Chapter One

Chapter One

ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT

Before considering its individual elements, we do well to think about the existence of the Christian creed as such. Where does it come from? What does it do? Why do we still have it? By no means is it obvious, after all, that people should gather themselves into intentional communities with elaborate statements of what the members believe. The word "creed" comes from its opening word in Latin, credo ("I believe") or credimus ("we believe"). Not all religions even have creeds. Belief as such is not nearly so central to most other religions as it is to Christianity.

Many religions put more emphasis on orthopraxy (right practice) than on orthodoxy (right opinion or belief). Judaism and Islam each have created sophisticated systems of law to guide behavior, but have allowed an astonishing freedom of conviction and intellectual expression. Both have been able to get along with comparatively short statements of belief. Buddhism and Hinduism concentrate on the practices of ritual and transformation rather than on uniformity of belief. And tribal religions express their view of reality through a variety of myths, not a "rule of faith" for their members. What is it about Christianity that placed such peculiar emphasis on belief, and, given that emphasis, led to an ever more elaborate and official statement of beliefs in a creed?

In what follows, I want to show that the creed is not a late and violent imposition upon the simple gospel story-as some of its critics charge-but rather a natural development of Christianity best understood in light of the specific character of the Christian religion and