EXPOSITION

OF

THE APOSTLES' CREED

By

THE REV. JAMES DODDS, D.D.

I BELIEVE IN GOD THE FATHER ALMIGHTY, MAKER OF HEAVEN AND EARTH

AND IN JESUS CHRIST HIS ONLY SON OUR LORD

WHO WAS CONCEIVED BY THE HOLY GHOST, BORN OF THE VIRGIN MARY

SUFFERED UNDER PONTIUS PILATE, WAS CRUCIFIED, DEAD, AND BURIED

HE DESCENDED INTO HELL, THE THIRD DAY HE ROSE AGAIN FROM THE DEAD

HE ASCENDED INTO HEAVEN AND SITTETH ON THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD THE FATHER ALMIGHTY

FROM THENCE HE SHALL COME TO JUDGE THE QUICK AND THE DEAD

I BELIEVE IN THE HOLY GHOST

THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH, THE COMMUNION OF SAINTS

THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS

THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY

AND THE LIFE EVERLASTING

EDITORIAL NOTE

Dr. Dodds' Exposition of the Apostles' Creed will supply a real need. It contains a careful, well-informed, and well-balanced statement of the doctrines of the Church which are expressed or indicated in the Creed, and it will be helpful to many as arranging the passages of Scripture on which these doctrines rest. Though historical references could have been easily made, the Editors agree with the author in thinking that to insert them in the discussion of doctrines would have probably perplexed the readers for whom the book is designed.

February 1896.

PREFATORY NOTE

The title and purpose of this Handbook limit its subject matter to an exposition of the doctrines which have place in the summary of belief termed the Apostles' Creed. It is not meant to cover the whole field of Christian doctrine.

A history of the Creed has not been attempted. There is much that is interesting in its origin and growth. It did not come into existence all at once, but was built up from time to time by the insertion of clauses formulated by Councils or by leading representatives of the Christian Church. The space available is not sufficient to include a history.

The Handbook being not controversial but expository, references to the heretics and heresies that gave occasion for the articles which have place in the Creed are few and brief.

JAMES DODDS.

THE APOSTLES' CREED

INTRODUCTION

While the disciples had Jesus with them, there was no occasion for a formal summary of the doctrines which His followers were called to accept and to maintain. He was present to resolve all doubts and settle all difficulties, so that when their faith was assailed or their teaching impugned they could refer to Him. Then, as now, faith had Him for its object,—with this difference, that He was visibly at hand to counsel and to direct, while now He is passed into the heavens and guides His people into all truth, not by personal instruction but by His invisible though ever present Spirit.

Another reason why Jesus gave His disciples no creed may be found in the fact that His work was not finished until He had laid down His life, and that no creed could have been satisfactory which did not cover those great unfulfilled events in His history that lie at the foundation of the Christian religion.

Jesus did indeed require belief in Himself as a condition on which healing and salvation were bestowed. Unbelief hindered His work, while faith in His Messianic claims and mission never failed to secure a rich blessing to those who confessed Him. The faith which He recognised was not the acceptance and confession of a summary of doctrine such as any of the Creeds now existing, but a simple statement of belief in Himself as the Son of God and the Messiah. On one occasion only does He appear to have called for a confession which went further than this, when, having declared to Martha the great doctrine of Resurrection, He put to her the question, "Believest thou this?"^[001]

After His death and resurrection, when Jesus charged His disciples to preach the Gospel, He bade them teach their followers to observe all things whatsoever He had commanded them.^[002] The Apostles, accordingly, appear to have furnished the leaders of the churches they planted with summaries of doctrine, such as we find in the fifteenth chapter of Paul's first Epistle to the Corinthians.^[003] Paul seems to refer to such a summary when he writes to the Romans commending them for obedience to the "form of doctrine" which was delivered them,^[004] and when he bestows his benediction on those Galatians who walked according to "this rule."^[005] It was, doubtless, such a compendium of doctrine he had in view when he charged Timothy to "keep that which was committed to his trust," contrasting this "deposit" with "profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called."^[006] The bearing of this charge is made more emphatic when it is repeated by the Apostle in connection with the exhortation, "Hold fast the form of sound words, which thou hast heard of me, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus."^[007]

It would thus appear that from Apostolic times there existed a form of words of the character of a creed, which, for some reason, came to be jealously guarded and concealed from all who were not Christians. It was perhaps Paul's reference to the summary of doctrine as a "deposit" to be carefully kept, that led the early converts to regard it as a private possession—a trust to be hidden in the heart and covered from unfriendly eyes. The Apostle did not mean that it should be so regarded, but this interpretation given to his words, or some other cause, led to its being used as a watchword rather than as an open confession, the consequence of which is that in the writings of the earliest Christian fathers no statement of doctrines corresponding to a creed is found.

