creed essay intro

Movie Reviews

Tv/streaming, collections, great movies, chaz's journal, contributors, black writers week.

Now streaming on:

One need not be proficient in “ Rocky ” lore to appreciate “Creed,” but for those who have followed the exploits of Sylvester Stallone ’s Philadelphia boxer, Ryan Coogler ’s latest film pays unexpectedly rich emotional dividends. “Creed” is so reminiscent of the 1976 film that introduced us to Rocky Balboa that I sense newcomers will fall for “Creed”’s characters the way viewers fell for “Rocky”’s 40 years ago. Though 2006’s “Rocky Balboa” was a fitting final chapter for its titular hero, “Creed” finds more of his story to explore. In the process, the film reminds us that, employed by the right director, Sylvester Stallone can be a wonderful actor.

Coogler’s story, co-written with Aaron Covington , unabashedly mirrors the arc of the original “Rocky”. There’s the humble boxer, his mentor and the woman who becomes his significant other and rock of support. There is also the famous boxer who gives our hero the boxing match chance of a lifetime. Armed with these elements, “Creed” then tweaks them, playing on our expectations before occasionally surprising us. It may be easy to predict where the film takes us, but that doesn’t reduce the power and enormity of the emotional responses it gets from the audience. This is a crowd-pleaser that takes its time building its character-driven universe. There are as many quietly effective moments as there are stand-up-and-cheer moments, and they’re all handled with skill and dexterity on both sides of the camera.

Coogler’s direction leaves little doubt that “Creed” is writing a love letter to “Rocky” lore while also establishing an original narrative about its own creation, Adonis Creed ( Michael B. Jordan ). Coogler perfectly captures his intentions in an early conversation between Rocky and Donnie (as Adonis calls himself). Their talk is framed with Stallone and Jordan standing in front of a picture of Rocky and Adonis’ late father, Apollo Creed. Coogler fits his actors in the shot so that the background image serves as a flashback and a flash-forward; the screen contains Rocky’s past and Apollo’s future. Additionally, Stallone’s run-down physicality as the older version of Rocky stands in striking contrast to the boxer posing behind him, frozen in time. We’re moving forward, but the ghosts of the past are still coming with us.

“Creed” begins with Donnie’s past, where young, orphaned Adonis Johnson is visited in juvenile hall by Apollo Creed’s widow, Mary Anne (a fiercely maternal Phylicia Rashad ). Mary Anne adopts the young man, a product of an affair Apollo had before he was killed in the ring by Drago in “Rocky IV”. Though Mary Anne raises him as her own, Donnie’s resentment about being in the shadow of a famous man he never knew nor met grows as he ages. Yet he secretly engages in his father’s sport. “Creed” shows Donnie fighting in Mexico before returning to his office job in Los Angeles 12 hours later.

That Donnie has a white-collar job is interesting. It’s the opposite of Rocky’s blue-collar existence, and it reminded me of a line in the boxing documentary “ Champs ,” where an interview subject states that “ nobody rich ever took up boxing. ” Donnie has clearly benefited from the spoils of Apollo’s legacy, yet a childhood filled with scrapes with the law and constant fisticuffs leads him to quit his successful job for one where the odds for success are far more limited. Mary Anne points this out in an excellent speech where she details the more unsavory aspects of living with a boxer whose body took so much punishment that he could barely perform simple tasks like walking up stairs or cleaning himself. Donnie hears her, but the clarion call of the ring carries him off to Philly to seek out his Dad’s former rival and best friend, Rocky Balboa.

Donnie hopes that Rocky will train him, and sets out to convince the reluctant ex-boxer to do so. But Rocky is simply not interested in becoming a mentor to the up and coming boxer who affectionately calls him “Unc”. Rocky’s lack of interest remains even after Donnie reveals that he is Apollo Creed’s son. To bring new viewers up to speed, Rocky talks about the fight that cost Apollo his life, and how Rocky was in Apollo’s corner at the time. To return to the corner, even with a different boxer, is not on his list of things to do, partially out of guilt for Apollo, but mostly out of a general sense of exhaustion. “ I already had my time, ” he tells Donnie. Of course, Donnie wears him down and, despite some jealousy from a coach at Rocky’s late trainer Mickey’s old gym (who had hoped Rocky would train his son), Rocky takes on Donnie’s mentorship. This eventually leads to an offer to fight Liverpudlian boxing champ Pretty Ricky Conlan ( Tony Bellew ).

In parallel, Donnie also pitches woo to his downstairs neighbor Bianca ( Tessa Thompson ), a hearing-impaired singer and composer whose loud music keeps Donnie from getting the required sleep he needs for his training. Like Rocky’s beloved Adrian, Bianca is a fully fleshed out character whose agency is not undermined by her eventual devotion to our hero. Thompson, so good in “ Dear White People ”, is even better here, singing her own songs and verbally sparring with Jordan as quickly as the real-life boxers he faces throw punches at him. Coogler relishes his love story as much as his action sequences, basking in the glow of their romance. At one point, he employs an upside down shot of the duo, laying side by side and engaging in a quick kiss that’s chaste yet sweetly romantic. A later romantic scene is far more passionate, and feels well-earned thanks to the prior one.

“Creed” reminds us that, even at its most absurd, the “Rocky” series has always been about loss. Specifically, how these losses affect the characters and how they grow from them. This is expressed in Bianca’s desire to make as much music as possible before her hearing loss becomes total and permanent, but it’s also reflected in the character of Rocky himself. The genesis of this film stems from the most absurd of the Rocky movies, yet “Creed” stitches “Rocky IV” and all the other Rocky films into its narrative with surefooted grace. The method to this madness is explained in a haunting, beautiful speech delivered by Stallone, who points out the consequences of his losses, both personal and professional, how alone he is due to the deaths of everyone he has loved, and how he no longer has the will to fight. Beforehand, we see Rocky visiting the graves of Adrian and Paulie (on the latter’s tombstone, he places some booze), and the specter of Apollo’s death hangs over “Creed”. Rocky also tells Donnie that his son has little to do with him.

Rocky’s big speech comes after a scene where he gets some bad news (which I’ll not spoil). Watch how subtly Stallone plays his reaction—he turns the simple gesture of removing his hat into a powerful lament. Coogler loves the faces of his actors, to the point where he shoots one boxing match as an unbroken take focusing on his boxers’ punch-laden mugs. He also gets an achingly beautiful and subtle commentary out of brief shots of young, brown faces looking at and admiring Donnie as he trains. Like Rocky, Donnie may be a hero for all races, but these shots of young Black children add an extra dimension by showing us rare instances of African-American admiration of a hero onscreen.

“Creed” is at its most effective when Coogler’s camera stands by, patiently letting his actors connect with us. He favors shots where two actors occupy the screen, taking care to calibrate the space between them. As a result, we become intimately familiar with the lovely young visages of Jordan and Thompson, and the gloriously craggy face of Stallone, whose once equally youthful appearance has grown and aged like the faces of those of us who were present for his first turn as Rocky Balboa. Stallone brings us back to his first, Oscar-nominated turn as Rocky, and his intimate knowledge of his character shines through in every frame. He is really, really good here.

“Creed” gives us a new hero, and Jordan is excellent at portraying him. The star, who worked with Coogler on the superb “ Fruitvale Station ,” conveys the confusion that many young people have while forging and accepting their identities. The moment he owns up to his heritage is intertwined with the film’s rousing, climactic boxing match but does not depend on it as a means of Donnie’s acceptance. Coogler is masterful in these shots of sportsmanship, stirring the audience into a frenzy of excitement, and he knows exactly when to shamelessly plug in “Gonna Fly Now.” Donnie Creed also gets his own version of Rocky’s triumphant Philadelphia Museum stairs run scene, re-imagined here as a street jog surrounded by motorcycles. It’s absolutely breathtaking. Note where Coogler places Stallone in this sequence, as it is the most visual representation of what his film is doing with these characters.

Speaking of the Philadelphia Museum, “Creed” ends there with a scene guaranteed to wring a bucket of tears from fans of Rocky Balboa. I wouldn’t dream of spoiling the reasons why “Creed” ends here, nor will I say who’s in the scene. But I will tell you this: The last shot of this film is a true thing of beauty. This is one of the best films of 2015.

Odie Henderson

Odie "Odienator" Henderson has spent over 33 years working in Information Technology. He runs the blogs Big Media Vandalism and Tales of Odienary Madness. Read his answers to our Movie Love Questionnaire  here .

Now playing

What You Wish For

Glenn kenny.

Ultraman: Rising

Simon abrams.

Monica Castillo

Nothing Can't Be Undone by a HotPot

The Strangers: Chapter 1

Brian tallerico, film credits.

Creed (2015)

Rated PG-13 for violence, language and some sensuality.

132 minutes

Michael B. Jordan as Adonis Creed

Sylvester Stallone as Rocky Balboa

Graham McTavish as Tommy Holiday

Tessa Thompson as Bianca

Phylicia Rashād as Mary Anne Creed

Hans Marrero as Flores

Tony Bellew as 'Pretty' Ricky Conlan

Brian Anthony Wilson as James

Ritchie Coster as Pete Sporino

Jacob 'Stitch' Duran as Stitch

Malik Bazille as Amir

Wood Harris as Tony 'Little Duke' Burton

Gabe Rosado as Leo 'The Lion' Sporino

• Ryan Coogler
• Aaron Covington
• Sylvester Stallone

Cinematographer

• Maryse Alberti
• Claudia Castello
• Michael P. Shawver

Latest blog posts

GTA San Andreas and the Legacy of Playing as a Black Guy in Video Games

Hollywood Continues to Fail Its Black Final Girls

58th KVIFF Welcomes Viggo Mortensen, Steven Soderbergh, Clive Owen, And More

Juneteenth Film Festival Returns For A Powerful Second Year

CREED: An Alleviating Cinematic Achievement

Art college 1994: an anti-nostalgic trip back to college, cannes film festival 2024: all we imagine as light & when the light breaks, my penguin friend trailer, am i ok trailer, cannes film festival 2024: the girl with the needle & wild diamond, cannes film festival 2024: ghost trail & black dog, cannes film festival 2024: megalopolis, cannes film festival 2024: the second act & on becoming a guinea fowl, it ends with us trailer, cannes film festival 2024: furiosa: a mad max saga, megalopolis trailer, interview with director lee thongkham for kitty the killer.

