CREED

an officially authorized, usually brief statement of the essential articles of faith of a religious community, often used liturgically in public worship or initiation rites. Creeds are similar to the so-called confessions of faith (q.v.) of some Protestant churches, which are usually more extensive formulations. Religious beliefs frequently are not brought to the fully explicit level of creeds or confessions but are expressed in rituals and myths. This is especially true of the so-called primitive religions. At other times beliefs are rendered explicit in the noncreedal form of liturgical formulas, sacred writings, codifications of law, or theological reflection. This was the case with the ancient religions of Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome, as well as in traditional Taoism, Confucianism, and Hinduism. On the other hand, the cultural transmission of a religion (as from Semitic to Hellenistic) frequently elicits the formation of formal creeds in an attempt to maintain the religion's identity amidst discontinuity and change and the encounter with proselytizing and pluralism. Only the so-called universal religions of Zoroastrianism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and some modern movements of Hinduism possess creeds in the full meaning of the word. In the religions of the East, certain words and phrases function in part as creedal affirmations. Li (laws of appropriate behaviour) and hsiao (filial piety) in Confucianism and tao (the way) in Taoism sum up important features of the religious tradition in which they are found. The mantra (evocative sacred syllables), especially popular in Tibetan Buddhism, is a type of expression of belief in the Avalokitesvara (jewel's) presence in the world (lotus). Also serving in some degree as a declaration of faith are the various mantras of Hinduism, especially the Gayatri prayer from the Rigveda that Brahman youth learn as part of their initiation ceremony. In fact, in most religions it is chiefly through liturgical expressions that religious faith is confessed and religious identity sustained. In Hinayana Buddhism a more properly creedal formulation is found in the early Triratna, the declaration of refuge in the Buddha, the doctrine, and the community. Creedal statements are most numerous in the religions of the West, and especially in the three classical monotheistic religions. A central part of the life of every Muslim is profession of the shahadah, which confesses that only God is God and that Muhammad is the Prophet of God. In Judaism early creedal affirmations that were apparently confessed in a worship setting as part of an annual festival are preserved in Hebrew Scripture. During the medieval period various efforts were made within Judaism to formulate creeds; of these, Maimonides' Thirteen Principles of Faith is the most significant, though it has never been officially recognized as normative. The confession of the oneness of God and of the resurrection of the dead are the central declarations of Jewish belief, and these appear as parts of worship. The scarcity of creeds within Judaism is explained in that Jewish identity is defined not in relation to the acceptance of doctrine but rather according to the observance of the Oral Law. The Christian religion, on the other hand, has given rise to numerous creeds. This is partly because the Christian church from the start possessed its distinctive gospel, or kerygma (proclamation), which was decidedly dogmatic in character. As early as the apostolic age this proclamation was beginning to crystallize in conventional acclamations (e.g., Jesus is Lord) and longer partly stereotyped summaries of belief. The process of creedal formulation in the West reached its summit with the Apostles' Creed (q.v.), which is still used in baptismal ceremonies and public worship by most Protestants and Roman Catholics. Its present working probably goes back to the 8th century; however, it likely originated from earlier baptismal creeds, and in particular from the Old Roman Symbol, which in its essentials seems to go back to the 2nd century. The Nicene Creed (q.v.), designed as an authoritative norm of orthodox teaching, was first formulated by the first of the ecumenical councils at Nicaea in 325. The second version of the creed, the so-called Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed, is accepted in both the East and the West. Like the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed is in part intended to exclude heretical views, in particular the Arian heresy that denied the equality of the Son with the Father. Thus, it affirmed that Jesus Christ is of one substance (homoousian) with the Father. Western churches also eventually adopted a filioque clause, which asserts that the Spirit proceeds from the Son as well as from the Father. A third ecumenical creed in the West is the Athanasian creed (q.v.). This creed, which has received less recognition in the East since the 16th century, is officially accepted by Roman Catholics, Anglicans, and Lutherans, although its use in the liturgy of these communions has greatly declined in recent centuries. Strongly polemical in tone, it expounds on the themes of the nature of Christ and the Trinity. It probably originated between 450 and 500 in southern France. also called confession of faith, an authoritative formulation of the beliefs of a religious community (or, by transference, of individuals). The terms creed and confession of faith are sometimes used interchangeably, but when distinguished creed refers to a brief affirmation of faith employed in public worship or initiation rites, while confession of faith is generally used to refer to a longer, more detailed, and systematic doctrinal declaration. The latter term is usually restricted to such declarations within the Christian faith and is especially associated with churches of the Protestant Reformation. Both creeds and confessions of faith were historically called symbols, and the teachings they contain are termed articles of faith or, sometimes, dogmas. The role of belief within religion is interpreted differently in the various empirical disciplines and by the proponents of particular theological or philosophical positions. Traditionally, it has been considered the primary factor in religion, but some modern scholars often regard beliefs as rationales for ritual, that is to say, as secondary expressions of religious experience or as a posteriori ideological sanctions for social and cultural patterns. The present article follows a current anthropological and sociological tendency to define religion as a symbolic system in which ideas and their concomitant attitudinal aspects and actions provide to an individual or group a model of itself and its world. From this perspective, every religion involves distinctive views or beliefs regarding the nature of ultimate reality. Additional reading A comprehensive treatment of creeds in all religions is Creeds and Articles, Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, 4:231248 (1912, reprinted 1955). For anthropological, sociological, and phenomenological considerations, see the International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, 13:398414 (1968); G. van der Leeuw, Phnomenologie der Religion (1933; Eng. trans., Religion in Essence and Manifestation, 1963); and J. Wach, Sociology of Religion (1944). Works devoted to creedal and confessional formulations are rare for most religions, but see S. Schechter, The Dogmas of Judaism, Studies in Judaism, pp. 147181 (1896); and A.J. Wensinck, The Muslim Creed: Its Genesis and Historical Development (1932). For Christianity, the fullest collection of texts remains P. Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, 3 vol., 6th ed. (1919); for Roman Catholicism, H.J.D. Denzinger and A. Schonmetzer, Enchiridion Symbolorum (1963); and W.M. Abbott (ed.), The Documents of Vatican II (1966); for Protestantism, T.G. Tappert (ed. and trans.), The Book of Concord (1959); and A.C. Cochrane (ed.), Reformed Confessions of the 16th Century (1966). On the Ecumenical movement, see L. Vischer (ed.), A Documentary History of the Faith and Order Movement 19271963 (1963). Brief but representative collections are B.A. Gerrish, The Faith of Christendom: A Source Book of Creeds and Confessions (1963); and J.H. Leith (ed.), Creeds of the Churches (1963). Secondary works on early creeds include O. Cullmann, Die ersten christlichen Glaubensbekenntnisse (1943; Eng. trans., The Earliest Christian Confessions, 1949); J.N.D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, 2nd ed. (1960); A.E. Burn, The Athanasian Creed, 3rd impression (1930); D.L. Holland, The Earliest Text of the Old Roman Symbol, Church History, 34:262281 (1965), and The Creeds of Nicaea and Constantinople Reexamined, Church History, 38:248-261 (1969). On later confessions, a full treatment with good bibliographies is E. Molland, Christendom (1959). This is usually supplemented by W.A. Curtis, A History of Creeds and Confessions of Faith in Christendom and Beyond (1911); and C.A. Briggs, Theological Symbolics (1914).