by Rev. D. MacLean, Glasgow
II. The History of Doctrine and the Creeds
The Church being a witnessing body in the world, it incurs the enmity of the world, and its views are subject to attack from that quarter. The defence of the Church against these attacks devolves to the sphere of what is called Polemics. The Church is also attacked from within by heresy brought in by false brethren. The most solemn warnings were given by Christ and His apostles on this subject. In speaking of the latter times (by which he meant New Testament times), Paul says, “Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils” (I Timothy 4:1). Again, he says to the Corinthians, “For there must also be heresies among you,” — for what purpose? — for a particular purpose — “For there must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you.” Among the works of the flesh in Gal. 5, heresies are included. The witness of Peter was that “There were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.” One of the functions of a creed, therefore, is to discriminate the truth from false teaching. In order to do this, the creed makes, preserves, and designates the attainments made in the various branches of the Christian faith. The errors, therefore, which crept into the Christian Church, which were refuted by those who loved the truth, served to sharpen the Church’s knowledge of divine revelation, and to lead to its clearer expression. The Church’s understanding of the Scripture therefore gradually grew over the centuries, and the reflections of the Church grew deeper and fuller, giving expression to the various creeds which have become its precious possession.
The circumstances of the historical and theological context of the development of these creeds is a very wide subject, and would really require a paper of its own. I shall content myself with some observations.
The Apostles’ Creed (sometimes called the Roman Creed) is of universal use, and is usually bound up with the Westminster Confession as forming a useful summary of Christian doctrine. Its growth and origin is obscure, but it is generally agreed that it cannot be traced beyond the 6th century. In joining it to the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments with the Catechisms, the Westminster Divines commented, “Not as though it were composed by the Apostles,” — that is, although its name is the Apostles’ Creed — “or ought to be esteemed canonical Scripture, but because it is a brief sum of the Christian faith, agreeable to the Word of God, and anciently received in the Churches of Christ.” It is as follows: “I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth; and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, which 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 arose 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 (not Roman Catholic) church; the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins; the resurrection of the body; and the life everlasting. Amen.” Now, you can see there a compendium of Christian doctrine.
The Nicene Creed in the fourth century was produced to refute the errors of the Arians and the semi-Arians. The Arians taught that the Son of God is the greatest of all creatures, of a different nature from the Father. The semi-Arians taught that although the Son was not a creature, He is not God in the same sense as the Father was. They held He was of a similar nature to the Father but not of the same nature. The Creed corrected these errors as well as giving the true doctrine of the Holy Spirit. Now, for a brief summary of this Creed, if you go to the Shorter Catechism — in answer to the question, “How many persons are there in the Godhead?” You are told “There are three persons in the Godhead; the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost . . . the same in substance” — the same in substance — that is what the Nicene Creed said, not different in substance. By substance, of course, we mean the nature or essence, the divine essence. “The same in substance, equal in power and glory.”
The Athanasian Creed, attributed by some to Athanasius the great enemy of Arius, but by others to the school of Augustine, sets out in still greater detail the doctrine of the Trinity and it is an admirable exposition of this great and solemn mystery.
The Chalcedon Creed was introduced to refute the heresies which had arisen over the Person of Christ. The Nestorian heresy taught that there were two natures, the human and the divine (i.e. in the Person of Christ) and they were so distinctly separated that the unity of the Person was thrown into the shade. The Eutychian heresy went to the opposite extreme and so confounded the two natures that they became one. Now, a brief summary of this is also found in the Shorter Catechism. “Who is the Redeemer of God’s elect?” “The only Redeemer of God’s elect is the Lord Jesus Christ, who, being the eternal Son of God, became man, and so was, and continueth to be, God and man in two distinct natures, and one person, for ever.”
By these Creeds the Church doctrine of the Trinity of the Persons in the one God, and the duality of the two natures in the one Christ, was fully developed and stated as the faith of the Church.