The absence of creeds or of allusions to them in the oldest Christian treatises gives seeming point to the objection urged by Professor Harnack and others against the Apostles' Creed as now held and interpreted by the Church, that it is not a correct summary of early Christian belief. That such objections are not well founded will become apparent as the various articles of the Creed are considered in the light of Apostolic teaching. The absence of creeds in early Christian writings is sufficiently accounted for by the care with which the summary was cherished as a secret trust, to be treasured in the memory but not to be written or otherwise profaned by publicity.

The word "creed"—derived from the Latin "credo, I believe"—is, in its ecclesiastical sense, used to denote a summary or concise statement of doctrines formulated and accepted by a church. Although usually connected with religious belief, it has a wider meaning, and designates the principles which an individual or an associated body so holds that they become the springs and guides of conduct. Some sects of Christians reject formal creeds and profess to find the Scriptures sufficient for all purposes that creeds are meant to serve. The Christian religion rests on Christ, and the final appeal on any question of doctrine must be to the Scriptures which testify of Him: but it is found that very different conclusions are often reached by those who profess to ground their beliefs upon the same passages of the Word of God. Almost every heresy that has disturbed the unity of the Church has been advocated by men who appealed to Scripture in confirmation of the doctrines they taught. The true teaching of the Word of God is gathered from careful and continuous searching of the Scriptures, and there is danger of fatal error when conclusions are drawn from isolated passages interpreted in accordance with preconceived opinions. It has been found not only expedient but needful that the Christian Churches should set forth in creeds and confessions the doctrines which they believe the Scriptures affirm. They are bound not only to accept Scripture as the rule of faith, but to make known the sense in which they understand it. As unlearned and unstable men wrest and subvert the Sacred Writings, it is fitting that those who are learned and not unstable should publish sound expositions of their contents. In the light of creeds, converts are enabled to test their own position, and to put to proof the claims of those who profess to be teachers of Christian doctrine.

One of the most widely accepted of these forms is the Apostles' Creed, so called, not because it was drawn up by, or in the time of, the Apostles—although there is a tradition to the effect that each of them contributed a clause—but because it is in accordance with the sum of Apostolic teaching. The history of this Creed is not easily traced. The care with which it was guarded excluded it from the writings of the early fathers, and it is impossible, therefore, to assign to their proper dates, with certainty, some of the articles of which it is composed. This, however, is evident, that it came gradually into existence, clauses being added from time to time to guard the faithful against false doctrine, or to enable them to defend the orthodox belief. It appears to have been the general creed of the Christian Church, in a form very similar to that which it now bears, from the close of the second century.^[008] At that time and afterwards it served not only as a test of Christian doctrine, but was also used by catechists in training and instructing candidates for admission to the Church.

It is sometimes urged as an objection to this Creed that it is not a sufficiently comprehensive summary of Christian doctrine. Those who object to it on this ground should consider the purpose of creeds. They were not meant to cover the whole field of Christian faith, but to fortify believers against the teaching of heretics. The Apostles' Creed was not intended, and does not profess, to state all the things that Christians ought to believe. There is no reference in it to Scripture, to Inspiration, to Prayer, or to the Sacraments. It sets forth in a few words, distinct and easily remembered, the existence and relations to men of the three Persons of the Godhead—those facts and truths on which all doctrine and duty rest, and from which they find development.

It is especially objected that there is no reference in this Creed to the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ. But, though not directly expressed, this doctrine is really and substantially contained in it. The Creed is the confession of those whose bond of union is common faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as their Saviour. The articles which treat of Him and of His sufferings and work are intelligible only to those who believe in the reality and efficacy of the Atonement.

