An Explanation of the Apostles' Creed

A catechism in six lessons, commissioned by Anne Boleyn's father, in which an old Erasmus sets out plainly what a Catholic believes.

by Desiderius Erasmus249 passages held

Latin, the original language

Original title: Explanatio symboli
First published: 1533(aged 67)
Original language: Latin

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Overview

At the Frankfurt book fair in March 1533, the first edition of this book is reported to have sold out in three hours. It had been commissioned by Thomas Boleyn, Earl of Wiltshire, the father of Anne Boleyn, who married Henry VIII that same year. Boleyn had already received an exposition of a psalm from Erasmus; this time he asked not for himself but for simpler readers, and Erasmus wrote, his dedication says, in a style suited to their understanding. The form is a dialogue between a catechumen, a candidate for baptism, and his teacher, in six lessons. Article by article they go through the Apostles' Creed, the short statement of faith that every Christian learned at baptism: God the creator, Christ's birth, death and resurrection, the Holy Spirit, the Church, the forgiveness of sins and eternal life. The teacher treats the Creed as the fixed rule against which every human opinion, and every error of pagans, Jews and heretics, is to be measured. The Church, in his telling, has stood firm against royal power, worldly wisdom and heresy alike. The book closes with the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer. The book went through about eight printings in two years, and an English translation appeared almost at once, its title page naming the earl as the father of the new queen. When it appeared, Erasmus was in his last years, living at Freiburg, where he had moved in 1529 when Basel went over to the Reformation, and under attack from Catholic and Protestant polemicists alike.

Key concepts

Why is the Creed called a “symbol”?

Because the Greek word symbolum meant a token of recognition. The catechist lists its old uses: a seal pressed on letters and jars so that nobody unauthorised could open them, and a token people exchanged when agreeing to share a feast, so that none could slip away. The Creed works the same way, marking who belongs to the Christian community and binding them together.

What is the “rule of faith” in Erasmus's catechism?

It is the old name for the Apostles' Creed: a short statement that holds, in a few words, the sum of what everyone must believe to be saved. Adults being baptised once recited it in public. Because it is fixed and brief, it can serve as the standard against which longer teachings and new opinions are tested, and Erasmus's catechist treats it exactly so.

What is a catechumen?

A catechumen is someone preparing for baptism and being taught the faith before receiving it. The book is written as a conversation between a catechumen and his catechist, or teacher, in six lessons. The form lets the learner ask the questions a newcomer would ask, so that each article of the Creed is explained in answer to a real puzzle rather than delivered as a lecture.

Why does the catechism call Christian teaching a philosophy?

Because for Erasmus faith is a wisdom about how to live, not only a set of propositions. His catechist says that however many teachers are employed, it is the Lord who truly teaches this philosophy, and that God chose to give his gifts to people through other people. Human teaching is the instrument, Christ the real teacher.

Themes of the book

What this book returns to, gathered into themes and ordered by how much of the text each one occupies.

The Rule of Faith

What must every Christian believe, whatever else they think? A teacher takes a candidate for baptism through the Apostles' Creed, article by article, as the measure of every opinion.

The Creed, the catechist explains, is the rule of faith: a few words holding everything necessary for salvation, once recited publicly by adults at their baptism. The same Creed is given to the most despised beggar and the most powerful king, so sailors, carters and cobblers become brides of Christ. Against it every human opinion is weighed, the errors of pagans, Jews and heretics included, and the Church has kept it against kings, philosophers and heresy alike. Teachers may be many, but the one who truly teaches this philosophy is the Lord.

faith
creed
christology
church
heresy
religious education
church authority
trinity
scripture
baptism

Enter a dialogue

Within this work

passages held: 249
distinct concepts: 383
by passages held, corpus-wide: #301

What this book thinks together

The wheel takes this book’s leading concepts and shows how often they come up together. The wider the band between two, the more of its passages speak of both. Among them, most often together: “christology” and “scripture”.

