy (cf. r T/zt~s.
r , 6; n Thcss. 3, r ; r Cor. 14, 36; Cal. 6, 6 ; Phil. r , 14, etc.)
oF "the word of God " or " the word of the Lord ". In contradition to the view that St Pad was a daring doctrinal
innovator, virtually the inventor of Catholic theology, a11 the
evidence goes to prove that he had a healthy regard for the
objective body OE teachjng authoritatively handed d o m in
"

"

the Church.1
Nor was St Paul isolated in having this altitude. ilccording to
Acis 6, 4 the ,4postles considered " the m i n i s q of the word",
that is, the proclamation of tbe message with which they were
entrusted, to be their overriding d u ~ The
.
author of r Pckr
recalls to his orrespendents ( I , 2 5 ) "the word whjch was
preached to you", and rvhih presumahly fomed the basis of
their baptismaI instrucrion. Esamples could easily be multiplicd, and the conclusion is inescapable that, however anachronistic it may be to postulatc fixed meda1 f ~ m for
s the
apostolic age, the documents themselves teste to the exjstence
of a corpris of dishctively Christian teachuig. In this sense at
any rate it is legitimate to speak of the creed of the primitive
I On ihis see the adrnirable study Paul md hls Prcdccts~orsby A.
(London, 1940)

M.Huntcr

THE APOSTOLIC TRADITXON

II

Nor was it sornething vague and nebulous, without

p r e c i ~ i ~of
n C O ~ I ~ O W :ifs main features were dearly enough
defined. The Epistla and Gospels are, of coune, rarelv if cver
,,ncerned to set out the faith in its fdness: they rather pre,,ppore and h h t at it. Eren so, it is ~ s s i b l to
e reconstmct, lvith
h i r degree of confidente, what must have been its chief
comtituents.
ifiirh
..+-- attention has been devoted in recent years to this subje,t. The result has been, ironicnlly enough, an alrnost general
rallying to positiom ivhich it a= fomerly fashionable to dism&s 3s tlie lart ditch af the ultra-consen.ative.1 A pioncer in
the fiel$ has been Paul Feine, whose researchesz broke neiv
p w n d in the most constructive way. His influente har been
extensive, although it has usuafly (like that ofA. Seeberg, whose
book Fs mentioned above) remained withonit overt acknowIcdgement. Feine exposes himself ta criticism, however, both
hy concentrating exciusively upon baptism and by apparently
insisting on fastening a creed, in the sense of an official and
textualiy determined formula, on the apostolic age.3 Morc
cautious, and on the whole more reliable, conclusions have been
worked out by C. H. Dodd, and have been expounded and
given currency in a series oF well-hown books.4 By ranraeking
the Padine epistla and the speeches ernbdied in the early
chapters of Acts (which are starnped, he thinks, with trait
pointing infallibly to their primiiive character), he believes he
is able to sketch t h e outline of the faith preached in the Churcli
in the first
0~
decades after the R-rrection.
Its core,
he argues, consisted in the proclamation that Jesus of Yazareth,
of the limeage ofDa~<d,had come as Son of God and 3lesiah ;
that He w~oughtmighty acts and gave a new and authoritative
teaching or law; that He was crucified, died, and was buried ;
that Ke rose again on the third dav-and was exalted to the right
hand of God, Yictorious over principalities and powers; and
q p - t d a t e di-sion
about thc apostolickerygmamakes little, if any, advance
mi.~ssante, ~ g q ch.
, 2) and F. E.
~ t r l o r oyf thz Chiirdi atib ih anbciy, I gr 8 , 3 1 6 ff.).
Brightman (cf. %
a
Cc~taltdc< a~Jto!ilirrhrnClairben$hskenntn~$~tses
rn der <til dcs JKT.~
Leipzig,

on what was familiar, =.E.,ta P. Ratiffol (L'Jglisc

1995.

''

Cf. Harnack's critical rcview in ni.L.l.,1925, 3 3 R. 1. Copptns ga\.e a

Fairer, more balanced notice in R.H.E.&i,1926, 582
' Cf. espccially 7;iw A p a ~ t ~ lPrsachirtg
ic
and iis Dcnslopmfs, London, r 936,

32

FR4GlrlENTS OF CREEDS

CREDAL ELEME-;TS IS T H E SXN' TESTAlrlEXT

that H e wilI come again to judge tlie living and the clead. 'Th
setting of a11 this was the conviction, openly announced, that
the -4postles and thosc in fellorvsliip with theni constituted thc
nezv Israel of God, tlie heir of the ancient promises, and werc
marked out as such by the manifest outpouriny of tlie Holy
Spirit. Tliose who emhraccd this gospel, repcnted and bclicvecl
in Clirist. would receive the forgii\~cnessof their sins and a share
in t h i life of the comine age.
So far a-. it goes, this analysjs of the propaganda of thc
apostolic Church coulcl hardly be bcttercd. Such are thc
pattcrn and content of thc redal therncs which can be overheard bv any attentive reader of thc New Testament ~ m i t i n ~ c ,
and on M-hichthc qynoptic GospeIs are maynificeny clahorntd
variations. TIie onc defect from which it suffers is the cansequence of the method of approacli which has hccn adoptecl.
Rased as it is on the prrachin,~of tlic carlv Cliui-cli as reflccicd
in St Paul's Zctters and d r t s , it tciids to convry a sIiyhtly m e sided picture of itq corpus of belicfs. Preachinq \,-ar onJv Une
of the spheres in which the faith of first-century Christians found
an outlet, and in preacliing, for obvious niissionnry rcasons, t h t
emphasis iended to be almost esclusivcly Christoloqical. I-et
the Church carried over from its Jewish antcccdents a settfed
helief in God the Fathcr, thc makcr of heaven and earth, the
one God of the whole world; and the teachin.g of Jeslus had
F
assigned special prominence to lhe Fatherliooci or
hod. T h c
S e w Testament repeatedly undcrfinei the pIace which thi
cardinal affirmation occupied in tlic thought of first-ccntirr?Cliristians. But if nttention is concentrated on the kcrymrr as it
appears in sermons alone, i t is easy to invet-look this i&F iortant
item. Sirnilarly t h t profound ly Triniitariari s;train ir1
Christianity is Eiahle to be ignored in the kin.d of ap!proacn
.r\-hich wc ar,
ning. The Trinitarianism of the Xew
Testa
plicit; but thc frequency witli which the
triad i
i recurs (as wc dia11 see in the followiiig section)
- partem
..
suqgcscs triar rnrq
ivaq irn~licitin Christian thcolo-y
from the start. If thesl: gaps are filled in, however, 1.c are
entitled to assume with some confidente that what we have
before us, a t any rate in rough outline, is the doctrinal deposit,
or tlie pattern of sound ~iords,~ r h i c hwas expounded in the
1

-1

r*

I 3

;,llo~"lic C h u r c l ~since its inausuration ancl ivliich constituted

;L, distinctive message.

3. Fragrnrnis of Crftds
That the Churcli in the apostolic age posscssed a creed in the
broad serise of a recognized body of teahing may be accepted as
demonstrated fact. But it is permissible to take a further step,
There is pIenty of evidence in the Sew Testament to show that
the
faith UYIS alreadv heenning to harden into conventional
.u mmarieS. Creed:s in the rue meaning of the word were yct to
Corne, bu t the mcivement towards formulation and fixity was
rea der of the New Testament is conuinder rva.?:L Thus-.the
.- - - -rinully comine; acrobs
rrt-ed-like sloqans and t a ~ catchwords
,
\\+hichat the time of w i t i n rrrere beinq consecrated by popular
usnge. In addition he Ligkts upon longer passages whicti, while
still fluid in their phrasing, betray by their context, rhythm and
2;enenl plattern, as \+.e11 XY h?? their content, that they derive
f rom corrirnunity tradition rather than from the rvriter's un----^-11.
triirrir~iciied
invention. TO esplain them as exccrpts from or
C C ~ O C F of ali oficial ecclesia~tical formula, as userl to be
hshionahle, is unnecessary and misleading. Sincc ihe very
esistencc of a creed in thc precire senre impIied js pure hypothcsis, 2nd iinlikeiy hypothesis a t thnt, it is more natural ro
treat them as independent units and examine them on their
mrrits.
his connection are worth noticing. First, thesc
1
stallization did not take place haphazardly.
re provoked by particular situations in the Church's
]ire. Particular occasions lent themselves to the exposition or
dcclaration of Christian doctrine : t hey called for sometliina
likc a sreed. l l e one w.liich has been most thoroughly investiw e d is baptism. Somc kind of assurance of faith, and thus some
sort of avowal of helief, was required of candidates seeking
admiaion to the Church. But it is a mistake to concentrate
csclusirreiy on baptism, as scholaw h a w sometimes been disposed to do. Thc catechetical instruction preceding baptism
~ a also
s a moment syrnpathetic to the shaping of credaI
summaries. So was preaching : the method and style of different
Preachers doubtless varied, but the content and wording of thcir
-

SI

CREDAL ELEMENTS iN THE NEW T E S T A M E V

I4
message inust have tended to run alonp certain accepted iines.
The day-to-day polemic of the Church, whether against lieretics
within or pagan foes without, provided another si tuation
propitious to the production of creeds. Yet anothcr was
supplied by the 1itur.g : solemn expressions of faith, in tlie form
of hymns, prayers and devotional cries, had a natural place
there.
interesting special case is the rite of exorcism. The
exorcism of devils wa widely practised in the early Church, and
the codification of suitable formulae of proved potency seems to
have set in relatively soon. Nor should we overlook thc forma1
correspondence of Church leaders with their flocks. In the
ancient as in the modern world, lctters, apeciaIly oficial ones
(and it must be remembered that Christian letters were often
intended to be read aIoud at Church meetings), abounded in
stereotyped t u m of phrase, and sometimes these had somethng
of the character of brief formal confessions.
Secondly, the Sitz im 06m,if this technical description of it is
in place, did not only create the occasion for tentative creeds : it
also to some extent determined their style, substance and
structure. Sometimes diffuseness was appropriate, sometimes
terseness and aridity. If a dry enumeration of Christ's redemptive deeds was suitable in a catechetical instruction, a more
enthusiastic, fulsome utterance might be expected in an act o
worship. I n certain circurnstances what seemed fitting was a
Trinitarian or a binitarian ground-plan, the former emphasizing belief in the three Divine Persons, the Jatter belief in the
Father and the Son. More often than not, a single-clause
Christological staternent was sufficient for the purpose in hand.
Tliis last division, based on underlying plan, has proved so
significant that, in proceeding to survey the evidence for quasicredal material in the New Testament, we shall cataIogue it in
accordance with the pattern it exhibits. At the same time we
shall try, though not aIways with much hope of success, to
indicate the situation in the Church's life in which the fomulae
under discussion have their roots.
First, then, let us gIance at the fomulary elements which consist of simple, one-clause Christologies. The most popular, as
well as the briefest, in the New Tesrament is the slogan Xi~rios
IGSow ( K ~ L O 'SI ? 7 ~ ~ U s = c cisJLord").
e ~ ~ ~ St Paul states ( I Cor.

FRAGSESTS OF CREEDS

15

,*,

3''. '.No one can say Kitrios IZzous except by the Holy Spirit",
nnd aFzin (Rom. 10, g \, '-lf with your mouth sou confess hpurios
~ z and~ believe
~ ~in your
l heart
~
that God has raised Him from
thc dead, yau will be saved." He does not discIose the occasion
on which tliesc utterances were made, but the context of the
fint, with its referente to the alternative of saying A n a t h m
I~:JOILJ (=cic~rsed
beJesus"), seerns to suggest that it is an hour
\,.hen the Christian's loyalty is tated (by persecution possibly,
but not exclusivelyj that he has in mind.' This harmonizes rvell
wjth the strcss laid by early Christians on the sinfulness of
denying Christ when challenged,2 as well as with what we know
the practice of rhe civil authorities of trying to induce
Christians haled before them to curse Christ.3 The verse from
Rornuns has been generally taken as an auusion to the acknowledgement of Christ's Jordship made at baptism. The repeated
description of baptism as "in the name of the Lord Jesus " (cE,
e.g., Acts 8, r 6 ; rg, 5 ; I Cor. G, I r ) certaidy seems to impIy that
the formula "Jesus is Lord" had a place in the rite. The words
occur again in Phil. 2, I I , wliere St Paul speaks of every tongue
confasing that "Jesus Christ is Lord", the sctting in this case
being liturgical. ,Aqain, that the tag \$.as handed out to convem as a canvenient epitome of their faith is suggested by such
passages as Col. 2, 6 , "You received Chrkt Jesus as the Lord",
and by the references in Acts to " believing on the Lord Jesus
Christ" (e.g. r I , 1 7 ; 16, 3r) and to "preaching the Lord
Jesus" (cf. I I , 20). The iifar~rdom qf St PoEycarp 4 reports
that the imperial rnagistrate, d o i n ~his best to persuade
*e aged bishop to come to t e m , asked him, "What harm
is there in saying Caesar is Lord?" The acclamation hirios
frisar would seem to have been a popular one in the civic
cult of the Roman empire, and Christians were no doubt conscious of the implicit denial of it contained in their own Kurios
I~.YOUS.
Another formula, equally concise and ancient, though

1'

Cf. O. Cullmam, h pr&

m n f i s s i ~d~e f i i c h r i t k ~ P
s 3~&, 1 9 4 3 , ~ ~ 'Cf.~~~.r0,33;26,3~f.;
13.2,22;2 Em.2,IZ.
Cf. i~farlyrd~m
OfS! fJolwarp g. 3, whrre St Folucarp asks " How can I curse my
king?"; andPiiny., Epb. S. 96, whcrc! hc reports to Trajan how he tricd to make

cliristians

' 8. 2

CIITSF (maltdirnr) C:hrisi.

(Lighifoot.
1921.

rG

G R E D : ~ ~ELEMEXTS
.

rs THE

?r'~t+TTESTAMENT

dertincd to be s u p e ~ e d e d\\.hen its oriqhaI 'rfes~ianicsignificance was forqotten, is "Jesus is the Ghrirt". I Jn. 2, 22 testifies
to irs use ("~'ihois the liar, except he rviio denies tiiat Jesus is the
Cfirist?"), as does .lfic. 8, 30 ('Teter said to Him, Thou art the
Christ
yct another whicii often crops up is ''Jesus is the Son
of Gocl ". A striking example of iis use as a baptismal conression
is tlie story of thc baptism of tlie Ethiopian eunuch at the hands
of St 'liiIip, ntiirated in ilits 8, 36-38. ~lccordingto the reding
of t h c \i-cstern test (for our purpose it makes no d i e r e n c e
n-hethrr it is oricinaI or an intcrpolationi, the eunuch sealcd his
faitli By declaring, "I bbeeve that Jesus C h i s t is the Son of
God ". The author of I John makes much of it, arguing (4, r 5 )
thai " IYIiosoevcr confesses that Jesus is rhe Son of God, God
abidcs in him and he in Cocl", and latcr asking (5,5), " Who is
the conqueror of the world, but the man who bclieves that
Jesus is the Son of God?" As used by him the words, while
ernbodying a prirnitix-c Christian affrrrnation, have a certain
p01crnical colourin., being dirccted a-aimt the Ducetists t\+horn
I1-e is attackinq. This comes OU^ in a more self-omciously
polcmical formula (4, 2), "Jesus CIirisr has come in the flesh".
The amc statement that Jesus is the Son of God, without any
hint of licresy-hunting, is quoted in Hrbr. 4, 14. It reappears ln a
vcry different setting in Mk. 5, 7, where the devil whom ti-ie
Lord is about to exorcize cries, "Jcsus, thou Son of God most
hiyh, 1 conjure thee", and in -1ik. 3, r l , where she demon
salutc Wim tvith the words, "Thou art the Son of GBd".
Possibly thee phcsages give a clue to the exorcistic fomulae
currcnt in the first-ccntury Ghurch.1
Sci Or wc have becn glancing ar miniature crceds, hardIy
more tlinn cabcliwords. Sidc by side with them thcre are many
exarnplcs of fuIlcr and more dctailed confessions in the pages of
the Xrw Testarnent. In I Cor. 15, 3 E.,St Paul rcprodires an
eytract rrom ivhat he decribes in so many words as " t h s
gocpcl (78 ~$a;~&ArorJ
which I preached to you and \t.hich yau
received": he adds that, so far from itr being hi gsspef, he in

hir ium had received ir, prerumably fmm the Church. The
prapent quoted rum :
fi,

timt
+-.-

"1.

found picturial cxpresslon in the wudely popular q?nbol of

the firh: tlie lettcrs si the Creek ' I ~ b k
spclled out "Jesus Chriar, Son of God,
Saviour". Cf.F. J. Drilgcr, Ichthps, I , ~ 4 8 259,
,
318 R. Cf. also thc second-century
iycriptian scratched up in San Sehasriano (Xiornc) and referrcd to in Z.N.7-

on to you in rhc first place what I had myself rcccived,

Christ died for our sins according to t h t Scriphires,
and that Me was buried,
and that He was raised on the thitd day according to the Scrip-

tures,
and that He appeared to Cephas,
then to the Tu-elve,
then to more than tive hundred brothers ar once
theo He appeared to James,
then to all the apast'les. . .

...

'L.his is manifestly a summary drawn up for catechetical pusposes or for preaching : it gives the gkt of the Christian message
in a concentrated form. A defensive, apologetic note becornes
audible in the impressive amay of u-imsses with which it
terrninates. -4long with it \%-eshould probably class thc more
close!jr knit theologial statement of R m . r , 3 f :

Concerning His Son,

Who was bom of David's seed by natural descent,
Who was declared Son of God with power by the Spirit of
holiness
when Hc was raised from the dead,
j e u s &t
our Lord,
thmu%h fr$%om\cre have received Face,

as ~zlellas tIie bnefer extrats in Rom. 8, 34:

Christ Jesus Who dicd, or rather

has been raised from the dead,
Who is on the right hand of God,
IZ?io also rnakes iintercessian for us,

and

Tim. 2, 8 :

Thr %ameslo-n

xui, 1922,r5r.

Rernernber Jesus Chrisr,

raised from rhe dead,
of the secd of David (according to my gospe't),

I0

CREDAL ELEMENTS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

FRAOMENTS OF CREEDS

Odd sciitcncs scattercd throughoiit the epistles seern to rcho

catechetical formulae Iike ihese, e.g. Gni. I, 4 ("Jesus Chrlst,
Who gave Hirnself for our sins") ; E Thesf. 4, 14 (" If ~ v believe
e
that Jesus died and rose again"); and x Thess. 5, g
(".
through our Lord Jesus Christ, 1Yho died for us").
So, too, the Icnathier, more freely expressed passage in
I P P ~3,. 18 E:

hymn-like scrap, setting out the eucntials of the paro do si^ in

rhythmi lines, is I T i m . 3, 16:
Who was revealed in the flesh,
ws justified in the Spirit,
appeared to angels,
was preached among the Gentiles,
was beliwed on throughout the world,
was t&en up in glory,

..

For Christ also suffered for sim,

the just for the unjust, to hring us to God,
slain indced in the flesh but quickened in the Spirit,
in which He went and preacbed to the spirits in prison
. . . t h r e u ~ htthe risinq agGn of JmChrist,
tlrhois on the right hand of God,
having ascended to hpaven.
anqels, autheriria 2nd powers having bem subjected to Him,

reas Iike a part-paraphrasc and part-quotation of an instniction preparato. to baptism. The imertion in t.erses zo E.of a
~ h o r account
t
of the rneaning of the samarnent bean this out.
The plan of these CIiristological k e v p a s is srnple :thcy are
built up by attaching to the name ofJesus selected incidents in
the redernptive story. Xn underl?in~
contrast betvecn ffesh and
cpirit, son of David and Son of God, humiliation and exaltation,
an often be detected. The mast irnpressive example of i t is the
well-knots-n ChristoIoqical passage Phil. r, 6-11, which s
entirely rnodcIIed on the antithess betr~een Ckrist's selfernptying and His elevation to gIory as Lord of reation - So far
from being PauEine, is is almost certaidy an ancient Christian
-tu- _ t
hymn, probabIy oF Palestinian derivation, 1%-llichwas dircaay
arranged in rhythmic strophes by thc time it fel1 inta St PauE's
Iiands. SchoEars 1 liave hazarded the guess that it must be an
exerpt from some primitive eucharistic Iturgy, but this is pure
conjecture : nothing in the language or in the rnovernent of ideas
givc the least support to it. The most tht can be cIairnet1 is that
its setting was undoubtedly cultic, and that it is a fine exarnple
of the errrly crystallization of liturgical material. Another
$o

H.Lictzmann, Z.fi.7.W. xxit, 1923, 2G5, md E. Lqhmeyer, $rios

JCJW

( S i k ~ n g s b ~ r i c t i&r
t c Il'cidtlberer Akadeniie de7 Wissmchaftlm, Phil. Hist. k!.r g274),
65 f. Alsn tlic larter" Pki/$prr (Gottingcn, 19283,ad loc.

19

The same type of kez-ygma, much abbreviated, of course, was

.lsedat exorcrism and for healing. Thus St Peter (Acfs 3, 6 )
ued the Iame man at Beaatiful Gate by solernnly adjuring hm,
In the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazoraean, walk." A lictle
ter, when asked to explain the rnracle (4, ro), he elaborara
the formula into "In the name of Jesus Christ, the Yazoraean,
I$'hom you crucified, Whom God raised from the dead."
So much for sngle-clause, purely ChristeEogical Fomulations
of the doctrinal depost of the pstolic Church. They were
rnanirestly not the ody * e : contemporancously wjth them
the doctrinaI deposit was taking shape in serni-formal codessions of a bipar6te stmcture based on the parallel ideas of Cod
LIie Eather andJesm Christ His Son. Onc of the most irnportant
inistances (~fthese is St Paul's ( I Cor. 8, 6 )

...
.
\Te, holvwer, have one God the Fathcr,

from 'bVhom are d things, and ~ : e

ta Him,
and one Lwrd Jeus Chrst,
through lt'hom are all things, and w e throush Him.

The formulary character of this is unrnistakable, and is

emphasized by the catehl paralfelism and the artificial construction. Theological motives are n part at work, for St Paul
is concerned to bring out the cosmic roles of Father and Son,
but polemicaI ones are for the moment uppermost, St Pau1 is
asserting the unity of the Ch&tians%od as contrastcd with the
I<
many gods and many lords" oF paganism. A closely related
Passage, looser in expression but built upoii the same plan, is
1

Tim.2, 5 f :
For therc is one God,
likewise one mediator hetwcen God and meii,
the man Christ Jesus,
Who gave Himself as a rnnsom for aI1.

...

20

CREDAL ELEMENT IN THE NEW mTAhENT

h o t h e r familiar mo-clause confeswion, the creed-like

character of which Ieaps at once to the eye, occurs in r Tim.
6, r 3 i:
I cfiarge you in the sight of
God Who gives life to a11 things,
nd Christ Jesus Who witnessed the &e confession
in the time of Pontius Pilate,
that you keep your comrnission spotless,
without reproach, until
the rnanifetation of our Lod Jesus hrist.

It hardly requires much irnagination to discern behind this

loose parapllrase a formal confession of belief in God the
Father, the Creaior of all things, and ChristJesus His Son,Who
suffered (this is surely the rnie sense of papwp+cai~.ros +v
~ a h i j vOpoXoylav) undtr Pontius Pilate, and will come again in
glory.1 The sltuation to which it belong 5vouId seem to be the
dactrinal preparation for bzrptism. A frgmentary creed of
similar Qpe is cited in 2 Tim.4 I asa mIernn adjui-iition:
I charge sou,
in the sight of God,
and of ChRst Jesus, Who is gaing to judge living. and dead,
and by His coming-again and His kingdom. . . .

Herc the Second Corning, usually included in the list oT saving

e.yIaits ascribed to Christ, appears as a mordinate artile or
faith.
-4 passage ~vitnessingto a binitarian formula of a slightIg
diferent type is Rorn. 4, 24:
because of us . . who bel iewe
on Hirn Who has raised
Jesus our Lord from the dead,
Who was delivered up for our transgessions
and was raised for our justification,

wher the creed-like note is unmistakable. Passages with

exactly the samr structure and content occur with g e a t frequency, as is shown by Rom. 8, I I ; n Cor. 4, "4;
Gal. r , I ;
For tha interpretarion cf. C. H.Turner in J.T.S. xxviri, 1927, 270 f. Perhaps
M. Dibrlius (Die Pa~toralbn'$e, 3rd d.rg55,68) wss right in thinking that e'wAohay;nv

may not havc stood in the original quoted by thr wricer. For p~ciprupr~w="suffrr",
cf. I Clmirnt5, 4: 5, 7.

to

Thesf-r. 1 0 ; Col. 2 , 12;andEph. i,zo.8orareth~confincd

St Paul. Thc authar of I P d ~ addrersa
r
his corrcspondents

(lY
21)

You who tlirough Him 1i.e.Jesus] beIieve on

God, Who has raised
Him fram the dead
and has given Him glory.

Jlqhateverwas the situation in which it took shape, it k clear

thnt 'W,Tfho ha raised the Lord Jesus from the dead" had
become a stereotyped ta? or clich before the third gpeneration of
the first century.
These comprise the cxamples of bipartite confessons in the
Ncw Testament to which appeal is generafly made. But they
Iiy no means exhaust the list : they can be abundantly rupplemented if the seasch for formulary elements is conduted on a
$vider basis. Pratically e v e q onc of St Paul's Eetter, for
example, o p w with thc con\,entional greeting, "Grau and
peace be to sou from Gad the Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ",' Evidentiy it .rsras a stock fom. Nor was it an idiosymrasy oF Pauline usage, Closely similar geetings Seature in
the Pastoral Epistles ( r E m , I , z ; 2 Tim. I , 2 ; Tit. I , 4) and
2 Pe&r (cf. I , I, "in the knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord ") ;
also in 2 Jn. I , 3 ("grace, rncrcy, peace from God the Eather
and Jesus Chrkt rhe Son of the Father"). -4~;ain,
the expres~ion
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ" had also harclcned into a stlircovped formula, as its use in Rom. r,, 6; 2
Cor. I , 3 ; 1 r , 31; E$/'. I , 3; r Pd, r , 3sho1vi.s.~
Itoriginal setting,
if we can judc from Rorn. I j, ~ i ("
j that you may unitedly with
alie mouth glorify God . . .") as well as from its frequent
~ r n p l o ~ r n eas
n t a bIessing, was probably liturgical. Apart from
such special contexts, however, numberles other passages serve
illwtrate the way in which thc mcn of the apostolic Church
acquiesced imtinctively in the coordhation of Father and Son.
I t \%'asalmost a cateqsry of their thinking. Thus Si Paul pra>T
in I Thess. 3, I I , " Slay our God and Father, and our Lord
Jesus Christ, make our way straight to you"; while in 2 Thess.
"

' Cf.Rom.r,~;iCo~.1,~;~Cnr.r,2;Gal.r,3;Eph,r,~(ctalsoG,r?~);
Phd. 1 ,
r,rr.
' 1%'.Bouqrct
in Jcssi$ &r Ilrrr, Gtiinqrn, 1916, JG ai.

2 ; 2 a s .

22

CREDAL BLEMENTS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

THE ORIGINAL PATTERN

r6 he expresses the hape that his correspondents may be

comforted and strengthened by "our Lord Jesus Christ and
God our Father". St James describes himself ( r , r ) as "the
servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ ", and St Peterm(r
Pet. 2, 5) ~ p m k sof "spiritua1 sacrifices acceptable to God
through Jesus Christ". The Apocalyptist too describes himself
(I, a) as having borne witness "to the word of God and the
testimony of Jesus Christ". The catalogue could be extended
alrnost indefinitely. The items contained in it, the reader
scarcely needs to be rcminded, are not creeds; but they are
highly significant as instantes of the codification of fundamenta1
theological ideas in the apostolic age, and they help to expIain
Lhe Iines aIong wliich creeds proper developed.
The binitarian schema, it is evident, ws deeply impressed
upon the thougllt of primitive Christianity ;so, it would appear,
was the Trinitarian. Explicit Trinitarian confessions are few and
far between; where they do occur, little can be built upon them.
The two most commonly cited are St Paul's prayer at the end of
2 Corinthians ( r 3, I+), "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and
the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be
with you ali", and the baptismal command put by St Matthew
(28, xg) into the mouth ofthe risen Lord, " Make disciples of a11
nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the
Son and of the Holy Spirit ". These are not the only exarnples,
however, of such formulae in the New Testament, aIthough
preoccupation with them has sometimes caused otbers which,
while pcrhaps less obvious, are in reality no less signifikant to be
overlooked. Amongst these may be reckoned I Cor. 6, r r, "But
you were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and in
the Splrit ofour God"; r Cor. 12,4 f., "There are varieties of
taIents, but the same Spirit, varieties of servie, but the same
Lord, and varicties of effects, but the same God Who effects
everything in everyone " ; 2 Cor. I, 2 x f., "It is God Whci confirms us along with you in Chrkt, Who h=. anointed us and
sealed us and given us the earnest of the SpiritjJ;and r Thess.
5, 18 f., "For this is the wiI1 of God in Christ Jesus for you :
quench not the Spirit ". The triadic schema is again clearly
visible in such a contcxt as Gal. 3, r I- I +, "It is obvious t11iat no
one is justified in the sight: of Gad by the law . . . Christ has

redeaed us from the curse of the Iaw . . . that you may receive
the promise of the Spirit through faith." An excellent instance
it is to be found in I Pet. r , 2 ,
. . according to the forem w l e d g e of God she Pather, by the consecration of the
spint, unta obedience to . . .Jesus Christ", and another in
H&. 10, 29, "OF how much worse vengeance will he be
thought worthy who has spurned the Son of God . . . and has
jnsulted the Spirit of grace? " A host o other passages stamped
w;th the same Iineaments might be quoted.1 In a11 of them there
is no trace of fmity so far as their wording is concerned, and
none of them constitutes a creed in any ordinary sense of the
tem. Nevertheless the Trinitarian ground-plan obtrudes itself
obstinately throughout, and its presence is a11 the more striking
because more often than not there Is nothing in Lhe context to
necessitate it. The impression inevitably conveyed is that the
conception of the threefold manifestation of the Godhead was
embedded deegly in Christian thinking from the start, and
provided a ready-to-hand rnould in whch the ideas of the
apostolic writers took shape. If Trinitarian creeds are rare, the
Trinitarian pattern which was to dominate a11 later creeds was
already part and parcel of the Christian tradition of doctrine.

2,

23

"'.

4. The Original Patt~xn

The preceding section has provided a survey, not necessarily
complete but sufficient for our purposes, of the credai elements
embodied in the New Testament. The reader should be wary of
drawing hasty or extravagant condusions, Often the words
"creed", "confession" and "formula" have been used to describe the material ;but they have been used loosely, for lack of
more precise designations. It cannot be too often repeated that,
in the proper sense of the terms, no creed, confession or formula
offaitli can be discovered in the New Testament, with the possible exception of such curt slogans as Kurios Isoxs, What is
manifest on every page is a cornrnon body of doctrine, definite
in outline and regarded by everyone as the possession of no
16 and 30; 1 Cbr. 2,
CC, e.g., Lk. 24, 49; Ronz. i , I-+;-fi, 1-5; 14, 1 7 f;
6, 13 R.; 1 2 , 3 ; 2 Cor. 3, 3 ; Ejh. r , 3; 1 , 1 1 - 1 9 ; I , 1 7 ; 2, 18-29;3,3-7;
3, '4-17;4,44;4,30-32;5,1&0;Phi~.3,g;Col. r,W;n%a.a,13-15; Tit.3,
4-6; t Ai. 4, rq; Jud. 2of. Thc c o m o 3 0 h m t ~ m (1I jrn. 5, 7 f. in the A.V.) i s
Ilot admissibIe as evidente, being a 4th cent. Spanish interplation.
1-16;

THE ROLE OF DECLARATORY CREEDS

CHAPTER

CREEDS XND BXPTISkf

r. Tlze Role of Declaratory Creeds
WE saw in the last chapter that a nurnber of situations in the life
of the apostolic Church lent thernselves to the prodution of
semi-formal onfessions of fait h. Brtptism, worship, preaching,
catechetical instruction, anti-heretical and anti-pagan poIemics,
exorcism-all t hese provided ocasions for givinq concrete expression, aIong lines determined by the iieeds of tlic moment, to
the cardinal articles of Christian belief. From any one, or ali, of
these, as the liturgy settled dowm in h e d moulds, s t e r e o t ~ e d
formuIarfe migbt be expered in duc course to demlop. In
point of fact they did develop from severa1 of them, as a n p n e
can discover at a glance who surreys the mass of sacramental
rites and services which have been handed do^% in the Church.
In this book, however, eur concern is not ~ 4 t hany and every
type offixed formulary, but with crceds in the teclinjcal acceptation af the word, such as the Apostlcs' Creed. Wliat we want to
ascertain is the environment in wl~ihdeclratosy statements of
faith like this originated and the motives which prompted
Christians to draw them up. And here we are confronted with
an all but univcrsally accepted anslvec. Creeds proper, it is
alIeged, rook their rise in connection w i t h the rite of baphm.
"'lt is indisputable ",remarked Hans Lietzrnann,i '"that the
mot of ali creeds iJ the formula oE befief pronounced by the b a p
tizand, or pronounced in his hearing and assenred to by him,
before his baptism."
This is a suhject which calls for rather careful examination.
There can bc no doubt (the argument of the present ~hapter
should serve to substantiate it) that creeds have, historica~l~
speaking, been intimately associated witli baptism. On any
Dls A@g# dcs GIa~benskkertrztni~~~~,
TUbingen, 1 9 ~ 1 225.
,
This short m a y
tormed part o1 a Fcsigabc presentcd to A. ron Harnack.
30

'

l~ew,moreover, it must be admitted that there was ao extremely

cloie connection between their formulation and the admission
ofneophutc~to the Church. But the precise kind of relationship
and &e exact character of the connection need to be defined. I t
i,
e';aSgeration to say that in the pat there have been considerable confusion and misunderstandhg on these poincs. The
kx-estigationwhich it is proposed to carry out in tkis chapter
wdl of necessity be somewhat cursory. But it should assist in
throu.ing light both on the emergence of credal formulae in the
church and on the ways in which they have hecn employed in
the baptismal liturgy.
Perhaps it will make a useful starting-point if we set down, in
aI1 its crudity, the popular theory of the relation between creeds
and baptism. I n thehr precnt form reeds are declaratory, that
i to say, they are short statements, ouched in the first person,
a s e h g beltief in a sdisct grotrp of facts and doctrines regarded
as vitallu important. Declasatory creeds of thi5 sart plav a recognEzed role in baptism as pnctised to-day. In the contemporary
Roman ritual, for exarnple, after the erernonie at the church
door, the priest conducts the party to the font and, as he p,
recites, along with the sponsors, &e Apostles' Creed and the
Lord's Praycr. So in the Eastern Churches,l after the exsuilation, or exorism of certain parts of the candidate's body, and
after his triple abjuration of Satan and triplc declacation of adhesion to Christ, he is biddcn to recite the Nicene, i.e. Constantbopolitan, Creed. Some such declaratory profession of faith, is
is cornrnonIy assumed, must aIways have fomed an eIement in
the service of baptism. TR fact, it was precisely the need for a
formal afirmation of belief to be rehearsed by the catechumen
at baprism whrch instigated the Church to invent cseeds in the
fim place. ?SShateverother uses they may have been put to in
course of hj~tory,the trae and original use of creeds, their
primar=ratjon d'rre, was to serve as iolemn afirmaom of faith
ia the context of baptismal initiation.
Bmadly speaking, and subject to certain reservations which
wil1 be mentioned later, this account is correct cnough so far as
concems the use of creeds in the fourth centuiy nd the long

,,

Cf., e.ga, I?. J. Goar, E4.yoA6yrov &c Rituale Frnecosum, Lutctiae Parisionim,

1647,338,

.?i2

THE ROLE OF DECLARATORY CREEDS

CREEDS, AND BAPTISM

33

perjod subsequent to it. T h e baptisma? liturgies, Easrern and

\Vestem, which have come dswn to us are jungle-Iike in their
comyifexity: their very variety, too, presents formidable obstacles to anyone who tries to hack his way throuqh them. But
the general ground-plan 1vh3ch they mkibit is fairly clear at
lcast as regards the candidate's a b a t i o n of his faitli. T ~ v o
momcnts, apparently, stand out in the ritual of baptism when he
rnight be espected to make his afimation. One ivas the very
act of being baptized, at thc c1irn.r of the 1%-hole
ccrernong. -4s
he stood in the watcr of the font, he tvas invited to assent to
three successive questions whether he bdieved in t hc Father, in
the Son and in the Holy Splrit. As he replied "I beIiev'j to
each of them, he ws plun,qed in the water, three times in all,
and his baptism was complet~.I n addition to this, however,
much earlier in the sei~ict:or even in the coursc of the ceremonies preparatory to tlie baptism itself, there was nnother
occasion when he was expected to afirrn his faith. This time ir
was not a case of asscnting to intcrrogations, but of reciting a
declaratory creed. It is this rite which was technically known as
the. "rendering" of the creed (Lat. redcfilio .rymtioli; Gk.
d a a y y d l a +S P ~ W T E W S ) , and which marked the culmination of
the catechetical training Icading up to the sacrament.1 At a
certain stage in the training (the exact date varied, but ir isnalized thrir transition to the superior grade of comprt~nk-sor
& ~ * r ~ ~ ~ v o
the
r ) bishop formally " deIivered " thc creed (chis
was the traditio $).mbolij to thc more adx-anced czstcchumenc. Jt
\\*as then thir busincss to lcrirn and assimilrite it. se as to be able
to reproducc it as tlieir olcn spirjtual pssession on t2ie cve of
t heir initiation. Tlic theon- wtis t hat the creed \vas a srcrct forniula ~rhichoulrl not Iici ii,rittcn down but must bc rnemoritcd
by the faithful. In many churIies there wouId secm to have
been more than onc reddition. TIis w7asthe case I I the
~ Eastz ;
and St AugustineGindicates t hat there was a preliminary reddition on the occasion of the delivery of the L o I + ~ 'Psayer,
s
i.e.
eight days after the delivcty of the creed. But in niost sites (she

Gallican was an exeption) a specially formal reddition was

provided for on t h e day of the baptism itself.
Some imprasian of how all this actually worked out can be
gained from thc picture of baptim as prartised in JenisaIcrn in
the rniddle of the fourth century ivhich has sunived ;R St Cyril's
Cntech~iicolh r u r r . s (deiivered ei ther in 348, when he was stiI1
a priest, at the h t a n c e of kjs bishop, or possiblyl after his 01rm
onsecration as bishop}. Thc prcliminaq- instniction took place,
ris eveq~vherein those days, throughout k n t , and at a cestain
point in the course of it (not directlg indicated, but probably at
the end of the Hlh week} the creed was defivered to the catechurnem.Vhe remaining; t\vo weeks before Holy Week were
occupied in expounding it. The baptism itselfwas adrninisrered
by night, on Easter Evc, and S t Cyril describesQow thc candidates were conducted into the forecourt of the baptistery
(r2 76v V ~ O ~ A C Or06
V /lamuparo o f ~ o v )and
,
there, turning
westwards, in four separate acts renounced Satan, his works, his
pomp and his worship. Then turning eastwards, towards the
region of light, they made their profession of faith, "I believe in
the Fatl~er,and in the Son, and in the Holy Spirit, and in one
baptkm of repeniance Wc may confidently surmise tIiat this
represents nn abridgement of the more detased formula whih
Si Cyril had commcntd on lausc by dause, but which he may
Eiave felt somc cornpunction about setting dolm. Their next
step was to enter the baptistery proper, wAere they stripped off
their clotlies, nere anointed with exorcized o2 and descended
naked into the water-tank. Here thev wwe sererally asked
whether they belie~edin the name of the Father and ofthe Son
and of the HoIy Spirit, and as they made their "satnq confession (+v (7w*7jpmv 6pmhVlav} " in reply thev were plungcd
three times in the water. St Cyrii's account is confimed and
suppIernented by that d the Aquitanian lady Etheria, who
ahout forty yean later visited Jenisalern and macle a tour of the
holy places, noting d o m liturgical and ecclesiastical practices
wi th devout curiosity. She reports4 that the catechumens had

For this riie in the fourtli century cf. Pcrrgria. Eiher.46 (Geyer, 97 f.) ;S i I-filary,
dt Jyn. gr (P.L. 10, 545) ; St Augiistine, Confes~.8, 2, 5 (P.L.32, 7511.
CF.L,Duchesne, Gh~isfianIVordzip (Eng.rrans. 1931),~332.
Sym. 59,. r ; 2 I 3, 8 (P.L. 38, 4riir ; r064 f.). Cf. L. Eisenhofcr, Hnndbucli de,
f i t ~ l r ~ c h Lrlurgik,
m
Freiburg im Brcirgzu, I 933, 11) 249 r-

Sa J. Madcr, Der h!. Cyri!Eus mn J~rusalcm,Einsiedeln, 1891,z f.

& i . 5, .ts! (P.G. 33, 320 E.).
For I his account see Cri. 1 t), 1-9 and 20, 2-4 (P.G.33, 1&8 R: and 1077 K),
which S t Cyril delivered to thr: newly baptized ir1 the following Easter wcck.
I'irtgrin. Etkr. 46 (Geyer, 97 f.).

Lib.

'

"'.

'

fG
CREEDS A N D BAPTISM
creed from altcraiion. St Augustine, too, teus a stosy which
brings out the spectacular, alrnost dramatic character of' the
"rendcring ofthe creed" at Rorne. Recalling the baptism of the
famous convert Victorinus, he reveais that Roman catehumens
on thc point of being baptized were expected to recite the creed,
in a set form of wards which they had memorized, From a lofty
position (de loco minefiffore)in fuI1 view af the congregation,Qo
St Leo, in a sharp Ictter to PaIestinian rnonks whosc ChrktoIogical i-icw he considered to have gone grievously astray, rebukes thernvor forgctting "the salutary creed and confcssion
which you pronounced in the preence of many witnesses".
None of them, unfortunateIy, lets us into the secret of the precise
point in the liturgy at which thEs impressive scene was enacted.
Thc gap i$ filled, however, by the extremdy interesting discussion of the arrangements for the catechumenate penned by
the Rornan deacon John about 5 0 0 . ~Here it is clearly stated
that the recitation of the Apostles' Creed fell outside the atual
rite of baptism, before the anointing of the Ef~fn.
Though it seem to hm-e Iorrmed larger at Rorne thn elservhere, this solemn selirarsal. or reddition, of the creed before
baptisrn was unit~rsallyobsewed in the WTest.It Tvas treated as
the occasion for a special semon, and a number of such &Ecourses have come down to us. St Au.gustine tatifies to the importance it assurned In Mrica. Not that he suggests that it was
&e only, or even the most prominent, affirmaton of faith at
baptkm. The declaratory recital of the ereed, as his referentes
to it make plain, was the concluding stage in ine catechumenate,
whereas the confession at the rnornent of baptism was in the
form of answers to interrogation. It was the same in other
Western churches. For example, the fourth-century treatise De
Sacramenlis, which consists of six short addresses derivered by a
bishop (almost certainly St h b r o s e kimself)4 to the newIy
ConBss. 8,n (P.L. 32, 751).
Eb. ina ad rnomk. Pdaut. I P.L. ~ a I o67
. , El.
,
EB. ad ~ m l ~ r i u4m(P.
I.. 59, 4 0 2 ) .
Thc view rhat i t cnnsistr of notes of addresses of S t Arnbrme's taken down by
a notnriw, put forward by F. Probst (Liturgic hvierten Jahrltunde~ts, Munstcr, 1893,
232 ff.), has becn widely acceptcd. Cf. G. Morin inJahrbuch fUrLitur.~cwi~st>ts~h?~l
viii, rgzB, 8 6 1 0 6 , and Doni R. H.Connolly's privately published pamphlet, T h
de $ a c r m n t i s , a w r k n f A m b r o ~ Downside
~,
Abbey, 1q42.For the text ser P.L. 16,
A',.

THE ROLE OF DECLARATORY CREEDS

37
baptized, and which clairnsl to follow Rornan models as far as
possible, reproduces the interrogatjons in detai1. According to
jtJ the candidate entered tlie font and renouncd, first, the devil
and his works, and then the world and its pleasures.2 Then rhe
spcakci- soes on to recall :
You iwre questioned, "Dost thou believc in Crod the Fattier aImighty?" You said, "I klieve", and wtre irnrnersed, rliat is, were
buried. Again you were asked, " Dast thou believe in ous Lord Jesus
Cfirisr and His cross?" You said, " I believe ", and were immersed.
Thus you were buried along ~ 4 t h
Christ ;for he whe is buried along
with C h i s t rim again with Him. A thrd time you were asked,
'+Dostthou believe d s o in the Holy Spirit?" Irou said, "I belier-e",
and a third time were immersed, so that your threefold confession
rciped out the rnadioId faailings of your earlier liie.S

The closely related wosk of St hmbrrise, thc DPrnysten'i~,~

which
s e e m to be largely dependent on the De sacramentir, gives a
similar account, mentiorhp tthe renunciation of "the devi1
and his ~%-orks,
the world and its l m r y and pleanires" after the
candidate has entercd the b a p t i s t e ~ ,and brieflv recalling,"in
language throwing the three separate answers into hip;h relief,
his affi-ations of belief in the Father, the Son and the Holy
Spirit. It is probably this act of faith which St Leo had in mind
when he remarked,' "at our regenertion , . ~ v renounce
e
the
devil and express our beliefin God", and again,g "He i not in
agreement ~4th
God who is out of harmony with the profession
he made at his regeneration, and who, unrnindfu2 of the dil-ine
contract, is fowd remaining attached to what he renounced
whilc departing from what Iie said he believed ".
A pIace is given to both types of profession in the Gelasian
Sacramentary, which is considered to rcflect Rornan Iitrrrgical
practice in the skth century. Here the renunciation of Satan
appears, as we might expect, ai an early point in the sepvicc,
and is carried out with the thrice-repeated cry "I renounce
(abrenilniio) Then comes the creed in its decIaratory form. As
child baptism was by now a11 but universal, the lubri enjoins it

".

3,

2.

I , 2.

16, 389-410. The Ambrosian authorship, dnpite

~owgcschichic,
h

1"

' P.L.

' 2, 7.

F, LooFs (LntJadm der

4th d.,
Halle, i g d , Q ~ O ) is
, sccurely rstablished.

' S m . 63,6 (P-L. 549 3571.

?kn. 66,3

(P.L.51, 366).

39

CREEDS h N D BhPTTSal

THE ROLE OF DECLARATORY CREEDS

to bc said t y t11c pricst with his Iiand ori the childr-en's hcacls.1
A11 thjs happens oiitside the acnial baptistery, and ic followcd hy
a series of prayers and liturgical acts. Tlien ia the baptistcry tlie
font is elaborately blessrd, and thc riihric continues:"

actual service, succeeded in establishing itself securcly in the

baptismal liturgy itself. Thus far the popular theory whose
credentials we are exarnining may be considercd to have justified itself.
The waming was given, however, at the beginning that its
vindication, even so far as concerns the period subsequent to the
fourth centurv, ~vouidh a ~ to
e be subject to certain reservations.
The first of these is that, for the early centusies at any rate, the
declaratory creed was not the onlv Ror the most significant
pmfession made at baptism. The "questions on faith (inferrogaiiont~ JWe) " and the answers to t hcm, as we havc sem, onstituted another. Zndeed, formin~as they did the kernel oF the
rite, it h- hard to escape the suspicion that the avawal oF belief
ivhich they ensbned wa-: regarded as the cssential one. This is
in fact borne out bv much of the Ianpage m e l by tvriters beIonging at a11 e\-entsto t h e earlier section of our period. St C)Til
of Jerusalem, for m'rample, uses the ~ w r d s 1'"-ou confessed the
sating onfasion fWpLOX~~uu~~
T$P m ~ f t f p c o vOpohcylav) " of the
declaration of belief made at briptkm, and it is the answers to
the "questions ou faith" that he lias in mind. In the ApostoLical
C~nstitutiorrs2the designation "confmsion of baptiqrn " par exselImce i applied to thern. So, too, thc grcat wveiqht attached by St
BasiI3 and other Greek fathers to the trip3e irnrnersion and the
triple interrogato. carifession bound up with it suggests that
for them this was the onfersion which stood out. It was the same
in the 'I\'est. St Augustine, for exarnple, inquires,4 "FIrho is
unaware that it is no true Christian haptisrn if the evangeIicaf
words of which the symbol conslsts are missing?"; and elsewhere Gpeaks of "the necessary interrogat ion frarned in a few
words". IR the GaElican ritual, as we have seen, this was the
only profession offaith made on the actual day of haptism.
And this leads us to a durther point undcrlining the secondary role ofdeclaratory creeds. They were not rcaily part oSthe

38

After the lilcssi tig of t l ~ cfont you hiiptize each onc of diem i n oi-dri.
you ask thcm tl~csequerions (sub h inimagniiones), "Dosi tliou
helieve in God ihe Pather alrniqhty ?" Resjp. "I he1iec.c." "Dost thou
belicve also i t i Jesus Clirist His only Son our Lord, li710 was horn
and suffered? " Rt.r)I. " X helicvc." "Dost thou tielieve also in the
Holv Spirit, r h holy
~ Churcli, the remi~sionof sim, thc rtfsurrction
of the f l d - ~ ?" RPJ,~.
" I l~elicve."Then at each t m yc?u piunqe hirn
three times in t h? w t e r (deirde Jdr ringu!ac rices mergis mrn tmfio In

as

u p aj

This 1135 bcen, of n e c e s s i ~ a, rapid and incomplete reliew of

a confusinq array of cvidrncc. TEiere is no tsk in the field of
Iiturgt ir-hich dcscn~crhipher priorir- to-day than the sorting
out of the baptismal and assoiated rite_.. and the elaboration of
a constmctiic thcriy of their evofution. 'Il%at has been said'
ho~i-cvcr,should bc suficient to prove that declaratory creeds
Iiad an asured position in the baptiFmd senice (understanding
this in the widcst sensel at any ratc from the fourth century. It
can even he clnimed tlirit thcir importance becomcs progrecsii.eiy en hanccd . T r i t lic Eastern Churchm the questions and
answers at t hc rnorncn t o f baptism erentually disappcared : ai1
that remainccl was the ttiplc sprinkling 14rh the 1%-ord
"So and
so is baptizcd in t hc nnme ".ctc. The C:onstantinopolitan Creecj
after thc abjuraiion of tlie devil is the on1:- pprofession of faitIi
which survivcs in the sen-ice, aiid i& form js of course dccIaratory. IR the West t his rivcr I~nppcnecl,thoug-h occasiona1 hints
rop up that itht irnportancc oi" the questions and ans~t-crs
climinishcd ( e . ~ .they rnight somctirncs be dispcnsed with in the
case ora sick baptizand Gho had alrcady recited thc declarntory
creed),3 and in the end tiiey werc detachccl from tlic immersions. Hcrc too, howevcr, thc dcclaratory creed, ihe recitation of whicli hacl in olden clays often taken place niitsicle thc
Cf. H. A. Wilson, T h e Gelasian Snrramcnkay, Oxford, 1894,79.
Cf.op. cit. 8fi.
Cf. t I i e Icttrr nf Si FuIqcntiiis oi"Iiuspe (first halrofsixth entury) to Fcrrandus
(E$. i n , r + : P.L. Gg, 386).

Cot. 20,4 (P.G.33, 1080).

tl. 7, 42 (Punk,448).
CriDt.Sp. ~ m ! 15,
o 35 (P.G.
32, 132). AlsnSt Grw. Kae., Or.40, qr (P.C. 36,
71, and Sk Grrg. N~sY.,
Orab. in Irnpt. Chri-rti (P.C.46. 585).
De bopf.con. Don. 6.47 (P.L. 43, 814).
L Ibid I, 13 ( P . L . 4 3 , r a r ) . C F . a l ~ r i U e / i d . r t o p . g ,rq.(P.L.qu,2n56}andEp.g8,
5 (P.L. 33, 361 f.).

42

CREEDS

why delay? Get up, bc ba~tized,and wash arvay your sins, calling on His name." I n Bcts, moreover, as in other books of the
New T ~ t a m e n t ba~tisrn
:
is described as being administered "h
the name rif the Lord Jesus": acording to J f i f t . 28, 19 and
Bidathe 7 t was in the threefeld narne. It has been canjectured
that a declaration of belief must liave been forthcoming corresponding to this f o r m u l a ~ ,and the onjecture s abundantly
borne out by the Churh's practice in regard to the formulary in
succeeding gencrations.
Therc: are sug!gestions eIsewhcre in the New Testamcnt of an
affirmat ion offai ih made at baptisrn. I Pft. 3, 2 r is olten citecl in
this coninection, but the true rneanir~g1 of ihe words uuirr8rjrr~w
dya8fjs g l r p w v ~ ~ a4 s PFV may sirnply bc "a request to God for
a good
:c". On the other hand, it is highly probable,
as was 1
iut in the pre~louschapter, that St Paul's remark."
confes Jwus as Lord with your rnnuth, and
belicve i
~ c a r that
t
God ha raised Him from the dead",
should t
:d to baptisrn : if so. %\*eprobably have a fragment of me oaprismaI confession as wl1. The actual codession
made s e e m to be overt3y rnenticined in r Tim. 6, 1 2 (+i?~ a ) c $ v
OFrolioyr'av), as well as in H ~ b r4,
. I 4 (" I,et us hold fast our conf e s s i o n - ~ ~ a ~ W r+js
~ m OpoXoylas ") . Anotiler interesting passage,
sornetirn.es overicd e d , is Eph. I , 13," Jn Whom having believed
you weri:sealcd ~ i t the
h Holy Spirit ofprornise" : belief, and so,
~ 1 1- .
wc are e ntiircu
LO infcr, some verbal rnnnirestation of it, precede
baptism.
'These and other passages (there is no need to cover the
familiar .vound in dctail) substantiate thc: hypothesis that a confession oif- farth
lally espccted at baptism at tlre time
Ir
.ents qucited tvcre written. 3ut they do not bv
ns necesr:itate-a: nd thk is what prirnarily conccrns usr
. rvas rn form dcclaratoy. The account of the
rnar rne comessron
eunuch's baptism stands aIarie in sug,ccstiny that it was: the
other tests can a11 be interpreted with equd success ;is postulatine a simple assent to questions acldressed to the candidate.
When ,e turn to the farnous description of baptism ~ i v e nby
r:

' '

'

-- Cf.
. .G. Kittel's 73. W.Z.N.T.,s.v. i P w ~ w(11,686). But seeK. Lnkt in H.E.R.E.
AI, 384b, and E. G. Scywyn. T h F i r ~EpistfeoJSt
t
Pctw, 1946,ad Ioc.
Rum. to, g .

THE BAPTISMAL IPJTERROGATIONS

A N D BAPTlSM

43

1 abliout the middle o the second century, our doubts

regarding the dedarato- form of the confession demanded are
reinforced. Kc remarks :

St Justin

,
I

I
1

AI1 thosc .rs*lizi Prab-e been convinced a i d who believe that our
instruction and our mesagc are true, and prornisc that they are able
to live accordinq to them, are dmonished to pray and with fasting
to beseech God for pardon for their past sins; and lve pray and fast
with &em. T h c n they are conducted by us to a place where them is
water, and are reborn with a form of rebirth such w tve have ourselves undergone. For they rcc:eivc a Iustral washing in the water
in the name of the Fa.ther and Lord God of tlic univeise, and af
our Saviour Jesus Chirisi, and or the Holy Spjrit. . . . Over him
who has elected to he reborri: aild has repciiicd oC his sim tthc
liame of thc Father and Lorcl God of tlie universc is namcd, thc
officiant who leads the candiciatr to ttie rvatcr using ihis, and only
this. dscription of God. . . . The name ror this lustra1 bath is
hteach"edightenment". the idea b-ing that t?lose tvho
is i n the
ing are enliqhtened in t h ~ i riinciertandiiny. 1101
ilate, and
I
name of jsus Christ, \'i7ho \\-as rucihietI under
- in the namc of the Holy Spirit. 'lt-hothrough the prophets announced
befordiand the t h l n g relatin~to Jesus, that the man who is enlightened is washed.
. .

Plainly S t Jlustin's (zhurch had orderIy arrangements for instructing coinverts in Christiarn doctrine and 6or satisfying itseIf
that they ha d propei-1y absor bcd it. But in spi t c oF the frequent
--J
-mauc LU FZLUHbCl uct one, there is no
attempts whicn nave. 1.ueen
unambiguous allusion here to a declaratory baptjsrna1 creed.
That oiie may have been uttercd is conceivable, but StJustin's
lan,gage seems rnuch more onsistent ivith a profession of faith
in the f o m of answ
questianinaire. .A rcvealing light k
ire hy hllr casual r.emark that it wtas
throwrn on the actud
the officiant who prunounced the 1 1 ~ 1 r i cu.-i.r God the Father
(which prcsumably implies that he also used the tvosds "Jesus
Christ, FVho was crucified", etc., aud "the Holy Spirit, ltTho
announced", etc.). Tt is verv rinlikely that tvhat i? here referred
ze thcc in tlie name of",
to is a fnrmu2a oF b aptism (
ver\
and is not at all likely
it
canna
etc.), partly because
that such forrnulae werc in ust. a r Lhis earljr date, and inore
'

L-

ii_iiiCi-i.-

---e

.-a

\4I)inl.

r . 6r (E.J.G., 70

r.). T h e book was wriiien at Rome.

4.4
CREEDS AND BAPTfSM
decisively because when they did come into use they were much
briefer than the ones suggested bere would have been. The suspicion is unavoidable that what St Justin had in mind was a
series of interrogations about belief similar to those which we
observed to be a regular feature in later baptismal rites.
Tertullian is a writer from whom we should naturally expecf
usefuI inforrnation on the subject of baptismal creeds. He wrotc
a full-length treatise concerned whol ly with baptism (defending
it against detractors, it must be admitted, rather than delineating its ritual), and his works abound in illuminating glimpses of
baptismaI procedure. Yet here, too, popular assumptions about
the rclationship bctween declaratory creeds 2nd baptism fail to
find confinnation. Kattenbusch observedl long ago that the
ceremony of "sendering the creed", the chief occasion for a
declaratory profession of faith and so conspicuous a feature in
later African and Rornan usage, had apparently no place in his
accounts of the adrninistration of the sacrament. To judge by
the hurried recapitulation of what happened given in Da
~ o r o n a the
, ~ liturgy passed straight from the renunciation of the
devil in the Iiiody of the church to the threefold questions and
imrnersions in tlie baptistery. Nowhere, indeed, is a declaratory
creed unmistakably hinted at. On the other hand, whenever he
has occasion to refcr to the Christian's afirmation of his faith at
baptism, he does so in Ifanguage ~vhichharrnonizef much more
easily wiih the assent given to a questionnaire than with a
declaratory profmsion. Severa1 times he employs the mctaphor
of a soIdier of the imperial army taking his military oath.3 There
must have been a dose pardlelisrn between the procedures involved, and sincc the soldier's oath was generally rehearsed in
his hearing while he simply indicated his assent, the obvious
deduction is that much the same must have happened at baptisrn. There is a well-known sentence in his treatise De spectmulis4which points to the sarne onclusion : "When we entered
the water and affimed the Chrisrjan faith in answer to the
words prescribed by its law (in legis suue verba prqtemur), we
testified with our lips that we had renounced the devil, his pomp
11, 60-62.
Ch. 3. (C.C.L. 11, 1042 f.).
a Cf. Ad mart. 3 ; De cor. 1 1 (C.C.L. I, 5 ; 11, 1056).
"h. 4. (C.C.L. 1, 2 3 1 ) .

THE BAPTISMAL TPITERROGATTONS

45

and his angels." The passage from the De coronn rvhich has already been referrcd to is similar in its bearing: "Then we are
three times imrnersed, making a somewhat fuller repIy thaii the
Lord laid down in the gospel (amplius aliquid respondentes quum
Dominus in euangclio determinaoit).'Yt is just possible to extract
from this an allusion to a deciaratory creed pronounced at the
rnoment of irnrnersion, but the singularity of such a profession
at this point in the service makes the interpretation far-fetched.
The "reply" is much more naturally understood of the baprizand's responses (probabiy, as in the later liturgies, a curt " I
believe'" to the oficiant" three interrogations, each one of
which was by nnow fuller and longer than the simple formuIae
implied in the Lord's cornmand in Matt. 28, 19.That this was
the procedure famiIiar to Tertullian is shown by Iiis remark
eIsewhere,l "Por we are baptized, not once but thrice, jnto the
three persons severally in answer to their severa1 names". The
weight he attached to these respanses can be inferred from
another staternentz of his to the effect that "the sou1 is bound,
nor by the washing, but by ihe candidate's answer".
- The only conclusion a Iair-minded critic can d r a w v s that
Teitullian knew nothing of a declaratory creed used in baptism.
No one accustomed to working through early baptismal liturgies
can doubt that the sole creed he would have acknowledged was
the baptizand's assenting "I be1ieve''iin answer to the questions
put by the baptizer. A remarkable confirmation of chis is provided by the Apostolic Tradition, written about 2 r 7 by St Hippolytus and probabIy reflecting Rornan liturgical prarice at the
end oF the second and the beginning of che third century.
Among the most precious features of this document is the detailed account it furnishes of the atechumenated and of the
baptismal service.5 Nos only is there no mention in a11 this of the
tradition orreddition of the creed, but thcre is not the slightest
suggestion of a declaratory creed to be found in the genuine
1.

Adv. Prax. 26 (C.C.L. 11. 11~81.

De r e m . rnort.'@ (c.c.~. 6sgj.
' It was drawn hy Kattenbusch in tbe passage referred to above. The case w a ~
well re-argued by F. 3. DoIger in Antike und Christentran iv, 1933, 138ff.
Ch. xvi-n in the edition of G. Dix (Landon,1937).
ti Ch. xxi. Cf., e.g., the discussion by H. Lietzrnann in Z.N.T. W . xxvi, 1927,
i6 K The orieinal Greek of the Trnbtwn i s l o ~ t :it suniives in Latin (only fragkentary), ~ahydic,Ethiopian and Arabic vmions.
e

IE

47

CREEDS AhiD BAPTYSM

THE B A PllS5fAL IVERRQGATIOSS

test. :I cteed which is delaratory in farm can be read in the

Ethiopic and Sahidic versions, but rxperts are satisfied that it i
a late intruder into the text.' The only profession offaith in fact
required is apparently the one which tlie candidate rnakes as he
stands naked in the water, I t conforms to the pattern which
should now be familiar to readers :

hoIy Ghurch?" the qucstion the? put is a lyinq one, for thcy do not
p s e s s the Church. . . .

46

The rvozd "syrnbol" in this passage has often been taken to refer
to a decIaratory creed. Yet "to baptize wjth the creed", in the
scnse of a dcclaratery creed, is an cxtraordinary, not to say iimpossible, manner of spcaking : at no point in the history of the
baptismal liturgl: was the declaratory cseed conceivcd of as
playin~this role. It shouM be obvous 1 that in this context
'' symbol'hnd "baptismaE interrocation" cover much the same
g o u n d , "symbol " possihIy- includ inq the irnrncrsions as ~\.ellas
ttie tripIe interr-rogation.~In a latcr letier3 iincludcd in the
Cyprianic collection, Si: Cyprian's correspondent Fimilian
relates how st crazed wsrnan hacl the ternerity to baptize people :

And when he who is to he baptized gom down to the water, Iet

him who baptizes Iay hand on him saying thus, "Dost thou belicvc
in God the Father dmighe;?" And he who is being baptized shall
say, "I believe". Let him forthr\ith baptize hirn once, haiing hk
hand laid upon his head, And afta this let him say, "Dost thou
believe in Christ Jesus, the Son of God, Who was born by the I-Ioly
Spirit from the Virgin Mary, Who was cmcified under Pontius
PiIate and died, and rose again on the third day living from ttie
dead, and ascendcd into thc heavens, and sat down on the right
hand of ihe Father, and wilI come to judge thelivine and the dead ? "
And when he says, " I believe", lei hirn i i a>~t ize him thc second time.
And a p i n let hirn say, ' D o s t thou believt: in the Holy Spirit,in the
holy Church, and the resurrerion of the ff esh?"Anr1he who iis bcing
baptized shaN say, "1 brlieve." And so IIet. nLm iiaptize hirn Zhe

Among the other dcceptions bv which s l ~ etook rnultitudes in, she

had the face to pretend that she was sanctifying; Gread by a trernendous invaca&n and was celebrating the eucharist . . . and
bapuzed rnany, mlnq rhc customar). and established xvords of the
interrogation [ Im'tuto e3 Ie-qitimu wrbo inferro.poiionis usri@nr), so that
she miqht not appear to deliate at a11 frcim thc ruie of the Churh.
What then are w-e to sal about Iier baptizing . . .? Surely Stephen
and his supporters must approve ir, espccialy as neither the symbol
ot. the Triniry (gmzbohm T~initatis)nor the cstablished and churchly
inten-ogation was Iacking.

- .
v

third time.

The realization that this threefold affirmation oF the baptizand onstituted, for Tertullian and St Hippolytus, the sole
baptismal confession should enable us to read certain important
third-century feuts with unclouded eyes. S t Cyprian, for exarnple, argued forcefuily in onc of his lttters%against the Novat i a ~ s heretics
t
and their daim to posses a valid baptkm:

Here again it is inappropriate to translate "syrnbol of the

Triniv" as a dedarator). creed: it is more natural to take the
tvords as referrins to the baptkrnal qucstions,P or perhaps to the
questions in thc setting of the triple irnrnersion.5 The passage
brings out with extrcme clarity thc ovesriding role of "the customary and established words of the questioning"'. Tf further
proof of this were required, one need only cite the pathetic story
related by Dionysius of Alexandria in a Ietter fi to Pope Xystus
about the man ~ v h ocarne to him in great distress: he had Emself been baptized in heretical circles, and had just witnesed a

But ifanyone in opposition should ontend that Novatian observes

the same law as the Catholic Church observes, baptizes with the
same symbol (eodem symbolu) as we, aknowledges the same God the
Father, the same Chnst Hi Son, the same Holy Spirit, and that he
has tht power to baptize bccause he does not seem to deviatie from
us in the baptismal interrogation-xvhoevcr thinks that this contention shodd bc put fonvard should realize in tlic first plaie that
the schismatics and w e do not have onc and the sane Iaw r,.+- +L*
,,,,
symhol and onc and the same interrogation. For when they say,
"Dost thou helieve in remission of sim and life eterna? through the

' CF.R. H. Connolly in3.T.S. xxv,

C

.@. fig, 7 (Harirl I , 756).

1924,

132

f.

'.

i
I

S e thc hrirf but nccliciit rrrnarks of O . Cascl in j'uhrbtrrhfr Lirinnrdkm-

~hoft
? CL
ii, H.
1922,
.J. Carpenrera33f.
3.7.S.xliii. 8942, ;r.
a EP. 73, in-I r (Hartrl 1. R i jt).
4 ~ f O.
. Casd. DP. cir.
L Cf. H. J. ~ a h n t e rop.
, it.
i Quotcd by Euscbius, H&. cccl. 7 , g (Schwartz, 276) a

50
CREEDS AND BAPTISM
baptisrn in the formulation oP so-caIled baprisrnal creeds. The
discussion aras mainly taken up with their use in the liturw of
baptism, but we should now be in a more fa\-ourable position to
tackIe the real issue before us. The s t r i h g fact has been brought
to light that for the first few centuries at any rate the only creed,
if creed is the iiglit designation for it, directly connected with
baptism was the baptizand's assent to the minister's questions
regarding I-iis beliefs : even when they forind their niche within
tlie liturgy, the function of declaratory creeds proper long remained secondary.
What, then, shall we say of the origin of these brief statements
oF belief couched in the first person? I t should be obvious that a
&der background must be sought for them than the actual ceremony of haptism itself. Their roots Iie not so much in the
Christian's sacramental initiation into the C w h as in the catechetical training by wrhich it was preeded. Delaratory creeds,
conceived in the setting of their orig;inal purpose, ivere compendious summaries of Christian dacsrine compiled for the
benefit of converts underg-oing instruction. The German scholar
A. Seeberg wras w ~ i k along
i ~ ~ sound lines when he state:i
"The primltive Chrktian creeds are simpIy and solely the reapitulation, jn a fomuIa based upon the Trinitarian g~oundplan, of the basie catechetical verities." Our own English
historian C. H.
put the same point in different words :2
"The creed bcl
t indeed to the administration of the rite
of baptism, but LU irie preparation for it."
We saw in the first chapter that even at the New Sestament
stage the Church's cenlaI message, the kernel of its doctrinal
deposit, was beginning to harden into semi-stereo-ed
patterns, and that atecheticl instniction was one of the fieIds in
whkh this proccss was earliest in getting under way. The proess ivas in fll wing in the second century, and in the next
chapter \\:e shall be passing in reviexv some of the forms in
which the "rule of faith" or "canon of the tnith", as it carne to
be called, found expression in that period. It i obvious that
teachem must lwys have felt the need for concise summaries,
approxirnating as closcly as possible to formuIae, and that the
Dcr Katechimus der Urchristenhtit, Lcipzig, 1903, 271.
%i Use of Cwch and Annlhmas in the Early Chiirch, London, 2 ed

I gr O, I 7.

THE GATECHETICAL SETTI'IG OF CRGEDS

I
I

I
I

5r

increasingly elaboratc and oficial clrarricter af the Church's

arranfements for kstructioi~must h a ~ emadc the need a11 the
more urqent. TWhat i stqnificnnt is that when w e first come
across deciaratoq* creeds, their cspres purpose is to siibseme
the ends of popular imtniction. TYtien the bi~lrophas " handed
out" thc creed in the later weeh of Lent, hc procceds to comment on it clause by clause. while tlie catecl~umemare required
to learn it hy heart as a convenient synopsis of what they are in
duty bound to believe. Similarly they arc espcctcd to "ive it
back" on the eve of their baptism, their alsility to recite it being
a demonstration that they are now sufficiently grounded in thc
faith. This original function of creeds, as well as their later role
in the servicc of baptism itself, is well illustratcd by the words
writh which Eusebius of Cacsarea prefaced the creed which hc
?roduced at the rouncil oT Sicaea ~ r l t ha view to his ductrinaI
rehabi1itation:l 'cL4swrehave received from the bishops before
us, both in our atechetical training and when xi;e received the
Saptimai bath . . . so \\?enowrbeliet-e and bring our fith forward to you."
Declaratory creeds mal; therefore be regarded as a by-produt
of the Church's fully developcd catechetical: system. At the same
time, as Eusebius's rernark helps to remind i ~ s ,the trditionnl
bridge. joining them to baptism should not bc ruthZessly dernolished. I t would be false as well as rnisleadinq to minirnlze the
connection between them: it was in fact cxtremely intimate.
The catechetical instruction of wkich declaratory creeds were
convenient summaries wa instruction with a view to baptism.
The catechumen was a11 thc time lookinq forward to the great
experiente which wouId set the crown upon a11 his intensive
preparatory effort. So rlosely did the catechetical instruction
dcivetail into the ceremony of initiation rchih I\-= tta be its
dirnax tiiat the single word baptiFq i~ an extended sense, could
be used to cotTerthem both taken together, Tfzus St Lrenaeris
could s p e a k b f "the rule of the rruth . . ichich he received
through baptiqrn (SL&TOG ~am&rPa-i-os)
". Furthermore, the catechetical preparation wa dominated by those features of the

Cittd by St Athanasius in ihc appendir to De decrct. N i c . ~ y n .(for the text, sec

Si 20, 1535 ff: also Opitz, Urk. r?).
Adu. hacr. I , g, 4 (P..7,545).