What a relief Creed is. With a current cinematic landscape dominated by remakes, reboots and sequels, the initial idea of Creed just sounded so unnecessary. A pseudo-combination of a Rocky reboot that is a sequel whilst also working as a remake just felt like something we really didn’t need.

Jurassic World was a complete misfire, a film which seemed ashamed of the films that became before it, using its unofficial mascot (the T-Rex) at the end as fan service so audiences will leave the theatre with a nostalgia-driven whimsical feeling inside, forgetting the incoherent, bloated empty mess that had preceded it. The film’s cynical approach to the previous three films made it seem disrespectful towards the iconic films that Spielberg had made back in the 90’s.

The One-Two Punch

Whilst this must’ve been a hard decision for Stallone , to hand over his most important and personal film franchise to a newer, younger director, the gamble has paid off well. Much like the previous film Rocky Balboa , Coogler strips away the excess sentimentality and superficiality that diminished the Rocky sequels and goes for an old-school approach.

Growing up in a wealthy household (propped up by his late father’s money) and getting a successful, but boring financial job, Donnie has grown up with a built-in fascination with the sport of boxing. One aspect that the film needed to flesh out more is exactly why Donnie has such a passion for boxing, outside for it being his father’s job.

The film starts quite quickly, with Donnie quitting his job, giving us no context as to exactly why he chooses to quit his job so quickly or what internal decisions led up to this. Creed  treats his decision as something that needs to be done quickly and urgently, but contextually within the film there’s no reason for it. Just an extra scene could’ve really established this at the beginning and given us a sense of Donnie living in an environment that makes him unhappy.

Rocky, still a legend around Philadelphia, still runs Adrian’s Restaurant, but has become sadly alone again due to the death of Paulie between now and the events of Rocky Balboa . Still regularly visiting the gravestones of Adrian and Paulie, Rocky has accepted his life and ready to exit as he’s lost everything that’s been important to him – his friends and family. His son, Robert Balboa ( Milo Ventimiglia ) has moved to Canada, leaving Rocky alone in Philadelphia.

I’ll Forgive The Boxing Puns

Whilst this film is the potential set-up for a new series of films based on Donnie Creed, this is still a Rocky sequel as well and Stallone returns to the role perfectly. This must’ve been quite a risky endeavour for Stallone – making a Rocky film where he is truly not in control any more, within the film and behind the camera. The film reflects that sentiment though, as whilst Rocky is revered for his past success, age has really hit him and he’s longer the dominant man.

The defining character trait of Rocky Balboa is that whilst accomplishing his dream of being a famous boxer, the great success achieved at the end of Rocky  is not the boxing match, but the fact that Rocky is finally together with Adrian, the love of his life. Their relationship has defined the franchise, as Rocky is quite a loyal, loving character, whose life is twisted by success and the various characters around him. Creed  luckily understands this arc of Rocky’s character, as Rocky is quite a lonely humble man now that he’s alone again. The introduction of Donnie Creed lights that passion inside Rocky again, not because he’s boxing again, but because he’s become a father figure to Donnie, able to be part of a family again.

Apart from Stallone , the full cast is consistently tremendous, with Michael B Jordan solidifying himself as a Hollywood leading man, showing the aggressiveness of Apollo Creed but combining it with the thoughtfulness of Rocky Balboa, a unique mix of the two icons in his life. Earlier this year, Jordan  copped a lot of grief (alongside his co-stars) for the cinematic misfire Fantastic Four , but with this film, he crushes any wrong-doings Fantastic Four might’ve caused.

If more spinoffs and reboots were like Creed,  I don’t think people would be as cynical about every old property that’s brought back to try and make more money. Whilst Coogler  showed potential with his debut feature Fruitvale Station,  he shows with Creed that he has the chops to have a great career in Hollywood. Between his rhythmic editing and interesting cinematography choices, the film never slows down or feels tired, using the old story beats from the original Rocky as foundations that he has modernized and built upon.

The entire cast, especially Stallone , brings their A-game in a film which could spawn an entirely new franchise, but I’d be perfectly happy if no sequels happened either. It’s quite refreshing to see a mainstream film with established characters that doesn’t feel like it’s constant set-up for an inevitable sequel or something that will spawn tons of merchandise.

Is there any other successful Hollywood spin-off films that you can think of?

Does content like this matter to you?

Alex is a 28 year-old West Australian who has a slight obsession with film.

How To Write A Personal Creed

There are many ways to write a personal creed. Some creeds are entire poems, while others are one-liners. This framework will help you to design a creed for yourself. Think of a creed as a way of living with your whole being.

• Your head knows who you are
• Your heart beats with purpose
• your family on one hand
• the rest of the world on the other
• acceptance of your reality
• action to change it

6 steps to write a personal creed

This is going to work much better if you get pen and paper now, and actually write a personal creed. Even a crappy draft is better than simply reading without taking action.

1. Who you are

“What we do flows from who we are.” – Paul Vitale

The ‘head’ part of my creed therefore reads: “I am more than I appear to be. All the world’s strength and power rests inside me. I am master of my fate and captain of my soul.”

2. Your purpose

“First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.” – Epictetus

Your purpose is what you HAVE to do. If you didn’t do this, life would lose its meaning, and you will wander lost. It is not what others expect you to do, nor what you feel obliged to do. Your purpose is what makes you jump out of bed in the morning.

The ‘heart’ part of my creed is: “My purpose is to grow; to be a better person today than I was a week ago. I make the world a better place by first being better myself, then sharing what I know with others simply and humbly.”

3. Your relationships: family

“Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.” – Jane Howard

This is probably the easiest part of the creed for most people. Many have the luxury of living with a blood family. Some don’t but belong to a group that they consider family. Think about the truth of your relationship with this family.

The first ‘arm’ of my creed: “I am enveloped in my family’s love. Their support frees me to be everything I can and want to be. I in turn provide for and protect the people I love most in the world.”

4. Your relationships: the world

“We live in the world when we love it.” – Rabindranath Tagore

At the deepest level, we are all one. You have to think beyond your immediate family and be involved in the world at large. When you do, you will connect to the source of all things and have infinite power. Decide how you relate to the world.

The second ‘arm’ of my creed: “All things are one. There is a part of me in each person; there is no ‘other’. Every person owns a beautiful story; I learn best by listening, not judging. By learning about another, I learn about myself.”

5. Your grounding: acceptance

“We cannot change anything until we accept it. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses.” – C G Jung

This part of your personal creed is about how you accept yourself, others, and life. This acceptance keeps you grounded in what is, rather than you wish would be. When you see clearly, you can act wisely.

The first ‘leg’ of my creed is: “The people I love do not belong to me; they have every right to think, speak, and act as they wish. Things don’t always work out the way I want; I can grumble, or I can grow.”

6. Your grounding: action

“Trust only movement. Life happens at the level of events, not of words. Trust movement.” – Alfred Adler

The final part of your creed is the closest you will get to an affirmation. This is the way you behave as a result of what you believe, most of the time anyway. Nobody is perfect and that’s fine. Just write the behaviour you want to manifest – this is why this part approaches an affirmation.

The final ‘leg’ of my creed: “I live each day as if it were my last. My motto is to think deeply, speak gently, love much, laugh a lot, work hard, give freely, and be kind. I am happy and grateful that I am becoming all I was born to be.”

Your personal creed

Go ahead and write a personal creed, using this framework or any other. Writing a personal creed is a little like trying on dresses. The first few attempts may not be a perfect fit so you have to keep looking.

Once you find a fit, you’ll know. It just feels right – you feel both comfortable and beautiful in this skin. And just like dresses, you may one day outgrow it and have to find a new one.

Our creeds are our offerings to life. It is the soul we leave behind when we depart this world. It should make the world a better place. Your creed is your legacy .

“This is the creed of creeds, the final deposit and distillation of all important faiths: that you should be able to believe in life.” – Harry Emerson Fosdick

You may also like:

• Do You Have A Personal Creed?
• Who Is Your Ideal Reader?
• Increase Your Influence: Change Yourself and Others
• How Do You Measure Your Life? 6 Possibilities
• Summary Of Your Life: How Will It Read?

49 replies on “How To Write A Personal Creed”

Thanks i have assisted

This is very incredible.I love the way you put it “The people I love do not belong to me; they have every right to think, speak and act as they wish. I believe the world will forever remember you.good job.

i dont think that the acceptance should be on there may be happiness or imagination 🙂

This has really helped me writing a creed! Thank you so much!

I’m speechless this is one of the most powerful articles i have come across. You have inspired me to write my creed. Life is so much beautiful when you set your sail instead of being blown wherever the wind’s of the world take you.

this was a big help to me!!!!!! THANKS!!!!!!!:)

Thank you for posting this! :)) This article really helped me in doing my homework in Values Education, which is write a creed about moral values. It’s kinda hard, right now I’ve already composed a 9 stanza creed. And I know that it’s not that good. Hope I’ll get good grades with it.