Concept co-occurrence, strongest first 8 concepts, joined by 21 pairings. 89 pairings reach beyond these concepts and are not drawn.
Concept	Paired concept	Shared passages
christology	scripture	6
charity	faith	5
church	faith	5
christology	resurrection	4
creed	trinity	4
faith	scripture	4
scripture	trinity	4
church	creed	3
creed	resurrection	3
charity	church	2
charity	scripture	2
christology	creed	2
church	trinity	2
creed	faith	2
faith	trinity	2
charity	trinity	1
christology	church	1
christology	trinity	1
church	resurrection	1
resurrection	scripture	1
resurrection	trinity	1

Works held

The author's work in order, this book marked in place. Your-language title first, the original beneath it where the two differ; side chips show which full texts are held.

1500 Adages (Adagia)
The work that first made Erasmus famous and the one he revised for longest, from 1500 until the year he died; Erasmus Against War began as one of its entries.
LA
1503 The Manual of the Christian Knight (Enchiridion militis Christiani)
The earnest twin of In Praise of Folly: when critics attacked the satire, Erasmus answered that it treats the same subject as this manual, only in a playful spirit.
EN
1504 Panegyric for Archduke Philip of Austria (Panegyricus ad Philippum Austriae ducem)
Erasmus's advice to a ruler, delivered as a speech of welcome; The Complaint of Peace and the essay on war later make its case for peace without the obligatory flattery.
LA
1511 In Praise of Folly (Moriae encomium)
A mock oration in Folly's own voice and Erasmus's most famous book; The Tongue of 1525 has been read as an attempt at a companion piece.
LAEN
1511 On the Method of Study (De ratione studii)
Part of the same English years' work as De copia, with which it was later printed; Erasmus's later The Education of Children moves the same programme back to infancy.
LA
1515 Erasmus Against War (Dulce bellum inexpertis)
The fullest essay on war in the Adages and the core of Erasmus's writings for peace; The Complaint of Peace restates its case two years later in Peace's own voice.
EN
1516 The Education of a Christian Prince (Institutio principis christiani)
Erasmus's one full treatise on government, in the old genre of advice books for rulers; The Complaint of Peace followed a year later.
LA
1517 The Complaint of Peace (Querela pacis)
A declamation in the voice of Peace, the device of In Praise of Folly turned to a serious purpose, and the most direct of Erasmus's several writings against war.
LAEN
1518 Familiar Colloquies (Colloquia familiaria)
The book that carried Erasmus's views on fasting, pilgrimage and monks to far more readers than his devotional treatises ever reached.
LAEN
1518 In Praise of Marriage (De laude matrimonii)
A schoolroom piece that turned into a controversy: the first of three works on marriage, followed by The Institution of Christian Matrimony in 1526 and On the Christian Widow in 1529.
LA
1520 The Antibarbarians (Antibarbari)
The first statement of the cause Erasmus served all his life, classical learning as the ally of Christian faith, written before any of the books that made his name.
LA
1521 On Disdaining the World (De contemptu mundi)
The counterweight to everything Erasmus later wrote about monks, from The Manual of the Christian Knight to the Familiar Colloquies, and probably the earliest of his surviving prose works.
LA
1524 On Praying to God (Modus orandi Deum)
Pastoral rather than polemical, though written in the same year as On Free Will, his challenge to Luther; the first of the late handbooks on Christian practice that end with An Explanation of the Apostles' Creed.
LA
1525 The Tongue (Lingua)
Erasmus's fullest treatment of a theme that runs through all his writing, speech as the mirror of the soul, written in Basel in the middle of the polemics of the 1520s.
LA
1526 The Institution of Christian Matrimony (Christiani matrimonii institutio)
Commissioned through the English court and dedicated to its queen, it is Erasmus's main statement on the law and practice of marriage, where In Praise of Marriage had been a single persuasive letter.
LA
1528 The Ciceronian (Dialogus cui titulus Ciceronianus)
Satire aimed at fellow humanists rather than at theologians, unusual in Erasmus's later years; it first appeared in one volume with his dialogue on the pronunciation of Latin and Greek.
LA
1529 On the Christian Widow (Vidua christiana)
The last of Erasmus's writings on women's lives, after In Praise of Marriage and The Institution of Christian Matrimony, and like the second of those dedicated to a queen.
LA
1529 The Education of Children (De pueris statim ac liberaliter instituendis)
Dedicated to a prince's heir, like The Education of a Christian Prince, but concerned with every child's first years rather than with government; the most personal of Erasmus's books on schooling.
LAEN
1533 An Explanation of the Apostles' Creed (Explanatio symboli) you are here LA

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