52
CREEDS AND BAPTiSM
impending sacramat which constituted its essence, the threefold interrogation with the thrcefoId =sent, and the threefold
irnmersion. Consequently the instruction deiiberately aimed
(some illurninating iIlustrations will be found in St Irenaeus's
handbook, the Epidcixisl) ai elucidating and expounding the
three aspects of the Divine Being in Whose triune name the baptism was to be accomplished, and the catechetical surnmaries
w-hose formation it pmmpted were inettitably cast in the Trinitarian modd. Left to thernselves or to other influentes, catechetical summaries might well have evolved aIong quite
diflerent lines. There were powerful tendencies in the early
Church to~vardsthe production of ssingle-clause or two-clause
fomuIations of the faith; but the impact of the baptisrnal comrnand, not to rnention the intrinic genius of Chistianity, ~ v a s
deiive. Finallv and most irnportant, over and above the
Trinitarian framework, tlie verbal content of the new declaratory creeds was in large measure borrowed from the baptisrnal
interrogations. These latter thernselves had by the thfm century
become, as Tertullian had occasion to obsewe,2 sornewhat fuller
than the Lord's command might seem ta have warranted, and
the additionat material had been derived from the atechctical
stock-in-trade. When declaratov creeds carne to be developed,
the influente was in thc reverse direction. New dauses might be,
and were, considered necessary, and other alterations rnight
have to be introduced. But the basis on which they were construeted normally consisted of the ancient baptisrnal questions
linked together as a continuous statement and couched in the
first ptrson.
A striking illustration of the close ties binding declaratory
creeds, despite their catechetical proverlance, to the baptisrnal
liturgy is provided by the narne which cventually carne to be
applied to them, h t in the ?tTestand later irz the East as weP1,
This name was "symbol" :gmbolum in Latin and m'p@ohov in
Greek. There is a weLl-knovn passage of Tertullian3 which k
1

Cf. cspecially Ch.6,7 , ioo (in the edition ofJ. Amitage Robins~n,London,
where he dwells on the "thnee ~ o i n t s "or "ariiclw" o f Christianity.
Dr ror. 3 {C.C.L,11, 1042).
Adc. Marc, 5 , I (6.C.L. I. 664).

19203,
a

THE NASfE

I1
,

S\3lBOLV%I"

53
oftcn quoted as supplying the first allusion to tliis desipation nf
the creed. I n liis hectoring way he is chatlImging; rhe heretic
Marcion, tvho liad made a fortune as a sliipmaster in rhe Black
Sea, to show what right he had, in view of his rejetion of the
Old Testamcnt and Aets, to acept SEPaul a an spostle. " I
should like you to infom us," he jeers, "ship-captain from Pontus, with what warrant (quo symboio) you have takcn the Apotlt
Paul on board your vessel?" The word ~ r n b o l u mhere means no
more than tlie documcntary authority for embarking a passenger, but some have suspected that Tertullian's choice of it
was suggested by its use as a title of the creed. This is most unlikely,l however, for Tertullian cannot have the creed ir~mind :
hls appeal is to the Scriptures tvhich Marcion had refued to
recognize. Apart Gom this, the earliest \Vestem instance of this
use of symbobm is agreed to be tbe sentencc of Ep. 69 of St
Cyprian wkch was reproduccd in the section Sefore the last,
though its significance thcre may cover more than a mere profession of faith. I n the East the customary description of the
creed was "the faith (4n l w ~ r") or "the teaching (70 CL&rILa)
'I,
and we have to wait for a hundred vears afrer St Cvprian, unta
&e so-called anons of the councjl of Laodicea,Vor the appearance of 70 dppwhov in this sense. The seventh of these (their
clalm to the title they bear is highly doubtfid) laid it down tEiat
heretics ~ h o u l dbe seqaired "to leam the symbols of the faith
(T& 3 s n l w ~ w p
06p,doha) " , In view of this, and the fact that the
designation did not become regular until the Wth century, it
seerns reasonable to suppose thnt it oriejnated in the IVest.
I n rnodern times the most ~videlyacepted interpretation of
gmbolum has been one which can be traced back to Rufnus. In
the preface af his wposition of the creed,3 when telling the
familiar story of its joint composition by the Twelve, he observes
that in Greek the word symbolum can signify either '"oken
(indkiurnor si-pm)" or coilatio, i.e. awhofe towards themakin~of
rvhich severa1 people have made contributions. T h o u ~ it
h made
c

CT.J. Brinktnnr, %l.

Qworfaisch~f!
cii. I ~ Z I!63:
, H.J. Carpnitrt. 3.7-Sdiii, IC++Z, 3 f.
e Fnr i r x t sec M ~ n s 11,
i 563 E. They probably rcprcsent a compilation madc by
a private individual. Cf. ihc ariirle by A, Boudinlian in Compia rcndus dii congris
scient. ininnat. de$ cafhol., r88tl, 11, 420-7 (wrnmarizrd in Hefrk-Lrclercq, His!. d a
~onnlts1, 992 fT. arid Dicr. dr throl. cuthnl. VIIE, 2 6 1 I R".).
"h.
2 lP.L, 2 1 , 337 r.).

54

CREEDS AND DAPTISM

a grc;it appeal to subsequent tvritcrs, the latter explanation can

be dismisscd out-of hand : it depends on faulty phiIolo,qy (the
Latin roilatiu =the Greek rrvp/loh$, not w',u/30)Iov), and is obt.iousIy inspired by the fancirul tale of the apostolic authorship
of thc rced. R u h u s drvells at length, however, on his dcrivation of tlie \wrd from the idea of a tokcn. Lhe Apostlcs realized,
fie says, that thcre were Jctvs goin about pretending to be
apostles of Christ, aad it was imporrant to have some tokcn by
~vhichthe preacher 1%-lie
tirasa m e d with the authentic apostolic
doctrinc rniyht he recoqized. The situation 'ir.= annIogous, he
says. to onc which oftei ariscs in civil wars, when thc rival partisans rnisht easiy mztke tlie most disastrous mistakes of identitv
tvcre i t not tliat the opposjng commanders hand out distinguishing emblems, or passwords (.y~nBoln distincfra), to thcir supporters : thus if therc are doubts about anyone, he is asked for
his token (intcrrogntus gmbolerm), and at once betrays whether he
is friend or foe. This is tIre rcason too, Rufinus goes on, why the
creed is never written down, but is committed to memory and
is tbus maintained as the secret af'npostoli churchrnen.
Tttro impartant pasages of TerruPEian have usuaIly been
hailed' as antiipating Rufintis's Iine of thought. In his De
pruesrxiptionez he rnakes a point af'the bond uniting the Roman
and the African churches, coininq the term confcsserarc to describe it. This verb, Like the noun ~onit-sstratiowhich he improvises in his second passagt-3 (here his sheme is the uni. of the
Catholic chir~chesgene~ally) js clerived h m Zessera- which in
thi context stands for the tafly or tokea which gucst-Friends
living far part rnight rely upon as a rneans of reco>pizingeadi
sther.4 Here the token conceived of as uniti~lgthe churhc and
cxpressing their mutuai relationship is their common apastolic
faith, or what hc caUs "the unique tradion of one and the
samc m y s t e l (firfidm smramenti una trnditio) ". But though tiie
ideas involved are not &?similar and tessera and symbolurn to a
certain extent overlap, TertuIlia~is not ttiinking preciseiy of a
csecd or crecds: indced, in thc fomer passage what he has in
view is the common faith and practjce of the Church in thc

'
'

F,.g. KatteilbuscIi 11, Rn n.; Ilurii, 49.

Ch. 36 (C..L. 1, 2 1 6 r.).
Ch. 2 0 (C.C.L. I, 2 0 2 ) .
For a Iively mamplr sre Plarltiis, Poenulus V. ii 86 f.

5 -5
widest sciise, iiicIuding HoEy Scripture, tlie sacraments und
martyrdorn. Moreover, alihouqh Rufinus" ttheory that .Vmholltm originalIy rneant s i p or token tsVastaken up by a nurnber
of other Fathers,t it was by no means the only or the most
rvideIy favoured erecsis. I V e havc rilready noticcd thc popularity of the rather \%-ir;ild
guecs that it was selecred as beiny
equivalent to colldio, or a joint composition. St Augustine lent
thr \veirht of his authority to another, much more plausiblc
explanation. Tlie creed k callcd a synbol, he sug5ested:bon the
analoq of the pacts or agreernents tvhich businasmcn cnter
into with nnc another. $~n~bolunt,it sliould be noticed, tvas an
ancirni Latin borroxring, and i11 secular risage had rneaning
raning from a signec-ringhr tlie impress of a seal-o a Iegal
bond or 1i.nrrant.5 That tthc last rnentioned tvas weil to the forc
in Cliristian times is provcd by its accurrence iil Tcrtu1lian.G 5t
Augustine's derivation of the titlp: of thc creed thus harmonizcd
with ciirrcnt linguistic usage, and it did not stand alone : it Iiacl
the support of a whole school of writers both beforc and after his
~Iay.~
Bafficd perhaps by the variety of explanations sponsored hy
thc Ft liers, rnodern students liave sometimes sought a solution
in an entirely different fielcl. It has 13een proposed8 to dcrive
the CIhrictian application of ymbalum ta the Church's reeds
from f l i ~practice of tlie myster). reli+ons. Stereotyped forrnulac. disclosed o d y to rnembcrs of the cdt: were often empliycd Pn tiiese at the isiitiation cerernonies and as trikens by
~vhichthe devotem might identif. each othcr; and thcrc are
solid gounds9 for h o l d i n ~ttrat thcy were technically known as
THE WAME

" SYMBOLUM"

Cf.. t.e.. t. A w-. . Smn. 214(P.L. 38,

P . L - 57,433).

1072)

; St Siamus of Turim, Hom. Rg

Cf Sm.212 (P.L. 38. 10581 and Sm. 2 t 4 (P.L. 38. io72). In &r t a t i n !h*
idtits of par! and pa~swordare cornbincd. T h e passages are d i s c u d by R. R ~ L F C ~
in Ephmrrrdrs LIiwgicw 1k, r938.440 f.
PIiny, Hist. mt. 33. I , 4.
I'lauiu~,Arudolirr I. i, 53; 11, ii, 55; c1C.
Cato [ab. Fmnt., E#. ad Anioa. imp. i, 2 ) .
Cri syiilrolum moriilir in Bepomit. 6 (C.C.L. I, 331).
Gf. Niceras Rem., Explan. gmb. i 3 (P.L. 52,873) ; Si Pewr Chrys., S m , 57,58,
59 (]'.L. 52, 360 ff.); E+lm. p m b , ad inrt. 13 (Y.L. r 7, i 155) ; St Fulgentius Rusp.,
Libri con. Fab. Ar. Frag. 36 (P.L.65, 8 2 2 ) ; C ~ C .
Wf., E.R., F. Nitzsch's article i n ~ e i t s c l t r i f tfilr Tholo&e und Kirch iii, I 893.
331-4' .
Cri R, Ditterich, Eine Milhrarlitugic, Leipzig and Berlin, 1923, 64 n.

56

CREEDS AND BAPTISM

symbols ( d p p o h a ) .Plutarch, for instante, has a sentencel referrng to "the rnystic symbols of the Dionysia orgies which we
who are participants share trith one another"' St Clernent of
,%lexandna,ridiculing the -4ttis cult, reproduces' some of its
sacred fomulae and d l s them symbols. That the word was
familiar, in this sense of cult slogans, to Latin-speaking authors
LT sbown by Fimicus Maternus' rernark,3 at the opening of a
discussion of such tags :
I should like now to give an account of the sigm, or symbols
(quibus . . . ~ i g t z i ~ueI
. quibm symbolis), by means of which the
wresched rabble identify one another in the midst of their superstitious ceremonies. For they havc their special signs, their speciai
answm, which have been imparted to them at their sacrilegious
gatherinp by the devil's h c t i o n .

So, tm, hrnobius applies4 precisely the same term grnbola to the
crude fomulae which the initiates were expected to recite in &e
rites of EEeusis. Thcre is obviousIv a certain paralleIisrn here
with Chktian creeds, and it is not surprising particuIarly when
we remember the extent to tvhich the Church"~teachers were
prepared to exploit the terminology of the rnystery cults, Siat
some scholars should have inferred ttiat symbolurn was among the
words which they appropriated.
Before attempting to arbitrate between the conflicting
theories, it may be advisable to glance once again at those key
passages in the correspondente of St Cyprian in which the word
is first used in onnection with the creed. It will be recalIed that
in Ep. 69, 7 he was deding with the claim of the heretic
Novatian to be administerkp: a valid baptism on the pIea that
" he baptizes with t he same v b o l as we Catholics, recognizes
be same God the Father, &e same Christ His Son, the same
Holy Spirit, and . . d m not seem to d&r from us in the
haptisrnal interrogation", and in repIy repudiated the suggcstion that the schisrntcs could pssibly have "the same law
of the symbol and thesame interrogation". Similarly Fimilian,

Com!, nd uxor. io (=611l3).

L Protrept. 2, 15(StihIin, 13). Tn z2,r8 (Stihlin,
worcl stands for cult objccts.
De crror.prqfan. rrlrp. i 8 (ZiegIer, 43).
4 A&. n d . 5.26 (Reiffcracheid, 198).

14)

and 2, a2 (Stihlin, 17) the

in Ep. 75, I 0-1 r , of the Cprianic corpus, dicussing the baprisrn

practised by a crazed xiroman, admitted thnt it lacked 'hneither
the qmbol of the Trinity nor the established and churchly
interro~;ation".There is general a p e m e n t nowadays that in
neither af these passaem can qmbol refer to a declaratory
reed, for ncither "to baptize with the creed " nor "creed of the
Trinity " are natural foms of expression, Almost certainly what
the writers had in view were the triple iiterrogations addressed
te the candidate by the rninister and his tripIe ssenting
answers:i possibly they were also thinking of the trlple immersion or aFusion.2 Thjs interpretation admirably fits the
expressions "'baptke with the symbol" and "symboI of the
Trinity"; while TertulIinn's rernarkz that "a Iaw of baptisrn
(lex lin,guendi) tvas laid dowm and the f o m wai prescribed : ' Go,'
He said, ' teach the nations. baptizinq them in the name of the
Father and of the Son and .af the Holy Spirit'," iIIustrates the
use of "lati of the s y b o l " . An interesting confimation is supplied by the eighth canon of the council of Arles ( 3 1 4 1 ,uvhich
~
made the following mlinq :
TI-ith regard to Africans, fortisrnuch as they practice rebaptisni
according io their o w n regulations, it is decided that if anyone
comes to the Church out of' Irercsy, they should address to hitp the
symbol quesiions (interrogc~itPum symbolum) . If ihty perceive that he

has been bilptized in the Father and the Son and thc Holy Spirit, it
wiil only be nccessary for a hand to be laid upon him so that he may
receive the Koly Spirit, But if on heing questioned he does not
answer with this Trinity (nonrespondcnbiaanc Trinitntem),he shouid be
baptized.

Here the phrase inttrrogeni curn gwbolum clearly seem to signify

"put to him the baptisrnnl questiom". Exactly the ame usage
of ~ymbal~irn
is irnpIied in the passage5of St -4upstine which has
already been rnentioned, where he state that "it is no true
Chrktian baptism i the evanielical words of which the symbol
onsists are rriissing".
See above. p. 47.
Both Katitnhusch (TI, 189) and P. de Puniet (D.A.C.L. 11, 293) understod
the latter passagc as referrhg slmlily to ihe immersions.
3 De bapt i g (C.C.L. I, 289).
MELIIS~
11, 472.
5 DCbapl. con. 130lt. 6,47 (P.L. 43, 214).

60
CREEDS AND BAPTISM
to a signet-ring or a warrant. And if it was as mcaning a sign or
a token that syrnbolurn was edisted as a titIe for the credal: questions and answers, Firmilian's rwealing phrase rnay provide a
pointer to its precise connotarion. Thc questions and answers
were a sign, an expressive and portentous symbol, of the Triune
God in Whose name the baptism was being enated and with
Whom the Christian catechumen was being united.1 That the
symbol was a symbo1 of the Trinity seems to be hinted at by the
language of the canon of Arles which has been quoted; and
there should be no need to ernphasize further the way in which
the questions and answers were regularly connected with the
Lord's command to baptize in the threefold Name. It is not impossible (though our theory by no means necessitates it) that the
fact that symbol was already the convenient term for a cult
slogan assisted, ifit did not directly provoke, its application to
the formulae which had become the distinctive tokens of
Catholic orthodoxy, However that rnay be, it must be agreed
that Rufinus may nat have been so widely astray as has sometimes been supposed in interpreting syrnboI as a distinguisliing
sign or emblem. By his time, of course, the creed which was most
prorninent was declaratory in f m , cansisting of a continuou3
statement and eniirely scparated from the triple questirins and
irnrnersions, We can readily understand how he and other
patristic writers of the same epoch and afterwards were at a loss
to fatbom the original bearing of the accepted descrlption of it
as a symbol, and felt at liberty to improvise such explanations

as occurred to them,
But whatever the uItimate reasons for the selection oF this
word, there can be no doubt that as used in the rhird century it
denored the baptismal questions and answers. Later it became
the reg~Iartitle of the declaratory creed. How this change carne
about, and at what precise date, we cannot now determine with
certainty. The transference, however, was a natural and easy
one, for the kinship between declaratory creeds and the baptismal interrogations was extremely close : it probably coincided
with the introduction of declaratory creeds into the ceremonial
So j.Brinktrine (though he rhought of the baptismal formula rther than the
questions) n ' T h e o l o ~ c h Quar#dsthri'i
c
cii, r g~I , r 66 f. O. Case1 supported the v i m
sketched above in Jahrbwh j u r Li.lturgiauissennhaft ii, I 922, I 33 f.

preparation for baptism. It was fuIly established by the middle

of the fourth c c n t u l , as we can infer from the allusiorrs of
Rufinus, St Augustine and otbers to the tradition and reddition
of the creed. A11 tbis has great intrinsic impartance, but it
should have a specia1 interest for us, engaged as we have been in
exploring the relation ofreeds to baptism. The grand discovery
to which onr lengthy discussion has led is that the classical namc
for baptismal creeds was icself in origin bound up in the most
intimate way with the primitive structure of the baptisrnal rite.

63
we &a11 be expected to tlirow liglit. They have long been uncler
discussion arnong students nf creeds, and certain canventiona1
THE CREATIVE PERIOD

field. M roo often, howevcr, they are vitiated by

being based on premisses which must to-day be considered
obsolete, and in consequence i t is imperative to go over the
g ~ ~ again
~ n inddetail. The Iessons learned in the previous chapter, for esample, involb-e a radical change in the perspective of
credal studies. It is not unlikely that they ~ilt
encourage, even
compel, a complete reorientation of outlook in certain direcsions.
Is would clearly be rash, For instante, to take it for ,granted
nowadays that sterwtyped offiial fomulae emerged, even
JocalIy, at a relatively early date, JVith some cxceptions the
gneral iendeny, among the classic Iiistorians of creeds, has
bcen io regard the movement towards fixiv as well under
way, in individual churches at any rritc, in the first iialf of tfie
sccond ccntury. Thc East may havc been slower, but: Rornc,
according to men Iike the German Kattenbuschl and the
English Burn,2 could boast of a fismly established, dominant
credal form before the epoch of the heretic Mascion, that is,
beforc thc 'forties of the second ~ e n t u r yAn
. ~ hypothesis Iike this
cannot be dismissed out of hand, but f es plausibiihy largely dcpended on two tacit assumptions, first, that the "mle of faith"
was identical with the cseed, and, secindly, that a decIaratary
creed at a11 periods featured in the service of baptkm. Once the
precariousnes of these aumptiom is grasped, it becomes possibte to approach the evidence ~vithoutpreconceived ideas and
appraise it for what it is w-orth, without always supecting the
lurking presence of an official formula. In itselfthe theory of t he
sudden codifiation of the Church's belief, e\-en in so go-ahead
a comrnunity as that of Rome, shortly after x.n. ~ o iso improbable, especjally in vierv of the extrerne fluidity of the Forms it
assumed in the preceding deades and the gradualness with
which other aspects of the liturgy scttled down. Indeed, if thc
histosy of the liturgy ptovides a proper pamlIe1, we should
v i e ~ shold the

THE

1IOi:EhfENT
I.

TO\VA4RDS F I X I T Y

Tke Crealitle Period

chapter is to examine the evolution oF creeds

THEobject
(usinz the ~ . o r d
in the elastic, non-tehnical sense adoopted in
the fiinstchapter) in the period hetween the close of the first century and the middle of the t Iiird. TJie uutide Limits of the survey
Iiave not. been chosen arbit rarily, but are dettrmiried by bistorical coiisideraticins. We havc alrcady glanced at tlie Church's
credal activity, such as it was, in tlic apostolic age : for obvious
reasons ic forrns a subject o11 its own, meriting separate discussion. After the middlc of thc third century, as has alresdy

bccn suggested, an entircly nw situation arose with the introduction of tiie "handing out" and "giving back" of the rced,
and t he disciplina orcani with whih they were cennected, These
ceremonies not only brought declaratory creeds into the foreground, but had the effect of tending to stabiiize their wording.
Ous period can therefore claim to form natural unit. That ir is
also onl: descning the claest scrutiny must be rnanifet to anyone wEio reflect': that thme half-dozen qenerations 1%-ere,
institutionally, arnong the most creittive in the Church's histol. Tlie
outline plan of CathaIiism had already been sketched in the
first cenrury, but it \\-asin the second and third that the solid
buildjng reared itself. This qeneralization i as m e of reeds and
liturgim as it iF of other cxpression of'the Catholic spirit.
As we pick our way through the cenfusing territory ahead of
us, we shalll be in danger of getting lost unltcss we have a clear
idea of what we are Iooking for. TIie precise date and mannes af
the cmergence of official summaries of faith, the developrnent in
particular of baptismal professjofis and their relation to other
credal staternents, the degree to wliich externa1 facrors such as
the Church's struggle with pagnnism and heresy condidoned the
content of ear1y creeds-these are some of the subjects on which
62

i
1
I

CI:Ir, ch. 7.
P. 84 R.
V h r sort of widence addriced was 'Tcrrullian's remark (Adv. M a r c . 1, 20:
C.C.L. 1, 460) ihat, accurding to his supporicrs, Marciun had not so much innovatd on the riitc oCfaith as restor~dii w1ic.n ir liacl liecn corrupted.

64

THE APOSTOLIC FATHERS

TIIE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FIXITY

expect tht the forrnulation of a nurnber of distinctive types of

confession, existina side by side in friendly cmpetition and
without any Iiard-and-fast rigidity of wording, would be tlie
natural ccond stage in the development of creeds.
Another lesson driven home by the results of our previoris
inquiry is the comparative width and richness of the ield which
the studcnt of creeds must explore. I t was a11very weU confining
his attention to the baptisrnal 1itu.w when the creed was
assumed to be a n ernbyo corning to birth within its womb and
drawing a11 its substance from that one situation in the Church's
life. M'e have sem, however, that, so far as b a p h is concerned,
it wilI be fruit1ea to look to i t as a sourre of dedaratory creeds in
this periotl :attention should rather be devoted to the baptisrnal
interrogations, so far as traces of them sunive. The baptismal
settinq, it i s clear, must be expanded so as to include the whole
system of tmining leading up ro the sacrament. I t was the
popular theology of the catechetical schools (perhaps "schoois "
is too grandiose a name for the instructiond arrangernents of the
second century) which supplied creeds uith most of their content. S o r shouId it be forgotten that there were a11 sorts of other
situatians in thc Church's life which lent themselves to the proclamation of its faith. \Te are accordingly just&ed, when we
look for inflwenes bearing on the fomation ofcreeds, in taking
accaunt of confessions of whatever kind wherevet we come
acrass them. In the secsnd century, as we have &adv seen was
the case in the first, the Eucharist, exorcism m d many other
formal or informa1 occasions in the experiente of Christians may
hve made their contribution. In this connection it wiPI be
interesting to inquire, in the light of the eonclusions of the tirst
chapter, how far onc-clausc, mo-lause and three-clame confessions continued to exist? side by sde and in independente of
each other, in thc second century as they did in the first.
Lastly, thcre i one more aipect of credal formulae in regard
to which it will be advantageous to keep an open rnind, the
choice of material for inclusion in them. A dogrna widely encouriged in tlie past was that creeds expanded from hrief
afirrnations to much Ionger, more claborate ones soleIy under
pressure of the desitc to rehut or exclude heresy. Thus the
description of God the Father as "rnaker of heaven and earth "

65

often thought 1 to betray an anti-Marcionite bias, Marcion

having distinguished the God of heaven Whom Jesus revealed
from the Dcmiurge who created the material orcler. Again, the
insistene on the details OS Christ's human career has frcquently
been attributed2 to anti-Docetic poIemic : the Docetists refused
to admit the physical reality of Hfs body. One German scholar
went so far as to declare that " the baptismal creed of tlie Roman
church was shply the precipitate of the struggle against MarcionV.3Actually, many of the clauses polnted to as anti-heretical were commonplaces of Christian confcssions at a time
when the motives alleged were scarceIy likely to have been
operative. Ia any case, as w e saw in the fim chapter, the
ev.olutionary approach ta the developrncnt of creeds k h e t
we pass t h e evidence for crecds in the second
w-ith pitfalls.
and thkd centuries in rm+iew,we shall try to xses ~vitlioutprejudice the infiuence exerted on their content and on tlie emphasis of their severa1 parts by polemical considerations. It musr
be obx-ious, however, that the prirnary aim of catechetical
instruction (to select what we hase reason to supposc \iras the
most fiuirful field of redal developrnent) was a constmctive
one: it \+-asto pass on to the inquircr or catechumen the wonderTuI story of &e sa\inq work ~vhichGod had accornplihed for
man in Kis Son. S o doubt the anti-heretical note is audible
from time to time : it is shrilIy emphatic in some of the passases
of St I ~ a t i u which
s
will shnrtly he citcri and which are sharply
anti-~eticin tone. Yet ive should not rashly assurnp ihat it
represents the only or the most important fwnction of creeds,
taking precedence over their orig-inal, and positive, frinction of
setting forth the faith.
ufa5

a. Tkc Apostol fc Fathers

The writings of the so-caIled Apastolk Fathers forin the first
stratum of our period. So far as creeds are concerned, they
reveal a situation closelg in line with the onc wc havc already
glanced ar in the New Testament itsclf. There is no sugqestion,
W.,c.g., J. Haussleiter, Trinilarlscltcr Glaubr und Chrislurbekanntrris in dtr aE!m
Kirch, Giitersloh, r 920, 5 1 .
' So J. Haussleiter, bc.cit.
a G.Krger in &N.T, W.vi, 1905, 72-9. Hc was reproducing, with additional
arwments, the thesis of A. C. McGiffert's The AjslEcs' Crcrrl, i gnc.

e.c.c.-g

66

57

THE MOVEMENT TOWARWS FTXTTY

TI1 E: APOSTQLIC FATHERS

much less e-plicit mention, of a formal, official crccd a n p h e r e ,

and the attempts to uncarth one have come to gief in exactly
the same way as the effotts to dicover a genulne ilpostles'
Creed in the New Testament. On the other hand, there is an
abundane of quasi-credal sraps which show that the creedmaking impulses of the Christian communities were alive and
active. In their ground-plan and content these fragments foreshadow illurninatingly the course rvhich was to be taken by the
later oficia1 formularies.
Sometimes thtse embryonic confmsions d i b i t an explicitly
Trinitarian character. The Diduch~,for example, gives unmistakahle directions for the admiaistration of baptism :i "After
you have said alE these things, baptize in running water in the
namc of the Fathcr and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." Two
chapters later, laying down reguiations about the people entitled to participate in the Eucharist, the anonynous author
desribes them as " those who have been bapsized in the name
of the Lord ", which is prohably only a cornpendious way of
refesring to the loner, triune formula ernployed at the initiation
sen~ice.In the Iiturgie, as we noted in the previous chapter, to
baptize in the name of tbe Faiher, etc,, rneant asking the questions '"ost
thou believe . . .? " threc times and plunging tl-ie
candidate in thc water in three sucessive imrnersions. As the
Didmhe to0 eivisages a triple sprinkiing, an interrogato-i-y creed
of this kind (whether confined to bare, unarnplified questions
about the h e Persom, Ice cannot of course say) js almust certainly presupposed. The author of r Citmcni b h out~a similar
formula when, echoing a verse of St Paul,z he inquires of his
reader,3 "Have we not one God, and one Chrjst, and one
Spri t of gracc Which has been poured upon us? " The stress on
one-onc-ORB is prornpted by his indignation at thc divisive contentiousness to ~vhichthe Corinthians haie succurnbed, but it i
not irnprobable that he has the interroqatory creed of baptism
h mind. Ks mention of the Spirit, JYhich was held to be bestowed in baptism, and hi rerninder in the next line of their
"one calling in Christ ",seem to presuppose a baptismal setting
and so to bear this out. It is perbap not far-fetclied to ovierhear

a hint of thc same formula ia &e solem, 03th-l&e asurance in

Ch. 7 (Lightfoot, 220).

a

Eph. 4,4-6.

Ch-46 (Lightfoot, 30).

eh, 58,' "For as God liveth, and the Lord Jesus Christ liveth,
and the Holy Spint ",especiaIlv as he immediately interjects the
ct
rhat this triune God is '"he faith and hope of the
e1
~d as t h e general context is one admonishing his
rcaoeru EU rcpose "on the most hely name of His rnajesty ", that
is, on the great h-arne into which they werc baptized.
If the background of these tsiadic onfessions is liturpical, the
famaus injunction in the ShffpFicrd of Herma,"'FFirst of all, believe that God i one, 1Vhe created and fashioned alI things, and
IT
h i n g come into existente out of non-existente . . .",
esents
us witli a sample of curscnt catecheticaf teachP
ing. rier 11ias was familiar with thc triad Father, Son and Hdy
Spirit ;3 and this fact, taken in conjunction with the cmphatic
'TFirst of a11",suggests that the basi pattern of the catechesis of
which this i s a fiaqmcnt rva Trinitarian. On the other hand.
w
ct quotatioris of it are not forthoming. rr:e can detect
u
~blcechoes of the speciaI Christ-kerygma in both St
CicrlrcriL dnd Remas. Tlie fomcr's aflusion ta "onc calling- in
Christ " 4 rnay hint a t this : so rnay such staternents of his as " the
creator of a11 things, through Hi heloved Son Jesus Christ . . .
called us from darkncss to lightU,fior "Through the blood ofthe
Lord rede mption will be given to a11 who hciievc and hope in
G;od",6 Of "Jesus Christ our Lord, by the will of God. gave His
b lood on (~ u behalf",br
r
a p i n " Of which resurretion Hc ha
made the Lord Jesus the frrst-fruits, raising Him from the
dead".s Hermas's referentes t o it are more open. The lw of
God which is $ven io the whole world, he declares! is " the
Son of God preached to the ends of the earth", while Christians
SI
rc t hose who have hcard the kerygma and have believed in
H[im. The oficers of the Churh are entitIed " tthe apostles and
teac~rcibuf the preahing of the Son O God " :" iit is their business to preach the name of the Son of God, and to bestow baptism as the seal of it.11

' Lightioot, 36.

' nfand. a (Lightfwt, 3 i t O .
a

'

Gf. Sim. 5, 6 , 2 ff.(Liglitfoot, 351 r.}r Cor. 46 (Ligiitfwt, 30).

Op. cit. 59 (Lightfoot, 36)Op. cit. ta (Lightfmt, i r ) .

Op. cit. 49 (Lightfmt, 31 r.).

a

Op. cit. 24 (Lightfoot, r8f.).

Sim. 8, 3 (Lightfoat, 362).

Sam. 9, i$ Lightfoot, 386).

Sim. [i, [lightfmt, 3 8 7 )

lu

68

THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FIXITY

The letters of St Ignatius have long been recognized as a

peculiarIy ternpting country to the expIorer of creeds. The
~ r h i t a r i a npattem is occasionaIly observable in them, an exarnple being Magn. r 3,l where hc invites his correspondents to
walk, in a11 their actioils, "in faith m d love, in the Son and the
Father and the Spirit, in the beginning and in the end", and, a
few lines later, to be in subjection to the bishop and one another
as
, . the apostles to Christ and to the Father and to the
Spirit". The very same letter2 brings to light an informal confession of a reognizable two-rnembered type : "There is one
God, Who reveaIed HimseIf throughJesus Christ His Son, Who
Is His Logos corning forth from silence." Nevertheless his most
noteworthy quasi-creda1 passages are Christological in forrn and
content, and provide some of the most convincing evidence for
the separate existence of single-clause confessions. A sarnple of
them is the summary statement in Ephs. 18,2 :3
For our God Jesus Christ
was conceived by Mary according to God's pIaii,
&L

THE APOSTOLIG FATIJERS

Son of God by the Divine will and powei,

begotten truly af the Virgin,
baptized by John
that He might fulfil dl righteousness,
truly nailed in the Aesh on our behaIf under Pontius Pilate
and Herod the tetrarch . .
that through His resurrection He might set up aa cnsign .
in one body of His Church.

of the seed of David and of the Holy Spirit ;

Who was born and was baptized
that by His passion He rnight clcanse water.

h o t h e r comes in Trall. g :4
Be deaf when anyane spe&s to you apart from Jesus Clirist,
Who was of the stock of David,
Who was from Mary,
Who was truly born, ate and drank,
was truly persecuted undcr Pontius Pilatc,
was t r d y crucified and died
in the sight of beings heavenIy, eartlily and uiider the
earth,
Who dso was truly raised from the dead, His Father raising
Him. . . .

A third is Smyrn. I, 1-2 :"

. . . being fully persuaded a s regids our L o d ,

that He was truly of David's stock after the f?esh,

Liglitfmt, r 15.
r Ch. 8 (Lightfoot, i 14).
a Lightfoot, I 10.

a
j

Lightfoot, I 15.
Lightfoot, 127,

69

..

Researchers of the oIder

- .- school
.
usualIy worked on the
assurngtion that 1Iassages like theise were freely paraphrased
extracts fram the 1iaptisma1 creed used by St Ignatius. Theodor
Zahn,] for examlde, poirited confrdently to the expressions
P
.
" professing faith" ar -pro~essing
rhe faith ( a l u ~ c v&ayy~MpEVOL) " and " professing to belong to Cbrist (o; 2 ~ a ~ M p n m c
Xptmo; c?vab)" in Eph8s. 14, z,2 and clairned to discern an
aliusion to the underlying formula. The attempts to reconstruct
" the creed of St Ignatius" have bee n nurnerlous and audacious.J
They were foredoomed to failure , however, for the martyr
bishop himself never so much as brearnes a- 1hint of the existence
ofsuch a formula. The passage cited by Zahn envisages faith as
an attitude, like love, not as a formulated body of teaching, and
the three Christologies quoted above are manifestly independ~ent unihi. What is true is that the outliae of the prirnitive
CIhristologgcal kerygma s visibIe through the loose folds of St
Ignarius ,s polemical style. The Ephesian text, with its dry-asd ust enurrieration of facts, may well represent a cross-section ~f
lc)cal cate:chetical teaching. The other two have a solemn,
a1Imost hymn-like character which has made some schoIars4
suspect th e Euchairist or some other liturgical situation as their
backgrourid. It is a distinct possibility, though the heightened
style may be merely the by-product of the writer's intense excite.r .
ment. A unirymg feature in a11 .three is their basic identity of
theological outlook. They are all built on the same foundation
idea of the antithesis between the Lord's humiliation and His
exaltatien, and exhibit the same scheme-according to the
L<

_ A L A _

r.

Das a@stolis& S p t

' Lightfoot, rog.

, Erlangen-Leipzig, 454 f.

a Cf., e.g., A. Harnack in his dnhnng to Hahn's Bibiiolhek; R. Seeberg in

-'?. xl (N.E. iii), 1922,3.
So, e.g., H. Lietzmann in <.N.T.W. xxii,.xgng, 265.

'

z.fr

7O

THE CREEDS

THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS F K i T Y

Rcrsli, accordin to the Spirit; son of David, Son of God. They

cltand in the line of tradition which leads back to Ram. r , 3 and
Phil. o ? 5-11. T h e second and third are remarkable For thc
pointedlp anti-Docetic nirt tvhich the author, conscious of the
mcnace of heretics denjlng the rcality of the Lord's human
experientes, ha5 given to them.
ririother witnesr: to the lively persistente ofthe ancient Christkerygma is St Polycarp. In his Ekislle to the P h i l $ p i u n s ~ erads
against peoplc who do not confess that Christ has come in the
fleh and deny the testimony of the cross (70 yap7.ilpiov 706
watipoc), saying that there is no resurrection and no JucIgment.
He summons his correspondents to abandon the vanity of the
many and their false teaching (&v808~8au~d&!as),
and to
reFUrn to "the word deIivered to us at the bcginning (TV 2f
6px;jr &CV .rrapdaP&ra hyov) ". Beyond doubt it i; the traditional
teachinq, compact in oudne ifpIastic in verbal expression, that
he has in mind. Tn an earlier chapter%f the letter we an catch
an echo of it:
. . . l~elievingon Ifim
IVho raked our Lord Jesus Christ from &e dead,
and gave Hirn glory and a throne at Kis right hand,
to Whorn are subjected all thing in heaven and earth,
Whom every breath of wind serves,
Who will come as judge of living and dead.

The structure of this confession is bi-membered, and it is

interesting to observe that the lengihier mernber, concerned
with the Christolo.gy, is snbordinated grammatically to the
shorter first member. 1'7 likelv i t a f r a p e n t of the routine
teaching handed out to converts in the Srnyrnaean churh. The
fact that it is a cento of taps h m r P r f ~ r 3deserves notice as
throlting Eght on the way in whjch the body of catcrhetical
tradition was built up.
3. 2Xe Creeds of St Jcrsh-n
From the Apostolic Fathers we turn ta S t Justin Martyr. His
first dpology, written at Rome 150-155 and addres~cdto the
emperor Antoninus Pius, nd his Dialogue wifh T@ha lhe Jew,

7I

OF ST JUSTIN

\%+tten 155-160 and recalling a debate which took pIace at

Ephesus some years earlier, are preciou sources for liturgical
p c t i c e in the middle of thc sccond cntury as weU as for the
apologeti~t h e o l o g of the perisid. Their value to the historian of
reecls is imrnense. Unlike the Apostoljc Fathers, in whose
writine~:we can o d y catch distant echoes of redal formulae, in
Stjustin we for the first time come acrass what can pIausibIy be
taken to be quotations of semi-formal creecls, I t is t
h fact rvhich
has created a special problem for students of creeds. They have
been mueh exercised to determine ruhat was the exacr relationship berween St Justin's firrnularies and the contemporary
creed of the Rornan church, So far as we are concerned, we
shall find it more convenient to postpone the cIetailed discussion
af this question to subsequent chapters, when we shall have
acquired a fuller acquaintance u?th the so-called Old Rornan
Creed. Here ir ~ dbelsuficient to observe that thereare marked
dkcrepancies betrveen this (technicalIy designated R) and the
formulac which mav be supposed to lie behind St Justin's
language, and that in any case the hypathesis that Rome
porsessed a single oficial crted at this date is higizly doiibtful.
Tlie majority of confessions found in S t Justin exhibit the
familiar three-dause ground-p1an. It is indeed remarkable how
deeply the pattern was imprinted on his mind. A multitude oF
minor contcxts an be collected to illustrate this, such as
Apol. I, 6, 2 : I
But we revere and worship
Him (i.e, the true God),
id the Son, \.\%o carne From Him and taught us these ttimp
and the prophetic Spirit ;
or ,4poI,

I, 63, 3
Ta the Father of the universe,
throuqh the name of His Son,
and OS the Hoiy Spirit ;

Apol. I, 67,

2 :3

The Makrr of all things,

through Nis Son Jesus Christ, and

through the Holy Spirit.

Ch. 7 Liahtfoot, 171).

Ch. +Z ilighrfoof, 168).
E..J.G.,

PC,.

E.J.G., 74.

E.J.G.. 75.

...

72

THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS F'D3Tl*

TBE CREEDS OF

73

ST JUSTrN

The Ionpest and most elaborate comes in Apol. I, 13: I

Thus 3t.e are not atheists, since trre ivorship

the creator of ~ h i universe

s
.. .
and that IVC with cond r e s o n honour
Him V%o has taught us these chings and was bom for this
PVO",
Jesus Christ,
14'ho ws crucified uncier Pontius Pilatc, the govemor of Judaea in
the time of Tiberius Caesar,
having learncd that He is the Son of the true God
and holding Him in the second rank,
and the prophetic Spirit third in ordcr, we shaII proceed to demonstrate.

The setting of the second and third of these extrracts is a description af thr: Eucharist : possibly thev are s u m a r i e s , some~vhat
abbrcviated, of prayers from the sen.ice. The Iast is ob.rriously
vep- free expancion, in the ~ i - r i tr's
e own 1mrds, of ' the creed we
are about to discuss. Its cbcumstantiality and expdanatory tone
.-*
-- n m .
are perhaps reminiscent of the lecture-ro----.
The nrro passaqes in StJustn which are ofoutstandingimportance both relate to thc s&ce of baphm, and were quotcd in
fulI in the last chapter. They have a striking similarity of wording, and this trait alone inclines one to suspect a. more or less
scttled liturgical forrn. The first 2 i~ quite brief and runs :
For thcy receive a lustra1 washinfy in the Hrater in tl~e name (~fthe

Father nd Lord Qod of the universe, and of our saviour Jesus

Christ, and of the HoEy Spirit. .
m

-4pol. I, 36.1 ,llmost certainlv, therefore, it repwduces rin acepted bapti~mrilform. L h e test of the second and third cIauses
i more iluid, but their content is broadiy cIcar. There is nothinq
to shoir*tliat the CliristoloicaI section w-as in any material \rray
fuller than our e c e r p t s indicate. If a n y t h i n ~is to be rcad, as
has sometimes been thouyht, into the phrn~c" the t h i n ~ srelating to Jesus", it must irnply that n more or l e s ~developed
CliristoIogy was appended to the clause about the Spirir. E t was
onty to be expected that scholarshi~would feel justified in
atternpting to reconstitutc wllat may be caPPed " S t Justin's
creed". It is necessary, however, t o undcrstand clcarly wlist one
is about. StJustin himselfexplains that the formulae (forformulnc
they wcrc) were uttered by the officiant ancl not by tbe cnndidate for baptism.Therepetitionof"inthc name of" bearsthisout.
-As we have sug~;ested,it is mest unIikcly that the baptismal
formula proper I baptize thee n &e name-', etc.) wasinuse at
thk period. It would seern, therefore, as wTea r ~ e idn the preceding chapter, that what \\*e liave hereis not a declaratory ccreed of
the kind tliat scholam have usually reccinstnicted, but the baptirsmal interrogations. In St Justin's chiirch the questions asked
b! i tlle offilziant had assurned a fised outline and ran as zo
C I1OIYS:
. .
Dost ttiou beiieve in the Fathcr and Lord God of the universe?
Dost thou helieve in Jesus Christ our Saviour, Who w a crucified
under Pontius Pilate?
Dost thou believe in the HoEy Spirit, Who spake by the prophets?

..

A few lkes later we come to the second passage :3

Over hirn who has elected to be reborn and has repented of his
sins the name of the Father and Lord Cod of the universe is narned,
the otiiciznt ~ h Icads
o the candidate to the water usinq this, and
onPy this. dacription of God. . . . 3ioreover, it is in the name of
Jesus C b s t , IVIio was crucifred undcr Pontius Pilate, and in the
name cif the Holy Spirit, 1130 through the prophets announced
bcforehand the things relating to Jesus, that the man \v110 is enlightened is wrashed.
The phrasing o f the cIause about God the Father is identical

in boih, and appears again, withour any significant change, in

Side by side tvith this strictly Triniearian confcssion, Sr Justin

could evidently draw upon a simple Christolo@calkerygma of
the type which, as we have seen, had had a continuous history
since thc preachhg of the Apostles and the tlnitinys of St Paul.
There are mny pxsaces in his ~.orkswhich reflect it: notable
exarnples being :
I V c say chat the \Vord, 1Vho is the first affspring of God,
~ v a sbegotten without carnal interoiirsc,
Jesus Ciirist our teacher,
and that He was crucified,
and died,
and rose again,
and ascended to hcaven;z
E.J,(;., ~ q .

.4/~i1. I,

2I. I

(E.J.G.. 4oi.

TECE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FIXITY

74
We fiad it proclaimed beforehnd in rhe books of the prophets that
Jesus our Christ would come to earth,
be born through the Virgin and be made man .
wodd be crucified and die,
and be raised again,

THE CREEDS OF ST JUSTIN

Jesus,

Whorn also we hve recognized as

Christ the Son O God,
crueifred,

..

and ascend into heaven ;l

But Jesus Christ, Mi'ho carne in our times,
was crwcified, and
died,
rose agan,
has ascended into heaven and has reigned ;z
He was conceived as a man of the Virgin,
and was named Jesus,
and was crucified,
died,
and rose again,
and has ascended to heaven ;3
For the rest you must prove that He consented to
be born as a rnan through the Virgin according to His Father's
will,
and to be aucified,
and to die, and dso that after this
He rose again,
and ascended to heaven ;4
For in the name of this very Son of God and first-begotten of all
creation,
Who was bom throngh the Virgin,
and became a passible man,
and wa crucified under Pontius Pilate by your people,
and died,
and rose again from the dead,
and ascended to heaven,
every demon is exorcized, conquered and subdued ;L
You would not blaspheme against Him
Who has come to earth and been barn,
and has suffered,
and has ascended to heaven,
and will also come again;a
Bid. 63, I (E.J.G., 168).
9 D H . 85, r (L.J.G., 197).
V i d . 126,I (E.J.G., 246 S.}.

75

and risen agairi,

and ascended to the heavens,
Who will come again as judge of a11 men right
back to Adam hirnseIf.1

It caa scarcely be daubted that these excerpts have sornethiiig

of a furmulary ring about them :they are echaes of the liturgy or
te
if the Church. At the samc time it wouId be a grave
e1
eat them as belonging to a three-clause creed with a
fuiiy expdnded Cliristological section of the type which later
obtairied the monopuly. There were occasions, such as the ritc
of exorcism or the eucharisti service, as welI as the systcmatic
exposition or preaching af the Christian message, when Christological confessions like these had a speial appropriateness, Thc
exm-cisticformula cited above, for example, bears every sign of
being a fairly close replica of one which was actually used. The
shorter form given in Dial, 132, I is akin to it, aIthough it adbs
a mention of the Second Coming. I t is difficult to resist the conclusion that St Justin h e w and, on ocasion, had recourse to
a developed Chnistolugical kerygma which already enjoycd a
rcleasure cif fixity and which was stilI quite independent of the
T'rinitarian confession.
T l . - - .I rir works of St Justin thus have considerable importance for
the studcnt of crceds. I t is pure guesswork, unsupported by anything that he says, to postulate I-iis acquaintane with an oficial
declaratory creed used at Rome or in any other church. On the
01 ther han~
d, he provides the earliest direct evidence we possess
fcrr the enlergence of relatively fixed credaI questions at bap--2
tistr~;ana he illustrates the continued existente of one-cIausc,
purely Christological confcssions alongside the Trinitarian nnes
employed at baptism and on other occasions. A fat which deserves notice is the fideliry with which these reproduce the
prirnitive kerygma, without bending it to any appreciable extent to polemical or apoIagetic needs or olouring it with S t
Justin's own philosophicaI theology. It is interesting to observe,
A

THE MOVENENT TOWARDS FiSIlT

76
in connection with the latter ofthe points just mentioned, that
there is a contemprary of StJustin's who can alo be claimed as
a witness to the Christ-kerypa in the rniddle of the second
century, the apologlst Aristides. Some earlier schoIars 1 jumped
all too hastily to the conclusion, \\-hen the Syriac version ofhjs
Apology was discovered, that it testified io the existente of a fulldress, formal declaratory reed. Even if such optirnistic clzirns
must be rejected, it should be clear that ch. 2 3 of the Syriac
text contains an illuminating paraplirase of the Church's
tradition about Jesus. To attach this to the statements about
God the Father in ch. I in t h e atternpt to reconstnict a threernembered creed is to rnkconceive the argurntnt of the Apolqy.
The theological discussion in ch. I is quite separate, and in ch. 2
.4ristides is drawiny on traditional Christological teaching
which existed in its own right and bctrayed many points of
resemblance with that of St Justin.

4. St Jrennatls aled his Rule of Faith

Next in order after St Justin as a witness to thc evoIution of
creeds comes St Irenaeus, the great Christian theologian and
apoIogist of tbe second halT of the second cenhiry. It was his
constant clairn that the Church's faith was eveqw-here one and
the sarne, In a farnous passage3 fie dwelt on the fact thar,
though It was scatterd from one end of the earth to the other, it
sliared one sysrern of belief dmived from rhe ,%postlesand their
disciples, and that while the lanpages of mankind were various
" the sirbstance of the tradition ($ S ~ a ~+w napa8uw) "
was idential in a11 pIaces. His favourite term for designating
this was " the canon of the truth ", hy which he did not mean a
single univeisally accepted reed, or indeed any kind of formula
a$such, but rather thc doctrinal content of the Christian faith
as handed down. in the Catholic Chusch.4 This, he ontended,
was identca1 and self-consistcnt e%-eryvhere,
in contrast to thc
variegated teachings crfthe Gnostic heretics. There are a nurnber
C:f. ,J. f<rndcl I-Iamir. Trric nnd S~udiesI.

rPqr. 9% R.

Op. cit. 36 f. The comspanding chapter o l the Gretk version in Bartaum and
Josaphaf is i5 (op. cit. i I o).
Adv. Iiatr. i , ro, 1-2 (P.G.7, 549 ff.).
C For thr best discussion of tht meamg of "the mlc ofthe truth" scc D.van den
Iiynde,

mrmcx de ~'mcigrrml
~Iirlim,Paris, 1933, Pt.

Ir, ch. vii.

ST TRENAEUS

AND

RIS RVLE OF F.4ITR

77

of passages in which he alluder to it or even reproduccs

s u m a r i e s of it, and we shall naw have to examine them. Of the
tnro matises which are ~elevant,the Epidpixk i and the Ad~erslls
/!op~~ser,the former is a popular, Iess contrriversial work, xvritten
a compendium of CIiristian teahjng for the cnefit of con-

verts under instruction, while the Eatter is af course St Irenaeus's

poIemicaI mngnum opus. Our task will be to detect suggestions of
forma1 or informal creeds and to observe the structure and interrelation of credal summaries.
Quite near the beginning of thc Epidcixis,i the author impresses on his reader jthe book is addressed to a fricnd named
llarcianus) the importante of faith and what it involve.
'.Fimt of aB," he says, '3t bids us bear In mind that \ve have
recei\-ed bapism for thc remission of sins in the name of God the
Fther, and in the name ofjesus Christ the Son of God, IVho
was incarnte and died arrd rose again, and in the HoIy Spirit
of God." There is another reference to the threefold name in
ch. 7, where he explins that "the baptism of our regeneration
proceeds through three points, God the Father bestowing upon us
regeneration through Wis Son by the Holy Spirit ". Precisely the
samc emphask on the " three points", or " articles", of bapitsrn
recurs towards the end of the treatise.3 The clear implicatiori
of his lanmage is that he knew a eries oF baptismal quations
I\-hich ran, at any rate roughly (there is no need to assume that
his transcription of thc test was neessarilv h I I or esactj :
Dost thou believe in God the Father?
Dost thou bclievt in Jesus Christ, the Son of God,
Who was i n ~ ~ r n a t e ,
and died,
and rose again?
Dost thou believe in the Holy Spirit of God?

For a detailed exposition of the " three points", in a context

like~i-iseconnected tvith baptism, we turn to ch. 6, where St
Irenaeus writes :
This then is the order of thc rulc oF our faith, and the foundation
the building, and the stability of our convessation: God thc
Found in an Armenian vcrsion in 1904.Referenes rvill be to the English
anslation by J. A. Robinson, London, rgzo (S.P.C.K.).
4 Ch. ioo.
a Ch. 3.

78

THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FIXITY

Pathei, riot made, not material, invisible; one God, the creator of all
things : this is the first point ofour faith. The second point is this :the
Word of God, Son of God, Christ Jesus our Lord, Who was ma&
fested to the prophets according to the form of their prophesying and
according to the rnahod oC the dispensation of thc Father : through
Whom (i.e. the Word) all things were made ;Who also a t the end of
the times, to complete and gather up a11 things, was made man
among men, visible and tangibIe, in arder to abolish death and show
forth life and produe a cornmunity of union hetween God and rnan.
And the third point is : the Holy Spirit, through Whorn the prophets
prophesied, and the Fathers learned the things of God, and the
righteous were led into the way of righteousness; and Who in the
end of the times was poured out in a new way upon mankind in all
the earth, renewing rnan unto God.

Manifestly this is not the baptismal reed : it is rather a kind of

short commentary on it. It gives the gist of the pre-baptismal
catecherical instrution, and illustrates how it was modelled on
the pattern of t h e baptismal questions.
Both these credal summaries from the Efideixis are ihreeclause Trinitarian onfessions. So are the most important embodied in Ad~ersmRaereses. An example is the farnous passage 1
in which St Irenaeus speaks of the odiodox churchrnan's "fullyorbed faith (am~g6 h d ~ X ~ ~ oin )one God almighty, from
Whom are a11 things ;and his firm belief in the Son of God, Jesus
Christ our Lord, through W'horn are a11 things, and in His
saving dispensations (7;s o2uovoPSas a G ~ o 0 )by which the Son of
God became man; and . . . in the Spirit of God, Who in each
generation discloses publicly among rnen the saving dispensations of the Father and the Son, as the Father wilIs". Though
the second and third sections are very loosely paraphrased, it
scarcely needs to be pointed out that this confession is deliberately modelled 0x1 the welI-known Pauline one in r Cor, 8,
6. As regards doctrinal ontent, its kinship is close, for a11 its
teneness, with the creed-commentary in Epideixis 6. 30th stress
the creative work of thc Father and Ris oneness, both teach that
the Son is the instrument of creation, and both dweli on the
prophetic work of the Spirit down the ages.
The most notable credai passage, however, in St Irenaeus,

ST IRENAEUS AND HIS RULE OE FAITH

79
and tRe one most frequently cited, is constructed on a different
$n. It is the passage to which reference was made at the
beginning of this section, and runs as foIkows : l
For the Church, although scattered throughout the whole world
the lirnits of the earth, has seceived from the Apostles and
their disciples, handed down, its faith in one God the Father almighty, Who made the heaven and the earth and the seas and aii the
t h i n g ~in them ; and in one Christ Jesus the Son of God, Who was
made flesh for our saIvation ; and in the Holy Spirit, Who through
the prophets procIaimed the saving dispensations, and the coming,
and the birth from the VIrgin, and the suffering, and the rising again
from the dead, and thc incarnate taking-up into the heavens of the
beloved Christ Jesus our Lord, and Ris second coming frorn the
heavens in the glory of the Father to sum up a11 tbings and to raise up
all flesh of a11 humanity, so that . . . He may make a just judgment among a11 men, sending into everlasting fire the spiritual
powers of evil and the angels who transgressed and fel1 into rebdlion,
and the impious . . . among rnen, but upon the just . . . bestowing Iife and immwrtality and securing to them everiasting glory.
as far as

The peculiar feature of this is that it seems to be the result of an

ingenious conflation of a short, neatly balanced Trinitarian
confession with a more detailed and circurnstantial Christology.
The forrner, like the passage quoted in the previous paragraph,
re-echoes, though more distantly, the Pauline formula of I Cor.
8, 6. The resernblance does not stop there, and in faet (despite
the word-order ' T h r i s t Jesus ",which recalls Rfiideixis6 ) there
is a close farnily resemblance between Adv. kaer. r , 10, r and
Adv. haer. 4, 33, 7. The Christology, it is worth noting, does not
form part of the second section, a would have been natural
at a Iater epoch, but is linked up with the triadic creed as the
subject-rnatter of lhe Spirit's prophesying. It has a11 the air
of having once existed as an independent one-clause confession
in which the severa1 episodes here represented by nouns (" the
comingM,etc.) were doubtless expressed by finite verbs.
Alongside of these, however, chere are many creeds of the
two-atticle type to be found in St Irenaeus, and our study of his
contribution would be incomplete if we did not take notice of
them. Some of them are reIatively simple tags, such as : 2 "And
1

Adr,. h e r . 4,33, 7 (P.G. 7, 1077)

Adu. hner. r, 1 0 , I (P.G.

7, 549).
ddv. haer. 3, r , 2 : in Latin (P.G.7, 845 f.}.

80
THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FlXITY
a11 these evangelists have handed down to us that there is one
God, maker of heaven and earth, announced by thc Jaw and the
prophets, and one Christ, the Son of God." Others are rnasked
by a fuller Christology, the mention of the Son being elaborated
with an extended kerygma. Por example, he describesl tribes
of barbarians who possess no writtcn Scriptures as having the
Christian tradition written in thcir Iiearts and believing
in one God, the maker of heavcn and earth and of all the rhings
that are in them, through Christ Jesus the Son of God, Who because
of His outstanding love towards His creation endured the birth from
the Virgin, uniting in Himsclf man to God, and suRered urrder Pontius Pilate, and rose again, and was taken up in splendour, and will
come again in glory, the saviour of tl-iose who are saved and the
,judge of those who are judged.

To these should be added a striking passageZaimed at Docetists

who distinguish t h e eterna1 Son of God from the human Jesus,
in which the Christology is loosely prefixed to a mlnute twomernbered creed reminiscent of I Cor. 8, 6 :
Hc is HimselfcJesusChrlst our Lord, Who suRered for us and rose
for us and will again come in the glory of the Father to raist again a11
flesh, and to show forth salvation and demonstrate the d e of just
judgment to all who have been made by Him. There is therefore one
God the Father . . . and one Christ Jesus our Lord.

This completes our survey of St Irenaeus. The evidencejustifies us in drawing cerrain onclusions. First, he was familiar with
i short baptismal creed in the form of a threefold interrogation,
aIthough it is impossible now to determine how hasd-and-fast
its wording was or how far Epideixis 3 rcflects its authentic
terrns. Secondly, St Trenaeus also kncw the traditional Christkerygma, with its recital ofthe experientes and acliievements of
the Lord. It is interesting to study the ways in which he was
prepared to combine it with, or inscrt ii into, dyadic or triadic
confessions. Thlrdly, he could further draw on two-articIe and
three-article surnmaries of Christian doctrine. Sometimes rhese
Adu. hmr. 3, 4,2 : in Latatin (P.C. 7,855 F.).
Latin (P.G.7, gng).

e Adu. h e ~3,. i 6, 6 : in

ST IRENAEUS AND

HIS RULE OF FAITH

81

their phrasing, as in Efiideixis 6, while at other

times their structure was fairly taut and formal, as in the opening words of Adv. ham. I , 10, I and the two-article surnmaries
cited above. None of them shows signs, any more than the
~hristologicalcanfessions, of being a creed in the strict sense of
the word : they are formuIaries which have become more or less
stereotyped. Fourthly, the irnpact of the Pauline text I Cor. 8, 6
deserves notice. Lastly, the influence of anti-heretical motives
is, on the whole, surprisingly slight, especially when we consider
the polcmicaI naturc of S t Irenaeus's work. It would be rash to
minirnizc it: the prominence given to the oneness and immateriality of God, to the identity between Jesus and the
Messiah prophesied in the Old Testament, and to the reality of
the incarnation in E'ideixis 6, probabIy betrays the desire to
rescue Marcianus from Gnostic fallacies. Such a trait as the
emphatic "incarnate taking-up into the heavens " in Adu. haer.
r , 10,I is also anti-Gnostic in tendency. These are superficial
features, however, and an be easily separated from the body
of the time-honoured rule of faith. It is noteworthy that the
polemical note is entirely absent from the brief baptismal
questionnaire.
Perhaps this is the appropsiate place to rnention certain other
formulae belonging to approxirnately the same period which
illustratc St Ircnaeus's creeds. Side by side with his two-article
confesslons, for example, wc may set the avowal put into the
rnouth of S t Justin (he suffered in the late 'sixties of the century)
in the ancient account of his martyrdom : I
were loose in

Our worship is givento the God of the Christiam, Whom we believe

to have beein at the b eginning the sole r:naker of these thin gs and th e
aui:hor of t he~whole M iorld, anc1 to the Sc~no God, Jesus C hrist, Wh O

h= j also bee'nannoui~ c e dby the proph ets as destined to come as a

.. --h1
liinr:n+r
+
,,,e
heiuiu fi$
u i A a i v a u u i i LO i h e r a L ~
c r i ~ i land as a teahel
doctrine.
"e

.A

Similarly, Lietzmann-pointed

mo*

out that the creed produced by

' Ach Iustint 2, 5 . The Iirsi half of the abbve C ~ P Preproduces

~
the tmt of P
(Parisimus, 1470, A . n . 890). Most editions give a text which has been hasmonized
with latrr creeds. Cf. P. F. de' Cavali~ri.Aluda e Testi 8, rgoz, 33 f., and P. C.Burkitt,
3.7,s.
xi, igny, 66.
2 . N T.W . xxii, 1923, 27 I .

84
THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FIXTY
by the Lord's ommand. The problem is to disco~rerwhat item
went to makc up t hi supplernentaw matter. +S.tiny ray oflight is
supplied by not her passa@ 1 from the same book. .slfter speakinp
of the divine narncs rlfthe Three lt'ho are at once witnesses of our
fait h and arantors of ihe sal\-ation ~vhichive seek, he goes on :
But after both thc attestation of our faith and the promise of salvation have been plcdged under the sanction of rhree witnesses, a
niention of the liurch is necessarily added ; for where the Thsee are,
that is, the Father nnd the Son and the Noly Spirit, there the Churcli
is toa, whicIi is a 11ody composed of three.

We are not here oncerned with the subtleties of Tertullian's

theology of thc Church, but we are concerned to observe tliat
cvidently the Church figured in the baptismal intermgations. It
figured alo, as tve noticed earlier in this chapter, in the credal
summary in thc Epistula ,4posiolozurn: 5r.e shall shortly come
across it again as an article in the reed af the Dr Batyzeh
Papyms and as a cIause in rhe baptismaI questions kno~into S t
Cysian. Ver). probabIy R E ~ S S T O NOF LYS had a place in Tertullian's questionnaire too. Suh at any rate is the suggestion of'
a passage- in ivhich, dealng 4 t h the problem of ~ h Jesus
y
Himself did not practise baptjsrn, he inquires derisivcly what
Re ould have baptized men inte, finding reasons for dismissing
each of the possible answers ("inio the remission of sinslwhich he bestowed v e r b d y ; into HimaelfT-Whom He oncealed with humility; into the Holy Spirit?-Who hacl not yet
descended from tIie Father ; into the Church?-which the
Apostles had not yet erected"). Many scholars would go much
furthez and ~vouldw e s t out of tbe words " a somervhat fulIer
reply" the su$yestion of an elaborate formula akin to, if not
identical with, the OId Roman Creed. The question d Tertullian's acquaintance w-ith this ancient formula 1%-i11
have to be
explored later. Hcre ~ r f emust be content with pointing out that
Tertullian's olsn language is quite unsuitabie if he has a fdldress reed in rnind. "A somewhat fuller reply" ssurely impiies
tbat the creed consisted o questions, and that the core and
substance of these were constituted by the words laid down by
the Lord, that Is, the names of the three Divine Persons. We are
De

bopt.

6 (C.C.L.1, 2 8 2 ) .

De bnpa.

I1

(C.C.L. 1, 286).

TERTULLTAN'S REEDS

85

ent;tled to believe that Tcrtullian's interrogations ontained

item than the mere rnention of the Church, but what they
1~qy-ewe can only gum. The likdihood is, ho~vever,that, added
toqether, they were not so numerous as to thmw the simple
triadk schilrne ompletely out of balance.
So much for the baptismal pa_Fsages: it should again be em$asized that these are the only ones where there is an unmistakabIe baptbml setting. For Tertuilian's citation octhe rule of
faitli we have recourse to four principal pasages, and these will
be given in chronoiogical order. The f i n r is from bis De praescription~,lwritten abour 200, and runs :
The rule of faith is . . . the rule by which we believe that there
is one, and o d y one, God, and He the creator of the worId, U?io by
W o d coming down in the beginning brought alE things into
being out of nothing; and that this F%'md,callcd Yis Son, appeared
in manifold wise in the name of Gdl to the patriarchs, made His
1-oice heard alway in the prophets, and last of all entered into the
Virgin >lar). b~ the spint and power of God His Father, was made
Resh in her wornb and was h r n from her as Jesus Christ, thereredter
proclaimed a new law and a new promise ofthe kingdom of heaven,
wrought wondrous deeds, was n a i l d to the cross and rose again on
the tliird day, was taken up to heaven and sat down at the Fathcr's
right hand, and sent in His place the power of the Holy Spirit to
guidc believers, and will come again in glory to take the saints into
the enjtiyment of life eterna1 and the celestial promises, and to condemn ehe irnpious to everlasting fire, both parties being raised from
the dead and having their fiesh restored.

Despite appearances, this is in effect a Trinitarian statement of

faith and not a binitarian one, as has been aileged. The wording
is extremely free throughout, and this excuses the inclusion of
the belief in the Holy Spirit in a subordinate cPause inserted into
the Ienghy Christolo_el.
Our next m o passages strike a mote formal note. Qne, from
a later chapter in the same treatise, Qxtob the common faith
~vhichthe Roman church shares with the Afrjcan:
Shc acknowledges one Losd God, creator of the universe, and
Christ Jesus, Son of God the creator from the Virgin Mary, and the
resurrection af the flesh.
Ch. 13 (C.C.L.I, rg7f.).

Ch. 36(C.C.T.. 1,217).

86

THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FIXITY

The source of the other is De vi~ginibus-~elmdis1 (dated

r I) :

208-2

Thc rule of faith is one evrrywherc, alone incapahIe of altcraiioir

a n d rcfom-lhe rule ivhich teachcs us to beIiwe in onc God almighty, creator of the world, and H k Son Jesus Chsi(tt, bom from
ihe \"irgin k f q , rucifid under Pontfus PiIate, raised on the tfiird
day from the dead, taken up into heaven, now sitting on thc Father's
right hrind, detined to come to Judge the liring and the dead
through tiie resurrecton of the flmh.

Thcrc i? no mention of the Holy Spirit here, but it should bc

noticed that the Spirit figures largely in the following sentcnces.
The fourth quotation of tlie rule of faith occurs in iidriprsw
Prwam,qwritten aftes z 13:

We, on ihe contraw , . believe that there is of ourse one God.

hut that acording to ;he divine dispcnsation which we cal1 econorn;
tliere is also a Son of this one God, His own Word, Who carne forili
from Him, through Whom a11 things were made, and without Whom
nothing was made. (We believe that) this Son was sent by the Father
into the Virgin, and was b o ~ mfrom her, man and God, 5011 ornan
and Son of God, and was given the name Jesus Christ; that He
suffered, that He died and uFasburied, according to the Scriptures,
and was raised again by the Father, and was taken up to herrven,
and sits ai the Father's right hand, and will come again to ,iudge
the living and the dead :IYho sent forth, as He had promised, the
Holy Splrit, the Paraclete, from the Father, the sanctifier of the
faith of those who bbea-e in the Father and the Son and the Holy
Spirit.

Nere agaln. as in the h t passage, we have a rnasked Trinitarian

formula which might easilv pass for a binitarian one. Another
interesting feature of it is the way it terminates in a brieFTrinitarian creed.
The first &g to be noticed about these exerpts from Tertullian's d e of faith is the way in which S i e y rnirror his
polernical interests. The second and third passages, taken from
contexts without any dot~nallycontroversial. flavour, are stark
sumrnar~esof essential Christian tcaching. There is not a turn of
phrase in them which is coloured by controversial ar stpologetic
Ch.

(C.C.L. 11, rzog).

Ch.

(C.C.L.II, i [tio).

bias. In sharp contrast the first passage abounds in traits which

are clearly traceable to Tertullian's animus against and eaqernes to refute rhe various sets attacked in the treatise. The aneness of God, for example, is set in high relief, aud the sug~cstion
of a s ~ r i n dGod is expresdy denied i ~ a u is
s identified ~ r ~ i thc
th
Mesciah of ancient prophccy and is declared to have experienced a genuine human birth from 3*ilaryis~voiomb;and the
resurrection of the Plesh is heavily underlined. These ivere just
t he issues over which Church and Gnosis drew-swords. SimiIarIy
the fourth passaye, from a hook devoted to exposing a heretic
~rfhoconfounded the Persons of the Father and the Son and
3at.e it out that the Father had actually suffered, rnakcs a
pecial point of the separate existence d the two Persons. It
was tliis Jesus Chriqt, it argues, sent from the Father, Wlio
was bom, as both God and man ; and it was He MTho suficred.
The hook was a product rif Tertullian" Montanist period,
and it i s ta this fact that we douhtless owe the special ernphasis
on tiie Spirit in the closinq section, On the other hand, all
this polcmical matter is on tlie surface, clearly separablc from
thc rule of faith, and has not coniributed any lasting elcrnent
to it.
The big question, however, is whether it can be cIaimed that
thc passages bear witness to the existence of a creed in the
proper sense of the word. CIcarIy if there is a creed uriderIying
thern, Tertullian cannot have reqarded its verba1 exprcssion as
imiolable. Otherwjse he would have felt some cornpuntion
abaut v a m g the lanpage in which he cIothed it to suit his
passing purposes. Ter~ullian,it should be recalled, was a
legalist : anythinq Iike an oficial form would have appcaled to
him. The theor). of scholars like Katrenbusch, that he was deterred from rvriting d o the~oficial
~ text by the onvention that
the creed was a mystery whicEi could be revealed only to the
initiated, has little to be said for it. It is hprobable that the
disc$lina arconi exercised suh an infiuence at this early date,
and Tertullian himself had no hesit ation about describing the
cercrnonies of baptism. It is impossihle, therefore, on the bnsis of
his citations of the rule of fafajth,to argue that Tertullian knew a
single au thoritative creed, even a local one.
At the same time it is dificuIt to resist the impression that

THE MOVEMEUT TOWARDS EmrrY

THE GROWTH OF FIXED FORM$

and fully understanding it from our expoaition may stand the

more FrrrnIy therein".] A thorough conservative in matters of
Church order, these wwrds suggest that the liturgies he inorporated in his treatise were those in use at Rome in his day and
earlier. Sine the book was written in the opening years of the
pontificate of St CaHistus (2I 7-2 I), or more probably 2 tawards
the dose of that of his predecessor Pope Zephyrinus (.rirta
I 98-2 r ;r), we may confidently tum to it for information about
Rornan liturgical practice at the end of the second and the
beginning of the third century.
We have already had occasion to refer to the baptismal creed
of the Tradition : in citing it here we shall endeavour to give the
reader a more exact picture of the faets. The restoration of the
true text rsbises complicated problems, for lhe Greek original of
the treatise is lost : we have to do what we can with a number of
translations into Latin, Coptic, Ethiopian and Arabic, and with
the revisions of the Tradition which appear in the Arabic Canons
of Hipplyr~sand the Syrian Te~tarn~nturn
Domina'.The basic
uthorities appear to be the Latin of the Verona Fragment
(fifth centus.),3 Test. Donz.%nd Can.H@.5 The sarting out of
the conflicting texts has been taken in hand by a number of'
scholars, notably R. H. Connolly,s R, Seeberg? B. Capelle,g
H. Lietzrnann and G.Dix.10 Below are printed the Latin othe
Verona Fragment (with the first article, which is rnissing from
the MS, conjecturally restoredj, and a reconstitution of what
may be presumed to be the original Greek: an English translation appears on p. 46 and p. 1r4. It wiI1 be observed that,
along with Seeberg and Lietzmmn, we have adopted the reading THROVGW THE KQLY SPIRIT FROM MARY THE WRGIN. This is
supported by Lat. and Test. Dom. Copt. gives IN THE H. SP.FROM
M., while Can Hipp., Eth. and Arab. suggest FROM THE n. SP. AND
M. THE V. Connolly, followed by Capelle and Dix, prefersed this,
arguing that it agreed with St Hippolytus's personal theological

=sage elsewhere and with the anaphora of the A$. Trud. itself. But
(a) he was much more likely to expound his own theological

g0

Ch. i (c[. G. Dix, Thz Ajmtolic rrndikiora, Lrindon, 1937, 2).

