The Ecumenical Creeds
The Apostles’ Creed
Symbolum Apostolicum · Received Form
As to the origin of the Apostles’ Creed, it no doubt gradually grew out of the confession of Peter…which furnished its nucleus…and out of the baptismal formula, which determined the trinitarian order and arrangement. It can not be traced to an individual author. It is the product of the Western Catholic Church (as the Nicene Creed is that of the Eastern Church) within the first four centuries…It was originally and essentially a baptismal confession, growing out of the inner life and practical needs of early Christianity…If we regard, then, the present text of the Apostles’ Creed as a complete whole, we can hardly trace it beyond the sixth, certainly not beyond the close of the fifth century…
— Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, vol. 1
Date: Received form by the eighth century; roots in the second-century Old Roman Symbol
Type: Baptismal confession of the Western church
Structure: Three articles: on the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit
Text: Traditional received English, from Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, vol. II
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 from the dead; he ascended into heaven, and sitteth at 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. Amen.
More Ecumenical Creeds
The Nicene Creed 325 / 381
The Athanasian Creed 5th to 6th c.
Reformed Confessions The full hub
Text from Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, vol. II (1877), now in the public domain. Formatted for Reformed Dogmatika. Spelling Americanized; wording unaltered.
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