The Creed: What Christians Believe and Why it Matters (2024)

Maybe 3 and a half stars.

Luke Timothy Johnson is a moderately conservative neo-orthodox Roman Catholic. A world-class Biblcial scholar teaching at (liberal Methodist) Emory.

There are some VERY outstanding new books on the Creed: Alister McGrath's I Believe; Van Harn, ed., Exploring and Proclaiming The Apostles' Creed [2004]; Michael Horton, We Believe, and the last section of David Matzko McCarthy, The Good Life [2004]. If I bought just two, one would be Johnson's. McGrath and Horton's works are certainly more orthodox in spots. (For example, 'born of the Virgin Mary': Horton and McGrath believe that the Creed is right on that, while Johnson strongly hedges.) But Johnson makes up for shaky orthodoxy in style, precision, and clarity.

His introduction is the best part of the book. His defense of creeds, against Modernity on one hand and Anabaptists on the other, is alone worth the $10. Pleasant cover and packaging too.

In this book, when Luke Timothy Johnson is developing the concepts of his own theology, he does so articulately and with deep scriptural insight. It is a good introduction to Christian theology.

But he also spends a good deal of time critiquing other theological positions, and how approach to doing that is almost always to create a straw man argument against it - he provides a bad stereotype of the position and then forcefully points out the theological shortcomings of that stereotype.

This book enhanced my understanding of the Nicene Creed: how it evolved, what it means line by line, why it's still important to say it today, and what we are doing (and not doing) when we engage in its recitation as a community.

I find Prof. Johnson's approach to the Scriptures and Christian tradition a respectful but also a decidedly nonliteralistic one. He gave me a new respect for the primacy of tradition, a somewhat shocking concept to many Protestants: that is, he convincingly explained that Scripture is best read through the lens of tradition, which culminates succinctly in the Creed, because if Scripture is put before tradition, there is no guide for reading and understanding save the individual, and the text can give rise to virtually any interpretation. I liked his explanation of how when we recite the creed, we are announcing our belief as a community, so that while any one individual at any one given moment may not believe as fully as she would like, she can still join her voice to the community, because "any profession of faith…entrusts the mind and heart to a truth that cannot be proven but can be lived" and because "the creed does more than declare what Christians believe. It challenges those who recite the creed week by week to live as though that which they recite is true. "

He argues, I believe fairly effectively, that the use of the creed can set clear boundaries and bring some sense of definition to Christianity by emphasizing the essentials we should have in common while allowing liberty and diversity in so many matters that have previously split the church. On the one hand are Christians who have "dropped almost all boundaries," on the other, "those with...unyielding boundaries by which they define true Christianity." Creedal Christianity, by offering a moderate number of essentials, can thus serve as a middle ground between the extremes of "liberal" and "conservative" Christianity, offering a useful definition of Christianity, for "if each Christian decides what Christianity means and which of its norms are truly norms, the church has then become a club that one can join on one's own terms."

This is a book for both non-liturgical Christians who have never thought of reciting the creed and liturgical Christians who rarely think about what it means when they recite it, what it means TO recite it. He goes through the creed with a fine tooth comb, explaining what each little part means. Why add "visible and invisible" after "creator of all things in heaven and earth." Isn't that a bit redundant, an extraneous detail? Is it just literary flourish? Not at all. It's an important detail that shapes who God *isn't*. This is but one example, but he does this again and again with the text of the creed–-explaining why every minute detail matters. He does think one addition is extraneous: the later addition of "filoque," the great controversy that fed the division between East and West. I tend to agree with him. Filoque, he says, is "theology at its worst, as a form of word-chopping with little real contact with living faith." The Christians of all major branches of Christianity share all the tenants of the creed in common—except this one. This dispute "provides the opponents of creeds with all the ammunition they desire…Here we see the unholy alliance between belief and power politics, supporting the suspicious that all belief is simply a matter of power and politics." Except in this one thing, the creed, he argues, is "virtuous" in its "frugality in belief."