SO Dix, op. cit , Gm. Inlrod., xxxv ff.
Cf.E. Hauler, Didmtalirz~apostolorumfrag. ld., Leipzig, r gm, r ro f.
' (=f. ed. of I . E, Rahmani. Mainz., 1800.
da
Cf. ed. af W.Riedel, Dic ~ i r c h m r e c h t s p e ~&s~ mPob. Alcx., Leipzig, r g ~zoo, ff.
J.T.S. XXV, 1924, r 31 ff,
, Z . f Y x KG. xl, ~ 9 2 2 ff.
~6
R. Bh. xntix, 1927, 35 R.
* T.N.T.W.=vi, 1927,76 ff.
'0 Op.
cit. lx f. and 36 f ,

'

91

ideas in the loosely worded anaphora than in the relatively fixed

baptkmal questions; ( b ) I a . and Te~t.Dom. are agreed to be
rnuch the most reIiahle witnesses to this creed (c!?. the way they
havc preserved Xp. 'Irlu., & v . . . & v . . ., { W w a ) ; (c) the
p f e r e n c e for <K . . . ai seems in part the result of the subconscious belief that H was identically the same creed as R ;
(d) if 2~ . . . ~ a was
l original the presence d THKOUGH . . .
FROM in Lat. and Test. Bom. is hard to explain, since neither the
scribe of the former nor the redactor of the fatter was apparently a Westerner,' whereas the presence O FROM .
AND
in thc others merely corresponds with Eastern usage.

..

[Credis in deum patrem omnipotentem?]

Credis in Christurn Iesum, filiurn
dei,
qui natus est de Spiritu sancto ex
Maria virgine, ~t crucifixus Y U ~
Pontio PiIato et rnortuua est [ e t
sepultus], et resurrexit die tertia
vivus a mortuis et ascendit in
caelis et sedit ad dexteram patris,
ventums iudicare vivos et mortuos?

Credis in Spiritu sancto et sanctam

ccclesiarn et carnis rcsurrectionem?

Thac this was a formal, fixed creed need not be doubted: an

interesting echo ofit can be overheard in anothcr context of St
Hippolytus, where he speaks oF "confessing God the Father
almighty, and Christ Jesus the Son of God, God Who became
man, etc.".3 The question is whethcr we are entitled to designate it the official creed of the Roman church. St Hippolytus's
regard for tradition and his anxiety that ancient forms should be
respected have already been mentioned. They make it certain
that the rites he described so minutely reflect actual practice at
Rome. But caution is neessary. Forma1 liturgical prayer was
stiI1 in its infancy. The eucharistic prayer which St Hippolytus
invites his readers to accept is manifestly his own cornposition

' Cf.G. Di,op. cIt. Iiv f.

a

Cf.Con. Nott. 8 (Nautin, 249).

The original must have ended simply

with ;r
&y? P ~ u X ~ o h ;

C)*

arrd designedIy gives expression to his anti-Munarchian

theo10,y.l EPsetvhere in the book he concedes that in celebrating
the hoIy rnysteres the bishop i s not absoluteIy bound to recite
the prayers prescribed as though he had learned them by
heart.2 He admits that it is a11 to the good if a bishop has the
ability to pray "suitably, wirh a g a n d and elevated prayer".
The most he stipulates is that no one shall be prevented from
rising set forms ifhe ti-ants to. IR view of this it ~vouldbe hazatdous to assume that the goal oFPocaI uniformity had been reached
irt the matter of baptismal creeds, though they lwre no doubt
more fixed than the eucharist. As Connolly remarked long aq0,3
"at the beginning of the thisd enhiry the Roman creed was
probably not so rigid in its formation but that the personal element may still have had some play"'. Thfs is, if anything, a
conservative estimate : tvc may well wonder whether, in the
light of the evidence, we are not better advised to think of a
nurnber of scrni-official forms than of a single authoritative
Roman reed at this time. But the further discussion of this question must be deferred until we examine the OId Roman Creed
itsclf in the next chapter.
It is interesting to observe that a slightly youngex contcmporary of St Hippolytus, Origen, wiiting at Caesarea in thc late
'thirties of the third century, hints at what Iooks like a formal
creed,4 no doubt that of his native -4le'randria. Cornmenting" on
St John 13, 19, he has been pointing out that there are certain
articles of faith whjch are absolutely essential ("the artieles
which, in being believed, save the man wha believes them "j,
and has been say-ing that the Chri~tianmust believe the rr.hnle
lot and must nst pick and chocice. Then. for the sake of c-learness, he instantes some :
First of alE believc that there is one God, 12%o created and framed
a11 things and brought all things into being out of non-bcing. We
must also believe that Jesus Clirist is Lord, and a11 the tmc tcaching

concerning both His godhead and His manhood. And w t

'

93

THE GROWTH OF FIXED FORMS

THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FIXITY

must

Cf. G . Dix. op. cit., xliv.

Cr. ch, X, 3-5 (in G . Dix's ed.).
3.r,y. =V, 1914, 137.
A On Origen's rule of faith, see G , Bardy. La r?fi de foi d'ori~nr,in Rdwrthts dz
~ ~ c i c n crrli,<irusr
c
ix, 1919.162436.
In <rm. Inann. 32, 16 (Preuuchen, 45 I r,).

believe in the Holy Spirit, and thae having free-wiI1 we are punished
for our rnisdeeds and rewarded for our gaod deeds. To take a case, if
3 man should appear to beIieve in Jesus but shodd not believe thas
nhcre is one God of the laiv and the ospcl, If'hose glar). the heavcns
brought into being by Him decIai-: . . . t h i man ivould be defrctivc in a most vital artile of raith. Or agairr, i a man should
beiicie that Ke l'ho x m s crucified undcr Pontius Pilate .
(but
hould not accept) His birth from the Virgn 5dary and thc Holv
Spirit . - . he too wodd be most defective . . .

..

Similar sumrnaries occur elsewherc 1 in Origen's works, and

there is abundant evidence to show that he attached great imponance to the ecclesiastical tradition of doctrine. TVhen these
passages are surveyed, it is impossible to deny that what he had
beforc his mind was some kind of triadic formula giving expressjon to the kernel ofthe faith: the phrses " born of the Virgin
hlary and the Holy Spisit ", " crucified under Pantius Pilate",
and the like, are typical. And ince shc form is Trinitarian, and
it is cxplicitly said that the articles are indispensable ones, without which a man cannot be a Cbristian, it may well have been
a formula which was cmployed at baptism.
IL'c havc no rneans of detesmining, of course, whether Origen
was thinking o an interrogatory or a declaratory confession.
Wc do knorv, however, that towards the niiddle of the third
ccntury. at any rate in yorth Africa, the forrn of the baprismal
quest ions had become settled and had acquired oEcial recognition. Our infomaton abvut this is desived from the conespondence between St Cyprian and Firmiiian to which referente was made in the preceding chapter. F i d i a n , it will be
recalled, .rtVasable to speak QoT an " ecclesiastical d e ' " of baptisrn, of an "established and churchIy interrogatiori (intmo,fatia legitima et ~cclesimtica)", and even of "t he cusrornary and
established trmrds of the interrogation (wiiata ef legitima vcrbo
inlerrogationis) ". Nothing warrants us in assuming that these
thing w r e exceptional or out of the way in his eyes. A s FirmiIian was bishop sf Caesarca, it is natural to regard any inferences drawn from his remarks as applying equally to other
CF. in M d t , c o m m i , ser. 33 (Klnsirrmann-Bcnz II, 61);con. C&. I , 7
(K~rlschaur , 60); I j e $rim$. I , prncf. (Koctschau, 9-16); ira Ierm. hom. 5, 13
(Klo~trrmann,42); in I Cor. Im.
4 ( c f .J'.%S. ix, 1908, 234).
!:/r. 75, 10-1 1 (Hartel I, 818).

94

SOME CONCLUSIONS

THE MOVEMENT TOWARDS FIXITT

churches of Asia Minor, The language of St Cyprian, too,

reveals that exzraordinary weight was attached to the precise
form o1t he administration of the sarameni, and that Novatianist
heretics udercshotving their cunning by imitating the Catholi
pracrie d o ~ to
n ths minutest detail.1 He gives some indicatio~r
of what was contained in the qusstions, rnentioning God the
Father, Jesus Christ His Son and the Holy Spmt, and going on
to qunte verbally what appears to be the remainder of thc third
article-"Dost
thou believe . . in the remission of sins and
everlasting lif thraugh the Iioly Church? "

7. Soma Conclvsions
It cannot be laimed that the survey we h a ~ just
e conducted
provide satisfatory answers to dl our questiom. Where the
dmuments are so sparse and their precise bearing often so
elusive, complete enlightenrnent is sarcely to be expected.
Nevertheless there are certain concrete gaim lvhich can be
rnarked down on the redit side. Xow- is ishe appropriate
moment for u to draw up an account of tIiern even if it must be
at the cost of some repetition.
In the first pIace, it should be clear that there was no shortage
ofcreeds, in the looser, less exact seme of the word, in the second
and third enturies. As in &e Yew Lestament period, the
Church's faith continued to find expression in serni-forma1sumrnasies adapted, in general struture, content and s ~ l e to
, the
simations whicli called them forth. lia. of the codessions at
which rve g1,mced wcrc Trinitarian in their ground-plan ;others
were binitarian ; still othca-s werc onc-clause Christdogical
staternents. :\I1 threc types, it wvould appear, e'risted i n d e ~ e n dently of each other, and we have seen no reason for supposing
that t he latter twcl were really f r a p e n t s of more fully developed
Trinitarian creeds. Thc Christological group in particuIar
merits attention : it carried on the ancient Christ-kerygrna
which had pIayed such an important role in apostalic times.
The principal items cornprised in it were well on the way to
becoming stereotyped : the sequenc of Christ's birth from the
Virgin Mary and the Hol y Spirit, His suffering and death under
Pontius Pilate, His resurrection an the third day, His session at
?E/). Fq, 7 (Hartel I, 756).

95

the Father's fight hand and His future coming to judge the
living and the dead, reurs wirh persistent regularity and in
language which is more or less fixed. No doubt ft had a secure
.iche in the exorcistic rite, in the anaphora of tlic Eucharist,l
and in atecheticalinstniction. An intereting point i s the variety
of ways in which these different types of confcssions were sometimes combined with each other. In Sr Irenaeus's A&. hoer. r ,
10, r , for example, we saw how an eIaborate Christology tould
be bterwoven with the third atticle oF a thrce-mernbered confessicn=; whilc the same author's Adr. haer. 3, 16, 6 and TertulIian's Adr. Prax. I provide esarnples of ChristologicaI
kerygma prehed, in the one case to a two-article and in the
other case to a three-article confession.
Having estabhhed this, however, what are we to sap about
creeds in t h e precise acceptation of the ~vord?Here our reply
wilI be calculated to disappoint many. Certainlv nothinq has
come to light to upet the conclusion of the previoui hapter
that declaratory creeds, stereotyped in form and oficially sanctioned by locai church authorities, had no urreny in the
second and third centwies. Still less woutd rhcre seem to be any
warrant for speaking of "&e recd of Rome'kor " the creed of
Antioch ",as ifeach local comrnunity possessed a singlc acknowledged fornula of i& own. It is inconceiiahIe that if, at any
pokt in oiur period, such a thing as an oficial declarato- creed
had been Inexistente in any church ofwhich records have come
.dom to us, it wodd have escaped without some mention, hoivever indirect. The familiar explanation that reference to it was
deliberatt-Iy avoided for motives o f cultfc reticente rests on an
anachronistic ante-dating oF the operation of these motives.
Admjttedl~great stres is laid on erthodox beIief by inany ofthe
writers we have consulted, and they are aD convinced that there
O
,,
universaIly accepted system of d o p a , or sule of faith, in
the Catholic Church. But this is never unambipously connected, even by theologians Iike St Irenaeus and TertulIian,
with any set form of words. Though they frec~uentlycite the rule
The bent early exarnple is the canon of St Hippoly tus's dpsiolfc Tradiiion (ed. oT

C.Dur, 3 f.1.

'

For 'other and Iater examplcr illustsating tEie long rsistence of this type
of mnflation, see H. Listnrnann, An/angr dri ~ l n u b e i i i & n n h i u t s ~ Tiibingsn,
1921, ri31 f.

SOME CDNCLUSIONS

THE MOVEMENT TOWAWDS I;I?U'IX

98

played by the orthodox carnpaign agaimt Gnosticism in the

shaping oF credal furmularies, thcir kerneI dways conskted of
those primordial veritits which it was the Church's rakon d Y t r ~
to proclaim to the worId. .Imore exact account of the matter
would be that part of the Catholic reaction to the Gnmtic cri&
was a renewed and enhanced insistence on the public, apostolically authorized deposit of doctrine which had been handed
d o m in the Church rrom the beginning as t h e canon or ruIe of
faith.
Finally, we may ask what factors, iF not &e desire for concise
official formulae which w o d d shut t h e gatc against heretical
kovations, were jnstrurnental in bringing about that measure
of unihrmity and codi6cation whih w.ere ahieved in our
period. A great change was wrought, though we may have
appeared reluctant to recopke it, between thc Xew Testament
tage and the nilddlc of the third century. Even if locally
authorized creeds and formulae were not so early in the field as
optimistic scholam have sometimes liked to imagine, we werc
able to observe a steadily progressing tendency for the baptisrnal
questions to "freeze'' (thr process was not complete, of course)
into r$d fonm, and we notied that she Iess formal sumrnarigs
ofdoctrine comprked under the mle of faith had a more precise,
detaminate outlinc and a more settled phraseology at ite
beginning ofthe third century than at the end of the h t . The
m w e r must be the unsatisfying one that the respomibLLity annot be assigncd to any singIe cause. Brit a more proitable way of
dealing with the question is to pojnt to the general, and universally recognized, tendency of the liturgy in this period to
assume a fmed shape. Creeds and credal formular, as E.
Norden Qad the acumen to remar$ and as H. Lietzmannz
was never tired of reiterating, are part and parceI of the Liturgy.
T h q share the forhincs of the prayers and services in rvhich
they are cmbedded, I l ' e shouid, of course, beware of ante-dating
tEie era of liturgical fixi5y. The Ianguage of the eucharistic service was still fairly pliable in the middle of t h e fourth century.3
None the less, towards the end of the second, at any rate in the
Wf+Agiostur 'hm, Leiprig snd Berlin, I I 263 K.

v,

e.,.,
Dit U$mm drr a p x l i s c h m $u%~tasbckmnt&lu,
(inSttmg~lrrrichtcder Ptetm, dkadmtis).
a Cf. G . Dk, 7hc Shapi Vtha L i t u r ~ hndon,
,
6 ff.

k i i n , 1911)~
"4

f i ~ dccades
r
of thc third, a bias in favour of

99
set forms was

making itself felt, and the prayers of the Gurch were being set
do1i-n in writing. The most obvious illris~ationis p r o d e d by
the A~ostalicT d i t i o n of St Hippolytus. In this movernent, itself
the product of causes deeply buried in the htinctive life of
institutions and societies, we can perceive 1zit large the gradual
codification of creeds which we are studying.

THE EVfDBNCE FOR R

THE OLD ROMAX CREED

r . 3he Evidcnce for R
THEtkird century was, from a number of points of view, a
critica1 epoch in the Church's history. One arnang the many
problems with which it had to grappIe was the influx into its
ranh of an ever-swelling multitude of converts from paganism.
Every thoughtful observer must have been conscious of the
grave threat to rhe integity of the Church?, traditional
teaching : the Gnostic crisis had demonstrated how easiIy i t
ouId he swamped by a flood of incorners vvlth incomplete or
sassly mispided notions of the auihenti content af Christianity.
a counter-measure a thorough reorpznization and
elaboraGon of the catcchetical systcm was taken in hand :many
signs of ir are disctrnible in contemporary Iitrrrgies and in the
writing of third-century falhem. St Hippolytus's Aposiulic
~raditi'Onshows that the Roman liurch was earlier iii the field
than most with this overhaul. Henceforth most exhaustive
arrangements were made both for grounding candidates for
admission to the Church in the main articles of betief, and for
testing their success in absorhing this teaching. One offshoot of
this tightening up, and one which js of direct relevane to our
studies, would seem to have been the development, some time
or other in the third centur). and probably in Rome first of ali,
ofthe rites ofthe handing over, or traditio, and giving back, or
rcddilio, of the creed as part of the immediate prepararion for
baptisrn. Once these conventions had estabhhed themselves. a
dedarator). fomuIa became necessay, and the cirurnstances
of its use by the bishop and of its being mcmorized and solemnIy
reliearsed by t i ~ ecatechumens were suh as to surround ic witli
imrnense prestige. The paraIlel development of the disc$liaa
arcani, or rule o secrecy, with a11 that it carried with it of awc
and reverente attaching to the central mysteries of Christianity,
only served to rnagnify still further the saredness of creeeds.
rm

IOI

The one selected for use by the local bishop mmt quiHy have
ousted all other s u m a r i e s oT belief current in Sie district, and
must itself have acquired the psition of the oficial s)mbol of
faith. The era of declasatoqt confasions was now in full swing,
and while it would be rash to suppose that the text was treated
;is in~iolable,eah local church henceforth had its own crted,
&ch rnight be marked by distincsve divergences Gom those
of jts neihbours. As the third century wore on, this situation
beame, it would seem, universal, and persisted for centuries
ifter ihe council of Nicaea had inaugitrated a line of conciliar
srccds laiming a more than rnerely local allegiance.
One o the earliest of tocal creeds to take shape and be
canonized in this way was that of the Roman church, It is the
purpose of this cliaptcr to examine the docurnent ~vhichlias
been jdentified as the ancient Rornan baptismal creed (its
coni.entionl description is R), to investigate its credentials,
and to give a bird's-ele view of its histiry so far as it is recoverable. No apoloipu sliould be needed for aHocati31g so mucIi
space to it. The decent ofthe Roman creed can be traced \r-ith
some d e p e e of confidente to the second century, at any rate
to its closing decades. If this is correct, it shoilld have a special
intercst as lifting the curtain a few inches from the obscure
period studied in the last chapter when there were a variety of
local types competing for a monopoiy. Tts outstanding impurtnnce on other grounds scarcely needs stressing. It became the
direct ancestor of a11 other local creeds in the West, and its
influ>me even on Eatem creeds was rnarked. The Apostles"
Creed itse'lr, u-hich was Iater elevated to a prisition of unique
authority as the baptismal formula of Rome and thc M7est
generallu, i rnerely one arnong R's many dcscendants : jt is in
fact, as we shaI1 later discover, the old creed of Rome enriched
with rniitter which had becorne popular in the pro~inces.
Our prirnaly source for the text of the OId Roman Creed,
in its T,atin form, i s the treatise Commeninrisrs irt y b o i u m apostolontn' which the Aquileian priest TyrannIus Rufinus wrote
triwards 404. T t was fram this famous boak that, in tlie first
~ h a p t e rwe
, culled the legend of the comporftion of the creed by
the twclve Apostles. In it Rufinus comments, lause by clause,
P.L. 2 1 , 3 3 5 4 .

I"3

THE OLD ROMAN CREED

THE EVIDENCE FOR R

on the baptismal creed o f his own church, Aquileia, and m m pares it wjth that of Rome. His reason for this odd procedure
was that, wliiIe he recoLgnizedthat the Roman church preserved
the original cseed of the Apostles in its purity, he felt constrained (by natural piety, we may conjechire) to use the
formula he had himseIf professed at baptism as his working
basi. Since he scrupulousIy indicates the points at which the
Aquileian creed diverges from the Roman, it has usually been
regarded as an easy task to piece the latter together as it
e'usted in his das. The text thus obtained is corifirrned by the
L a t h cseed tz-hich has been inserted. on the back oF t h e last
page but one (p. 2 2 6 ticrso), into the Graeco-Latin uncial MS
Laud. Gr. 3j in the BodIeian Libra..
Thk is a sixth or seventh
c e n t q M S , and is b a t known as Codex E (Codm Antiquisnmus)
of the Arts ofihe Aposll~s.Further c o n h a t i o n is supplied by a
Cottonlan IIS (z h SX) of the eiehth century, now in the
Bri tish >.luseum,
Printed below in pacallel columns are &e Latin text of R as
suggested by Rufinus and the 51% w-e hai~ernentioned and an

Reme in 340.An over-zealous exponent of Nicene orthodoxy,

he had f d e n f o d af the Eusebian party and had been expelled
from his see as being virtually a Sabellirin. Ljke others in the
same plight at this time, he took refuge in Rome, where he
seceiir~da w a m weIcome, His apologia took the form of a
detailed statement oF his bdiefs on tlie theological issues at
stake: the i d a was that his Roman supporter might have
material with which to vindicate his innoctnce. Tn the rniddIe
of this documentk sshort creed crops up which is a replica, in
ai1 save a feew relatively unirnpwtant points, of the creed which
can be reconstnrcted out of Rufinus's treatjse. This \+.as
identified, towards t h e middle of the smenteenth entury, by
James U s ~ h e rt,h~e scholarly archbishop af Armagh (who had
also been t h e first to disentangle the Latin text af R from
Rufinus), as the contemporal creed oT the Roman church. Its
interpolation by IfarcelJus ia his defence was, thought rssher,
an ingenious move desiped to provide an absolutely unjrnpeachable proof of
orthodoxy by the innuendo that he
coasidered the Pope's ow-n baptismal confession the best
expression of bis faith ; and \$-e know from Pope Julius's allusion
to it in his subsequent Jctter to the Eastern bishops that the
plan succeeded.3 PsacticalIy all scholan since Usshtir's day have
~quiescedinhis identification. 3larcellus's cseed runs as foliows :

I O2

Engljsh translation :
W

o in dcum pairem omnipotcnE r m:

a in Chrisrum I m m filium eius uni-, dominum nosirum,

qui n a t u cst d c Spiritu sanctn ct Maria
viqine,

qui sub Pontio Pilato rrucifixus rst

sepulrus,
fcrtiadie rts-31
a rnortuk,
asccndit in cactos,
sedtt ad dextcram pairis,
undc vmtunri cst iudicare
vivos t t mortuw;
ct in Spiritum sanctrim,
sanctarn ccclcsiam,
rernissionem prccatorum,
carnis resurrcctioncm.

ct

I klieve in God the Father almighty;

in Chrh J e o l ~Kis odu Son, w r

hrd,
)%%o s
a
'
\
bom fmm the Holy Spirit
and the S7+n M q ,
Ii'ho under Pontius PiIate w a s m c i fied and brnied,
on the third day Tose again from the
dead,
ascended to heaven,
s i t ~at t h right
~
hernd of t l i t Father,
whence He will come to j u d ~ rthc
living and the dead;
and in the Holy Spirit,
the hoEy Chwch,
t he remission of sins,
the resurrection of thc flesh.
nnd

Some sixty yeass before Rufinus wrate his book, a reed

practically identical wjth the above, but in Greek, figured in
the weI1-known apologia wliich Marcellus, bishop of Ancyra
in Cappadocia, submi tted to Pope Julius I at the synod held in

' See S t Epiphanius, Pari. h r . 7 2 , 3 (H011111, 258).

a See his De Romaiias ecclesiae .'vmbnIo ajo~lolico wlzrc liliisqils jde f~rrnulif
diairibn, London, 1647

a CF. St Athan., A@. con. Ar. 32

(P.G.
25, ~ o n ) .

. ..

'04

TETE OtD ROMAN CREED

T h e text, it ir411 be observed, exhibits severa1 dcviations from

the Latin verion suggested by Wufjnus. The chief 5f tthesc are
the omission of FATHER ( . r r a ~ &in~ jrhe h s t articlc, and the
additjon of ZFE EVERLASTMG ( z ~ r j va;&vlw) after RESURRECTIQN OF TKE FLRSH : a Iess irnportant variation is the insertion of
APTD ( ~ a ; before
)
O N TKE LWERDDAY and sr-rs.
MarcelIus's letter is not the o d v witness to the Greek text
of the Old Roman Crceci : a MS of considerably later date an
also be cited. This is the ollection of litur@cal piecec known as
the Psalipr of AAheljtan, in the Cottonian Collection in the
British lluseum. The cretd appears in the MS (Galbsi A
XVIII : 9th ent.) at rhe end ofthe psalter proper aIong with
othes formulae, the reek words by a curious trick having been
transcribed in Anglo-Saxon characters. The contents agree
exactly with the Latin R,and the text differ from MarceZlus7s
in a number of rninutiae ( ~ ~ t for
v a K~~ / V E ~ V~, C Y J * C CYtov
Z
for
s G-y~ovmrtpa, etc.!, as well as in the points mentioned above.1

The p r e c e d i n ~section has given a sketch of the argument for

supposing that Rufinus and MarcelIus bear witness to the
existente of a st~t.idardcreed at Rome in the fourth century.
Vssher's briiliant surmise seerned to be orroborated in a quite
rernarkabIe way when the tme date and authorshp oF St
Hippolytus's Tradifion, with its interrogato. formula so closely
similar to R,n*ereestablislied at the hcginnuig oF this centur)..
Before proeeding Further, Iiowever, we mut subject his case
to a more seardiing scrutiny. The Roman creed is such a key
document in the history of creeds that ahsoluie assurance as to
its credentials i s desirable. Moreevcr, while practically a11
scholars since Ussher's time liave accepted the traditional identification, objections have been advanced against it by F. J.
Badcock, whose worl on ctecds has had comiderabEe hflrience
in Great Britain. 12:e must weigh his arqument before passing
to an investigation of the earIier history 3nd pedigree of t he Old
Roman Cseed.2
It wns Abp. Ushcr who madc use of Psa!!. Arihtl.
For Radcmk1sviews cf. 3.T.S.
xxiii, 1922, 362 iT.and Th Hisiory of ilu Crttds,
London, rogo and 1938. They havt not so far Iiccn fully discussed in print.
1

THE TRkDITION DEFEXDED

105

The pivot on which thc whole orthodx tlieory tums ie, of

oufie, the beIief that the contempasary creed of the Raman
c-,urch an be reliably recovered from the h i n t s givcn by
~ ~ f i n in
u shis treatise. Badcock was accordingly not siow to
drnw attention to the fact that a11 Rufinus pmrnised to pive in
bis book was the creed of his native church Aquileia. Adrnittedly
he in$ed out severa1 striking divegcnces between it and the
Roman creed, but we have no reason to suppose that his Iist
exhaustivc. U d a s we can be sure that ir \Tas, the attempt
to reconstnict R ~ i t h
the aid of his casual rernrks is foredoomed to collape. Stress has also been laid on the fact that
iliere are a number of respects in wlzich the reed pieced to-

gether from the Cornment~riuirdiffers verbally from what must

liave been rhe current Roman form, Thus Rufinus uses in with
the ablativc, not the accusativc, whcn expressing belief in each
of the three divhe Persons. Again, for m ostu sox in the second
artide he writes unicojitio P ~ W instead of &e undoubtedly more
plausible fiiittm eius uninirn. The accumulation of thtre and
similar points tend to underminc coddence in the testirnony
of the Commeatariris to the Roman creed.
Strictures like these betray a urious misunderstanding ofthe
character and purpose of Rufinus's tract. If there is one thing
whicb he rnakes crystal clear in bis ppening chapters, it is that
he canceives of himself as cornrnenth~on the Apostles' Creed,
rhe formula originally comocted by the Tivelye, and not
prjrnafily on the creed of his own or any other local church.
He severa1 times refers, in general terms, to the "tradition of
the creed" and the "tradition" whlch "was given to the
churches ", and declares Qis itention, in contrast to the
b~haviourof the heretica! cornmentator Photinus, of "restoring
their plain and simple rneaning to the apostolic words". I n
arder to estabtish tbe authority of the creed, he relates the
familiar story oF how the Twelve severalily contnbuted its
clau.;es before departing from Jerusalem on their missionary
enterprises. At the same time-and this is the next point he
brings out2-he is convinced that thc veritable creed of the
b o s t l e s is preserved in its integrity in the Roman church alone.
Hc was apparently of the same mind as St Arnbrose, who had
I

4"

Cli.

(P.L. 21, 337).

Ch.3 ( P . L . 21, 339).

THE OLD R O m N CREED

T E ORfCINAL LANGUAGE OF R

v n e r a l orthodoxy in Roman eyes, there rvi;as none that he ould

appeal to ivith an q u a l hance of uccess. The practice of
~roducingcreeds as proof5 of me's orthodoxy was, apparentlv,
-.
conventional in the foiirth century, and agreed 1Viv;tti-tfr e prevtiling disposition to Ireat creeds as tests. Eusebiius oT Caeaarea,
J?>
as we shnll see, followcd it at the council of NiciLea, and b--u UICI
Theophronius, bishop of Tyana (in Cappadocia), at the synod
of Anriocli in 34 r . I Marcellus went one better by quietly putting
forward as his own the creed ofthose whose favour he hoped to
win.
The fat that the text as it has come down to us m
severai variations Gom what was probably the true R
text need not pertwb UF.undulv: it is unlikely that it w u m w
anyone at the time, for the verk;a1 expression of creeds was not
then considered sacrosamt. In any case ~ v eare dependent for
-->- irannrion
n.
our knowltdge of St Epiphanius
at this point on a
single MS %of the early fourteenth century. As for the prt
ef EVERLASTING LIFE ( 5 ~ at&~tov)
4~
in the fina1 article
scarcely caneivabie that the words are an unconscious reli~iuhence by Marellus of some Ea;tem re
I. Much more
probably th- are to be explained as an
ation, absentminded or deliberate, on the pairt of sont i t : snoe who semembcred the full text of the Apostla' Creed ta, loyaUy.3 The
a d y variant likeiy to cause diffculty is the omission of FPLTRER
(na~6pa)in the h t article. Archbishop Ussher hazardd the
guess that it was "lefr out, as it would appear, by scribal carelessness". But this hardly merits consideration. It is worth
noticing that there are two other plaes in this letter where
Marcellus shows a predilection for thc f o m " God almighty
(&o3 r r o v r o ~ ~ ~".
~ ~One
a s ) of the charactcristic points of his
theology was that he Word of God did not beceme Son until
the Incarnation, His only generation being in the ITirgin's
womb, m d that thc titie Son, like those of image, Christ,Jesus,
lifc, way, etc., was o+ propcrly applicable to Him during the
incarnate state.4 It was logical that he shodd feel a certain

reluctant about describing the eterna1 God, to Whom fie

~t'ord belonged, a~ Fathet in His ultimate being. H e was t h e
indivisible, absolutely one hfonad, and &e T$'ord resided in
Him consubstantidly (GPoo6aros) as an inseparabIe energy,
~ o ast a distinct hypostasis. It is therefore undentandable that
he sheuld have preferred in certain contexts, such as the opening
article of the creed, to avoid the t e m Father. Suh a daring
tampecing with the text (his Roman judges, biased as they were
in his favour, were pcrhaps inclined to turn a blind eye to i t )
uras a manoeuvre as much in keepjn~uith his character as
w-irh his theolo~;-~.

1x0

Cf. St Athanasius, De S+. 24 (P.G.26, 724).

J-Jcnmn's mcr. Bosc I (A.D. 13%).
Cf. the imprrssive array ofsuch alterations in Capari, Qwllcn 111, 108ff.
Klusterniam's Ewcbius Mferke IV,
185-2 15 (Ltipzie, 1906).

Cf.Frae.+4-;r, 42, 48, 91. rog in E.

111

We may take it as established tliat the formula seferred to by

.ufinusand quoted by MarcelIus is none other than the Roman
creed of the fourth entury. We zherefore possess it in two versions, Latin and Greek. The question arises which of them is the
original one. It is a question ivhich lias bcen much discussed,
not only to satisfy academic curiosity, but bccause of t h e
bearing the answer ha sn t h e date and composition of the
creed.
The practica. unanimous verdict has been that the Greek
text is the original and the Latin a tr,mslation: it is borne out
by the presence in St Hippnlytus~Trodilion of a closeIyrelated
creed whose origina1 was Greek. A case has been advanced for
tl-ie contr:iry thesis, however, the argument used 1 being that
tlie Latin text reveals rhythrnic qualiries which are noticeably
L - ^ - & r--.
aL~crr~
L J Vthe
~ Greek. Some of the ancient authors, like Faustus
of Riez,2 even descsibe it as a camcn or hymn. It i s assumed that
the version whicb is built up with stylistic care must have the
priority in time. But not everybody \vil1 h d this reasoning
c1
g. In the case of liturgial pieces a rhythmic translati
i unrhy?hic original is just as conceivable as the
rt
s a rnatter of plain fact, however, it is not possibIe to
observe in the Latin text any of the rhythm fashionable in the
artificial prose style of the ernpire. Whether the test of quantity
Cf,H.jordan, Rhythmirch Prosa in der altchrisl~ichcnlul&iscltcn Lileraiur, 3905,'4 , /-1S';Z
. '.
1 R., and J . Hausslciter, Trinitarischcr Glauh, 9 2 A.
CX. his phsase v b o l r salutdrr car- in Dc Spir. s m . r, r (Engtlbmht, 1~5%'

II5

THE DLD ROMAN CREED

R, TERTULLIAN AND ST HIPPOLYTUS

expatites on the close relationship between the ,4frican

churches and Rome.

The resemblances leap to the eye at once, even in translation.

~ h e consisc
y
not only in the general pattern of the creeds, their
agreement in stressing Christ's birtb from the Holy Spirit and
h e Blessed Virgin rather than His pre-cosmic begetting, and
their use of such characteristicaIly Roman turns as CHRIST
JESUS. They include also remarkable sirnilarities of language
which can be picked out at a glance in the original texts. But the
discrepancies are obvious too. The first is thc ornission by H of
the description of Jesus as ONLY-BEGOTTEN and OUR LORD.
Secondlv.
,, while H probabIv defines His earthly birth as BY THE
s the distinctive wording
HOLY SPIRZT FROM TH
mo1b THE H(:
ILY SPIR
-Y. Thirdiy, R has AND
. -.
- --WAS BUIUED as againsr ri. s ANU ULXU (AND WAS BURED of Fmg.
Ver. is not original). FourthIy, H interpolates the word LIvrNG
before FROM THE DEAD. Fifthly, there is a difference between H's
treatment of the Second Coming and R% s: I-I probably had a
participle (ZpXdpmv),while R k a d WITENCE HE WLL COME
(G8'8sv E p X ~ ~ a rSixthly,
).
H hias noth ing to correspond (the
.-1variant texts which insert tke
worus
are of later date) with
R'SREMXSSION OF SINS or RESURRECTION OF THE FLESA. Lastly,
it has severa1 minor differences of wording and the character-

114

"Let UUQexamine", he cries, "what that blessed church (Rome)

has Eearned, what she has taughc, what she has shared (confesserarit)
with the African churches: she acknowledges one God and Lord,
creator of tl-ie universe, and Christ Jesus, Son of God the creator from
the Virgin Mary, and the resurrection of the flesh,"

Many have been tempted to regard this as a manifest alIusion to,

possibly even citation of, R. We have already suggestedl that
their exegesis is mistaken, and have argued that Tertuliian
was not thinking of an official formula. This will be the plae
to probe the possibility that he was familiar with R rather more
thoroughly.
Let us start, however, with the baptismaI creed of St Hippolytus's Aposfolic Tmdilion, setting the two texts R and H
(=the creed of the TradibEon) side by side. It should be remernbered, of course, rhat in its present form R is a declaratory creed.
The probability is that if it was in current use in the first decade
or so of the third century ir consisted of three questions.
Dost thou beliwe in God t h e Father
almighty?
Dost thou believe in Christ Jesus, thc
Son of God,
Who was bom 6y the Holy Spirit from
the Virgin Mary,
M'ho was crucified undm Pontius
Pilate, and died,
and r m a g a h on the third day living
from the dead,
and ascended into the heavens,
and sat d o m on the right hand of the

Father,
and will come to judge the livjng and
the dcad?
Dos? thou bdieve in the Holy Spirit
in the hoIy Church?=

I beIiwe in Gxi tha Father almighty;

and in Christ Jesus His only Son, our
Lord,
Who was b o m from the Holy Spirit aod
the Virgin Mary,
Who under Pontius Pilate was crucified, and buried,
on the third day rosc again from the
dead,
ascended to heaven,
sits on the right hand of thc Father,

whence he will come to judge the living

and the dead ;
and in the HoIy Spirit, theholy Church,
the remission of sins, the resurrection of the ffesh.

The perplexing thing about these creeds is their ombination

ofstriking reaemblances with a number of significant differences.
i

Sce hove, 87 f.

See above, p.

91

n.

isti

IN THE HOLY CHURCH.

The impression left by a comparison of R with Tertullian's

excerpts from the rule of faith is even more bafiing. The difficulty of assurning that he had any one formal creed in mind
when he wrote was rnentioned in the preceding hapter, but
there are certain points which can be taken as settled. Thus the
brief surnrnary introduced in his De praescriptione 36 and quoted
above indicates familiarity with the form GHRIST Jesus so
characteristic of R and H. Again, the most formal of his creed
extracts (De virg. vel. r ) agrees with R in singling out the Son's
birth from the Virgin Mary rather than Ris eterna1 generation,
and in rnentioning His cnicifixion " under Pontius Pilate ".
The Virgin birth also features in Adv, Prax. 2 . In addition some
of his better-known passages reveal unmistakable verba1
coincidentes with R, such as the word-order " on the third day
resuscitated from the dead" in Da virg. vel. r , the sentence
"sitting now at the right hand of the Father " in De nirg. vel. I
and " sits at the right hand of the Father" in Adv. Prax. 2, the

r 18
THE OLD ROMAN C R E E D
Roman credd forms) all represent differcnt cantemporaiy
traditions enjqing the blessing of Roman authority. This, or
sornething like it, is by frir the most probable hypothesis unless
R's characteristic differencs fmm H confirm Dom Capelle's
view of their derivative status.
I t can safeIy be said that they do not. So far from there beiny
a n y t h i n ~distinctively ttiird-century about them, psaciically
all of them represent material which might well have secured
admittance to a Roman creed in the second century. This
applies notably to t h e titIe o t ?LORD,
~
but it is true also of the
clause T B ~R E - ~ ~ S ~ OF
O Nsrxs, whatcves the atual date of it
insertion into Rornan creeds. The former was a cornrnunplace
from the earliest times,' while tlie latter figured in the midseond-cent~ryreed of the Episfula Aposfolorum. There ivere,
indecd, circles in the West which preferred, after the example
of the Old Testament, to confine the title LORD to God the
Father, and this possibly explains its absence from H and
Tertullian" cceeds. The adjective OPILY-BEGOTTEN (povoy~Vjj)
may have ewed its ptace to Scriptural precedent, as Dom
CapeIle rgues, but there were probably dogrnatic motives ac
work as well, and the date need not be so late as he suggests.
The clairn that Christ Iras the trtie Only-Begotten was heing
advanced by St Irenaeus against the Ta1en.tirilan Gnostis long
before &e second century ended.2 I&nppearance in R is much
more likely to indicate a polemial gesture than a revenion to
Biblicisrn on the part of the Rornan oficials of the early third
cenhiry. The o&er variations of Panguage between H and R,
whih Dom Capdle dismisses so lightly, serve to ernphasize the
difference bettveen the two creeds. It is difficult to believe, for
example, that a n y h n g rvas gained by attering the precise
BY THE HOLY S
P FROM
~ THE VIRELV M A R Y , whih
~
probably
stmd in H, to R's simplet FROM THISROLY SPIRIT ?LWTHE WRGE
MARY, any more than by hanging WTLL GOME TO JUDCE
(2PXdLCEV~~)
to WHENCE HP, W L L COME TO JUDGE [ ~ E tVp x T U ~ ) .
Lhe true solution of the problem presented by the sirnilarities and differences betwecn the creeds of Tertullian and
Cf.,e.g., Rom.

I,

5 : ro, g; St I r ~ n . Adv.
, hucr. 3, 16, 6;4,33, 7 (P.G. 7,925;

..

i ' ~ ~ , d dhaer.
u . 3, 16, I ; 2; 6 (P.F.7, 9 2 0 ; 921; 925).
N . 8. Dom Capelle does not iicccpt thi3 rtading: see R. Rdn. w i x , i927,35
J.

ff.

R, TERTULLIAN A N D ST IIIPPOLYTUS

I9

Si Hippolstus and R has already been foreshadotvcd. Scvci.nl

credal surnrnarie were probably in use in t h e Roma11 cliurcIi
about 200. There is no reason to doubt that St Rippolytus
introduce~us to ont of them, but rhere must have been otliers
as weZ1: the aye of Iitur,+cal frxity and u n i f o h t y had not yct
arriced. R may i-eq- weI1 have been another. The striking
sesernblances between R and H are best explained on the
Iiypothesis that, while both were in a sense independent forms,
they wcre close relativa and jostled against each other like
mernbers of a farnily. Thus there must Iiave been considerabte
mutual influente, especially as on our theoq- creeds rvere still
fairIy elatic in their verbal espression. Similarly Tertullian
seems to have known R :some of Iijs statemem at aiiy raie read
like echocs of it. But he seems to Iiave known, and to have
frequently resorted to, other types oE doctnnal surnrnary too.
One of these rnay have been H : there are points of ontact
tietween his language and that of H. Others were of the distinctivcly Eastern rnould. This explanation is the only one
which does justice to the fact that no one redaI formula had
apparently yet been granted a monnpoly. If it rules out of
court tlic neat but artificial rheory oF origin sketched by Dom
CapcIlc, it at Ieast enab3es us to carry back the history of R
with confidente to the turn of the second century. 'Ef it is
legitimate to foIlorv up the hint contained in the polemical
insertion of Monogenes as a description of Christ, ~ v ernay be
emboldened to peer still further back into the obscurity of'the
second century.

5. The Holl-Hnrnack @polbsis

IVitli this concIusion research inte the pre-&to.
of R might
to have reached a dead end. The attempts wIiich
were formerIy popular to discern the shadowy outline of R
hovering behind the credal formulae of St Justin proveci sterile.
True, his baptismal questions, as we reconstructed them, for a
rnornent tempt us to discover pointers to the Old Rornan Creed
in rhe absence of the ad-jectivc ONE with God the Father and in
the prominence given to Christ's cmcifixion under Pontius
Pilate. But the whole plan of thc creed is in fact quite ditTcrcnt,

be thought

THE OLTI ROMAN CREED

THE HOLL-HARNACK HYPOTHESIS

with its descriprion of God as "the Father and Lord of the

universe'" its ddesigna tioti of CIirist (Jesus Chrisil, be it noted) as
r & our Saviour",
arid its rnention of ihe Spirit's prophesic

deat1l oon the cross that God exalted Him and gave Him the
name which is above every name, so that every tringue should
confess that He is Lord (in the Gseek, K~EOP),
the ~econdtitle of

rninistry. A ompletely fresIi line of investigation was, however,

opened up in rr)rr) bv a sei'ies of brilliant papers presented in
that year to the Prussian Academu of Sciences by Karl HolI,
Adolf von Harnack, and H:ins Lietzmaiin. Some account must
now be given of their pioneer u-osk, &e sesults of which have
been acclaimed in many qunriers as solidly established. TIie
mggestions they put fonvard, i f accepted, \r-ould hare tlie effcct
of placing the composition and character of R in an entircly

the creed.

I20

new perspective.

Holll confined hirnself to .in ana1:sis of the second, m

Christological, scction of tEie crecd. First, he noticed that t h e r ~
are m o descripti~etitles attactied to hristJes~~-!aj ms OSI,Iswx and (b) OUR LORD. The C;iisistology xvhich folloits, he then
obsemed, breaks natural!. into t\v.\-oseparate passaem, and ench
cif these is introduced i11 the original Greek bu tlie clefiniic
artide (7v y ~ n ~ e 4 et.
t ~ a;ind ~ X r f2 4 n ~ v r l o vIltAdrou etc.':.
The first af thesc describcs the birth of Jesus Chist from thr
Holy Spirit and the I'irqin Maq-. The second dweIh on His
crucihion, burial, resurrection, ascension, secsion at His
Father's riqht hand, and future coming in judgrnenit. It is most
unlikely, li; urgcd, that this 5)-rnrnetricalstructure, throwr~as i t
is into sharpest relief by the reuplicatien of the definite article,
ais accidental. What it suggests is that each of these descriptive
passages is a theoIogica1 exposition of one of the preceding titles
ascribed to the Saviour. Thus the forrner of them explains and
justifies the divine Sonship d o n g the lines o f l u k e I, 35,~ u h e r eit
is prophesied by the Anqel that the Holy Spirit wiU descend
upon tlie Blesred vir@;, and that thereforc [note Sid in the
Greek) hcr off~pringwill be called Son of God (uEs Bco, the
very title of the creed). Similarly the second wouId seem to
interpret Christ's position as LORD as beitag the reward of His
sufferings ancl detith upon the cross, The theology is precisely
that of St Paul in Phil. n, 6 K, where he makes the point that it
was bacni~e(note Si8 again in v. g) He humbled Himself to
CT. Sittrrngsbcricliit der Pfruss;~chttiAkadonk, r g r g , T, 2 ff. Cf. also his Gc~ammltc
I 1 5 ff.

Atfinfzt

121

Holl's lecture did no more than hrcak up R into its constituent elemcnts. 3ut if his arpment is valid, a furiher step ma)Iogiatly be taken. R as we h o w it mu5t be a derivative creed,
a descendant ofa more primitive form which once stood alone
and did not ontain t h e doubIe Christology cxpandinq the
titles attributed toJmus. This was the infwence which A. von
Harnackhenplicitly drew in his supplementary artide ontributed to the B e r h Academy ane month after Holl'i. The
original skeleton reed must have m n as folIows :

T beIie1-e in God the Fathcr alrnigliv,

iind in Christ Jesus, His only Son, oiir Loi-d,
and in the Holy Spirit, the holy Chtirch, the forgivrness of sins, the resurrection of thc fleh.

This creed, he polnted out, bears the proof of its one-time

independence on i.ts face. X o t only is it built upon a s?.rnmetrical
pattern. three main articles t\-ith three suborcIinate rnembers
each (he treated 'Z?IE. FORGTVEYXSS OF SINS and THE RESCRRECTIOX OF TRE FLESR as qoing toyether) , but a similar s~mrnetrical
a m p o n d e n c e can be observed in the flow of ideas.
A forrnidable difficuIty confrontinp this hypotiiesis, as stated
by Hamack, is that of fitting the two items THE FOREIVENESS OF
srxs and THE R ~ K R R E C T I D SOF THE FLESH into the alleg-ed ninefold scheme. Not everyone was prepared to accept Harnack's
proposal to cut the knot by lurnping them together as two
cornpIementa~ aspects oF one conception, the fruits of the
rcdernption enjoyed by believer. It was at this point that H.
Lietsmann stepped in with his con triburian to the symposium.2
First, he argued with rnuc1.i force that it was simply impossible
to treat the two sub-claizses as one. Tlie tru soiution, he then
sugqested, rvas to omit THE REMISSION OF STNS as no part of the
skelcton creed. Tn rcality the primitive formula was a genuine
nine-clause one, and he pointed ta tlie reecl of the Dr RrtIyzeh
1

Sitrun~sberchieder Preussiahcn Aiirdemie, 1 1)1 9, VII, r i 2 F

V$EE
ahovr, 8q,
np. rit. XVII, 269-74.

127

THE OLD ROMAN CREED

CONCLUSION

mentiu11 oE His forthcorning -Parousia and His final sumniiiig-iip

of a11 things, while " the namie which is alioire cvery name" i s
t Twirn.
clearly for him Chri-,
These are very serious objections: tliey strike at tIie rrcry
roots of the sriggestion that the Christological setion of R i s ;i
twofold theological commentary ou the preceiling titles o!'
Christ. The question arises whether in fact there is ariy compelling reason for accepting it. 1t is ~vorthpointing out that no
capital shouId be made out of the fact that the Christology
dweils sticcessivcly on two distinct phases of the Lord's experience, Hi earthly generatioi~and then H i s passion and
exaltation, as if thcir cornbination in a unified declaration in the
creed werc sornething rying out for explanation. Esarnples of
the Christ-kervgma in h-hich the birth from the Blessed Virqirt
and the passion are set side by side are forthcoming as far back
as the letters of St Ignatius.' St Jutin too, as we saw in the
prexious chapter,' is a witness to precisei?: the same type OS
kerygma. TIic creed of St Irenaeus's EpIdeixfxfs,3witith its referencc
to "Jesus Christ, the Son of God, IVho was incamte, and died,
and rose again'" stands out as the perfet f c
r of the
kind of Christollog ive meet wjth in R. The onl
j feaiwrc
about R is the onc which first attracted Holl s direricion, the
reduplication of the Greek definite article TV (representcd in
Latin by the rcpented qui), ~vliichseemed to hirn to throw the
two divisions of the hristology into harp relief. No one can
determine now what was the redact~ir'smotive in inserting rhis
trait : perhaps he sirnpIy wanted to underline the t~r-o3spet.s
of the divine rnystel, the Lord's incarnation and His redemptive ation, By itself, however, it is much too feeble a buttress to
sustaiii so claring and far-reacliing a construction as tlic
hypothesis of HoII and his associates.

important advance in credal studies. The questioti which nest

rears its head concerns the date at which we may presume thc
simple, three-articled formula which underlics the Old Rornaii
Creed to have been enlarged by the inscrtion of ri fully developed ChRstology. So far as general considerations go, a datc
somewhere within the second haIf of the sccand century would
seem most in accord with the available data. Anything lateiwould be difficuli to reconcile wifh St Hipprilytus's use of a
baptisma! creed closelp akin to R and incorporating a similar
CIiristology. hloreoxrer, St Hippolytus, we know, was a onservative who preferred to walk in old path ; i t is antecedently
probabIe that the litrir.gies he reproduces had the authority or
a t least a generation behind them. A date prior to I 50 ir;
esposed to specjal objections too. St Justin is an irnportaiit
witnt-ss for the existence of the Christ-kerypri ; but tiie second
of his baptismal questions, whi1c mentioning die crucifcdon,
does not seem to have induded a futl-length Christolog-tcal
passage. The lke of tradition in rvhich he strtnds i not csactly
that of R, but the suggmtian of his fomulae is that the firsi
tentative experiments at interpolating Christological assertions
into the second question were being made about ;themiddle af
the centuq-. In
case it is hard enough to ftnd h e d famulae
of any kind prior to StJustin. The first exarnple of a rather fuller
Christological insertion comes in a docament dating rrom n
generation later, St Irenaeus's Epideixts. I f the laconic words in
his creed, "FVho was incarnate, and died, and rose again," ma)he taken as standing for somewhat more detailed sttements, it
is not far-fetched to see in it an extremely close parallel to R so
far as structure Is concerned. Further pointets to the date of R's
redaction are suggesred by the possible motives in the minds of
those who carried it out. If their object, or even one of thcir
objects, was to provide a counterblast to Docetism by emphasjzing the reaIity of Christ's experienes, this would supply
additiona1 confirmation of the date towards wliich the argument is tending. It was in the scvcnties and eighties of the
second century that the Church's polemk against Gnosticism
was beginning to take shape and becorning a force to be
reckoned with.
'rhere is one important piece of evidence, tiowever, whicli

I 26

Even if so muh of the three Geman scholars' complex

theory must perforce be discarded, enough remains in their
dernonstration of R's cornposite character to signalize an
Cf.the paasages fmm Trall. g and Sinjrii. I cited aboilc, 68F
'CCF. thc cxcerpts cited abnve, 73 C.
Sce abovc, 77.

11
)I

r 28

THE OLD ROMAN C'REED

has not yet been quoted and which may seem to demand a
rather later date. This is the well-known passage, often identified as a fragment of the Little LnbyrEnth and attributed to St
Hippolytus, which has been preserved by Eusebius. The
author is exarnining the claim of his Adoptionist opponnts to
reprcscnt thc primitive Christological tradition.

I
I

"For they declare", he says, "that a11 the older teachers, including
the Apestles themselves, received and taught exactly the same doctrine as they give out now, and that the truth of the preaching was
preserved inviolate ( T E ~ ~ ~ nU j v~ &4.j&tav
U L
TO$ q p v ' y p a ~ o s )until
the times of Victor, who was the thirteenth bishop in Rome from
Peter : but that from his successor Zephyrinus the trutli was falsified
( . r a P a u ~ x a p +v~ a ~
B A ~ 0 ~ a a v") .

Natusally the au thor reject~their plea, bidding them consulr the rvritings of St Justin, Miltiades, Tatian, St Clement
and the rest, "in a11 of whom Christ is procIaimed as God
( $ E O A O ~ E L 6~ L L
ioses to empIoy
,; )". But thc: term
have seemed to some rnodcrn investig
reveal the fact
-1 TI
. .- -.
..-- ..
.
- r r.
that rhe officia~
L i u r r i i i r i aurliriiiir y oi ialiri, rri other words the
creed, was tampered with in t h e pontificate of Zephyrinus.2
I n particuIar, the words "the truth of the preaching was
falsified'" the verb s r a p a ~ a p d ~ a ~being
r v taken in the sense o f
to corrupt or alter a text,3 have secmed to bear this out. Hence
scholars like W. M. Peitz, j.Haussleiter and R. Lake have: united
in regarding the incident reported in this veiled langilage as
being none other than the interpolation of the long Christological section into the short Trinitarian formula which lies
bebind R. On this view the final redaction of the creed must be
thrust we31 forward into the third century, the reign of
Zephyrinus being r 97-2 I 7.
The difficulty of supposing that one of the principal Roman
summaries of faith was still an imrnature nine-cIause formula
in the first decade of the third century is obvious, but such an

xp

129

objection cannot count as decisive. More important is the dose

kinship of R in its developed form with the baptismal creed of
SLHippolytus's Tradition. The hypothcsis under discussion asks
us to believe that t h e dissident bishop allowed the Christological a r t i d e of his creed, which as it stands has a fulI-dress
account of the exploits of Christ, to come under the infuence
of a new-fangled addition to R introduced by his hated opponent and contemporary Zephyrinus. This is altogether too much
to credit, Equally important is the fact that the hypothesis rests
upon the premiss that at the beginning of the third century
there was a credal formula which could be designated the
official creed of Rorne. There should be no need now to underline the fallacy of such an assurnption. The really damning
criticism, however, is that the theory is involved in a totally
rnistaken exegesis of thc passage we are discussing. To put the
matier briefIy, that docurnent does not represent the anonyrnous
Adoptionists as talking about creeds or.officia1 formularies at
aII. Their grievance is that the truth of the preaching" has
been faIsified, and by that they plainly mean the Christological
doctrine of the Church, not a creed. T h e Greek verb n-apaxapoUECYis equally c a ~ a b l e
of signifying "falsely expound " or " misrepresent", as in a passage of Socrates 1 in which Eustathius of
Antioch is reported to have charged Euscbius of Caesarea with
misrepresenting, or aricaturing, the Niene faith. That must
be the sense it bears here, since its object is not a document but
"the tmrh". Even had the author said chac " the preaching'"
had been falsified, there would still be no reference to a creed,
for ~ 7 j P v in
~ pthis context, as always, means the content of the
Church's message and not the formula, if any, in which it is
officially embodied. He himself, a few lines further down,
defines the subject of discussion not as a formulary but as "the
Church's belief (r05 ~ K K X ~ U L ~ ~ G+KpO~ Bm j p a ~ o ~and
) " , this
('

-.A-.

H.E. 5 , 9 4 3 ff. (Schwartz I, 500). The title LitilcMyrinth is due to Theodoret,

Mwt scholan to-day deny its connexion with St Hppolytus: cf. E. Bardy, Paul dc
Samosate, 2nd ed., Louvain, 1928, qgo n.
E CF. W, M. Peitz, Stimnaen der Zeit xciv, 1918, 553 ff.; J. Haussleiter, T7initarischm Glauha, zgno, Gtersloh, 84 ff.; K. Lake, Harcard Theol.Ramew, xvii, 1924.
I 7 3 fi-.
CL for this iise Eusebius, H.E. 5, 28, rg (Schwartz I, 506).

CONCLUSION

shou'id put the question beyond all doubt.

This ill-founded coniecture having- been dcrnolished, we are
free to return with renewed confidente ta the theory of a somewhat earlier date. J. Eebreton2 hazarded the guess that the
H.E. i , q (P.G.67, 14).
Cf. HiStoire du dogme ds la Triniid, Paris,
religieuse xx, i 930, gf K.
E.C.C.-5,

I 92 7 4 ,

11, I 6i ; Recherches de scienm

137

THE TEACRXNG OP THE OLP ROMAN CREED

THE PERST ARTICLE

understoad in relation to His Son Jasus Christ. That this was

part at any rate of the intention of the creed is obvious from
the language of the second artile. Most often, however, where
the t e m "Father" was used at this time, t h e referente was to
God in His capaity as Father and creator of the universe.
Thus St GPement of Rome couId speakl of "the Fathcr and
creator of the whole univeme" and of "the derniurge and
Father of the ages", whiie St Justin was frequent in his referenesqo " the Father oF a11 and Lord God" and " the Father
of ai1 thing"'. A revealing text is that in which St Irenaeus
declared that the universal creator wa c d e d Father because
of Ris love (revealed in His creative activity), Lard because of
E-Fis might, and our maker and framer because of Hi wisdom.3
St TheophiIus of Antioch has an interesting passage4 describing
God as "Father because of His being before the universe ",
while TatianS speaks of Rim as "Father of thjng perceptible
and of things invisible ". So, too,.cvhen Xova tian expounds6 the
clause GOD THE F A ~ AND
R ALMTGM LORD i
n his mle of faith,
he paraphsases it as meaning '"the all-perfet founder of ali
thing". To Christians of the second c e n t u r y this was beyond
anv question the prirnav, if by no means the o d y , significance
of the Fatherhood of God. It was a beEef which tthey shared, as
the tliird book of Unfcabtes and the witings of Philo prove,
14th Hellenistic Judaism' as well as with enlightened religious
people generany.8
Xaturally therc was nothing ontroversiaI about this affirmation of rhe divine Fatherhood. Nor was there about the epithet
ALMIGHI"Y which rvent clseIy conjoined w
ih it. Lhere was
abundant authority for its use in the Scptuagint, and in early
Christian writers it recurs on ountless occasions as a description of God's majesty and transcendence. Lhe underlyinp
meaning cif W ~ W O K ~ ~inT WGreek,
~
however, and the meaning

en for granted in the second-century Church, was by no

ms identicaI with that of "Almighty " in Engljsh or omnfpvtcnr in Latin. The exact equivalent of these would have been
rawti8hapo. Ilawi > ~ p c ~ wjsp in the first place an active
word, conveying tlie idea not just of apacity but of the
actualization of capmaity. h![ore irnportanr, the basic conep.1
tion involved i uricler man that contained in '"AImi,~hty".
ITai
p has the meaning "all-ruling ", " all-sovereiyn".
Thi
ight out in nurnberless patristic contexts, but with
p a r ~ i ~ u alorce
i in the first few chapters of the second book oE
YS haare$c,S.
S t Irenaeus
! be ane 'God," he argue a~aintthc Gnostic
iere
musl
"Either d
h
,
.
k
,
,
"
,
:
of divine beings, " LTho contains all
theory of a -*A&
61dU,
things and has made wery created being according to His will: or
cle there must be m a n y indeterminate creators or gds . . . but
not one ofthem wilI be M.For eah one of them . . . will be defective in wmparison with ai1 the rest, and the name of ' Almightv'
wilI come to nought (soicetur omnipotcniis appeliatio) ."1

136

CIi. 1 9 and 35 (I,iqhifoot, 16 and 23).

.'f~!. 1 , r l : h1 Ir. ti IE..],C;.. 33%7 R : 821.
/Irli*. Ano.:,, 17, 1 (P(;.7 . r i t i q ) : cb 2 , 3 n b 5 f .(P.G. 7.84off.1.
, i d .=irt!o/, I , 4 (/'.C.
6, TOQ~).
(17. d z ) . C r n ~ r 4
. (IC,,J.C;.3 2 7 1 ) .
e D E Trb'n. I (i..[..
3, q 1 3 ) .
C1: 111 .Mace. 2 , 2 I : 5 , 7 : and PIlilo. jminriirn.
"C, c.q., Epiirtur, I , 3. r ; I . (i, 7; I , i y, r z : 3 , 24, 1 5 f. Alsri S t ,Jiistili. ..ipol.

'

1,

22,

St Theophilus of h t i o c h rnakes the ame point when he

Ts called. almighty " because Re mles and
CXFilains tI13t GQd
cornpasses ;aEl thingS. For t1ie heights of the heavens and the
de1~ t h saf t he abysses and t he lirnits of the world are in His
hand." Similarly Origen rr1akes3 th e fact that God is alrnighty
an argurnent for the nem:jary exis,teme of a reated order.
"Thus God cannot be cal Eed evenI almighty unles He has
subiects over whom to hold sway; and consequently for God
: almighty, the universe must necessarily
to
ou4 of his lectures devoted to discussing
exi
n a t r o ~ p a - r w pO L uyri1 of Jerusalem remarks that the Almighty is
IHe Who mles all things, Who has authority over all thinpr.
Peisple who isay there is une Lord ofthe soul, and another of the body,
r pedect. For how could he who has authority
-1..
+L-+ n p : t h ~ ;c
irnp,?
over the soul, but not over the body, be almighty? And how could he
who is master of bodies, but has no sway over spirits, be almighty?
But the divine Scripture and the utterances of the rruth know
only one Gad Who rules a11 things by His powtr,

'

,.L.L.

...

A d o . h r . 2 , I , ~ ( P . G7,712).Cf.also2,6,2
.
(P.C.7,794f+).
Ad Autol. r , 4 (P.G.6, ra2g).
a De priacrp. I . 2 , ro (Kocrscliau V , 41 C).
& i . 8, 3 (P.G.33, 628).
1

THE LEACHING OF TIIE OLD ROMAN CKEEU

THE CORE OF THE SECOND ARTICLE

The alternative rneaning, that underlying n-arroS;vapos

and now obviously present in the English translation, was not
long in rnaking itselffelt. Thus we gather from Origen's Contra
Ctlsua that t he pagan phjlosopher, no doiibt picking up scraps
of Church doctrine, WLF under the impression that Christians
taught that God could d o anything. " He can assuredly according to u do anythjng, " replied Oriqm,' "that is, anythirig
that an be done wittiout detriment to His diblni?, His goodness w His wislies." Tliiis God can no more be unjust thari n
t h i n ~whose nature it is to be src-eet can, in virtue of its natural
quality, prove i tsel f bi ttcr. In another passape "oncerned witli
the same dificulty, he contended that God could not do what
was base: if He could, He Who is God auld not be God, for
f God doesi what is base He is no lonqer God. TVhen Rufinus
comes3 to the word, he sticks to the k ~ d e rtradition, sayiny.
"He. is aIled almi~htybecause He rvields power over a11
thinqs (quod ornnitim tentaf potcssbnl~rn'l:" and goes on to point ou t
that Ile does thic shrotl~hthe agency of the Son. St Auqustine,
however, was exercised about the probIem of what God could
and ould not do. In Sermon 2 I 3,4 for exampIe. he rernarks tliat
we can expect a11 rnercies From Him because He is ornnipotent :
to say that He cannot cir&ve a11 our sins is a blasphemous
denial of His omnipotence. He is. in a word, omnipotent to
perforrn eveq-thing that He wills. I-et he continues, "I can te11
the sort of things He could not do. He cannot die, He cannot
sin, He cannot lic, He cannot be deceir-ed. Such things He
cannot : if Hc ouId, He would not be almighty." O n other
occasions S t Ayqistine combined the older view with the more
philosophic one. In Sesmon 214s he first of all teaches that tlie
beIief in God's dmightiness is equivalent to believing that He
is the universal creatar : "Be rnindfuI to believe God omnipotent
in tlie sense that there is no creature which He has not reczted."
Then a few parayraphs later he discusses the problem of divine
omnipotence in n more speculative vein. Taking 2 Tim. 2, I 3
(" He cannot deny HimscIf ") as his text, he points out that
the rcason why God cannot do certain things is that Hc does

not will to do them. "If God can be what Wt does not will to
be, He is not ornnipotent."
But the paradoxes and philosophical puzzles inherent in the
notion of divine omnipotence were altogether foreign to the
minds of the authors of the 01d h m a n Cseed. The chief
doctrine contained in the fimt article of their interrogato.
formula was the creative Fatherhood of God, His rnajesty and
transcendent sovereignty. It might appear that there was
nothing distintively Christian about sach a belief, for rhc
best Jewish and pagan thoupht of the age would have heartily
endorsed it. But a speeial atmosphere surrounded the words
as they were conned by the Chrktian catechumen in anticipation of his sacramental intiation. He knew, asJtws and payans
were not prideged to know, that the eterna] Father of the
universe was alo the Father ofJesus the hnst, and had even
vouchsafed to adopt him as His son by Face; and he knew
that the so~rereivpower which God possessed bg right had
bem signally rnanifat in the resurrection of His Son and in the
redernption of His chosen people.

'38

Con. C r f . ~3,. TU ( K o ~ ~ ~ I.
cc
262).
~ I ~ u Op. C ~ I . j, 23 ( K o r t s r h a ~11.
~ 24).
~ ~ i i m ? n . i t i ~ i 1 1 ~ ~ b . a / ~ . r , ( f . ~ 4. P
~ .1L,.~3 ~8 .311n.6 n L

I'.L. QH,

aci(;ti

fl.

2.

;rhe Core of ilic Second

139

A rticle

Detached fmm the specfd keqpgma about Christ, the seond

article of the Old Roman Creed was extremely terse-rn 13
C R W W JESUS HIS 0NL.Y SOX OUR

LORD (K&

E ~ Xpmv

'ITw&

pvoyFv? rdv mfprov tjfriiv ; ct in Chrisiurn Iemm

filium n'us unicum domlntrm nosrrumj. Even this form must
represent an elaboration of the t r u e original, for onLY almost
certainly seused its place in the latter at some date subsequent
to i& cornposition, and it is possible that LQRD too was a late
entrant. The unusual word-order CHRIST JESUS is a feahlre
which pulIs one up at onc with a jolt. Xt reappears in the
baptismal questionnaire of St Hippolytus's T~adilion,in one ai
any rate of TertulIian's foms, and in thc crecds of Rufinus
(Aquileia) and St Peter Chrysologur (Ravenna') : evcrywhere
else it yields place to the normal JESUS cHarsT. The presence of
the inversion is a proof of the primitiveness of the core of tbe
OId Roman Creed. Wiien it was put logether CHR1ST WBS no1
vlOv a h o i i 1-0v

See

below, pp, i 73 f.

IP

THE TEAHING OF THE

sornething of it orignal significancc as a ti&,

the equivalent of Messiah or the h o i n t e d , still hovered ahout
it. St Paul was evidendy onscious of the word's true implicntions, for hc howed a marktd prediIection for the order Christ
Jcsus, But the most illuminating paralIeIs are to be found in
accounts of the apostolic prcnhing by the author of Acts. Thus
St Peter is re~resented( 2 , 36) as declaring, " Let a11 the house
of Israel know assuredly that God has made Him both Lord
and Christ, this Jesus FVhom )-ou crucified." Latcr ( 5 , 42) i t
is said of hin and his companion apostles that ''tthey cceased
not to teach and to preacb Jesus as the Chnst
-4pollos at
Ephesus, we are inforrned ( r 8, 28), " powerfulIy confuted thc
Jews, and that puhlicIy, showing by the Scriptures that Jesus
was the Christ
Evidently the nucleits of R joined handts with
the ancient kerypa.
The authority behind this usage was, of course, the OId
Testament. 'OXprms, the Anointed, was the regular Septuagint transtation of the Hebrew Jfmkiak.' The Messianic category had been used by Jesus Himself, and it was natural for
early Christianity, rooted as it was in Judaism, to appeal to it
as an explanation of the significance of His Person. I n the postapostolic age other categories loomed into the foreground, and
the historical associations of the older Hebrew title were less
apparent to converts entering bhe Church from a Gentile
en~ironrnent.Hene c m n called for elucidation. St CIement
of R m e uses the word more frequently wjth the article than
ivithout, and in some of hls ontexts ?t is apparent that it retained for him something of its 34essianic flavour. But St
Justin, who was fulIy appsised of its proper connotation (as
Iiis Dialogue3 shows), found it advisable to explain tfie enigmatic
t e m to the Roman Senate. It appIies, he said,d to the Logos,
Who is alone properly to bc called God" Sonn." Being begotten
in the beginninq when God created and set in ordcr aii thjne;s
ithrough Him, He is alied Christ in virtue of the fact that Hc
has Hirnsdf been anointed and that God througli Him has set
a rncr riame:

".

".

Harch and Rcdpath, Comrdnnce, s.v.

C f . , ~ . g . , 1 6r, ; 4 z , t;+4,3;4qi 1;54,2;57~3
(Lightfmti 13: =7;~9;$1;34;

Sce

35).
r

E.R., 48 ff. (E.J.G., 146 R.).

Apl. 11, G (E.J.C.. 83).

TRE CORE OF THE SECOND ARTICLE

OLD ROMAs CREED

141

a11 t h i n g in orde." Tht name itself, he adds, contains an

f nefFable meaning (Ormp ~ a ail% ncp~41pvGyvwowv qpauhv).
In yeneraI it was the interpretation of Christus as "anoinred'"
which was to pefsist when the speifically Messianic referente
had faded into the background, Tertullian, for exarnple,
pointed out 1 that Chrlslus was not properly a name but an
appellation and sipified "anointed (uractw)". He had been
designated such as a resuIt of " the sacrarnent of anointing".
St Cqnl of Jerusalem discused both JESUS and CRRTST in his
tenth CatechcsLr,%onluding that "He is called Christ, not as
anointed by human hands, but as hving been anointed by
the Eather etemally for a uper-human priesthood ". Recurring
to the same same point a little later,3 he summed thc matter
up by saying that "He bears rwo names, Jesus beause He
bestows saIvation, and Chnst because oF His priesthood".
Rufinus carried on the same tradition.

"'He is alled Christ," he remarkd4 "from chrisrn, i.e. from

. . . Christ is either a highpriestly or a royal narne. For
in the oId days lmth high-priests and kings wrem consecrated Iiy &e
anainting oT c1iiism. But rhey, beins mortal and cosruptible, were
anointed with an unguent of comptible rnattcr; but He is made
Christ through the anointing of thc HoIy Spirit."
anointlng.

To cmrs~
JESUS ~ W O
further descriptions were attachcd-ms
and oua LORLI, The word o r t u (p~vT's; unicirs)
rnerits some discussion, particularlv as it is probabIy a later
accretion to the original nucleus. In &e h'ew Testament it is
used by St Luke, St John and the author of Hebrews, hut by
no one else. Ets proper rneaning is clear3y brought out in Hebr.
t r , 17, where Isaac is described as Abraham's "only son",
and in Lk. 7, 12, where the Lord raises the "only son" of the
widow of Kain from the dead. As indicatinp; the peculiar relation ofJesus to God it is onfined to the Johannine wi-ntings.5
There it stsewes &e uniqueness ofJesu alike in His Sonship
(so different Srom the sense in which men can be the sons of
God), in His intimacy with the Father, and in His conseguent

OXLY sos

iAdr.Prax.~O(C.C.L.II.~non). QCh.4(P.G.33,66)
< ~ o m n in
. . ~ b np.
.
( P L . 9I.g.45).
Ch. r I (P.C.33r 676).
Cf.Jn. i, 14; 4 18;3, 16; sI 1 8 ; 1 Jn- 4,g.