[…] over at Joyful Living encouraged me to sit down and write out my personal creed. Inspired by my word of the year (light) and the words of Marianne Williamson, my personal creed […]

Oh, this is so wonderful…Daphne, your whole explanation and diagram of how purpose and action can co-exist with a deeply felt experience of the world – especially if that experience sometimes feels paralyzing is masterful, thank you. I’m so glad I found you and would love to reference you often, Thank you, Rori Raye

Welcome and thank you for visiting and leaving a comment! Glad you found the explanation and diagram useful, and I love your interpretation of it – of integrating purpose and action with a ‘deeply felt experience’… wow. I’m glad you found me too and I look forward to sharing our experience of life and blogging!

[…] for writing your personal creed and for pointing me to Daphne’s blog, Joyful Living where this project began. I had not been planning on posting but rather journaling or attempting a poem for myself today. […]

Hello Daphne,

I have visited you frequently over the past few weeks. I am inspired and motivated with your posts, each and every time. This post is especially special, for me, at this time. I am working on finding my way back from somewhat of a journey that took me away of “my self.” Thank you!

Hi Daphne, Beautiful. You inspire me to pen down my personal creed. I might have to come up with something real soon. Thank you for this!

Abundance (doing what I can do now) through authenticity.

Beautiful creed! Your heart speaks so clearly through your thoughts and words! No doubt, your creed will inspire so very many!:~) Thank you for sharing.

I thought I had already written my creed but it doesn’t seem to be anywhere here…?

I love your little person and I love the heart is our purpose. Your personal creed is beautiful and the last part is very powerful. Thank you for sharing it with me. Giovanna Garcia Imperfect Action is better than No Action

Hi Giovanna, I’m glad you like the little person, and the meaning of the heart. I’m grateful for your affirming words about my creed. Your warm encouragement is much appreciated.

The beauty of a personal creed is that I get to create whatever I want. I can dream and imagine utmost greatness in myself and in others. Kind of a personal mission statement…I guess that’s how I’ve been thinking of it lately…my mission, my project…perhaps is similar to a creed.

great outline – very helpful for someone like me with a logical brain!

Stacey, you’re so right that a personal creed is for us to create exactly as we wish. There is no right or wrong way because it it personal. If you’d like to share your personal mission statement here, I’d be happy to include it in the post with the other examples. Glad you like the outline – I guess I have a logical brain too!

Thanks for this great assignment Daphne. I incorporated Marianne Williamson’s words into my creed.

I am light. My purpose is to let my light shine, to shine light on others, and to give people permission to do the same.

Stacey, I love your creed. The first line, just three words, is so powerful because you use the “I am”. And I love the fact that part of being light is to allow others to shine their light too. You’ve certainly shone some light here today. I always feel brighter (not as in cleverer but as in happier) when I see you around!

This is a super post. I would say my personal creed spills over onto my website, livelife365, and that is: live live every day, every way, as best you can, and never give up.

peace, mike livelife365 Social Networking Blues

Your website name is certainly a creed in itself, and very nifty sounding too! You’re right that we’re all given 365 days a year and can choose to live each one to the full. Great creed!

Wow! What a way to put it into words! Thanks for this!

Mark, thank you for your encouraging comment. I really appreciate it.

This is wonderful! You’ve laid it out so nicely. I’m going to take the existing creed I have and rework it this weekend. And what you’ve written is such a great framework for bringing it all together. Awesome stuff!!

Hey Lance, I’m so glad you agreed to rework your creed. I can’t wait to read it because I’d love to know what drives someone as wonderfully giving as you. I’m glad you like the framework – I had to think quite a bit about how to write my own creed and couldn’t find any guidelines out there, so I had to make it up!

This really helps! I will put mine in writing and let you know how I do! Thanks for informing me of the errors. Taking the time to contact me shows how much you care!

Tess, I’m looking forward to reading your creed if you’ll share it. You’re very welcome for the heads up – I do care and you deserve the best anyway. I’m learning so much about you and admire what you’ve done in your life.

Hi, Daphne! Thanks for sharing your wonderful, creed. We are indeed more than we appear to be. Within each of us is God unmanifest, and our purpose is to fully manifest our godliness within! 🙂

Jocelyn, I like the way you put it: within us is God unmanifest, to be manifested in our lives. Nice!

Great series Daphne- plus I love the Jung quote! This is very nice Daphne! Your creed is showing through big time!

Jay, the Jung quote is brilliant. And so true. Thanks for your support, Jay.

This is beautiful, Daphne!

My favorite part is the sentence: Every person owns a beautiful story; I learn best by listening, not judging.

It’s so true! That’s what I love best about blogs – people share their beautiful stories and I get to learn.

The graphic and approach you offer here are truly inspired! (Perhaps I should have waited for the instructions before I did the assignment)

Anyway, thanks again for sharing your own joyful story!

Thank you so much for your kind words. Your creed was beautiful and part of that beauty is that it came naturally to you without need of this framework. I love the way you also posted it on your site.

You’re right that the great thing about blogs is that they are written by real people with real stories. You have much to contribute with your stories too!

Hi Daphne – I really like the way that you laid out how to develop a personal creed. I have pieces of “the body” figured out, but not the whole thing. I think I’ll take some time to flesh it out.

Also, I think your creed is more poetic than you realize 😉 Thanks!

Hi Amanda, aww… thanks for thinking the creed is even a teeny weeny bit poetic. You’re too sweet!

Good on you for having parts of the ‘body’ figured out. If you get it all figured out in the next few days do post it here so I can include it in a post linking back to your blog!

I love your little figure and its meanings, Daphne.

Robin, thanks so much. I had to think a little to work out that figure!

I agree! Your diagram is one of the best parts of this post! It’s like an evolved stick figure 😀

I’m enjoying how your creativity shows up on your latest blog posts, it’s so wonderful to see!

I loved how you broke it down…the visuals plus your own creed as an example really helps. You’re such a great teacher (and thinker)!

I feel like, I can now roll up my sleeves and get going on my creed writing 😉

Hi Carlota, as you can tell I’m not much of an artist so I have to stay with stick figures! Glad you like it though. And your kind words about being a teacher and thinker mean a lot to me. Thank you so much for those words. Hey, if you get your creed done in the next few days I’d love to feature it in the next (and probably last) post in this series!

I have one word. Impressive!

Very nicely put Daphne. 🙂

Sunny, I have two words. Thank you!

It’s great having you here.

Thanks for this post. I’d say my goal in life is to be open to every experience I have, without fear, closure or rejection, and to help others cultivate the same openness to their own experience.

Hi Chris, being open to experiences is a great personal creed. That practically guarantees growth! Thanks for your comment.

Thank you too. BTW I have a question too. Is there any specific reasoning behind putting the Acceptance on the right leg and Action on the left one? 🙂

Hi Sunny, I’d meant the two legs to be equal without any one coming first, but as I wrote I realised that acceptance brings about better action so maybe it does make sense to put acceptance on the right leg so that from our perspective reading from the left, it comes first. Great question!

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Film Review: ‘Creed’

Michael B. Jordan and Sylvester Stallone deliver knockout performances in Ryan Coogler’s ‘Rocky’ spin-off, which lives up to the best of its predecessors while forging its own path.

By Andrew Barker

Andrew Barker

Senior Features Writer

• Kraftwerk Returns to the ‘Autobahn’ on First Night of Disney Hall Residency: Concert Review 4 weeks ago
• Sammy Hagar on Rocking with Van Halen, Building His Cabo Wabo Empire, and Why Live Music Will Be The ‘Ultimate Savior of Art’ 2 months ago
• Shane MacGowan, the Pogues Frontman and ‘Fairytale of New York’ Singer, Dies at 65 7 months ago

Defying conventional wisdom about diminishing returns, this holiday season will see the release of the seventh installment in an iconic 1970s film franchise that not only lives up to the best of its predecessors, but also respectfully forges its own path. (Hopefully the new “Star Wars” movie is good, too.) With his “Rocky” spinoff, “ Creed ,” writer-director Ryan Coogler confirms every bit of promise he displayed in his 2013 debut, “Fruitvale Station,” offering a smart, kinetic, exhilaratingly well-crafted piece of mainstream filmmaking, and providing actor Michael B. Jordan with yet another substantial stepping stone on his climb to stardom. Yet the biggest surprise may be Sylvester Stallone : Appearing in the first “Rocky” film that he didn’t also write — and the first in which he takes on a supporting role — the veteran channels all his obvious love for the character into his performance, digging deeper as an actor than he has in years. Despite some heavyweight competition over Thanksgiving weekend, “Creed” should still be a contender at the box office.

Related Stories

Live music blues: are black keys, jennifer lopez just the beginning, 'the boys' to end with season 5 on amazon.

A first-scene flashback introduces Adonis Johnson (Alex Henderson) as an adolescent in a Los Angeles juvenile detention center, busted for fighting in what we assume is a regular occurrence. An orphan who’s been bounced from one institution to another, he receives an unexpected visit from one Mary Anne Creed (Phylicia Rashad), who tells him that he’s the illegitimate son of her late husband, former heavyweight champion Apollo Creed.

Popular on Variety

Flash forward to the present day, and the twentysomething Adonis (Jordan) — Donnie to his friends — is still living with Mary Anne in the white-marble chez Creed, making abortive attempts to work an office job while heading to Tijuana for black-market weekend prize fights. A talented boxer with a weakness for writing checks that his gloves can’t yet cash, he decides to decamp for Philadelphia, against his surrogate mother’s wishes, to train with the man who knew his father’s skills best, professional nemesis-turned-friend Rocky Balboa (Stallone).