I did have some difficulties with the book. He tends to see the Resurrection and Ascension as symbols more than as historical events, an idea which admittedly bothers me, but he presents his view in such a way that it does not seem to be at all in keeping with the typical "progressive" Christian line on this, so that his attitude and intention seemed orthodox to me. Thus, the Resurrections is not merely a resuscitation, but a real experience of Jesus' entry into the immortal existence of God. The Ascension is not a mere moment of going up in the clouds, but the real and ongoing reality of Christ having assumed his place at the right hand of the Father. While I agree these events were "more" than the historical moment, I don't fully understand his need to discount the historical moment, but I suppose it is because he is concerned such historical literalism will present problems when Christians encounter the differing accounts of these events in the Gospels and will limit Christian experience and understanding to that which can be defined in purely historical terms. In other words, the Resurrection and Ascension are too great to be contained by history. He also has been a fervent opponent of the "historical Jesus" movement, because he does not believe Christ can really be known through historical means. Thus, we can confidently say, "On the third day he rose again," and know that means something much more powerful and spiritually encompassing than that definitely on a specific day after a specific amount of time, Christ experienced a resuscitation and returned to mortal life. If that was all it was, it would be no more significant than any other resuscitation recounted in the Old or New Testament.

He emphasizes the fact that the creed says THAT these things happened (God created the world, Christ became incarnate of the Virgin Mary, he rose again, he ascended to the right hand of the father, he will come again to judge, etc.) but does not say HOW they happened (will happen). I think this was an insightful and important point and one which would lessen the divisions within Christianity if Christians would take note of it.

One thing that was annoying about this book was that it became increasingly clear that the author was desperately avoiding trying to use the male pronoun (he, him, himself) to refer to God, so that he ended up producing convoluted constructions such as "...who God seeks to find reflected in God's own image," "The pattern of God's seeking to express God's word," "God has been truthful in God's revelation," and "The way God has shown God to be," not to mention the dread "Godself." He does defend the use of the original gender-specific language in liturgy, saying that "It is a form of generational narcissism to change texts to suit one's own needs." But he apparently thinks it is necessary to pursue gender neutrality in modern texts. I suppose it is less narcissistic to torture the English language in modern prose than in ancient liturgy, but it is still distracting. Skylar has been annoyed in Skylar's reading of gender-neutral texts, because as far as Skylar Skylarself is concerned, people who protest the insignificant fact that the English language lacks a gender neutral pronoun for the third person singular have a great deal of time on their hands that would be better spent in serving God or ending the sex slave trade.

In addition to this distracting effort at gender neutrality, there is also some tangential mention of male and female distinctions seeming inadequate and the church needing to see ways to show hospitality to those who don't "fit comfortably within our accustomed categories." I'm not sure what he's getting at, but I suppose he is referring to the hordes of transsexuals trying to beat down the narrow church doors who are repeatedly repelled by insensitive references to God supposedly having created some persons by the name of Adam and Eve. Or maybe he thinks that because only 98% of A likes B, we should stop speaking in generalities such as "God made A to like B." In general, though he's quite careful not to venture too far into either "conservative" or "liberal" theological camps. Even his two little anti-capitalist screeds (Really? We're in "economic slavery" in the first world? Compared to what time in history, exactly, and what nation on earth?) somehow managed not to seem too terribly politically pro-socialist.

All in all, my few objections aside, Prof. Johnson offers new (to me) insights into the creed and a perspective that is generally different enough from the typical liberal/conservative divide as to be refreshing. His explication of the Creed is an extremely helpful starting point for reflection.

I enjoyed the beginning of the book in that he explained the history well and dissected the creed well explaining the origins of the specific words and meanings...BUT, I did not like the interpreting of the meanings of the creed that he gave. He seemed to have a more progressive bent in his interpretations of the creeds, rather than a historical interpretation. I just had an uneasy feeling the further I got into the book and thought, "I am an Anglican and I am more Catholic, than he is as a Roman Catholic." I looked him up on wikipedia and found out that he is indeed not a true Roman Catholic. Look him up and see for yourself.

He did say some very good things about the importance of the creeds, teaching them to our children and more.

A solid survey of the Nicene Creed. Johnson begins with some personal reflections on the recitation of the Creed, and the potential problem of it becoming just something said which has no meaning, and then follows by unpacking some of the historical context for specific language used, why the Creed matters for Church history, and the life of the Church now, and where the language of the Creed comes from biblically. Johnson normally writes in a more scholarly mode, but this is designed for a broader audience, and succeeds for the most part, so most readers with at least some exposure to theological terminology can manage, though most lay readers will certainly be challenged intellectually, which is, of course, a good thing, and one of the aims of the book; to get readers to think more deeply about the Creed.