The Creed contains twelve articles, and to each of these, and to every part of it, the words "I believe" belong. One article relates to God the Father, six to God the Son, one to God the Holy Ghost, and four to the Holy Catholic Church and the privileges secured to its members. These articles are—

In estimating the value of creeds in the early ages of the Christian Church, it is important to bear in mind that the converts were almost wholly dependent on oral instruction for their knowledge of Divine truth. Copies of the Old and New Testaments existed in manuscript only. These were few in number, and the cost of production placed them beyond the reach of the great majority. A single copy served for a community or a district in which the Hebrew or the Greek tongue was understood, but in localities where other languages were in use the living voice was needed to make revelation known. It is only since the invention of printing and the application of the steam-engine to the economical and rapid production of books, and since modern linguists have multiplied the translations of the Bible, that it has become in their own tongues accessible to believers in all lands, available for private perusal and family reading. It was therefore a necessity that Christians should possess "a form of sound words," comprehensive enough to embody the leading doctrines of Christianity, yet brief enough to be easily committed to memory.

ARTICLE 1

1. I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth

SECTION 1.—I BELIEVE

The Creed is the expression of personal belief. Whether spoken in private or in a public assembly, it is the confession of the faith held by each individual for himself. Each of us has a separate life, and each of us must personally accept God's message and express his own belief. Religion must influence men as units before it can benefit them in masses. Faith that saves is a gift of God which every one must receive for himself. The faith of one is of no avail for another, therefore the Creed begins with the affirmation "I believe." In repeating it we profess our own faith in what God has revealed concerning Himself.

"I believe."—The Apostles' Creed is a declaration of things which are most surely believed among us, and its several parts or articles are founded upon the contents of Scripture, which is our one rule of faith. It does not begin with the words I think or I know, but with the statement "I believe." "Belief" is used in various senses, but here it means the assent of the mind and heart to the doctrines expressed in the Creed. When we repeat the form we declare that we accept and adopt all the statements which it covers. "With the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made."^[009]

Faith differs from knowledge. There are some things which we know to be true, and there are others of which we say we believe them to be true. There are certain truths which are termed axiomatic. When the terms in which they are expressed are understood, the truth they convey is at once admitted. We know that two and two make four, we know that two straight lines cannot enclose a space; but we do not know in the same sense those things which the Creed affirms. It deals with statements that, for the most part, have never been, and cannot be, tested by sense, and that cannot be demonstrated by such proof as will compel us to accept them. We believe them, not because it is impossible to withhold our assent, nor only because nature, history, and conscience confirm them, but on the ground of testimony. "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God."^[010] We believe because we are assured on sufficient and competent authority that these things are so. We know that we live in a material universe, but our knowledge does not extend to the manner in which the universe came into being. That is a matter of belief. "Through faith"—not by ocular or logical proof, but on testimony—"we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God."^[011]

Faith differs from opinion. When a man believes his mind is made up. By whatever process it may have been reached, the conclusion commends itself as one that is fixed and irreversible. Opinion, on the other hand, is held loosely. It is based not on certainty but on probability. The possibility of error is recognised, and the opinion is readily surrendered when the grounds on which it was formed are seen to be insufficient or misleading. "A man," says Coleridge, "having seen a million moss roses all red, concludes from his own experience and that of others that all moss roses are red. That is a maxim with him—the greatest amount of his knowledge upon the subject. But it is only true until some gardener has produced a white moss rose,—after which the maxim is good for nothing."^[012]

The testimony on which faith rests is human or Divine. It is human in so far as it is based on human experience and observation. It is Divine in so far as it rests upon the direct revelation of God. Faith in man is continually exercised in business and in all the departments of life. It is necessary to the very existence of society. Faith in God moves in another sphere. Its objects are not seen or temporal, and they do not rest for proof upon the testimony of man. It receives and assents to statements which are made on the authority of God, who knows all things, who therefore cannot be deceived, and who is truth and therefore cannot deceive us. On this Divine rock of faith, and not upon her own knowledge, the Christian Church rests. "If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater."^[013] Among Christian virtues faith stands first. It must precede everything else. It is the foundation on which all Christian character and life are built. "He that cometh unto God must believe that he is."^[014] "Without faith it is impossible to please God."^[015]

That which Christian faith realises and grasps is expressed in doctrine. Faith is not a separate and self-dependent grace. Its existence and growth arise from those things which are believed, and therefore it is necessary to study and understand, as far as we can, the doctrines of the Christian faith before we can possess or manifest belief. It is important that we should have a definite knowledge of these doctrines; that we should study them in relation to the Scriptures upon which they profess to be founded, and that we should be in a position to defend them against assailants. Thus faith will gather strength, and believers will be "ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh them a reason of the hope that is in them with meekness and fear."^[016]

SECTION 2.—GOD—^[017]

The existence of God is the basis of all religious belief. If there is no God, there is no moral obligation. If there is no Almighty Being to whom men owe existence, and to whom they must give account, worship is a vain show and systems of religion are meaningless. Theologians, therefore, from the days of the first Christian apologists to our own time, have endeavoured to establish by proof the doctrine of the Divine existence. To those who accept the authority of Scripture the existence of God is a fact which no argument can overthrow; but as there are many who reject this authority, evidence has been sought elsewhere than in Scripture to establish the doctrine. The arguments for the Being of God are mainly threefold, being drawn: (a) from the consciousness of mankind; (b) from the order and design that are manifest in the universe; and (c) from the written revelation which claims to have come to men from God Himself.