Still tending to his restaurant and making regular visits to his late wife Adrian’s grave, Rocky takes some convincing to get back in the game as a trainer, but he soon relents, and the two start to develop a touch-and-go familial bond. Adonis also meets antagonistic with his downstairs neighbor, a bohemian avant-garde R&B musician named Bianca (Tessa Thompson, very brash, very flinty, very Philly), and strikes up a romance.

At first Adonis tries to keep his parentage under wraps, but after an early victory the information leaks, and thanks to the publicity he’s offered an underdog shot at the title: British light-heavyweight champion “Pretty” Ricky Conlan (Anthony Bellew) is set to begin a potentially career-ending prison sentence in six months, and needs an opponent for his swan-song bout in Liverpool’s Goodison Park. Meanwhile, Rocky confronts a serious personal battle of his own, and his trainer-fighter relationship with Adonis is turned on its head in a number of genuinely touching ways.

“Creed” makes no bones about retreading a number of “Rocky’s” story beats, not to mention reaching back into the archives a few too many times for key locations, costume elements and music cues. But it’s the details that elevate this material: Adonis helping braid Bianca’s hair and the two collapsing in a post-bout ice-cream coma; the fact that Bianca sometimes wears a hearing aid (her progressive hearing loss isn’t treated as a symbolic plot point, but simply as a fact of the character’s life); Adonis’ hilarious — and immediately believable — physical manifestation of nervousness in his dressing room. Cut and spry, Jordan looks every inch a fighter, and the physicality of his performance is matched by some well-rounded internal gymnastics: Adonis bears a chip on one shoulder from his group-home past, and one on the other from his treatment as a sort of legacy admission into the boxing world, and Jordan manages to make his character’s fiery temper empathetic rather than alienating.

This being a “Rocky” movie, it goes without saying that the training montages are plentiful, and the climactic battle is a dialed-up, leave-it-all-on-the-canvas epic, featuring virtuosic editing and one bloodily beautiful extreme-slow-motion shot. Yet it’s earlier in the film that Coogler really ups the technical ante. Shot in what appears to be a single take, Adonis’ first major fight is staged with breathtaking precision, the camera circling in and out of the scrum almost close enough to become a participant itself, the two fighters hitting their marks perfectly, and separate sound channels piping in bursts of crowd noise and shouted trainer instructions from all sides, adding up to an immensely immersive experience. As a viewer, one starts the fight admiring the filmmaking technique, and ends it with shredded fingernails.

As wildly uneven as they became, the “Rocky” films have always been unusually attuned to the constancy of personality through extreme life changes. Even after becoming a rich, famous hometown legend (and later, after the loss of most of his family and fortune), Rocky has always been essentially the same person, for better or worse — a lovable lug with a steady undercurrent of self-doubt and loneliness. Coogler and co-writer Aaron Covington understand this about the character, and Stallone’s degree of confidence in his director shows through. Without straining for pathos, using his battered body as an asset but never as a prop, the actor finds continually surprising, understated notes of tenderness and regret. For all its flaws, 2006’s “Rocky Balboa” at least offered a dignified sending off for the Italian Stallion, and the risks of reprising the character yet again were surely considerable; Stallone deserves credit for taking a chance on the young director, and his trust has paid off in spades.

Reviewed at Warner Bros. Studios, Burbank, Calif., Nov. 12, 2015. MPAA Rating: PG-13. Running time: 133 MIN.

• Production: A Warner Bros. release, presented with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures, in association with New Line Cinema, of a Chartoff Winkler production. Produced by Irwin Winkler, Robert Chartoff, Charles Winkler, William Chartoff, David Winkler, Kevin King-Templeton, Sylvester Stallone. Executive producer, Nicolas Stern.
• Crew: Directed by Ryan Coogler. Screenplay, Coogler, Aaron Covington; story, Coogler, based on characters created by Sylvester Stallone. Camera (Deluxe color), Maryse Alberti; editors, Michael P. Shawver, Claudia Castello; music, Ludwig Goransson; music supervisor, Gabe Hilfer; production designer, Hannah Beachler; art director, Jesse Rosenthal; set decorator, Amanda Carroll; costume designers, Emma Potter, Antoinette Messam; sound (Dolby Digital), Damian Canelos; supervising sound editor, Benjamin A. Burtt; sound designer, Steve Boeddeker; re-recording mixers, Boeddeker, Brandon Proctor; special effects coordinator, Patrick Edward White; visual effects supervisors, John P. Nugent, Alison O’Brien; visual effects producer, Alison O'Brien; visual effects, Sandbox FX, BigHug FX, East Side Effects; assistant director, Donald Sparks; casting, Francine Maisler, Kathleen Driscoll-Mohler.
• With: Michael B. Jordan, Sylvester Stallone, Tessa Thompson, Phylicia Rashad, Andre Ward, Anthony Bellew, Ritchie Coster, Jacob “Stitch” Duran, Ricardo “Padman” McGill, Gabriel Rosado, Alex Henderson.

More from Variety

Summer game fest: ‘batman: arkham shadow,’ ‘mortal kombat 1’ trailers, blumhouse reveals 6 titles and tim robinson teases ea’s ‘skate’, regulators shouldn’t blow the whistle on venu sports just yet, batman unmasked exhibition showcasing costumes and batmobiles headed to u.k., jude law turned down superman because it just felt off and ‘a step too far,’ but he did try on a ‘more metallic’ suit for his audition, is netflix about to turn into a franchise factory, more from our brands, what’s keeping grace cummings alive this time, this new ultra-premium tequila from gran centenario was aged in red wine barrels, lakers to hire jj redick as next head coach, per report, the best loofahs and body scrubbers, according to dermatologists, j.lo’s atlas bests dune: part two on nielsen streaming ranking, while bridgerton again dominates, verify it's you, please log in.

• Houston Community College
• Eagle Online

• Judy Bouvier

Purdue OWL - Introductions, Body Paragraphs, and Conclusions for an Expository/Persuasive Essay

Introductions, Body Paragraphs, and Conclusions for an Expository/Persuasive Essay

Introduction

The introduction is the broad beginning of the paper that answers three important questions:

• What is this?
• Why am I reading it?
• What do you want me to do?

You should answer these questions by doing the following:

• Set the context – provide general information about the main idea, explaining the situation so the reader can make sense of the topic and the claims you make and support
• State why the main idea is important – tell the reader why s/he should care and keep reading. Your goal is to create a compelling, clear, and convincing essay people will want to read and act upon
• State your thesis/claim – compose a sentence or two stating the position you will support with logos (sound reasoning: induction, deduction), pathos (balanced emotional appeal), and ethos (author credibility).

Thesis Checklist

Your thesis is more than a general statement about your main idea. It needs to establish a clear position you will support with balanced proofs (logos, pathos, ethos). Use the checklist below to help you create a thesis.

This section is adapted from Writing with a Thesis: A Rhetoric Reader by David Skwire and Sarah Skwire:

Make sure you avoid the following when creating your thesis:

• A thesis is not a title: Homes and schools (title) vs. Parents ought to participate more in the education of their children (good thesis).
• A thesis is not an announcement of the subject: My subject is the incompetence of the Supreme Court vs. The Supreme Court made a mistake when it ruled in favor of George W. Bush in the 2000 election.
• A thesis is not a statement of absolute fact: Jane Austen is the author of Pride and Prejudice.
• A thesis is not the whole essay: A thesis is your main idea/claim/refutation/problem-solution expressed in a single sentence or a combination of sentences.
• Please note that according to the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers , Sixth Edition, "A thesis statement is a single sentence that formulates both your topic and your point of view" (Gibaldi 56). However, if your paper is more complex and requires a thesis statement, your thesis may require a combination of sentences .

Make sure you follow these guidelines when creating your thesis:

• A good thesis is unified: Detective stories are not a high form of literature, but people have always been fascinated by them, and many fine writers have experimented with them (floppy). vs. Detective stories appeal to the basic human desire for thrills (concise).
• A good thesis is specific: James Joyce’s Ulysses is very good. vs. James Joyce’s Ulysses helped create a new way for writers to deal with the unconscious.
• Try to be as specific as possible (without providing too much detail) when creating your thesis: James Joyce’s Ulysses helped create a new way for writers to deal with the unconscious. vs. James Joyce’s Ulysses helped create a new way for writers to deal with the unconscious by utilizing the findings of Freudian psychology and introducing the techniques of literary stream-of-consciousness.

Quick Checklist:

_____ The thesis/claim follows the guidelines outlined above

_____ The thesis/claim matches the requirements and goals of the assignment

_____ The thesis/claim is clear and easily recognizable

_____ The thesis/claim seems supportable by good reasoning/data, emotional appeal

Body Paragraphs

Summary: This resource outlines the generally accepted structure for introductions, body paragraphs, and conclusions in an academic argument paper. Keep in mind that this resource contains guidelines and not strict rules about organization. Your structure needs to be flexible enough to meet the requirements of your purpose and audience.

Body Paragraphs: Moving from General to Specific Information

Your paper should be organized in a manner that moves from general to specific information. Every time you begin a new subject, think of an inverted pyramid - the broadest range of information sits at the top, and as the paragraph or paper progresses, the author becomes more and more focused on the argument ending with specific, detailed evidence supporting a claim. Lastly, the author explains how and why the information she has just provided connects to and supports her thesis (a brief wrap up or warrant).