I am very familiar with Luke Timothy Johnson and use his commentaries quite often in my homily preparations. His book, "The Real Jesus," on the Historical Jesus movement is very insightful. I believe he represents the best in Catholic biblical scholarship. Naturally, then, I was curious to read what he had to say on serious matters of doctrine.
First of all it is clear that this is a book that comes from the heart. Johnson is convinced of the need to understand the creed in order to understand what being Christian is all about. In other words, the Rule of Faith not only guides what we believe but informs us about who we are and how we live in the world. Second, Johnson convincingly demonstrates the scriptural background to the Nicene Creed. The Creed is not a political creation of Emperor Constantine or the Council of Nicea. It is based on the collective experience of those early Christians, an experience that goes all the way back to the Apostles' experience of Jesus himself and which is conveyed to us in the writings of the New Testament.
That being said, the move from Scripture to Dogmatics is not always easy. Johnson walks a rather difficult balancing act and at times nearly looses his balance. There are a couple of systematic theologians whom I know that might shudder a bit at some of his statements, particularly in the section on the marks of the Church.
Despite a few misgivings, this is a good book. Johnson is clear and precise, and not overly scholarly. Clearly written for a broad audience of the kind that would come to their church hall for a parish lecture series. This is a very good book for those who want to have a better understanding of their faith: fides quaerens intellectam>,

Over the pat couple of years I have increasingly become aware of the controversy that Christian Creed, and Creedal Christianity, invoke. The more fundamentalist Christians tend to think of creeds as a later development, and by extension a corruption, of the original pristine New Testament Christianity. On the other hand, theological liberals of all stripes perceive creeds as a straitjacket and a tool of control and exclusion of the heterodox views that were suppressed by the Orthodox "faction". Furthermore, secularists and atheist equate any and allegiances to creeds as a credulity, an infantile instinct that needs to be eradicated if we are to move ahead as a society. Luke Timothy Johnson in this wonderful little book goes a long way in defending The Creed against all these major detractors, and he does it with a great deal of skill, scholarship and finesse.

The early chapters of this book explore how did particular statements in The Creed come about, what were the historical and theological disputes that lead to their inclusion. However, this is not the main focus of the book, and some other works on this topic may be more relevant. The major part of the book is dedicated to taking each one of the statements in The creed (and The Creed in question is theNiceno-Constantinopolitan Creed), elaborating on its meaning, providing the relevant biblical proof-texts that support it, and providing the significance of it in our dailylives and in the world at large. It is here that Luke Timothy Johnson is at his best, and this book brought new freshness to the old statements of faith that I've been reciting in Church for many years.

This is a wonderful modern book that I highly recommend to anyone who is interested in the Christian beliefs.

Johnson writes a thoughtful exposition of the Christian faith through the Nicene Creed. You get his distinctives (Catholic, biblical scholar) only subtlely because he quotes Scripture more than a Baptist minister, albeit with some interpretations that might make that minister squirm. He affirms the relevance and necessity and use of the Creed today and then expounds it line by line over three hundred pages. It was never dry (and this Protestant did wonder at the wealth of Scripture citations) and often provided a refreshingly different take on familiar doctrine (and generally orthodox - though conservative Protestants and Catholics will find places of disagreement, especially as he pokes at their sources of authority). I also found his discussion of the resurrection and ascension vaporous and less clear than most of the prose in the book. I will mine this book and use portions, maybe even large portions, of it in my teaching.

He answers why the words of the creed as follows: "In a world that celebrates individuality, they are actually doing something together. In an age that avoids commitment, they pledge themselves to a set of convictions and thereby to each other. In a culture that rewards novelty and creativity, they are written by others long ago. In a society where accepted wisdom changes by the minute, they claim that some truths are so critical that they must be repeated over and over again. In a throwaway, consumerist world, they accept, preserve, and continue tradition. Reciting the creed at worship is thus a counter-cultural act."

Luke Timothy Johnson is fast becoming my favorite Christian author. He is exceptionally knowledgeable on Christian history and seems quite fair in his assertions and his interpretations, recognizing what is known vs. what is speculated. In this book, he walks through the Nicene Creed phrase by phrase, describing the historical context and why each section was needed in its time. For the most part, he goes to the level of depth that is needed to present his explanations or arguments in a meaningful way, and without being overly redundant or verbose.

He makes a compelling case for why the Creed is needed more than ever in the modern age. The value of the creed is its economy; it says what it needs to without saying too much, and in so doing, it lays the groundwork for the one, holy, catholic (not Catholic), and apostolic church. He is also right that too few of us understand the creed and why it says what it says, and his book goes a long way to reconciling that gap.

As far as assigned texts go, this is one of the more enjoyable ones I've read. It has a really fascinating history in one of the early chapters about all the controversy and theological debate that heralded the formulating of the Nicene and Apostles' Creeds to begin with, and it's just so interesting. Would I have found it interesting if I hadn't been required to read it? Meh. Probably not. But nonetheless, I'm glad it's part of my "read" repertoire now.