(a) (Consciousness) There is a wonderful agreement among men as to the existence of a great invisible Being by whom the world was created and is governed, and who charges Himself with the control and guidance of its inhabitants and concerns. In a land such as our own, in which Christianity has held place for many centuries, belief in God, however it may fail to produce holy living, is almost universal. This belief exercises a strong influence, and has contributed not a little to the formation of our national character. It is an atmosphere always around us, sustaining and promoting the healthy life of those even who are the least conscious of being affected by it. The belief is indelibly impressed upon our laws, our literature, and even our everyday occupations. It is stamped upon the relations men sustain to one another. It is this which for one day weekly suspends labour that Christians may have leisure to worship God and to meditate upon the duties they owe to Him. It is in recognition of this that we see tall spires pointing heavenward, and churches opening their portals to the inhabitants of crowded cities and to the dwellers in scattered villages. In Christian lands the consciousness of men bears testimony to the existence of God, but it is not in such lands only that this consciousness exists and confirms belief in the Divine. In the earliest times, long before history began to be written, such a consciousness was prevalent, leading men to faith in and worship of a Being or Beings infinitely greater than themselves, present with them and presiding, though invisibly, over their destinies. The study of Comparative Religion has shown how nearly the primeval inhabitants of lands widely distant from each other were at one in the views they had come to entertain. Hymns, prayers, precepts, and traditions are found in the sacred books of the great religions of the East, and archaeologists have deciphered on ancient monuments, and traced in primitive religious rites, clear evidence of belief in the existence of the Divine. The valleys of the Nile, of the Euphrates, and of the Tigris have revealed facts for the theologian's benefit that are almost exhaustless. In the Egyptian Book of the Dead, and in the religious hymns and the ritual of which they formed part in the sacred literature of Babylonia, there is proof that four thousand years ago hymns were sung in honour of the gods, and prayers were offered to propitiate them and secure their favour. But belief in God had place long before these hymns were sung or these prayers offered. This is shown by the existence of words in the most ancient hymns, prayers, and inscriptions which could not have been used unless the ideas which they conveyed had already existed in men's minds. These words—some of which are preserved in modern tongues—when traced to their roots, help greatly to explain the character of early religious thought, and prove the existence of a widely diffused belief in the Divine Being and His government. They serve as confirmation of a belief, which is in harmony with many facts, that God had revealed Himself to humanity before He furnished the revelation which has come down to us. Words are not originated by accident. They are expressions of real existences, and before they found place in hymns or prayers the ideas which they denoted must have been matters of faith or knowledge to those who used them. Before man is found professing faith in pagan deities some idea of God must have existed in his mind. Men did not like to retain God in their knowledge, and so the idea of the Divine became perverted, and in its first simplicity was lost, and the multitude followed numberless shadows all illusory and vain. Still, there lingered remnants and traditions of belief in a Divine Creator and Governor which must have originated in such a primeval revelation as the book of Genesis records. We find there the statement that God revealed Himself to our first parents by direct intercourse. They heard and saw and talked with God. They therefore knew of the existence of God by personal perception, and the ideas they held regarding Him were founded on His own manifestation of Himself.

Closely connected with this consciousness is the sense of responsibility universally prevalent. There is a law written on the heart of every rational human being, under the guidance of which he recognises a distinction between good and evil, right and wrong. He possesses a faculty to which the name of conscience has been given, that convicts him of sin when he violates, and approves his conduct when he conforms to, its dictates. However much different peoples and different ages may be at variance in their particular ideas of what is right and what is wrong, the conception itself has place in all of them. There are certain fundamental notions as to what is just and what is unjust, what is virtuous and what is vicious, that find universal or all but universal acceptance. This power of distinguishing between right and wrong constitutes man a moral being, and separates him by infinite distance from the lower animals. To the beasts that perish there is nothing right or wrong. They live altogether according to nature, and have no responsibility. Man stands in a different relation to the Lawgiver who bestowed on him the faculty of conscience and impressed on his soul a conviction that he will have to give account for all his actions. The Being to whom he must give account is God.