'

r5r

THE TEACHING OF THE OLD ROMAN CREED

THE CHRISTDLOGICAL INSERTION

them. Even where it is present in a passage taken as a whole, it

remains doubdiil whether WNDER P O N ~ SPUTE should be
taken as contnbuting to it. On the other hand, no antiDocetic argumcnt was directly and explicidy founded on the
words in such second-ccntury writings as have come down to
us. The real explanation of the presence of Pontius Pilate in
the creed lies eIsewhere-in the fat diat the saving story of
which the creed i s a recapitulation is rooted iu history. A date
was called for so as to bring out that these m-ents dd not
happen a n y h e r e ar at any time, and that the Gospel is not
simply a .tem
of ideas. For once Rufmua succeeded in hitting
upon the tmth when he sernarkeda: "'Those who handed d o m
the creed showed great wisdom in underlining the actual date
at which thtse thin,p happened, so that there mig-ht be no
chance oF any uncertainty or Irapenasupsetting the stability
of the tradition." It'ithout anyone sa+g so in so many words,
the instinct of the Church recognized the need for a histoncal
referente. Thus, while the final f o m in tvhich the dating
crystaUized wras always L ~ E RP O ~ PILATE,
S
alternative
forms were possible. St Ignatius, for exarnplt, in Smyni. I speaks
of Chriot as '"tmly nailed for us in the Resh in the times of
Pontius Pilate and Herod the tetrarch", while St Justin' has
"undcr Pontius Filate, who was govemor in Judaea in the days
of Tiberius Caesar ".
The clairns of the remaining elements in this section to
belong to thc apostolic keygma are undisputed. WAS BURIED
was cited by St Pau1 3 as an item in the catechetical instruction
he had reccived. That it was already an independent articlc
of faith and that importance was attached to it i s obvious from
the fact of his prefixing "that (076) " to it. SQ, too, preachingd
at Antioch in Pisidia, Iie singled out the fact that "they took
Hirn down from the tree and Iaid Hirn in the tomb ". We may
be certain that the reason for adrnitting the cIause to the catechetical tradition had nothing to do with its guaranteeing the
realit y of the Lord's ddeath. Thcre was no need for an anti-Doceti

polemic in the first two or three decades of the Church's

hitory. What is more to the poinc is zhat Chrjst's burial plays
a prominent part in she Gospel narrative. Na doubt Christinns
dwelt on it and exploited the details surrounding it beause it
was the ilecessary prelude to His resurrection. It is to this
interest that we must attribute the presence o f the clause in
the creed. At a11 wents it is impossiblc to argue that the huriai
was treasured because it figured in ancient prophecy. Later
theobgia-s, like Sr Justini and Sr Cyril of Jemsalem,z wese
hard put to ir to ainearth prophecies in the Old Testament
showing tht it was preordained. Other were frankly at a loss
to explain its purpose in rhe creed, and Rufinus, for example.
suggested 3 that the insertion oF HE DESCEXDED TO HELL was
intended to efucidate the enigmatic dause.
The rest of he article can bc disrniised in ri sumrnary
p a r a p p h . 0s TEE THIRD DAY ROSE A G A I S FROM T H E DEAD
formed the Scerrrel of the apostolic preaching from t h e inauguration of the Christian mission. Closely Iinkcd with it and with
one another are the h v o ciauses A S C E ~ E DINTO THE HEWXS and
SITS AT THE RIGHT ~
S OF
D THE FATHER. We obsen-e them
both conjoined in I Pct. 3, 2 2 : "'Who is on the right hand of
God, hving gone up to heaven." Other parallel passages
which an be cited are Bom. 8,34, Col. 3, r , Eph. r , 20,Hebr. r , 3
and 13, as well as Bcts I, 3 1 K, j,30 E., j, jj.Ultimately the
ideas contained in these clauses go back to Ps. r ro, r : "The
Lord said unto my Lord, Sit &ou at my right hand, until 1
make thine enemes thp footstool," which according to St
Mark4 Jesus Rimself quoted in the ourse of His teaching in
the temple. Though it is not e~plicitlyaffirmed, the Ascewion
and the Session, as the words of the psalrn indicate, meant
much more than rnight seem apparent on the surface. The
first- and second-century Christian who expressed his faith in
them understood them as irnpIying that Christ had beaten
d o m the hostile power opposed to Him, and onsequently
to His Church. The natural sequence of the glorious victory
was procIaimed in the words WHENCE HE WTLL COME TO JUDGE

r5O

Comni. in s p b . a p r t . 18 (P.L.Ii , 356).

Apol.1, 1 5 (I;.J.G.,34).
I Cor. 15, 4. Cf,also h.
ti, 4,which singles out the Lord's burial as a significant moment in Ais pargion.
Acts rg, ng.
a

Cf. Dial. 97; i 18 (E.J.G., r E r ; 236) : hc rclics on I$. 53, 9; 57%r .

Wf. Cmt. r3,34 and 14,3 (P.C.33>813 nnd 828).

a Comm. in . p b . apost. 18 (P.L. 2 1 , 3563.
12,35 f.

'

r 60
THE TEAGAINE OF 'XTHE OLD ROMAE: C ~ E D
belong to the Church" as material-minded; they branded 1
them as "ecclesiasticaI", and went so fas as to revife the sacred
name of the Church,* To counter their propaganda he developed the view that mernbership of the Church was necessary
to salvation. "He \vi11 judge a11 those who are outside the
truth, that is, outside the Church."3 Again he remarked,4 "AI1
those who keep outside the hurch . . bring condemnation
on themselves"; and we recall his teaching that it is onlg
within the Church that the Holy Spirit can be received. When
it is rernembered that the earliest credd appearance of HOLY
mmc~
is in the formula contained in the Eptrtuba Apostolorum,
an anti-Gnostic treatise, it is difficult to resist the C Q ~ ~ U S
that its presene in the Old Roman Creed, w h l e not directly
polemical (there is Iittle proof of that), is a by-prduct of that
enhanced and seIf-consious ernphais rin she Chwch as an
institution which was becoming characteristic ai orthodox
theology in the seond haK of the centur)-.
Hard on the heels of thc rnention of the Church comes THE
E m s r a N OF srss. Tks did ncit starrd, as Jve have seen, among
the baptismal interro*qationin St HippoIytw's Tradifion. On
the ather hand, it seems to have had a place in Tertullian's
creed-material, for in a well-hown passage of the Dc baptismo5
he raised the question why J a u s HimseK did not baptize and,
to demonstrate the folIy of the suggestion, asked rhetoricaiIy
what He would have baptized people i n t e " the remission of
sins? Himself? the Holy Spirit? the Church?" The five-clause
creed of the Epislilla Apostolomm induded a mention of it. In
Eastern creeds, as we shall shortly see, it was a regular item in
the third article. Sometfmes, as in the Apostolic Comrtidirtions,~it
coincided with the Western forrn, but more often it was closely
conjoined with baptism, a typical wording being ONE B A ~ S M
UNTO THE REMLSSIQN OF sms.'
Probably this supplies a clue to the original btaring of the
clause in R. One of the grand convictions of Christians was
that in baptism a11 their past sins were washed away once and

lAdu.hr.3,15,1(P.G.7,918).
4Adu.hagr.1,25,3(P.G.7,68~).
Adv.haci.4,~3,7(P.G.?,1076). aAdv.hmr.~,~6,3(P.G.7,633).
Apost. Canrt. 7 , 41;7 (Funk I, 446).
"e
bapf. t I (C.C.1.. r, 286).
7 CC., r.g., thc old rrccd or.Jeriisalcrn (sre pp. IR^ f.) and the creed nf Constantinople (our Nirrnc Crccd).

THE SPIRITIN ACTION

!
I

~ O ~

I,

for all. We recall St Peter's dramaii words,' "Repent and be

baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ unto the
remission ofsins ",and St Paul's indignant rebuke to the backsliding Co~inthians,~
"But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified." So the second-century author OS the
Epistlt of Barnabar rernarkedy3" We go down into the wa ter fulI
of sins and uncleanness, and come up bearing fmit in our
heasts," and Hermas4 wrote in a similar strain, "11,'e went
dowm into the rvater and received remissian of our past
errors." St justin's famous acounts of baptism delineates its
ohject as being "that ri-e may obtain remission of our former
sins", and he assuredvthe Jew Trypho tbat the one tvay
to secure this boon was to acknowIedge Jesus as Xfessiah
and undergo the bath prophesied by Isaiah. It'hat aU thh
language enrisages, of coune, is rin cornmittcd prior to
baptism. ,hregasds sin committed after baptism, the usual
rernedies suggested were prayer, repentance, confersion and
good worb.7 But preumably thcse availed o d y for minor
sins: the possibility of Christians being guilty of, and being
absolved by thc sacraments of the Church imm, acts of
griwous sin --as only begianing to be taken into consideration
in the econd century.
FVe are therefore justified in conluding that in practice, at
the time it obtained entrance to the Old ~ o m a hCreed, THE
R E ~ S I O NOF srss must have conveyed the idea of the washing
away of past offences and the opening up of a new Iife thsough
the instrumentaliq- of baptism. There is no serious arpument in
favour of the suggestion8 that the clause was a djrect reffection
of the controversy at Rome in the reign of Pope Callistus
over the Churh's power to absolve its rnernbers from major
sins. Apart from other considerations, ic is manifest that the
words had worked their way into the recognized creed material
long before the outbreak of this dispute. In confirmation of our
view it is worth noticing that in the Epistula A~astolorum the
a

161

'

E@,BL%.

32;16i49!5lpf;;64).
a

4:

I I (Lightfoot, 256).
M d . 3 (Ephtfoot, 322),
" i d . +J (P.C. 6 , 571)
A@[. I, 61 (P.G.6,420 f . ) .
c F . , e . ~ .I , Clm. 51 : 2 Clm. 8 : 17: 16; 19:
- . -6,Rarn. i o . 10-11 ILiahtfoot.
.

Cf, F. J. B

cock, Thc Hishry of fhc C r r d , 2nd cd, t 938, '33.

r 66

THE TEACBINE OP THE OLD ROMAN CREED

which the Church had either inherited from Judaism or herseIf

received in the Gospel revelation. The clearest proof of the
authenticity d the Old Roman Creed l i a in the way in which,
while some of its lauses have received a sharper definition and
others a heightened emphasis from the cantroversial atrnosphere
of the second century, they one and a11 hark back to the
primitive kervgrna of zhe apostolic age.

HAPTER VI

CREEDS WESTERN AND EASTERN

THEinformation

at our disposal about the "crceds" of zhe

seond and early third cmttrry Rornan chusch is, reIatively
speakin-;, extraordinarily rich. Thanks to it. we can write at
least a tentative h i s t o l of the beqinning-s of the OId Roman
Creed. If it is a history u+h severa1 zaping lacunae, and if the
historian has to rely more often than he would choose upon his
imaglnation, we can at least discern in shadowy outline the
proces by which R carne into being. The local creeds of other
churches fared Ias fortunately. Apart from those with Rornan
connections, the ernbryonic femulae of the second and earlv
third cenmries glancd at in Chapter TI1 make a ptetty meagre
harvest. In t h i s chapter our objet %i11 be to provide some
account of TVestern bapptmal creeds other than R and of
Eastern baptismal creeds in the followinq tu-o cnturies. The
reader would be well advised not to pitch his hapa too high.
Even when full-blown declarato? creeds begn to take the
stage, the exarnples rve an reconstmct with onfidence are
few and far between, and tbe story of their earlier development
rernains wrapped in mystery.
The reasons for this state of affairs, which rnight seem singular
to a newcomer to this field, are not really difficultto conjecture.
For one thing, the Rornan church was probably a pioneer in
the production of crystallized credal forms. The liturgy at Rome
had made big strides in the direction of fixity (thougli, of coutse,
the goal had not by any means been reached) weI1 befare St
Hippolyrus drafted his Trodilion as a model. Other churches
lagged behind, and the East was if anything slower than the
West ta stereotype irs liturgical rites and prayers. Credal summaries of faith, whether interrogatory ar declaratory, were a
by-product of the liturgy and reflected its fixity or plasticity. In
167

I70

qf'

CREEDS WESTERN AND EASTERN

THE PAUCETY OF CREEDS

is na hint there of its being a novelty, we are justified in carrying

it at Itast a couple of generations back. Some scholarsl have
onttnded that its roots lie in the fisst decades of the second
century, if not earlier, and imagine that t h q can trace glimpses
of i t in St Jutin' works. This is extravagant, however : St
Justin not only has no word that could be trvisteci into an
allusion to it, but he felt not the slightest compunction about
describing the araments in detail in a treatise desiped for
pagan eyes. ,4 reticente of sorts when speaking of the sacraments
an be observed in Tertullian and Origen. The former upbraided2 conternporary heretics for admitting both the faithful
and catechumens indiscrirninately to their services, implying
that in the Catholic ChurcIi (hs had not yet become a Montanjst) the sacraments were fened about. Origen too, arguing with
Celsus, had to admit3 that Chrjstianity had certain esoteric
mysteries. I n one of his hornjliesk he expressIy declined to explain the significance of Chrjst's Body and Blood before a rnixed
audience: "Let us not linger on these matters, which are weI1
known t o initiates but cannot be reveaIed to the uninitiated."
Bat the practice was obviously an1y at an embryonic stage. St
Hippolytus, writing in Tertullian's lifetime, feIt at liberty to
publish the baptismal and euharistic IituLgies. Moreover,
nothing goes to show that in the times of TertulYian and Origen
this reserve extended to the Church's doctrinaI norms. TertulIian, like St Irenaeus, rvas continually quoting, on oecasion
quite faithfully, quxi-credaI surnmaries of the nile of faish.
Origen, in the fist of the two passagcs mentioned above, ridiuled the idea ofChristian doctrine heing a seret. To drive his
point harne, he rehearsed severa1 articles of what ounds like
a creed, declaring that the whole world was familiar ~viththem.
St Hippolytus set do~vmhis haptisma1 quesnons iri full 14th the
rest of t he rite, and nowhcre so mucIi as hinted at the handins
out of a carefully guarded formula to the catechurnens, Christian teachcrs and aptllogists of this period, as is well known,
made a special point of taxing heretics with the secrccy in
which they wrapped their doctrines, and claimed that the best

guarantee of the apostolicity of their own was that they were,

and always had been, public.
Evidently the d e of secrecy was of gradual growth. At first
it covered the sacraments, only later the reed. Even when it
reached its heyday, as we know, the reed was not regardded as
quite such an esotekic mystey as the sacraments. Whereas the
fuller teahng about these was resen-ed until after baptism,
the creed was handed to the catechurnens in the final stage
of their preparatiou. We shall not be far wrong if we place its
extension to the creed somewhere io the second half of the third
centuv. I t cannot hve been much easlies than that : Iater it
would be hazardous to date i t in view of the testirnony of St
Cyrjl of Jerusalem. Lhe eRect of its introduction (and this is
what is of importante to us) must have been to impose a virtual
censorship on the direct quotation of baptisrnal creeds. Even
the influential Rornaii creed fel1 under this. The reader must
have fel t surprised that there should be such a dearth of evidcnce
for its existence in the third and fourth centuries. Marcellus is
the only writer between St Hippolytus and Rufinus who quotes
it directly. Even he was scrupulously carefuI not to attach an
explicit idensification-label to it. Rufinus, too, did not reproduce
the full text of either the Aquileian or the Roman creed: we
have to piece them together Eike jig-saw puzzle. Practically a11
the other contemporary Iocal creds were Iost to sight in the
same deliberate bIack-out. Tlie complete text of one or m o
Easteni creeds has s w i v e d for special reasous, but in no singIe
case have we a direct, continuous quotation of a 1CTestern
formula. FormnateIy a number, both JVestern and Eastern,
can be recomtructed, mostly out of sermons or expositor\.
essays. But for this v e q renson, if for none other, it would be
dangerous t o c'laim anytliing like absolute certainv for their
wording.
The sparsenas of material available is disappointjng ror
othes rezsons than the f r a p e n t a r y knowledge of actual creeds
whicli it perrnits. I t means that tliere are few, if any, of the
widcr questions about creeds in this period to which we can
return satisfactory answers. One of these is the precise date of
tlie establishment of the rites of the tradition and reddition of
the reed i11 different districts. Again, was it only the largcr

F. X. Funk,
AIttr drr ArA-rindis~plin,Paderborn, 1907,41-55.
Br pwtwr. hoer. 41 (C.C.L. I , gsci).
I,>HI.L r i i . I 7 ( K I ) P ~ > LI.~f r~i ) L
. I

-,g.,

'' IXiiti

11i

I,p?i. 9. In ( B a ~ h s ~ r+3H).
i~,

1 ~ 3

GREEDS WESTE RP4 AND EASTERN

6ASTERN CREEDS

3 3 ~ i(or 340)~submitted at the cou~icilof Nicrica

hirnself in the letter of self-justification
which lie suhsequently thought it prudent to despatch to his
ffock. An important item in the statement read out before thc
emperor Constantine and the council (we shaI1 have an opportunity of discussing it more fully in the next chapter) was a
creed, tlie test of which runs as fallows :

ished iii proportion as it was a mere ad hoc generalization of

reeds in the CathoIic East. But his own statement to the ounciI
makes the position absolutely clear. Re introduced the formula
with the words : "As we received from the bishops Gefere us,
both in our catechebcal instruction and when w e were

182

10

(32j),~C

set i t down

in one God. the Faiticr almaker of all things iisiblc

&+7w1.
m t h i - .
and int-isiblc;
Kai &a rmnr 'I~au& X p t m , ~ O v m t .4nd in one LorcIJews Christ, thc
Pco A+u,
&&v ir Pro, &k;ir t b r 8 r ,
of God. G d from G d , light from
liqht, Iife from life, S o m only be<YY
CM i+.u ~ v p ~ ~ ~- pi uj &, r o r o r
viqi w i v c o ~ np
,
n 8 i . r ~rcv
~ a;&vriri,
pottrn, frnr-hgottm of all mation.
tr 7C xa7pos y~vrrri]/,i,rii:
t' o; *.m;
k q o ~ t e n kforc all agcs from the
Fathrr, throuqh tlhorn all t l ~ i n ~
carne into k i n q , IClio k a u w ofciur
dr-ation wzincarnate, a d dwcIt
among men. and .wffmed, and roqt
ayain on the thLd day, and axrndcrl
rr? thc Father, and will come aqain in
gIory to j u d liring
~
and dead :
\\'c lxlicr-c alxi in one Holv Spirir.
iC bclicr-e

rrpe+opu, r9v r&

inriww~Opa+;v

7r rui

+h.,

This creed, possibly ~ 6 t ha fiilIer final cction, is almost

certainly Eusebius's ourn: the crecd, that is, of the local comrnunity at Caesarea. Some criticsl have shown sceptiirm on
this point, thinking that he could never have had the impertinente to fojst a forrnulary of his orm oa the grand ccumenical
council. Tts basi structure, they argue, may well hal-e been
borrowed from the Caesarean model, but its contents were
probably an amalgam of baptismal creeds in general. But onjectures like this are wide of'the mark, and spring from a misunderstanding of the actual situation as well as from an extravagant measurc of scrupulous caution. As a matter of historica1
fact (we shaI1 develop this point later) Eusebius did not bring
the creed forward witlz a view to its being adopted by the
council, but in vindication of his own orthodoxy, which at the
time lay under a loud. Jts apoIogetic value would have dimin1 So, t.g., A. Harriack in hir article A p o ~ t o l i ~ c hSynibofuim
c~
in Hauck's Rca!t~riicyklofiacdic, 3rd cd., I .

baptized (h~ j ijc a r r ] ~ r r cual

~ &c 70 hourpGv iAappyop~) . . .
so a1so we beIieve now and submit our belief to you," The
inference that the creed which he then proceeded to insert was
the reed of his own baptism, and so of Caesarea, js the only one
which does justice to his words. Since Eusebius, who was bom
circo 263, had been brought up as a Christian, we are jristified
in concluding that a recopized baptismal formulaq on these
lines must have been current at Caesarea in the Iatter half of
the third century.
A second e~arnpleof a local Eastern creed of fairIy early date
is the baptismal creed ofjerusalern. JVe awe our knowledge of
jt to Sr Cpril ofJemaIem, w-ho while still a priest (or possibly
as bishopj commented on it clauses in the catechetical Iectures
he deIivered in 348. Yaturally S t CyiI did not quote the text
of the creed in tiis dscourses : the discipline of reserve prevented
that. But it can be reonstituted from the sectlon headings of
the lectures (these, of course, are the work of editors, not of the
preacher himsdf) and from the body of the lectutes themselves.I A point worth noticing i that St Cyril, although prepared to do battle with Acaius of Caesarea over the privileges
granted by the couacil of Xicaea to the see ofjerusalern, declined ta incorporate anyhing of the Kicene docttine into the
creed which he handed out to his catechumens. Like many of
his contemporaries he was apprently suspicious,3 at this period
of his life at aay rate, of the new-fangled Nicene term OF DNE
SUBSTANCE, which seemed to smack of Sabellianism.
I T t u ~ c o ~ rls
rv

<va @&v, m r & a newoitpa-

~ o p a mt7r;lv
,
oijpauou ~ a 1p j s , 6pu~1i,
T E mwcuv itai dopirwv.

U'c bclimc in rinc I>d,

thc Faihcr aimighty, rnakrr oT hcaven and carth,
of aatl things visiblc and invisible;

Sce Cal. 7-18 (P.G.33, 605-1060},The words printed within brackcts occur
oaly in the editor's stction headings,and so cannot be tnistcd.
a For St Cyril's theological position at this time, sct tlie ualuable articlcs by
J. Lehon inX.ff.E. xx, 1924,r81 F. and 357 Cf.

r 86

CREEDS WESTERN AND EASTERN

EASTERN CREEDS

suspicious air about it. In the Christological sectian we observe

how he has silentlv altered the Greek FROM MARY THE HOLY
VIRGIN, attested by Eusebius, to FROM MARY THE VIRGIN, presumably to bring it Into line with thc Rornan usage. A similar
motive may have inspired the substitution dr BELIEVE for the
more usual WE BELIEVE, 0f QUR LORD JESUS CHRIST for OPTE LORD
JESUS CHRXST, and o~ TIIE TKXRDDAY ROSE AGAIN for ROSE AGAIN
ON THE T ~ R DDAY. Despite these touthings up, however,
we have every reason to idenrify the underlying form as
being, Jike the Jerusalem creed which it resemblcs, an ancient
baptismal symbol,
L o t h e r Syrian creed, also used at baptisrn but much longer
nd more detailed, is found in the Apostolical Consfitutions in the
acount 1 there given of the ritual of initiation. The treatise itself
was probabIy cornpiled in Syria or Palestine towards the end
of the foirrth century.

I am baptized also in t h t Holy Spirir,

that is the Paradete, Who worked
in a11 ihe saints from the beginning,
and afterwards was e n t to the
aportles aIso from t h e Father according to the prorniue of our Saviour rid
Lord Jesus Chriut, and after the
apostlcs to all believers within the
ho1y Catholic and apwtolic church ;
in thc resurrection of the Aesh and
in the remission of sins and in the
kingdom oi heaven and in the Iife
of the age to come.

Another interesting creed which has come to light recentIy

is the one used at baptism by Theodore of Mopsuestia (in
CiIicia). He was ordained priest at Antioh in 383 (circa),and
exercised his ministry thereuntil he was consecrated bishop of
Mopsuestia in 392 : 6 e died in 428. In his atecheticaf ~ e c t u r e s , ~
which have survived in Syriac, he expounded the baptisrnaI
creed to his neophytes, citing its severa1 clauses textually many
times over, and thus it is possible to piece the formula together
as a whole. It bears a remarkabIe resemblance, it is worth
- -.
recalliuig, to a Syrian creed used by the Nestorians which Caspari reconstruted in what must have been approximately its
Greek: form. As it stands it bears obvious signs of having developed in the controversial atmosphere of the fourth century,
but its basis is no doubt ancient, We reproduce the creed below
in English along with a retranslation iito Greek rnade by Pse
J. Lebon.3

APOSTOLICAL CONSTITUTIONS
s lsvu &:vAnd I believe, and a m baptized, in one

~emdw
K U ~
flonrl[opac d
q r o v P d m ~aX538~~81'BEV

Kai

unbegotten, only, t m e God alrnighty,

thc Father of the Christ, creator and
I C d hpl0iiWv TCV ( ~ T W W V , <f 06 T A
frarner of a11 things, from Whom are
?rdm.
a11 things ;
k41 ris r d v d p w v 'IquoCw r d v Xpwrdv, And in the Lord Jesus the Chrisr, His
7du p o v a y r y o k o t ulv, TV ?rpwr~ortor
onIy-begotten Son, the first-begotten
suqs U T ~ O E W S , TV ?rpd aihjyww r i S o ~ i ~ of a11 reation, Who before ages was
TO RUTPS y v 8 ; v ~ a06 W?LO%&Q,
81'
born, not created, by the good plea03 r d ?MWQ ~ Y ; V < T O 7; :V 0i&#0k
sure of the Father, through Whom
~ a :&?ri y i j ~ ,pCL'Td 71 ~d dpa~a, 7 d ~
a11 things carne into being, in heaven
ar' <q7wv TWV +epGv KUTEABMQ
and upon the earth, visible and in2f o G p a G v ai w p ~ Ba ~ Q ~ ~ v T;K u ,
visible, Who in the last days carne
r;j dyias ~ a ~ 6 & o M
v U ~ : Qy<T8i.ra,
S
down from heaven and took flesh,
xal m X ~ ~ a u ~ ~ 6ulws
w o v xa~4. mii~
born from the holy virgin Mary, and
vpw 70; 6 ~ 0 6KU; ?rarp8 aho+ov,~ a ; lived in holy wise according to thc
oraupwO~mvrra$*ri ITowiov 1TtXLrov, uni
laws of God His Father, and was
2?rot4avma
+&v,
&ai 6vamwa
crucified under Pontius Pilate, and
r'ic vcupSv p r ~ 4 76 ra&Tv
~ p i q
died for us, and rose again from the
$p4PII, ai Lv6hOnvra ris rads 06~:parodr
dead, after His passon, on the third
xai ~ a B ~ u 8 ~ 2u
w ah.$+TO;
rarpdr,
day, and ascended to heaven, and
ai T ~ L V~ P ~ p ~ OVYT<I:~
~ v
TO;
sat down on the Father's right hand,
*:&vos p c ~ bS t q s ~pcvuva~~ & w a r u i
and wiI1 come again at the end of
vci~po&, 06 7 5 s #aurkias 0th ;ma&
the age with glory to judge living
riAoc.
and dead, of Whose kingdom there
will be no end ;
RUMDKP&-

ropa, 7dv ru+kpa r06 Xp~w~oii,

mi-v

MOPSUESTIA
W e believe in one God the Father
almighty, maket of a11 things visible
and invislble ;
And in one LordJesuli Christ, the m l y begotteri Son o i God, the first-bcgotten of all creation, Who was begotten from His Father before dl
ages, not made, true Gcd from tmc
Gd, of one substance with His
Father, through Whom the ages

Ap. Cumt. 7, 41 (ed. of F. X. Funk, I, 444 ff.).

1 ~ 7

Published for the fimt time (the Syriac with an Engliah translation) by A.
Mingana in Wodbrookt Studies V (Carnbridge, r 932).
a Caspari, QwIIm I, 116 and r 18. Cf. also Rahn 132. The text survives oriIy
n Syriac.
a

RiHiE.rucrii, 1936, 836.

I90

Asius went on i o assert t11at this faith of his was baed on ihe
holy Scriptures, jn which rlic Lord had rommanded His disciples to go and teach a11 riations, baptizing them in the threcfoEd Name. Yct i t can scarcely he cIairned that liis formula was
more than distantly related ao curyent baptjsmal hrrns. Sozomen reportsl the opiniori OS some diat it was "an artificial
oncoction ( Q E ~ V C K WmS u y u ~ k - 8 a ~ ) and ceriainly the body of
it seems to have been bascd rin tlie Niene creed, thougli carefully excluding the latter's distinctive teaciung. Tlie historical
passage in the central seciion, it wi31 bc obsen-ed, is an abbreviation of the Xicene wording. It is the concluding articlc
which sounds coi~vincinql!*Iike a IocaE Egvptian crced. Thc
Sicene formula confrned iiself to a menti011 of the HoIy
Spirit, and it is not easy to imagine any special reasons why
.4rius, if he wanted to continue, should have irnprovised out
of his own head. hIoreover, thc omission of HOLY with ~ I I C
Church recalls Alexander's rseed, while the unusual elaboration of the future lifc aligris the formula w i t h thc creed af the
Aposiolical Conriiti~fionr.
Our other Egyptian creed is the forrnda kno~i-nas tlie crecd
of St Macarius. Thc descnption is not very apt, for, if the evidence on which ous knotuledge of it depends is weI1 founded.
ic is net ikis creed at a11 but the oficial formula ofsome Eg)-ptiaii
church. According to onc oF the stories appended to a nintli
century Viennese codex of the so-caled ripothegmata Macarii,
the saint was catled upon by a local bkhop in the neighbourhood of Arsinoc to assist him in dealing with a heretical monk.?
The monk wanted to recite Iiis faith, but St Macarius ojected,
"Let not an evil faith he so much as narned before the peeplc,
but let us pronounce the Catholi faith of the Church," and
pessuaded thc bishop to recite it. Lhe following is the creed.

".

ST. MACARIUS
L'rrrrdw

d s Ba

fltv, nmQu

aauro-

U&TO~~.

Ka; CIS 7th Pwwiov a h o t A+,

St'
av' ;m:qor sohr aiwras, +&v
aumArlp

a
242

EASTERN GREEDS

GREEDS WESTERN A N D EASTERN

I believe in aire a,
the Fathcr
almighty ;
And in His wnsubstantial Word,
through WWhom He rnade the

Hist.e~cl.I, 2 1 (P.Cr
67, ioiz).
For the story, nnd the imt o f t h t crccd printcd below, see Kattenbusch 11,
ff.

r& aldvuv r& 8BCvorv rjc d p a p ~ i a s

i ~ ~ ~ p $ ai~
a uapxi,
~ a
r j i r irr 7+r
dyias nap'iimv Mapias ;um@ ;rrcor$oam, +Y m a u p w 8 ; ~ ~mi
m dmBa~rra
*ai T~&'LTO,
ai d v a m ~ ~ a T ~
iri'fi no; aa8c~rrmr :ir 6rE ro
nnrp87, KO; x a i v i p ~ p t w v&
p;AAm71 u;&vi ~ p i ~ m
GMET
t
NU: I Y K ~ U T .

r4

]g1

ages, \Vho a1 lh cunsummation uC

the agcswith a vitw ta thc destmc-

tion of sin sojourncd in Ilrrh, which

He tmk from thc holy V i q i n Marv,
\Vho
~
T
~ was crucificd nnd died and tvas
husicd, and rwt again nii the third
day, and sits on t h t right hand nftlic
Fathcr, and will come again in thc
coming agc to judgc 1iring and dcad ;
And in rhc holy Spirit. l\'lio ir con+ubstantial ivith tlie Father and Hiu
14-0rd. LCZur bIicrc a150 iii thc
rcsumrion of sou1 and body. as thc
.+pos~lc-1%. "Ft is mnn a natural
Imdy, i t i s raiscd a spiritual bndy",
ctc.

.sljqhtly
I
different version, omitting thc word SOJOPR?EED,
mcntioning the ascension ta heaven, and rnaking a few changcs
rif wording and word-order, is given in a Paris 3 f S . T l i e
details of the story are quite realistic, and there scems no
reason to doubt that it sepresents a gcnuine reminiscence,
cmbroidered \?th the miraculous in haqiographical fashion,
of St Ilfacarius, who died in 390 at the aqe of go. Thc rced
itself reveais some striking points of contact with t he crced of
St AIe'ander of Alexandria, such as thc sentcnce +9TTHE COSSUMMATI05 OF TRE AGES NTTH A VIEW TO THE DESTRI'CTIOS OF

and the sequence of participlcs c R t F c t n E D LYD

mention of Fontius Pilate in either case.
It also resembles the creed of Arius, e.g. in the short first articIe
without allusion to the Father as makcr of heaven and carth,
in the description of Christ as Eogos fallowcd imrndintc1)- by
the reierence to Him as the agent of creation, and in the clause
WILL COME TO JUDGE without any mention of glory. These
points not only serve to cconfirm the inferencc that St Macarius's
crecd i5 an authentic E_gyptian onc, but also acld ~veightto our
previous ar,e;ument in favour of she view that Alexander had a
creed in mind and tliat Arius was basing his rip~lo~gy
on ari
Egyptian formula.
The above are a number of specimcns of local creeds wsed
by churches of the East . The selection has bcen deIiherately

SIN SOJOPRSED,

nED

. . ., Mithout

This MS was followed by E. Prcusdien in liir PoIlndiiis iind Rujniis. Giessen,

'897, 1 2 7 .

CREEDS WESTERN A N D EASTERN

COMPARTSON OP EASTERN AND WESTERN CREEDS

confined to local creeds or formulae deriving from them : the

symbols framcd by eclesiastical assemblies have been excluded
from consideration for the moment. Even so, the list should not
be rgarded as complete. Some, possibly the majority, of the
conciliar reeds of the fourth ensury are local creeds wearing
a thin disguise. Besides these, however, there are severa1 other
formularies which have been passed over in she meantime
because they make no speial contribution to the present disussion and wil1 be more fittingIy examined in a subsequent
chapter. Arnong these are the so-alled creed 1 of Lucian the
Martyr (died 3 I I), which is supposed to underlle the second
formula of the synod oF Antioch (341), and the two creeds "of
St Epiphanius. The present selection should be sufficient for
our purposc. The reader should no-iv be in a position to form
some general idea of the charater of Eastern creeds. He Iionld
also have gained some irnpression of the nnumber and varietu
of confasions of which the Eastern churches could boast.
I t wiII not escape notice that they are wi-idely distributed
over the Chrjstian East, and that some of them must go well
back into the third centui. The hanrest, we are led to suppose,
would have been muh fuller if the discipline of resenpehad
not been in operation. T h e irnportance o i this is far-reaching.
Some of the older critics, under the irnpression that Rome had
nn oficial creed in the second century and unable to disoves
any parallel in tlie East, took the \lew that baptismal creeds
were in fact a novelty there and did not exkt as formal documents before the last generation of the third century. Thus
Harnack3 and Kattenbusch,' the Ieaders of credal research in
their day, thouglit they could trace the two earliest Eastern
creeds, those of Caesarea and Jerusalem, to Antioch. Their
theory wa that the Old Roman Creed was adopted there after
the deposition of Paul of Samosata, about 272, and that after
undergoing radical revision to comply with the special sequirements of the East at the time became the parent of a11 Eastern
reeds. This latrer hypothesis will be considered later, but for
the rnoment we must be content with observing the weakness

of the premisses on which its depends. First, it invo1ves a serious

errar about the date and manner of the ernergence of dec2aratory creeds. Even at Rome it is unlikely, as we have seen, that
there was a single authoritative creed of this kind until the
rniddIe of the t h i d century. Before then the baptismal creed
proper had bem the interrogation regarding belief, and we
have arnple evidence that this existed in the East as well as
the West, Dionysius of AIexandri a, for example, in the middle
of the third entury knew af I '"the faith and the confession preceding baptism", and of" the questions and answcrs'" Firmiliari
of Caesarea, a littie before Dionysius, could speakc of " the
established and churchly intemgation" and ""te customary
and established words of the interrogation". Secondly, so far
as surnmaries of faith are concerned, tve possess uch early
Eastern examples a the profession of the presbyters of Srqrna3
and the creed of the Epistula Aposfolonim.~Thirdly, it seem
highIy likely zhat several of the creeds listed above derive from
a period weU before the counciI of Kicaen. This applies at anyrate to the creeds of Caesarea and Jerusalern, and very probably
to the underlyiny bask of others too.
In vicw oof this evidence, and the absence of any facts pointing
in the oppoite direction, the only natural conclusion is that
Eastern creeds followed a c o m e of devclopmcnt closely analogous to that of JVestern creeds, with t1ie difference that the
peculiar position of the Roman hurch secured a special role

r g2

Cf. St Athanasiur, Da syn. 23 (P.C. 26, 721 K}.

Rncorntw, r i 8 and r rg (Holl I, 1 4 - 1 4 g ) .
CF. art, Apastoliscliss symboium in Hauck'~Realmcyk., 3rd cd., I, 749.
I, 380 R., 11, 1g.i ff'.

193

for the formula it finally adopted. At the primitive stage tthere

were the ancient baptismal questions and answers, arid at the
same time more or less fked cateclietical summaries were
coming extensively into use. Later, in the third century, with
the elboration of the catechumenate and af the baptismd rite
itsclf, declaratory creeds were introduced and spesdily became
regular.

The local Eastern forrnularies rit which wc lanccd i i i the

preceding section make a rnotlcy ctowcl. Thc firsi general
In Euseb. Hist. e c d . 7, 8 and 7, 1) (Sctiwarta, 275: 276).
Cf. St Cyprian, @I. 75, 1 0 f. (Hartrl 1, t i i t l ) .
Circ abovc, p. 82.
See above, p. 82.

E.C.C.-7

]g6
CREEDS WESLERN AND EASTJSRN
(6vamvra) For Chist's resurrection, as opposed to R's ROSE
AGAIN FROM THE DEAD. A srnaI1 point is that they a11 express
the ascension by the Greek B v ~ X B w aas against R's characteristic &vafima, R is also exceptional in stringin,g togetht
- :r the
various item in this section of the creed without any con necting particle (Eastern reeds repeat the conjunctiorIAND bet ween
.,
WAS I N C A R N A ~ ,SUFFERED, etc.), and in prefacing irs account
of the Second Coming with WHENCE (othes Western creeds have
THENCE, whereas Eastern creeds generally read AND WILL COME
AGAIN).

The third article presents stilI further material fcIr contra.sting

the two types of creed. Some of the Eastem form1s represient a
transitiorial stage at which its contents were lirnitea-1 m a. bare
mention of the HoIy Spirit : so the creeds of Caesarea, Nicaea,
and possibly the first creed of the council of Antioch ( 3 4 r ) . I
The majority, however, elaborate the third articIe much more
fully than R does, as often as not referring explicitly to baptism
and subordinating THE REMISSION OF SINS to if, and usually
describing t h e Church as ONE and c ~ ~ a o (sometimes
~rc
APOSTOLEC as well), and adding LIPE EVERLASTING or LIFE OF THE
L.

L.

COMINC AGE.

The accumulation of characteristics commoi1 ta Eastern

creeds which we listed in the preceding section Is sufficient to
justify us in speakinp of an Eastern type. The problem we now
have to face is whether we can take a further step and assert that
a11 Ertstern creeds belong to one family and actually descend
from a. single stock. The aiialogy of tthe lineal connection
between all later W7estern forrnularies and their ancestor the
OId Rornan Creed has naturaily been ternpting to scholars. It
would be highiy satisfying if a similar course of development
could be posited for the East on the basis of the undoubted resemblantes between all Eastern reeds. This was the assumptioli on which the majority of alder students worked. With
Kattenbusch and Harnak, of course, it was an integral part
Scc below, p. 2 6 5 CF. its curious words, "But ir something must be added,
we beliwe also concerning the resurretion of the flesh and eterna1 Pife."

THE DESCENT OF EASTERN CREEDS

'97

of their theary that Eastern creeds derived from the revision of

the Old Roman Creed carried out, as they supposed, at Antioch
about 272. Others who did not s h x e their view of the Western
basis of Eastern creeds were equally confident that, behind
the mass of local variations and onwliary revisions of the fourth
century, they could descry a comrnon plan. The question was
reopened, with characteristic thoroughness, by H. Lietzmann
more than two decadts ago. He devoted the third of his farnous
Symbolstudien 1 to an exhaustivc analysis and collation of all the
principal Eastern formularies. As the fruit of his researches he
drew up a simple creed of three articIes which he feIt sure must
represent the original confession underIying a11 Eastern reeds,
and whjch lie accordingly labelled 0.
I b e l i m in one God, the Father alm i g h t ~ ,maker of a11 thinps visible
and invsible ;
noiqnjv.
Ku;C.?? &l~ 6 ~ '1f 7 l0l 0 h~' &~078~,TV And in one Lord Jesus Ghrist, the only
begottrn Son of God, Who was beviv 706 8doU T ~ Vpovwym$, TV
gotten from the Father before ali
706 ? T ~ T ~ Sywq8iivra ?rp awwv
ages, through Whom all things carne
V;.
al&vwv, 81' od 76 ?rdwa i y < v ~ r o .
into being, Who pecause of our
TV [Si& r;lv + E T ~ P U Y G ~ ~ I U Vi~~av]
salvation] became man, suffered,
Bpwx?joavra, raBvra, uai dvawr&a ~ f i
and rose agaia on the third day and
T~LT??
trai dv;ie8vra ct 70:s
el;pavo, #a; [r;&hrvj ;p,yrwot' ~ p y t ~ a ~ ascended to heaven, and will come
[again] to judge living and dead;
tWvra ~ u IiC K ~ S .
And in thc HoIy Spirit.
Ka; ris 70 Yuw mrcpa.

In this formula, or something very closely reembling it, he

argucd,. we have " the comrnon archetype out of which the
Eastern confessions grew"."
The va'tue of Lietzmann's metiulous sorting out of Eastern
credal forms cannot be rated too highly. The third of his Symbolstud~enis a painstaking piece of work which w i l remain indispensable to students for many years to come. His skill and
ingenuity, too, in seizing upon the recurrent Eastern traits and
reassembling them in O deserve acknowledgernent. Whether
O ever had historical actuality or is rnerely a scholar's artefat,
it certainly rcmains the rnodel Eastern creed. It represents
&V.T.W.xxi 1922,5-22.
Ste his artidt on creedr in Encjclop@din Rrifmnica, 14th edition, Vol. VI, 657,

lg8

THE DESCENT OF EASTERN CREEDS

CREEDS WESTERN AND EASTERN

a commen partem which reveals itselfwith surprisino; frequency

behind the diverslty of Eastern confessions. Yct i t is difficult to
repress the conviction that he made a rnistake in deciding
to set out upon the path trodden hy so many previoui scholars
with j1l success. Thc analogy of the histov of crceds in the
I\:est may have hcen ternpting, but it was deceptivc. There is,
on the face of ir, no reason why the course of dcvelo~
iment
should have been similar in the East, and aImost every reason
why it should Iiave been different. Thc status and authoi-ity of
ihe RIIman ck-iurch, it should bc remernbere, were quite
peculia.r : therc was nothing remoteIy parallel to them in the
East. Elecause i f its prestige, aided by the relative lateness o
the rise of other local churches, the Roman church was able
to exercise a quite extraordinaq infiuenc:e on the: Iiturgy ILn the
areas which acknowledged her suzeraii1s.Even apart from
I" -..- + . T A 11um
r--- the
the testimony of actuaIly recorded reed,
~ Y C"L
SIIWUICI
start have been prepared to find the JVestern churches looking
to Rome for an authoritative liturqical confession. O n the other
hand, unless faced with very compelling considerations to nhe
contras., we should naturallu be prdisposed to betieve that
the Eastern Iiurches developed their ~edalforms in some
measrire of independence of each othcr.
The.whoIe presupposition of a comrnon archetypc for Eastern
creeds :;eems to rest upon a miscimception of the way in which
. .
.. of the baptismal service. So
creeds took shape in the- conrext
far as our evidence goes, the questions and aiZSWCTS at the
rnoment of baptism were the creed in ernbryo. These questions and answers, however, toqether with tht: catech eticaI
-- much
.
summaries with which they
-rvt:re onn ected, wcie as
part of Eastern as they 7sere of 1Nestern practice in the second
and third centuries. Consquentl y, each li>cal chusch rnrist have
possessed, virtually from tne stan, tnt ~eginninqxof a creed or
creeds as part of its Iiturgical apparatus
is no need to
posit an U f i m or Grundppsrs at alt, so E
: East is c.oncerned, muh less one so elaborate and pa~c~iiiy
rnacurc as O.
The fact which is singular is the position of R vis-d-rtis other
Western creeds, but that is explicable in the Iight of its early
origin and the extraordinary pre-cminence enjoyed by the

.A--

-*A----

Roman church.

iI
I

'99

Our doubts are redoubled when we turn to the text and

compare the Eastern creeds rnarshalIed and sun~eyedby Lietzmann with one another and with O . Strikjng as are the resernbhnces which they display, they exhibit none of that unde-rI ~ i n gidentity lvhich was sa obvious a fearure in Western
formularies. No one who examines them is likelv to conclude
at once that they are a11 variants of a comrnon f o m . On tht
contrary, side by side with the similarities there are equally
irnpressive divergentes. Thus the general agreement over the
First article hardly arnqunts to more than wc should expect in
view of the common Christian teaching. Lietzmann himself
adrnitted that the second half of it, which appears ia O as
MAKER OF ALL T ~ G 'VISIBLE
S
AND ~ I S I R Z E , C O U I ~ not be
recomtmcted with any certainty. In addition to the form he
selected for inclusion in 0 , there were traditions which read
TRE CREMOR ( K T ~ Y )AXD ?~QXER ar TRE L ~ ~ R S E
OT ,
rvhich expresscd the same thouqht b:- the Pauline "from TVhorn
are all thingsW."here
may also have been a tradition, reptesented by Egrptian creeds, t.r.hich omitted all reference to the
Father's creative work. Ayain, while 111 the second article the
mention of OYE LORD JESUS CHRZST was pratically universal,
there tvere some irnportan t creeds 3 fiom which QXE was significantly nbsent. Others again4 diverged from O in describirig
the Son as FIRST-BEGOTTEN DF ALL GREATION, a credal tradition
at least as 01d zs St Justin."
notable discrepncy with O js
the appearance of thc session at the Father? right hand in a
great number of Eastern creeds. Their independence in this
respect from R is proved by their preference for the Greek
K ~ B F ~ ~ Eor
Y ~~I a~% w v r a
to R's ~ o @ r j ~ ~ iLastb,
wva \vider
background than O's urt AXD r': LHE HOLY S P ~ I Tmust sureFv
be souqht for the third article. In some creeds it was no doubt
confined to a bare mention of the Spirit, but we knotv, from St
Justin and from St Irenaeui, as \%.e11 as from others, that an
expanded third rticIe had won a footing quite early.
Gf. thc third creed of h t i o c h in St Arhm., Dr gn. 24 (P.G.26: 724 f.) : qrc
infra, p. 266 rCL the formula of Nic6 (359) giwn by Theodoret, Hs'st.eccl. 1,2i (Parrneniicr,
145 f.).
Cf. tht C~ECCISof Antioch, Aposl. Coi~t.,and Egypt a i a n above.
Cf. thc c r r d s of Caesarea, Antimh, Apb. Const., Mopauestia.
' <:C. Ilirrl. 85 (E.J.G.. 197).

'

'I4

THE PRQMULGATTON OP N

THE CREED OF NICAEA

at one of the sessions in the presence of the emperor himseif:

This began with a short preface declaring that the faith whicli
he now believed, and which he was now submitting to the
ounil, was the faith in which he had been instructed as a
catechumen and had been baptized, and which he had himself
taught both as a priest and as a bishop. There followed irnmediately after this what was manifestly a baptismaI creed, in all
IikeIihood, in view of the previous statements, that of the hurch
of Caesarea.1 In its turn the creed was followed by a brief
theoIogica1 explanation and elaboration of its lauses, asserting
i n the plainest terrns the continued separate existence of each
of the three divine persons (" the Father is in truth the Father,
the Son in rruth the Son, the Holy Spirit in truth the HoIv
Spirit "1, arthouqh tactfuIly avoiding Eusebius's fawurite and
charateristic description " three hypostases". To oncIude the
rnemorandum carne an assurnce of his unswening attachment
to these doctrines in the future as in the past. Eusebius then
resumes hjs Ietter proper, sernarking that 'hhen this faith had
heen ser forth by us, there was no soom to gainsay it. Our
belored emperor himself was the first to testie tht it was
entirely osthdox, and that he himself held exactly the same
opinions. He insrmcted the others to s i g n it and to assent to its
teaching, with the single addition of the word 'consubstantial
( ~ p o v " w ~ 0'5").
Apparently onstantine added hi own interpretation of
tbis contentious word in language designed to counter
possible objection in advance. "He explained that ~pooucos
was not used in t3ie sense of bodily aflections, for the Son
did not derive His existence from the Father by means of
division or severane, sine an immaterial, intellectual and
incorporeal nature could not be subject to any bodily affection.
These things mtist be understood as bearing a divine and ineffable signification." The council, however, on the pretext of
adding CONSUBSTANTTAL (npo&aa i-+
mG pootsu~ovr p ~ ~ t h j ~ v r )
<L
produced this forrnulary "-and then follows the creed of
Nicaea with its anathecas. Eusebius brings his letter to a close
with a 10ng passage explaining how he insisted on scrutinizing
the creed, and refused absoIutely to append his signature iintil
For the

tcxt of this, scc above, p. 182.

215

a satisfactory explanation had been put upon every clause both

of the symbol itseIf and of the anathernas at the end.
As well as suppiying precious hints regarding the origin of
the creed of Nicaea, the letter is a fundamental authority for its
text. In addition to the appendis to his De decret. &;c. gn.,St
Athanasius quoted the creed again in hls letter to the Emperor
J0rian.I Other important witnesses to the au thentic text are
Socrates the historian,2 and St 3asil.J The creed was reproduced, of course, by many other Greek authors in the entury
following the council, and numerous Latin versions of it were
carrent.4 A text based on these authotities is printed below with
an English trandation. Its purity is g-uaranteed by what took
place more than a hundred years later at the council of Chalcedon (451). Xt the third session, held on 10 Ocrober, thc
assernbIed bishops: caused the creed oF Kicaea to be read out
in their hearing. According to the ver\. fuH account presen-ed
in the Acts of the cauncil, this was done by Eunornius, bishop
of Kicomedia. The choice of this dignitay, metropohran of
Bithpia (in which Xicaea was situateci), um dictated. w e
can be sure, by- the desire to have the creed recited in its

authentic, original text. The latest editor of the Chalcedonian

a t a , Eduaid Schwartz, has showns that tht tcxt read out, so
far as can be judged, difered only in rninutt particulars from
the one printed below.
NKXEA

n'ur'fV

i r

in one G d , thc Farher

a h i g h w , rnakcr of all L hings visi blc
and invisiblc;
And in onc h r d j c s u ~Christ, the 5on
OS a,
bqoztcn from thc Fathcr,
p o e , T O V T ~ ~ I Ui~
+i$
rikhs m
ody-beptttn, that is, from tht subm ~ f i r , B E ~~ Z K@o;,
i~
dwrds,
stancc of the Fathtr, God rom Cod.
Brdv dlv8ivv CK BcoS ~ ~ B C W Uyf~?,,
Iight Srom light, iruc Gcd from true
@&Q
o6 =or$&a,
P o u ~ o uT~T~~ T ~ L . God, b t ~ o t t c n not madt, o f onc
ar' 05 7; & n a + ~ r a , r&T E IY T+
oiubtancc with the Fathm, throiigli

m i p u *=TOu&mpal nivmr. Gparulv rn KO; &p~cuv

notdv.
Ka; rir &ri k p w r 'ITm;vXPcm~,&V
uGv r& Bm, y c v q 8 b m
m am.rp3c
&a Brv,

Wt helievc

E#. a d l o a . im g (P.G.
26, 817).
Hi.tt. a i . I, 29 (PC.67, 58).
& E j . 125,2 (P.G. 32,548).
See C. H. Turner, Eccitsiae Occidenidit Monumsnla Iilrir Antigiiis~iiti~a,
Tom, 1,
Fase. 2 , 297 (Oxford, 1913).
".C.O, 11, I , 2 , 79. Sre a170 <.&.T. W . xxv, 1926, 48. rv. Bardy in f i i s i o i ~ e
dt ['EgliJp (FIiche et Martin) 111, 87 and A. D'hl$ii n Rschrches de ~cicnctreli&tsc,
=vi, 1936, 85 R., have misundentod his arvment.

2 16

THE CREED OF NICAEA

TA

;v
yf, +;v &r' &s
mhs du#pdnov~ ra; 6iA n ) v ijPrripav
uwqpav rrartA6'6vra *ai uap~w&ma.
ivav8puim$aaute, nirt4wa rra; rivaorvra
ri ~$9
* i p q , dvrA8dvra r;s 0 6 p ~ v c 6 s ,
nai ipxiprvov rrpiwi bcvras wai v r c p ~ r .
oVpat.+

raC

Ka;r;s 78 e'Ym~nvcpa.
Tnk 82 k<yowa$. $r 'MC
i r e O & $v, ai
r p ; v ywilO?wr cic +v, mi &i;,t &ir
mwv i y l ~ c oI ,j ;
[ iripnc i k m B a < w s
oGuiar &uuovsap tirar.
r r i o r 8 v +j
rpc;rr9r

4 &ro+v

+&r u;Oi,

r o Proi;,

&.uPcPar;~ttri. *ciBoAtir+ iirrrAriu;a.

Whom all things came into being,

things in heauen and things on earth,
I V h o because of us men and bccausc
of our sd>-ationcame down and bec a m e Licamate, becoming man,
suEcred and rose again on the third
day, ascended to the heavem. rind
wiI1 comc to judge the li\ing and the
dead ;
And in rhe Holy Spirit.
But a5 fur t h w who y ,There war
when He s a s not, and, Before being
bom He was not, and that H e camc
into existente out of nothing, or whn
arert that thc Son af God is o a
diferent hypmtasis or aubstancc. or
is creatd, or is mbjeci to a l t m t i o n
or change-these the Cathoiic Churrh
anathematizm.

A? this point we Ieave Euscbius's letter, and to reconstruct

the rest of the tory must rcly on frapentary reminiscences in
other wri tem. The bishops were invited to vote on the synboI
whih was now laid behre hern.' There xvas apparently much
ernbarrassment, much heart-burninp. The emperor's laboured
explanations were not calcuIated to allay the bishops' suspicions
of what appeared to them a new direction in theological interpretation. Arius and his friends were piven the choice dsigning
or being sent into exilc": they chose the latter. 3ut thev were
a small compan?r. Apart fsom the heresiasch himself, only
Secundus of Ptolemais and Theonas of Marmarica declined
to give their sipatures. Even Eusebius of Nicamedia and the
local prelate, Theognis of Nicaea, were found prepared to
conform. T h e idca !hat they subscribed a text in which the
word S r o o d u ~ o(="of
~
the same substance ") was replaced by
Oprouws (="of like substane"}~ Is an ingenious fiction
invented so as to save their honour. In fact they limited
their opposition to a refusal to endorse the oficial condernnation of Arius himself, thtir argument being that his
teaching had been ~rossly misrepresented in the formal
accusations.
Philoriorgius, Hi.rt. cccl.
!'liilnglnryiu.i, Hi.rt. tccl.
l'hilo~tnrqiils,I f i ~ twti.
.

g (Ridez, ! o ) .
I , ga (Ridez, 1 0 ) .
i. 4 (Bidvz, i o f.).
I,

COMPARISON OF N AND CAES.

n17

The twafoId probIem onfrenting the student of creeds

concerns the identity rind intention of che short formula
(technically known as 5 ) w-hich was rhus canonized by the
ecurnenical council. What is the histoty of this creed whic1t
Constantine suceeded in persuading the three hundred and
eighteen bishops to accept, and what fine shades of rneaning
nttached to its diputed cIauses? The solution to the first of these
problems which held the fieId until reentlv, and which rnay
still be met rvith in many text-books af Church history and
authoritative encyclopaedia articles, is based upon a sirnple,
rather one-sided reading of the apologetic letter of Eusebius
referred to and surnrnarized ahove. N, i t was argued, is none
orhes than the local creed of Caesarea (hereafier designateci
C m . )raised in the light of the empetor's instructions. T h e
ornrnittee appointed to c a q out the revision inserted, as
admonished, the -rs,ord, Fwo6wro~( =OF QXE SUBSTLVCE) , and
tmk ad~antageof the o p p o ~ t u n i tithile
~,
thev were at it, to
make severa1 other changes in the same direction. This is t h e
view lvhich was carefulEy worked out and enesgetically defended
by the EngJish shoIar F.J.A. Hart' and A. E. Rum,2and which
-4. von Ramack3 maintained for most of his life.
These scholars wese weil aware that the divergentes bemeen
CAES.and S. xwse rather more numesous and far-reaching than
Constantine's encotmagement, to judge by the accepted readinp
of Eusebius's letter, rnight appear to have warranted. But they
had ingenious and ably worked out expIanations ready ta hand.
Thus, according to Hort, the lauses FIRST-BEGOTTENOF . ~ L L
CREATIOK ( n p ~ ndqs
~ ~ ~ ~U E ~W Pand
~) ~BEFORE ALI. AGES
( r p n-dv-wv 7 i j v al&vwv), which appear in CAES.but not in
N, were "possibly dropped because of the danger that they
rnight play into the hands of the heretis, who liked to appeal
to the former as suggesting rhat Christ was a creature, and who
could interpret the latter as impIying tl'iat 'there was wlien He
was not '." The title s o (VI&)
~
was substituttd in N for LOGOS
Cf. Tm Diaertutioiar, Cambridge, 1876, 54-72.
Ae continzied t o hold the samc view in Thc

' CC. Introdilctzm t o bhe Cveds, 76 R.

Councii 01
Nicuea, London, I gng
SCC Hxuck's R~ulanc~klopnerlic,
3rd ~ d . X1,
,
1 5 f.

sI8

119

THE CREED OF NICAEA

COMPARTSON OP N AND CAES.

in CAES.beause of its Biblical associations, and because the

latter word had been discreditcd by Arian misme of it. Hort
indetd wmt further, and in contradiction to popular misrepresentations of his vieivpoin t insisted that other creeds than
CAES.made theu contributions to ?i'. The insertions and modifications in the second artide, he noticed, correspond fairly
exactly to the phraseology of extant Sy-ian and PaIestinian
creeds. The inference he dsew was that, despite Eusebius's
sitence on the point, the leaders of other gret chutches must
have been iavited to ollaborate in drafting the new forrnulary.
I'et these admissions did not shake his convition, based upon
what seemed to him the unrnistakable meaaing of Eusebius's
words, that N "might with equal cotrectness he described as
the creed of Caesarea with additions'"."
Yet, however we take it, this description hardly rallits with
the facts. The truth of the matter is, as anyone can discovtr for
himself who cares to make an exhaustive comparison, that
CAES.and N differ ar more radically than Hort and his followers, even in their most liberal rnornents, were prepared to
concede. It is not just a question of the ma~pulationof a few
technical slogans. If the two formularim are placed side by
side, it can be seen at a glance what dauses in N are specificall~
anti-Arian imertions. Manifestly the sentenct THAT IS, FROM

MAKER DF ALL T-GS

WSIBLE AWD I N V ~ L E
the Greek vvrwv
parGv T E irai Gop8rov m r T n j v l as against CAF.S.'S
rv TWV
&dwwv p a d v T E ~ a 20PC;rwv
;
m i r l r ; l v . In the third article
$ reads K Q ~~ 1 s76 ytov m . ~ U p a(AND IN THE ROLY S P ~ I T ) ,
while C-. offers a m ~ o p c v~ a El ~ SN mw*p Zytov (N.R. OXE
HOLY SPLRIT). Admittedly these are insigriificant differen c&
for whkh it is not easy to conjeaure a motive. But, from our
point of riew, their very insiqnificance rnakes them a11the more
irnpressive. IVhy should people have bothered to make such
changes, especialiy he change in the third articlefrorn a superior
to a much inferior form? In the first of these divergentes from

THE SUBTANCE OF THE F A T ~ R( ~ o w i m r v;K +s o$aCa rov^

=arps) is onc of them. The clauses B E G O ~ ~XOT
I
MADE
(y+3~70&
05~ mtfl@&a)
~
and OP o%%s v s s ~ ~ ' wmr
r c ~ THE
FATKER ( p u v
T+ .rrarpl) fatl e q u d y obviously into the
same cateqory. So toa, it i 3 appartnt, do the words TRUE GOD
FROM TRUE GOD (@eGv & I ~ % t i . O v 2~ 8eoU &%T$~iroC), which

assert the fullness ofthe Son's deity. If these item are removed,
and at the same time (for argurnent's sake) the clauses in CAES.
stipatized by Hort as possibly suspect are retored, we should
expect to come face to face 4 t h the Caearean fomuIary.
Actually what onfronts us is a creed braadlyresernhling CAES.,
but also diverghg from i t in a number of particulars, mjnute
and i m p ~ r t a n t .In
~ the fim article, for example, N has for
Op. cir, 58.
Tn this discussion I bave relitd Iargely on the masttrly coliation oF thc two
c m d s givtn by H.Ljetzmann in X.N.7. W.m i v , 1gri5, 196 ff.

CAES.,it should be noticed, N is in line with the econd crecd

of St Epiphanius, while in it omission of o- from the third
article it agrees with his first creed.1
But it i s in the structure of the seond article that N stripped
of the anti-Arian sentences reveals itself most strikingly as aEien
to CAEJ.Thus while CAES.separates ONLY-BEGOTTEN SON (viv
p ~ ~ Y ~ tand
6 j )BEGOTTEN FROM THE FATHER ( 2 ~
ro m.rp
y ~ y ~ v p 4 m v ) , and pIaces the latter towards the end of the
firse half of the article, N joins them together and pushes them
farward to the very beginning. N aIso uses the aorist participle
ycvvt)Q&a
instead of the perfect ~ E ~ ~ for
~ BEGOTTEN.
Y
O
Y
There is nothrng in N to correspond to the theollagically
colourless LTFE FROM LIFE {[w;lv 2u tw7js) of C A ~Corning
.
to
the second half, we ob.sert.e that C.s~s.'s 6: o6 ~ a &ivrre
;
78 xvra (THROUGH WHOM ALL T ~ G CAME
S
ISTO BEWG) reappears in ?; as St" ou' n m &2&70.
The foilowinn; lines
(on the basis of the theoq under discussion) abound in similar,
to a11 seeming pointless, changa and additions, such as the
cEumsy insertion of THIIU-GS1% HEAVEN AW T ~ G ON
S EARTH
(r&7~ & r+O+OL+
~ a TA
t 2v fn yfj)*the insertion af BECAUSE
OF us MEIJ AND {Zt'
T O ~ E6v8p&mvs ai), and the insertion
of CAME DOWN (K~TEAOWU), the omission o a couple of AND'S
as well as (Tos what conceivable reason?) af rrI GLORY (;v 865:3),
and the change of TO THE FATHER ( r p s 7th maripa) to TO
TI-IE HEAVENS (dq 06~avo$q), and of the participle 7jtdwa
(WILL COME) t o 2 P X E t ~Thc
~ ~ ~ net
. resulcz is the definite
L

For St. Epiphanius's mcds, sct hia Atmratw,

I:f. Harnack, R t d ~ i ~ k k 3rd
l . , d.,XI, i 5.

1 I 8 and

r ig (Holl I, 146-149).

-.

220

THE CREED OF NICAEA

assidation of N to the Jeriisalem-Antioch type of creed, and

Rarnack wen argwed that thcse dterations ould be regarded
as "undaynatic concessions" made by rhe drafting committee
to the powerful patriarchs of those sees. Actually we have no
reasan to believe that people were so interested as all that in the
exact phrasing of their Iocal creeds at thrs date. PT they rrrere,
it is extremel!- odd that personages so weighty should hare
heen content ~ 4 t hsuch insiqnificant conces~ions.
4. The I ~ f f eofr Errsfbiw

The efTect of the above considerations is inevitably to cast

grave dowbts on the Hort-Harnack hjrpothesis that Y was the
result of a recasting of CAES.They compeI the question whether
in fact that hypothesis is necessitated by the testimvny of Eusebius's letter. And here it is warth noticing that none of the
authorities who preserve the letter so much as hints that it
implies any lineal connection between CAES.and N. St Athanasius? sbject in reproducing it was frankly enough avowed' : he
wanted the world to know that even Eusebius, who had resisted stoutly untiI the eve of Nicaea, had eventually come
round to adrnit that the Nicene teaching represented the faith
of the Church and the tradition of the fathers. His letter was
thus at once a confession OF the error of h 2 former ways and a
repudiation of Arianism. Sirnilarly both Socrateshnd Theodoret,J knolrrinp the p r a t i ~ ewhicich Eusebius enjoyed and the
way the Ariam had of expioiting it, were glad to use the Ietter,
with irs admission, albeit reluctant, tht the Ncene formula
could be interpreted in an acceptable seme, as a stik ~ 4 t h
which to beat the heretis. These facts deserve to be recaued
because the rnodern scholar unonsciously slips into the
assumption that the interest of ancient chroniclers coincided
with his own, and fotgets that, ~vhilethe letter throws valuable
light on the cornposition of N, it only does sa indirectly.
A poinb of decisive irnportance to be noted at the outset is
that Eusebius himself nowhere claims in his Ietter that N was,

THE LETTER OF EUSEBIUS

22 1

ot was intended to be, the resu1t of a revision OS the creed of his

native church. The key sentence comes at the ver). beginning,
where he announces that he is going to quote, first, '-tlie
statement about my beliefs which I submirted (+v $4' ~ J A G Y
s p ~ c 8 ~ T a .rrrpi
v
srloi~or ypadrfv)"? and then the second
'.w.riting (ypqbj~)'\hich the bishops had psduced "after
making additions to nj-words Irais $ p ~ ~ ; p a l dwi*a> r p a d r f ~ a&~c ~ ~ ~ ~ v T E Here
s ] ' ' . Eusebius's "statement ribout rny
beliefs", to whch additions were rnadc, cannot have ben
sirnply t h e creed of Caesarea. The description must refer to the
whole exposition wkich foITows, and which (as was pointed out
previously) inctuded, as well as the creed, both his personal
declaration that he had been brought up in this faith and Iiad
hirnseIf loyally taught it, and (what is directly relevant) the
theological elucidation appended to ihe creed. If this is so, then
" my words ",to which he complained that additions had been
made, cannot be taken, as is cornmoniy done, as being equivalent t o the Caesarean creed. They cannot refer to any text as
such, but must refer to the general theological position expressed in the whole passagc. The emphasis, in other worcls, is
on the old inherited faith of the Church, taught by the bishops
preceding him and ultimateiy derived from the Lord HirnseEf,
much more than on the Caesatean creed considered as a document. I t is this traditional teahiig to which, by his account,
the bishops listened so respectfully and which the ernperor
himself so generousIy applauded, cornrnanding that it should
be iiidorporated in a formal profession containinp the worcl
homooilsios. There is no sugsestion that either Eusebius or Constantine expected the final dournent to be the actual Caesarean
creed with the Xicene key-word inserted. 12'hat Eusebius implies that he had a right to expet was that it would givc expression to the docfrine which he had professed to the atisfacsion
of the council. the only fresh fcature being the nuancc introduced by the use of homoowios.
A similar and parallel misunderstanding vitiates the current
interpretation put upon the other key-passage. This is the
sentence by which Eusebius introduced the creed of the council :
But they, on the pretext of adding Irornoousios (~po$cwi3 s
s poovw~ov T ~ O U B T ~ K ~ Sproduced
),
this docurnent.'"ome

226

THE CREED OF NICAEA

which the Arians first praented their formuia as a basis, only

to see it Indignantly rejected, and then the venerable bishop of
Caesarea stepped forward with the haptismal confession of his
church amid the e;cneraI applause, must be discarded. His reaI
object in subrnitting a creed, it wouId appear, was to clear
himself of the taint af heresy and so to obtain his theological
rehabilitation. If this be so, the episode must have ocurred at
a preliminary stage of the agenda, whereas the creed-making
probably carne much later. Kot onlp is this the case, however,
but Eusebius's letter, if read aright, nmvhere suggests (contrary
to the widespread notion) that he ever clairned that the
Caesarean text as such had been selected as the working basis
of the official forrnufary, much les that he ever complained
that the creed-drafcing cornmittee falled to adopt it a their
basis. His disappointment is obvious, but its cause was not &e
committee's cavalicr tampering with, or disregard of, his ox+m
Caesarean creed. The verbal differenes between h.
and _h;
were apparent to every careful eye, but he was apparentlv not
i n t t r ~ t e dirr them. The real ground of his disappointment was
&e theological t m e of the nelv creed, as he showed by the wav
in which Pie scrutinized ctreryspecificall>-theological clause in
the formula itself and it anathemas. The g i s t of his cornplaint
was rhat, whercas the emperor had comrnended the traditienal
teaching of which d ~ statement
e
submitted by himself had provided a sample, and had simply urged that greter precision
be given ta it by incorporating the one word homootlsios, the
committee had exceeded his injunctions and had completely
distorted the teacling. They had introduced, not so much a
new creed, as what looked dangerously like a new theology,
which Eusebius was only able to accept (so he ssured his
correspondents) after he had tested every a h d e of it. Only a
niisreading of his language, and the diappearance of the records
of the synod of Antioch, have led scholm ta take his rerniniscences as evidence for a direct relationship beiween CAES.and
M. Properly interpreted, they do not, as we have seen, support
such a conclusion. Xndeed, they do not give the least colour
to the idea that he was even interested in the problems which
naturally exercise modern credal research.

THE BASIS OF N

227

5. TheBasis oJN

If the commonly acepted theory of tlle relationship of C m s .

and i\T is reiected, the question of N's background must be
C; ickled al?&h. Tbie most o b ~ i o u sapproach is to inquire what
is, this bas,i, creed which, as we saw, stands revealed when tlie
p-l--Ll-a i p a ~ ~ \T:-~tr;nr;
i ) --- - :
insertions are strippcd off. What rernains, it
is worth emphasizing is not just ri rnusilated torso, but a complete and, to all appearances, independent forrniilary. The
Nicene alterations, on oiu new assumption. can he restricted
t<) ( a )

the

'HAT E, FROJI TAE STBSTANCE OF THE F.J,TNER,

pasage ~

con
E FROM TRYE GDD, B E G O ~ S
There is TIOW
ice stooc1 wtierc rhe Sicene
no need tu suppuse Siat I
iSiers ti-rote soxi or that ILTFE FRO:5% LIFE a1~d BEFORE ALL AGES
were for some -season strr ick out, or that other modifications
wese introduced for subtIe motives sucn as xhose suegested h:Hort and Harnac:k. It Ivas lony ago obemed that 5 bore a
striking r1esembla~ c eat ertain points to crceds oF the SyraPalestiniat--. L ? p L i H. fietzrnann foilowed 1 up this hint, and
argued tf iat the creed underlying X, into which the Sicene
t;igs were interpolated, must have been one helonging to the
Jerusatem f a d y The reeds to tvhh its kinship is most rnarked
are the fi~t of the t ~ s . oquoted by Sz Epiphaniiis h a d dthe one
u sed by S;t Cltj_i of Jemsaiem in Ris carechetical lectures. 3 'Ihe
.-.+..-r
ablum
eed which the draftiny cornmittee used, thought
ed, ancl it js irnpcissihIe now to mess
Lietzmann, has nd~t SUMV
the chrirchtowhi.ch it bel onged.
-. . suggestion,
.
This is an amacnve
arid it liolds water even if,
as is prob able, we should be driven to conclude that the present
tiext of St. Epiphanius's first creed has ben intmded into the
nnanuscrijpts by the carelessness or mlsplacecl zcal of Iater
SIcribes.4 7Thc Palestiriian traits in Y are unrnistakable, as anyone
C an pel-ceive who takes the trouble to collate is with creeds from
3lyria ancI Palestine. It is also possible an this view to acount
for any resemblances which N may be thought to have to CAES.,
for CAES.too is pr'esumabl-y a creed of the same Syro-Palestinian
family. P;I and Cd4~s.are therefore related, not, however, as
and ( b ) th

. SL-BSTAKCE

?G OT MADE

WTH TAE FATHER.