  The four elements of a good paragraph (TTEB)

A good paragraph should contain at least the following four elements: T ransition, T opic sentence, specific E vidence and analysis, and a B rief wrap-up sentence (also known as a warrant) – TTEB!

• A T ransition sentence leading in from a previous paragraph to assure smooth reading. This acts as a hand off from one idea to the next.
• A T opic sentence that tells the reader what you will be discussing in the paragraph.
• Specific E vidence and analysis that supports one of your claims and that provides a deeper level of detail than your topic sentence.
• A B rief wrap-up sentence that tells the reader how and why this information supports the paper’s thesis. The brief wrap-up is also known as the warrant. The warrant is important to your argument because it connects your reasoning and support to your thesis, and it shows that the information in the paragraph is related to your thesis and helps defend it.

Rebuttal Sections

In order to present a fair and convincing message, you may need to anticipate, research, and outline some of the common positions (arguments) that dispute your thesis. If the situation (purpose) calls for you to do this, you will present and then refute these other positions in the rebuttal section of your essay.

It is important to consider other positions because in most cases, your primary audience will be fence-sitters. Fence-sitters are people who have not decided which side of the argument to support.

People who are on your side of the argument will not need a lot of information to align with your position. People who are completely against your argument - perhaps for ethical or religious reasons - will probably never align with your position no matter how much information you provide. Therefore, the audience you should consider most important are those people who haven't decided which side of the argument they will support - the fence-sitters.

In many cases, these fence-sitters have not decided which side to align with because they see value in both positions. Therefore, to not consider opposing positions to your own in a fair manner may alienate fence-sitters when they see that you are not addressing their concerns or discussion opposing positions at all.

Organizing your rebuttal section

Following the TTEB method outlined in the Body Paragraph section, forecast all the information that will follow in the rebuttal section and then move point by point through the other positions addressing each one as you go. The outline below, adapted from Seyler's Understanding Argument , is an example of a rebuttal section from a thesis essay.

When you rebut or refute an opposing position, use the following three-part organization:

The opponent’s argument – Usually, you should not assume that your reader has read or remembered the argument you are refuting. Thus at the beginning of your paragraph, you need to state, accurately and fairly, the main points of the argument you will refute.

Your position – Next, make clear the nature of your disagreement with the argument or position you are refuting. Your position might assert, for example, that a writer has not proved his assertion because he has provided evidence that is outdated, or that the argument is filled with fallacies.

Your refutation – The specifics of your counterargument will depend upon the nature of your disagreement. If you challenge the writer’s evidence, then you must present the more recent evidence. If you challenge assumptions, then you must explain why they do not hold up. If your position is that the piece is filled with fallacies, then you must present and explain each fallacy.

Conclusions

Conclusions wrap up what you have been discussing in your paper. After moving from general to specific information in the introduction and body paragraphs, your conclusion should begin pulling back into more general information that restates the main points of your argument. Conclusions may also call for action or overview future possible research. The following outline may help you conclude your paper:

In a general way,

• restate your topic and why it is important,
• restate your thesis/claim,
• address opposing viewpoints and explain why readers should align with your position,
• call for action or overview future research possibilities.

Remember that once you accomplish these tasks, unless otherwise directed by your instructor, you are finished. Done. Complete. Don't try to bring in new points or end with a whiz bang(!) conclusion or try to solve world hunger in the final sentence of your conclusion. Simplicity is best for a clear, convincing message.

The preacher's maxim is one of the most effective formulas to follow for argument papers:

• Tell what you're going to tell them (introduction).
• Tell them (body).
• Tell them what you told them (conclusion).

 Copyright ©1995-2011 by The Writing Lab & The OWL at Purdue and Purdue University .

• How to Cite
• Language & Lit
• Rhyme & Rhythm
• The Rewrite
• Search Glass

How to Write a Credo Essay

A credo is a personal belief or passion that centers an individual. A credo essay assignment asks you to describe why your personal belief is so important to you. As a first step to writing a credo essay, make a list of things you believe in. Think emotionally and logically about what brings fulfillment to your life. You may believe in literature, painting, charity work, cinema, romantic love or tennis. Like other expository essays, the credo essay does not try to persuade a reader to believe you, but simply offers one viewpoint -- yours.

Create a statement that lays out your belief. This will be your skeleton thesis statement, which you will develop later. If your credo essay will focus on the importance of family, for instance, write a statement that makes the claim concrete, such as, “I believe family togetherness is the key to a satisfying life.” It is still a vague concept but your essay will explain it.

Write an introductory paragraph. Start with a “grabber” sentence, a line that will grab your reader’s attention. If you are writing an essay on how playing piano makes life fulfilling, describe your fingers lightly but powerfully bouncing from one piano key to the next when playing J.S. Bach’s Prelude in C Minor.

Flesh out your skeleton thesis statement. Develop it into a statement that more fully describes your passion. For example, if you are writing about family, your thesis statement might be, “I believe maintaining family togetherness provides the basic structure for a healthy, fulfilling and structured life.” Or, using the piano example, you might write, “Playing the piano gives me a comfort, happiness and challenge I cannot find anywhere else in my life.”

Address each part of your thesis statement in the body paragraphs. In the first paragraph, address the first concept in your thesis. For example, devote the first paragraph to how playing the piano brings comfort. You may discuss how the knowledge you have about the keys and the sounds they make when played at different intervals makes you feel safe and comforted, like you do under a warm blanket. Continue with a theme for each of the paragraphs.

Conclude the essay. Wrap up your credo essay in a few sentences by summarizing your belief. If you wrote about your religion, for example, summarize in the conclusion how having religion in your life gives you peace in times of stress and trouble and how grateful you are that God exists in your life. Remember that you are not convincing people to believe with you: this is your individual belief. However, you do want your credo to have a lingering effect.

• Purdue University Online Writing Lab (OWL): The Expository Essay

Noelle Carver has been a freelance writer since 2009, with work published in "SSYK" and "The Wolf," two U.K. literary journals. Carver holds a Bachelor of Arts in literature from American University and a Master of Fine Arts in writing from The New School. She lives in New York City.

Have a language expert improve your writing

Run a free plagiarism check in 10 minutes, generate accurate citations for free.

• Knowledge Base
• How to write an essay introduction | 4 steps & examples

How to Write an Essay Introduction | 4 Steps & Examples

Published on February 4, 2019 by Shona McCombes . Revised on July 23, 2023.

A good introduction paragraph is an essential part of any academic essay . It sets up your argument and tells the reader what to expect.

The main goals of an introduction are to:

• Catch your reader’s attention.
• Give background on your topic.
• Present your thesis statement —the central point of your essay.

This introduction example is taken from our interactive essay example on the history of Braille.

The invention of Braille was a major turning point in the history of disability. The writing system of raised dots used by visually impaired people was developed by Louis Braille in nineteenth-century France. In a society that did not value disabled people in general, blindness was particularly stigmatized, and lack of access to reading and writing was a significant barrier to social participation. The idea of tactile reading was not entirely new, but existing methods based on sighted systems were difficult to learn and use. As the first writing system designed for blind people’s needs, Braille was a groundbreaking new accessibility tool. It not only provided practical benefits, but also helped change the cultural status of blindness. This essay begins by discussing the situation of blind people in nineteenth-century Europe. It then describes the invention of Braille and the gradual process of its acceptance within blind education. Subsequently, it explores the wide-ranging effects of this invention on blind people’s social and cultural lives.

Instantly correct all language mistakes in your text

Upload your document to correct all your mistakes in minutes

Table of contents

Step 1: hook your reader, step 2: give background information, step 3: present your thesis statement, step 4: map your essay’s structure, step 5: check and revise, more examples of essay introductions, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about the essay introduction.

Your first sentence sets the tone for the whole essay, so spend some time on writing an effective hook.

Avoid long, dense sentences—start with something clear, concise and catchy that will spark your reader’s curiosity.

The hook should lead the reader into your essay, giving a sense of the topic you’re writing about and why it’s interesting. Avoid overly broad claims or plain statements of fact.

Examples: Writing a good hook

Take a look at these examples of weak hooks and learn how to improve them.

• Braille was an extremely important invention.
• The invention of Braille was a major turning point in the history of disability.

The first sentence is a dry fact; the second sentence is more interesting, making a bold claim about exactly  why the topic is important.

• The internet is defined as “a global computer network providing a variety of information and communication facilities.”
• The spread of the internet has had a world-changing effect, not least on the world of education.

Avoid using a dictionary definition as your hook, especially if it’s an obvious term that everyone knows. The improved example here is still broad, but it gives us a much clearer sense of what the essay will be about.

• Mary Shelley’s  Frankenstein is a famous book from the nineteenth century.
• Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is often read as a crude cautionary tale about the dangers of scientific advancement.

Instead of just stating a fact that the reader already knows, the improved hook here tells us about the mainstream interpretation of the book, implying that this essay will offer a different interpretation.

Here's why students love Scribbr's proofreading services

Discover proofreading & editing

Next, give your reader the context they need to understand your topic and argument. Depending on the subject of your essay, this might include:

• Historical, geographical, or social context
• An outline of the debate you’re addressing
• A summary of relevant theories or research about the topic
• Definitions of key terms

The information here should be broad but clearly focused and relevant to your argument. Don’t give too much detail—you can mention points that you will return to later, but save your evidence and interpretation for the main body of the essay.

How much space you need for background depends on your topic and the scope of your essay. In our Braille example, we take a few sentences to introduce the topic and sketch the social context that the essay will address:

Now it’s time to narrow your focus and show exactly what you want to say about the topic. This is your thesis statement —a sentence or two that sums up your overall argument.