I would like to read to you another of these Creeds which sets out in a very beautiful way the teaching in regard to the Godhead. This Creed, which was a development of the Nicene Creed, was gradually adopted by the Church in the West. “I believe in one God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth and of all things visible and invisible; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, begotten of His Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made; who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was made man; He was crucified, also for us, under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried; and the third day He rose again according to the Scriptures; and ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father. And He shall come again with glory to judge both the quick and the dead; whose kingdom shall have no end. And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified, who spake by the prophets. And I believe in one catholic and apostolic church, I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins; and I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.” Now, you can see the advance made there over the Apostles’ Creed. That advance came through these four centuries as the Church combatted the enemies of the Truth and came to clearer and clearer expressions of the truth as it is in Jesus with regard to the Godhead, the Person of the Holy Spirit, and the Person of the divine Redeemer.
The controversy between Augustine and Pelagius covered, in particular, questions relating to the nature of man as a result of Adam’s fall, the nature of grace, and predestination. The view of Augustine, was that man is dead — spiritually dead, spiritually incapable of saving himself. His view of predestination and grace was, that out of the lost and ruined race of mankind, God in His mere good pleasure chose a number that are to be saved. The view of Pelagius was that man was well, that man was capable of saving himself, and that if there was such a thing as predestination, it was because of good works foreseen by God. The views of Pelagius were condemned by various Councils, of which we may mention the Ecumenical Council held at Ephesus in A.D. 431. By means of this, clear views of these subjects were attained to by the Church, and progress had not only been made in Theology (that is the doctrine of God which we have been speaking about with regard to these other Creeds), but also in Anthropology, i.e. the doctrine of man. So the doctrine of God — the Trinity, the Person of Christ, the Person of the Holy Spirit — has been dealt with in the Creeds during these four centuries and then in the Augustinian-Pelagian discussion, anthropology, the doctrine of man, had also clearly been set out.
Leaving aside the Roman Catholic Council of Trent, we now come to the period of the Reformation. The Protestant Church was divided into two systems of theology — one was the Lutheran, the other was the Reformed (sometimes called Calvinism because John Calvin was the most outstanding theologian of the system.) The Lutheran Church developed its own Creeds and they need not detain us here. The principal Creeds or Confessions of the Reformed Church are the Gallic, Belgic, Second Helvetic and Scots Confession, the Heidelberg Catechism, the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England, the Canons of the Synod of Dort, and the Westminster Confession with which we are most familiar.
In the early period of the Reformation, the great doctrines which were clarified and which were rescued from the errors of the Papacy, were those connected with salvation (the theological name for that is Soteriology). These are doctrines such as effectual calling, justification, adoption, sanctification, etc. These doctrines were clarified at the time of the Reformation. As time went on, the doctrine of the Church and the means of grace became clarified also. The result is that the Westminster Confession involved a bringing together of all the doctrines which had been classified down through the centuries into one creed. This creed, therefore, is not only Scriptural, but also embodies the teachings to which the Church has attained through the guidance of the Holy Spirit down through the ages. Hence the doctrine of God and the Trinity embraces the teaching contained in the Creeds of the first four centuries. The doctrine of the Fall of Man and of Free Will reflects the days of Augustine. The doctrine of adoption, justification, etc. reflects the glory of the Reformation, while the doctrines of the Church and Sacraments are the result of the mature spiritual reflection of the later Reformation and Puritan times.
The notion of setting aside this noble Creed, so Scriptural, and the result of the meditations of profound Christian Scholars down through the centuries, to be replaced by some ‘affirmation of faith’ produced by the nebulous pseudo-theologians of the present day, is a real catastrophe, and should be resisted at all costs. In the position now of having the Westminster Confession of Faith, you need not go off to the Library and say to the girl behind the counter, “I want to look at the Nicene Creed.” You don’t have to do that — its substance is already in the Westminster Confession. You don’t have to find out about the Chalcedon Creed. You don’t need to find out about all these developments right down through the centuries, for they are all embodied in the Westminster Confession of Faith. This is the great value of it, the tremendous value of it — and that is what I would like to impress in speaking about the value of the Creeds — that all these Creeds down through the centuries have been summed up in the Westminster Confession. Certain theologians in the Church of Scotland want to set aside the Westminster Confession, and say, “We’ll set it aside with the Nicene Creed, and we’ll keep them as memorials of what the Church attained to in the past.” Well, I’m afraid that one cannot have a very high opinion of these gentlemen. They know perfectly well that the substance of the Nicene Creed is in the Westminster Confession of Faith. What they really want is to make them theological museum pieces.