C.**

-..

. - - I 923, zny.
--Z.N. T.h,,r.. xxiv,
--

See ahove, p. r 83 f.

Cf, Ancoralur, r r8 (Holl 1, rqti).

p. 3 I i3 If.

Scc LIrIow,

228

THE CREED OF NICAEA

ofispring to parent, bat as two denizens oF one and the same

ecclesiastical region. Tbere is nothinp intrinsically improbabIe
in the ommittee's having: reourse to a Palatinian f o r m u l a ~
3s a working draft. The alternative hypothesis, that they did
not use an existing creed as a working draft buc improvisd
their formulary de novo, hris not much to be said for it. The
procedure secrns unlikely in itself, and the creed which is left
when thc patently Nicene passages are removed has all the
air of being an independent formulary.
Harnack, however, though persuaded towards the end of his
liFe of the untenability of the hitherto conventional theorv,
which he himself had once supported, of the relation of C m .
to N, found Lietzrnann's substitute proposal too difficuIt to
digest. His objections 1 were, h t , that the whole existene of this
lost Palestinian creed was chimerial ; secondly, that the suggested picture oF the ourse of events scarcely does justice to
Eusebius's narrative; and, thirdly, that it fails to account for
the stylistic peculiarities of N, Eusebius may bave bbeen wrong,
wiIfutly or unconsciously, in postulating that CAES.was intended by the ernperor to be the solc source of the new conciliar
formdary, but his argument implics that there must be some
kinsbip behveen C X S . and S. Consequently he argued that,
once the coirncil was ageed ihat a ncw reed containing the
homoousian catchwords was to be promdga-ated,a number of
bishops of the orthodox and central partia, arnong them
Eusebius, probably produced thtir creeds. Lhe offiial or
05ciaIs appointed to campose a draft of the new symbol had,
therefore, no option but to piece together a cornposite document
reflecting a variety of ecclesiastical traditions; and since in addition last-minute suggestions were probably thrust upon them, it
is l i d e wonder that the formula was dumsiIy witten. As a
result, Eusebius, and severa1 oher bisbops too, could with some
show of justificatiou claim that their creeds had been impressed
to pEay a part in the rnanufacture of the Kiene fomulav.
This cornpromising solution has secured support in certain
quarters,' but is open to serious criticism. If the interpretation
<.fl.r W ,miv, 1925,203. Hia remarh art
tn No. r 3 of Littzmann's Symklslardun.

added as a "kritiucher Epilog "

E.g. from F. J . Badcock in thr 2nd edition of liis book.

TIIE BASIS

OF N

229

of Eusebius's letter rrhich was developed in the preceding

section is correct, there Is no ground for supposins that he evcr
clairned any relationship between CAES.and S. Thus &e keystone oF Harnack's arch ollapses. Quite apart from this,
however, it is not true that the existence of the underlying
formula is a rnatter of pure guesswork. As has heen pointed
out, tlie Nicene technical catchwords are obvious in N to
every eye. If they are detached from the body of the creed to
wkich they adhere so Ioosely, they teave behind a complete
snd, to all appearances, independent fomuiav. It is dificult
to see how we are to explain this on the basis of Harnack's
reconstmction of the course of event. lioreovet, iF the editor
tir editon were piecing to~etheran entirely new c c r d out d
elernents contributd from n. varietu of xoures, it rernains, in
spite of Harnack, a myrteq- why they did not do their joh
better. One would expect the resultant formulary to be a homogeneous whole. Instead, as we have seen, we have a complete
creed of the familiar Eastern type with the anti-Arian clauses
added, to a11 seeming, alrnost as an afterthought. They have
been interpolatd with a gaucherie and disregard for st)-listic
grace which are hard to reconcile with Rarnak's picture of a
new formula built up from &e foundations by the drafting
cornmittee. If, on the other hand, the plea is put fonvard thnr
the veiy varie- of cornpeting laims rendered their task
difficult rind conduced inevitably to clurnsy workmanship, i t
must still be asked why this clumsiness should make itself
manifesr only in respect of the anti-Arian passages. The rest
of the creed, these lauses removed, runs smoothly enough.
Ramack's objections thus fali to the ground. There is no
need to examine them further, or to inquire what evidence Iie
had for his theory that the bishops of severa1 se6 must have
proffered crceds to an ernbarrassed drafcing cornmittee. His
reconstmction of ivhat happened was clcarly conjectud. W'e
are Iefr ~,-iththe meagre conclusion that S consisb of some
local haptisrnal creed, of Syro-Palcstinian provenance, into
which the Nicene keywords were somewhat awkwardly interpolatcd. To go beyond this and attempt to identify the underlying formula would be an unprofitable exercise. The drafting
~ommitteewas prohahly left a fairly free hand, subject to tlic

230

THE W E D OF NICAEA

result of its labours proving satisfactory to the body of t h e

counc3, and we have no rneans of <wesingwhat lines they
worked upon. There was a tradidon, rccaIled many years later
by St Basill but in iwelf quite unobjcctionable, that the leading
spirit raponrjble for actuaily writing the creed rvac a Cappadocian priest called Hermogenes, a staIwart opponent of Ariirs
who was destined to become bishop of Caesarea. Even if we
accept it as reliabIc, however, it must rernain an open questan
whether hir achievement was confined rnerely to proposing thc
specificdly anti-Arian cIauses, or whether he also suggested
thc local formula into which they were inserted. In any case,
we may surmise, he and kis coIleagues were much more concerned to bolt the door fimly against Arianism than worried
nbout the Rval clairns of different credal texts.

THE M E A N I Y G XND U S E O F T H E
E

YTCEYE CBEED
r . The Arian Theology

IN the last chapter we were so much taken up with the literary

problem of the Niene creed that we had to leave severa1 other
important questions virtually untouched. In particular, the
theological significance of the creed and the motives, doctrina1
or otherwtse, which lay behind the characteristic terminology
in which it was expressed, deserve rather more extensive
treatment than was tthen possible. TYe shaI1 therefoce in this
chapter attempt to elucidate its crucial clauscs in a way which
will bring out th&r d o p a t i c tendenq. It wi41 also h+ to clear
UQ some cornmon and wiciely prevalent misconceptions if we
devote some attention to the use made of the formula in the
deades fo1Iowing the ecumenicd council. As the principal
aim of those who rnanufactured the creed was to cal1 a halt,
once and for alP, to the Arian heresy, our discussion will have
to be prefaced by a brief account of the heretics' rnain positions.
The reader who desires detailed and authoritative information
should resort to the full-sized bistwies of doctrine or, better
still, to the fundamental documents of the controversy, such
as the surviving fragmen~tsf h ' s own writings.1 The sketch
which is aii that can be proxided here wilZ confine itself to
emphasizing points witk a bearing on the creed.
The outbreak of &e Arian debate is probably to be p l a c d
sornewhere in 318,"when Anus was presiding as priest ovcr
tk
h of Baualis. The broad lines of his sustem, which
w
leI ofdovetailed logic, are not in any doubt. Its kty-

L
I h c ninit conrenient rollrrilon of thme, as v thr haerncnts of ,&teriu$ thc
Sophisi, i\ to br found In G. Rnrrly's R~cherchcs~ t i rmint 1,ucicn d7.4nfrochr, Paris,
1936, azG H. For the documents in grneral, see Opitz. Clrkundm.
Tliis tradirionxl datc, ~ i i s i ~ a roif autumn 323 aq proposcd by E. Schwariz
f.Nnclrrich/. I;ot!. 1905, 297). h a ~hrrn shown still to he h r ~ zupported
i
(cf. H.G.
pirs. <,.h<T.1If.xxxiii, 1934, 131 E.: N. H. Bayncs..7.Y..V.xlix, ~gqH,1 6 5 4 ) .

931

232

THE MEANING AND USE OF THE N I ~ N ECREED

stone was the onviction of the absolute transcendente and

perfection of the Godhcad. God (and it was God the Father
Whom he had in rnjnd) was absolutely ane: there could be no
ether God in the proper sense of the word beside Him. The
carefully drafted prdession of faithl which he sent to bishop
Alexander from Niomedia,2 always recogziized as classlc

authority for his teaching, opened ~ 4 t hthe ernphati words:

"\Ye acknowlcdge one God, Who is alone unbegotten, alone
eternaI, alone wi t hout be~nning,
alone tnie,alone possqsing imrnortality, alone wise, alone good, aloae ruler, alone judge of
all, etc." This God was unengendered, uncreated, from everla9ting to evcrlasting: Hjrnself m-ithout sowce, He was the
soure and origin of whatever ebe epristed. The being, substance, essence (ot:u/a, T I X ~ t v ) of the unique God was
absolutely inco~mmunicable. For God ta communicate His
essence or substanee to another being vould imply that He
was divisiblt and subject to change. 3ioreover, if another being
were to &are the divine natuse in any valid sense, there would
be a pluraIity of divjne Beings, whereas God was by definition
unique. Thus eveything else that existed must have come into
e'ristence hy an act of creation on Ris part, aud must have
been alled into being out of nothing.
The jnescapabIe orollary of this was the drastic subordination of thc Son or Word. God desird ta create the world, and
for this purpose He emplqed an agent or instrurnent. This was
nccessary bccause, as one of the exponents of the Ariao theology,
Astenus the Sophist, prit it,Qthe created order could not bear
the weight of the direct action of the increate and eternd God.
Hence God brought inta existence His Word. But, &t of all,
the Word was a creature, a ~ s t m p aor n-oi~pa,as the Arians
were for ever reiterating, Whom the Father had brought into
existence by His fiat. Tme, He was a perfect creature, and was
not to be compared with the other creatures, but that He was
to be ranged arnong ather derivative and dependent beings
they had no doubt. He war "the fint-begotten of a11 creation",
W. S t Athan., DEsy.i 6 (P.C.26, yd i.) ; Opitz, Urk. 6, n.
W. Ilrelfrr has rcndcred Anui's flight to Nicornedia doubtful (3.T.S. xxxiii,
1936,60 ff.).
a Cf.
Sr Athan., Or. con, Ar, 2 , 1 4 ; sce also De decrrt. Nic. syn. 8 (P.C. 2 6 , 2 0 0 ; q,
437)-

the Pauline text being inserpreted to mean that Ne was included arnong creaton. And, like all orher reatures, He had
been created out of nothing (if O ~ KOwwv). To suggest that
He participated somehow in the essene of the Godhead was,
hinted Arius with a mischievous touch, to Iapse into a sprcies
of Manichaean perversion.
Secondlv, as a creatifre the M'ord must have had a beginning,
only the Father being without beginning (8vapxor). "He carne
into existence before the times and the ages", said Anus in his
letter to Eusebius of 5icornedia2: naturally, because He was
the creator of "the times and the a g e " just as much as of a11
the rest aF the cmtingent order, and so was " begotten outside
time (bXpvws y q 1 7 ~ s ) " . But, continued Arius, "before
He was begotten or created or defined or established, H e was
iiot ".Halaring been created by God, He was neccssarily posterior
to God. Rence the familiar and repeattdly used Atian
* . ,> slosan,
"There was when E e was not ($v ?r071 OTE OGK T V ) . H e n ~ , -_..
too, their exasperated protests against the orthodox counterc ~ ",God fmm everlasting, the Son from everlatinq; the
Father and the Son together alway (ar; Bcr, &i uEr* &a
namjp, GCLntiES)",3 and their rejetion out of hand of the
idca thar the Son could eternally coexist with the Father.
Thirdly, it MIowed from a11 this that the Son couId have no
real knowledqe of His Father. Beinq Himself finite, He could
not cornprehend the i n h i t e God : indeed He had no fulI comprehension of His own being. "The Father", remarked Arius
in a parsage cited 4 by St Athanasius, " remains ineffable to the
Son, and the Word can neither see nar know His Father
perfectly and accuratdy . . but what He knows and sees, He
knows and sees in the same way and with the same measuses
as tve know by our own powers." The same point was rammed
horne on many occasions.5 A fourth conseguence was that the
Son was liable to change and sin ( T ~ E W T S K U ~ aXhorws8r).

'

C t his profesaion of faith cited a h v e . For Lhc Manichaean idta that God was
light, i.e. a material substance, andJcsus Christ a f r a ~ m t naf
t thc divine light, scc
St Aug., C~nfer.3, 7 , 12; 5 , 10,20 P.L. 32,688; 715f.).
In St Epiphan., Paa. Iiae*. 69,6 (Holl 111, 157) ; Opitz, Urk. r .
a Cf. thc letter to Eusebius just cited.
Ep. ad ejisc. Aeg. et Lib. r n (P.C.25, 565).
E:T. St. Athan., Or. con. Ar. r , 6 ; De pn. 1 5 ; St Alrxandtr in Socrates, Hisi.
1,6,(P.G.2 6 , 1 4 ; 708; 67,48).

D*

239

THE REPLY OF THE NICENE CREED

nonsense to talk of God being subjected to necessity if His t 7 e y

nature was to beget. In ansrver to the objection that then the
Father must, since it is natural for fathers so to be, be prior to
the Sou, they had recourse to Oigen's well-horin teafirrig of
the eterna1 generation of the Son by the Fther. The Godhead
had never betn without His 1Vord or His Wisdom: so the
Father had never been other than Father, and had never been
without His Son. The Son and the Father must therefore have
coexisted from aII etemity, the Father eternally begetting the

the binding formulae containd in the Church's creeds should

be expressed in w i r e d language w-as:~lolated.The orthodox
had their answers to a11 these ca1iIs. They would hal-e pseferred
a more Scriptusal term, but they had discovered that every
Scnptura] title or ima- that was put fonvard was immediateiy
G s t e d by rhe Arian rninority to s u i t their orvn purposes. St
Athanasius was later to argue' that, if the word did not appear
in Holy Writ, the meaning it stood for did ( c l KUZ p+ o h w s ;v
~ a t sypa4ais E E ~ V at Aitrrs, &A
+V
GK TWV ypa+Wv Stvo~av
E . X O U ~ ) . As for the Antiochene fathers who had anathernatized Paul's use of the word, they had understood it, he
argued, in a purely materialitic sense.2 He vigorously denied
that the word irnplied that the essene of the Father was
divided, ar that the Son tvas a portion of the Father, on t h t
analogy ofhurnan generatioh. The dicine esscnce was, of course,
indivisible, and as such it must be whoIly possmed by the Son.
As if the Arian theolo_q had not been plaed under a total
ban in the creed itself, the anathemas return to the attack with
senewed vigour and particularization. A1 the phrass singled
out for condemnation are typical Arian catchwords or slogans :
most of them had been repeated again and again by krius
hirnself in his ill-fated Thaiia. To a certain extent they repcat
the analogous anathemas apperided to the profession of
faith published by the council heId at Antioch earlier in the
year. Lhe, first proposition pilloried, "There was when Hc
was not (?v r o r E ;TE OUK $ V } " , pithily urnmed up t h t
Arian derlia1 of the Son's eternity and asserted His posteriority
ti3 the Faither. It I:rops up so frequentlv in the literature of the
--- cunrrovcisy that detailed referentes are unnecessary.3
Arian
Origen, it is worth noticinq, had long ago given the ditect
negative to speculations along t h a e lines, declaring' in so many
words that "there was not when He was not (non tst quando
J4lius non 1rilitufui$)". St Dionyslus of Rome, too, had rernarked,"
Ter if tlIie Son carne into being, then there must have been

Son.
But it was in the fourth characteristic phrase of the creed,
the words OE ONE SUBSTANCE WITH THE FATHER ( d p o o u ~TG
~~
*arp:), that the full weight of the orthodox reply to Arianism
was concentrated. The previous history and use of che word
will be tudied in the next setion, as will the motives for its
seletloa for insertion in the cred. Here it wiU be suficient to
point out that it completely travcrsed the Arian position by
assertjng the full dei. of the Son. T h e son, it irnplied, shared
t he very being or essence of the Father. He was therefore fdIy
divine : whatever belonged to ar characterkzed tht Godhtad
btlonged to and characterized Nim. The word itself, as well
as the idea it contained, had been expliitly repudiated by the
AIlan Ieaders, and it aroused objection in quarters outside the
heretical camp. There were four chief grounds for this hostility
to it, and each of them carried different degrees of weight with
different people. First, there were mny who thought that the
term mwst entail a rnaterialisti onception of the Deity, the
Father and the Son being regarded as parts or separable portions of a concrete substance. Secondly, if the Father and the
Son were taken as bcing of one rubstance, it seemed to many
that Sabellianisrn with ail i& perils must lurk round the comer.
ThirdIy, the semi-Arians made the point at the councii of
Ancyra (358) that the word had already been ondemned by
sound and orthodox bishops at the Antiochene synod (168)
which had dealt with Paul of Samosata. Fourthly (and this
consideration worked upon the minds of many who were far
rtrnoved from Arianism proper), the word consussTANnAL, no
more than the plirase FROM THE SUBSTANCEDF THE FATHER, was
not to be found in HoIy Scripture, and thus the tradition that

- A .

<I

DEd m t . Nic. syn. 11 (P.C. 25, 4533.

Dr v-45 (P.G.2 6 , 772).

Or.mn.Ar.

I,

(28) (Koetschnu, 9gri).

rim$.
In 4SI
:
tlihan., De dc~ret..,V~ir.!iln. zG
I

(P.G.Ij,464).

r,

11;

rq;Dt?)n.

5 (P.G.r+, 849); Dc

240

TAE MEANINC AND USE OF THE NICENE CREED

when Hc was not. But He has been from everlasting (&i Sk jv),
if indeed He is in the Father, as He Hirnselfsays," The second
formula condemned, "Before He was begotten He was not
( 4 v y B r y @ ~OUK
~ +v)
i~ not much more than another
rnethod of expsming the thought contztined in the first. -4tius
had used it in his letterl to St Alexander, and aqain in his
Ietter 2 to Eusebius ofXicomedia.Judged tq-orthodox standardr,
its error lay in coneiking of the Father's generation of tht Son
as a temporaI act, or at least as an act which had had a beginning at a particular point in erernity. The orthodox view
aar that represurted by Origm in his ninth Homily on Jeremiah that the Fathcr for ever begets the San. Eusebius, it may
be pointed out, seemo to have been guilty of a curious (and, we
may be sure, wiEul) misunderstanding of the intention of the
creed. In recounting his attitude to the anathemas. he savs that
he had no objection to this one, for everyone was agrecd that
the Son
- - of God existed prior to the ieshly generatian. Xn other
words,
- - he was taking " begotten" in the-sense, never heard of
in the contrwersy, of Christ's historical birth, In the next
paragraph he recalls that Canstantine himself, when explaining
thc anathemas, had urged the point that the Father, as changeless God, must always have been Father, and that the Son must
therefore be conccived as havjng cxisted "porentially (6wdpcr) "
and " without generation i&EYVj7~s)" w i h the Father before
Hc began to erist "achlally (ivpyr&)". This was an ingenious
atttrnpt to get mund the Xicene teaching, which was that rhe
Son had been really begotten from all eternity and had always
existed in the M e s t sene as Son.
T h t remaining anathemas c a q on the same theme.. "He
carne into existente out of nothing (2f WK wwv i y i v n o ) "
needs no special comment after a11 that has already been raid.
A genetatson later the banned phrase became the wntchword
of the Anomoean p a e , who in consequence werc d u b b d
" Exoukontians "-4
Thc words "Of another hypostasin or
substance (2f :ripas h o i m o ~ w rjs oiioas) are more importam,
'I,

jJ

In S i Athan., De 9.r6 (P.G.26,709)~Cf.Opitz, Urk. 6 .

In S t Epiph., Pm.haer. 69, 6 (H011111, 157).Cf. Qpitz, Urk. I .
a Hom. in Icrm. g, 4 (Klostemann 111, 70).
Cf. St. Athan., De svn. 3r (P.G, 26, 749); Sacrates, Hisl. CCGI. 2, 45 (P.G. 67,

360).

THE REPLY OF THE NICENE CREED

24 1

noi so much for their doctrine (they rnereIy re-echa thei

Alian clich that the Son was not af the Father' suhstance},
but hecause they show the tcms h3posbasis and ousia employed
as qiaivalents. The history of the relation of these mo kcywords can hardly be set forth afresh here. It will be enough to
remind the seader that, while their separate application weit
settltd at the synud of Alexandria (3621, their onfusion prior
to that had k e n a sousce of cndless trouble. Afier 362 the
meaning assigned to hyposiaris in r e g r d to the Trinity was
"penon" : its role was te stress the inditiduality of eah of the
three males or f m in which the dix-ine essence existtd.
Ousia was reserved for the divine essence or substane itself,
the very being of the Godhead. Earlier the etpology o f @os t a k (i;$~rrrvat="lierinder ") had made it susceptihle of the
meaning "substratum", and so it had approximated to ousia.
Origen had ttempted to discriminate between them along the
lines which were later adopted, but without success. In the
controversy between St Dianysiris of Rome and St Dionysius of
Alexandria, one of the chief causes of misunderstanding had
been uncertainty as to the precise sense in which the terms
wert being used. The Pope, for exarnple, suspected his Alexandrian namesake of virtual tritheism when he-spoke of "thsee
hyposfmt~~',while his own prefcrene for " one nuria" must
have 1ooked like SabeIFianisrn to the bishop. At the time of the
owncil of Nkaea &e West, Egypt and the orthodox party wese
inclined to i d e n w the terms, describing God as one a u i a or
onc Iiypostac*s indifferently.1 St Athanasius maintained this usage
until t he end of his fife, and Tn bis E$. od Afros episcofios, written
probably in 369, remarked,? "Hypostasis is ouno, nrrd means
nothing ehe than 'being'." But in the East generallu about this
time the rneaning "individual existent" or " person" for
Iiyposhis was the current one. We saw that Eusebius himself,
in the profession of faith which he submitted to the council,
tactfully avoided the formula rpds h o m u c i s (three hupostases), but it was the one he noimally employed and which
expressed bis theology. The treatment of the two terms as
having the same meaning was, therefore, another token of thr:
1
2

Cf. St Athan., Tom. adAnt. 6 (P.G.26, 803f.).

E#.ad Afr. 4 (P,G.
26, 1036).

brushed aside 1 the insinuation that the Son was a "consubstantial portion (pFpos o*p~ov'~aov)
" oF the Father : it seemed
to him, as many contexts show, to imply a division of substance. Eusebius of Nicomedia was envisaghg precisely the
same idea when, in his letter to P a h u s of Tyre,: he angrily
exclairned that they had Rever heard of two ingenerate beings
(dyV.ra) nos of one divided into two or ssubjected to any
bodiIy experiente. That many more than the out-and-out
Arians took this i'iew of Iiomoousios is clear h m the fact that,
according to Eusebius's famous letter, Constantine felt it necess.
to explain that the word arried no qnasi-physical implications and must not be taken as suggesting anv division or
severance from t he Father's substance.
A most ifluminating: ilfustration of yet another current interpretation of Aomoousios was prorided by the afF& of the t ~ v o
Dionysii in thc 'sixties of the third century.3 Bishop Dionysius
of Alexandria, it will be recalled, had b e m put to much trouble
bv an outbreak of Sabellianism in the Libyan Pentapolis. 'll'hcn
he took forccful rneasures to eradicate it, the Ieaders of the dissident group made a formal complaint to the Rornan pontiff,
alleging arnong other things that the bishop of Alexandria declined to say that the Son was hotnooruio~ wth Gd."Dionysius,
it appears, tvas a keen protagonist of the Origenist theolo-qu.
There is Iittle doubt that the Sabellian stood for that ancient
and, in popular circIes at any rate, widely established brand of
Monarchianism whih regarded Jesus Chnst as she earthIy
rnanifcstation of the divine Being. To them the Ongenist
appzoach, with its dis tinction oF the three hypostases and its
tendency to subordinate the Son, was anathema. When they
appealed to hornoou~iosas theit watchword, they meant by it
that the being or substance of the Son was identical with that
of the Father. The way in whih they invoked hornoowios in
their complaint to the Pepe is thus highiy significant. 11 suggests, first, that it was already becoming in certain circles a
Sce his Icttcr to St Alexander i n 5t Athan.,

Urk. 6.

Dt syn. 16 (P.G.26, 709) : Opitz,

Theodoret, Ifiixi. PCCI. 1, 6 (Parmcntier, 2 8 ) : Opitz, Urk. 8.

The mwt cnnvenitnt ditien oF ihe corrcapondence is that o f C. L. Fcltoc
(Cambridge, 1904). My whrences arc to it.
' See Feltm, i RO.
a In

technical term to describe the relation of the Father and the

Son, and, seondly, that they expected it would be recognized
and approved at Rome. It is equally significant that St Dionysius abstained from pressing the necessity of using it upon his
narnesake. His formal reply 1 condemned the views reported to
him, in particular &e separation o f the divine Being inte "three
powers and unrelated hypostases and three divinities ", and
took a rnarkedly hfonarhian line. St Dionysius of Alexandria
made an extrernely skilful defence of himself. W'hile maintaining
a11 the essentials of t h e Oriyenist position, he esplained that he
had not used homoousios because it was not a ScripturaI word,
but haci reallu intended the doctsine it enshrined. To prove
this he claimed that he had produced as illustrations of the
relation of the Father and the Son such irnages a5 the reIation of
patent to child, of seed to plant, and of the well to the stream
which flow-s from it, all these being examples of entities .iv'hih
were 'bftthe same nature (dpSLoyn.ij)
". Of course, this was quite
a different exege& of hrnoouios than the Sabellians wanted,
and a quite different one too from what the Pope may have had
in rnnd. TVe are back again at the generic meaning of the word
favoured by Origen and the Valentinian Gnostics before him.
It js possible that St Dionysius of Nexandria prwed tao subtle
and expert a dlalectician for h i ~Rornan brother, and that his
profession ofw-illtigness to accept the formula counted for more
than his carefully argued exposition of Trinitarian dotrine.
The next occasion on wkich the t e m cropped up rvas, apparently, at the synod of Antioch in 268 whih condemned
Paul d Samosata. Though there is no recard in the surviving
docurnents reIating to the council, and though the tvhole
episode was completeIy lost sight of untiI the Serni-Arians
dragged it out of obscurity at the council o Ancyra (358),it
seerns certain that Paul's application of thc description Fromoousios to the relation of the Father and the Son was condemned
by his judges. The question whih faces us is what he can have
meant by it.2 Some modern scholars,3 basing themselves on
"cc

Fcltoc, I 77 ff.

a The most satisfactory treatrnent o t this diEcuIt. gucstion is by G. Bardy, Paul

& Samomte, 2nd ed., Lauvain, rgzg, 333 ff.
E.g. G. L. Prestige in God in Putrtstic Thouxhl, Lnndnn, 2nd cd. 19.52, Ch. X (a

rnmt valuble chapter).

T H E HOMOOUSfON

Another valuable link in t h e chain of evidence is provided

by a story told by the historian PhlIostorgius 1 to the effect that

Ossius and S t Alexander reached an understanding together in

Njcomedia, before the council, on the use of the very term
komomios. The fact that Arius repndiazed it so forcefully in hjs
letter to St Alexander might be read as an indication of his
awareness that his bishop's mind uvas veering in its direction.
The courre of events thus adumbrated would suggest a wider,
more complex bakgraund for the fomulation of the creed
than those who regard it as rnerely a unifying device of rhe
emperor's are prepared to admit. F. Loofs Qsharply crjticized
Philostargius's report on the ground that St Alexander, to judge
by his cncyclical letter3 and his lettcr 4 to Alexander of Byzantium, had pitched his tent in thc moderate Origenist camp.
The thcology he there expounded, Loofs arg-ued, ivas markedly
Origenist in compleon, with its shess on the eterna1 generation of the Son, its predilection for "like in a11 things", and its
insistente that Father and Son were two hypostases. But it is
rnisleading to place this c~clusiveernphasis on one anpect of
S t Alexander's thought, which nas sery far from being a
lopicdy coherent rystem. Side by side with the Ongcnist
strain thert was a strong, not always cEear1y worked out, conviction of the inseparable unity forrned by Father and Son. This
carne to Ught in such statements as that the Father could not
be conceived to have ever heen without His Word and His
Wisdorn (Woyos roi d o s ) , 5 tthat the San (cf. 3. 10, 15)
had a perfect knowledqe of the Father6 and was His perfect
Image,e that thc Father and the Son were two inseparabk
beings between Whom no inten~alcould be thought (&ArL\jlwv
dxdpcosa np&yparu ~ o ) , and that the Son, if not (r +js
odulas 5-00 r n ~ ~ d was
s , $6 ahoC 705 OWO ~ a r ~ d g . With
6
ideas
Iike t h a e in his head,' and with his spccial knowledge of
the way the Arians reacted to the daim that the Son was
C

HLrt. C&.

1,

(Bidn. 8 f.1.

~ h o u i hnot dto&ther sympathctic to St Akxander, Harnack bmuqht out

h i teachinq
~
in Lrhrbrrrh I r Dogmnier~cAithtr,gih td., 11, ? n j R:

iht c s s m t i a l s of

253

honioorrsios with the Father, we can readily perceive that the

way was clear For an agreernent between Ossius and the bishop
of Xlexandria.
Shroiided as they are in obscurity, it is irnpossible riow to
pick one's wa): with any confidente through the deliberations
of the council. One thing which may be regarded as fairly
escablished, however, is that the preciJe trTay in rvhich thc
homoousian formula was to be used had not been finallu determined in advance by the personages who ,guided the proceedings. This is borne out by the strong tradition, which St Athanasius recalls,l and which is in itself most probabIe, that the
original intention was to frame a definition in language
bomwed from Sripture. This was only ahandoned when it
was seen that e v q conceivable text or biblical turn of phrase
could bt ingeniously distorted l ~ ythe Arians to look like
evidence in support of their speculations. St Ambrose tells a
story,2 which lias already been cited, that Eusebius of Nicomedia was himself responsible for throwing the word hornoowios
into the debates. Re goes on to say that "when his Ietter had
been read out, the fathers inserted this w r d into theis definition
of faith because they obsewed rhat it stmck terror into thtir
a&-ersaries' hearts. They thought it an excellent idta to sever
the head of the foul heresy with the l7e.erysword which zhey had
themselves unsheathed." Loofs thought3 this a "feeble hook'bon
which to hang such a mornentous happening, but there is nothing Intrinsically unlikely in the reminiscence, although St
Ambrose may hare been gir?ng a rnther generalized account af
what took place. Ossius and his confederates mau welI havt
judged that the enemy was playing into their hands, and that a
handle had been given them, at the opportune moment, tu
spring the prearranged m r d on the assernbly. After the
blasphernies of Eusebius of Kicomedia, the atrnosphere wa3
hound to be more favonrable than they had dared hope. And
the emperor had been won over to be their rnouthpiece.
Thus the different partie present at tbe ecumenical council
understood its creed in very different ways. For Constantine:
himself the theological issue was neither here nor there: ht
Sce abovc, p. 2 13.
a Ft~fg&, 80.

D r j d . 3J 1 5 , 125 (P.L.16, 61.1).

in substance ". A11 these fomulae were Iater to be brande$ as

Arian or Semi-Anan in their bias. Yet at this stage St Athanasius apparentIy preferred to ernploy them, and consciously
(it must have been consiousIy) kept himself dear of homooirrios.
I t was oniy in rhe early 'fifties, when he w m t e the De scntmtio
Dionysii and the De dmelis dVit~~nae
gnodi, that he carne out
into the open as the charnpion of the Nicene fomulae.
To be linked with these two points is a third, the extraordinary ignorance about the docurnents of the Arian controversy which apparently prevailed for many years in the West.L
It is interesting to note that the Western chnrches had no firsthand knowledge of the principal texts expounding the Arian
position-such texts as the letters of Arius nd the letter of
Emebius of Nicomedia-until Iittle short ofa quarter of a entury
after the coundl of Nicaea. The year 355 kpprobably the earliest
date to ~vhichthe publication of the first Latin translations can
be ascribed. Even more remarkable, however, is she fact that the
comesponding orthodox docurnents were equally slow in coming
to the notice of Western churchmen. Ko doubt there was a
general Imowledge :ef what had taken pIace at Xicaea, and of
course the papal chancdiery, and probably the archives of
other great sees too, possessed authentic copies of the creed and
the canons in Grcek with Latin translations. But it was St
Hilary of Poitiers who abolished the blackout and introduced
the West generally to the crucial ttxts of the Arian controversy.
Even before his exile in 356 he had published some : in his De
synodis, addressed in 359 to the bishops of Gerrnany, Gaul and
Britain, he carried on the good work. But the reaI measure of
the ignorance in which the Western churches were s t U enveloped is disdosed by a confession whiiich he made in his DL
synodis2 regaxding his orvn acquaintancewith the Xicene symbo1.
"Though I had been baptized ", he remarked, ''some time
previously and had been a bishop quite a while, I did not hear
of the Ticene creed untl X was about to set forth to exile Vdem
Nicaenam mnnguam nisi emabirms audiai)." Yet, as a modern
schoIar 3 has aptly commented, " Poitier was not at this time
Cf. G . Bardy, L'occident ct Ies

sRaic.5~reiigiwses KX, I 940, 28 R:

' D ~ s s y n . gr (P,L.ro, 545).

donimnats

' An exccllmt txample or a book writteu o11 thne linrs is H. Lietzrnann's

L ia wntrovarm aricm, in fim d a

a G. Bardy, art. n't. adfln,

a town lost in the depths of a desert aad iniiccessible to sounds

from outside."
We have here a body of, at first sight, star&ng facts whill
suggest that the status of the Xicene creed was very different in
the genesation or so foIlowing the counil from what many have
been brought up to believe. One is perhaps tcrnpted to sympathize with the somewhat radical solution of the probIem provided by that school of historiansl which treats the Kicencs
symbol as a purely political formula representative of no strain
-C thought in the Church but irnposed on the various wrangling
boups as a badge of union. If this reconstruction of the situa3n is accepted, d1 the awkward facts seem to fall at once into
,_ae. St. Athanasius's reticence about the homoousion ceases
to be at all mysterious once it is agreed tliat, so far from being
one of the instigators ofits adoption at tlie council, he was still
at an Origenist phase of his theologicd developrnent,%attaclied
to the doctrine o'three hypostases and highly suspicious of the
ernperor's chosen term. The apparent disregard for the council
and its work beomes expffcable in the light oT she realization
that it was not conceived as having presrikd a positive
theology, but rnerely as having passed sentence on Arianism
in its original fom nd as having atternpted to restore unity in
'ie divided Church. Just as there were no Nicene theologians,
iere were no anti-Nicene theologians: a11 were united in
:kriowledging its achievemcnt in the sense described.
There are certainly valuable and true features in this bold
.ternpt to elucidate the course of event, but it Is marrd by
ie determination to make the piture altogether too clear-cut.
,he insistence on eliminating the Nicene group of theologians,
and particularly St .4thana~isius,is its most disastrous weakness.
Far too much has been made in certain quarters of his abstention from using the term hmnoausios, as of the alieged drastic
development of his theology wliich is associated with it. As
stated by Loois, the theory depended, it may be pointed out
in passing, on his being abte to assign the three Oraliunes cnnlra
Arianos to an extremely early date, 338 or 339 : only so was he

TII Berlin, I 938).

L a i 6 in Rcaletigkl, I, zoa T.

Gerrhichic &r altcn Kircht,

So F.

THE AGE OP SYNODAL CREEDS

264
with something more approaclijnq precison, the varying position of ?
in the
i eyes of the contendinq g~oups.
The firt creeds tvhich it falls to us to investiyate are the
four tsaditionaIly associated tr-ith the Dedication Council held
at Antioh in the surnmer oF 34 I . I Sinety-seven bishops, all
Eartern and all adherents of the Eusebian way of thinling,
met in conclave at this synod, and the emperor Constantius
imitated the precedent set by his fther by being present in
person.=The imrnediate and ostensible object of the gathering
was to celebrate th: dedication (hence the Greek titlc of the
council, 4
r o l 9 2 y ~ a t v l o c s ) of the golden church founded
ten years previously by Constaniine and now brought to
completion by his son. In fact, the ecclesiastica1 eremony
prmed to be no more than a convcnient pretext, and the real
motives at work ufcre not long in disclosing thernselt-es. St
Athanasius, w e ma? recai& had been deposed by the council
of Tyre (335), and Marcelius of Anq-ra by the councit of
ConstantinopIe (336). On the death of Constantine both had
been pennitted to return to their episcopal thrones, but the
Eusebians had taken speedy steps to extnide &em oncc more.
They had taken refuge in Rome, and the synod convoked by
Pope Julius I in the spring af 3413 had pronounced them
guildess and readmitted them to comrnunion. One of the chief
concerns of the Declication Council was obviously to present
a united front to tliis Western insult, and to reply t o tlie Tetter,4
fuli of rernonstrahccs and accusations, which Pope Julius had
sent announcing the Roman decision. But doctrinal issues
carne to the fore as well. Eusebius and his friends had eviden.
been cut to the quick by St Athanasius's reiterated
charges t h a t they were ~iriuallyhrians and by the Pope'r
insinuation, put forward at S t -4thanaoiusys instigntion, that
they were beinq dislqal to Kicaea. Hene arnonx the first
measures of the counciI (the exat order of events cannot be
reconstructed) was the prornulgation of a solernn staternent
protatinp that thcy were not Arian ("How, bcing bishops,
In my discussion nT this council 1 rely, as must all students, on E. Schwanz's
mast~rlystudy ofit in <tir Ge~chichtades Aihnnasitu IX (Jllach~icht.Gbi!. 191I , 46, ff.).
= so st ~ t h m .nc
, syn. r5(P.G. 26, 725).
T h e date is Schwartx'c, : the one more usuilly givcn is 340.
For the leiter, sce St Athan., A@l. con. Ar. 21-35 (P.G.ng, 251-p8).

should we foIlow a priest ? "1, and that, so ar from taking him

as their teacher, they had only ieceivdl Arius back into communion dter rigorouslp testing his orthodaxy. To cIlnch t h i s
they appended a recd,' which opened: "For we have been
taught from the beginning
T o h I i c v ~in onc W, thc C d of
the univmc, the crcatm and pthFwv&v
+C
-q3o+~.
\+der of ali t h i i g intelligibje and
perceptiblc ;
Rui rk &a uL8v m9 B ~ o i ipowyEYjj, vp& h d in one only-begotten Sou of
God, bcfore a11 agea subsisting and
&wuv a i h w h+Xovrrr
ai d w a
TG y ~ y w q u radrv
~
n a ~ p i ,8 ~ 0' 5 7d
mexistiRp with the Father Who
?rrra Z y i v e o , 78 +C ciPard xa1 d
begat Him, through Whom xll
&&ma, &v KU; &" x^^^ +pep&
things carne into being, t h i i s visible
K ~ T 'd o u ; a v ro t r n ~ ~ ~r a d @ & r a
and invisiblc, Who in thc last days,
rccording to the Father's good
pl-c,
camc down and was incamate d the Vi-,
and fdhilcd
a11 HL Fatha's will, mEwcd and
w-as saisad agalo, and asctndcd to
heavcn, and sits on tht Fatha's
nght hand, and will come again to
judgc liiing and dcad, and abidn
&g and G d for thc w ;
LVe kliew also in ~ h Holy
t
SpLit.
h d if somcthing must k addcd, wc
k l i w e also concming the resumetion of thc flcsh nnd life werlastirig."

E<&a

Bev, r D v rGi. &i Bdv, rrtmrti,,

.r& d v r w v vgriiv rr u d d+Gv

St Athanasius, who quoted this creed along with the other

cretds of the Dedication Counil in his De synodis, hserted
the ungenerous innuendo that they were proof of the "Arians' "
passion for novelty and their general indecision. But there is
r e d y nothing to show tliat this, the so-called First Creed of
,htioch, was formulated as an officil confession of the counil
at all. The protest about their not behg Arians with wliich
the
- - bishops prefaced it suggests, eveu in the Fragmentar). fom
~tAthanasius's citation, that it was In fact sirnply an extract
n the apdogetic letter rvhich the council prepared as an
wer to Pope Jdius. As it stands the formula cantains
nothing particularIy striking. In pattern and substance it is a
creed of the recognizable Eastern type, and is no doubt a
baptisrnal form modified t o suit the requirements of the
St Athan., Ds sp.az (P.G. 26, 720 L).
9*

266

THE AGE OF SYNODAL CREEDS

council. J. F. BetIiune-Baker
misleading irnpression
of it when hc said 1 F
t lat "it t
anizing ' not only in its
avoidance of any ex pression
Arians cnuld not have
accepted, but also in
~nationof ONLP-BEGOTTEN and
in its marked attrihuti on of the work of the Incarnate Son to
the good pleasure and purpose of che Father ". The term homo"
orisios, adrnittedly, does not reature
in ia, and to this extcnt it
silently evades the full Kiccne theology. But ,4 xianisrn in the
proper sense of the n-ord is delibera tely sul43d O U t 13y the
--J
-affirrnation that the Son existed before a- 1i3 r a g a *riu
coexisted
R-ith the Fathier. ,4t thie same *time the bishopc seized the opportunity to rnake a !
. h t at ti-ieir much-hated oe
1larcelIus of i~ncyra,agaimt whom the statement about the
Son's everlasting kingdom and divinity \+-asai
was a
characteristfc article in his e a c h i n g a h a t C1
rdship
must one day he terminateci, as St Pad hirnself st-riiea ro impl y
when he said ( r Cor. r j, 25j, "For He must reign until He set
ali His cnemies under His feet." Thus the dil-ine llonad, which
in the historical reveIation had unfolded ItseIf successiveIy so
as to form a triad, ivi
retum, 1by an ordered
res-ersaI of the proess,
tity, and God would be
all in aI1. M a n y creeds
occasion to observe,
stamp A~iarcellus'sdoctrine as hcretical by asserting thc unending reic? o f the Son.
There is another formula^^ which, dapite being mideadindy
called thc Third Creed of h t i o c h , ha reaily na title to be an
official staternent of faiith promiulgated by &e r:ouricil. So far
from ernanating from thc asseinbly itself, it .tvsis the forrnula
.
:
which a certain bislio]-. TI...-- ~hroniusof Tyarra,
in r
dappadocta, thought it pru
deposit with his colleagues.
Possibly he had been i
I of heresy, and was conscious
of the desirability of dearing iiimself. 5Iis creed3 opened rrith
an unusually solemn adjuration , "God knows, Whom I cal1 to
witness t o rny soul, thar thus I b elieve :
-ln God
- . .
E/s6t0i na.rdPa x a v r o ~ ~ d r ~ 7v
p a , rtv
the Father almiphty,the meator
,

Awv m i a ~ vua:

ndvra.

i< T A

T O L ~ T ~ ~ V ,0 5

1 ~ 7

THE DEDICATION COUNCXL

and maker of the universe, from

Whorn are a11 thigs;

Earfy IiisUiy of Clirisiion docarit~e,5th ed., London, 1933, 172.

Cf. Frafig. 1 1 I ff: i11 Klosicrmann's appendix to his Eusebius IV,200 ff.
See S t Ailisii., Be vil. 24: (P.G. 2 6 , 724 f.).

Kd ir

And in
&v &Av aVroc rv powyn;F, Bev
ai uoqliav, ~ d v~ U ~ r o v divine

I b y o v , SJvapu

Hii only-begotten Son, the

M'ord, Powcr and Widom,

our Lord J

~ U Christ,
J
throughwhom
are all things, Wlio w~ bqottcn
aidvwv. BrOv k v ir Oroti T ~ F ~ U , fmm thc Pather btfort the ages,
rol dwtr
r& 8c&
Vnomdoct,
~ d m Gt d frorn pcrfcct God, and
i*"
<G+~WY
8; ~ T iV p e f i v ~ ( a B b w a
Whn mists as a prrson wiih God.
~ a ymrilOtma
l
iic
~
&
uw m &
ancl in thc laat dayi came down and
72s ypa#&t, &d&vm,
m8vra
was born fmm thc Yirgn accordin
wir; Qwm&a
d&
~ ~ p l I(&
~ ,
to the S a i p t w , kcarnc man,
&dEBvra
mM c i ~ p ~ o & ,ai im@rrrsuffrrd and r w c again tmm tlie
8iwu i r c 6 c ( i v mi7 nmp0r ai-&, K&
dcad, and asccnded te hcavcn, and
n&
ipSwv p - 6 S&rrtai B+wr
sat down on th right hand of Mis
x p h u 5L;nns H& YEX~OW,ai p i m ~ ~Fathcr,
~
and will a p i n come with
glory and power to judgc ti~ngand
<;E s
k aiGviis.
dcad, a& abidcs for thc agts ;
And in tht Holy pirit, thc ParacItic,
K& r:g & m U p T Pv, TY n+*l\'lthe Spirit of qruth, \I%ich God
TO,,
+d m&pa +r &$kar, 6 rc&
throuqh the prophct pnimispd to
&A TU; rr++ov
InmtSam $E&
p u r out upon His wrvanu and the
I q i c w M r o k J-G
h 6 . b ~
=a; 6
h r d p r o m i d to scnd to H disA p t o s i-rL4n & h -roi* I a m ; - :
cipla, ll'hich also Hc scnt, a~ thc
,a&pis, D xai ~ ~ c &c rr; ,ir&rrp
.4cts d thc :\psiln tatiry.
s&v d-DXum
papn*p,Cm.
But if a w n t tcaclics ar holds in hi$
ffi &;6i
-@ m;nfY r+ m * m Mmi
k r t anything oihcr than this iaith,
& &w@, W E ~
Z-, U t. ~d
?
let him bc anathcma . - of MarMW&v
TO;
' A y n h r , $ ZaBd3.;ii*,
ccllua of :tih.r;i, or of Sabdlius, or
i l a d h v m &p~crm;os, ,d&hPa
of Paul of Sammata, Icr lioth him
ZUTW ~ o a&
i&
K&
.&.rrr ol iriirand a11 who r h a r t with him bc
wM-ms &(;i.
ar~ithema."
+&V

T&Y

'ITmW XPimu, 61*OQ +i ri-,

yt-wq8eh-a

TO; ?mip&

xp& T&

This creed apparendy satsfied the company, and all the

bishops subscribed it. kike tthe first one, it plainIy reptesents
a rernodelled baptisrnal onfession, although t he alteratiions and
interpolations are probably far more nurnerous in this case.
Perhaps this is what St Athanasius had in mind when he said'
that the formula was the cornposition of Theophronius hirnself.
It is chiefly noteworthy for it strong insistente that the Son
is a hypostasis, and therefore, presumably, not a mete functioii
of the Father. Both Paul of Samosata and Marcellus had demed
this, and therefore are anathernatized at the end along with
Sabellius. The words AND ABIDES FOR THE AGES applied to
Christ reigning in glory represent another cut at Marcellus.
It ws his teaching, it would seem, that the council viewed
with particular apprehmsion. It is likcly that thc cloud under

268

THE AGE OF SYNODAL CREEDS

THE QEDECATM31V COUNCIL

~vl-liichTheophronim stmd w*asbecause of his sup]posed Ieatnings

in that direcsion. The bihops probablv wecorned the oFP"rtunity of signing the disclainer containe:d in the creed, a.nd of
thereby putting their disapproval of Marcellus on record once
more.
The o d l - official statement of faith ratified by the Dediation
Council in its own name was the so-called Second Creed of
Antioch.' According to S t Athanasius's not wholly unprejudiced
account, the bishops had repented of, ar changed tlieir minds
about, their enrlicr definition ( p c m y v m ~ s&T t T O ~ FT P O T ~ ~ O L ) .
St Hilary gave thc story a differcnt, and more credible, twist
by saying that the suspected heresy of one of their number
prornpted the composition of the creed (cum in sus~icionem
i~cnissetunus ex ~pistuptjquod p a r a ~scnlired). If this j
t, the
gurlty man may wel1 Irave been Theophronus
a, for
~ h emain tcndency of she creed is antiSabeiiian anci antiSIareHan. It is a long, rambIinq docurnent, having as a basis
a typical Eastern baptismal confession greatiy expanded ~4th
biblical phrastses oF theologial import and teminating in a
group oF anathemas. There is an ancient tradition that the
creed of Lucian of rlntioch underlies this formula, and the
possibility that it has some link with him annot be dismissed.2 Our creed runs :

6TCuovWv~cum; not7+v
ifo 6 r i rvra.

rai rpvom'v.

liai CIF &a AKfjp(ov'I~aovXpxpro~~,I&

~l:&r, &t
76" pot.OYFy &&v, SL' 06 -ri
d w a , r v yrwil8itro np6 r& dww
ro narps, Priiv & O~ro,ZAov 3 &L.,

Agrceabiy witli Lhe evangelic and

apostolic t'raditin wc beliwc Ls one
G d t h Father almighty, thecreator
and rnaker and provider of the
unirrcrsc, from 12-hom are all thirigs;
.Lnd in one h r d Jesus Christ, His Son,
only-kyotten God, throuqh 1I"hom
arc all things, IVho was kgoiien

bcrore the ages from the Fatlier, G&

fmm &c?, whoIe from wlio2e, wle
@arnXla<K fiouhjWr,
O& inrp~ot;
Srom d e . perfect from perfcct, K&
A+v
<&ma, d i a v 5c;Qav.
.L$from King, Lord from b r d , liring
811,,,Gv, d j d ~ r a s%
. i & m u wzarpim.
,
Il'ord, Iiving \Vidom, truc Light,
@irpai; rp~rr8r.rr irai ~ P ~ M o L3 j ~3 ~ I : \\ay, Truth, Rcsurrcction, ShepBr6qrw QUULQ~ +e ~ a Bouhjr
;
xoi
had, Doar, unalterablc and unS w L ~ w rrtd S b r m na+pdr &machnngable, exact Xmage of the Godp M ~ m o vrlnva, +;v rpwr+omv r q s
htad, substance, will, v e r and
@LPV

~IPV,

~;.!cwI'

K
:

T&OL*,

VccStAthan.,Dcsyn, 23 (PbG.26,721 R.); StHii.,Dcsyn. 29 (P.L. ro,502 e.).

For a full discussion, sec G. Bardy, R~chcrclrcssur saint Lucisn d'Antiochc, Paris,
'.936,05 ff.

26g

plory of tht Fatbcr, tht kt-kgottrn

of a11 m t i o n , fVho w a s in the h*
g k y w:h Gd, C*od the {Ord
accordinq to what was said in thc
~ospel,' Xnd thc \\Ord H-s C 4 ',
throuyh IVliom ali t b g s -e
intu
king and in \+.horn a11 t h g s cansist, \$%o in ihc 1st da:% camc down
mm abor-c, and was bom from a
Virgin accordinq to xhe Scripturcs,
and btcamc rnan, mtdiator of Gad
and men, and Apo~tleof our faliirli,
and Princc of lifc, as He says, 'l
carne dowii From heaven, not to do
my own will biit thc will of Hirn Wlio
senr me', Who auffcred for us, and
rosc agan on thc third day and ascendcd to hcavcn, and sat d o m nn
ihc Fatber's right hand. and will
come a g i n with g 1 0 ~
and powcr to
j u d v Iivinq and dcad;
And n &e Holy Spirit, I\'ha is giwn
to be1ism f.ir camfort and sanctic a ~ o nand initiation. as ako our
Lord Jrsus Chnsr cnjoined His disciplts, sayinq, 'h,
tcach alI natinm.
baptizkg thcm in thc namc of the
Father and o rhc Son and nT the
Holy Spirit', i.c. of a Fathtr M'lio
iu truly Fatlim, and a Son M'ho i s
truly Son, and of tlie Holy Spirit
Wha is truly Woly Spirit, the narntil
not being ~ i v e nwithaut meaning ar
effect, but dtnoting accurately thr
peculiar suhistcnce, rank and glory
nf cach that ir named, so that thcy
are threc in ~ u b i s t t r e ,and ont in
a - m e n t.
T a h p oi5. +mrr n j v n:orrv, ira; i( Holding then this faith, and holding ir
fmm the M i n n i n g ro the end. Yi thc
-r
* a ; p i X p +<%v5 +WCS.
*wf.
sight oTGod and oFChristn,c anathc-roV BcoC na; roV Xjxnrit ~urir
a:pr+i*?i'
matize i-try hcrctical hctcrdoxy.
rrli&!;ai.
6vrn8cp~;opn.. *a; f i rir
And if anyonc trachts contrary to tlic
=+i 4, &I+7;. yp&
Q@+r
4miv
wwnd and right faith of the Srrp
S i G 0 ~ 1hiyw
,
i x & ~ v $racp9v ja:Gm
m, that time or season m apr:
4 c l v u r 4 yvyci&i -6 mV ?O-either is or has bcen before the gmci
@vai. &v L,:&,
dd8rpa Zmw. KU; <:
ation of tIic Snn,let him be anathernrr.
+L< A+t
7 8 u vv uriwpa &r ir r&
Or if anyone iay that the Son is a
rswprwv ? y i v q u a &s ;v r& yyrvY&TWY
4 n o l ~ p aAs r& noc~pritwv, creahirc as ont of the creaturtn, or
an oTupring as one of the offsprings,
ai fi? &r a i B c L ~ Lypa$at anpa8&w~riv
or a werk as onc of tht works, and
TWV X ~ O ~ L ~ ~ ~; Z
KY
U W
~ W
Y6 6 ;,emu,
not as the divine Scriphavc
j r l TL PMo 8t8unrr rj &ayycA;(rrar

* 7O

THE AOE OF SYNODAL CIE.EDS

nnp' u" naptA,!?oCcev, B i e t g Zww.

~
$pc;s
yip r i v i *o?< da r&w BeEwv y p $ r j v
~ci~Sco~&m
6nd
s

& ~ m d h&Air&v&
~ v

TC

+e

npa+tir

ai

K U ~i p q 3 8 f i ~ n i

mmfiopw x a ; droAov80Gpcu.

handd down the aforcsaid articics

one aftet aaother, or if he teachcs
or p r e a ~ h etmidcs
~
what we havc
remived, let him be anathema. For
a11 that has b m n handd down in
thc d i h c Scriptums, whcthct by

THE DEDICATION COUMCIL

pmpheb or a p t l u , we do tmly
and revcmtly beliwe and ioIIow.

This formula, the authentic creed of the council, is remarkable for the light it throws on urrent controversies as well as
on the general theoIogical position for which the Eusebian
parpr was fighting. The intensely Scriptural tone is unmistakable. Not onlly is its doctrine expressed as far as possible by
extracts from the Bible, but the sipatofies tbemselves clairn
biblical authority for their teaching and osmize aZI who
praurne to deviate from the n a m w Scriptural path. Arianism
proper is exduded, and the creed piles up descriptions 05 the
SOIIas WALTEMBLE ASD ~ C H A K G E A B L Eand m o WAS m m
B E G ~ wmr
G
GOD, as well as putting a ban on sweral Arian
domines in the concluding section of the anathemas. Z t will
be recailed, however, that Arius had had a sense of his own
whih he was prepard to put upon U N A L T E ~ L EAKD UNCHAPUGEABLE, Moreover, the -4rians could have quite m i i y
got mund such a dacription as A C R E A ~ - R EAS OXE OF THE
G R F . A ~ E S , for tht pnidtnt f o m of h e i r teaching was h a t
the Son, whiEe a creature, was a perfect one and aot like other
reatures.1 In fact, there are severa1 points of resemblance
between this ctttd and the fomulary whch Arius and Euzoius
submitted to Constantine to secure their rehabilitation.
As regards the anathemas, the addition of mim OR SE.~SON
on AGE robbed the Nicene ban of much of its force,
seeing that the Arians wtre ready to concede that the
creation of time and the ages was to be attributed to the
Word.
In its main drift, however, the creed is violently antiSabellian, anti-Marcellan. This comes out forcibly in the exegesis attached to the baptismal cornrnand of Mt. 28, r g. With
its insistence on the separation of the three hypostses and on
the fact that they are not just three names, it re-echoes teaching

which Eusebius of Caesarea had put forward at Nicatal and

which he l a t a repeated specfically against MarceIlus.2 The
latiter had taken Asterius the Sophist, the disciple of Lucian,
task for precisdy this teaching.VThe string of descriptive
rases from the Bible IWD FRQM COD . . . GXACT IMAGE),
: to mention a nurnber of other passages, is strongIy rerniniscent of language which Asterius had used and h4arcellus had
vigorously denounced.4 Marcellus had asserted that such ti tles
as "exact image of the Father ", "Life'", " Way ", " Resurrection", rcD~or'',
et. belonged only to the inearnate Christ,S
whereas the creed pointedly applies them to Him in His preincarnate state. Positively ir has a rnarkedly Osigenist flavour,
d e e d its use of Col. r , 15 shom. Ia guiding conception i
of tliree quite separate hypostases, each possessing its own
subsiistence and rank and ~ l o r v ,but bound into a uni. by a
com1mon h m o n y of xvill. This reprduces exactly what
Origen had taught when he spoke 6 of the Father and she Son
as bcing "mo things in subsistence, but one in agreement and
hamony and identity of wili (&a So n j 6nomdu~tT&-

,
.
.
c

a*,

S i T$J Opi.oCI
KQZ 717 ovP&ui~La ~ a l rawqrr TOV
/ I o ~ h < ~ r n'
st) i Kothing ould be more opposed than this

para,

hierarchicaiIy construaed Trinity to the Monarchianisrn

recently appzoved at Rcime and represented in its extreme
form by IiarceElus. The qmod was working with a theology
which, wkle by no means sytnpathetic to Arianisrn, was
franldy pre-Xcene in its tone. In expressing thernselves thus
it must not be assumed that the bishops werc consciously antYicene. St Athanasius himself considered it politic at this
period to ernploy other t e m s than the hornoousion. They
resented, and probably sincerely, any insinuation that rhey
were undermining the Nicene decisions, and they re-echoed,
admittedly in a weakened form, the Nicene sentence on

Arianism.
A fourth syrnbol is traditionally connected with the
See his lettei to

1
I

Cf. Arius's formal proieasion sent to St Alexander and rcproduced by St

Athan., De m, 16 P.E,26, 709): Opitz, Urk. 6,

271

his church.

Con. Marcel!. I , i (Klw termann TV, 4).

Cf.Fragg. 65; 7 2 ; 74 (Klostermann IV, 197 ; 198; 199).
Cf.Frag. 96 (Uostermann IY,2 0 5 r.}.
Cf. Frnx. 43 (Klotemann IV, 1 9 9 ) .
Con,Cels. 8, 1 2 (Koetrchau T I , 299 f.),

272

Dedication Council, though its acha1 oripin is somewhat

obscure. Its t e ~ tas
, given by St Athanasius and Socrate,T runs
as foilows :
ITLmpw d s

&a &bv. m&pa 1-alVe icbrlirve in one nd, the Father

r i q v xa; rmt*
TA
almiehty, creator and m a k a oi ali
nuvxua: C[ oi n2ua a a i p k i r - oipiiiLc
thinp, fmrn ll%orn cvcry farnily in
nu; id r;";. dwG5trai.
hmirn and earth is nsmcd;
Kai rir r& p o v o y d a h o v&, &v
And in His only-begattcn Som our Lord
m t p ~ o+@v
~
' J ~ u n hX p ~ v v,;"
, vpd
Jcsus C k s t , Who was bcgotten from
n i r w v ~ i vaivwv z'u T O ; xerpG ywthc Fatber before all agra, Cod from
~ O ~ X T UBrdv
, i u Bco, d r j s ;u $m; S t
God, light from light, tlirough Whom
ob Eyiveso 7& arru, i v TO:? O A ~ ~ W L
ai\ things carne into bcing, in heaven
ai i r ; r$s y$s, 7; $parti ~ ar&
: 2Pa~a,
snd on earth, visiblc aiid invisible,
hdyov &ir
xui oo.$iav uni S w a p r v ual
bcing Word and Wsdorn and Power
[w$v ~ a$&li l
d 7 S ~ ~ & ~, ir'
Y tOX7wv
and Life and tnie Light, Who in the
+WY jW@v St' SpZs Ili.nv8pwlrjwvr~
last days bemuse of us bccame m a
itd y ~ 8 t 5 mt~c+r LyLap sropF&ov,
and was h m fmm rhc holy lirgLi,
7 i v omupui@&a
*a; d n o 8 w ' n u m;
M'ho --ai rmdfied aad dicd and was
7a&ra
moi Z I P ~ Y I;K ~ ITK&Y
rj
buricd, and sase again from the dead
7 p i Ijplpo.
~
rd6w)t+Oira C;P oGPmPv,
on the third d z y , and u-as takcn up
KC~; K U ~ C & & ~ &J &e.fr+ 705 ~ Q Y & , I
Cd
iw hcaven, and rat do-TI on thc
~ P X ~ ~ F I&
D-r:Ymwrt.klr0 &SVE ~ p i m
Fsther's ri# hand, and will camc
5i;i~ns Ka; wirpai~ rrni ri&fi-m
a t the end af thr age rn judge Iiving
i ~ c b - rKU=-6
~
r& +a
,
a
0:
4
and drad and to reyard cach accord@awd~~~La
& d n m m o r o&
GtwIvr~
inq to his rvorks, Ib'hosc rei- is unri$ TO& ZmLpow ~ G V U TZ*n m c y 2 ~ ccilsing and abides for cndlcss ages;
na@i[prwis & 6e.f~$ roC xmlw; ou
for He wiii be stting on t hc Father's
pvrir & roj a&bt ~ 0 0 i r &
~ , Iai
&
& T,+
rght hand not only In this age but
~tiMowc.
a!so in the coming onc :
Kai F:P 76 mcCpu T JYIOV,T O - ' ~ L TV
And in the Holy Spirit, that is the
T ~ ~ ~ K A ~O 'TH EQ~ ~v ~, T u ~ ~ c ~ % ~707s
w s
l'araclete, Whom Fie scnt as He
iro&Aots
p ~ +?v
d FZF o i p o w k a h
prornised to the Apostles after His
~ V O ] O V d.irr'rn<dc ScBQac
a&&
xai
asecnt to heavcn to tcach them and
i.nop@nus mLvre, Si' 08 ual 6yta.Tto rcmind them of a11 ~ h i n pthrough
,
fievvrac d TGY rihtup~dr E;$ ~MY Whom also the souls of whoac whe
~ ~ . ? W K & Wk
Y a'.
hai-Cs L i m l y klicvcd in Him w-dl
rpko,pa,

T& i A
<f

THE DBDLCATION COUNCIL

THE AGE OF SYh'ODAL CREEDS

b m s 2.f os* S.*wv 4~&i, i

m o m u i ~xai pij
mG

i7.+~%i

PFoV, KU; ?v
&Uurpoz~o&

707~X&~DS

&c

o&

4 ne801tmi &irdif&.

+-,

ht sanctified.
hrIhDSC,,.hO caY htthe son is fmm
nathing, orisfrom mother hyxwtasis
and s not from Gid, and rhat t h m
was a time w h m Nc wss not, thc

St Athanasius" account of the matter is that, some months

after they had published their first three formulae, the bishops
felt dissatisfied with their work, and being indecisive in mind
drew up yet a fourth statement of fizith. This they despathed

273

Gaul by the hands of four of theit nurnber (Narcissus af

Xeronias, Maris of ChaIedon, Theodore of Heraclea, and
Mark of -4rethusa) and delivered to the emperor Constans (he
uas orthodox in the Athanasian sense) at his court at Trhes.
~ocratestells rhe more picturesque s t o v that the four envoys
~ h ohad been sent to the West with the official creed of thc
Dedication Gouncil conealed it at the Iast moment in their
lothes, and delivered this one, of their rrwn cornposition, to the
empcror. It rmains a rnystcry what prompcecl this strange
emtiassy of Eastern prdates to the Augustus of the West :
Socrates's confused explanation that it was in response to
Constam's own requesc for further information about the
deposition of St Athanasius and Paul of Constantinople scarcely
r i n g s true, Frobably E. Schwartz was right in discerning in
the delegation a rnanoeuvre on the patt of the East to satisfy
Constans that a general council (for m-hich the ltktern emperor
was pressing, but. which thcy were n x i o u s to avoid) was unnecessary. LAt anl-rate the intrinsi chasacter of the formulasuggests an attempt at rapprochement between East and JVest.
For the most part it has the air of being an old-fahioned baptismal creed. It abstains from Iaying down the Iaw on tht
separateness of the divint hypostases, and t he questionable
formulae of Asterius. have disappeared. It does not, of course,
mention the hornoousion, but there was nothing provocative
about such reticence. The condemnation of Arianism is much
more outspoken, and from the Westerri pojnt of view much
more satisfactorv, than anything that had appeared in the
other formularim. The insistence in the anathemas that the
Son had m3 t come into existente out of nothinq, and that He
wais not of another hypostasis but from God, cut the ground
frotrn unde
t any h d of Xriani~m.On the other hand, the
..
authors fels free to let thernselres go in thejr onslaught on
3farcdlus, whose doctrine of the Lunited reign of Ghrist was
repudiated with unusual thoroughness. As a theological statement it differed substantially from the official creed of the
council, and if passions had noo been so excited and if the issue
had not bten complicated by theologically irrelevant factom,
it might not have proved so unpalatabie to the West.
to

Gcsch. dfhn. I X (Nothrkht.Gft.Igr I , 514 E).

2 78

2'HE AGE OF SYNODAL GREEDS

the Son is one and the same as that of the Father. Yet the Fathcr
and the San are not identical. "We do not say that the Father
is the Son, or again that the Son is t h e Father: the Father is
Father, and the Son of God is Son.'"~ Logos o the Father, the
Son is His powr (SGvapt) and wisdom (uo&a). Tlie technical terms employed by 3Iarcellus were studiously avoided, and
it was mcn asserted against hirn that " the Son reigns endlessly
ir-ith the Father, and His kingdom has neither t e m nor passinga w q " , The theolo,p, nevertlieless, betrdyed his iduence at the
cmcial point. The Father, it wa conceded, is greater than che
Son, but "not because He is another h p o s t z i s or in any way
diRerent, but because the name oF Father k superior to that of
Son'" The explanation that They are one in t-irtue ofharmonv
of 1411 ( S r A r;lv ~ ~ ~ & r . L oK vC ~ +v pvorav), the formula
bonrowed from Origen b?-the Seond Creed of h t i o c h , ' tms
stigrnarizcd as lasphernous and corrupt. But d e way in whic11
They are separatc Persons in any omprehensibIe sense was
not made clear.

This

was, it must be obtious, an extreme and highlv provostatement, and the abusive Ianguage in which it i v a s
couched did not render it any more acceptable. In itself the
theology involvcd was di fficult enough for e\-en moderate men
in the Eastern camp to tictv with sympathy, but it finally
darnrned the door in their face by corning dorvn deisiveIy in
favour of the formula "one hypostasis". There has been much
debate as to how far it an fairly be decribed as the official
creed of the council. AI1 agree that it tvas probably the composition of Ossius and Protoqenes, but the general opinion has
been that the synod never in fact stanped it with its official
approval. I e wanted to do o, hut St Athanasius, who apprtciated its firebrand character, persuaded the majority to he
content with the R'icene creed, Xut the chief authority for this
version of the affair i s St Athanasiusz hirnself. He was writing
a t a time (362) when much in the Serdican creed was distinctly
embarrassing to him (its insistente on "one hypostasis " did
not square with tbe dccisions oF the synod of Alexandria regarding the iise of fpFostasis and ousia), and when it had become

cative

S c t above, p. 269 ; 2 7 1 .
Tom. ad dtrii~cli.5 (P.G. 26, 800).

279

FROM SERDICA TO JIRMIUM

his policy to uphold the Nicene syrnbol as the sole authoritative

riterion of orthodoxy. On the other hand, it is cvident that the
Eustathians of Antiorh to whom St Athanasius wrote about the
creed supposed that i t was the symbol of the counil. Theodoret
was of the same opinion.1 Mareover, we have a letrer2 from
Ossius to Pope Julius assuring hirn that the reed was not
intended to dethrone the Nicaenum. It is odd that he should
have taken the trouble to wTjte such an apoloiry Por a formula
which was of a pureh private nature and which the s ~ o had
d
deliberately decjded not to endorse. The m e account of the
matter is probatilu git-en by the historian Sozemen.3 Accordinp
to hirn, the reed fomed, despite the embarrassrnent it was later
to cause to St Athanasius, an authentic part of the enq-c1iaI
letter. Ossius and Protogenes thought it advisable to write to
Pope Julius in case he should suspect them of being disloyal to
Sicaea, and &e defeace they pleaded was that thcy ~vanted,
for the sake of clarity, to give a fuller exposition of 5 . 4
Two more crceds fall to be mentioned here as belonging to
thi phase of the great dopmatic controversy, both of them the
handiwork of the Eastern par.. The first O them, the famous
Ecthenr Aiocrosrkhas, or Long-lined Creed,s was carried to
Milan in 34j by four bishops charged with the task of expIaining the Estern theological standpoint to their \%'estern olIeagues and the emperor Comtans. The tide had meantime
been flowlng in favour of St .4thanasius, and onstantius himself had been sho~vinghim and his supporters unwonted favour.
Nanirally enough, therefore, the creed breathed the spirit of
appeasement. Composed probably at Antioch, it consisted of the
formula of PhilippopoEis, i.e. the Fourth Creed of the Dediction Counil aIoag with the additioeal anathemas,s expanded
to severa1 times its original size by eight elucidatory paragraphs
addressed to Western churchmen.7 The most noteworthy featurc
of these was the scrupulous avoidance of the mileading and
contentious words hyposta~M and ousia and of the Formula, so
Hisi. eccl. 2, 8, 53 (Parmentier, I 18).
I n the collection of Thedosius the Deaon (P,L. 5Gi 839 1.).
HisfaeccL. 3, 12, 6 {P.G.,67, 1065).
See thc discusion by I?. Loofs in T h ~ & c l uStidian uiid Krifikdn, r 909, 29 r ff.
See S t Athan.,Dcsy. 26 ; Socrat., Hist. cccl. I
, rg (P.G.26, 28 E.;67, 224ff.).
7 For tmt cL Ha n 359.
Sec above, pp. 272 and 276.