This is the most important part of your introduction. A  good thesis isn’t just a statement of fact, but a claim that requires evidence and explanation.

The goal is to clearly convey your own position in a debate or your central point about a topic.

Particularly in longer essays, it’s helpful to end the introduction by signposting what will be covered in each part. Keep it concise and give your reader a clear sense of the direction your argument will take.

Prevent plagiarism. Run a free check.

As you research and write, your argument might change focus or direction as you learn more.

For this reason, it’s often a good idea to wait until later in the writing process before you write the introduction paragraph—it can even be the very last thing you write.

When you’ve finished writing the essay body and conclusion , you should return to the introduction and check that it matches the content of the essay.

It’s especially important to make sure your thesis statement accurately represents what you do in the essay. If your argument has gone in a different direction than planned, tweak your thesis statement to match what you actually say.

To polish your writing, you can use something like a paraphrasing tool .

You can use the checklist below to make sure your introduction does everything it’s supposed to.

Checklist: Essay introduction

My first sentence is engaging and relevant.

I have introduced the topic with necessary background information.

I have defined any important terms.

My thesis statement clearly presents my main point or argument.

Everything in the introduction is relevant to the main body of the essay.

You have a strong introduction - now make sure the rest of your essay is just as good.

• Argumentative
• Literary analysis

This introduction to an argumentative essay sets up the debate about the internet and education, and then clearly states the position the essay will argue for.

The spread of the internet has had a world-changing effect, not least on the world of education. The use of the internet in academic contexts is on the rise, and its role in learning is hotly debated. For many teachers who did not grow up with this technology, its effects seem alarming and potentially harmful. This concern, while understandable, is misguided. The negatives of internet use are outweighed by its critical benefits for students and educators—as a uniquely comprehensive and accessible information source; a means of exposure to and engagement with different perspectives; and a highly flexible learning environment.

This introduction to a short expository essay leads into the topic (the invention of the printing press) and states the main point the essay will explain (the effect of this invention on European society).

In many ways, the invention of the printing press marked the end of the Middle Ages. The medieval period in Europe is often remembered as a time of intellectual and political stagnation. Prior to the Renaissance, the average person had very limited access to books and was unlikely to be literate. The invention of the printing press in the 15th century allowed for much less restricted circulation of information in Europe, paving the way for the Reformation.

This introduction to a literary analysis essay , about Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein , starts by describing a simplistic popular view of the story, and then states how the author will give a more complex analysis of the text’s literary devices.

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is often read as a crude cautionary tale. Arguably the first science fiction novel, its plot can be read as a warning about the dangers of scientific advancement unrestrained by ethical considerations. In this reading, and in popular culture representations of the character as a “mad scientist”, Victor Frankenstein represents the callous, arrogant ambition of modern science. However, far from providing a stable image of the character, Shelley uses shifting narrative perspectives to gradually transform our impression of Frankenstein, portraying him in an increasingly negative light as the novel goes on. While he initially appears to be a naive but sympathetic idealist, after the creature’s narrative Frankenstein begins to resemble—even in his own telling—the thoughtlessly cruel figure the creature represents him as.

If you want to know more about AI tools , college essays , or fallacies make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

• Ad hominem fallacy
• Post hoc fallacy
• Appeal to authority fallacy
• False cause fallacy
• Sunk cost fallacy

College essays

• Choosing Essay Topic
• Write a College Essay
• Write a Diversity Essay
• College Essay Format & Structure
• Comparing and Contrasting in an Essay

 (AI) Tools

• Grammar Checker
• Paraphrasing Tool
• Text Summarizer
• AI Detector
• Plagiarism Checker
• Citation Generator

Your essay introduction should include three main things, in this order:

• An opening hook to catch the reader’s attention.
• Relevant background information that the reader needs to know.
• A thesis statement that presents your main point or argument.

The length of each part depends on the length and complexity of your essay .

The “hook” is the first sentence of your essay introduction . It should lead the reader into your essay, giving a sense of why it’s interesting.

To write a good hook, avoid overly broad statements or long, dense sentences. Try to start with something clear, concise and catchy that will spark your reader’s curiosity.

A thesis statement is a sentence that sums up the central point of your paper or essay . Everything else you write should relate to this key idea.

The thesis statement is essential in any academic essay or research paper for two main reasons:

• It gives your writing direction and focus.
• It gives the reader a concise summary of your main point.

Without a clear thesis statement, an essay can end up rambling and unfocused, leaving your reader unsure of exactly what you want to say.

The structure of an essay is divided into an introduction that presents your topic and thesis statement , a body containing your in-depth analysis and arguments, and a conclusion wrapping up your ideas.

The structure of the body is flexible, but you should always spend some time thinking about how you can organize your essay to best serve your ideas.

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation to our free Citation Generator.

McCombes, S. (2023, July 23). How to Write an Essay Introduction | 4 Steps & Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved June 19, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/academic-essay/introduction/

Is this article helpful?

Shona McCombes

Other students also liked, how to write a thesis statement | 4 steps & examples, academic paragraph structure | step-by-step guide & examples, how to conclude an essay | interactive example, "i thought ai proofreading was useless but..".

I've been using Scribbr for years now and I know it's a service that won't disappoint. It does a good job spotting mistakes”

Get science-backed answers as you write with Paperpal's Research feature

How to Write an Essay Introduction (with Examples)   

The introduction of an essay plays a critical role in engaging the reader and providing contextual information about the topic. It sets the stage for the rest of the essay, establishes the tone and style, and motivates the reader to continue reading. 

Table of Contents

What is an essay introduction , what to include in an essay introduction, how to create an essay structure , step-by-step process for writing an essay introduction , how to write an introduction paragraph , how to write a hook for your essay , how to include background information , how to write a thesis statement .

• Argumentative Essay Introduction Example: 
• Expository Essay Introduction Example 

Literary Analysis Essay Introduction Example

Check and revise – checklist for essay introduction , key takeaways , frequently asked questions .

An introduction is the opening section of an essay, paper, or other written work. It introduces the topic and provides background information, context, and an overview of what the reader can expect from the rest of the work. 1 The key is to be concise and to the point, providing enough information to engage the reader without delving into excessive detail. 

The essay introduction is crucial as it sets the tone for the entire piece and provides the reader with a roadmap of what to expect. Here are key elements to include in your essay introduction: 

• Hook : Start with an attention-grabbing statement or question to engage the reader. This could be a surprising fact, a relevant quote, or a compelling anecdote. 
• Background information : Provide context and background information to help the reader understand the topic. This can include historical information, definitions of key terms, or an overview of the current state of affairs related to your topic. 
• Thesis statement : Clearly state your main argument or position on the topic. Your thesis should be concise and specific, providing a clear direction for your essay. 

Before we get into how to write an essay introduction, we need to know how it is structured. The structure of an essay is crucial for organizing your thoughts and presenting them clearly and logically. It is divided as follows: 2  

• Introduction:  The introduction should grab the reader’s attention with a hook, provide context, and include a thesis statement that presents the main argument or purpose of the essay.  
• Body:  The body should consist of focused paragraphs that support your thesis statement using evidence and analysis. Each paragraph should concentrate on a single central idea or argument and provide evidence, examples, or analysis to back it up.  
• Conclusion:  The conclusion should summarize the main points and restate the thesis differently. End with a final statement that leaves a lasting impression on the reader. Avoid new information or arguments. 

Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to write an essay introduction: 

• Start with a Hook : Begin your introduction paragraph with an attention-grabbing statement, question, quote, or anecdote related to your topic. The hook should pique the reader’s interest and encourage them to continue reading. 
• Provide Background Information : This helps the reader understand the relevance and importance of the topic. 
• State Your Thesis Statement : The last sentence is the main argument or point of your essay. It should be clear, concise, and directly address the topic of your essay. 
• Preview the Main Points : This gives the reader an idea of what to expect and how you will support your thesis. 
• Keep it Concise and Clear : Avoid going into too much detail or including information not directly relevant to your topic. 
• Revise : Revise your introduction after you’ve written the rest of your essay to ensure it aligns with your final argument. 

Here’s an example of an essay introduction paragraph about the importance of education: 

Education is often viewed as a fundamental human right and a key social and economic development driver. As Nelson Mandela once famously said, “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” It is the key to unlocking a wide range of opportunities and benefits for individuals, societies, and nations. In today’s constantly evolving world, education has become even more critical. It has expanded beyond traditional classroom learning to include digital and remote learning, making education more accessible and convenient. This essay will delve into the importance of education in empowering individuals to achieve their dreams, improving societies by promoting social justice and equality, and driving economic growth by developing a skilled workforce and promoting innovation. 

This introduction paragraph example includes a hook (the quote by Nelson Mandela), provides some background information on education, and states the thesis statement (the importance of education). 

This is one of the key steps in how to write an essay introduction. Crafting a compelling hook is vital because it sets the tone for your entire essay and determines whether your readers will stay interested. A good hook draws the reader in and sets the stage for the rest of your essay.  

• Avoid Dry Fact : Instead of simply stating a bland fact, try to make it engaging and relevant to your topic. For example, if you’re writing about the benefits of exercise, you could start with a startling statistic like, “Did you know that regular exercise can increase your lifespan by up to seven years?” 
• Avoid Using a Dictionary Definition : While definitions can be informative, they’re not always the most captivating way to start an essay. Instead, try to use a quote, anecdote, or provocative question to pique the reader’s interest. For instance, if you’re writing about freedom, you could begin with a quote from a famous freedom fighter or philosopher. 
• Do Not Just State a Fact That the Reader Already Knows : This ties back to the first point—your hook should surprise or intrigue the reader. For Here’s an introduction paragraph example, if you’re writing about climate change, you could start with a thought-provoking statement like, “Despite overwhelming evidence, many people still refuse to believe in the reality of climate change.” 

