Historical theology: how doctrine was formed, tested and defined

Program / Course 25: Theological Synthesis / Lesson 1.3

What you will learn

• Explain why the church defined doctrines in response to particular disputes.
• Describe the roles of creeds, councils and the writings of the fathers in the formation of doctrine.
• Distinguish development of doctrine from innovation, as different traditions understand them.
• Use a simple method to study how a doctrine was formed.

The big idea

Christian doctrines did not appear fully formed. Most were stated precisely when a question or dispute forced the church to say clearly what it already believed. Creeds, councils and the writings of the early teachers record that process. Historical theology studies it, asking who said what, in answer to what problem, and with what authority. Traditions differ on how much weight these definitions carry, but all must say something about them.

Key terms

Creed

A short, authoritative statement of the faith, from the Latin credo, I believe. The Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed are the best known.

Council

A gathering of bishops and other church leaders to decide questions of teaching and discipline. Seven early councils are accepted by both Catholic and Orthodox churches as ecumenical (meaning involving the whole church).

Church fathers

Influential early Christian writers, roughly the second to eighth centuries, such as Irenaeus, Athanasius, Augustine and Gregory of Nazianzus.

Heresy

A teaching judged by the church to contradict its central faith. The Greek word originally meant a choice or a party.

Orthodoxy

Right belief, or right praise. Used with a small o for the idea, and capital O for the Eastern church.

Development of doctrine

The idea that the church’s understanding of its faith can grow in clarity and detail over time without changing its substance.

Rule of faith

An early summary of the main teaching of Scripture and the church, used by writers such as Irenaeus and Tertullian to test interpretations.

Background

The first Christians confessed that Jesus is Lord and that God raised him from the dead. Within a few generations, questions arose that those short confessions did not answer. Is the Son of God a creature or fully God? How can God be one and yet Father, Son and Spirit? How can Jesus be both God and a man? Teachers gave different answers, and some answers seemed to the majority to lose something essential.

The church responded in several ways. Individual writers composed treatises. Regional gatherings of bishops met. At times an emperor called a general council to bring unity, as Constantine did at Nicaea in 325. The councils produced creeds and short definitions, often adding technical words from Greek philosophy to rule out particular misreadings. Understanding why those words were chosen is the work of historical theology. It is also a reminder that the formulas were meant as fences against error and not as full descriptions of God.

Step-by-step explanation

Step 1: Begin with the question that forced a definition

Almost every major definition answers a specific problem. Arius, a priest in Alexandria in the early fourth century, taught that the Son was the first and greatest of God’s creations. Athanasius and others replied that the Son is of the same being as the Father, since only God could save. Nicaea settled the matter for the church with the phrase homoousios, usually translated of one substance with the Father.

To study any doctrine, first ask what the dispute was. A definition that seems abstract often makes sense once the problem is clear.

Step 2: Look at the sources the participants used

The participants argued from Scripture, from the rule of faith, from the worship of the church and from reason. Athanasius appealed to Scripture, but also to the church’s practice of praying to Christ and baptizing in the threefold name. Historians study these appeals to see how arguments were built and which texts mattered.

Notice that the fathers rarely thought of themselves as inventing anything. Their goal was to guard what had been received. Whether that goal was achieved is exactly what traditions debate.

Step 3: Distinguish what was decided from what was only discussed

Councils produced creeds and canons, but they also produced debate that was never formally settled. Historical care means separating the formal decision from the opinions of individual participants. For example, the Council of Chalcedon in 451 defined that Christ is one person in two natures, divine and human. How best to explain that union was left to later writers.

Some bodies rejected a council. Many churches in Egypt, Syria and Armenia did not accept Chalcedon and are today called Oriental Orthodox. Scholars debate how far that disagreement was about meaning and how far about wording, and recent dialogue has narrowed the gap.

Step 4: Ask how later centuries received the definition

A definition lives in its reception. The Nicene Creed was revised at Constantinople in 381 and later expanded in the West with the filioque, the phrase saying that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. The Eastern churches object both to the content, as they understand it, and to the way it was added without a joint council. Western churches defend it as a faithful expression of the Spirit’s relation to the Son.

Tracing reception shows that doctrine is not only a matter of the first decision. It is also a matter of the way later Christians have used, explained and sometimes disputed it.

Step 5: Decide what authority the history carries

This is the step where traditions diverge. Catholic and Orthodox churches hold that ecumenical councils speak with real authority, though they differ on how many councils and on the role of the pope. Protestant churches generally hold that councils are authoritative insofar as they agree with Scripture, and the major Protestant confessions accept the early Trinitarian and Christological creeds on that ground.

A student does not have to settle this question at once, but should know which position is at work in any argument.

1. What problem or dispute led to this definition?
2. Who were the main voices on each side, and what did they appeal to?
3. What exactly did the council decide, and what did it leave open?
4. Which churches accepted the decision, and which did not, and why?
5. How has the decision been used and explained since then?
6. What authority do I give to councils, and on what grounds?

Examples

Different perspectives

Catholic

The Catholic Church teaches that doctrine can develop, as John Henry Newman argued in the nineteenth century, so that what was implicit is made explicit, while the substance stays the same. Councils and the pope, in defined circumstances, have authority to settle questions of faith. Vatican I defined papal infallibility in 1870.

Orthodox

Orthodox Christians hold the seven ecumenical councils and generally resist the language of development, preferring to say that the church preserves the same faith and states it afresh when challenged. They do not accept the later Western councils as ecumenical, and they reject papal infallibility.

Protestant

Protestant traditions in general treat the creeds and early councils as faithful summaries of Scripture and as a guard against error, but hold that only Scripture is the final authority. This principle is called sola scriptura. Some Protestants, especially in the Anglican and Lutheran traditions, give the early church more weight than others do.

Secular and critical historians

Many historians study the councils as events shaped by politics, personalities and imperial power as well as by theology. Most also agree that the arguments were serious ones about meaning. Scholars debate how much was inherited from the earliest church and how much was a new construction.

Why it matters

A student who does not know how doctrines were formed may either treat them as arbitrary rules or assume they were always held in the same words. Both mistakes distort the picture. Historical theology shows that definitions answered real problems, that they were argued from Scripture and worship, and that churches today still differ about what authority to give them. That knowledge is necessary before anyone can say honestly where their own beliefs fit.

Common misunderstandings

Knowledge check

Think it through

1. Which council or creed do you know least about, and what would you want to find out?
2. What authority do you give to the church’s definitions, and have you said why?
3. Can you think of a modern dispute where it would help to ask what problem a definition answered?

Independent assignment

Reconstruct a dispute

In your own notebook, write 400 to 600 words on one early dispute (for example Arius and Nicaea, or the debate over the two natures of Christ before Chalcedon). State the question, summarize what each side held and the sources it used, say what was decided, and note which churches later accepted or rejected the decision. End with one sentence on what authority you think the decision should carry and why. Use the library readings listed below.

Further study

• Council of Nicaea (325) and Council of Constantinople (381), The Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed Read the text and mark the phrases that answer particular disputes.
• Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, eds., The Seven Ecumenical Councils (Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, vol. 14) Read the documents of one council and notice how they are written.
• Athanasius of Alexandria, On the Incarnation of the Word A classic argument from the fourth century.
• J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines The standard account of how doctrines took shape.
• Tertullian, The Prescription Against Heretics An early discussion of the rule of faith and the authority of the church’s teaching.
• Justo L. Gonzalez, The Story of Christianity For the wider history around the councils.
• Jude 1:3 Contend for the faith once delivered.
• 1 Timothy 6:20 Keep what has been committed to your trust.