286

THE AGE OF SYNODAL CREEDS

one shodd prr:ach thenn, for the

nd that tIiey urc
not contained in inspiired S c r i ~
'e the subject is
beyond the knt>wledge
c,f man, a
e can e qilain the nativity
.. tGl,$%n
of the Son, regarding Whom it ia
,, ihail explaili His
generation?" For it is plain that ody the Father knows how He
bcgat the Son, and the Son how H e was begoeen by the Father.
There i s no qucstion that the Father is the greater. For it can bc
doubtful to none ihat the Father is g-reazer than the Son in honour,
dignity, splcndour, majesty, and in the very name of Father, the
Pon Hirnself testiying, "He Who sent M e is greater than 3." And
no one i s ignorant ttiat it is Catholic doctrine that there are t ~ o
Persons of rhe Father and the Son, and that the Fathcr is greater
and tht Son suhrdinated to tIie Fathcr, tqether uitli a11 thosr
thngs which tlic Fathei. lias subjected to HLmw3f; and thar tlic
Father has no hqioning and is in\<siblc, immortaI and impassilile,
Imt tliat the Son lm bern begotten from the Father, C;od from God,
light rrom light, and that ihe gcneration o l this Son, as has drcady
lxen said, no one knows except H k Father. .4nd that the Son 01'
God Himself, our Lord and G d , as w-e read, took flesh or body,
that is, man, from the tvornh of the Virgin l i a 3 as the angel foretold. And as ai1 the Scriptures teach, and especially the Apostle, the
doctor of the Ientiles hirnself, He took h m the k-irgLxi hhry manh d , through d i c h H e shard in suffehg. The whole faith is
summed up and is securcd in this, that the Trinity rnust alwags bc
preserved, as we rcad In the gospel, "G,
baptize a nations in the

,.

name of thc Father and oi" the Son and of the HoIy Spirit." Complete, perfeci is rhe nulnlier of the Trinitv. But the Paraclete, the
Spirit, is througli t l ~ eSon: Ne was sent and carne according to thr
promi!
:o instruct, ~ c a c hand sancti+ the apostles and a11
helievi

'fie mos[ noteit.orthy things about this creed are its extraordinary cmphasis on the oneness of God the Father, nnd its
explicit prohibition of the use both of AomooiLsros and homaiowios.
St HiIary shrewdly observcd that the fomer af these points
was made at the cxpense of the full divinity of the Son, and
went on to point out that the agnosticism professed rcgarding
the Son's generation left ihe door open to believing that Hc
was borii either from nothing or from some other substance
than God the Father. It is M e wonder that Eie described thc
documenf as " the blasphemy7"1 Apart from this, it is full of

I
I

THE TRIUMPH DF AKlANISM

287

suspicious staternents about the Son's subordjnatirin, and i t

even hints that, as opposed to the impassibility OS the Father,
He was in some way passible through association with the rnan
Jesus. We may note the significarit fat that, while every creed
of the central Eastern party de~ised sincc the Dedication
Council had contained anathemas of Arianism as a rnatter of
ourse, such anathemas are for the first time conspicuously
absent here. The Kicene tvatchward, while noi declased false,
is put under a ban, as one might expect in n thoroughly
Anornoean formula. The FinnisIr scholar J. Gurnrnerus gave
an accurate estimate of its character whcn he wrotc' : "'1S7ithout
directly preacIiing Arianism, tbe formula was an edict of
tolerante in its fa\-our, \*-Me the biene p a r v found itse1f
exduded from that tolernce." The Sicene creed, towards
whih a11 sections ofthe Church had hitherto obsewcd a comcct
and tactful attimde, suddenIy found itsclf declared unorthodox and unlawful. Oaius of Cordoba, one of the original
psomotors of T,now an aged rnan, was present at tiie synod,
nnd the framers oof the "Blasphemy", in thcir eagemes
to arm their reed .rt+ithas much psestiqe ns possible,
did not scrupieQo foire lllm to attah his siqnature to
it too.

Put forward as a formula oF peae (sucli thc emperot iiaively

supposed it might prove), thc Second Creecl of Sirrniurn was
" a trumpet which was heard from one end of the empirc ao
the othet".J In the Jrest it raised an imrnense stir, bein a
t'Cresterndocurnent composed in the main by \Vestem bishops,
and the resuIt W ~ aS strengthening of the position of the Nicene
rreed. Sliortly- aftenvards, for exarnple, we find Plioebadius of
Agcn clescnbing the latter as " 'the perfect ruIe sf Catholic
faith " , 4 and attacking the " Blasphemy ", A Gallic ynod
attacked it too about the same time, and formally condemned.
i t . 6 In the East the effect of the publication of tlie Sirrnian
manifesto, with the contemporaneousernergence of the extrerne
teachings oAeths and Eunamius (the leaders af lhe Anomoean
1

'

Dic AomSurianiscAa Partes' bis ;um Tode des Koii~lnnriw,Leipzip, igoo, 57

Sozom., Hisf. %
, c.! 4 , 6 and 1 2 (P.G.
67, 1 1 2 1 and 1144).
H, M. Gwatkin, Studies of Arianisin, 2nd ed., Gambritlt~c,i 900, i 62,
COR.Ar. 6 (P.L.20, 1 7 ) .
St Hil., Desyn. n and 8 (P.L, 10,481and 485).

288

party), was to open the'eyes of the great body of central churchmen or " Serni-Arians" to the rnenae involved in the new,
more virulent Arianism. A crisis meeting was held at Ancyra in
358 under the chairrnanship of Basil, the local bishop, and the
reaction was vividly expressed in the synodal Ietterl which
announced its decisions. While failing to rnention Nicaea and
ir1 fact condemning hornoousios (the word, they pointed out,
had been rejected by the council which sentenced Paul of
Samosata), the Semi-Arians were outspoken in their hosiiIity
to the Anomoeans and insisted upon the doctrine that the San
was like the Father in substance ( 6 p ~ ~ ~j .When
u ~ ~ delegates
s
of the synod of Ancyra, Ied by Basil, made conract with Constantius at Sirmium a littie later in the samc ycar, they succeeded in winning him over to sympathy with the Serni-Arian,
or homoeousian, standpoint and obtained his agreement to
the drafting of a formulary reflering it, the so-called Third
Creed of Sirrnium.2 This consisted of the First Creed of Sirmium (i.e. the second creed of the Dedication Council with
anathemas directed against Paul of Sarnosata and Photinus)
augmented with a number of anathemas whlch figured in the
Ancyran Ietter.
Flushed with his success and onfident of being abIe to steer a
course between the Anomoean teaching and the troublesome
homoousion, Basil of Ancyra now pressed the emperor to
surnrnon a general council wkich rnight legislate a find settlement. After some changes of plan and consequent delay, which
the Anomoeans skilfully exploited so as to recover much of the
ground they had lost, Constantius granted his request, but the
dnouement proved, as the creeds which we shall now consider
will show, very different from whttt Basil had expected. The
arrangement which Constantius fcnalIy sanctioned, at the suggestion ofthe Anornoeans, was that two paralIe1 caunciIs should
be held, one of the Western church at Rimini on the Adriatic
coast of North Italy, and another of Eastern bishops at the seaboard town of Seieucia in Cilicia. Meanwhile, in May 359, a
small cornmittee met at Sirmium and, in the emperor's presente,
drafted the following formulary as a working basis to be subSee St Epiptian., Pan. hner. 73, 2-1 I (Holl 111, 26g28q).
Cf. Sozomen, lfisl. ecc]. 4, I 5 (P.G. 67, I I 5 2 ) .

~~9

THE TRfUMPH OF ARIANISM

THE AGE OF SYNODAL CREEDS

mitted to both councils for their discussion and, it was hoped,

approval : I
We beIieve i one only and true G d ,
the Father alrnighty, creator and
framer of ai1 things ;
sfly
And in one only-bcgotten Son of God,
Kui EL!
Who was begotten impazstily from
7tp& ,
God More a11 ages and before all
dov;;
beginning and before a11 conceivable
time and bcfore ali comprehensible
eswnce, through Whom the ages
were fashioned and a11 things carne
into existence, begotten only-begotten, alone from the Father alone,
God from God, like the Father Who
begat Him ccording to the Scriptures, Whose gcneration no one
knows save only t!ie Fathes Who
begat Him. We know that this only
begottcn Son of God, at the Pather's
bdding, carne from beaven for the
abolitiou of sin, and was b r n from
tbe Virgin Mary, and consorted
with the disciples, and fulfitled all
the economy according to tlx
Fathm's will, was crucified and died,
and descended to hell, and regutted
things there, Whom the gatekeepers
of hell saw nnd shuddered, and rosc
again from the dead on the third day,
and consorted with the disclples, and
fulfrlled all the economy, and when
forty days were completed was taken
up to beaven, and sits on the right
hand of the Father, and will come
on the 1 s t day of the resurrection
with the glory of the Father, rendering to each according to his deeds;
Ka: E ~ ST ymv m<U,uu, d UWF d And in the Holy Spirit, Whom the
Only-begottcn of God, Jesus ChriSt,
p O v o y 4 ~705 &03 'Iitfl06~xplUTd~
Himself prornised to send to the race
2Tw~lhani nkpJa4 r+ +L
TWW
of men, the Paracrete, as It is written,
&8+wva
TV n a p & ~ A l y o vi,c a ~ i76 yc' I go to My Father, and I shall pray
ypapplvov n i ~ 4 p x ~npds
p ~ trdv r u ~ i p a
the Father, and He will send you
p u ai n a p a ~ d d u wTQV warlpa, ml
;.&v
n a p ~ ~ q ~n&&ir
ov
Upb, 78
another Paradete, the Spirit of
truth: He shall take of Mine, and
me+a 7fr &TOrl~s' 2urlvor &c TO^
shall teach and remind you of a11
~'~$,~T
K uUL~A~&LK U ~& T o ~ V S U L
;C"s +?v*cr#.
things.'
"C"",

'

In St Athm., De y.8 (P.G. 26, Ggz C ) . Socrates, in Hisa. PCCE.

reports that the original was Latin.
>.C.-I0

2,

37 ( P , G . 67,

2Q0

THE AGE OF SYNODAL CILEEDS

But whereas thc term 'substance' has

been adopted by thc fathers in simplicity, but being unknown by the
people givcs offene, because neither
do the Scriptures contain it, it has
seemed good to rcmove it, and that
there should be no further mcntion
o f substance in regard to God, because the divine Scripturm nowhere
refer to the ubstancc of tht Father
ar the Son. But we say the Son is likt
the Father i n ai1 thing, as the holy
Scriptuces themselves declare and
tmh.

Because of the elaborate dating prehxed to it ("in the consulate of the most illustrious FIavians, Eusebius and Hypatius,
on the eleventh day before the calends of June"), this creed,
the Fousth of Sirmium, became k n o m , rather sardonically, as
the Dated Greed. Its critics thought it ridiculeus to suggest that
the Catholic faith could be datcd.1 The final drafting of it is
supposed to have been the work of Mark of Arethusa. It seems
to have been bsed upon a baptismal creed of thl: conventionai
pattern, although the alterations and interpolations have completely disrupted the ground-plan. Some feitures in the underlying text hint at a kinship with the creed of Antioh. Such
etc. recall t l ~ cvery similar terminology
employed in the symbol quotcd in Latin by John Cassian.2
Again, this crecd stands out as being the first to give oficial
recognition to the Descent to Hell, But its reaI importance is
theological. It was a mediating manifesto, designed as far as
passible to please everybody, and it gave expression to the new
" Homoean " formula of compromise proposed by Acacius of
Caesarea and accepted by the ernperor-LIKE rN ALL R=P E C T S ~ ~strictly
~
avoided technical terms. The "orthodox",
it was thought, could noce with satisfaction that it proclaimed
the Son's generation in a way incornpatible with Arianism.
The new Arians for their part could congratulate themselves
that the use of ousia, and withit the homoousion, was condemned :
the Son could not be described even as LIKE IN SUBSTANCE.
AGES WERE FASHIONED,

U.St Athan., De gn.3 (P.C.26, 685).

Sec abow, p. 184 f.

THE TRIUMPH OF ARIANISM

2g1

si1 of Ancyra and his influential party would have liked to

ve seen LIKE J N SUBSTANCE sanctioned, but had to be
Ilent with LIKE IN ALI. THINGS. At l e a t that went further
ciidn Valens and Ursacius wanted, with their belief that the
Son was like the Father "in will and energy", but unlike Him
in subsrane. When it carne to appending their signatures, the
leaders of the severa1 groups could not conceal their disgruntlement. Valens, we are told, tried co write simply LIKE,
leaving out IN ALL THINGS, and had to be pulled up by Constantius. Basil, t o ~ in
, the copy which Vdens was to take to
Rirnini with him, added a lengthy postscript expounding his
own interpretation of the creed and emphasizing that the Son
was like the Father "in a11 things, and not just in wili, but in
hypostasis and in existente and in substance".'
This creed appears again, in 'a dress slightly but significantly
altered so as to bring it more into harmony with the taste of
VaEens and Ursacius, as the forrnuIary signed on ro October,
359 in the Thracian town of Nic by a delegation of Western
bishops from the council sitting at Rimini.2 This crowded
stssembly (over four hundred bishops are said to have attended)
had shown itself ardently Homoousian, had acclaimed the Nicene
creed and rhe use of "substance'" had deposed and excom-=inicated
1
111
Ursacius, Valens and their caadjutors, and had sent
an embassy to Constaniius to acquaint him with their decisions.
TI?ie emper or, as we can appreciate, was by no means pleased
. :. J..th:
. . _ ~ r : 1nis
uraft Homoean creed had been so hastity brushed aside.
The emoys were directed to Nict, where they were gradualy
worn down by the protracted delay as well as by the propaganda and threats to whih they were subjected.~ventualIy,
contrary to their instructions, they consented to sign a revision
of the Dated Creed, which was now put forth as "Nicene".
Most of the alterations were purely verbal and of little comequence. Of greates moment, however, as betokening a substantial weakening of the draft creed agreed at Sirmium, were
(a) the omission of rrI ALL THINGS With LIKE, and ( h ) the prohibition not only of ousia but also of 'bon hypustasis" in the
. L

For th-c details, see St Epiphan., Pm. Iusr. 73, aa (HoU III, 295).
For text see Theodoret,Hist. wI. 2 , 2 I , 3-7 (Parmentier, 145f.) ; Hahn 164.
St Hil., &a$. h&. 8, 4 (P.L. 10, 701 E).

52

g2

THTs AGE OP SYNODAL CREEDS

doctrine of tlie Trinity I"nor of the prosdpun of the Father arid

oi the Son and of the Holy Spirit must the phrase ONE HYPOSTASTS 13e used ")
The subscription of this reed was a demonstration that the
Arians were cleverly exploiting the new Homoean compromie
to their own advantage. Meanwhile events were taking a not
dissimilar course at the paralld Eastem c o m d at Seleucia. The
great rnajority were Hornoeousians, led b ~George
*
of Laodicea,
and wanted to endosse oficiaIIy the Second Crecd of the Dediation Council. Indeed, they ratified it at the second session
(28Septernber) hehind closed doors, the minority of Rornoeans
led by Acacius hat-ing wivithdraltn. At the next session,
however, on
September the minori. returned and, with
the imperial cornrnfssioner Leonas acting as their spekesman,
put fonvard their creed.1 It opened trith a short preface whicli
declared that tlieg did not rejet the authentic faith publishcd
ar the Dedication ouncil, but that trouble had arisen since
then because of lhe words homoousios, homuiousioj, and anomoios.
" JVe accordingly repudiate hornoousios and homoiowios as alien
to Holy Sriptuse, and we anathernatize anomoios." The docmine to be accepted wa that the Son was "&e the Father",
as the -4postle had said of Him that He wa the image of the
jnvisible God. Then folIowed their creed, which w a ~in effect
the Dated Crecd of Sirmum witk some minor alterations. The
cmcial words IS ALI. T ~ G were,
S
however, omitted after LIKE.
There fdlolved a protractcd debate as to what exactly was
implied by "like", and in the end Leonas dissoIved the ouncil
without the matter having been put finaIIy to the vote. Like
the ouncit at Rirnini, both groups sent deIegations to thc
emperor at ConstantinopIe to report their decisions, but
Constantius was determined that the Homoe~risians, no less
than the Western Hornaousians, should sign his Homoean draft
creed. After a Iong struggle lasting well into thc night he wrung
their signatures from thcm on 31 December, 359.2 Thus thc
Hornoean victory was complete, and it was this sequence of
events wIlich S t Jcrome liacl in mind when he wrote that " the

CF.St. A t h n ~ i . Qc
,
syn. 29;S ~ c r a tHist.
. ~ mcl. 2,40 (P.G. 26,744 f.; 67,337 ff.) ;
St. Fqiphan., Prin. harr. 73, 2 5 (HolE 111, 298 E).
"r. Sozomeii, Nist, itcl. 4, 23 (P,G.
67, i 188).

293
iole world graaned and wondereti to find jtself Arian (ingsTHE TRIUMPR OF ARTANISM

1
it t0tu.r orbis, et Arianum se esse m k tius
From the official point of view, therefort:, tlie faitli cif the
iurch was now Hornoean. To complete thc work, however,
wa necessary to bring the decisions af the delegates of
mini and Sdeucia before a great united counil and obtain
i ts final ratification for them. To this end a synod,z dominated
by Homoeans and onsisting Iargely of bishops from Bithynia,
was held in Constantinople In danuas. 360. Tlie fdlowing is
the creed which it promu1gated:J:

li-e klicvc in one Gd, iht Fathcr

alrni~hty.fmm IChom are all thinqs ;
.\iid in the onIu k o t t r n Son ef G d ,
1\30wat bcqottcn from Gud bpforp
a11 aand b f o r c all licyinniny.
ihrough \Chorn all thinga carne into
cxisirnm, v35ible and inririible. bey r p + i , ~ 64 ~opoyn$,pBm~
& PWU
gottcn only-lxgottcn, alonc from tht
m -c+, Prdr in 8m6, Zpomv r&
Father slnnc, God from God, tikc
YC1~+va~
m&v
t
m r p i md AS ypat h t Fathtr l\-ha k o t Him acordo; +v
y i i w w o L ~ E ; Y~ t & ~ ~ .
ing to the Scripturcs, 1 C h genera~
r i P+ B & ~ O ywnjwm~aMdv r m n j p .
tion no onc knows savt a!-c
thc
r o i h r oSapm p v r v r j Brot
Fathtr f\*ho bcgoi Him. %\'c know
n P m m m p O S aapa).ry+ihat this only-knttcn Son c r i C&,
Par i*. r&
~ 6 p m & 6 s -r;Ypu=at.
the Faiha smdinq Him. a m c from
n; u u + J ~ t+s
,+s
4 mU
hravcn ss i t is ~ ~ i t tfor
mthe dtstrucB ~ m m;
, yrny8;vm
m-6tion of sin and dcath, and was b r n
*s r;o@&v 78 ~ a &
&&v.
;a
rom t h t HoIy Spirit, from thc T i g i n
oiprra & & p u m , itd Lrnrnp~+'i.ro
as rcqards thc Rnh as it is
pni MF paapTWw, ~ u i& q g 7 j ~ Ma.
writttn, and consortcd with the
oi'iiwopls d r l p d c i u q r K&
n j v nasdisciplcs, and haring fulfillccl alI the
p n jp. fiA7mv, m w & 8 7 0
& KOI-occoncimy according to thc Fatfier's
%mYC;m
r a & ~ a I(& ~ i r4
s URTU,~will wns mcificd and dicd, and wss
BOpco r m r r ~ ) i v 8 & n , Cm~irirm; a h r
t u r i d and dexendcd to the lower
i
(+N,
&&r ~ld
Lid
world (at ZZ'hom hell itsel~qriailcd):
~ W wcpiiv
Y
r p i q Gpipo ~ u SIi;TP(&E
ptrB ~ I YPni%pG~,KU; r A T p ~ @ ~ l u W v Who alro rosc a p i n from the dead
on the third dav, and sojourncd with
r c u ~ n p i ~ o i - r o$prptv &v&$499
tht disciples, and when lorty days
oCpavo8r rro: no#i(~rar i v & a [ i $ 706
wcrr fulFiIlcd was taken up to beaven,
~ a + p r UNU~NOS
,
;V 3 ?iq$q
and sits on thc Fathcr's right hand,
njc ~ W O T ~ & O S i u 6 ? T U T ~ L K8i9,
~
purposing to come on thc last day
i r a &mo6G : ~ & m w~ n r d
TA Cpya a h o .
of tIit rcsurrection in the i?ather*s
glory so as to render t o rach acording io hiq dccci~.

DMI. con. L w ~ ,19 (P.L. 23, 172).

For this synod, see Sozomen, H i ~ t cccl.
. 4, 24 (PJ.67, r r 8R r.).
Cf, St .\than., De gn. 30 (P.G.
26, 745 K).

'i'HE TRTUMPI OF ARIANIYM

=94

THE AGE OP SYNODAL CREEDS

Kal rls 78 ycov nucvpa, mp aMdr d And in thc Holy Spirit, U7hom thi:
t t . 3 4 ~706 8 ~ 0 6VIAS O XPLG%& A
onIy-begotten Son of God Himdf,
Christ our Lord and Gcd,promised
iriprop ~d B r d ~ +&v
Anpyrficrro
to send as a Paraclete t o the race
of men, as it s written, 'The Spirit
of truth', Whom He sent to them
TF ievijABm rls TO<* O & ~ ~ W W I .
when He had mcendd to heaven.
Ti 6) mPa
aiooc, &tp &:Aom<por
But as for tnhe name 'suhtance', which
;rM 7Giu a a r i p w v &i&,
Bj?.tiothnrii. 6;
ivas adopted simply b!+ the fathen,
70;s XUO;S u~u18doz'Idepe, 8rGrt pq&i
but beiny u
n
b
m t o the peopre
e; y&a;
~ o i c o acpiixovoiv, + p ~ a r
ocwioned otrene, hecausc the
~repraipff+ai r o i noi.irA&
pCLOSfrr;ai.
Scripnues t h m r l v u do not contain
p j P ~ vr o t AeimaF y;lrrRab, hcifi$nrp
it, it has pleased us r h t it should bc
aboiished and that no mrntion ar a11
~?1; 9 ; @tini yp&l
oC6nP;F ;pqgr r w a v mp: oth;ac nmp8r h-o; ~;or:, ~(i;
should be made of it henceforth,
y 6 p o i 8 i &arr & h a u i r m p ; -a;.&
>inceindecd the divie S c r i p m nouai V ~ O CK& BY;OV r v c $ p a ~ o cGr.ap8ccr\hcre h - c made rnention o l ttie
@ma. p o r o ~&i
Aiyopw 7@ a u y i ;.;v
subsrance of Father and Son. Kor
Mv I& d;F~.riti, a: B c k r ypada; rrai
i n d e d shod the term h y p t a s i s bc
LGuru~.mt. 114ea~ll*iit: (I;~<OC~Ca ; T C
u d of Fathw and Son and Holy
~pOlcpor~ a ~ c ~ $ & p aroi
v iiiriiug
Spir:'. But we say the Son s Iikc t h t
ra1 r a i w p r yBwvrac ; i m ( ~ i
Father, as the dirine Scripnirw say
ivwm .yjlr i m c P d q ~
ypndr;r,
3nd reach. But let a11 the h m i a
Bw@rt~o
ioriwar..
which haix eithcr beoi condernned
pciiowlv, ur h a x z come aliout mure
rmently and arr: in opposition to this
mcd?h anarhcma.
n i p m ~ vr+ yiijrr 7Wv i ~ @ ~ W r wm vp K A ~ T O V ,X ( I B ~ T <y~d y p a v o i (17.i 7rucCfia
dT8r:asli, &tp u i ~ o s r~p$cil

..

-++

This is the last of the long line of creeds promuigated in this

era so prolific in their rnanafacture. The spod which ratifid
it expressIy rejected a11 previous syrnbols, and forbade the
formdation of new ones in thc future. In itself the new creed
represented the complete triumph of that Homoean comprornise which attempted to drive a rnediatinq road bet~veen
the irreconcilable positjons of the Anomoeans on the one hand,
and of the Hornoousians and the Homoeousians en the other*
It is, af ourse, the cseed of Nic, and so the Dated ~ r e e of
d
Sirrnium, in a slightly altered dress. It became t h e oficial
formula of wi~sitwas henceforth t o be known as Arianism,
especially arnong the barbarians on the outskirts of the
empire. It was not for nothing that Ulfilas, t h e national bishop
of a colony of Goths established an the banks of the Danube,
whorn chance had broughc to the imperial city, shared in the
deliberations of the council. 1 Arianism, it will be appreciated,
a misnomer, for the creed asserts none of che articles
Cf. Socratcs, HiJt. CCC!. 2 , 4 1 ; Sozomen, Hirt. tccccl. 4, 24 (P.G. 67,349; I iBg).

is really

I
I

295

of the old heresy and explicitiy condemns Anomoeanism. Its

deliberate vagueness, however, made it capable of being reited
by Christians with very different sets oF ideas, Comprehension
was Constantius's aim, and the term LIKE, without any qualifiration or addition, seemed better adapted to achieve this than
question-begging phrases which were tied u p with elaborate
spstems of specdative theology. The creed tvas circulated to
all the bisbops of Christendom\vith an imperial lettcr commanding them either to sign it or take the consequences.'
.4t this point our survey may be fittingIy brouyht to a dose.
It is not for a book U e this, devoted solely to the shidy of
credal fomulae and concerned only indirectly witli rhe hiatory
of doctrine, to trace the stages by which in the course of the
next twenty years the 'iicene faith reasserted itself and made
i t pmsible for a creed giving expression to the homoousian
doctnne to oust and supersede rhe speciously neutra1 formula
of Conszantinople.
1

(3f. *tu,

Ktt- r&. 2,43 ; Sozorncn, Hiri. tcrl. 4,26 (P.G.67,gj 3 ;r 1g7).

THE TRADITION ABOUT C

*g'f

Iiaving been publicIy read and acclaimed, tlie imperial

onnrnissioners ordered " the faith of the I 50 fattiers" to bc
reald out too.1 The description they used was the one popularly
applied to the council of onstantinople of 38 r . Aetjus, the
arlideacon of the capital ty, immediately got up and recited
our creed from a w r i t t e ~
documcnt. It again played a prominent
t at the fifth and sixth sessions,? on 22 and 25 October,
:n it Iras incorporated along with the Nicenc creed in the
inition adopted b?- thc council. On the latter ocasion the
ueiinition ernbodying it was s i p e d , in tlie presence of the
emperor Ma~cian,by the papal leqates and a11 the bishops
present. The minutes, or acfa of tlie council of Clialcedorr,
which S U ~ ~ YinC fd,tlius constitute our prirnary source for
the creed. The Greek text printed beIow, along ~ 4 t ha translati an, reproduces t h e cersion read out at the third session as
it appears in the magisteriat edition of Eduard Scliu-artz.

CrGied

THE CONSTANTINOPOLITAN CREED

BY far the most influential credal product ofthe fourth century

was the ~ermulawhich i sometimes technically called the
Xiliceno-Constantinopolitan creed.1 Ordinary 4
IS are
familiar ivith i t as the creed of the Holy Eirchar
-e it L%
rnisnarneci the Kiene creed. Its hybrid Gtle curriu~iim the
popular but erroncous tradition that it is none other than the
tme Nicene crecd enlarged with the theary, widely held since
the middle cif the fifrh century at any rate, that the occasion
of it enlargcrnent was the second genera
1, held at Constntinople in 381. OF a11 etristing reed
e onIy one for
which ecumenicity, or universal accept;a+l~~,
~ a-i Lu
it: -7piausibly
claimed. L'nlike the purely JTestern A4postIesTreed,it war;
admitted as authoritative in East and JYmt like from 45 r
onwards. and t has retained that position, with m e sig-nificant
variation in its text, right donm to t h ~
t da< 5Eo far
from dispIacing i t, the Reforrnation r
d its bi nding
character and gave it a new lease of IZe
extendetd currenc): bv translating it into the vernacular tongum. It is thus
one of the few threads by which the tattered fragments of the
divided robe of Christeridom are held together. Yet the circurnstances of its composition and prornulgatlon,
we31 as the
courc of its history, are far from clear. t wiIl ble the bu siness
of this and the following chapter to at tempt ti3 unravt:I the
tangled skcin cif problems which they raisc.
First of aii, die origina! tcxt of the creed, known as C for
short, must be estabIilied. Ets first appearance, at a11 events
as an officialforrnulary, was at the council of Chalcedon (45 r ) .
At tlie third session of the cozincil, on IO October, the Nicene
The ?ame srprna io Iiavc Iieen First applied to it by Joh. Bencdikt Carpiinv
(Carpzoviu~)in thi: rniddlc rif the seventeenth centiiry. Cf. hiq I r q n g r in lihror
rrcfcrinrirm Luthrrnnnrrtm !ismhnlirnc, Leipzig, 3rd rd., i6gn, 57.
296

..*a,

God thc Father

alrniqhic, makcr of hcavn and
canh, of a11 things 1 isibl and inviriblr ;
. h d in onc Lod Jcsus Christ, thc anlybmotrcn Son of God, bcpottcn from
the Farhcr More all ages, lieht From
light, truc r
m
d from rme Gcd, bepiittcn not rnadc, of one srrbstance
with thc Father, thraugh l\'Eiom all
t h i q carne nto txictrnce,
hecausc of us mcn and becaux of
aur sahation carne d o m from
heavcn, m d was inarnate from the
HoIy Spirit nnd thc Virsiri Mary
and b r r a r n r man, and was crucified
for us iindct Pontrus Pilate, and
suffcrcd and was buricd, and roic
agafn on thc third day iiccordinq ta
the Scripturrs a ~ i d ascended t u
heavril, and sits on thc right Irand
oi thc Father, and will come again
with glory to judgc liivitig and dcad,
of Whosc kingdorn therc will be no
cnd ;
{\ belicvc in oac

" X . 0 . 11, I, ii, 79 f. Mansi VI, 957) counted this tIic second scssion, but
Schwartz lias restored the true or er.
8 if.C.Oi 11, I, ii, 128 and 141.Only the formrr cites tlic rrecd in extrtiso.
1: o*

298

THE CONSTANTTNOPOLITAN CREED

Kai r k 78 n v r p -r& JYrciv, 76

xal +d {womrdv. 1.0
70t

Apmv
n~rp6s
imropnidprvriv, + sVv n a ~ p ;uai v i 6
U U ~ T ~ O U K W O ~ ~ uoi
~ ~ O
~ V~ I J S O ~
sD la)i+mv
Si8 s&i, np&?+ljr. c;$ p;av
&yLav X U @ O A ~ K I ~ Y ~~OP*OAIK;~V CKUATJoim. OpdcyoCpcv ii. p y u p a rlp
+E~~&
Ypmplcir..
:I;-

And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and

life-giver, M'ho procecds Srom the
Fathcr, Wlio with the Eatlim and
U ~the~ Son
~ ~ i sY together
.
worshipped and
togeiher gloritied,Who spokc through
the prophets; Ln onc holy Catholic
and apostolic Churcli. U'e mdess one
baptism to tht temission oi sins; w c
look fonvard to the r m c c t i o n of
ihc dead and the Iife of thc world ta
come. h e n .

There can be no doubt that the test of C, as of Lu', publicly

recited at the third halcedonian session and repsoduced above
sepments the primitive, authentic shape of the creed. 'lt'hether
ar not it was acttrally composed and ratified in $31 (1r.e shalI
spend some time sifting this tradition a Jittle Jater), its connection 14th Constantinople was apparently taken for granted.
Thus the motive for inviting the archdeacon of the imperial
uty, Aetius, to read it out, as for calling upon Eunomius of
Sicomedia ta read out K, was plainly to nake sure of an
acusatc vemion. T h e texts to tvhih the assembIy listened had
been extracted frorn thc archives in tvhich the original docurnents were presumcd to have been deposited. It shouId bc
observed that the texts ernbodied in the Definition appeat to
have differed in severa1 respects fsorn tSiose recited at the thlrd
session, and that E. Sclr~vartzhas suggestedl that they were
deliberatelu modified, at the request of Marcian and the
Empress Pulcheria, so as to be brought into closer harrnony
with eah othcr. lt'harever the final verdict on this difficult
question ma); be,+tue mau rest content that it can do nothing
to upset our confidente in the antiquity and uthority of thc
version of C quoted at the thircl session. It is intercsting to notice
that the creed was formalty rchcarsed and subscribed on 16
September, 680, at the eighteenth session of the sixth general
council, the tliird of Constantinople, and that it is the f o m
printed abovc that the recorded minutes preserve.3
Having settlecl the texc, let us now t u r n to the problem of
C's identity, Referente has aIready been made to the universal
7 . N . T . W . =V, ~916,3&ff.
J *k b ~ has
n a dciailcd criticisrn of Schwartz'e case in R.H.E. xxxii, 1936,809ff.
a Cf.Mansi XT, 633.

THE TRADITION ABOUT C

199
tradition that it was the sy mbol of the council of Canstantinoplc.
At Chalcedon it was introduced as such, and the fathers
apparently (we shall consider their attitude more lrisely later)
accepted the description without dernur. In the form prevalent
from the sixth century onwards the tradition asserted that C
was sirnply N eIaborated by the interpolation of clauses designed
to counter heresies rc+ich had croppcd up sulisequently to
Nicaea. There are Lnts in the rninutes of the ounil of
hdcedon that the theory af a revision of N was already in
the rnakrng. At the first esion,l for exarnple, Eusebius of
Dorylaeurn and Diagenes of yzicus jurnped up and acpsed
Eutyches (whose case, it l i 1 1 be recallcd, w a ~under investigation) of falsehood in denying that tlic friith of the Xicene
council ould receive aiiy additioiis. "The reed received
additions", cried Diogenes, '' Srom tlic holy fa thers on account
of ihe perverse notions of Apollinarius and 'l'alentinus and
Macedonius and men hike them. The words W-IO C.ME DOWIL
A?m WAS NCAKKATE FROM

LRE HOLY SPIRIT r\ND THE S R G W

were inserted into the creed, but Eucyches has left them
out because he is an ApoIlinarian. . . For the exprrrsion
which the holy rathers at Xicaea used, viz. WAS INCARXATE,
rhe holy fathers who came later larifiecl by adding monr TFE
HOLY S
P ~ 3 ~- n
TRE 1 - m MARY."
~ ~ Thouph lie did not expIicitly rnention C, it is probable that Diogene had it in mind
when he spoke of nn expanded vei-sion of S . His statement
\ v x not allosued to pass unchallenged. The Egyptian bishops
at once pretested agaimt the idea of anything having been
added to tbe creed of the Nicene fathers, and dedared that
Eutyches had done right ta quote it in iis original forrn. But
the episode is p o f that, even at this reIatively early date, C
was being regarded as an expansion of' N carried out hy the
r50 fathers.
The same point of view came to the forc on severa1 occasions
at ChaIedon. For exampIe, at the fourth session, when members were giving their testimony to the agreernent of St Leo's
Tome with N and C, Florentius of Adrianopolis in Pisidia
characterized our creed as "proclairning clearly that our Eord
Jesus Christ was incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the Virgin
A.C.0. 11, Ix ia ! ) I .
MARY

in S it is placed alongside of B E G O ~ YFROM THE FATHER

tiithout the artide. ( r } 50, too, Y s yfiw$&a EIK 705 ZCCT~Si?
reproduced in C as ~ &
v 706 na-rp y~~v%&a.( d ) 145th the
cnccption nf mavpw~&z (CRUCIPED), the severa! members of
the sccond artldt in C are linked together by AND. (e) In
the third article the simple K U ~ E ~ ST +OV .rrvcGpa (AND IN
TPE HOLY SPRIT) of N reappears in C as uaZ E;Y r8 mieiipa ~d
+YLOIJ. I t is diffiult to con-iccture why the suppascd revises of
3' shou'td have gone to t h e trouble of making these, for the
most part trifhg, altertions.
This statistical cornparison makes it certain that, whatewr
else C may be, it cannot accurately be described as a rnodified
version of N. T h e two are rctaliy two utterly difTerent texts,
resembfing each other in a broad, general way, but to no
greater extent than any othcr pair of Eastern formularim.
Hoit summed the matter up 14th onvincing succinctnes when
he pojnsed outl that o f the r 78 (approx.) words in C e d y 33. or
abour a fifsh, can be p1ausibIy derived from S. If C had a direct
relationship ~ 4 t hany faurth-century creeds, jt was ertainly
not with h-,but with ertain others which Iiave not so ar been
rnentioned. It is interesting to observe, in passing, that it is
practically idcntical with the first symbol quoted by St Epiphanius to~vardsthc cnd of his Ancwufus2-that
is, if the hfS
etidence can be trusted. The onIy respects in which the lattcr
differs from it are jn the incIusion of (a) l a 4 1s~
THE
SXXSiAXCE OF ??IE FATHER, ( h ) mGS
T? REAVEX .4';D TEISGS
o s EARTH, and (r) the Kicene nnathemas. C also bears a ertain
resernl~ilanceto a urious Larin creed found in the collection of
Theodosius the Dcacon, in Codex Verona LX (58),under the
obviously unsuitahle titIe Synhalus sanctae synodi Snrdici.3 This
reads JESUS GHRTST OUR LORD, has tlie order TRUE GOD EROM
GOD, OXY-BEGOTTEX SOS OT;COD, O I T ~ OF
~~S
03T SV8STANCE M r I W
TRE:FATHER, and ornits one or two items i11 the third article, but

otherri-ise seems to coincide with C.A discussion of these texts,

however. rnises Iarge issues which an only be satidactorily
treated against the balckground of the rnain problern, viz. the
Two Disstriations, i a7 n. Cf. Narnack, op. (ir., I 19,
Anror. I 18 (Iloll I, iqG f,).
For t h tcxt,
~
sce A. E.Rurn's article in .7.T.S. ii, 1901,102R.; C. H.Tumcr,
Ecciuiar Occidriitafis nionumcnto Iurir Anfipirtima, Oxford, I 939, I I, iii, 468.
1

relation of C to the council oF Constanhople of 38E. To this

we must now turn, but rve can do so with the ful1 asurance
that the tradition is in errar at least in its identification of the
basic stock of C with N.

The uni\?ersal tradition, as we have already noted, dating

ar Eeast from the time of the auncil of Chalcedon /451), is
that C was she creed ratified by the r3o bishops who fomed
the council of ConstancinopIe (May-july 3811, and who had
been summoned, along with some 36 bishops of *Macedonian
sympashies who later withdrew, by rhe emperor Theodosius I
for tlie threefold purpose of finishing once and for nll with
Arianism, settling the Macedonian Heresy as amicably as
possi ble, and appointing a new patriarch for the imperial. city.
Lntil recently the great rnajority of rnodern scholars have been
united in their rejection oF this ancient ~ i e w
of C's origin. The
objections apinst supposing that C was composed and promulgated by tlie ouncil of 381 have seemed ovewhelming,
both in nurnber and in weight. One or two notabIe scholars
liave stood their gsound, but the general opinion 11as been that
the Chalcedanian fathers were just as much rnistaken about
C ' s original ratjfrcation as they, or at any rate their successors,
were about it relatianship to S. So far from beinq the authoritative formula.,
or ckdh~sis,of the bishops assernbled at Constantinople, it must be some local baptismat creed .rr.bich somehow os other (at this point the suggestions mooted differ
msirkedly) beame connected with the counciI. Some such
theory, it is held, would explain how a creed which manifesdy
could not have been the oficial proilouncement of the council
nevertheless succeeded in persuadina uncitical generations of
churchmen that it was.
The considerations which have been regarded as fatal to the
tradition deserve detailed recpitulation.1 First, such first-hand
evidence as we have bearing on thc activities of the council o
Constantinople is innocent of reference to C. The official
See, e.g.,F,J. A. Hort,TuioDi~serWioss,73ff.; A. Harnarkin Redencgkl.,yded.,
XI. I 7 ff. ;.J. Kunze, Dnr niconisch-konr!antim~lifnni~rhc
,+nbol, l,eipzig, rB@, 5 ff.

3 0 ~
'FHE CONITANTINOPOLITAN CREED
rninutes havc nvt been preserved, no doubt because the counil
was not reckoned as ecumenical unta much Iater. O n the other
hand, there is no mention of a cseed in the four canons which
the auncil sanctioned or in the letter which, on completing
its Iabours, it despatched to Theodosius with the canons.1
True, later collections include thsee additional canons with
our reed appended, but it is agreed that both they and it are
i n t s u d e r ~ .The
~
first of the genuine anons confines itseIF to
confirming t he Sicene faith in the words :

The faitii of the 3 r 8 Sathers who met at Xicaea in Bithynia must

not be set aside hut must be maintaind as binding, nnd every heresy
must be anath~matized,and in particular that of the Eunomiam, o r
Anomoeam, and rhat of the Arians, or EudoXians, and that of the
Semi-.4rians, or Pntumatomachians, and that of the Sabeliiam, and
that ofthe ?r.iarccllians,and that of the Photinians, and that of the
Apollinarians.

The lettcr to Theodosius epitomizing the cound's work sirnply

says: '"ter
that we published some concise definitions
( m p o Gpovs
~ ~
;[E+W+Q~W~,
r a t i f - g the faith of the
Nicene fathers and anathernatizing the heresie whih had
sprung up against it." It is difficult, the critia think, to take
rhis as an allusion to C, not least because C is devoid of anathernas. Very nearly the same company ofbishops foregathered
again in Constantinopie in the following year {382), and sent
a famous syndicai letters to Pope Darnasus excusing themselves on various grounds from accepting his invitation to an
ecumenical council to be held in Rome. In the c o m e of it,
after summarizing their theologicaI views, they referred their
correspondent for a fuller exposition of them to "the statement
(r@
7 p W ) of the s p o d of Antioch" (which had bem sent to
the Pope in 3791, and also to "'the statement which was last
year published by the ecumenical synod held at Constantinople,
in which documents we have confessed our faith more fully
(bv citr d a r 6 ~ p o v r;lv nmw & p A o y $ a a p ~ ) , and have in
written form anathematized tbe heresies which have betn
For tht lerter and canonr, 8Ce Mansi 111,557 ff.
Cf. Mansi 111, 67 for thc crtcd.
Ciad by ~ h r o d o r i tIirt.
,
rrcl. 5 , g (Pannrntirr, 289 R The rclevant xetion
is 1 3 on
~ p. 293).

I
i

THE CASE ACAINST T H E TRADITEON

3O7

recently irivented". Here again, it js argued, tlierc can be no

referente to a newly forrnulrited or recently ratified creed. Thc
fomox of Constantinople, like that oF Antioch, must have been
an extended theological manifesto witli anathcmas subjoined.
Secondly, the externa1 evidence of historians and otbcr rifriters
has every appearance of being in accord ~vithtliis version of
what took place at the ceuncil. Socrates,' foi. example, in his
account of the proceedings, describes how, aftet the secession of
the llaedonian bishops, the fathers settled down to the
re-afimation of the Iiicene faith (2fl~fla;waaraVRts +v h*
?u'rua;u amtv). Earlier in the same chapter lte had remarked
tbat the object of the cmncil was "to ratify the Yicene faith".
Sozornenhand Theudoret3 te11 the same tale, using almost
identical language. Harnack ws convinced that St Gregory
of Xazianzus, u.ho had actuauy been president of the council
for a time, must abo have taken the view that its work was
lirnited to ratify-ing the Sicene creed. Shonly after the ouncil
he wrote a Eetter 4 to ledoniu in answer to his request for " a
cancire definition and nilc of our bdicf ", remarkinq in i t :
lie for our pari have never esteernrd, and ncver an esteem, any
doctrine preferable to the faith af the h01y fathers ~ v h oasrembled at
Siaea ro destro! the ,4riari heresy. !';e adhertp with God's help,
and shall adhere, to this faith, supplementing rhe p p s which they
left, conceming- the Holy Spirit brcausp this qupstion had iiot theii
k e n raised.

The natural irnplication of this, the German scholar argued,

was that St Gtegory admirted only thc Nicene cseed, despite
his consciousness of its deficiency in ertain particulars, He
could ilot have wRtten in such terms had he been aware that
a fully satisfactory alternative formula liad already been
solemrtly prornulgated a few months before.5
The third and most impressive objection is t3ie secmitigIy
ahsotute siIence regarding a Constantinopolitan creed whicli
apparently reigned from 381 to 45r . This silence i s particularly
striking for the various synods which met i11 the period, at
which some allusion to such a creed, had it existed, rnight have
Hist. CECI. 5 , 8 (P.G.67,576 ff.).

Hiji. cccl. 5 , 8 (Parmentier, 288).

<:r. Hauck's R~ril"icykl.,3rd

ed., XI, 18.

Hist. ecci. 7, 9 (P.G.67, r 436 E.).

E/). rnn ( P . C . 37, rg?),

3I2

'PHE C O N S T ~ I ' I N O P O L ~ L A CREED

N

as the proof of his theological corretness ; and the creed which

he wodd present would be the revied creed o f Jerusalem.
This would be entered in the minuta of the council, and mau):
yean later, when peopIe had fogotten the precise order of
events, may well have come to be rcgarded as in fact thc creed
promulgated by the corincil.
An alternative scilution was advanced by J. Kunze in his
important Etrle book on our creed.1 Mis view, which was taken
up enthusiastically by A. E. Burn,2 was that C may liave bem
used at the baptism and episcopal onsecration of Nectariius,
praetor of the city, who was clecred bishop of Constaritinople
jn the course of the council and, in consequence, bccame its
third president. At the time of his election he is known to have
been a Jayman and unbaptized. It js probable, acgucd Kunze,
that he receivcd both baptismal instructian and the sacsarnent
itself at the hands of Diodore of Tarsus, rvho had sponsored his
crtndidnture. The fact that C firsr comes to light in Cyprus
(Sdamis was St Epiphanius's see-city) and passed t ticnce to
SI-edra in Pamphylia, seemed to Kunze to makc i t i adoption
b the church of Tarsus, in Cilicizi, a distinct possihility. Its
use at the baptism and ordhation of Nectarius would thcrefore
be perfectly natural if Diodore wa the bishop wtio adrninistered them. Granting that it was so used, C wauld inevitahly
I x associated thereafter with the council, the more so as
Nectarius probalsly made it the oficial creed of Conatanrinople
thcreafter. Among other pieces of evidence which seemed
to Kunze to tally with his conjecture is a curious note
crnbedded in the minutes recording the voting at Chalcedon
on the question whether X and C agreed -4th Leo*s Tome.
A s fie ast his vote, Callinius of Apamea in Bithynia, a t o m
iiot too far removed from Constantinople, described thc counciI
r i r 381 as Iiarlng been heId "at the consecratiori oT rlie ~nrit
pious Sectariur ".TThere was evidently some corulection in hi
mind between the creed which formed part oof the Definitiun
and the elevation of Nectarius to the episcopate.

(a)

A.C.O< 11, 1, ii,

11q.

the absence of any hint in ontemporary documents that

tlie council made itself responsible for anything more enter-

' DOSnit&isclt-konsfonb. Symbol, 32 R:

maEnc@n/)&ia Bri;sniiicti, r I tli cd., VII, 391i.

The onsiderations listed in the foregoinpl section combine

ta confront the traditional aScripti0ri of C: to the council of
ConstantinopIe with an crnharrassing question-rnark. \+'e
cannot casual2y bmsh aside such facts, if fats they- are, as

prising than the re-affirmation af N, ( b ) the unquestioning

assumption in the long span between Constantinople ancl
Chalcedon that N was the sde arzthoritative formula, and (c)
the evidence for C's vogue as a purely local baptismal crccd
dmost a decade before tlie r 50 fathers met. Tt is not surprising
that many scholars have found the case overwhdming. O n the
other band, there have always been a rninority who have
refused to bow the knee. Caspari, it rnay be noted, steadily
adhered to the tradition, despite bis apprcciatian of the difficulties it entailed. Even in the hey-day of the Hort-Harnack
hypothesis, voices could be distincdy heard questioning its
validity. Arnongst these consenrative stalwarts may be numbered the German scholar W. Schrnidt,l the Russian eccIesiastical historian A. P. Lebcdev,2 and thc Greek archbishop Chr.
P a p a d o p o u l o s . ~ h eEnglish F. J. Badcock4 Iater joined their
ranks. More recently still Eduard Schwartx 5 added bis powerfril
influence to the defencc of the tradition in its most uncompromising form. 50 great is the prestige of his tearning and, in
particular, of his knowldye of ihe day-to-dav working of the
synods of the early centuries, that the position which he espoused, oncc abndoned as untenable in most quarters, har
evidently beiun to be taken serioudv again.
It is easv to s)mpathize with the dksatisfaction of these more
cautious students. There were p t 7 e weaknmts in the HortRarnack h ~ p t h e i wiiich
s
i t s brillant faade could no6 onceal.
h'ot every student, for exampIe, will be prepared to admit its
Cf. Nmir firthlichc zmdickrqt x, I 899, 935 E.
For a summary oF his views rre J.%S. ic, 1903,285 FT.
See ' E r r r l i ~ ~ ~ o v r2rcmpir
m)
?
:r B ~ o A v r + r o ~ o h fTO
~ 'ABqvrjor
Atheiir, 1924.
CF.3.T3.xvi, rg15, 2a5 aiid liis bonk (2nd ed.), i86 R.
~..N.T.I17.xxv, $926, 38 ff.
e
a

mirnrn~~~iloii.

1
318
THE CONSTANTINOPOLITAN C U E D
in spite of their understandable detachment and even coolness,
no one wns apparentll*disposecl to ast doubts on its banafidfs.
\Ve sliould bear in mind that they were mera of spirit, quite
courageous enough, as in the case of their refusal to draw up
a new creed, to stand out against the plainly expressed wishes
of the ernperor. The implication is diat they must have ?xen
satisfied that it had a real and sulxtantial connection with the
council of Constantinople. To suppse tllat they abstained
from questioning its crdentials, ar that when they questionerl
them they allo~vedthemselves to be hodlwi-inlced by Anatolius
and Aetius, reveals an extravagant rneasure ofscepticism. Thc
only reasonable conclusion to draw, in tiew of their initial
bewilderment and their eventual readiness to canonize C aIong
with h', is that in the meantirne trustworthy evidence had been
produccd showing that it w5s indeed the creed of the counil
of 381.
The failure of the Hort-Harnak hypothesis to explain the
attitude and language oE the Chalcedonian fathers is its fundamentalIy unsatisfatory fcature. In the light of it the uttempi of
some scholars recently to discover ways and means of rehabilitacing the tradition is not surprising. One great obstacle in their
way has been the presene of C, or a reed remarkably like it,
in a treatise of St Epiphanius' written severa1 ycars before 38 r .
'CVe should perhaps remind the reader that the implications of
this argument h\-e sometimes been catrjed too far. Granting
it its full weight, it would still be posible to hold that thc
fathcrs of 381,even if they could no Ienger be reckoned as
C's authors, rnay nevertheless have adopted it as a suitaMe
expression of th& teaching. The obstade, however, sterned
wnsurmountable to many until, as a result of a closer analysis
of the rext of St Epiphanius, certain facts were disclosed which,
jf solidly establkhed, disposed of it once and for all. The
schalars to whom this discaven~is due are Lcbedev, Papadopoulos and Schwartz-I
To state their conclusion in a sentence, there are grounds for
believing that t h e creed originally occupying the place at
present held by Ep. I in A~uruttar.r r8 was not C but N. The
reasons for making this inference are two. First, the Ianguagc
SCCtllcir worka ciied on p. 3 13.

THE TRADITION RE-CONSfDERED

whjch St Epiphanius himself used in thc surrounding coi~text

is more consistent with the creed's being h' than C ; and,
secondly, the intrinsic characier of the creed which follows in
r 19, known as E#. 11, seerns to presuppose X ratther than C:.
As re~ardsthe former point, Sr Epiphanius comrnencled Iiis
crecd to the people of Se-edra as one belonging to the wholc
Church : he spoke o it as this holy faith of the Catholi
C:Iiurch, as the holy and only virgin of God seceived ir from
thc holy Apotles of the Lord as a tmst to be preserved". *Gter
setting it down ia f d , he wcnt on explicitly to ascribe it to
Yicaea in the \rrords: "This faith was handed d o m from the
hoIy .?jpostles and <xlas publisk~d?) in the Church, the holy
cit?., by a11 the holy bishops, above three hundred and ten in
numbcr, yathered together then." The dder Lnterpretation of
thesc cnigmatic words, which took them ns implying that the
creed embodied apostolic, Jerusalemite and Nicene elements,
overlaoked the true reference of " the holy city ". As K. H011
pointed out in the Berlin edition of the Ancoratus,l the phrasc
was commonIy used by S t Epiphanius to describe, 1iQt the
earthly city of Jerusalem, but the heavenly JerusaIem of the
Church. What he was really saying in his complicatcd way
was that the crced he had just quoted was the Nicene creed.
In harmony with this Iie terminated it with the Xicene m a themas, which undoubtedly Iook somewhat aut of place at
thc end of Ep. 1 as it stands in the text at present. Secondly,
when he proceeded to write out a fuiler creed (Ep. I I j in
ch. I rg, he announced in so many words that it would confum
itiith " the faith enjoined by those holy fathers ",but trtould takc
account of the various beraies whih had raised their hcads
since they had published it. But when E). I1 is studied closely,
it is seen to add little or nothing to the anti-heretlal content
of Ep. I : the most ehat can be said is that its Ianguage i s slighily
sffcr and more precise. If N originaIly stood where Ep. I now
stands, Ep. I1 must have provided a valuable supplement to
it, but af'ter Ep. E it was virtually superfluous. Moreover (and
this is the realIy startling point), Ep. I1 is in no sense a rernodeI1ing of Ef. I, but consists of the ancient Nicene creed,
N, cnlargcd with an anti-Apollinarian, anti-Macedonian
"

1
i
I

1,

1
1

3'9

3ec nutc od lm.

3*O

TAE CONSTAN1TNOPOLI'I'A;Y

running cornrnentary, and with the third article elaborated

dong difkrent h e r from the third article of Ep. I. The concluion is irresistible that the only \vau of explaining ihis queer
assortrncnt of fncts is to arrume that rhe position now usurped
by Ep. I righrfufly beionr to X,and that the present situation
carne about through the rnisplaced aeal of some scribe in substituting, or adding as a marginal glors, the form which he took
to he the fully deueloped, mthorizcd Nicene creed. Since at
this point thc Ancoroiur depends on a single, not very accurate
MS, no objection against this inference can be convincingly
raised from that quarter.
Another obstade faing the champions of &e tradition \vai,
ar we sawr, the complete absencc of any suggestion in suis-ivinq
records that the council of ConstantinopIe had been sesponsible
for a crced of its own. Yet the quertion has been xked recently
whether this reprments an altogether fair account o l the evidente. First, E. Schwartz and his supporters have called for a
rcconsideration of the letter, preserved by Theodoret,' which
the synod of Constantinople of 382 deipafched to the Western
bishops asrcmbled at Rome. I n this, we remernbcr, tliere was
a relerence to "die tomos of the synod of Antioch" and " the
tomos which was 1a.t year published by the ecurnenical council
held at Comtantinople, in which documenu Ire have confezsed
ou, faith more f d y " . There is nothing far-fetched, it is argued,
i11 taking tomos in thir parsage as a description of C.The ver
"we have confessed" js precisely the one used h r s e t t i n ~out
one's faith in a creed. Secondly, a parallel reconsideration of the
letter which Flavian sent the emperor in 449 has been dernanded.2
It has been aked whether the reasons for excising "and in
Constantinople" from lhe text are valid. The words have the
bacliing of some irnportant MSS, and the surnmary of iiis
faith which FIakian gives in the following sentences seems ta
praupposc a fdler creed than S.
Thirdly, in addition to these obscure and much dkputed
passible allusionr, there are a number of quite unambiguous
paflstic parsaga wliich suggat that the Constantinopolitan
fathers wcre known to Iiave made alterations in thc Nicene
I

'1

H U ~r .c c ~5 , 1 3 (Parmcntier, 293).

a rf.C.0.

II,T,i,3g.

W E D

II
!

1
r

32 I
creed. Thus one of the pseudo-Athanasian dialogues De TriniTHE TRADTTIOPL' RE-CONSIDERED

fofe1 represents ?r3acedonius, who stands for the heresy called

aftes his name, as being accused by onc Otshodoxus of beinq

dissatlsfied with the Sicene creed and of hab-ingmade additions

to it. He counten t h e charge by inquiring whethcr the orthodox
toa had not been guilty of the same offence. Orthodoxus has to
admit that they have added to N, but pleads that their additions were nat inconsistent with the Nicenc creed and concerned
matters which had not becn raised at the time of Nicae. The
date and authorship of the dialogue are uncertain, but it must
have been wrirten prior to the outbreak of the Nestorian convoversy, and recent scholarship has produced an irnpressive
case for attributing it to D i d p u s the Blind (3 r 3-3g8).2 It ma7
therefore well belong to the decade irnrnediately following t h e
counil of 381. Again, Theodore of Xiopsuestia, in his commcntary on th Wiccoc crecd,3 nftcr arcribing thc wholc of it
down to the words AND IN THE HOLV SPIRIT to the Nicene
fathers, declared that thc more devcloped tesching about the
Spirit which followed was due ta " the Bthers who carne &ter
them". The ini tiative, he said, was taken by a synod of Western
bishops, but was confirmed by a Iater gathering of Eastern
bishops. A few pages later4 he repeated his point, again affirming that "the doctors of the Church, who assembled from ali
parts of the earth and who were the heirs of ehe first blessed
fathers," endorsed the Nicene faith but added clauses about
the Holy Spirit. We noticed above that Diogenes of Cyzicus
took the same line, though with regard to a different clause
of C, at Chalcedon, saying that FROM THE HOLP SFIRIT AND
THE: VIRGIN MARY had bcen inserted by " the holy fathers who
carne. IaterFY.5The same tradition, as we saw earlier, regarding
the activities of the x j o fathers was rnaintained in orthdou
and Monophysite circles after Chalzdon.
It is not surprising, in the light of these and similar consderations, that the traditional theory that the council of 381 was
Dd.dtjanc. trin. g, i (P.G.28, 1204).
: Cf. E.

Stolz, TkvIogi~ch.tQuartnEshrifi Ixxxvii, rgo5, 395T., and the very

thorough study liy ilnseim GdniIicir, O.S.B., iii Siudta A n s t b t a n ~XI, Roine, igqr.
a Cf.A. Mingana's edition, Woodbrwke Stuciar~V (Combridge, 1932)~
93.
' Ibid. I 0 1 f.
See abovc, p. 299 (A.C.0, 11, I, i , 91).
E,C.C.-T

33O
THE
Again they wrore :

CONSTAN??NOPOLlTAN

33l

'TOWARDS A SOLm'ION

CREED

We decree ihat the exposition of the right and bIameless faith of

the 318 boly and blrssed fathers, assernbled at Nicaea in the time
of tbe crnperor Constantinc of pious mernoq-, should be pre-eminent
(.rrp&pnc~v ~ ' L E Itvhilc
Y ) , thc dccisions of the 150 holy father
.
should dso hold goodl.

..

Later still in the Definition they declared that the council

has decreed primarily that ihe creed oF the 3 18 holy fathers shouId
remain invioIate; and on account of thoe ~ r ~ hcontend
o
against t h e
Holy Spirit, it razifies the teaching subsequently set forth by the
I j o hofy f a t h e ~asembled in the royal city conceraing rhe essence
of the Spitit, nw as adducing an?zhing Ieft Ia&g
by their predecessor~,but making distinct by Scriptural testirnanies their conception concerning tlie HoIy Spirit against those ~ v h owere tqing
to set aside His sovereignty.-

" I r e get the irnpression ", remarked Pre J. Lebon,3 " tl~at,
except for special reasons, the ChaIcedonian fathers wouId have
preferred to have recalled simply the Sicene creed. . . Their
sperial reason for acordiny an apress and distinct mention to
the intewention of the Gnstantinopolitan fathers is given by
the bishops sf Chalcedun in the r7ery t e m s in which they
define the nature of the work of the second general council in
regard to the formula of faith. For t hem the Constantinopolitan
fathers reeived the syrnbol of the 318 and set their seal on the
same Fai th, but tliey also, against the Fneumatomchi, clarified
- their thought, ~ 6 t happropriate Scriptural referentes, about
the HoJy SpiLit.'"
The conlusion to which we are thus drawn is one which,
while rejecting the Hort-Harnack hypothesis of a purely
accidental association of C with the counil of 381, avoids thc
radica1 alternative espoused by Eduard Schwartz and such
English scholars as Badcock, viz. the theory that the council
actually propounded a new creed of its owri and elevated it
to a position parallel to that of N. It seerns clear that tbe
council's only ohject was to restare and promote the Nicene
faith : only, in doing this i t availed itsetf in some way or other,

probably in the course of some extended statement d its

teaching, of the formutary now known as C. This creed setrned
to it, in harmony with current usage, ta bc " the faith of the
Nicene fathess", but that faith set forth in a fosm better
adapted than N for dealing with the heresies of ihe hour. In
adopting this view of the matter we are in effect returning to
the position held by many scholars before Hort rind Harnack
had worked out their critique of the tradition. J. R. Lurnby,
for cxample, in his Hki%r)l af t h ~Cre~ds,pubtished in 3873,
dtveloped his argument along similar Iines. "o too 'IV. Bright,
in his weltknaum Canom ofthe FirsirsfFour General Councils 1880),
made the point2 that "th-e mernbers oF the council of 381 A.D.
would not consider themselves to be in any sense invalidating,
but rathet confiminp and perpetuating, the forrnulary of A.D.
325, when they adopted, with hardly any change, a development of It " tr-hich they found in St Epiphanius' Ancoraliis. In
this chapter zve have not been ready to accept the text of St
Epiphanius as it stands, but perhaps tlie case we have set out
has given rene~vedweight and additional dai-ity tu \\+lint is
wsentially a conservative position.
P.

63 r.

1'. tki r.

THE HOLN SPIRIT TN C

T H E TEACIIING AND HISTORY OF

3 38
Fiaptismal crted with which they were working (St Cyril had
clwelt on thc cloctrine in his catechetical instructions), i and
that its presencc there was one of the fctors suggesting that
this particuiar formula was well adapted to their purposen.

While the anti-Apollinarian bias of tlie clame about Christ's

birth is not unarnbiwously dear, there can be no doubt as to
tbe polemical bearing of the next cIause in C to eIabrate and
extend the teaching o f the original Xicene creed. This is, of
course, the sentence OF h-OSEKISCDOM THERE SHALL BE NO
END. These words, taken bodily fsom S t Luke ( I , 331, were
aimed at the doctrine, attributef to MarcelEus of iincyra, that
the relationship of Sonship in the Godhead w a limited to the
Incarnation, and would diappear when the p u v e s for which
thc ll'ord became incarnate had been acomplished. The
It-ord weuId tken a p i n become, what H e had been from a11
eternity, immanent in the Father, ll'ho lmdd be a11 in all.2
We saw in Chap. I'; that anti-llarcellan clausw, expressed in
these or similar terms. were incorporated in most of the Estern
conciliar reeds constructed in the 'forties and 'fifries of the
fourth century: they tcstify to the dread in rvhich l*iarcellris's
views were held. The words thernsdves made an appearance
in the creed cornmented upon by St Cyih of Jerualem, who
gave his animosi. against the heretic fuF1 rein : "If ever you
hear anyone saying that there is an end te the kingship of
Christ, hate the heresy. I t is another head of the dragon whih
has sprouted latelv in the region of Galatia."3 MarceZlus died
in 374, and the excitement over his dangcrous doctrines had
to a large extent passed away. Yet so late as 337 St Basil's
letten reveal that they were still feared, and that there waq
opposition to restoring to communion too easily those tvho
shared thern.4 The Marcellians and the Photinians (followers
of Marcellus's extremist disciple and ally) were among the
Ileretics sinsled out for condemnation in the first canon of the
WCF.Cai. 1 2 (P.E. 3 3 , 7 1 5 ff.).
8 Sec xbovc,
4

I=F.Epp.g6$.5:265,3 (P.G.39,981;988f.).

33c
council of Constantinople. The council's obkct, rnai~ifestly,wa
to dispose ane and for a11 of a11 the varioiis heresies by which
the pure teaching of the Nicene faith had been embarrassed
since its fomulation, and sine it was platina the Arians and
their successors under its ban, it was fitting that those whose
error Iay on the Sabellan side should be proscribed as well. In
aEl probability the dause or WHOSE KTNGDOM, etc., alreadv stood
in the creed which the r 50 fathers took over and made their
own, It was an item in St Cyril's creed as early as 348, and
it must have spread to other creecl of theJemsailem and re'lated

I
I

farniIies.
The ban on MarcelIus" doctrine has seemed to some scholars,
not altogether jwtIy, as a mere pro forma re-enactment of anathernas which had become conventional. But thc third article
of the Constantinopolitan Creed byond question represented
a development of and advance on the teachng of K which the
controvmies of the hour made imperative. Severa1 of the
redenda listed iu it-the Church, baptism, the remission of
sins, the resurrection of the dead, the life of the world to come
-were perfectly norma1 constituents of the third article of
Eastern baptismal fomularies. The clauses in which the distinccive i d a of the second general cauncil found an outlet
were thme concerned with the doctrine of the Holy Spjrit.
The heretics against whom they were directed were the
Pneurnatornachans, otherwise known as 1,Iacedonians. (The
latter name, which later historians liked to use, was scarcely
appropriater the Serni-..Zrian hlacedonius, ~ v h o had been
bishop of Constantinople behveen 341 and his deposition in
360, was not realiy the founder of the party called after hirn.)
IVhile the Arian controversy was at its heipht, the problems
raised by the status of the Holy Spirit had been kept in the
background, aithough neither Arius himself nor his fdlowers
liad concealed their view that the third Person oF the divine
Triniiry, like the second, was to be ranked with the creatures.
In the late 'fifties, however, of t21e fourth century His true
nature and position began to be rnatters of public discussion.
About this time, as we Iearn from thc lettersl which St Athanasius addressed (356-362) to St Serapion, bisliop of Thmujs in the
P.C. 26, 529-676.

'CNE 'LEACHING AND HIS'I'ORY OF C

341
(WY uPmv) was the Septuagint equivaIent of the Hebrcw
Tahwch, though its use was too widespread in the Hellenistic
world for it to be decisive. The aI1-important clause, however,

iva

W H O IVITH I X E FATHER Ah'D THE SOX IS T'OGETIEER WOR-

The expressions used alrnost

reprduced St Athanasius's owm choice of words, "'Who Is
glorified with the Father and the Son."l Even more strikingly
did i t reflect St Basil's usage. He had spoken of " that sound
doctrine acordiny to which the Son is confessed as homoousjos
wftIi the Pathet, and the Roly Spirit is nurnbered together wihi
Them and worshipped together rvith Them with identical
honour (posrpw r r w a p ~ @ ~ rTf E~ aua;
~ ( T W ~ ~ T ~ E F T U ~ } 'Hc
'.~
11ad also writteri.:3 "Glorifying the Holy Spirit with the
Father and the Son because of the conriction that He is not
alien from the divine nature. For that which i3 foreign in
riatiire could not have shared in thc same honours." TIx
starting-point of his rreatise De Spiritu sancto was his desire to
demoi~stratethe legitimacy of a doxology giving glory te thc
Father "with tlie Son and with the Holy Spirit ". The burden
of its central section" was the dernonstration af the identity of
honour (Oporcp;a) enjoyed by the Spirit with the Father and
the Son. For St Basil these phrases "congEorification" ancl
" identity of honour " had a very definite rneaning : t h q were
the equivalent of "consubstantial" since their applicability
was based on identity of being.6
A feature of t h i 5 article about the Spirit which is at first
sight somewhat puzzling is the comparative miIdness of its
tone. The criuncil oF onstantinople, our records say, took its
stand on the full consubstantiaIi~of the Holy Spirit with the
Godhead. Ir was because they ould not stomach this, apparently, that the Macedonian representatives decided to take
their departure. yet t h e clause we are studying scrupulously
avoids the term h o r n o ~ ~and
o ~ contents itself, apart from the
mention of the cvorship and bonour due to the Spirit, with
SHIPPED .WD TOGETHER GLORIFIED.

CP.Ad Strnp. i,3r ;Ad Iov. adjn. (P.G. 26, Gor ; 820).
32,473).
' Ep. 159,22IP-G(P.G.32, 621).
'' IJafi. 9-14 (P.G.32, 108- 173).
EP. W,

For a tull d~rcussionof St Baail's position and the significance for Iiiin oF
Iwmtirnns, aee the edition of Dc Sj)irrlu sanclo by B. Pruche, O.P., 12 ff: (editions
du

CrrJ, Paris, i 946).

biblical phraes which, however unexceptionable if pressed,

could be accepted by the Macedonians in their own sene.
Ssholars have pointed to rhis faca as onclusive evidence that
this article could not be the work oF the comcil, which must
havc cxpressed itself in rnuch more dccisive Ianpaqe if it had
made a credai pronouncemtnt on the Spirit. yet such ar@ments k t r a y a curious failure to understand tHe historical
situation. The aim of Theodosius in summoeing the council
was genuinely conciliatorv, and he had insisted on includiny
a quota of Macedonian bishops i n his invitation. Acording to
Socrates,' "the emperor and the bihops who s h a d the same
faith spared no efforts to bring Eleusius and his party into unitv
with them". Renewed eEorts to win them over were to be made
a couple of years late+ : hopes ran high that the Church might
be reunited on the basis of the Nicene faith. At the same time
it must be remembered that not aU in the orthodox ranks felt
completely easy about the frank description of the Roly Spirit
as God and as consubstantial with the Father and tlie Sari
which was beoming de rigueur. Their leaders generally, starting
with St Athanasius, had deliberately exercised restraint in their
language about the Spirit. St Basil, En particular, practised a
diplomatic caution which was sometimes harslhly judged in
more uncompromising cirles,a and even in the De Spinru
sondo, while in effect pleading for the doctrine af consubstantiaBtv, had desisted from using the t e m . There is a rwealing
passage in one of the sermons of St Gregos of Xazianzus,
preached almot contemposaneously with the council, in
which, expatiahg on the prcvaiiing unertaint). about the
real status of the Roly Spirit, he admined that some of
those who held Him to be God kept this as a pious opinion to
thernseIves.4
Bearing these points in rnind, we can appreciate that C's
fim but ternperately worded theology of the Spirit mau well
have corrwponded exactiy to the teaching which the 150
fathers felt it advisable to incorporate in their creed. In thcir
Hiri. CECI(. 5 , R (P.G. 67, 577).
Socrat., Wist. CECI. 5, 1 0 (P..
67, 588 r.).
CT, the anecdote told by St &eg; ~ a z . Ep.
; 58 (P.G. 37, I i6). Sct alm
QraZ. 43, 68 (P,G. 36, 588).
"Oral. 31, 5 (P.G. 35, 137).

Iiioi

344
'THE TEAWING AED IUSTORY OF C
discussions with the Ifacedonians at the h t session of the
council t h q could hardly conceal their acceptance of the consubstantiality of the Spirit. S o doubt they pressed Eleusius
ancl his supporters to join 14th them in acknowledging the
homoousion. But C rvas a reed intendcd for widespread popular use : iS it was to be regarded as thcir version of the Nicene
faith, it was natural that thcy should show a certain reserve.
They had both those within their own ranks who were s t i l not
whoIly oiiverted and ttie Macedonians, of whose conversion
they had not given up a11 hope, to think about. Hoivcver boldly
they had exprmsd themselves at rhe council, or in the fuller
official exposition of their teaching sent te Pope Damasm, the
creed stood apart as a specially binding formula, and in the
ciscnmstances it was dcsirable that its wording, while fim and
to the point, should steer clear of provoca6on.

As canonized by the council of Ctinstantnople and reafirmed in the Chalcedonian Definition, C, like the original
Xicene reed, appeared in the guise oF a formal tmt of orthodox
belief: Tfierc is every reason to suppose, hotr-mer, that it was
also ernployed from early times as a baptismal confession. Such
had probably been i& original funcrion before the 150 fathers
appropriated it, and its smooth-fl owing style and balanced
theologica1 content marked it out for liturgical use. It is not
unlikely that it was established in Constantinople and the surrounding region before 451 as t11e oficial baptismal creed. It
would be natural for Constantinople, a city whose church life
had been presided over mainly by Arians since St Alexander's
death, to adopr the orthodox reed of 381 for catechetical
purposes. This would help to explain the marked eagerness with
tvhich the imperial comrnjssioners and the eccIesiastica1 spokernenof Constantinople pressed its claims at Chalcedon. That &ler
4j"it was the baptismal creed oE the Constantinopolitan church
scarceIy admi t s of doubt. As ilIustrations of the fat we may note
that Basiliscus, in his encyclical issued in 475, declared rhat he and
a11 the faithful before him had been Isaptized with the Nicene
creed ;while Zeno in his Hcnoticon (482) spoke of the creecl of tlie

Ii

THE BAPTISMAL USE

OF

345

318 fathers as confimed by the I jo father as the only symbol

with ~r.hihChristians were baptized.1 Yet the context maka it
pIain &ar they rm-e thiiinking of C as the complete, definitive
f o m of the Kicene creed. JVhen shortly aftenvards C was

interpolated into the Bucharist at Constanhople, we are

distinctly told that hitherto it had been used as the baptismal
creed.2
In process o time, however, C was destined to become the
sole baptismal creed of a11 the Eastern churches. A few cornmunities detached from the cen-1 stream of Orthodoxy, such
as the Jacobite church of Syria,3 and the S e s t ~ R a nArmemans
,~
and Abyssiniane cfiurches, continue to ernploy creeds marked
wibh traits dratvn from S. But, broadly speaking, C , to all
intents and purposes in its original fom, has enjqed a monopoly of baptism since the sixth century. Thc stages af itr progress
to this unique pesition cannot now be traced in detail, but it is
apparent that they were not accomplished a11 at once. At first
the practice in the East was to insert the Nicene key-words into
the frarnework of local baptismal creed : the creed of Antioch
ited by John Cassian is an obtlom exarnpIe. Later, in the fifth
centufu prior to Chalcedon, fomuIaries were in use a t baptism
which bore a remarkable resemblance to C, as \rvesaw when
we studied the reeds of Yestotius and Theodore of Mopsuestia.
There is no real basis for the w+despread view that N in its
pure f o m was frequentiy used at baptism, or indeed that it
was ever used at all. The assumption that it was has to explain
how a creed so manifestIy defective, particularly in its meagre
tliird artide, cauld ever have lent itself to catechetical purposes.
What has given currency to this view js the failure to appreciate that it was regular to describe any fomulary which was
loyal to the Xicene tradition as '-the faith of Xicaea". After
Chalcedon the process of bringing local creeds into line ~vitjth
C was accelerated, altliough the iwitjng of FhiIoxenus of
Hferapolis (Jlabbugj' and Set-erus of ,4ntPmh5 show that
%

Evagrius, Hist. itcl. 3, 4 m d r 4 (P.C. 86,2600 and fiz+)Cf.Thcodorus Lector, Hid. ecct. 2,frog. 32 (P.G.
86,201).