Including background information in the introduction section of your essay is important to provide context and establish the relevance of your topic. When writing the background information, you can follow these steps: 

• Start with a General Statement:  Begin with a general statement about the topic and gradually narrow it down to your specific focus. For example, when discussing the impact of social media, you can begin by making a broad statement about social media and its widespread use in today’s society, as follows: “Social media has become an integral part of modern life, with billions of users worldwide.” 
• Define Key Terms : Define any key terms or concepts that may be unfamiliar to your readers but are essential for understanding your argument. 
• Provide Relevant Statistics:  Use statistics or facts to highlight the significance of the issue you’re discussing. For instance, “According to a report by Statista, the number of social media users is expected to reach 4.41 billion by 2025.” 
• Discuss the Evolution:  Mention previous research or studies that have been conducted on the topic, especially those that are relevant to your argument. Mention key milestones or developments that have shaped its current impact. You can also outline some of the major effects of social media. For example, you can briefly describe how social media has evolved, including positives such as increased connectivity and issues like cyberbullying and privacy concerns. 
• Transition to Your Thesis:  Use the background information to lead into your thesis statement, which should clearly state the main argument or purpose of your essay. For example, “Given its pervasive influence, it is crucial to examine the impact of social media on mental health.” 

A thesis statement is a concise summary of the main point or claim of an essay, research paper, or other type of academic writing. It appears near the end of the introduction. Here’s how to write a thesis statement: 

• Identify the topic:  Start by identifying the topic of your essay. For example, if your essay is about the importance of exercise for overall health, your topic is “exercise.” 
• State your position:  Next, state your position or claim about the topic. This is the main argument or point you want to make. For example, if you believe that regular exercise is crucial for maintaining good health, your position could be: “Regular exercise is essential for maintaining good health.” 
• Support your position:  Provide a brief overview of the reasons or evidence that support your position. These will be the main points of your essay. For example, if you’re writing an essay about the importance of exercise, you could mention the physical health benefits, mental health benefits, and the role of exercise in disease prevention. 
• Make it specific:  Ensure your thesis statement clearly states what you will discuss in your essay. For example, instead of saying, “Exercise is good for you,” you could say, “Regular exercise, including cardiovascular and strength training, can improve overall health and reduce the risk of chronic diseases.” 

Examples of essay introduction 

Here are examples of essay introductions for different types of essays: 

Argumentative Essay Introduction Example:  

Topic: Should the voting age be lowered to 16? 

“The question of whether the voting age should be lowered to 16 has sparked nationwide debate. While some argue that 16-year-olds lack the requisite maturity and knowledge to make informed decisions, others argue that doing so would imbue young people with agency and give them a voice in shaping their future.” 

Expository Essay Introduction Example  

Topic: The benefits of regular exercise 

“In today’s fast-paced world, the importance of regular exercise cannot be overstated. From improving physical health to boosting mental well-being, the benefits of exercise are numerous and far-reaching. This essay will examine the various advantages of regular exercise and provide tips on incorporating it into your daily routine.” 

Text: “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee 

“Harper Lee’s novel, ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ is a timeless classic that explores themes of racism, injustice, and morality in the American South. Through the eyes of young Scout Finch, the reader is taken on a journey that challenges societal norms and forces characters to confront their prejudices. This essay will analyze the novel’s use of symbolism, character development, and narrative structure to uncover its deeper meaning and relevance to contemporary society.” 

• Engaging and Relevant First Sentence : The opening sentence captures the reader’s attention and relates directly to the topic. 
• Background Information : Enough background information is introduced to provide context for the thesis statement. 
• Definition of Important Terms : Key terms or concepts that might be unfamiliar to the audience or are central to the argument are defined. 
• Clear Thesis Statement : The thesis statement presents the main point or argument of the essay. 
• Relevance to Main Body : Everything in the introduction directly relates to and sets up the discussion in the main body of the essay. 

Writing a strong introduction is crucial for setting the tone and context of your essay. Here are the key takeaways for how to write essay introduction: 3  

• Hook the Reader : Start with an engaging hook to grab the reader’s attention. This could be a compelling question, a surprising fact, a relevant quote, or an anecdote. 
• Provide Background : Give a brief overview of the topic, setting the context and stage for the discussion. 
• Thesis Statement : State your thesis, which is the main argument or point of your essay. It should be concise, clear, and specific. 
• Preview the Structure : Outline the main points or arguments to help the reader understand the organization of your essay. 
• Keep it Concise : Avoid including unnecessary details or information not directly related to your thesis. 
• Revise and Edit : Revise your introduction to ensure clarity, coherence, and relevance. Check for grammar and spelling errors. 
• Seek Feedback : Get feedback from peers or instructors to improve your introduction further. 

The purpose of an essay introduction is to give an overview of the topic, context, and main ideas of the essay. It is meant to engage the reader, establish the tone for the rest of the essay, and introduce the thesis statement or central argument.  

An essay introduction typically ranges from 5-10% of the total word count. For example, in a 1,000-word essay, the introduction would be roughly 50-100 words. However, the length can vary depending on the complexity of the topic and the overall length of the essay.

An essay introduction is critical in engaging the reader and providing contextual information about the topic. To ensure its effectiveness, consider incorporating these key elements: a compelling hook, background information, a clear thesis statement, an outline of the essay’s scope, a smooth transition to the body, and optional signposting sentences.  

The process of writing an essay introduction is not necessarily straightforward, but there are several strategies that can be employed to achieve this end. When experiencing difficulty initiating the process, consider the following techniques: begin with an anecdote, a quotation, an image, a question, or a startling fact to pique the reader’s interest. It may also be helpful to consider the five W’s of journalism: who, what, when, where, why, and how.   For instance, an anecdotal opening could be structured as follows: “As I ascended the stage, momentarily blinded by the intense lights, I could sense the weight of a hundred eyes upon me, anticipating my next move. The topic of discussion was climate change, a subject I was passionate about, and it was my first public speaking event. Little did I know , that pivotal moment would not only alter my perspective but also chart my life’s course.” 

Crafting a compelling thesis statement for your introduction paragraph is crucial to grab your reader’s attention. To achieve this, avoid using overused phrases such as “In this paper, I will write about” or “I will focus on” as they lack originality. Instead, strive to engage your reader by substantiating your stance or proposition with a “so what” clause. While writing your thesis statement, aim to be precise, succinct, and clear in conveying your main argument.  

To create an effective essay introduction, ensure it is clear, engaging, relevant, and contains a concise thesis statement. It should transition smoothly into the essay and be long enough to cover necessary points but not become overwhelming. Seek feedback from peers or instructors to assess its effectiveness. 

References  

• Cui, L. (2022). Unit 6 Essay Introduction.  Building Academic Writing Skills . 
• West, H., Malcolm, G., Keywood, S., & Hill, J. (2019). Writing a successful essay.  Journal of Geography in Higher Education ,  43 (4), 609-617. 
• Beavers, M. E., Thoune, D. L., & McBeth, M. (2023). Bibliographic Essay: Reading, Researching, Teaching, and Writing with Hooks: A Queer Literacy Sponsorship. College English, 85(3), 230-242. 

Paperpal is a comprehensive AI writing toolkit that helps students and researchers achieve 2x the writing in half the time. It leverages 21+ years of STM experience and insights from millions of research articles to provide in-depth academic writing, language editing, and submission readiness support to help you write better, faster.  

Get accurate academic translations, rewriting support, grammar checks, vocabulary suggestions, and generative AI assistance that delivers human precision at machine speed. Try for free or upgrade to Paperpal Prime starting at US$19 a month to access premium features, including consistency, plagiarism, and 30+ submission readiness checks to help you succeed.  

Experience the future of academic writing – Sign up to Paperpal and start writing for free!  

Related Reads:

• What is an Argumentative Essay? How to Write It (With Examples)
• How to Paraphrase Research Papers Effectively
• How to Cite Social Media Sources in Academic Writing? 
• How Long Should a Chapter Be?

Similarity Checks: The Author’s Guide to Plagiarism and Responsible Writing

Types of plagiarism and 6 tips to avoid it in your writing , you may also like, leveraging generative ai to enhance student understanding of..., how to write a good hook for essays,..., addressing peer review feedback and mastering manuscript revisions..., how paperpal can boost comprehension and foster interdisciplinary..., what is the importance of a concept paper..., how to write the first draft of a..., mla works cited page: format, template & examples, how to ace grant writing for research funding..., powerful academic phrases to improve your essay writing , how to write a high-quality conference paper.

North Johnson City

BAPTIST CHURCH

• Jun 25, 2021

The Apostles' Creed: An Introduction

Updated: Aug 28, 2021

An Early Christian Creed Which is Needed Today!

When beginning any historical journey, it is logical to start at the beginning. For a study of the main creeds, confessions, and catechisms (the 3 C's) of the church, that would mean the Apostles' Creed. While there were undoubtedly earlier creeds in use (as early as the Apostolic age), the Apostles' Creed is the one which gained the widest early acceptance. It was first mentioned, by name, in the writings of Ambrose around 390 A.D. However, there is evidence for it existing much earlier. Individual parts of the Apostles' Creed are to be found in baptismal catechisms as early as around 220 A.D. In fact, a generation earlier, Irenaeus seems to quote from a portion of the creed. It is certainly possible that such quotations are of earlier creeds which were collected into the Apostles' Creed; some evidence seems to point in this direction. Regardless, the truth of the creed was being quoted, taught, written, and transmitted throughout the early centuries of the church.

