SOME BASIC TEACHINGS FOUND IN THE CREED: THEIR SALVIFIC AND EXISTENTIAL SIGNIFICANCE (Part 1)

 

Dr Philip Kariatlis, in Voice of Orthodoxy, 35:4-6 (2013), pp.28-29.

The Creed – or more precisely, the Nicene Constantinopolitan Creed – which we repeat every Sunday at the Divine Liturgy, and at Baptisms or even during our own personal prayer was never intended as a text to be studied only by the so-called specialist theologians concerned more with the history of theology. Even though it was formulated some 1700 years ago it is still relevant for our life today. Unfortunately, however, whilst the Creed is often recited – and even at times from memory by some – it is nevertheless little understood and its significance rarely appreciated. The ‘creed’, coming form the Latin credo which means ‘I believe’ is essentially a text outlining the Church’s most important beliefs or doctrines; it is something which the Church holds to be true and therefore enjoins its members to believe in as well.
Yet, more than a simple ‘acceptance’ of certain beliefs regarding the existence of God, the Creed discloses a faith in God that we, as believers, are called to hold fast to, to entrust ourselves to and to make a commitment to these saving truths. To the extent that the Creed gives witness to the way that God has revealed himself – as Father, Son and Holy Spirit – the faithful are called to place their trust in, and ultimately surrender to, this loving reality; indeed, a loving way of life which is beyond imagination, beyond boundaries and ultimately salvific. Moreover, and most importantly, the truths revealed in the Creed, relating to the Trinitarian God, to which we are called to entrust ourselves, are relevant and can underpin the way we live our life on a daily basis.

Statement, Summary and Standard of Faith

When the Creed was first formulated in the fourth century (to be precise in 325AD and 381AD respectively at what came to be known as the First and Second Ecumenical Councils), it was considered to be a public statement of faith confessed by the faithful as a sign of their unity in, and allegiance to, the true faith. Indeed, as a statement of faith, it precisely gave witness to those teachings that the faithful had personally accepted to be true, and as such made plain to which ecclesial community they belonged. Secondly, the Creed was also considered to be a summary of faith containing the most fundamental doctrinal tenets of the Christian Church in a brief and concise way. In claiming to encapsulate the essentials of the faith in summary form, the Creed was seen to contain those beliefs which were considered to be indispensible for a person’s salvation. Far from being theoretical speculations about the faith, the Creed was written as a genuine testimony and confession of the Church’s encounter with the true and living God. In this way, its teachings were seen to be relevant not only for salvation but also for the day to day life of Christians. As a formally recognized statement and summary of faith, the Creed slowly began to enjoy a kind of authority becoming a sort of benchmark by which true beliefs could be distinguished from false beliefs. In this way, it soon also became a standard of faith by which the faithful could evaluate the extent to which their personal faith was in fact the true faith of the Church. The Creed continues, to this day, to be a salvific statement, summary and standard of faith for the Eastern Orthodox Church and as such a definitiveand classic expression of the Church’s faith.
Before presenting some of the most basic truths contained in the Creed, which we will do in the following issues of the Voice of Orthodoxy, it is important to highlight its inner coherency; it is to this that we now briefly turn.

 
Inner Coherency of the Creed 

It is very important to appreciate the inner coherency of the text of the Creed as a whole. Very often the Creed is read simply as a list of disparate doctrines disassociated from each other. So it is often understood, for example, to say something about the Father which then moves on to say something about the Son [Christology] followed by the Church’s teaching on the Holy Spirit [Pneumatology] and finally ending up with something about the Church [ecclesiology] being ‘one, holy, catholic and apostolic’. The Creed also makes references to God’s kingdom [eschatology] and our initiation into this radically new life o God through baptism (and by implication through our participation in the Eucharist and indeed in all the sacraments of the Church) [sacramental theology].
Incidentally, it would not be difficult at all to develop a rather comprehensive ‘Dogmatics manual’ based on the Nicene Creed. That which needs to be underlined, however, is that all the doctrines that we encounter in the Creed are intimately related to eac other; each doctrine naturally flows out of the preceding doctrine. Indeed, systematic theology, which very often in Orthodox circles is looked upon with suspicion – claiming that it is a Western innovation and that Orthodox theology is more mystical than it is systematic – is precisely concerned with placing doctrines side-by-side and seeing their inner connection.
Etymologically speaking, the word ‘systematic’ is derived from the Greek conjunction, ‘σύν’ meaning ‘together’ and the verb ‘ἴστημι’ meaning ‘I stand’.
In this way, systematic theology is concerned with standing doctrines side by side in order to be able to discern their unity and inner coherency.
With regards to the inner coherency of the text of the Creed, one example will suffice to make the point. After our proclamation of faith in the Father, the Son and finally the Holy Spirit, there is the article of faith dealing with the Church. Failure to see this reference to the Church as being inextricably linked with what precedes it would be to miss entirely the main point of the Creed. The creedal text, as a whole, is intimately connected and we must see how every statement flows ‘naturally’, as it were, out of the preceding one.
In placing the article of faith in the Church immediately after its presentation of God, the Creed is underlining a fundamental tenet or doctrine of the Church; namely, that the Church ought to be seen in its most intimate connection with God and more specifically, in the case of the Creed, with the Holy Spirit [leading the faithful to the Son and the Son to the Father].
Consequently, the Creed is identifying a fundamental ecclesiological claim within the Eastern Orthodox tradition that the Church is essentially nothing other than the miraculous presence of God here on earth today; a communion by grace between God and the world and not a mere human gathering devoid of the presence of God. In other words, in connecting the Church with the Holy Trinity, the Creed is highlighting the fact that the Church is a gathering where God is the one responsible for ‘calling’ the community together and where God is also present and acting within the gathering of faithful believers.
Even though, today, one may easily fail to see this important connection between God and the Church, for the fathers of the early Church this was self-evident. And so, for example, St Ireneaus of Lyons (d. ca. 202AD) wrote: “where the Spirit is there is the Church. Where the Church is there is the Holy Spirit.” Seeing and appreciating this connection, we come to see, for example, that the church is nothing other than the very locus of the action and presence
of the Spirit – and indeed the Father and the Son – in the world. In this way, the Creed presents the  true nature of the Church as a gathering of people in which God can truly be experienced. In light of the prevailing confusion with regards to the Church today, an appreciation of the inner coherency of the text can demonstrate a foundational truth of the Church and explain why such an ecclesiological article of faith is placed in the text of the Creed Having looked briefly at the significance and inner coherency of the Creed, our attention in the next issue will be turned towards focusing on some of the basic teachings found in the Creed.