Hahn 128.
4 Hahn 132,
"ahn
136.
Hahn 141.
He died drca 523. Cf. his De rina C sancta Trinitatc rncorpwato ti parso dissert. I
(Pairo/. Osient. XV, 489 L).
He died in 538. Cf. his Lib. con. irn). grmnin. 3, i I (Corp.~ c r i p Chtist.
.
Orimf.,
Script. Syr.,Ser. ]V, Tom. v, r.+q : cd. J . Lcbon, Louvain, rgzg).
a

TIIE TEACHING AND HiSTORY OF C

354
mass. O n the othcr hand, Aeneas o Paris (i8 7 1 ) ~writing
about thc middle of the same century,l speaks of '"the Catholic
faith, which on Sunday the entire church of the Gaub chants
at mass ". Thtre are two outstandingly irnportant passage,
however, which point Sie way to Sie m e solution. The
first is by Walafrid Strabo, abbot of Reichenau ($849), and
deserves to be reproduced in fdf.?
"The syrnbol o l the Catholic faith", he wrote, "is rightly rehearsed
in the solemnities OS the m a ~ s&r the gospd, so that by means oC
the holy gmpel wc rnay believe ~ i t the
h heart unto righteousncss,
and by rneans af thc creed onfession may be made with the lips
unto salvation. And it is u~orthnoting that the reason why the
GreekJ transposed that creed (rathw than another) which we, in
imitarion oi thern, have adopted in t h e mass into a mmicd chant,
was because it was the peculiar codession of &e c o d of Constantinople. Ptrhaps BISO it seerned more suitable for setting to
mwic than the Sicene creed, which was prior in time. Furthermore,
they tvknted the p i e l of the faithfid, at &e celebration of the sacrarnmts, to counter the poisons of heretim ~ 4 t hthe mediune concocted in the imperial city itself. From there the usage is believed
to have passed to rhe Romans. Among the Gauls and Gerrnam,
however, the same a e e d began to be repeated more wideIy and
kequently (latiu ri crcbrius) in thc euchansc ofEces after the depsition of the heretic Felix, who rr-as condemned in the reign oE tht
glorious Charlcs, ruler of the F~anks."

Our second irnportant context is an account, preserved by

the abbot Smaragdus,J of a conference held in 810 between
Pope Leo I11 and three delegates, or missi, sent to Rome by
Cliarlemagne. The passage is too long to print in fulI, and in
any case the barbarousness o f the Latin does not onduce to
eiegance of translation. The real topic of discussion was the
Iegitimacy of including the words AND FROM THE SON in the
creed in the clause about the procession of the Holy Spirit.
Indeed, the purpose of Charlemagne's embassy to the Pope
may well liave been to extract from h i n some sort of oficia1
endorsement for tht inclusian of the contraversial phrase in
the creed. Thc gist of the Pepe's reply was that, while he had
1

Adv. Grm. 93 (P.L. 121, 72.1).

Dc m/.vrrm cxord. et incrmr. 22 (P.L,E 14,947).
P.L. i02, g7 r r.; also Mvn. Cerm. Hist., Comi. 11,240 ff.

C IN TIIE HOLY EUCHARIST

355

given his licence for &e singing of the reed in the royal chapcl
at Aachen and elsewhere in GauI, he ttad neves sanctioned
AND FROM THE SON. Thc interesting point which emerges, so
fas as we are concerned at the rnornent, is that the singing of
the creed in the Frankish rite had been approved in Pope Leo's
reign, i.e. at some date after 795. This agr-ees exactly with Walarid's independent statement that the custorn began after the
deposition of Felk the heretic. Felix, we know, was the famous
Adoptionist bishop of Urge1 in Spain (there was a great outbreak of Adoptionism in Spain in the losing decacles of the
eighth centuryj, who Jvas finally condemnd and obliged to
make his submission at a counil rvhich met at Aachen in
October 798. W7e mau observe, in passing, that the position
assigned to the creed by the Franks was that which it now
occupia h the ITest, r i z . immediately after the gospel. Evidently they were an-are that they were breaking 14th the
practice elsewhere (e.g. in Spain), for llTafafrid thought it
proper to supply an edif'inq justification for the Fm&sh
position.
Ire have not yet, however, exhausted rhe impottance of
'ZVaEafrid's d d e n c e . It need not be supposed that he had
rnerely a chr~no~ogical
intent in citing the deposition of Fefix.
The unmistakable innuendo of his rvords is that the Adoptionist
contro'c-ersygave an impetus to the liturgical innovation. Canfirmation of bis insinuation annot be looked for in the acts
of the counciI of Aachen, for they are lost. Rut there are strong
reasom for supposing that St Paulinus of Aquileia, who took a
Ieading part with Mcuin in nishing the Adoptionist outbreak,
deliberatelg fixed upon the Constantinopolitan Creed as the
most effective Instrument for suppressing the heresy. Hn all this
he had AIcuin behind bm.For example, at his synod at Cividale de1Friuli in 796 or 797, after inveighing eloquently against
Adoptionism, he advised the assembly that the hesr nostrum
against errers of this kind was the reed of Constantinople.
He dcclared in so many words that the true doctrine with
which to counter Adoptionism was inculcated mucli better
by the creed than by anything else, and he enjoined the
learning of the creed by heart on his clergy.1 A close anaEysis of
"m.

Gemi. Hist.,

Cencil. Ir, i 80 f. ; iBg.

C IN TIIE HOLY EUCHARIST

the Caroliiigjan text of the creed, which is approximately tliat

used in the Wmt to-day, shows that it is identical with the one
promulgated on that occasion hy S t Paulinus. In the light of
tlris acknow1edgiid policy of his, and the fact that the text irulated in Charlemagne's dominions was drafted under his
influence, it js dificult to resist the conclusion that tlie chief,
if not the only, motive for bringing the cseed into the mass wa
thc desire to rol1 back the menace of Adoptioaisrn.l The practice, it shouId bc pointed out, would not have smck people as
at a11 revolutionary. The Carolingian empire extended far d o m
into Spain, and tlius included provinces where the creed had
bcen chanted at mass since the d a p of king Reccared ; and it
is highly likely that the custom prevaiied in the nortli of
England too. I t i s this fact which explains l t T a l a f r i d ' otherwise
puzzIiny staternent tliat the repetition of the creed became
"more widespread and frequent" after the deposition of Fclix.
Thc placinz of rhe creed in the Frankish sewice after the gospel
probably betrays the influence o5 Alcuin. Coming from Xorthurnbria, where tiie creed ma7 hatte been sung at this point, he
was probably responsible for the preference being given to it
rather than to the Spanish position.
IIeanwhiEe the Roman church, with the whole ecclesiastical
region subject to its liturgical swap, held aIoof with haracteristic conservatism and refraincd fmm f a l h g into Eine 14th
the new fashion. The student should be on his guard against
taking too Iiterally sta tements Iike that of Walafrid that " frum
there (i.e. Constantinople) the usage is believed to have passed
to the Rornans ". Probahly this represents what Frankish liturgists wanted to think, and perhaps sincerely did think, alt hough t he qualifying word cr~diturreads iike a twinge uf misgiving. We should be cautious, t o ~ ,about s ~ c ha refercnce
as thut of Amalarius of Metz, in his Eclogae de oJcio missae,?o
the Roman custom of saying the creed. The book is probably
a tenth-centurycompilation ; and, in any case, what the author
had in mind was not the practice of the Roman church itself,
but the Ordo Romanus which Pope Leo's predecessor, Hadrian 1,
On all this sec thc

I~IIC.
~nlld.il 192;9+
7 11:
P,L.155, 1 3 2 3 .

very suggeutive article by

Dom B. Capelle in Rah.

th(ioI,

357
had sciit to tlie Gallic churcli at the request OS Char.lcliiag~le,1
and into which rubrica1 directions regarding thc creed had
probably crept. All the really solid evidence (e.g. Smaragdus's
report of the interview between the missi and Pope Leo) leax*es
the lear irnprasion that the recitation of the creed at mass
was frowned on at Rome.
Two hundred years had to pass before another emperor,
perhaps a I s s famous figure in European history than Charlemagne, but the batower offavours on the Pope which the Iatter
may well have Telt obliged to repay, succeded in inducing one of
Leo's successoss to bring the Roman usaqe into conforrnity 14th
the rest of Christendorn. Abbot Berno af Reichenau, who
was himself an e-wjtness, tells the story of haw the emperor
Henry 11, visiting Rome in ror4 for his coronahon, was
shwked to discol-er that the mass celebrateci there still lacked
a creed.'
"If we," wrote Berno, "as is often stated, are rorbidden to sing the
angelic hynn on feastidays because the Roman clcrm do not sing
it, we ma?- in like manner leave unsaid the r e d afttr the gospel,
lxcause the Roman never sang it even up to the time of the ernperor
Henry of blessed memory. But bing asked by the said emperor in
my prescnce why this was theu practice, T heard them +e an
answcr of this nature, that the Roman chutch had never been
taintcd with any &eg of heresv, but sernaincd unshaken in the
soundness of the CathoIic faith according to the teachinq of St Peter.
and so ir was more needfd for that s)?nbol to bc sung frequently Liy
those who might be suliied bg anv heresy. But the h r d emperoi did
not desist unta with generaI onsent he persuaded the apostolic Lord
Bcnedict that they should chant t he s?mliol at t11r public mas<."

1
1
8

I
I

The Pope was already heavily in Henry's debt for assistame

in overcoming the rival pseudo-pope Gregory in ror 2, and i i i
general his position vis-&vis thc ernperor made cornpliiincr
with his requests sound comrnon-sense in mat ters like this. Tn
any case Rome was at t1iis period very much undcr the liturgical influence of the German church, and the adoptioil oi tlie
creed was rnerely the climax of a long series of borrnwings.3

For the Pope's letter, see Moii. Gcrm.HiJi., EM.111,696,

W. his L Q d . dt quiblrrdam rcbw ud tnrsr. o8.r. lirrlin, (P.L.1 p, irif;o 6).
Cr. Tli, Klau~er,Historischrs j'ahrburh liii, ~ g g g ,r 69 fl'

358

THE TEACWING AND HISTORY OF

CuriousIy intertwined with the seria of iacidents by which

&e creed worked its way into the Eucharist is the problem of

rhe fatefid interpolation in the third article which, ever since the
tighth century, has been one of the most explosive topics of
debate betrveen the churches of East and JYest. For many
hundreds of years the text of C accepted in the Latin church
and its daughtec ommunion~Iras contained the clause PRO~ E E D W GFROM THE FATHER AND THE SON (jliuque) of the Holy
Spirit. The Orthodox churches of the East have remained
fiercely, even fanatically, attached to the more primitive PROCEEDING FROM TRE F.~TWER.A full discussion of the portentoua
addition in a11 its implications would necessitate an examinazion of at least three questions-the theology of the double
procession, the history of the insertion of the filiogue, and the
histciry ~f tthe long-standing quarrel between East and West
over it. Here we shalI. be mainIy concerned with the second,
although a few rcmarks about the first must be set down by
way of prefacc. Thc third belonp by rights to the fiefd of church
history proper rather t h n the smdy of creeds.
50 far as theology is concerned, the doctrine that the third
Person derives His being equally and coordinately from the
first and the second was charatcristic, in its fully deveIoped
forrn, of Western Trinirarianism and, in particular, of St
Augussine's presentation of it. From the days of TertuIlianl
the typi-I-formula had been, "From the Father through the
Son ". 3n tHe fourth century, however, the deeper irnpIication
was extracted from this that the Son, conjointly with the
Father, was atually producti~~e
of the Holy Spirit. The tmt
to which appeal was reqdarly made was the Lord's staternent
in Jn. 16, 14, ' T e (i.e. the Spirit) will receive of mine." In
St Hilarv,z Phoebadius of Agena and St slmbrose,4 while nhis
teaching was cIearIy inculcated, a certain reserve in its fornulatiom was observed, and the affismation tbat the Spirit
1

THE PILIDQUE

procceded from the Son was avoided. St Aups tine, however, felt no
n m d for reticente. His Trinitananism did not start with the
Father as the source of the other two Persons, but 14th the idea
of the one, simple Godhead JVhich in Its essence is Trinity.
TFhe logical developrnent of his thought involved the beIief
that the Holy Spirit proceeded as trul>-fiom the Son as from
the Father, and he did not scruple to expound i t with knkness
and preision on numerous occasions.l He adrnitted that, in
a primordial sense (princ$alitex), the Spirit proceeded from the
Father, bccause it was the Father Who endowed the Son with
the capacity to produce thc HoIy Spirit.2 But it was a cardinal
premiss of his thedogy that whatever could be predicated of
one of the Persons could be predicated of the others. So it was
inevitable that he shouId regard the denial of the double proc&on as violating the iznity arid simplicity of the Godhead.
This way of t h h d h g bearne unimrsallu accepted in the
West in the fifth and s k t h centuries: there could be no more
illuminating instance oT the hold the great African had on
Latin Chriseianity. Greek theologv, however, was by no rneans
prepared to take the bold step whih seemed so easy and natural
to St Augustine. Many passages can be cited from the Eastern
fathers, and have been cited in the course of the Iong, cmbittered controversy, which appear t o approximate to the
doctrine 05 the double procession. One or two writers, like
St Epiphanius,3 may even havtve succumbed to the infiuene of
their Latin associates so far as to echo their language. Generally
speaking, however, they never lost sight of the idea, which St
Gregov of N y s a brought out forcibIy at the close of his Quod
non sunt tres dii14 that what accounted for the distinctions in the
Trinity wa the fact that one of the Persons stood in the
relation of cause (4a l ~ t o vto
) the other nvo. Thus they found na
dificulty in saying that tbe Spirit proceeddfrom the Father
through the Son, the Son being considered the Father's iinstrument or agent. But they treated it as axiomatic that the Father
alone was the source or fountain-head of Deity, and th5t both

Cf.Adu. Prax. 4 (C.C.L.I I,

r I 62) : spirilum non aliundc pufo quam a jiotrr prrjlium.

Cf. De ttrin. 2, zg; 8,20; 8,26 (P.L. 10,69;rrgo f; 255).
Dcfd orth. 8 (P.L. 20,49). It is possible that tht author ofthis work i s Gregory

'
nf Elvira

359

784 f ; 8 ~ &9.4.
E
3

Cf. n s i n n . 1 5 , 17,29;~ 5 , 2 6 , 4 f(P,L.42,1081 ; 1095).

Clf. Aiircr. 7 , 8 (Holll, tg).
P.C. 45, 133.

THE TE.4CHlND AND HISTDRY OF

360

the San and the Spirit derive$, in the only legitimate sense of
t h t word, from Him, the one by generation and the other by
proccssion. Their srtadfast refasal to fall into line with the
Latins was not the fmit of mere obstinacy, but sprang from an
instintive sense of the deep principie invoIved. 7iVhat realIy
divided East aand M7estin their acnmonious and often unsai70uay
quanel over the Jilioque was a fundamental difference of approach to the problem of the rnustery of the triune Godhead.
Naturallp the leaders of M'estcrii Christianity, while fuIly
accepting and teacIiing the dactrine of the double procession,
were far too cautious and diplomatic to flaunt it ar an official
dogma in the face of Eastern theologians. Gatherings held far
from the centre, like the third council of Toledo (589) and the
E n ~ l i s hsynod of Hatfield (680),1 rnight proclaim the doctrine
and anathematize iits deniers, but the papa. deliberatelu resisted the temptation to cornrnit itself. To take but one erample,
th procession of the Spirit from the Son as well as from the
Father was expressIy taught by St Gregory the Great' (590Gog), but the formula expressing it was carehlly omitted from
the profession of faith put out almost a century later (680)h-!
Pope Agathon in the name of a s y o d held at Rorne.3 So far
a9 creeds are concerned, the double procession made its first
appearance, i t would seem, in Spain, jn a series oflocal formulae
clirected against ihe PrisciIIianist heresy. One OS the most
ancient of these is the so-calted creed of Damasux,4 in iis
original form ascribed to St Jerome, which A. E. Burn identified as the Pope" rreply to thc treatise addressed to him by
Priscillian of Avila in 380. K. Kunstles hazardcd the guess
zhat
actual compilarion H-as tlie work of the s y n d of Saragossa, which condemned the heretic in the same vear, aiid
which mav have scn t it to Damasui: for his approval. Markedly
anti-Friscilfianist in tone, it ontains the statement :"11'e believc
. . . in the Holy Spirit, not bqotten nor unbeyotten, not
created nor made, but proceedin~from the Father and the
Son." Another example is the crced with twelve anatlrcmas
Cf.&de, Hist. eccl. 4, r7 (P.L. 95. rq8f.).

= cf.Mord. r ,

22,30 ; Hom.2 6 , z
1220).

.!3. 3 (PL.87,

"

which has often been fathered on the fint council af Toledo

(400)~'but which Dom Morin suggated "ight be the longlmt Libellm in mudum sgmboli of Pastor, bishop of Gdicia in
. Hese, toa, belief is expressed in "the Spirit, the Paraclere,
.o is neither the Father Hirnself nor the Son, but proceeds
n the Father and the Son "'. hiany other similar texts rnigli t
ue quoted, and the student rnight be tempted to infes that there
was sornething particularly deadly to Priscillianism in the
flzoque. Tlie true explanatiori, however, is that PriscilIianism
was marked with a deep strain of Sabdlianisrn, and ihe refutation of it dernanded a dctililed exposition of Trinitarian teaching. The preenc of thejlioqus in Spanish crecds of this period
rnerely testifies to the popularity of the doctrine in this section
of the Wcstern church.
A vivid illustration of the hold the double procession had on
Spanish Ctiristianity is provjded by the record of e\-ents at
la in 589. At the openin- session
Reccared' councii
ihc king addressed tl
sled bishops and notabIes, dwellinr:
at Iength on his ow
rsion and his earnest desire to do
what he could to set forth the time faith.3 Thercupon he proceeded to recite an exposition of it, In the course of which tIic
following statement occurred :
In equal degree must the Holy Spirit be confessed hy us, and wc
must pr-eah that He proceeds from the Father and the Son and is
of one substance with rhe Father and the Son : moreover, that the
I'erson oi't he Holy Spirit is the third in the TTinity, but that Hr
nevertheicss shares fully in thc divine essence with the Father and
the Son.

Evidentlv the doctrine ~ c c l s regarded as clincking the case

against Arianisrn. Tt implied that the Son, as the soure e q u a l l ~
of rhe Spirit, was in no sense inferior to the Father, and that all
three Persons were completely oordinate and participated
egualIy in the divine essencc. The council followed Reccared's
lead enthusiastically, and drafted the third of its anathemns i ti
the forrn: " Whoever does not believe in the Holy Spirit, or
doe, not believe that He proceeds from thc Father and the

(P.L. 75,541 ; 76, 1198).

For text see Hahn 168 ; also Maii~iIIJ, f 003.

H-Bir. x, 1893, 385 F.
Maiisi IX,977 11.

For texi s c t Halin roo. Cf.A. E. Durn, 245 ff.

Anlipriwillinnn, Frribiirq irn Brrireart, ignj, 46 ff.

II*

362

THE TEACHENG AND HISTORY OF C

Son, and denies that He is coeternal and coequal with the

Father and the Son, let him be anathema."' The suggestion
of thjs langrzage is that, while the doctrine was considered indispensablc, it did not strike the council as revdutionary, but
rather as an accepted asticle of orthodoxy.
It has often been held tiiat the interpolation of the word
JSlioque into the actuaI text of the creed must date from this
occasion. King Reccared formaIEy recited the Kicene creed,
with its anathemas, and the Constantinopolitan Creed as embodying the faith of the first four general councils. l e has seemed
incredible that, after his own forceful langurige on the subject
of the double procession and the enthusiasrn ~ 4 t hwhich the
council took it up, the t e m symbolizing the doctrine should
not have been incorporateci in the creed. The evidence of thc
hlSS, however, is not free from ambiguity on the point. bfany
years ago A. E. Burn drew attention to she fact shat sweral
important hiSS containing the acts of the council either lack
the cmcial word or exhibit it inserted by a later hand.VThe
matter stiu requires investigation, but the conc2usion seems
inescapable that, as original1:- recited at the council of ToIedo,
rhe text of C was the pure one 1vithoutfi1iopue.Yevertheles~it
was inevitable that, with lhe groiving stress laid on the doctrine,
the word should speediIy creep into the creed. Spanish MSS of
the subsequent centuries give abundant iIlustrations of the
proces at work.
The sest af the story is familiar enough. The use of the
jlioqire spread from Spain to Gad, where, even bdore it
Enstalled itseIf in the creed, it found a niche in some ntes in
the Preface of the mass.3 At f i s t the West seems to have been
genuineIy unawase that the doctrine of the double procession
represented a definite advance on, or certainly dafication of,
the teaching of earlier centuries. Thus she synod of Hatfield,
summoned to stabilize the Church against the presumed
Eutychian tendencies of Monotheletism, expressed its Ioyal
Mansi IX, 485.
Cf.his bricp nrticlc in J.rS. ix, 1908,301 f. Unfortunateiy no onc setms to
havc followrd up and confirmtd his researches.
Cf. the first contr~baliaof the third of the Gallian masses of Mone (P.L. 138,
8671, inscribed on a Rcichenau palimpacst dating fmm circn 650: the Spirit is
addresscd as "nubsisting by rnystic procession Trom tbe Father and the Son*

adherence to the decisions of the first five ecumenical councils

and oF the Lateran synod heId in 649 under Pope Martin I.
But the profession of faith which it published ran as follows :
We acknowledge and glorify our Lord Jesus Christ as they (i.e,the
fathers of the general councils) glorified Him, nrither adding nor
subtracting anything, and we anathernarize with h e x t and voice
those whom they anathematized, and we acknowledge those ivhom
they acknowledged, glorifiing God the Father wittiout beginning,
and His only-begotten Son, begotten of tht Father Ixfore all ages,
and the HoIy Spirit prwceeding in an incxprcssiblc manner from tIie
Fathet and the Son, as thme holy apostIcs and prophets and doctors
taught wvhorn we have mentioned.1

Lnguage like this reads a11 the morc sttangely when it is

rernernbered that archbishop Theodorc, who presided at the
symod, had once been a monk at Tarsus and so presumabIy was
familiar with the m e text of the creed. Sooner or later, however, a clash bens-e-een E x t and JVest w a hound
~
to come. Lhe
first round seems to have been fought at the ouncil of Gentilly,
at Easrer 767. The imrnediae subjects under discussion 1%-ere
the worship ofimages and the return of territofies in Italy, to
which Const-antinople f d t it had a clairn, but i t is reported 2
that " the question about the Trinitv was ventiIated between
the Greeks and the Romans, and whether the Holy Spirit
pmceeds from the Son in the samc way as H e proceeds from
the Father". Apparently what happencd was that the TVestern
delcgates accused the arnbassadors of t he emperor Constantine
V [Copronymus~of neglect in the matter of the worship ef
images, and thcy retorted with a reproach about the improp"ety of insertingjlioqut?into the creed.
The dispute which had shus flared up almost aecidentaIIy
rvas not long in developing into a steadv blaze. Pippin, king of
France, who had been present at the counci1 of GentiIly, died
in 768, and his son and successor, C h a r l e m a ~ e took
,
up the
JIioque &h sornething Iike fervour, using every opportunity to
parade it before the horrifred East and trying his best to inducc
the papacy to lend him its moral and pratical support. A

' Rede, Hist. ecd. 4, I 7 (P.L. 95, igg).

"{ansi

XI], 677; Ado Virnnensis,

(P.I,,i n3,

~hr01t.

125).

364

good exarnple was the remonstrance he addressed to Pope

Hadrian I in 794. The Patriarch of ConstantinopIe, Tarasius,
had irculatcd a letter ta the clergy of Antioch, Alexandria and
Constantinoplc giving a creed expressing helief in the procession of thc Holy Spirit from t h Father
~
aIone, and it appeared
that Haciririn hacl given his assent to this confession at the
scventh general council helcl iit Nicaea in 787. Charlernagne
rebuked thc Popc for adrnittins such erraneous doctrines as
those of Tarasius, " who professes that the Holy Spirit proceeds
not from the Father and the Son, nccording to thc faitIi of tlie
Kiene svrnbol, but from the Father through the Son ". The
Pope in his seply, written also in 794, defended the Patriarh,
arsniins that his tlieolop- was not his own, but was conscinant
\iith the teahjng of rnriny ancient fathers rind ~s-iththe practicc
oSthe Rornan churli.'
In the same y i s t hc f;/inr/ile rcccived great putilii 1:- ;i[ tlir
synod of Frat~kf~irt-on-lc1ai11,
which mct to condemn +c
Adoptionist heresy nnd its chief supporters, Elipandus of ToledrI
and Felix of UrgeI. Charlemagne wa present in person? and
the Pope was rcpresented by legates. -4mong the docurnents
read out was thc Libcllt~softhe Italian bishops agahst Elipandus, which was probably thc work d St PauLinus of AqtiiIeia.
Here the doctrinc of the double procession I\-= vigorou~ly
asscrted.2 Latcr in the proceedings a letter of Charlemagne's
to Elipandus and the other Sparrish bishops wa read out, and
appended to this was a f o m of creed h whch he, too. proclairned belfef in the double procession."wo
yean later, in
796 or 797, at the synod of Cividale which St Paulinus summoned, the symbol set forth was C with thejlfiliogacin the third
article.4 n his jnauqurnl addsess St Paulinus skilfullv justifrccl
jts insertion : jt no korc violated the principie tliat new creeds
must not be framcd than did the alterations which the fathers
of 38 r had felt obfiged to make in N. It had becorne necessai-y
to interpolate A N D FROM THE SON "OR aount of those bereiics
who whisper that the Holy Spirit is of the Father aIone".b We
need not daubt that thc form in which the creed was sung in
Hi.ri., F$p. V, 7 ff.
M o n . C;crni. Hist., finei!. 11, 163.
Moti. Gcrrn. Htst., Lonctl. 11, 182.

1 A f f ~ t t .Fcrin.
9
6

THE FIL10QUG

'1'1IXS TEACITING AND IIISTORY OF C

Alan. Getm. Hisi., Comil. 11, I gG.

' Mori. Germ.Hist., C m i i . 11. i U 7.

365

the royal chapel ai Aachen, and in the Frankish dominions

generally after 798, aIso contained thc dis~iutedclause.
Nevertheless the papacy had not becn tvon over to accept
it, and Charlemagne, who saw the Jlioqtre ns a tnirnp-card
against the Eastern ernpire, could not rest until he had persuaded Rome to fall into line with his policy. Ht made a strong
attempt to do so an the occasion of the troublesome incident
which took plae at Jerusalem in 808. There was a convent
of Latin rnonks setsled on Mount Olitret, and these were
treated as hereti and threatened with expulsion by their
Orthodox neighbours because they c hanted the Constantinopolitan Creed at mass with the addition of AVD FROY THE
s o ~ SaturalIy
.
t h q resisted, protested rheir rights in the rnatter,
and addressed a letterl to Leo I I I complaininp: and inquiring
what they should do. They requested him to inform Charlemaqne, for it was in his chapel that they had htard the creed
suny 14th thejliope. The Pope, it appears. first af a11 sent rhem
a profmsion of faith aimed at rhe Easern churches and affirminq the procmion of the HoIv Spiric from the Father and the
SOII.'
Then he iaformed the ernperor of t h t affair. I t was as a
result of these happeninp that Charlemagne, wha assurned dze
role of protector of Christians in the H01y Land, commissionecl
Theodulphus of Orleans to write his treatise DFSpiritu S ~ ~ C S O "
and assernMed a council at Aachen in 8 9 - 1 a. The delegates
present approved and endorsed Theodulphus's book, pronouned in favour of thejliopt, and possibly even enjoined its
addition to the creed.4 It was: as a. consequence o f this gathering
that Charlemagne sent that ernbassy to Leo I1 I of which abbot
'Smaragdus preserved an account. As his report of the conversation still shows, the envoys used a11 their arts on the Popc
without av,ziE. With Roman conservatism, and a shrewd
scnse that if he yielded he would put hfrnself in an awkward
positioi~vis-&vis tPic East, he parried their ingenious argumenis, The doctrinal truth conveyed by thejlioqiie, he freely
adrnitted, was essentiai to orthodoxy, bu t not nll essential
rruths were enshrined in the creed. He adrnitted, too, that he
1

CT. Ep. ptrrgrin. monnch. (P.L. i ng, I 257 ff.).

a.E#, 15 (P.L.1 0 2 , 1090 ff,, and rfg, rz6o ir.).
P.L.

105

239 E.

q o n . Gtrm. Hist.,

Cancil. 11, 235

r.

TIKE RECF,IF'ED 'TES'S

3 69
so-called Ordo Rornanrr~ontiquiis, rvhicli hr tnade the openin~:
sectioii nf his influential De diDinis catholicnc ecclesiac o&ciis nc
ministPnis, published in bis cathedral civ in 1568.1 It is identical
with t h e one which was authoritative in the iVest in the later
rniddlc ages, and which t he reformers thernscIvcs adopted as
their norrn-esept that Luther read CH~ISTIAS for C~THOLIC.

THE APOSTLES' CREEB

I

Credo i n dcum patrcm omnipotcntcm,

NEXTto the Constantinopolitan Creed, the most important

confessional formulary in Christendom is the so-alled Apostles'
Creed. Except in Anabaptist circles, its authority was generally
recognized at the Reformation, Martin Luther singling it out
as one of the threc binding sumrnaries of belief, and both Calvin
and Zwingli including it arnonq their doctnnal norms. The
Enslish church has gven it unu'iual prorninence by requiring
i t s recitation twice daily at rnorning and evening prayer. It
has neveir ranked arnong the theologial standardr;, and consequently has no pIace in tAe Piturq-, of the Eastern Orthodox
churches, but the suspicion 14th which they one regarded i t
has long disappeared. In the ttventieth cenhiqr its prestige
Iras been enhanced and extended by its acknowIedgement
hy severai ecurnenicd gatherings as a uniquely authoritative
statement of Clvistian belief. I n 1920, for exarnpie, it was put
forward by the Lambeth Conference, in its famous Appeal to
a11 Christian people, as one of the four pillars (the Hol y Scriptuses, the two dominicd sacrarnents, and the ministry were
the others) on which the visible unity of the Church rnight be
ereted.1 Sirnilarly, at the World Conference on Faith and
Order which met at Lausanne in t927, churchmen from the
East as well as the U'est recited it in unison at thc opening
session, and joined in acclaiminp i t as a fittinq exprcsiion of
the Christian rnessage2.
T h e text of tht A4posnlesTreed,in its Latin and its English
dress, is printed below. The Latin orresponds exactly with the
Form given by Melchior Hittorp, canon of CoTogne, in the

1
I

crcatorrm cmli t t tcrrae;

Et in Tesum Chnstum, rilium eius
unicum, dominum nmtrum, qui conceptus c ~ de
t Spiritu sancto, natus
ex Maria virgine, passus sub Pontio
Pilato,mcifixus.mortuuset repuitus,
dmendit ad infenia, tertia dic resurrexit a mwtuk, awmdir ad coeiw,
sede? ad dmdei patns ornniporentis, indt wnturus est Eudicarc
rivos ct rnortuos ;
Crdo in Spiritum sancnim, a n c t a m
rclesiam atholicam, sanctomm
comrnunioncm, mninimcm pccwtorum, carnis r m c r i o n r n i . ct
i i t a m artcmain. .lrnrn.

I believe in Gxi thr Father alrnigliry,

m a t o r UT htaven and carth ;
.eid in Jcsus Clirist, His only Son, our
h r d , IVho was conceivd by t h t
Holy Spirit, born irom the Virgin
Mary, suffcfd undcr Pontius Pilatc,
was crucified, drad and buricd, dcscended to hcll, on the third day rost
a p i n from ttie dead, axended to
heax-en,sits at the right hand ol W
rhe Father almightv, thence Hc will
cometojudgethe liiingnnd thedead:
I be1ier.e in thc Holp Spirt. ihc holy
Cathnlic Church, the communion o l
&ts,
thc rcmiuion of sins, thr rtsurrcction o[ t h t flwh, aiid rirma!

life. .4mcn.

Firsi, we should natice (the fact ha9 never b e i i denied) tlint

what we have here is simply a rather elaborate variant of thc
Old Roman Creed (R) which we identified and studied in
Chapters 111 and IV. For ease of reference the canventional
labet T (=textus rccqtris) is customariIy attached to it. We
observed in Chapter VI that &e creeds ured in the Western
Church in the early enturies for instructing catechurnens and
ridrninistering baptism were aIways variant foms of R. ICc
glanced at creeds of this description hailing from Xorth Italy,
khe Balkanr, Korth Africa, Spain and Gaul. In a11 of thern thr
core was R, and ihey were distin,.gshecl frorn one anotber and
from R either by minor rnodifications of phrasing or by tlie
inclusion of additional rnatrer. In the case of T the chasaterjstic
trimminas, all told, amount to eleven-{a) T ndds CREATOR OF
HIEAVEN A'ND E A R ~(crealor~mmeli et I m a r ) ; (6) T alters R's
<,

Section VI d lhe Apped, whirh formcd the ninth of tle Reaolutinn~

adopied by the Canfertnce (p. 28 ofthe Rcport, pulilirhed tgzn),
CF. G . K. A. BeII, Ilorirmcnts nf Christian Uni& 2nd ser., 1930, 9.Thc Orthdnx
representatives safc.garried their traditional attitiide h! a rautiaiir fnotnotr.
368
"te

I
I 1

Cf.. p, 73 oF the 1568edition. SCC alno hfaxima bihlinlliccd wteriim$utrum r; aritircriprvrunr cccbiastimxm, Lii~diini,1677~
XTIT,(i$,wlirrr the B r h Rornorisir

giiorilm

L..

rrniiqiriis i.i convenicntly

reprinted.

371
and Iaying it down that the brethren in a monastery, at the
closc oE their night prayers, "should a11 together with a united
voice recite the sjmbol of thc: Christian faith." 1 ITe havc to
wair until mueIi later for definite cvidence of its use at rnattins
and prime. Alcuin does not rnention the practice in his Iitutgical
writings, and the fint to prescribe the use of thc creed bpforr
rnattins and prime, as afim omptine, are St Benedict ofAniane
(tBn I ) , the g e a t reformes of monasterim under Cliarlemagne
and Louis the Pious,%nd Amalarius of 3Ietz.q~utthe presence
of the creed in early psalteries proves that its imerhon into the
rnorning ofices can be safely carried back a p o d way before
their epoch. By this time a11 the other derivative versions of R
had given place to T, and it thus fel1 to it, as the mature flewer
of Western credal developmtnt, to inherit an impressive role
in t h t daily worship of the Church.
There are severa1 closcly connected problems which T
raises and which it will Ise our task in this and the follawng
chapter to examine. One blg question to which we musc
attempt t o supply an answer conerns its identity and prwenance. 1s T a provincial creed, a cousin of all those others which
flounshed so prolifially all over Wetern Europe and North
Africa after the third century? If it is, to what region must we
assign i t ~birthplace, and by what fateful sequence of evtnts
are we to suppose that it carne to be promoted to a paramount
position a-en at Rorne? AlternativeI>.,is it in fat a revision of
R arried out by the Rornan church itself. Parallel with this
literary and historical inquir). is the probIem of the meaning
of the additiond matter which reprwents the cUference betwetn
R and T.Il'hat were the motives for its incorporation, and to
what extent was the teaching of the seed altered by i#
presence? For rhe moment we shall limit our inrestigatian to
the theological and doctrinal aspect of the Apastles' Creed.
This is so intricate and importnnt that the whole of the prestnt
chapter will be taken up with it. In the final hapier we shall
turn to the even knottier problem of T's origin and emergtrnc:
as an independent creed of European authority.
THE RECEIVED TEXT

distinctive word-order cmrsT r ~ s u sto the more common JESUS

CHWST ; (C) T gives precision to R's BDRN FROM TEE HOLY SPIRIT
rn THE VIRGPI ~ I A R Yby reading CONCEIVED BY THE HOLY
SPIRIT, BORN FROM TRE VRGIY hI.4RY; (d) T adds SWFFERED
(pmw) before ~
E PONTIUS
R
PILATE; ( E ) T inserts DEAI)
(moriuus) ; (f;l T insem DESCENDED TO HELL ( d e s c d i t ad infma)
after BITRED; (9)T expands R's AT TRIZ RIGHT HIWD OP THE
FATHER 10 AT TRE RIGHT HAXD OF COD THE FdTKER ALMIGHTY

(nd d p x t m m dei p a t k omnipokntis) ; ( h ) T changes R s WHEXCE

(undt) to T ~ E S E E(indej ; ( 1 ) .T adds CATHOLIC (catholicam) to R's

description of the Church as HOLY; ( j ) T interpolates COM~ N I O NOF smm (sanctorum communionm) as an article of belief;
(k)T adds ETERNAL UFE (pitam a e f e m m ) .
Secandly, we should recall in passing that, dthough the
milieu in which R and its daug-hter creeds grew up was rnainly
catechetical and baptismal, T was from its forrnation called
upon to discharge muh more extensive functions, Its primary
rale, of course, has aIways heen to serve as the declaratory
creed at baptism. In that capaci ty it has featured in the baptismal rites of the Latin West since the eighth century, and in
that of the Rornan church, in conjunction with the shorter
and more primitive interrogations, since a date only a Iittle
latcr which w e s h d have to discuss in the foIlowing chapter.
But alrnost contemporaneously 4 t h its find redaction T obtained a Fwthold in the divine ofice toe, and this it has retained evcr since. Long More that happened, when their
creeds were still Auctuating and immature variants of R, S t
Arnbrose and St Augustine were speaking of the symbalumfisn
as n talisman to be memorized and recited at stated intervah.
"Say the creed daily," the latter advised his flock.x '"When you
rise, when o u compose yourself to sleep, repeat your creed,
render is to the Lord, remind yourselfofit, be not irked to say
it over." At this early period the regular repetltion of the creed
had nothing, so far as we know, of canonicai obligation about
it, but was a matter of private devotiou. In the rniddle o f the
seventh century, however, we find St Fmcruosus (icerca 6651,
archbishop of Braga, assigning the creed a place in compline,
Strm. 58,

r (P.L. 38, 399

r.). Cf. St Ambrwe, De mrg. 3 , 4 ;

init. (P.L. 1 6 , 2 2 5 ; 17, I 155 and

i 160).

&pEm. p t b . ad

m o n d . 2 (P.L. 87, ~ogg).

C. Vitu S.B m d . Anian. {Bolland. Acto SS.,Antwcrp, 1658:Tom.IV,618).
C:l: I1e CCCL. O ~ C 4?
.
2 (P.L. 1a5#I 168).It was published not long aftcr 820.

"tg.
3

1
The first artide need not detain us long. It has already been
pointecl out in Chapter V that the original import both of
FATHER and of ALMIGHTY very early faded into the background. After the fourth century, if not before, exegetes and
expositors alrnost always interpreted the Fatherhood as referring to the spccial relation of the first to nhe second Fersoii
within the Holy Trinity, Once the theolo@cd conception of
the triune Godhead had begun to become expIicit, it was inevitahle that churchrnen shouEd come to regard the creed as a
cornpendious exposition oF current Trnitarianism. A p-picaI
comment was tha t of St Faustu of Riez (fi. 450) 1 : "How excellently throu~houtthe whole creed the separate Persons are
distinguishea. How manifestly in all these the Tini. is unfolded." AFrnost a century before him li'icetas of Remesiana
had characterized tht creed, apart from the articles folIowieg
m HOLY SPIRIT,as "this profession of the Trinity",? despite
the fact that 3t had been fat from the intentions of R's framerri
to make it such. So GOD was regularly understood as onnoting
the one Godliead, and FATHERas pointing to the Father of
Jesus Chzist. ALMTGHTY, too, gradually lost its prirnitir-e sense,
suggested by the Gseek T ~ W O K ~ ~ TofW "ali-niling
~ ,
", and under
the influente OS the Lazin o m n $ o t m was taken to irnply zhe
ability to do all things.
.
.
The only nm:e! clausii wliih appears in T's first article is
CREATOR OF HE:AVP,N A! m EART
: predicate like this,
siressing God's creative: ativiq
m almost invariable
elernent in Eastem recds. Its absence rrom R was one of the
most chararterisric fcatures of that formulary. Western theologianr nlwavs tauyli t the doctrine, of mune, and catechetical
expositions oS thc rule of faith no doubt always explained and
elaborated the first article by dwdling on God's work in the
creation of the universe: it was a truth which marked Christianity off from all other reIiGons. So Novatian, in the middle
of the third century, demanded thaz we believe "first of all, in
God thc Father and alrnighty Lord, that is, the all-perfect
I

CE. Hom. I dt .ymb. in Caspari, QwEIcn TI, 188.

De symb. 8 ; 9: 1 0 (Rurn, 46; 47; 48).

'1
I

CHANGES 1N THE IIKS1' AR'rIGLE

3 73
I'rurner of all things, Who suspended the heavens aloft, established the solid earth, etc." i Xicetas accurnulated a whole row
of adjectiva which, he said, belonged to God-"unbegotten
. . .invisible . . .incornprehensibIe . . . unchangeable . . . good
and just, frarner of heaven and earth".%uffnus made a passing
allusion ta God as "altogether the author of a11 things ".3 But
overt referentes to this aspect of His being were infrequent and
late in Westem creeds. Xorth Afrian formularies were the
first in the field witli tllern, if rue can judge from the words
CREATQR OF ALL -GS
(univer~onirn~.taturem)in t hc text handed
down to us by St Aupstine.4 The ideniical phrasing of our
Xpostles' Creed is attested by the creed of St Caesarius ofAr1es.J
Thc choice of words is curious. For long thc Western tradition
seems ta have hovered between C Q X D I T O R E ~and CREATOREU,
wliile FACTOREM (aIw,ay preferred in Latin translations of the
Constantinopolitan Creedj Sailed ao win much support. What
rnay haire unconscioudy determiried the uItimate selction 01CREATOREM ma?. h - e bem the fact that the Vulgate version
of Cm. I ! I read: "In the beginning God rrratcd (creami, notwithstanding the L S X &oquw) lieaven and carth."
Did any special considerations prornpt the in terpolation of
the clause? Some hax-e overheard the rurnbliny of anti-heretical
polemic in it. It is weT1 known that the Church did not hesitate
to use its inherited dogma that God had madc earth as well as
heaven as a powerful weapon against the Gnostic denial that
the material order could have owed its existente to the good
God. But this was in the second and third centuries, when
Western reeds were as yet innocent of dlusion to God's
reativity. In a lates age PrisciIlianisrn rnight have furnished
t he occasien for a pointed delaration tIzat God was ~ h author
e
of rnatter no less than spirit, for {tojudge by the anatliematisms
pronouned against it by the counciI o f Braga oF 563 6) therc
was a strongiy Manichaean strain in its teaching. It refused to
;idmit that flesh was the Ilandiwork of God, preferring to
Dc lrin.

E
I

(P.L. 3 , 9 1 3 ) .

' D4 rymb. 2 (Rurn, 39 f.). This clauar rnay havc f i ~ u r c din his creed. Ser ahove,

rim
..

174. f.

"ok.

iiisymb.a@d.q(P.L.

' Srrm. 215 (P.L.38,

h

21,

341).

1072).

See a h v e , p. 179.

hlansi IX, 774 ff.Gf.especially Nos. 4, 5 , 7, 8, I i , iz, 13, aiid 1.1.

SOME MiNOR MODIFICALIONS

A rather more interesting elaboration of R's original text is

the reading wao w ~ sCONCEIWD BY THE HOLY S P T R ~ BORN
,
FROM THE WRCIN MARY, so characteristic of the Apostles' Creed.
The earIiest rormulary to exhibit this is the one alleged by St
Serorne to have bcen drafted by the orthodox par- at Rirnini
i11 359 (this was thcir e m crceci, nat the onc their representative signed at Nic! , which has been attrihutecl to one of their
leading mernbers, Phoebadius of A~en.1About the same periocl
\%-ecome acoss cchies of thc ivording in St Hilary.2 A ccntulater St Faustus of Riz vouches for its cumency in Provence : Ilt!
treated it as an accepted articlc of his creed.3 The sentence has
often been printed in one of St .%u.ptine'ssermons, but the
reading is almost ccrtainlv fauli!..' Both h i s other semons and
his w ~ i t i n ggenerallu irnpI!- tliat tlie text he was familiar %vith
approxirnated to R at this point. IfTemar- notice that, tvPiilc
the openiiig article of the orthodox formula of Rimjni w;ic
ohviously- iimpro~ised with an e!.e to the theol~gicalksua of
the hour, its ChristoIogy has all the air of hax-ing been cxtracted
b d i l y from a baptisrnal creed of &e R-type. It is plausible to
conjecturc that, if Phoebadius reallu had any hand in its ompmition, he madc use of a Tom which was familiar to Iiim in
fis own churh.
There is nothing to indicate diat, as arighiaily prnpounded,
tlie modificatiori was consciously anti-heretical ira tendency.
I'et that it had tlte object of onveying a subtie doctrinal
nuance and correctinq possible misunderstanding seems likely.
It was evidently considered important to d i s t i n e h between
the respective roles of thc Holy Spirit and the BIessed Virqin
in the incarnation. Thus, where R (in agrecment with M f . I ,
2 0 ) used the sjmple preposjtion FROM (@.r),most of its loca1
variants preferred iwo prepositions, BY (de) to mark the operation of the Holy Spirit, and FROM to express the birth from our
Lady. The addition we are examining carnes this tendency a
step further in harmony witli the emphasis on the conceptioii
in Lk. r , 31 and 35. It has been prnposed that, if the original
ChristoIogy of the creed was one irnplying the incarnation of
For the tcxt, 9cc St,fcrome,Dial. ndu. Liicifer. 17 (P.L.23, r ~ o f . )and
, Hahn 166.
De I&.

ro. 20 IP.t. 1 0 . qr8).

377

divina Spirit, it may well have occasioned iineasiness to later

theologians, with their fomulated theory of the personal and
eterna1 distinction of the Son from thc Spirit.1 The burden
nay be :accepted, even if t2ie underlying
of this sugg
lifferent Trom t he: one proposed. The intraCIiristology
duction firsr or sep,arate pr,epositionis, and then of the fresh
.. .
participle c1O s m I1, .may
we31 have been detemined by the
hrow
what
the fully developed theologl; of
instinctive d esire to t
the Trinity considei-ed the true perspecnive into the sharpest
relief. This expIanation derives some suppors from the patnstic
dis:ussion of &e cl,use. Rufi.nus, for
, wliose teut read
BP and FROM but not coxai; m D , W
ins to ernphasize
. 0 .C -- fthar -1.
rne m n rs7a ererrraii) a v ~ iir i riit: rlcntciis, and that BOBN
su m~HOLY S P ~ mereIy
T
rneant that He (the Son) had built
a ternple for Himself in the Virgin" swornb.' St Hilary repeatediy underlined &e fact that the role of the Spirit was to
m e creixl apparently lacked the
con
in and B ORN, was fully aware that
dist
.
BORn r - ~ u u li ~ nvcu
t
r w i .%L" IHL WRGIN MARV might lead
to the trava. that Jmw was in effect the Son of the Spirit.
His solution" of &e problem was to suggest that Jesus is not
EteralIy bom fiom the Holy Spirit : He js the Sori of (30d the
Fat heri bu t can be described & born from the Spirit, just as
we, wha af course are sons of G d by adoption and grace,
cani legitim;ately be describe:a a!?-boirn of water and the Holy
Spirit.
Severa1 centuries aftenvards the nice distinction between rhe
conception and the bifih was to equip the champions of arthodoxy ~ 4 t ha useful weapon against the heresies of their day. In
reak of Adoptionisrn in the losing years of
con
Alcuin made frequent appeal to the h r d ' s
t he
concpliori vy c r i e doly Spirit as rhe clinching proof that, even
as man, He was more than an adoptive Son (3;Iius adofitivus).
Since He had been actuall~onceived by the Holy Spirit, it was
plain that He had never at any mornenf of Ris earthly existente
hecn anything else than God, and so it was out of tlie question
L

-L

1 1

-----

Cf,H.J. Carpenter in J.T.S. xl, 1939,36.

V o m m . tn qmb. awt.g (P.L. 2 I , 349).
a C f . , e . g . , D c ~ r u 2,94;
i.
10, 1 7 f f . ; ro,35 (P.L.
In,66; 956ff.; 371).
BncI1ir. 37-40 (P.
L. 40, 15 r i.).

T H E COMMUNION DF SAINTS

MS evidence that Nicetas, too, had TO ~ a LIFE

e EVERLASTFNG
in his creed. Yet an independent, more positive cornplex of
i d e a w3s not SIOW in attahins itself to the clause. St Cyril of
JerilsaIem, for examplc, ~vhiledisposing of LIFE EVERLASTINC
quite briefly, did indicate that ir s t d for somethins more t han
mere connuance of life : it pointed, he said, to " tlle real,
veritablc life (tj 6 v w s
~ a a;q B W s ) " , which was God
Himself. For S i c e LIFE EVERL.WG
was life with Christ
in heaven, eternal nnd blessed life, the fnit of faith and right
conversation, a life which neither the pagan nor thc unhelieving Jew could possess, 2311t which w;is resewed for tlic faithful
wlio lived chasteIy here on earth.2 Thus the emphais ~ 5
transferred from the idea of protracted existente to the blessed
quality of the Iife of the world to come. Lhus when the Pelagians, anxious to justify their practice of baptizing children,
tried to draw a distinction hetweeii life everlasting or salvation
(which sinful men of courue need) and the kingdom of heaven
(which was what they thought innocent babes rnight acquire
in baptismj, they were met with an indignant protest from St
Augustine. It was a bIaspbemous nwelty, he urged,J to say
that lirc everlasting differed in anv way from the kingdom of
lieaven. So, too, in thc rniddlc ages the stress in LIFE EVERLASTING
was on the positive state of lilessedncss enjoyed by the redeemed.
As S t Thomas Aquinas put it, rhe first truth about eternal life
is that a man these finds union w-ith God, FVho is the rewarci
and end of a11 our lahonrs. and crorm ali our deires..'

Finally, we come to an additiond cclause of' the Apostles'

Creed whiiich has aroused irnrnense dlscwsion, TRE COMMUN~ON
OF S A I ~ S (sancbwm ~omrn~nionem).
The h-st surviving creed to
attest its presence is the formulary ommented on by h'icetas
of Remesiana. Before Nicetas, Iiowever, if Dom G. blorin's
conjecture can be accepted as orrect, it wodd seem to have
featured in the so-called "Faith of St Jerome3',J whili ends
3 Cai. i8,28ff. (P.G.33, 1049 r.).
De symb. I z (Burn, 5 r .
Scrm. 294, z t (P.L.3 , 1336 R.).

Cf. &$OS. J@, symb. awt.n d j * . (Vol. 111 of 163p Paris editioii, I 33).
Cf. Anrcdota Marcd~aimnIII, i i i , igg i.

.'389

IN THE HOLY GHURCH,

COMMUNION O F SAIPrTS, TBE RESURRECTIOY OF TIIE FLESW,

I I BLLlEVE I S THE REMISSIOY OF SINS

,

i LIFE EVEREXSTISC. ,411 01d .innenian creed qiioted by

Caspari abo speaks of belief i11 I*HE I-ORGIVE>ESS OF siss IPS THE
ROLY CHGRCH LYD THE C O A I ~ I U ~ T OOF
S S ~ U S T S .TOO
~
much uncrtainty, howetter7surrounds tlie origin of these ovo fornularies for us to be able to build much upon thern. But the pl.ir;ise
cropped up b e o n d any shadow of doubt, though its rneanin~
is not entirelv clear, in the resoiutions of a GaIlican s-od held
nF Sirnes in 394.: From now onward it ws to enjoy a ~ o g r i e
in recds, but almost esclusivcly in South Gaul.
This Sact 1s-ould seem to favour the inference that h'icetas
probahly bomowed COMMUNIOK OF s m s in the fim place from
Gaul, with which Iic Iiad close personal tics as the friend of St
Paulinus cif Xola, and which he visited Qn more than one
ocasion. Harnack, however, qziestioned this, and contcnded
that the exchange was more likely to have been in the
revesse direction, Nicezas deriving the idea from St Cyril
of Jerusalern. But there is nothing to indicate that St Cyril
had riny knowledge of coMMwNron OF SAINTS: the passaqes
Harnack cited from the Cnterhetical Lectares n support of his
theory are altogether too vapic.3 In any case, it is in-gular
that, on this assumption, St Gyril's example should apparently
have induced Xicetas and the West to adopt the clause while
failiing altogether to persuade the East to do so.4 Dom klorin
onstructed R more elaboratc argument, tracing the clause
back through S t Jerome to h e n i a , and so to Caesarea {St
Cyprian, who corresponded with Firmilian of Caearea, had
spoken of a "comrnunion of evil persons"-cmrnunio malorurn) ."
.h question like this is not rcally capable of solution, for rliert
is very little evidence to go upon and zhe argurnents are fairly
evenly balanced. But i t must be pointed out that the main
p e g on which Dom Morin's hypothesis hangs, St Jerorne's
supposed authorship of the Fides Hieronymi and the date of
1

See Q~tLlm11,

II

; Hahn t38.

Cf.Hefele-Leclercq,Hirroire dts conn'ls 11, 93.

Cat. 18, 26,fin; 27; 10 ( P . C . 93, 1048 ff.).
Cf. the remarks ofJ. Kostlin in Harick's K e a l ~ n ~ k1'l1,. 504.
Rm. d'hfsf. c t /i!#. rdig. ix, 1904, 3.
Ep. 69, g vartel 1. 758).

exegesis whih S t Thomas Aquinas espoused in his short essay

on the Apostles' CrcecZ.1 "Because a11 tbe faithful forni one
body," he wrotc, '"he benefits belonging to one are cornmunicated to the otliers. Tliere is thiis a sliaring of Eienefits {communio bonon~m)in the Churcli, and this is what we mean by
smciorurn cammunio." Tlie goods shared, he went on to explain,
comprise everything worih svhile done on earth by the sajnts
(sancli), hsit particularly the seven sararnents, which convey
to us the virtue of Christ's passion, He being thc head o tlie
body. Acording to most scholars, St Thomas took sonclomrn
here as neuter and as ptecisely equivalent to bonomm, i.e.
"benefits", but this seems most irnprobable. Such an interpretation consorts i11 with the stress on Sie faithful as donors and
recipients of the benefits. or with the explicit nerition of "a11
the saints" further down in the chnpter, or 154th the indusion
of blesdnqs other than the Ch~uch'ssacraments amonq the
benefits under discusrion. It should be e ~ i d e n tthat what St
Thomas atually understood b!- the clause xvas "that sharing
or participation which the saints enjy". r i t the same time
other medieval writcrs applied it trictly to the Church as a
corporate society. Arnalarius of Trkes {tcirca 8 I 6:), far example,
paraphrased it as tlie fellowship of the saints h-hich is held
itogether
the Spirit,? while hIapus of Sens -pIained it as
rneaninq, "tliat iq, the ccingrcgation of all the faithful in
Chrjst "-3
Our review provides an Plluminatin~picture ofthe fluctuating
rneaning which were read into ~latartorumcommunio in the patristic and medieval periods. Tet the inescapablt concluslon to
which it points is that, so far as the creed is concerned, the
dominant conception, at any rate between the fifth and eightli
centuries, was "fcllowship with holy persons ". The sacramental
exegesis carne later in time, and has a11 the air of being secondary: even where it did occur, sanctomm itself was most often
understood in a rnnsculine sense. The strengtli of Th. Zahn's
case was drawn from considcrations which were cither priori
or far rernoved in their bearing from the history of the Western

Erpos. sul. y n b . ajosi. (VoI. 111 rif the 1634Paris edition, 1 3 2 ) .

Efi. d~ C ~ X bapt.
.
(IJ.L. 99, UgG).
Librll, dt my~l.
bapt. i t i Mnrtlne's De anliqui~ccclainaritibw, Antwerp, I 736, I 70.

THE COMMUNION OV SAINYS

/
I
I

j
I

1,

395

creed. Thus he and his followers argued that a reference to the

sacraments was surely caled for in the oficial summary of the
Church's faith. Ka doubt there is force Iii this: nrid we rnay
conjecture that it was the instinctive conciousness of a lacuna
in the formiilary which, among other factors, rnoved t he iheolopians of later ages to read an allusion to the sacriiments inte
it- But it would be foolhardy to work on the assumption that
the criterion of what ouht to have been embodied in tlie creed
supplies the k q to what actually w;is embodied in it. Agaiil,
they placed great reliance on analogim draisn from Greek
usage, appeahg to the frequent presence of a sacramental
reference in such w-ords as scorvwvCa and 7; &ia. But it must
be pointed out that tsue parallcls to sancfomi?icomrnicnionen~are
hardly to be found in Greek. and that in any c z e it is hazardous
to assume that Greek and Latin linquistic usage necessariIy
overlapped. If hile 14 ZYia in Greek reqslarly meant the consecrated elements of t h e Eucharist, there is no unarnbiguour;
evidence unti1 very late that sancfa had the samc technical
sense in Latin. In the Few absoIuteIy incontmvertible instantes
that c a n be collected of the ~vord'sbeing used in this ~ a p thc
,
rneanulg seems to be quite tmtechnical and general, and the
context placa the reference to the sacrarnents bevond an:reasonahle doubt.1 The relevance and Iralue, moreover, of
paralIet from Greek Iin,quistic practice become ewn morc
quesbonable if we are Llisposed to agree that the roots of conrm o r OF
~ s
m are to be sousht in South GauI rather than
an y Greek-speaking envlronment.
For these reasons the oIder, traditional. understanding uf
the phrase seems much more tikely to be the original one. When
later the sacramenta1 interpretatiori began to thnist itseIf to thc
fore, it may have been in some degree the response to the felt
need for some mention of the sacraments; and the growing
tendency to inlude the sacrament of Penance under THE
REMXSSION OF SINS may have helped to focus attcntion on thc
gap. The term cornmzlnio itself, which was corning to be increasingly appropriated as a teme descriptlon of the sarament
Cf. St Augustin, In Joh. e2Qltg. Irnct, 6, I 5 ; D c j d . e1 np. 8 (P.S. 35, 1439 : 40,
In E$. 98, 5 (P.L. 33, 36)) sometimes citcd in thir conncction, sanctis
probably niearis " 'sninls".
202).

TEXTS APPROXIMATINC TO T

THE ORIGINS OF THE APOSTLES'

CREED

IT was made plnin

at the beginning of the preceding chapter

that the formulary now knom in the 1Ves-t as the ApostIes'
Creed carne into existence as one of many v a r i a m of the ancient

haptismal confssion of the Roman church. 'CVe have already

o b s e d how much more detailed and theologcdy mature it
is as a statement of belief than R, but nothing has so far been
said about thc complicated and diffiult problem of its origin.
The issues which this raises are of great interest and importaice,
and we shalF devote this chapter to a discussion of them. Dur
fint task, it is dear, must be to summarize the elidence for thc
earliest appearance of T (=ie'*lirs receptrrr), and about this
there is no serious doubt. A text to ali iiitents and purpwes
idedcal with it is found in the tract De singulis libris canoninj
starapsus, writttn by St Prirniniu, founder and h t abbot ofthe
famous monaster?. of Reichenau, near Lake Constance. St
Priminius (his name has usually been spelt Pirminius, but h t h
pidology and the preponderanr MS tradition suppott our
forml) was a notable Bmedictine missionary who arrived in
the neighbourhood of Lake Constance about 724, establkihed
the abbey of Reichenau under the protection -and with the
patrona,Fe oof Charles Martel, organized monastic institutions
in S.W. Germany general!y, and awakened a new religious and
scholarly life by the banks of the Upper Rhine. He wrote his
Scorapsus2 at some date which cannot now be determined
between 710 and 724. 1t is a kind of compendious handbook
of Chrjstian doctrinc, cornpiled out of Holy Scripture and

' On thc ~ i p c l l i nolhis

~
namc, and its irnplications for the quertion of Iiis barkground and oriin, se G. Morin, Rtriuc Clrnrlrn~~pe
i, 191 r , 2-4.
P.L. 89, i029 ff.By far t h t bcst edition of the text i r that printed in G.Jcckcr's
Dic Hrirnnt dtt hriiictn Pirmin, Munrier in Westf., 1g27.
398

I1,

399

recognized ecclesiastical authors, and was designed to assist

him and his disciples in their rnissionary enterprises. Later he
fel1 into disfavo~irwith the local authorities, was expelled and
took refuge in Alsace, and after a further period of energetic
labour ended his days in the abbey of Hornbach (near Zweihrucken), another of his foundations, probably jn 753.
Prminius quoted the ApostIes' Creed in three separate contexts in his rnislonary manual. In the first of these (chap. TO)
he recounted the familiar stmy of hotv the Twelve, bcing filled
with the Hoiy Spint, composed a summay of beIief. T h e creed
which results from pieciug together the tu~elvefedauses which
he sited coincides e ~ a c d yrrlth T, except that it reads SAT
(scdii) instead of m ( s e d ~ i )of Christ" ssession ar the Father's
right hand. The thbd (chap. 28) consisk of a hortatory instmction on fith and rnorals, and reprodua the creed in a
loose, inexat fashion. By far the most interestfng is the second
(hap. 12), in wPiich St Primurius rernrnded his readers of the
solemn occasion of their olcm baptisrn.
"Thus we recall to p u s merno~es,brothem," he wrote, " the pact
rw made with M in the baptistery itself: that is, how, R-hen we
m e severalEy asked by the priest our narnes and how we were called,
eithes you ourself awwered, if you were already of an age to
a m y r , or at aU events he who was undertaking thc vow for ).OU
and lifted you up fiam the water anwered and said, 'He is d l e d
J o h , ' or some 0 t h name. And the priest inquired, 'John, do you
senriunce the d e d and ali his works and all his show?' You replied,
'I renounce, that Is, I despise and retinquish, all evil and diaboiic
works.' M t e ~that renunciation of the devi1 and all his works, vou
-1.werc,, ,,I
,~d by the priest, 'Do you believc in God the Father
alrnighty, creator of heaven 2nd earth ? ' Sou replied, ' I beliwe."
And again, 'Do you believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord,
Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born fiom the Vitgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate, was cruified, dead and buried, descended to hell, on the third day rose again from the dead, ascended
to heaven, sat at the right hand of God the Father nlmighty, thene
"- wiF1 come to judge tbe living and the dead?' And you replied,
~elieve.Vndthe priest asked a third time, 'Do you also believe
he Holy Spirit, the holy Catholic Church, thc ommunion of
ts, the remission of sins, the resurrection oT the flesh, eterna1
life? ' Either you or your god-father Cor you replied, ' I believe.'

See what rnanner of pact and prornjse ar confwsion on your patt is

bindinq tienveen you and God. And believing you werc baptized in
the name of the Father and of the Son and OS the Holy Spirit unto
rhe remission of a- 11 vour sins, and werc anciinted by the priest with
the chriqm of salvation ur to eternei1 life, anci your bosd y was lothed
with a white ga rment, arid Chsist cIothed .your sou1 with heavenly
-.,m*I
-A
7uui quardian."z
grace, and a hol? aiisL*
as assignLu
!vu
I

*r

..

+n*r,.

Li,

.,C

lIr...*

This, we observed, is the first appearance of a creed practicalIy identical with T:its only divergence Is SAT (sedif)for T's
sm,and this is hardly s i ~ i f i c a n tin view of the popularity af
srrs in MFesterncreeds. Formularies alrnost as similar to T are
to be iound in certain other roughly contemporary liturgical
docurnents. Onc of thesc is the seventh, or early eighth, century
missal sometimes caIled the Gallican Sacramentasy, but nowadays more commonly designated the Missal of Bobbio2 (Cod.
Lat. I 3246 in the Bibliothque Nationalc at Paris). Rere the
creed puts in no fewer than four appcarances.
(A) O n the first occasion3 it is prefixed to the serrnon at the
deliver). of the reed, just after Sie cerernony of the " openinp
o the ears ",i-e. the ritual handing out to the candidates of the
first words of eacli of the four gospels. While fairly close to
T, it differs from it in severa1 particulars, notably in substituting I BELIEVE for AND at the openin of the second artile
and OYLY-BEGOTTEN EYERLASTING~ for T's O ~ Y in
, emirting
OLR LORD, in ~witingoscErvm, BORN, C R U ~ E D ,DE=
and
BURIED as participles in the accusative, and in using the prist
SAT for sm. The position of HOLY wit11 the Spirit also deserves
notice. (3)Another text an be reconstructed out of the serrnon
which follows on immediately afterwards expounding thc
clauses of the creed.5 Thougli allasive and not necessarily omplete, it presapposes an aquaintance with ONLY and OUR LQRD,
as well as with t h t reading w ~ wxs
o CONCE~-EB . . BORN
..

..

For a phorqraphlc r c p d r ~ c t i o nof the pziasxgc as containcd in Cod. EinsidIensis, rqg, fol. 2-37 r. (late 8th w cadv 9th centurv: rhe k
t oT tht t h m M S S of
.Scurap~w, see A. E. Hurn, Fmsrrnilrs o - ik Crcidj. Plate S H. Rradshaw S r ~ i c t v

xxx\-1,lgogj.

For i h c text. ~w H. Rradshaw Socitt)- LIII. $917 {a mrnplctc photqraphic

facsirnilr). and L\;lII. igzo (a complcte transcriprinnl.
H.13.Soc. LVTII, 56: in MS fol. 88 r.
Kattcnbusch (11,776 n. 28) snw the influente of the Te Dcum w, r n and i 5
in this pcculiarity.
H. 13. Soc. LVTII, 56 f.: in MS foll. 88 v.v,

(C) Yet a tliird creed crops up,' this time interrogatory in

fom, in the semice of baptism provided for Easter Even,
directly after the renunciation and before the irnmerions.
Again it approximates closely to T, the main differences being
that CoNclrrvED, BOIZN, etc. are expressed by participles in the
accusative, that DEAD is lacking, that SAT replaces sr.ss. and
that ETERNAL LLFEis greatly elaborated. (D) Lastly, an isolated
text of the creed figures in a collection of misceilaneous addenda
attached to the end of &e rnissal.Vt consists of a fragment
attributing the severa1 c1au:es to their presumed apostolic
authors, and exhibits a nirmber of peculiar divergentes from
T.For example, it lacks CREATOR OF HEAVEN AND EARTH, it
speaks of ~ r onLy
s
soo
~ m GOD m n LORD, it has no C O N C E ~ D
but reads instead BORN FROM THE VIWGIN MARP LHROUEH THE
HOLY SPIRIT, it omit DEAD, FROM 'I?IE DEAD and CATHDLIC, it
adds THROUGH HOLY B A F ~ Mto R E ~ S I O N OF SINS, and lmes
~ i t RESWRRECTIOX
h
OF THE FLSSH TO ETEWAL LIFE. It has been

wrongly identified as a formular). for use in the hour offica.3

h a rnatter of fat, though there would be nothing out of the
way in the presence of a cseed in the hour services at this date,
the context of the passage, as welI as the attribution of the
articles to the twelve Apostles, suggests that the ornpiler's
interest was in the main techetical.4 The Latur of the fmt
and third oF these variants of T (A and C), with all their
carelesnesse of spelling and g r a m a r , is printed belaw :
BOBBIO C
BOBBIO A
Cnedo in dcum patrem omnip:enwrn, Crcdis in dnim patrem omnipotmtem.
reatorcm ccli et tem?
acatorem ccli et terra&
Credo in lesu Christo filiurn eius uni- Crcdit et in Iesu Christo filiurn eius
unicum, dorninurn nostrum, conccpgenitum scrnpiternum, conceptum
tum dc Spiritu sancto, naturn ex
$e Spiritu sancto, natum ex Maria
Maria virgcne, passo aub Poncio
virgene, passus mb Poncio Pilato,
Pibto, cnicifunim et sepultum, discnici6xum, mo-m
et ~cpuIhim,
cendit ad i d a , trrcia dic murdi-dit
ad inferna, tercia die rcrexit a rnonuk, ascrndit ia cclis,
&t
a mortuis, ascmdit ad cclus,
&ir ad drxtdei patris a&x d i t ad dcxtcram dc patris omnipotentis, inde vwturus iudimFivm
potmtis, inde venturus i u d i k X+OS
ac mortuos?
ct morh10s.
2

P
3
4

H.B. Soc. LVIII. 74 f.: in MS folI. r I 7 v.-i 1.8 r.

H.B. Soe* LVIIT, 181: in MS fol. 298 r. and v.

E.g. by Kattenbuech I, 5 ;11, 747 n. 34; 881 n. r+.

See A. Wilrnart in H.B. 50c. LXI, rg23,43.

T'S REDAC.I'ION

from St Boniface. If the inident ever took place (it js cdifyirigly

recounted, and St Bonifae's own r\,elI-informed bioeraphcrs
are siIent about it), ir must havc bcen a pasing vizit as St
Boniface !%,asreturning to Slainz from the anointing of Pippin
as king of the Franks. The nnmc d St Priminius dom not crop
up in thc surviving corser;pondcne of St Boniface, in spite of
their bclonging to the same Bencdictine Order, and whilt the
two men must have been aware of eacli other's exitcncc, they
appear to have kept out of each othcr's way. Thus, altbouqh
St Boniface was omrnissioned by Pope Gxegory III in 738 as

his legate in both Bavaria and ,\lamamia, he seems to liave

studiously abstained from developin his mission in Alamannia,
no doubt so as to avoid intcrerjng wivjth the work of St PrEminius. T h e assumption that they were friends and operated as
as~ociatesor even colleagues is entirely without historical basis.
Thus it involves more than one risky leap into the dark to
conclude that, since St Priminjus used T, St Boniface must likewise have used it, with the implication in mind that St Roniface" usc of it suggests, in the light of his well-known devotion
to Roman practice, that T was a Rornan forrn. As a rnatter of
plain fact, not a trace oF thc creed which he employed for
baptismal purposes suzvives in St Bonifae's writings.2 In any
case, it Is hazardous to take it for granted that kis creed-form
must have been identicd with rhe Rernan one, for ivhiIe the
Roman authorities undoubtcdly insisted on the main scheme of
their baptismal o%ce 'being obsewed, there is nothing to show
that they were particularlu conerned about &e I\-ording of
the reed. Xf the mission of St Augustine of Canterbury to
Enland more t h m a centu. earlier fufnishe any anaio-q,the
inference would be tbat they were not. TR the reign of St Gseyo.
the reat the Reman chusch almost e r t d y emplyeed C as
its baptismal creed, at any rate for dornestic purposes. St A u g s tine, wc know, was a stickler for Roman precedent, and jn
particular stipulated that " the minitry of baptism, by which
we are reborn to God, should be fulfilled according to the
rnanner of the holy Roman and apostolic church."3 Yet a11 the
Un all this, see G. .Jeckcr, Dir H~imo!des h!. P i r m b , rq.
Kattenbusch brought tliis out ([I, 8z r K.).
C.&de, Hfst. ~ c l2., o (P.I,,
95, 83).