(b) (Order) Another ground of this belief is the order manifest in the universe. There is a symmetry that pervades all material things of which we have knowledge. Part is adapted to part; objects are accurately adjusted to each other; "wheels within wheels" move smoothly; every portion fits into and works in harmony with every other portion without discord or jarring. It is unthinkable that these effects should be due to chance or to a cause that is without intelligence. The perfect arrangement of parts that work together must have been planned by a living Being of infinite wisdom, knowledge, and power. This Being, whose creatures they are, must exist. Behind the pervading order there must be personality, purpose, and action. The fool may say in his heart, "There is no God," but, as nature bears testimony to the existence of an omniscient and omnipotent Creator, reason calls for another conclusion.

(c) (Scripture) There is a limit to the knowledge of God which the consciousness of man and the order and design in the universe impart. These serve to establish the truth that God is, but they do not convey the intimation that He is a moral Governor and the rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. They declare little of His character, and are silent as to many of the duties which He requires. To make God known, the teaching of conscience and of reason must be supplemented by revelation. It is in the Bible that the believer finds the strongest proofs of the existence of the Divine Being, and from the Bible he obtains also the most comprehensive and satisfying view of the Deity and of man's relation to Him. He there finds that what he has to believe concerning God is, that He is Jehovah—the Being infinitely and eternally perfect, self-existent, and self-sufficient; the only living and true God, there being none beside Him. The heathen believed in and worshipped many gods. The untutored savage peopled the groves with them, and the pagan philosopher built innumerable temples in their honour. The Pantheons of Greece and Rome were crowded with the statues of favourite deities. The doctrine of one living and true God was prominent in the revelation given to Israel. God's message by Moses had its foundation—truth in the proclamation: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord."^[018] His glory and His work are shared by no other being. He is the absolute Sovereign and Lord of all creatures. In the Bible, too, man learns that God is his own personal God who cares for him, and to whom he owes love, allegiance, and obedience. All who refuse to believe in the existence of God reject the testimony of Scripture regarding Him, but to such as acknowledge its claim to be the Word of God, the evidence it supplies is convincing and all-sufficient.

Examination of ancient heathen religions and of the views they set forth regarding God shows clearly the distance at which they stand from the revelation of Scripture. The gods of the heathen were of like passions with their worshippers—selfish, cruel, vindictive, and without regard for equity or justice in their treatment of men. The God of the Bible, on the other hand, is a righteous God, merciful to His creatures, and desirous of their temporal and eternal wellbeing, and when He inflicts suffering it is not as a passionate Judge, but as a Father who chastens His children for their profit.

The doctrine of the Trinity of Persons in the God-head, though not expressly stared in the Creed, is implied in the clauses which refer to each of the Persons who compose it. There is one God, but in the Godhead there are three Persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, whose names indicate the relation in which each stands to the others.

Each of the Persons is complete and perfect God. While there are three Persons in the Godhead, the same in substance, equal in power and glory, these three are one. The doctrine thus stated is termed the doctrine of the Trinity. This word is not found in Scripture, but the truth which it expresses is set forth there, dimly in the Old Testament, distinctly in the New. In the first chapter of Genesis the word "God" is in the Hebrew a plural noun, and yet it is used with a singular verb, thus early seeming to intimate what afterwards is clearly made known, that there is a plurality of Persons, who yet constitute the one living and true God. The same indication of plurality in unity appears in the account of man's creation: "Let us make man."^[019] This doctrine of the Trinity is essentially one of revelation. Natural religion testifies to the existence, the personality, and the unity of God, but fails to make known that the unity of God is a unity of three Persons. The doctrine does not contradict reason, it is above reason.

It is sometimes said that the doctrine of the Trinity involves a contradiction in affirming that three Persons are one Person. This charge misrepresents the doctrine. Trinitarians do not say that Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are three Persons in the sense in which three men are three individuals. They believe that there is one God, and that Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are yet so distinct that the Father can address the Son, the Son can address the Father, and the Father can address and send the Spirit. God's ways are not as our ways. He is not a man that He should be limited by the conditions of human relationships. When we say there are three Persons in the Godhead, we use a word applicable to men, which, though the most fitting one at our disposal, must come far short of fully describing the relations of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost to each other. Possessing no celestial language, we cannot fully describe or understand heavenly things.