Three stars because I didn't spot any gross theological blunders, only points that could be said more clearly. That's more than I can say for the previous two books I recently read on the Nicene Creed. But the author says the best things in the worst way. He flails at few dozen too many strawmen, and his non-stop contrarian posturing guarantees a stony reception from readers who don't already agree with him.

In depth look at the importance of the Creeds, specifically the Nicene-constantinopolitan creed.
It is a rich powerful resource. I appreciated Johnson's wrestling with the different ways some of the peices of the creed have been used by different groups. Also Johnson was clear that the Creed is not THE statement of our faith but a piece of how we tell and live out the story of Jesus Christ.

Excellent account of the issues leading up to the development of the Nicene Creed. So much of what is fundamental to our faith was, at one time not agreed to at all.

Thorough, detailed, learned, and clearly written, this thoughtful book examines the Nicene Creed phrase by phrase. Extraordinarily helpful in evaluating my own Christian faith and beliefs.

This book was very thought-provoking. Numerous times I went to my scriptures to look up Johnson's references. I also kept thinking about the topics Johnson discusses after putting the book down. I think that makes it a pretty successful book.

It was also very illuminating. I'm not Catholic; I'm actually Latter Day Saint (commonly called Mormon), and as such, my church does not believe in everything in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan creed. But I wanted to learn more about it to better understand the beliefs of my Christian friends who are not of my faith.

I never really understood how different my own beliefs are from those of many other sects. But, there are also many beliefs we have in common, such as the need for a personal transformation in our lives brought about by the Spirit and faith in Jesus as our Savior.

This books caused me to think more deeply about how different beliefs are connected - such as how one's understanding of the relationship between us and God affects our understanding of Christ's role in our lives and human agency.

I was hoping for more discussion of the history of the creed, which only took about the first 3 chapters. The majority of the book dealt with the text of the creed itself, taking it apart line by line.

There was one part that disturbed me: saying that Mary was not a virgin, and that Jesus is the biological son of Joseph. I'm fairly certain that is not a mainstream Catholic belief. Johnson frequently comments that the scriptures are meant to be understood metaphorically. Certainly a lot of the Bible is metaphorical, but his commentary left me wondering if he takes any of the Bible literally.

He also speaks a great deal about the "mystery" of God and how "unknowable" God is. Certainly, there are many mysteries that we do not understand. But I don't believe God intends for us to never understand. We might experience a trial in our lives in which we must exercise blind obedience to God's will - but we are not meant to be blind always. At some point in our lives, hopefully, we can look back on that experience and understand what we were meant to learn from it, or how it was meant to put us in the right place at the right time. Likewise, as we study the scriptures, ponder, pray, and keep the commandments, we are meant to gain greater understanding of God and of His plan. We are not meant stay as children, needing "milk," but to at some point need "meat" (Heb. 5: 12-14).

Another shocking thing to me was Johnson's admission that he does not know why we have free will, calling it the "problem" of free agency, since, if God is good, why would He allow us to do bad things? I've been taught the answer to this from childhood. Someone who is always good does not force his or her will on others. A good person encourages others to be good through service and being a good example. Parents allow their children to make their own choices, even bad ones. Without that, their children would never be able to mature and grow. God treats us the same way. If He forced us to keep the commandments, we would never learn to love God and to obey Him out of love and faith.

My objections to his theology are not meant to dissuade anyone from reading it. Rather, I wanted to continue the discussion Johnson began.

Wow! Just wow!

I always love when a book challenges my thinking and makes me look at something in a different light.

Luke Timothy Johnson's book The Creed is an excellent book for anybody. Skeptics, atheists, fundamentalist, modernists, liberals, conservatives and all in between. He makes an argument that Christianity should return to the Creed as a rule of faith to unify all Christians. In doing so, we acknowledge our differences and understandings, but come together as one Christian faith. He carefully explains the creed and what we find inside of it.

He can be a bit wordy at times and there were some times I wished he would move on to the next topic. However, he explains each part of the Nicene Creed and breaks down exactly what Christians believe and why that is important. Next time someone asks me what I believe and why, I will show him this. He also does an excellent job of providing an exegetical view of the Bible, looking at it beyond literalism and also beyond the historical Jesus perspective. While I didn't agree with everything, he showed me that Christianity is not an individualist faith that many have come to see today, but a community of believers and sinners, all with doubts and maybe even different views, but who come together as people who have been forgiven are are forgiving.

