Signature passages, the lines readers know this work by, are set in a pale wash.

Article 1. That God is one.

We believe that there is one divine essence, which we call God; and we believe this not only because the contemplation and sight of the things of nature teach it to us, but much more because Holy Scripture bears witness to it for us.

Article 2. That the one God is not divided into three persons, but distinguished.

Holy Scripture teaches us plainly that this divine essence is truly distinguished into three persons, namely the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit; and that these three persons are, each one, the one same God, eternal, infinite, and most perfect in himself. And these persons are consubstantial and coeternal, without any confusion of their properties or relations, and therefore without any disparity or inequality among themselves, just as the Church defines from the Word of God against Sabellius, Paul of Samosata, Arius, Nestorius, Marcion, Eutyches, and the rest of the heretics of that sort, whose ravings we abhor with all our heart.

Article 3. On the eternal providence of God.

Nothing happens by chance or apart from the most just decree of God, even though God is neither the author nor a partaker of any sin whatsoever. For his power and his goodness alike are so great, and so far beyond comprehension, that even when he employs the devil or wicked men to carry out some work (men whom he afterward justly punishes), he nonetheless brings his own holy work to pass well and justly.

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A note on this translation. This English text was prepared for Reformed Dogmatika directly from Beza’s Latin (Confessio Christianae Fidei, London: Thomas Vautrollier, 1575; first published in French, 1558) with the help of AI (Anthropic’s Claude); no copyrighted English translation was consulted, and in particular nothing is drawn from James Clark’s 1992 version.

It is offered for unhurried reading rather than scholarly citation; for academic work, cite that published edition. The Fathers, councils, and liturgy that Beza quotes are translated from his own sixteenth-century Latin and identified as his citations; Scripture is given in the ESV; and difficulties in the Latin are flagged in the footnotes rather than smoothed over. Corrections from readers of the Latin are warmly welcomed.

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