The Sunday News
Talking Spiritually Rev Paul Bayethe Damasane
WE began last week interrogating the basis of a religious credo. There is nothing that has stuck to me all these past years as a believer, as my childhood days as a server, acolyte and assistant in the Anglican and Roman Catholic Churches. The songs do ring in my soul and resonate in my studies of the Holy Scriptures. I am reminded of my late father a lot as he led the chant of the creed. That is why I have chosen to use the intro to the creed that he would make in a clear, forceful tenor that had the cadence that would make you feel you are ‘there!’ I cannot say it in English because there is no word in this language to express it. Walk with me as we investigate the origins of the creeds and confessions of the Christian faith. Note I do not say the origins of the faith but the creeds and confessions!
Creeds and Confessions, therefore, have been found necessary in all eras and branches of the Church, and, when not abused, have been useful for the following purposes:
- To mark, disseminate and preserve the attainments made in the knowledge of Christian truth by any branch of the Church in any crisis of its development.
- To discriminate the truth from the glosses of false teachers, and to present it in its integrity and due proportions.
- To act as the basis of ecclesiastical fellowship among those so nearly agreed as to be able to labour together in harmony.
- To be used as instruments in the great work of popular instruction.
We should remember, however, that the matter of these Creeds and Confessions binds the consciences of men only so far as it is purely scriptural, and because it is so; and as to the form in which that matter is stated, they bind those only who have voluntarily subscribed to the Confession, and because of that subscription.
A creed as we defined last week is a brief statement of faith used to list important truths, to clarify doctrinal points and to distinguish truth from error. Creeds are usually worded to be easily memorised. The word creed comes from the Latin word credo, meaning, I believe. The Bible contains a number of creed-like passages. For example, Jews used the Shema, based on Deuteronomy 6:4-9, as a creed. Paul wrote simple creed-like statements in 1 Corinthians 8:6; 12:3 and15:3-4. 1 Timothy 3:16 also appears as a creed, a concise statement of belief.
As the early church spread, there was a practical need for a statement of faith to help believers focus on the most important doctrines of their Christian faith. The Apostles’ Creed is named so because it accurately reflects the teaching of the apostles. It was not written by the apostles, but was gradually formed, by common consent, out of the Confessions adopted severally by particular churches, and used in the reception of its members. It reached its present form, and universal use among all the churches, about the close of the second century. This Creed was appended to the Shorter Catechism, together with the Lord’s Prayer and Ten Commandments, in the first edition published by order of British Parliament, “not as though it were composed by the apostles, or ought to be esteemed canonical Scripture . . . but because it is a brief sum of Christian faith, agreeable to the Word of God, and anciently received in the churches of Christ.”
Church fathers Irenaeus, Tertullian, Augustine and other leaders had slightly different versions of the Apostles’ Creed, but the text of Pirminius in AD 750 was eventually accepted as the standard form in the Western church.
As the church grew, heresies also grew, and the early Christians needed to clarify the defining boundaries of the faith. In the early 300s, before the canon of the New Testament had been finalised, controversy developed over the divinity of Jesus Christ. At the request of Emperor Constantine, Christian bishops from across the Eastern Roman Empire, with a few from the West, met in the town of Nicea, near Constantinople, in AD325 to discuss the matter. They wrote their consensus in the form of a creed, called the Creed of Nicea.
In 381, another major council was held at Constantinople, at which the Creed of Nicea was expanded slightly to include a few more doctrines. The resulting Creed is called the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed, or more commonly, the Nicene Creed. This Creed is formed on the basis of the Apostles’ Creed, the clauses relating to the consubstantial divinity of Christ being contributed by the great Council held in Nice in Bithynia, AD325, and those relating to the divinity and personality of the Holy Ghost added by the Second Ecumenical Council, held at Constantinople, AD381; and the “filioque” clause added by the Council of the Western Church, held at Toledo, Spain, AD 569.
In its present form it is the Creed of the whole Christian Church, the Greek Church rejecting only the last added clause. The Nicene Creed was a result of a secular leader insisting on religious leaders to interrogate the faith. It is because of the same reason that some sections of Christianity hold it that the entry of Emperor Constantine brought in a lot of pagan thoughts and system into an otherwise holy church. But surely that is the subject of another day nonetheless keep it in mind.
In the next century, church leaders met in the city of Chalcedon (also near Constantinople) to discuss, among other things, various theories about the divine and human natures of Jesus Christ. They also developed a creed to explain what they believed to be true to the gospel, true to the apostolic teaching, and true to the Scriptures. This creed is called the Creed of Chalcedon. Creeds can become formal, complex, abstract, and sometimes assumed as equal to Scripture. When properly used, however, they facilitate a concise basis for teaching, safeguard correct biblical doctrine, and create a focus for church fellowship. These three creeds are widely accepted among Christians as consistent with the Bible and as statements of true Christian orthodoxy or right teaching.
You may ask and say, “Mrevu why creeds after all?” You will appreciate that to Christians of past centuries, preserving orthodoxy was something worth dying for. When Athanasius refuted Arianism in the fourth century, many held to a heresy which made Jesus Christ a lesser god than the Creator.
Athanasius was persecuted for what he believed, but he stood for truth and prevailed. Thus Athanasius contra mundum (Athanasius against the world) became a proverb for future generations describing a person who will stand for the truth no matter what the cost. Throughout history, orthodoxy has not always been popular, but it has always defined what the true Christian believes. And the truth has prevailed. Going to the future and the possible future cradle of the faith in Africa we need to understand and know what we believe in.
Till next week, Shalom!