He focuses a lot on unity, often showing both sides of an issue or belief. So for a topic he will show what the fundamentalists believe and what the modernists believe and then deconstructs both and offers his own.

This is a great primer for anyone questioning faith, not sure what the believe, a new Christian, or been a Christian for a long time.

I could not recommend enough!!!

A thorough examination of the history of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, its professions, and its implications. It took me a while to get into the book, but Luke Timothy Johnson presented the creed in a way that is easy to understand, yet full of depth and thought-provoking statements.

As someone who is part of a church that uses the creed consistently and places a great deal of importance upon it, this examination served to strengthen my feelings towards the creed, and give me a richer understanding of it. Johnson has pretty specific ideas about how a church should treat its basic tenets and how Christians should behave theologically and intellectually, with which I agreed almost entirely. I would expect this book to be frustrating and/or confusing for Evangelicals, atheists, people of other faiths, or anyone who is not part of (or at the very least familiar with) an older Christian tradition.

This is a little nitpicky, but I would have preferred that the numerous Scripture references be placed in footnotes rather than directly in the text. There was no way that I was going to stop and read each passage, and it was cumbersome to try and keep the flow of the text while skimming past these references. I also wish that the last two pages of the book had been placed somewhere a few sections earlier- they made the conclusion a little bland, and pulled away from a beautiful description that Johnson had just given only pages before. Like I said, a little nitpicky.

I really enjoyed this read and I learned so much from it.

Southern Baptists are supposed to be "anti-creeds," but I confess, I'm a big fan of the historic creeds of the church. They encapsulate much of what I believe and remind me of how much we "non-creedal" Christians have in common with those who do embrace the Apostles' and Nicene creeds.

So, I've greatly enjoyed Luke Timothy Johnson's book, The Creed. Johnson not only gives the historical background and context and explains what the Nicene Creed means - he "preaches" the Creed in this book in a way that encourages believers.

I've been a fan of Johnson since I read his The Real Jesus about ten years ago. That book is a winsome defense of the person of Jesus Christ presented in the New Testament, and a devastating critique of "The Jesus Seminar" participants who somehow think they know better than the writers of the New Testament who Jesus was and is.

Johnson gives evangelicals like myself another reason to appreciate our Catholic brothers and sisters who embrace The Church's (Big C) claim that Jesus is Lord.

To the other reviewers I would add: Johnson has a superb writing style. He is careful with his arguments and keeps the prose fresh, perfectly clear, and forward-moving. He has an obvious enthusiasm for the subject that captivated me. Readers might be expecting a heaping portion of history and theology. No. This book is about the Biblical foundations of the Creed. I especially admire Johnson's skill at presenting "just the right amount" of detail -- the book is highly informative without being a dissertation. Although the Creed is thoroughly grounded in the Bible, its content and meaning depend on traditions that began with the earliest generations of believers and extended--some might say through the workings of the Holy Spirit--to successive generations, especially as found in the Patristic writings and the councils that construed both the Bible itself and texts of these earlier believers.

Johnson explores the way the scriptural traditions leads to the Nicene Creed. He explores the simplicity and depth of the creed's meaning. His conclusions looks at the relevance of the Creed for today. Johnson has respect for inclusive language, Biblical Fundamentalism, Liberation theology and other ideologies but he challenges them all. This text contains no end notes and is written so a non-seminary audience could understand it. Having a theology dictionary nearby may be a good idea for this one.

Luke Timothy Johnson masterfully shows how the Nicene creed was formed, the meaning of each line (especially those estranged to modern minds), and lifts up how the creed holds the middle by both offending the extremes. He then challenges the creed reader to see it as a rule of faith and guide to reading scripture and theology as one of the many tools the church at its disposal.

The Creed of many Trinitarian Christians is one that unifies believers but where does it come from and what does it mean? This book answers those questions and more with plenty of information in a digestible manner. The author does an excellent job breaking down the Christian creed chapter by chapter while giving you explanations with history and bible verses.

I was back and forth between a 3 / 4. But, in the final two chapters, Johnson won me over with this line:

"the church is a sacrament of the world's possibility."

4.

I have really enjoyed LTJ's work in this book so far. Always thoughtful interaction with Scripture.

Will start reading this a little at a time along with my daily devotionals..........
Randy's reading first so I'll start when he's finished!

Academically respectable and eminently readable, The Creed is an excellent choice for personal reading, a church study group, or a college text.

Very clearly written.

Good, not great. I was expecting more from Johnson, but this one left me mildly disappointed.

graceful introduction to the Nicene Creed by a excellent theologian.

It's interesting in light of reading some about the Gnostic Gospels.