What is the Apostles’ Creed ( _Symbolum Apostolicum_ )?

St. Hilary says, “We are compelled to attempt what is unattainable, to climb where we cannot reach, to speak what we cannot utter. Instead of the bare adoration of faith, we are compelled to trust the deep things of religion to the perils of human expression.”²⁷⁶

The Lord Christ questioned his disciples about their faith in him, so Peter confessed that “ He is the Christ, the Son of the living God ” (Matt. 16:16). Perhaps this declaration of faith provided the main idea for the creation of a creed of faith for the Church that declares “the truth of the Lord Christ, the Savior.” Another time, the Lord gathered his disciples and gave them authority to preach, teach, and baptize, saying, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit ” (Matt. 28:19), thus providing them with a formula for a trinitarian creed related to baptism. Thus, the New Testament records for us a formula of faith in Christ and a formula of faith in the Trinity. These two formulas are the essence of the faith of the Church.

F. L. Cross says of the Apostles’ Creed , “Though it is much later than the Apostolic age, it can so far claim to be Apostolic that its articles one and all express the faith of apostolic times .”²⁷⁷

Patrology²⁷⁸ offers us many texts of creeds found in the writings of both Eastern and Western Fathers. Among these are creeds found in the writings of: Irenaeus, bishop of Lyon, 180 A.D.; Tertullian of Carthage, 200 A.D.; Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, 250 A.D.; Novatian of Rome, 250 A.D.; Origen of Alexandria, 250 A.D.; Gregory, bishop of Neocaesarea, 270 A.D.; Lucian of Antioch, 300 A.D.; Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea, 325 A.D.; Marcellus of Ancyra, 340 A.D.; Cyril of Jerusalem, 350 A.D.; Epiphanius, bishop of Cyprus, 374 A.D.; Rufinus of Aquileia, 390 A.D.; and the creed found in the Constitutions of the Holy Apostles.

The Eastern texts differ from those of the West in that they are generally longer and more diverse. They have a metaphysical dimension (what lies beyond physical nature) and include a number of educational expressions in response to heresies that were widespread in the East.