NOT ROMAX

409

evidence seems to point to the condusion that R was the creed

which the British hurch was persuaded to adopt. Bum's
further point that St Priminius himsdf followed Rome both
in the position of the creed and in the forrn of the renunciation
cannot be t d e n seriously. It is not really posible to reconstruct
the prccise order of cerernonics irom St Priminius's selective
urnmriq-. So far as we an, ho~vever,it is rnanifest that he is
referrjng? not to &c formal recitasion of the creed at nhe
rtddirio, as Brarn's argument presupposes, but to the interrogaaions at the actual moment of baptism. The fact that the redaE
qucstions knoirri to St Priminius rvere cast in the fom of T is
3 proof of the decidedly un-Roman charcter oF his baptismal
rife. The guestions used at this point in the authentic Roman
service were aIwrys much bricfer tliari T, as we know from the
Gclasian Sacramentary, as well as from the service as it js
performed to-day.
Rurn was also guiIty of trying to squeeze too much out of his
texts when he interpreted Amalarius as irnplying in his reply
to CharIemagne that his crccd-form (again T)was Rornan as
wcll as the ceremonies hc used at baptism. The most that can
be deduced from the context of his letter is that he arranged for
tlie order of cerernonies to reprociue the Rornan scheme. Hc
was no more seferring to a speciftcally Rornan wcirding of the
crccd than he was irnpl?ing that the Holy See had a distinctive
verrion af the Lord's Prayer, It is in any case dangerous, when
picking one's wa!- through FranklsIi liturgia of this perid, to
build too much on the dcscription of a rite as Roman. The
Carolin$ianc, especialIy Cyharlemagne hkmelf, were no doubt
de?ermiiied Rrirnanizers, and fosrered the adoption of the
Roman liturq- by every mcans within their power. Bur what
emerged as a result of their efrorts, and passed for "Rornan",
was usuallu a tranparent conflation of Rornan with GalIican
elemcnts. The general pIea that tlic Rome which decIined to
accept the jfilioque fsorn harlemagne cannot be credited wi th
meek acq uiescence in the Gallican forrn of the baptismal creed
can be disrnisscd out of hand. 1t is highiy improbalilc that
Leo 111's motives for repudiatir~gtlie jiioque had anything to
do witli his concern for anicnt texts as such, or even with the
disdain a Rornan pontifF might be supposed to feel for being

dictated to in Iiturgical matters by a Frankisb emperor. It is

not dificult to perceive that what deterred him was really the
statesmrtnIikc instinct that he must on no account put himself
and the Holy See in the wrong in the cyes of Eastern Orthodoxy.
Relations between East and JYest were quite delicately enough
balanced as it was without &e Pope gratuicously placing trump
cards in thc hands of the Oriental bishops. As a matter of fact,
as we shall later observe, the tide of liturgical influence had
already begun to turn, and if in the eighth century che Roman
rite was spreading throughout France and Germany, in the
ninth Rome itself was becoming the borrower. So far frorn the
HoIy See being too proud in the ninth entury to be a debtor
to the Gallican church, Gallican elements were beginning to
appear with incrcasing fiequency, with her free consent, in Izer
service-books.
So far these are rnainly negative considerations. If they suffice
to undermine the positive case advanced in favoux of T3 alIeged
Roman origin, they still Ieave the hypothesis of such an origin
a possible one. The argument which has inclined most scholars
to reject it has still to be rnentioned : it divides into three parts.
First, there are strong grounds for supposing that, in so far as
a creed of this type was known and used at Rome before the
ninth century, it was R and not T. Leo the Great (t 461) and
Gregory the Great
604)~it has been shown,l while both
apparently Ignorant of T, both knew and avaiIed themselves
of R or a creed very similar to it. The appearance of R, and not
T, in the Codex Laudianus of Acts, a late sixth- or seventhcentury MS brought to England by Roman missionaries (possibly by Theodore of Tarsus, 669-1901, and in the FsaIter of
Aethelstan (ninth century) points in the same dircction.
Seondly, it is diEcuit to escape the impression, as was pointed
out in the previous chapter, that the Roman church used C
as its baptisrnal creed, for its own local purposes at any rate,
for some hundreds of years. Thirdly, it must have struck readers
of the lst section that a11 the earliest documents testifying to
T's existence or t o the existence of creeds akin to T are Gallican.
Whaiever mysteries there may be about their precise provenance, they cannot by any stretch of irnagination be associated

(t

Ry Kattmhusch, 11, 807 ff.

with Rome directly. The majority of them date from befare

the middle of the eighth century. The significance of this is that
it was not untiI after the middle of that century that that
deliberate Rornanizing of che Gallican service-books which was
such a feature oF Carolingian liturgical policy really got under
way.
If the theory that T originated in and emanated from Rome
is discarded, its source must plainly be sought in one of the
provincial centres. A useful method of approach to the probIem
is to examine the differcnt types of local creed, so far as they
can be ascertained, and compare them with T. Although it is
obvious that creed-forms were not rigidfy fixed, it is equally
obvious that the texts used in diferent localities tended to be
marked by distinctive trair. Thcre is prima facie much plausibility in the hypothesis that T must have taken its rise in the
region where formularies closely approximating to it were
current.

If this 5s the approach adopted, it becomes clear at once

that certain regions can be decisively ruled out. No one, perliaps, is likely to propose Africa as the milieu in which T was
born, but it is interesting to note that such creeds as we can
identlfy as African diverge eemphatically from T. Lei us take
the forrnulae quoted on pp. r75 f. as representative African
creeds. Of the eleven provincialisrns 3isted in the first section
of Chapter XII onIy five appear in them-the word-order JESUS
CHRIST, DEAD, THENCE, ATHOLIC and ETERNAL LIFE; and of
these neither n m n nor CATHOIJC (only in St Augustioe) seems
to have secured a firm hold. At the same time, in striking contrast to T, they have unusual features like KIYG OF THE AGES,
EMMORTAL,and THRQUGH THE HOLY CHURCH. O n the other hand,
it has occasionaIly been argued that T rnay be a North Itaf an
forrn, The presence of a closely similar text in the Bobbio Missal
has been Railed as proof of this, but (quite apart from the unlikelihood of the Bobbio Missal being in f i c t a North Italian
docurnent) the theory derives littIe or no support frorn the
creeds belonging to that region. They are, as tve saw on pp.
173 f., much nearer to R than to T.

412

THE ORIGLNS OF THE APOSTLES' CREED

The lairn of the Spanish churches must be rated much

higher. Spain seems to have possessed a fairly stabIe version of
the creed frorn the tirncs of St Martin of Braga (f. 580) d o m
to the eighth century, atid this agrecd with T in a host of
pasticulars. Naturally all Spanish creed of this period had thc
word-order JESUS CHRIST. But in addition the clauses SLTFERED,
D ~ C E N D E DTO MELL, GOD TAE FATHER ALMIGHTY in the passage
about the Session, CATHOLIC and ELEMAL LFFE ali had a place
in them.1 Lhe kiozarabic l i t u r u could even boast comrrnrox
OF s m . Yet it must he noticed that, notwlthstanding thc use
of the Constantinopolitan Creed at mass in Spain sincc $9,
the words MAKER OF IIEAVEN A X D E4R??I W e i T ~llfomily
lackh~.
55,too, was the important distinction C O S C E ~ D RP . . . BOR':
FROM

....

A creed of some interest in determiriiag T's provenance is

necessarily the late fourth-centuy fornula of Sicetas of Rernesiana, in what is notv alled Yugoslavia.Vhe text which
can be extracted from his De gmbolu age= with T extraordinarily closelv. Beyond any shadow of doubt Sicetas was
familiar with the variant f o m s JESVS e m , SCFFERED, DEAD,
ATHOLTC, and ETEKVAL LIFE, and spoke of Christ as sitting on
the right hand oc T E F A T ~ R(omitting .-z~mc~-rr).
dthough
sljghtl!. I a s certain, it is hihly probable that he kneiv CREATQR
OF HEAVEN AND EARTH. A most striking feature of his reed was,
ofouse, its inlusion of COMMUNIO': OF SANTS. The chief points
of divergeme between it and T were its failure to mention
CONCEIVED BY and DESCENDED TO WELL. I t is worth recalling
that Nicetas's a-gmernents with T do not stand alone, for we
can point to other ~vell-known creeds deriving from the
Eastern distrits of the Western empire and rhc neighbouring
provinces of the Eastern ernpire which have similar points of
contact tvjtli T. The Fourth Creed of Sirmium and the
related creed of h'ic 130th contained DEAD and D E s c E m E e
TO AELL. The so-called " Faith nf St Jerome", whatever its
actul relation to the snint, combined Nicene eIements with
elements drawn from local crecds (possibly from Pannonian
creed-hrms current arouncl Stridon), and revealed an acquaintance with CREATOR OF HEAVEN AND EARTH (tlie text
See abovc, pp,

1 7 7 f.

Sec aboyt, p. i 74 f.

reads OF THINGS VISIBLE AND INVXSIBLE), DESCENDED to HELL,

and COMMUNiON OF S A ~ S . '
I t remains an indisputable fact, however, that rceds practicdly identical with T began to appear in SoutIi Gaul, and
particdarly in Provence, from the fifth century onwards. The
creed of St Faustus of Riez, we may recall, alscady contained
the characteristicwording CONCEIVED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT, BORS
FROM THE VIIEGW ~ R Y and
,
could also boast of thc lause
cowilr.~~ow
OF s m , in the middle of the fifth century.2 1 - e r y
important is the creed recently identified by Dom G, *tforinas
that of St Caesxius of Arles (f 542) - 3 This contained CREATOR
OF HEAVEN km E~RTR, the distinction coscErvEw su . . .
BORN EROM
. ., the clauses SWFFERED, DEAD, D E S C E ~ E DTO
AELL! FATFKER . . . ALMIGHTY, THENCE, and C011%CLFiiQS OF
S M ~ T Sand,
,
of course, p r - s crrrrrsl, chmotrc and E'STRXAL
LITE. It W ~ distiapished
S
from T only by a few minor pcculiarities-the use of om-BEGOTLZY
for OSLY, zhe omission of om
toar, and the insertion of ETERVAL after OFILY-BEGOTTES, the
jnsertion of an additional I EELIEVE at the o p e n i n ~of the second
wticle, and &e inverted word-order sanctum Spin'lum. St Caesarius's disciple and younger contemprav St Cprian of
Toulon had a fomulary closely resembIing rhis. The sunriving
framcnts do not show CREATOR OF HEAYE-I AND EARLR (any
more than St Caesarius's creed does in the body of his
expository sermon), or DEAD, OT ALMIGRN
in the clame about
Christ's sesioa, but t h q - add OUR LORD and leave ETERNAL out
after O Y L Y - B E G O ~ N . At
~ the same time, as we saw earlier in
this cIiapter, there are ertain liturycal documents, notably the
3,lissal of Bobbio and the Missale GalEicanum Vetus, as well
as the slightly later Sacramentary of Gellone, which testify to
forrns hardly diEering from T, and wlrich are alrnost certainIy
to be connected with Gaul.
The evidence thus trongly suggests that T's place of origin is
to be sought in South Gaul. O n the whole, scholars have been
inclined to look to Eurgundy because of the apparent connection

!
i

Cf.G. Morin, Amcdota Maredsolom I II, iii, 199f.

See above p. I 79.

See above p. 179. This is the crccd tvhich appcara in Missale Gallicanuin
Vetus, foi. no v.
a Sec above p. I 79.
a

Dom Xiorin had

beeii much occupied in reconstihiting t h e

homiletical works of St Caesarius. He was Ied by tEiese studies
to observe, with ever-growing conviction, how dose were the
bonds of union between the old G d i c a n sacramcntarj and the
liturgy preupposed by St Caesarius in kis serrnons, and particuIarly in his bibIical catechetial instrucbons preparatory to
the Easter baptisms.1 It really seems that the solution he proposed has leared up the age-long riddle of the place of erigin
of the Missal of Bobbio.
A further fact which makes the picture which is now taking
shape more convincing is the appearance of a reed virtually
identical 14th T in rhe Sacramentwium Gellonense. Liturpjcal
authorities are ageed that the MS containing this was written
in the closing years of the eighth century, and the probability
is that it was written for some relgious house in the neighbourhood of Meaw (not far from Paris, to thc East). Its most recent
editor, Dom P. Ptlniet, as rvas remarked above, has arped for
Gellone itself, in the neighbourhd of 3iontpelIier in S. Frmc,
as its birthplace, but his cae is not likely to conkince everyone.
The abbey of St Guilhem-du-Dsert at GeIlone was not
faunded untir 804, which is rather a late date for the MS; and
one cannot overlook the repeated mentions in the rnartyrology,
in the original hand, of the abbey of Rcbais (in the dioese of
Meaux). Dom A. \\'ilmart's discovery' tliat the same hand that
wrote rhe Sacranientary worktd on another eighth-century
MS beIonging t o the chapter a t Cambrai, while not impiying
that the Sacramentary was made for Carnbrai, strengthens the
case for its connection with North France. From our point of
view the interesting thing i that tradition has linked S t Priminius
with Meaux, -4ccording to his biographer,3 the Benedichc
missionary did not go straight to Illarnannia. He took refuge
first, probably, in Aquitania, and then travelled on to Austrasia,
wiiere " he exercised a pastoral episcopate blarndessly" for a
spell at a place called Castellurn Melcls. There has been some
controversy ox7er the situation of t h i s mysterious place. Dom
G. tiforin conjectured (for reasons, Tt must be feared, more
R. Bn. ilvi, 1934, 187.
See R. Bh.xlii, r ggo, 210-222 : the MS conccrntd is No,grxi in the municipal

librarv at Cambrai.

~ f Vit.
. ct mirac. S. Pinnin. r (Mm. Crrm. Hist., Script.XV, o i f.).

!
\

1
I

patriotic than 1veU groimded) that it must have been Melsbroek, formerIy 31eItburch, near Brussels. His guess was rendered possiblc, though hardly plausible, by his insistence on
rcading, againrt the evidence of ull the best MSS, Meltis for
hielcis.1 O n the whole scholarhip has come down decidedIy in
favour of identif:+ng Castellum hielcis ~ 4 t h *tfeaux.~
.
Certainly
this is on general grounds the most likely t h e o in
~ view of the
ancient eccledastical tradition that St Prirninius was once
bishop of Meaux. It is therefore possible that the presence of
a creed identicaI with T (the creed, be i t remembered, o St
Prirniniusj in the Sacramentay of Gellone is in some way a
relic of the influence which the Benedictine refugee from Xarbonne must have ~Yreldedthere during his stay mo or three
generations previously. The MS, it should be noted, has a
number of other Spanish traits.
The hypothesis that T originated in S.W. France, in the
region once k n o ~ mas Septimania, and that it attahed its
present shape there in the seventh century, is ane which deserves
serious consideration. Its. superiority to the Burpndian hypothesis scarcdy needs to be emphasized : diere is no connecting
li& between St Frirninius and Burguiidy, and the association
of the relet-ant liturgical MSS ~ 4 t hBurgundy is purdy acidental. So far from being an objection to it. the appearance of
similar creeds in the Latin Balkans comparatively early, e.g.
in &e wsitings of Nicetas of Remesiana, supplies it 4 t h useful
confirmation. There were close ties between the Eastern districts of the Western empire on the one hand and Gaul and
Spain on the other. To take an exnmple, St Martin of Touis
(f 397) was not only born in Pannonia (at Szombathely, in
Rungary), but w-orkcd there for a long period. St h i I h of
Braga (i580) was dso a Pannonian. T h e Visigoths, who after
419 subdued S, Gaul and then Spain, and about 470 infected
a setion of the Burgundians with Arianism, had settled for a
considerable time in DacW and its neighbourhwd. The Ostrogotb, who mled Provence for more than a generation d t e r
5m0,carne from Pannonia. Hence a certain borrowing of rodai
CT. R. Bh. xxix, i g i z , 262-173.
&um Archiu mix, r g t 4, 550 ff., and GCHhgar flrachr. PliilHzsl. AI.. rgr6, 23 r R. See ntao i\'.
Lrvkon, .jwri Archi;. uxl;i.iii. 1913,35 r f.

* SW B. Krusch,

C H A R L E M A G X A S D THE CREED

clauses is easily accounted for. Relatims were equaliy close

between Xreland and both Spain and Gaul, and iFIrish missionaries streamed over Europe in the train of St Colurnhan, Ii-dand
in its turn ws indehted to Western Etzrope for n g ~ o ddeal of
its culture and liturgical art. Thus the acquaintance of Irish
churchmen with T can also be explained.

4- Chorlcniagne aad

iha

Creed

\Irliatever may be the final mrdict on thc claims of S.W.

France to be thc birthplace of the fe.rtits rtcepiu of the Apostles'
Creed, very few wi1I be likely ta deny that its osigin is to tx
sought sornewhcre north of the Alps at some date in the late
sixth or seventli century. Having estahlished this fixed point,
we sliould now he in a posi tiori to taklc the equalIy important
and no less troublesome problem of its canoniza~ionas the sole
baptismal reed of the JtresternChurch. H o ~ vdiid T comie to be
seIectd for this exalted role, and hy what s t e1s
~ did it obtain
an e n t q into the Roman l i t u r . ~ TIVO
?
separate discussicins will
be necessary, for i t rvould scem that T first became the authorized version of the creed in France and Gerrnany, and then
workecl its way to supremacy at Rome itself. IC may as well be
admitted at the outset that we cannot hope to reconstitute with
precise detail the s t a p by which these goals we rc reachc:d. The
scanty evidence available does not allow us to p lot out a t h c o l
in terms of concrete happeriings and hard-and-fast dates.
XevertheIess, though the coui~tsy we shdI be exploring is
tfiiickly veiled in mist, it is possible to discern clirnIy the kind
ofdeveloprnerit that must have taken pIace, nd tlius to recoiistruct it in broacl outline.
A fact which stands out with unrnistakable clarty is that
circumstances wcre uniquely favourablc in the Frankish ernpire,
in th late eighth and early ninth centuries, to the selection and
d t ' i a t e enthronernent of a singIe test of the baptisrnat creed.
In the first place, the Srankish d e r s , and Charlemagne in
particular, deliberately gave liturgical uniformi ty a high place
in their pragramrne af cultural restoration. It was their consistent aim, after the pact of mutual support sealed between
Pippin and Pope Stepheii 11 iri 754, to hring liturgical usage

421

theis reaIms, rnarked as it was at the time by haotic diversity,

into some kind of order b a s d on harmony with current Roman
practice. Rernan inffuences werc dready at work (e.%. m i s ere indelCntigabIe Romanizers), but
sicinares ti
thley must
powerfu I impulse when Pippin set
. --J-l.
--- L-rRrirric ucrurr: Irrc Lirgy as a riiuuci and endeavoured to supply
liimself witli Roman Iiturgial books.1 There is some question
whether Pippin" seforms extended fieyond ithe insduction of
thc Roman chant of the antiphonary and responsary.2 IVhatiI question, there can be no
ever mau kie t houglit of t his
:rnagne
doubt thalt Charli
caUy continued the samc
1 of mass and the adrninisIE: ideal j(nthe e
Rc~rnanizin
--tration of tlie sacramenrs gcncrally. In a11 t hjs he received substantial aid froin the puse Gregorian sacrarnentary which, in
aiis\ver to his request, was sent to him in 785 or 786 by Pope
Hadrian X bv the hands of abbot John of Ravenna."~ djs~ U the
I F'rankish territofies, the copies made
ser
were inl erpolated with Iatish modificabons
OT
r--d e s ~ ~ ~LVl t prcvrir
u
i r riuin clnshing too violently with local
usage. So far as the baptismal office was concerned, we have no
reason to suppose that the pdicy had any drastic effect on the
text of the creed. In view of the reluctance which Charlemagne
and his adviser Alicuin showed to i~psettingestabIished usagc
mi>re than necessary, we cain appreciate thar they would not be
-u. uciliruIic
f -&L-- -- * L - T"--r
t l i ~ ~ u a cLU
rnt: I - L ~ P C VI baptismal creed in favour
of t he fom C still employed in t he Roman r i t e ar the tradition
and the reddition. But it is at least cEear tliat the spirit which
was in the air must have been Eiostile ta the persistente of
re!+na1 id iosyncrasy, and imust harre encauraqed t hc developmirrit of urkiform, O flicially recognizied texts,
---.i
JIn the !a o n d Iilace, alurigxiue
their general conccrn for
uniforrnity of sites, the FranI;ish rulers laid gi-eat stres, as a
matter o[ state policy, on the learning oF the creed and the
T,ord's P r a ~ e r . In tlie dqlorable breakdolvn of eduation,

ici

--Au

!L

1 Sre Ri. Netztr, Iniruwtim de h ~ S I C

r-I~C m Ftmc raw lu G r ~ l V i f l ~ m ,
Paris, 1910,30 ff ; E. &mar, Pippin wd dic Romisch Kirckle, Rerlin, 19i4, tz-53 ;

'I'ri. Klauser, Ri*!.3drbilch liii, I 953,169 R.

rio, e.g., S. Raumer, Gc~chichkdar Brsuiers, Freiburg, 1895,228 ff. But cr. Th.
Klauser, I f i ~ tJ. ~ l h r b l ~liii,
h 1933, 171.
PCJF
the Pn~r'rIctfpr, cf. .!h
Cfrm.
. Hist., EM. TlI, 696.

CHARLEMAGNE AND T H L CREED

cdture, moral$; and reli

-igion rvith which they found thernseIves
confronted, th ey s e mL to have seized upon thcse texts as
-admirablv adapren Cror
imposing at least a rninrnum standard
of knowledge. Thus Carlonan, in 142, sanctioning thc decisions
of a counci1 presided @ver by St Boniface, took the step af
ordaintng that e v e 9 year in Lent bishops should examine their
parjsh c1erg)- on the functions of their ministry, and chiefly on
the cerernonles rir baptism, on the prayers and ritual of the
mass, md on the Catholic faith.qWhat was contempIated, no
doubt, was an investigation into the priest's grasp of the
essentials o Chcistian teaching, but both contemporary usage
and the general ipporance of the clergy at the time suggest
that the exarninarion included the text ofthe creed.2 Osiginally
applicable only to the territory under Carloman's sway, Austrasia, this ordinance was accepted by Pippin ar the council of
Soissons in 7qq for &ustria,3 w7as a h e d by the general
councii ofthe Franks in 74/,4 and "as repromulgated by Charlem a p e for ali his dominions in 769.6 The immense irnportance
he attahed to teaching the m e faith carne out forciblv in the
Admonitio Gmtrnlis%which
he published on 2:j ar& 789,
and severa1 of its capitula (e.g. 32, 8 2 ) almost 1-ead like paraphsases of the Apostles' Creed. Charlernagne ne:ver weairied of
reiterating that what he wanted was instructed priests, rneaning
by that men with an exact knowledge of their liturgical functions, of baptism and mass in particular, and able io educate
the peopIe by sound commentaries on the Lord's Prayer and
the reed.7 Lolcal- counlcils gave practical force to his wishes by
ratifyinp his pt-opammie of eccIesiastica1 studies. We possess an
interesting quesrionnaire drafted, probabIy, for the use of a
m i s m at some date betrveen 803 and 813, which opens with
a brusque inquiv addressed to the clergv, whether t h q
know by heart and understand the reed and the Lord's
_&__k

a
95

CCI. A. Boretius, CupiPitrrlariaRcpm Framrrm (Mon. Gcrm. Hist., h

~ e11)
. I.

INo. 3)-

' Cf. E.Vykoukal, R.H.E. xiv, rg13, F.

Mm. Gmm. Hiri., C h l . 11, 35 (No.iv).

M o n . Cem, Htst., Cantil. 11, 47.

A. Boretius, Up,cir. 45 (No.8).

A. Borctius, 0t1.n'!, 52 ff.
CF. the rnatcrial conveniently assemblcd by M. Andrieu, Lrs rrrdincs rmani
du hmt mpycn dgc, Louvain, I93 1, I, 476 ff.

423
Prayer.1 We &o possess a list of itemi of knowledge which "a11
eclesiastical persons are bidden to learn", which includes thc
Catholic faith oF St Athanasius, the ALpostles" Creed, and the
Lord's Pra.er.?
At the same time a seria of parde1 ordinances made the
study of these basic texrs obligatory on a11 the laip. T o pick but
two examples out of rnany, a Ietter of Charlemagne's has come
down to us addressed to a bishop Garibaldus (Gerbald of Liilge,
784-8 r a), and giving expression to his solicitude for &e religious
instruction of the faithful.3No one is qualified to be a godfather
or godmother, he insists, unless he knows by heart and can
repeat the Lord's Prayer and the creed. In thc same way, in
a prog-iamrne of questions draum up for the benefit of Charlemagne's missi, it is laid down that ali Christians are expected
to know the Lord's Prayer nd the creed, and to be able to
teach them to others.4 Decrees of thi pattem c o d d be multiplied indefinitely. Their impliation would seem to h that the
creed, like the Lord's Prayer, was a recognizable, officia1
instmment ; and if thi was so, it is obxious thar a Iarge number
of variant texts c01~ t d
not hlave been tolerated for long.
A turnirig-point in the developrnent of a single officialversian
of the cret:d may :ilmost cr:rtainly be discemed behind an jmportant rneasure which Charlemagne took in 8 r 1-8 r 3. It was
probably about that time that he wrote to a11 the rnetropoIitans
in his realms demanding detailed information about the baptismal rttes practised and the baptismal creed used in thir
dioceses. In his letter to Odilbert of hlilan he said : 5
Thus ive desire to learn, either by letter from you or by n-ord of
rnouth, in whas mamer you and your suffraqans teach and instruct
the priests of God and the people committed to vour charge reprding the acrament of baptism, that is, \vhy a child is firt made a
catechumm, and what a catechumen is. -4fter that, what you te11
them a b u t the other parts d the semice in order-as r w d s t h t
scrutiny, what the scrutiny is ;as regards the symbol, what the term
1 A. Borct ius, Op. cit. 234. C
f.slso C.De Clercq, h l.!~isloiion rclfgkwc Fromqut,
Lwvain and Fsris, 1936,251.
' A. Borctius, Op.ti!. 235.
A. 13risetius, Op. &i. 241.Cf.C. De CEercq, O$. cit. 2 2 2 f.
A. norctius, Op. cit. rog L
8 A. Borctius, 09. m t . 246 E. Cf. also C. De Clcrcq, 0p. cit. 216.

THE ORIGINS OF THE APOSTLES' CBEED

424

means according to the Latins ; as regards belief (de wedulitut~),after

what fashion they are supposed to bbelieve in God the Father
almighty, and in Jesus Christ His Son, Who was borii aiid suffered,
and in the Holy Spirit, thp:
hnlv
.
-. - .. Catholic Church, and the other
items w:hich follow in the same crt:ed; as regards the renunciation
of Satan and a11 his works and shovvs, what the renunciation is, and
.
.
,
e
*c
+
L , devil. etc.
..,L-+
v r i l a L uii3 the works and
"
1
~11e
-v'

S ~ C I W ~

We observe that the empcror I-iere spec

mentions the
reed. His object plainly was to secure u
y in the baptismal service on t2ie basis of the- n
nuIriari Lype. The bishops'
replies, a number of which have come down to us, must have
revealed an appalling state of diversity, and we must assume
that his worst suspicions were confirrned. Thus the councils
held un der his E~uspices.in 813 irisisted anew that the Roman
rite mu:it he the standartI, and th~ a the
t bishops should instruct
the cler!=y along those liries. The ideal of uniformity was being
eagerly pushed forward, and it is interesting for us to observe
that the text ofthe baptismal creed was among the items about
whlch the ernperor was most concerned.
The results to which this survey points may not at first !;cem
very exciting. But if we have no~wherecome acrr3ss any L:lear
sign of a monopoly bein:g grante,d to T, we shoul d at lear;t be
in a position to appreciate how very propitious the atmosphere
was to thc ernergene o f a single official creed and the elimination of idiosyncrasy. It need not accasion surprise shat the
choice fel1 upon T. It must be rerneabered that T was unusually
favourably placed for attaining pre-eminence. Originally a
native of Septimania in S.W. France, it was in current use a t
ArIes on the other side of the Rhne ; and through the rnissionary wanderngs of St Prirninius it had become domiciled both in
northern France and in parts of Gerrnany. The abbey of
Reichenau whih its pztron had established was a vigorous
centre of liturgical influente. It was onIy to be expecred that
when the po1icy of liturgical uniformity pursued by the Carolingians, the eIevation of rhe baptismal creed into an eduational
instrurnent, and the special solicitude of Charlemape for the
baptismal sewice, combined to hasten the adoption of a common form, that chosen form would be one which had aIready
arhievcd a wide measiire of diffiision nnd populnrity.

CHARLEMAGNE AND THE CRELD

I
I

.
.
A
_

I
i

1
\

Ar: any rate it was abeut the beginning of the ninth century
that T hegan to enjoy a practical monopoly in 'SVestern Europe.
We notied above that the form of creed which AmaIarius of
Trves sent to Charlemagne in answer to his questionnaire was
either T or sornething very dose to it.1 It would be interesting
If we couId discover what part, if any, was played in the development by the court schoob at Aachen and Tours. An unsolved
question i s the authorship of the Bistutatio buerorurn which tradition ascribes to Alcuin.2 In chapter r I of this interesting little
work the creed is quoted twice over, in the form of questions
and answers, and both times it is the text of our Apostles' Creed.
The Disputatio survives in a Salzburg MS (No. 67) of the end
of the niath entury: the other works written out aIong with
it there belong indisputably to AIcuin. Froben, the editor of
AIcuin's oollected works, accepted it as genuine, declaring that
its styIe and manner corresponded exactIy with Alcuin's, but
scholarship has not pronounced a final verdict. If the tract i5
really by AIcuin, it wouId constitute a rernarkable iIIustration
of T'8 adoption as the official text of the baptismal creed by
Charlemagnc" lleading theologans. As it is, there is nowhere
else any trace o T in Alcuin's wrirings, although he alludes to
both the Constantinopolitan Creed (which was for him the
creed par excellenc~)and the "ApostIes' Creed ". Almost a11 the
other ninth-entury writers are equally siIent about the text of
the creed they knew and used. But there is one notable exception, Hsabanus Maurus. He was, it should be observed, a pupiI
of.Alcuin's at Tours, and it is a fat that he quotes the creed, in
t h(: authentic form T, severa1 times in his works.3
-4nother illustration of the special status which T wrts now
acquiring is provided by its appearance in pslters. It was about
this period, or a little earlier, that the creed began to be written
out in psalters along wirh other kindred formularies, such as the
Te
nd the Quicunquie Vult. I't is a remarkable fact tha4
wh
he ApostlesTreed appear.s in ninth-centur y psalter:j,
.-1 .-1.
.the ~ e x r1s the one we are scuuyirig.
Probably the i:arliest c)F
these service-books is thc Vienna Psalter (No. 1861 in the
-1.

425

See above, p. 406: cf- P.L.99, 896.

For the text, 8ee P.L. ror, 1099ff.
3

Cf.esp. H m . r3 and De eccl. discip. 2 (P.L.

I 10, 27; 112,I225 f.).

THE ACCEPTAXCE OF L AT ROHE

KationaIbibliothek

at

Vienna), which accerding

to

tradition

was ordered by Charlemagne From the copyist DaguIf for psesentation to Pope Hadrian I. This wouId place it earIier than

795,Kaftcnbusch wns inclined to doubt this very early dating,

pointing out that the ITarolus and Hadrianus referred to by the
original scribe might equally well indicate Charle the Bald
and Pope Hadrian II ; but there is probably more to bc said,
on palaeographical as welI as other grounds, for the mditional
date.1 Here we have 'Ir in a service-book produced to tlle orders
of the king hirnself. T also features in the famous Utrecht
Psatter, now in the library of the Univcrsity of Utrecht, which
goes back to the first decades of the ninth ~ e n t u r y Again
.~
it
rnakes an appearance (foi. 167 r,) in the PsaIter oT Charles the
Bald (Cod. Lat. r 152 of the BibEothque Xationale, Paris1.3
This was made for the king hirnself during &e Iifetirne of Quem
Hermentrude (842-8693.Mre know that Charlemape tzras concerned, in harrnony with his insistence on proprieiy in other
rnatters liturgical, that the c1erg-y should be supplied with
corrected psalters.4 T must have had sornething of the status
and prestige of an official form if it was selected for incfuion
in psaIters prepared for the royai house. Its presence in them,
and probabIu in the corrected psalterr: used by the clergv, must
be rekoned as one of the explanatioris of its rapid diffusion in
the ninth century, for the saying and singing of the psatms, as
a method of intercession and for other purposes, became a
devotiori of tvidespread popularity arnong clergy and laity in
Caralingian times.
3. Tht Acreptance of 7af Rome

The preccding section has attempied to assemble, it is to be

feared in a ratlier selective and haphazard fashion, material
throwiny light on the proccss by whih the Apostles'Creed in
ihe f o m or ?r beame current coin throughout the Frankish
dorninions. li-e are not in the Ieast susprised to observe that it
was treated as the uthoritative version of the crecd in the West

'

g e n e d y in the eleventh and twezfth centuries. St Ivo of

Chartres (t I r i 7), for example, wrote a serrnon on the Apostle'
Creed, and it is certain that thc text he had before him was T,
despite the fact that he passed over DEscENDEn TO HELL without
mention.1 50 too Joslenus, or Gosienus, who was bishop of
Soissons in thc first half of the twelfth century (t r 1521, presupposed T in his exposition of the creed.2 The late twelftfrhcentury Spanish priest and monk of Leon, St Martinus Legionensis (iIZZI), aho used T as Iiis standard,3 as did Abelasd
(f. I 142) almost a century btfirc him.4 What is more interesting,
however, is the fact that, from the twelfth century onwards at
any xate, T was the official text of the creed at Rome itself. A
useful jllustration of this is iprovided by Pope Innocent I11
(+ r 216) in bis treatise on the Blessed Sacrament,5 Discussiiig
the singing oE the c r e d t rnass, he quoted both the Apostles'
and the Constantinopolitan Creeds, thc fomer in the shape of
T. From this time onwards trivial varfations in the text disappear, and it is pIainly T which is everywhere regarded as the
Aposrles' Creed. Thus, when St Thomas Aquinas wrote his exposition 5f it, he adopted T as his basis as a matter of course.fi
Thc question wlizich must now be faccd is when and how a
version of R which, as we have seen, in a11 probability reached
its final development in France, carne to be adopted at Rome.
It wil1 be recalled that the crecd used for declaratory purposes
in the Roman baptismal rite since the sixth century had, almost
certainty, been C. Tke questionnaire addresscd to the andidate
at the rnoment of baptism continued, of course, to bbe an abbrevition d R : precise- the same curtailed version is eaplayed
at the same point in the sen-ice to-day. Rut both the Gelasian
Sacramentary and Mabillon's Osdo Rornanus VI1 depict thc
candidate or his sponsors as making tl-ieir psofession of faith in
the wards, I BELIEVE IN Q N E GOD, etc. There is nothing to show
that this practice had become obsolete, much less that T had
taken the p'lace of C! at tke beginning of the ninth century ;
Snm. 23 (P.L.
e

Cf.H. hclcrcq, D.A.L.C. ii, 703 L

E CC. H.
a

Leclcrcq, D.A.L.C. xi, r344 ff.

CF.H.Leclercq, i3.rI.L.C. iii, 843 ff.

Cf.,.ldmoniiio Gmcrali~,capp. 70 .ind 7s (A. Boretius, Op.cit. 59 f.).

427

rk,604 F.).

Exps. i a symb. (F.L. 186, 1479 E.).

(P.L. 208. tsa6 R.).

Scrm.
A

Dc sacr. nltar. m y i . 2;
' ErMr. s u p r w b . *i.

50 ( P . L . ' ~r7, 827 L).

[Vol I11 of the 1634 Paris edirioii uf iiis worh).

TBE ACCEPTANGE OF T A T ROME

indeed the evidence that does exist suggcsts that thc catechetical use of C was in full swing at that time.'
The two earliest allegedly Rornan documerits whih testify
to T> acceptance at Rome are (a) the Ordo Rornanus antiquus,
edited by Melhior Hittorp in r568 as the first part of his De
divinis catholicae ecclesiae oficiir, a ~ i d( b ) the Codex Sessorianus 52
(now Codex 2096 in the Biblioteca Nazionale a t Rome). The
Corrner of these, described by tlie seventeenth-century Cardinal
Tommasi as "a hotchpotch of diverse rites according to various
customs", has been traced by recent students to the middle of
che tenth century.2 It is one of the principal documerrts Iying
behind the "'Romano-German Pontifical" of the tenth century
which it has been the noteworthy achievement of M,MicheI
Andrieu to disinter."The
Codex Sessoriaxius 52 is also a composite document, including preces of the late eleventh and
twelflfth centuries.4 Of thc four egments of which it is made up
-103 and foll. 178-190 are, for the most part, of the
I century, while foll. r 04-177 and 011. r 91-205 belong
LU crie end of the eleventli century. The whole seems to have
been written beyond any doubt in Italy. The MS was the
property in the thirteenth century (such is the irnplication of
a note jotted down on the v m o of the Zase page) of
the abbey
- - - .
of Nor:iantola,
- isituated r o km.t o the
nosrth-east of Mode:na.
The occurrence of T in botli these i rngortant source!; calIs
for a rnore pre cise and detailecI description. Maany frag rnents
.. .
r
.
and excerprs
Irom the baptismal nre are t o be founa naotica1ly
scattered up and d o m the Ordo Rufiaaaus antiquw. In a11 of them,
with a single exception, the creed presupposed is C. In this one
exception, however, which is printed on p. 73 of the 1568
edirion, T is quoted as a declaratory creed, with the prefatory
rubric :
1

429
the tiinth hour, as he is about to biess the font, as the custoin is,
pronounces the Lord's Prayer, Pnkr ?tos.kr, etc., Credo irz deum, etc.
I

'1
C

T*

C;

When the litany at the font is finished, a11 the clergy and people
standing in a circle round the font, silence is made and the Pope at
See above pp. 346 R.
Cf. R. Msndiemeier, Amalar uon Metz, 1893, 140; S. Biurner, Die Ku;/wlili
i, 18Bs, 626.
a CF. h o o d i i w ~@sommiidil hnut moym &e, Louvain, 1991, and Le pona$tal rnmaiii
nu myoi-&e (Stridi e Testi LXXXYI, r 938).
a The MS has been described by C . Mmin, R. Bin. xiv, 1897, 481--$O; P.
Grisar, Anulerta Romana 1, 214-116.Cf.M.Andrieu, 0p. cit. 287 ff.

1 rf

In Codex Sessorianus 52 thc creed T appears in two separate

places. The first of these is on folI. r 14v. and r r5 r., where the
braditio vrnboli is described after the model of Mabillan's Ordo
Rornanus VII, but with certain significant changes. The chief
of these are two, ( a ) that there is now no suggestion that the
catechumen speaks Greek, and (b) that the text of the creed
which the acoIyte recites is no longer C but T. It is worth
observing, however, that it is C which is recited at the redditio
symboli on Holy Saturday. The second appearance of T is in
the sermon expounding the creed which begins on foE. 161 v.
and ends on fol. 163 r. Here the names of the apodes considered responsible for each clause are written in the margin.
The reconstituted reed coincides exactly with T, except for the
omission of BORN FROM THE VIRGIN MARY, which must have
been Ieft out by an oversight. There are other creed-texts in
the MS as well as T: for example, on fol. r63 r. another exposition of the creed is given, and this yieIds a text (the preacher
quota it in full in his exordium) losely resembling R.
The Ordo Rornanzu antquus, as we saw, was probably not
cornpiled until the middle of the tenth century. Moreover,
much of the material ernbodied in it is patently Gallican, and
not Roman at all, Ii: is doubtful in consequence whether, jn
spite of its narne, it can be adduced as a witness to Roman
practice at aI1. The special irnportance which, in the eyes of
students, attaches to the Codex Sessorianus 52, depends on thc
possibility that it may give us a precious glimpse into Roman
liturgical habits in thc middle of the ninth century os a Little
later. As Dom Morin pointed out long ago, certain formulae
which occur in much thc same iporzion of the codex as the
baptismal rite seem to be directly onnected with this date. On
fol. r 26 r. are to be found certain solemn acclamations to be
recited at papal masses on great festivals in honour of the Pope
and the emperor. The names mentioned are Nicholas (domno
nosiro Nickolao) and Louis (domno raostro Hludouico). Tt seems
natural to infer that the pcrsons indicated must be Pope
Nicholas I (858-867) and the emperor Louis 11 (85a-875).The

4.3 2

THE ACCEPTANCE OF T AT ROME

THE ORXGINS OF THE APOSTLES' CREED

the close points of ontact between it and the Roniano-German

pontific a1 compiled probably in Mainz about t hc rniddle of
the tenih century. It inclines to the opin.ion that the codex, or
the model on which it was based, must have seen the light only
a short whle before the definitive adoption of the pontifica1 at
Rorne, i.e. ia the latter part of the tenth century. So far as its
contents are oncerncd, it is clearly an amalgam of material
derived from many sources, Frnkish and Roman alike.
If the ultimate bearing of considerations like these is not
altogether clear, they do at least emphasizc v e r - forcibly the
danger of building too much on thc occurrence of our received
text of the creed in Codex Sessorianus 52. Quite a number of
possibilities necd to be weighed which did not enter into t h e
purview of Dom Morin and Kattenbusch, and one would Ilke
to defer decisions until a properly noted edition of the codex is
available. In the meantime, confidente in the theory that T
supplanted C in the Roman baptisrnal service as early as the
ninth century is seriously undermined. It may well have done
so, but the evidence usualIy marshalled with a view to proving
it is far from satisfactory. On the other hand, it is possible to
propose an alternative date which has considerabIe intrinsic
likeIihood. This is the period when, as a result of political circurnstances and its own disastrous interna1 weakness, the
Roman church succumbed without resistance to FrankoGerman influente and, in particuIar, permitted its liturgy to
undergo virtual transformation. This period lasted roughly
from the restoration of the empire under Otte I in 962 to the
opening of tbe reign of Pope Gregory VI1 (1073).During &e
whole of this century and more, as Pope Gregory hirnself obscrved, " Teutonicis concessum clst regimen nodrae ecclesiae. "1 Everything goes to show that the cundition of the Church in Italy,
and not least in the koly city, was deplorable in t h e tenth
century. Ignorance and corruption were rife, and liturgicaI
science and practice had fallen into pitiful decay. The emperor
Otto I, who made the rehabiIitation of ecclesiastical standards
one of the rnain planks of his policy, made severa] protracted
stays in Italy, and swarms of Geman ecclesiastics crossed the
AJps in his train. It is no matter for wonderment that their
Cf,G.Mnrin, Arwcdota Muredmbma 11, i, 460.

1i
0

1'
I

433
efforts to resuscitate sound liturgicd usage resulted in a drasric
GaIIicanization of the Rornan rite. A step which must have
contributed largely to this was taken by Pope Gregciry V in 998.
O n 2 2 April of that year, apparently, on the intervention of
Otto III, he accorded special priviIeges to the abbey of
Reichenau, including that of having its abbot consecrated by
the Rornan pontiff himself, but in return imposed on it the
duty of sending to the HoIy See, on each occasion of the consecration of an abbot, one sacramentary, om episde-book, one
gospel-book and two white horses.1 This curious harge throws
an iIluminating ray of light on the shocking leve1 of cultural
life in central ItaIy at the time, if the Pope could not rely on
loca1 sme$toria to produce the service-books that he needd.
At the same time it conveys a vivid irnpression of rhe liturgical
subjection of Rome, and illustrates one of the ways in which
the Franko-German rites penetrated beyond the Alps. The
rnissals and sacramentaries which the mortks af R.eichenau
despatched periodicalIy to the Lateran palai:e must naturally
. .
have conformed to the pattern of usage cnrrent at the time
in Alamannia and in the Frankish empire generally.
It must be admitted that no echo ofthe baptismal creed, no
whisper hinting at its vwying fortunes, can be overheard in this
Iengthy span of centuries. The change-over from the use of C
to the use of T may have been carried through at any one of
several possibIe dates. One thinks, for example, of the essay at
liturgical reform tried out in the second quarter of the tenth
century by AIberic, Pnfricim Romnorum, with the assistance of
St Odo, the venerable abbot of Cluny.2 T
his resuIted in the
blending of the Roman liturgy inherited from St Gregory and
pontiffs more ancient still with a number of important Gallican
elements. Again, the suspicion cannot be avoided that the
Benedictine mo& at Reichenau may have played their part.
The baptismal orders which travelied south to the papal paIace
from their sc@toriurn certainIy contained the creed T which
had descended to thtm from their refugee founder.
See A. Brackmann, Ecrmania Pm1i~%& (h Reg& PonfiRomanorum} 11,
152,nr. 12. It was not a dead letter in 1083: cf. M. Anddeu, h or&ms
romni, 516.
2
M. Andrieu, ies ordim romani, 5 r 2 R., and RRV,des sciencc~rtlk. v, r 925,
1

Pt. I,

I ir

m.

Arnid much that is obscure and baffling, however, one broad

coriclusion stands out ; and it remains equaIly true whether the
earlier or the Iater date for the transformation of Rome's
baptismal rite is preferred. The adoption of T inro the Rornan
liturgy rnay be regarded as a by-product, srnall in itself but
fraught with lasting significance, of the large-scale pesmeation
of the Rornan service-books with German infiuene after the
beginning of the ninth century. The claim has been made'
that "it was the Franko-German church which, at this critica1
epoch, saved the Reman liturgy for Rome and the Western
world". If the argument of this chapter is welI founded, these
words rnay be appfied in a special sense to the Aposties' Creed.
In persuading Rome to accept a new baptismal confession, the
church beyond the Alps was rnerely handing back to her,
enriched and improved, that same venerable rule of faith
whicli she herself had compiled in the second century as an
epitome of t h e everlasting gospel.
1

So Th. Klauser in Hist. J&rbwli liii, I 933, I 89.

INDEX
Aachen, 353,365: 425 ;Councilof (79B),
955; Council of ( ~ I o 365
) ,
Abclard, 3931 42 7
Acaciuri of Caesarea, 290,292
Achamoth, 245
Acta Iuslini, 8 I n.
Acbs @Si Z;harniu, 379
Admomfio Gmrnlis, 42zr 426 n.
Adoptionists ; Adoptiomsm, 128, r 29,
130, r47i 3559 356,364, 377
Ado Viennensis, 363 n.
Aeneas of Paris, 354
Aetius (the Anomacan), 283, 287
Aetius (of Constantinople), ng7 F, 318
AFrican Church, 36,
54, 85,88, 93,
114, I 16, 175 f.
Agathon, Pope, 360
Alamannia, 408, 414~4.33
AIberic, Patri~sRomomrtm, 433
Alcuin, 353, 355, 35% 37'3 377, 392,
4211 425
AI&, A.D7.,2 15 n.
Alexander, St, 188, igo, 191, 2 ~ 6 , 2 r o ,
132, 233 n, 234 n, 233, 240, 242,
246 n, 25" 252, 253 f, 262, 344
Alexander of Byzantium, 206,210,252
AIexandria, 92, 188f, 322; Synod of
(362j, ,241, 2789 2849 332s 340;
Council of (378),335
Amalarius of Metz, 353, 356, 371
Arnalarius o f Trhes, 394,406, qog, 425
Ambrose, St, I, 2,36 f, 105 f, 168,172 f,
249, 253, 337,958, 370,396
Arnmianus Marcellinus, 263
Anaatasius (Chronicler), 366
Anastasius I, Emperor, 349
A n a t h o IFsous, I 5
Anatolius oT Constantinopie, 3r 7,318
Ancoratus (St Epiphanius), i92 n, prg n,
3043 3'0, 3 ' k o i 327 f, 331
227
Ancyra, 14,
109; Synod of (358),238,

a,

288

Andrieu, M.,422 R, 428,43r n, 433 nAncmoeans, 240,283, 287 f, 294, 295,

3 6 340

Antioch, 34, 189-6, 197, 207, 279,

328; Counc~loF (P#), 101, 207,
238 f, 247; Council of (325),208 f,
21I , 224, 239; Dedication Council
of (3411, I 10, 208, 262, 253-74,

281,282, 292; Council of (m),

306, 320,335
Apollinarians ; Apolinarianism, 303,
306, 333, 334,335,336, 337
A~Ilinarius,z99,333,334,335~
33%382
Apostles, Compo~tionof creed by, 1-6,

172, 1 9 j 9 3 i 4
Appthgmata ~ M m r i i r, go
Aquinas, St Thomas, 3, 388, 394,427
Arians ; Arianism, 109, 188, 206, 208,

Aristotle, 243, 244

Arius, r89f, 206,210,21 I , 216, ngk34,
236,237,240,242, 249,251 f, 2585
96r,262,2F5,270, 277,283, 339
Arles, 415 f, 424; Council of ( g r p ) , 57,
60,206; Council of (3559,284
hnobius, 56, 58
Asdepas of Gaza, 277
Asaemanus, J. A,, 122 n.
Asterius the Sophist,qr n, 5-32?271,273
Athanagild, 52
Athamius, &,51 n, I 1 0 n, 169,181 n,
206n, P i a , 213, 215, 220, 223,
232 n, 233, 235, 236, 237, 239,
241, 243, 230, 25T, 2539 25% 2649
265, 267, 270 % 271, 272 f, 274,
275,276,277,278 ff, 282,3I 1,335,
339 f, 342, 343 ; attitude towards
N, 257 f, 259, 260 f, 284 f.
Athenagoras, St, 154 n, 244
Augustine, St, 32, 36, 39, 55, 57, 61,
106, 125, 134f, 138, 168,169, 17'2,
175 fn 233 261, 358 f, 370, 3733
376 f,980,381 n, 384, 387 f, 395 "i
397
Augvstint o f Canterbury, St, 408
"7

438

INDEX

INDEX

C r c d (coniimd) :Crccds (cmiinwd) :43i, 432, 33 ' and ApollinariNestorius, 187, 3-24?345
Sicaea (h7, I*, 196, 20542, 263a n i m , 3 3 3 3 ; baptismalureof,3 t3,
295, 296Qo1, 336 f, 319, 320 f,
344-8, 35% 41% 429, 432; Comparison xmith X, 301-5 ;conncction
3'231, 332, 333. 3389 339, 313,
M ith Council of Constantinoplc
344, 3451 346s 349,350 f, 362, 3 f W
($I),
303-10. 313-32;ronnrction
375; c o m p a h n ivith CMS., 2 I 7 w ~ t h.]erusalrrn, g~c+rz. 314f.
120; ~ i t h
C, 301-5; draline of,
32 j ; Holv Spirit in, 3'4, 331t?-44;
n11-p;
Eusebius on, 2 - i i 4 ;
mcaning and use of, 23.1-9: nor
in Eucharisi, 34&57,41z7 427: rcIationship ro 'i,2S~&p5, 32%3t; I
Wd ar baptism, 255, ~56,324 r,
~ 5351;
, text of, z r j r.
teachinc and histow of, 322-67;
Si*, I C n,~ 291 f, 294. 378. 41 2
tradinin~i a h u t , rg6-301, 3 i i j - 2 2
'icraas of Remeiana, 174 i, .+r?
Constanzinople. CFuncil oF %i,
O l d R o m !R),jr,84,91,92, 100293 f~ 29% 3 i 8
166, $67, I ~ T 172-81,
,
192, 19+,
C O ~ Iiiiirgy,
I ~ C 122
ypnan of Tnulon, Sr. 416
~ $ f,
5 197, 198, mo, 201 f, 203,
Damasua, 360
33 j i 37;78.384.409
f, 41 1 F datr
of, I 27-30 : daughttr-meds ol',
Datrd Crced oC Sirmium: I ~ CSir1 72-8 1 ; evidente for, I o w i o+ :
rnium, Fourth Creed,
ori~inalIanyage of. I i 1-13 ; rcDcdicaiion Council:sce.4ntioch (34r 1.
lationship to T, 369, 370 f, 404;
DZr Balyzeh Papym, 8+,88 f, r z 1 f,
ieaching of, 131-66;text, 102 T,
188, 195, 203 n.
Origcn, 92 f.
Eastcrn, 107, i Gn, I 7 1 , i8i-204, 229,
Palestine, 2~8,227,nr8
26g! 268, 33gr 372, 375, 379, 31(5
Philippopolis, 279
L7Ctlrrsz~Mncrosttchus, 276 n, 2 7 9
Prilycarp, St, 7 0
Ii~yptian,18891, 2 0 0
I'risciIIian, 177, 178,375
Epidn.ri.~, S t Irnaeus's, 77-81, 97, '
Ravcnna, t39, r73, 174
rzli, 127, 195, 203 n, 204
Epiphnnius, Sr, First (Ep. I), 192,
Hicz, r?& 5 375, 376, 4 13
Rimini,Orthodor;fomulaof,~i6
2rgnj227,304,310.312,315,318,
Ruspe, 176
3t9, 320, 327, ~ 2 531
8 ~; Second
Scrdica, 277, 278, 283
(Ep. III, 192, P r g , jrg,328, 339,
S i m i m , F k t , 281,288; Ljccond,
33 7
283-;;
Third, 2 8 8 ; Fowth
Epida ApOrBlorlmr,
I 18,153,
("Dated"), 18-2,
294, 378, 41 2
tj;,
160, i 6 1 , 193
"Fatth o f S ! Jrrom," 3#f, 412
I Smyma, Prub??en of, 82, 193
Spanish, T ij, I 77 f, 378, 38j, 412
Gillt~,I 78-80, 378, 383, 403- 4 9 ,
Smixn. r-,
218, zz;,
379, 382
qro
TrrruIlian,
82-8: g5,g;, r rg-18, i24.
Gallican MiswE, 4 ~ 3 413
: n. 416
Cklasian Sacramentay, 37 f. 107,
'39, 137, 160, :;o
Tt~twrrirtm
Bmini, E)O f, 195
122,346. +og, 427
Toulon,
178ff; 416
Hippo, t76
Hippolytus,
St, qo-1, iw, 107, 1tJ- I
TtIrirY, 173, 174
..
lt"estcrn, i o l , i67-81: iqg-no+, 373,
119, 122, 534; 129, 133, 141, 153,
16% i95
375~385,394
lpatius, St, 68 ff, 126
C&,
.4nti-heretical bias of, 6, 6+ f,
Irrnntus,St, iW2. Set&oEfiidh*u
S i , 85f, 97:, 127, ~ 5 5 ,349, 166;
b a p t i d - s c e Baptiarnal Crrcds;
Icrusalern [ S t G d :.I), 160n, 187 f,
caicchctical setting of. 45-52 ; CODr93,227in55,31r;3~41339 Justiii, St, 70-6, 81, 119, 1 3 6 ~195,
ciliar, I ~ P205-1
,
1 , 255 i, 263-95 ;
202, 203 n, 204
declaratory, Ch. I1 passim, 63, 64,
88, 89, roof, 193; in Eucharrst,
Lucian t hc Martyr, r 92
348-57, 412, 427 ; in thc nlficts,
Macatlus, St, igo f, 195
368,
f, 401 ; iepcndary comMiian, 107, 1721 1739 1742 179, 375
positi of, 1-0, 29, 53, 54, 1 0 1 ,
Mopsucstia, gq, 187$ 256,323
I 05, 399, 401 ; tests of orthodo~y,
Mozarabic Iiturgy, I 77 f, 352, 4i 2,
205-1 i
.I t6

CmdP. Clauses from:-

439

Crccds, Clauses fmm (coniumd) :Si& a i thc ri&! hmrd af t h Faihcr, 151,

Almi&,
I 1 2, I 32-4. 136-9, 3 ;*
A rcmdcd info tlic h-,
I5I
303
Brgoitm mf m d , z I 8, ~ 2 237
7 f.~
To.ytIicr m f i i p p c d and gMficd, 342
Burtrl, 150-i~ 303,378,385
Trvr GodJrom lrtl~God,21 8, 327,236
Cuthlir, I g5,370, 384-6, 412
LTnndrrPonhw Piloir, 93. I 15, I 49 f,
Chriri J r m , t Ij,125, 1 3 ~ 4 137+
,
195, 2% 3037 370
Communtm of S&b, 175, 3 70, 38%
Wiir
!OF man), i y j
I S ' k t H c L c i l l ~ ~115-~8,1ji
,
97, 4'2, 413
Gnrcircd..
bom..
370, ~ 7 1 6 ~Il'hos@krihmqhIbhFpr~kfuir,3~~
C r m . F. S.. z& n.
Cnun, 15.. E.,88
Cullrnann, O., I 3 n, 25 f.
zprian aF Canhage, St. 46 f, j g , 56,
$3,
%V 3 3 5 ~ 3 i 9n4'2743
Cypr1aII of Toulon, Sr, 178,389,413
Eirmd L
i
j
,i q , I ro, 175, 176, 185, Cyril or.-Uexandria, St, 300, 309, 38 7,
196,3;0,3868,389, -+ot,41%+r3
322,323,324
h r h r r , 104, 108. r 10. 116. 1 9 2 6 .
Cysil of Jerusalem, S t , gg r, 39, 134,

.,

137, r41: 151,'68, I j r , 183,255f,

3 1 1 1 314 fi 333,338 t 385v 388 rDaillC, J., 168
Damasus, Popc, 306, 3 ~336,344
)

& rnm a n d f i r

our salvalion, tgq

Spirit and th Virgin
Mory, go, 93, 94, 118, 146-9,q g ,

Ar

h n i

th H0-y

$8

Darnian, St Perer,
De Clercq, C., 423 n.
13e dcsrdfs N i c m a e synodi, 21 2 n, 2 15,
220 n, 232 n, 235 n, 236 11, 239 v ,

P.,

3 1 1 , 32 1, 324, 326, 335 f,

J3b f, 377
Frwrn the substatue of Ilic Falhar, ri rg,
9 18, 2 2 7 , 235 f, 238,250,30zi3m4,

242,

258,260

337 r.
Godfrrmi Cod,302
God the F n t h AImighy, 1 3 2 3 , 375
Hob Chrch, 47, 82, 84, 85, 07, r 37t76,3!P

Dcdication Council : sec Antioch.

Dt incarmiionc (St Athan.}, 257
DCmytcriis (St .4mbrox), 3 7
Der Udyzeh Pap>rus, 84, 88 f, i 2 I f,
189, 195,203 R.

Jesus Chrrrt, 1 3 ~ 4 1374

,

Dtsncr~mmirs(St~lmbmsc),361~
Dcxcnt to Hell, 5, 290, 378-383, 413,

HolySpirit,tj2-5,2rg,383f,416
Llyc-.e~fr,
9 1
b i a , r 1618.
1-13 f, 3 4 1

120,

124.

413

125, 141,

r%fak<roJ bmnm mid rnrth, 65 f,

Dc srn&

Piorqsii, 258,260
DrS?rr~tzswQ (St Basil), 342, 343

DCf riilitak

202,

(&udix%th;i~l.i, 321

Iliklius, >i.,20 n.
W l d u h r , 3, 42, 66
195~119I L i i d m l i l l , 379
Of w b ~ kingdmn
r
lkm rhuilbr rn d , 1 Didx rnus thr Blnd.. ~ 1 1
Ilietcrich, h.,jg n.
3033 338, 339
Onc I.od. I 16, 132, 195, 202
Uiodor of Tarsus, 3 1 2 , 3 1 j
On ilu ihird dv rose agirili, I 5 1
1 3 1 n ~ ~ nolCyzicus,
es
299,32I , 326,333
O n r b a f i l h i m ! u ~ m i s s i o n o f ~ i n r , 1 6 0 ~ .Uionysius of .-ZIexandria, St, 47, 193.
Prowdrng Jrom I
h Fnflier, 341, 358,
24 1 246, 247
Dionysius ofRome, St, 239,21t,"47 r.
3f.X
P r o c r r d f n ~ f r m ~ h F u t h r a i i d t f i c S o n , Dis~plrnao~cani,3z,gj,4g,6a,8~,1~1,
16!-71
301, 354, 355, 3 5 M 7
Rents~ionoJnnr, 82, 84,94, I 15, t 1 7,
Disputotiopiicrwum, 392, 425

303

,Wal.rr of dl !hRgs ;xn61e md inciriblr,

it8,izif,!6*3,185,q6~384

Rmrrrtiwn of Ih Jesh, 87, 97, 1 2 1,

i 6 3 d t 3 8 7 i 401
Ratcagafr~oniiiethirdday,112, 186,
195

11
I

'

Dx,G.,45n,go,ginigzn,g~n,~8n~
Doetists, 16, 65, 70, 80, 97, I 27, 145~
149,383
Dodd,C.H.,gn, r 1
Dlger, F. J., 16 n, q j 11.

Donatisli, 390, 391

Ducheme, L., 32 n, 417, 430 n.

Feine, P., r I
Felk of Urge[, 354,355, 356, 364
Filioque clause, 301, 354 f, 358-67, 407,

-Emter, Baptisrn at, 33,401,418

Ecthesis MurvstiJi~~,
276 n, 279
E ~ v p t i a nChurch, 122, 195, glo
~&nhofer, L., 32 n.
Elbogen, I., 27 n.
Eleusis, Ritea of, 56
Eleusius of Cyzicus, g+ r , 343, 344
EI-Hurr, 415
Elipandus of Toledo, 364
Ephesus, Counul of ($34,
tB5, 308,
316 f, 32~,323,324, a g ; Robber
S y o d Y 'of ( ~ 9 130,
Epidams (St Irenaeus), 52, 77-81: 97,
- 126, 127, 1 9 5 , 2 0 3 n i 2 0 4
Epiphanius, St, 108, I 10, 192, 206,
304,310,3'2i318fj 327,331,335 fi
337,341 nr 359
Epistuta Apostalurum, 82, I I 8, I 22, I 53,

409 f.
Firmicus Maternu, 56,58
Firmilian of Caesarea, 47,56,59 f, 93,
193
Fish, Syrnbol of, 16 n.
Flavian, of Constantinup1e, 308, 5'0
Fltskamp, M. J,, 4r j n.
Flora, h i t e r to, 245
Florence, Councrl of (r439 E),4
Florentius of Adrianopolis, 290
Forbcs, C. H., 403 n.
Frankfwt-on-Main, Synod of (7941,364
Frnkish Church,430;-Empire, 366,
4 14,420~42
I , 430;-litur~y, 355 fi
409,430 f.
Froben, J., 425
Fructuosus, St, 370
Fulgentius @ Ruspe, St, 38 n, g j n,
1 i 5 f, 384
Funk, F. X, 170 n.

Ethiopian eunuch, 16, $, e,

@
Euckarist, 18, 64, 66, 69, 72, 88 f,
~ I 93,
Y
168, 205, 296, 3539 358,
366,367,393, 395,421,422; ccfeed
m, 296,3457 3 4 s 5 7 i 427
Eunornius Ithe h o r n c e a n l , 281, 287
Eunornius of Nicornedia, ;i5, 298
Euphration, 237 n.
Eusebius of Camama, 47 n, 51, 128,
EZ~,
169, 181-3, 19311,208, 211,
212, ar3fJ 2r7,218,228,237,240,
241, 242, 243* 24.5, 249, 250, 264,
271%274, 385 n; letter of, 213216, 217, ZP&,
229, 246,250
Eusebius of Doryheum, 185, zgg
Eusebius of Nicornedia, 213, 2 r6, 233,
234 n, 236, 240, 246, 249, 253,
254,258,262,264

Eusebrus of Vercelli, 284

Eustathius of Antioch, St, 129,212,249,
254
Eustathius of Sebaste, 340
EutYches, 299, 308i 309,3339 336
EurjEhianism, 336, 337,362
Euzoius, 189,262,270
Evagr:ius, 3rw n, 345 n.
borclsm, 14,16,1g, 30 f, 64,75,95,205
Exoukontians, 240
Erplumtio fomboli ad Vlatiuttdos,3,55 n , q 2
Eyndt, D. van den, 3 n, 76 n, 83 n.
Fabricius, C., 28 n.
Faustus of Riez, St, I E r, 152, 178, 372,
3753 37% 381 3% 391

GalEican liturgy, 35, 39 f, 366,409,410,

4II
Gallican Sacrarnentary : se8 Bobbiu,
Missal of
Garibaldus (Gerbald oF Liege), 423
Gaul, 353, 413, 416, 417; Church of,
3,579 3903 39' f i 397, 4'0 f.
Gelasiaii hacramentary, 37 f, 107, 122,
346, 409, 427
Gelasius of C y z ~ c a 262
,
n.
&iione, Sacramentarj of, 346, 404,
4'3? 4t83 4'9
Gennadius of Marseilles, I 74
Gentile Christans, 25 f, 27
GenriEly, Councii of (76T}, 363
George of Laodicea, 292
German Cbmch, 357, 366, 403, 432
GeminIus,_285

Gibson, E. C. S., 314 n.

Gnostics; Gnmtiusm, 76, 8r, 87, 98,
100, r 18, 127, 142, 143, 14.5 fr 164,
2451 "7,373
Goar, F. J., 31 n, 40 n.
God, Fathmhood of, t n , 25, r7f, 97,
111, 132-6, 139, 141, 195, 218,
232, 233, 236, 252, z S ~ 276,
,
278,
202,285,3591 372,374
GwbeI of Peter, 38 t
Greetings, Epistolary, 14, n r
Gregorian Sacramentary, 4 2 I
Gregory the Great, Pope, 36n, 381 n,
40% 410,433
Gregory 11, Pope, 406

Gregory 111, Pope, 405, 408

Gregory V, Pope, 433
Grcgory VII, Pope, 432
Grcgory of Elrira, 328 n, 416
Gregory o f Hunting on, 407
Grrgory of Nazianzus, St, 39 n, 307,
326,337,343
Gregory o l Nyssa, St, 39 n, 359
Fregory Thaumahirgus, St, I 45
Gregory of Tours, St, 416
Grisar, P., 428 n.
Gummms, J., 287
Gunthor, Anselm, 321 n.
Gvintkin, H. M., 287 ri.

Hadrian I, Pope, 356 f, 364,421,426

Hahn, C. L., r 79,405,
Hardouin, J., 4 n.
Harnack, A. von, 6, I I n, 30 n, 69 n,
12c-6, 147, I53 n, ' 8 2 "9 '92, '96,
201,208, 217,220, 222, 227, 228,
229, 2 5 2 % 2779 3022 304 ni 305 ni
3 0 7 , 3 ' ) 9 , 3 ' 3 , 3 ' 4 , 5 ~ 8 , 3 3 ~332
~ fi
346,343 n, 3897 396
Harris, J. Kendel, 76 n.
Harrison, P. N., 163n.
Hatfield, Synod af (6801, 360, 362
Hauler, E.,go n.
Iiauret, C., 260 n.
I-Iausslciter, J., 25, 65 n, I I I n, 128
ffmoticon, 300, 34.4, 349, 350
H e n v 11, Ernvror, 357, 367
Heradeon, 245
Hermas, Shephsrd of, 67, 154, 155, 158,
IFF,38;
Hermentrude. a26
Herrnogenes, o
;
Hess, H., 274 n, 275 n.
Hilary of Poitiers, St, 32 n, 248, 258,
268,282,284,286,358,376 f, 397
~ i p p o I ~ t uSt,
s , 3.545 f, 82 89, go+,
97, 99, 111, 112, 113f, 116, 119,
1221 1241 1279 128fi 133, I39iI47i
148, 149n, 1 3, 160,162, 167, 170,
195, 206, 381 See ulso Apo~folic
'Trudition.
Hittorp, Melchoir, 368 f, 428
Holl, K., IZA,
147, 148,319
Holy Spirit, 3, 12, n l f, ng f, 28,42,66,
8j-7i96,14s7 196,277, 28% ~ O f,
Q

Homoo&s
(orokrw~ = "like
in
substancc"}, 216, 257 f, 280, 286,
288, 2 9 ~ , 2 9 2
Homoousims, 2&4,291 f, 294, 295
Homoousios (po&mr = "of the
same substance"), I T I , 183, zra,
213, 214, 116, 217, 218,221-3,
225 f, 23.5, 236, 238, ~ 4 - 5 4 , 2.55,
257-62, 266, 271, 273 E, 283, 286,
290, 29% 295~332fi340, 341-4
Hmnbach, A b b q d,399
Horner, G . W., 122 n.
Hort, F. J. A., 2r7fY 220r 222, 227,
235 "9 30% 3043 305 "i 310 fi 3133
3'5,318,328.330 fHrabanus M a m s , 353,392,425
Hunter, A. M., IQ n.
Hypwtases, Dcctriine ofthree, 214,223,
23 ,24',246,z4gg, 254,259,270 f,
~ 7 280,2Q
% ~ ~
H @ o s t w ~(wmaa~r, 223, 241,244,
24.5, ?48,250, 2 7, l i 8 f, 2913 302
H p s t a s i s , One, 277 f, 291 f.
Hypoppses (Theognostus), 236

Ignatius, St, 3, 65, 68-70, 126, 142.

'4.4, '45, '49, 15% 7 5 % 379%
385
Ildefonsus of Toledo, St, 1 7 7 n; 384,
386,415
Innocent 111, Pope, 427
Instantius, r 77
Ireland, 353,430
Ircnaws, St, 2,51 f i 7-2,95,
9% 97,
r18,rzg,125f, 127, r33, 136. 137.
14" 143, 144, 145, '48, 149, 1549
155, 156, 158, 159 f, 16 f, 170,
199i20492455 375, 37% 321
Irish Church, 352 f; rnissionrtries, 41 7 ,
420
Isaac the Great (Sahak), 324
Isidow of Seville, St, 3 n, 415
Italy, 172-4, 363, 365,428, 43'i 432 f.
Ivo oT Chartres, St, ~ 8 393,
4 ~427
james, M. R., 407
Jecker, G., 398 n, 408 n, 415n.
,lerorne, St, I , 292 f, 360, 376, 389,

392 n.

Jemalem, 183 f, 192, 199,

IZO,

227,

31' fi 374,379,328,339, 3451 368

"Jesus is Lord," 6, I 4 f, 23, 2 7
"Jesus is the Chrkt," 16, 27
John, St, 3 i 9 i '423 1.56
John,Abbot of Biclaro,. 350 n, 352
:]ohn, Abp. of Constantinnple, 349
John oi Ravenna, 42 i
,John the Deacon, 36
.lnn=,rl, H. M.,nr,qn.

INDEX

Verona Fragnieiit, gu
Victor, Popc, 130
Viciorinua, Mariua, 36, s 13 r i , o A j
Victricius nf Koi~cn,St, gqti
t'ig~lantius,392, 396
Vipilius, Popc, 346
ViSipoth9351, 3 5 2 , 4 t ~ ,
Vitalis, 336
Voss, G.J., 5, 3 t o
Vykwkal, E.,422 n.

tl'alafrid Strabo, 354,555,356

l+'a~ner,6.F., 352 n.

Westcott, B. F., g n.
\Cilmart, R . , 401 n, 404 n, 41 7 , 418
M'ilson, H.A-, 38 n. 346 n.
\Yord : srr Logos.

Zahn, Th., 6% 390 n, 394

Zeiller, J., 274 n.
Zeno, Empespr. 3mi 3 ~ 349,350
,
Zeno the Stoic." "s8a
Zephyrinus, %pe, go, 128, 129, 148
Zivingli, H., 358