Why would this surprise us? After all, it was named the Apostles' Creed specifically because it was a short encapsulation of the doctrine handed down by the Apostles. While it is not my purpose to argue again the need for creeds (please refer back to last week's post), it is noteworthy that such creeds arose in the first place. The Scriptures are authoritative, infallible, and sufficient; the emergence of the 3 C's does not contradict that fact. These statements arose in light of the need for a succinct doctrinal statement in an age of emerging heresy. The Apostles' Creed was an important early tool in the fight to preserve orthodoxy. It is an equally important tool for us as well.

What do we, through the Apostles' Creed, confess? We confess the following:

I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended to the dead. On the third day he rose again. He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church*, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.

* This denotes the catholic or world-wide church of believers, not the Roman Catholic Church.

Next week, we will begin our journey through the statements of this creed. As we prepare for that, consider reading this creed daily. Further, consider utilizing Martin Luther's approach of praying through the Apostles' Creed. For more on this approach, consider reading the excellent book, The Barber Who Wanted to Pray , found in our church library. Although it is a children's book, it is a book which can benefit adult believers as well. Regardless of how you prepare for this journey, please do some work of preparation.

When Martin Luther traveled to visit the churches in the late 1520's, he was shocked at how little basic knowledge there was among the church people. This was far enough into the Reformation era that he felt more progress should have been made. His approach to remedy this problem was to emphasize the Lord's Prayer, the Ten Commandments, and the Apostles' Creed. Additionally, Luther wrote two catechisms (a shorter and a longer) which had the same focus. Now, we stand nearly a half-millennium beyond Luther's day and are not significantly better off. What is our road forward? I believe that it is the same one Luther proposed then:

Expository preaching

Emphasis on the marks of the church (Scripture, Baptism, the Lord's Table, and Church Discipline)

Emphasis on the 3 C's (creeds, confessions, and catechisms)

Emphasis on foundational Biblical knowledge (10 Commandments, Lord's Prayer, etc.)

Focus on the Gospel

We would do well to move forward in light of how God has reformed His church in the past!

Join us next week as we look at what this creed declares about our heavenly Father

• The Apostles' Creed
• Creed, Confessions, and Catechisms

Recent Posts

The Bride of Christ

"I Believe in the Holy Spirit"

He Will Come Again!

• What is the Gospel?
• Gospel Fluency
• Basics of Systematic Theology
• Worldview Basics
• World Religion Basics
• God’s Big Picture: Tracing the Storyline of the Bible
• Seven Arrows: The Basics of Bible Study
• Bible Basics
• Old Testament Basics
• New Testament Basics
• Mining God’s Word
• Sharing My Faith
• Making Disciples
• Living Joyfully
• Maintaining Purity
• Practicing My Faith In My Workplace
• Keeping a Spiritual Journal
• Watch Your Life
• Ancient Greece and Rome
• Before Nicea
• After Nicea

The Apostles’ Creed

• Early Christianity and the New Testament Canon with Andreas Köstenberger & Michael Kruger
• History of the Middle Ages
• The Medieval Church with Carl Trueman
• Scholastics & Doctors of the Middle Ages
• The Theological Method of Thomas Aquinas: A Critique
• Pre-Reformation History
• The Lutheran Reformation with Carl Trueman
• Reformation in England
• Reformation in Germany
• Swiss, French, Dutch, and American Reformation
• The Westminster Standards
• The Five Solas
• 17th-18th Century Church History
• Whitefield, Wesley, and the Puritans
• Early American Church History
• 19th–20th Century Church History
• Theologians on the Christian Life
• Martin Luther
• John Calvin
• Blaise Pascal
• Jonathan Edwards
• C. H. Spurgeon
• C. S. Lewis
• The God Who Is There with Don Carson
• KINGDOM: The Story of Scripture with Jason S. DeRouchie
• Biblical Theology (Beginner)
• Biblical Theology (Intermediate)
• Biblical Theology (Advanced)
• Kingdom, Covenants & Canon of the Old Testament
• Introduction to the Pentateuch
• The Pentateuch
• The Life of Abraham
• Introduction to Biblical Poetry and Wisdom Literature
• Biblical Prophecy
• New Testament Biblical Theology with G. K. Beale
• The Origins of the New Testament Canon with Michael Kruger
• New Testament for Ministry
• Introduction to the Gospels (Beginner)
• Introduction to the Gospels (Intermediate)
• Evidence for the Reliability of the Gospels with Tyndale House
• The First Days of Jesus
• Parables and Miracles with Vern Poythress
• Life of Christ with Craig L. Blomberg
• Life & Teachings of Christ with Dan Doriani
• The Final Days of Jesus
• The Heart of Paul’s Theology
• Paul’s Prison Epistles
• Asking the Right Questions
• Foundations of Biblical Interpretation (Beginner)
• Invitation to Biblical Interpretation (Intermediate) with Andreas Köstenberger
• Arcing Scripture
• The Literary Art of Genesis
• Learn Hebrew Quickly
• Daily Dose Hebrew and Greek Courses
• Deuteronomy
• 1 and 2 Samuel
• 1 and 2 Kings
• 1 and 2 Chronicles
• Ecclesiastes
• Song of Solomon
• Lamentations
• 1 Corinthians
• 2 Corinthians
• Philippians
• 1 Thessalonians
• 2 Thessalonians
• Doctrine of the Church
• Questions: The Church
• Unreached Peoples and Places with David Platt
• Advancing the Gospel Deep and Wide
• The Motive for Church Planting
• Gospel-Rich Church Planting
• The Ordinances of the Church a Baptist perspective
• Questions: Baptism & The Lord’s Supper
• Basics of Church Eldership
• The Pastor as Shepherd
• Restoring Biblical Eldership
• Small Church Ministry
• Developing Leaders
• Discipleship and Family Ministry
• Becoming a Pastor-Theologian
• Educational Foundations
• Church Administration
• Women’s Ministry
• Youth Ministry
• A Theology of Corporate Worship
• Christian Worship
• Worship Matters with Bob Kauflin
• Leading Worship: Ecclesiology and Contextualization
• Basics of Preaching
• Christ-Centered Preaching with Bryan Chapell
• Fundamentals of Expository Preaching with John MacArthur & Steven Lawson
• Mechanics of Expository Preaching
• Basics of Biblical Counseling
• Marriage & Family Counseling
• Theology of Urban Mission
• Urban Evangelism
• Inner-City Ministry
• Basics of Systematic Theology with Scott Swain
• Building Your Theology
• Building Systematic Theology
• Theological Foundations: Scripture, God, Sin, Christ, & Salvation
• The Authority of Scripture with E. J. Young
• We Believe in God
• The Doctrine of the Trinity
• The Attributes of God
• Questions: The Person and Character of God
• Questions: My Relationship To God
• We Believe in Jesus
• The Doctrine of Christ with Stephen Wellum
• The “I AM” Statements of Jesus
• Questions: The Person And Character Of Jesus
• Questions: My Relationship to Jesus
• We Believe in the Holy Spirit
• The Doctrine of the Holy Spirit with Gregg Allison
• The Work of the Spirit
• Justification by Faith: A Biblical Theological Perspective with Don Carson
• TULIP: The Five Points of Calvinism
• The Doctrine of Perseverance
• The Doctrine of Glorification
• Soteriological Debates
• Questions: God’s Work In Salvation
• Questions: The Lost & Salvation
• What Is Man?
• The Doctrine of End Times with Gregg Allison
• Your Kingdom Come
• The Nature of God
• The Fall of Man
• Christ & His Work
• The Ten Commandments
• The Lord’s Supper & Baptism
• Christ & His Return
• How to Keep a Spiritual Journal
• Christian Hedonism
• Joy: Theology & Practice
• Suffering & Persecution
• Questions: Pain & Suffering
• Sexuality, Friendships, Dating, & Gender
• Sexual Purity
• Parenting: Equipping for Life with Andreas & Margaret Köstenberger
• Questions: Children & Parenting
• An Introduction to Faith and Work
• Mission at Work
• Theology of Faith and Work
• Business Ethics
• Business Leadership
• Career Planning and Discernment
• For the Life of the World
• Ethics and the Medical Profession
• The Vocation of an Artist
• The Things of Earth
• Creativity: God’s Imagination & Ours
• Faith in the Workplace
• Evangelism in a Skeptical World
• Covenantal Apologetics
• The History and Nature of Apologetics
• Moral Truth and the Problem of Evil
• The Apologetics of Blaise Pascal
• Derrida, Foucault, and the Bible
• Ethics: Making Biblical Decisions
• Faith and Science
• Strangers in America: How Faith Guides Our Politics (Beginner) with Bruce Ashford
• The Beginning of Life & Abortion
• Ethical Issues of Pregnancy and Infertility
• End of Life Issues
• Marriage, Gender, and Sexuality
• Racial Unity
• Marriage, Divorce, & Remarriage
• Christian Guides to the Classics: Augustine’s Confessions with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: The Death of Ivan Ilych with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: The Devotional Poetry Of Donne, Herbert, And Milton with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: Great Expectations with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: Shakespeare’s Hamlet with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: The Odyssey with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: Paradise Lost with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: Pilgrim’s Progress with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: The Scarlet Letter with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: Shakespeare’s Macbeth with Leland Ryken
• Christian Guides to the Classics: The Stranger with Leland Ryken
• Christian Foundations
• Church History
• Biblical Studies
• Old Testament
• New Testament
• Pastoral Theology
• Bible Doctrines
• Practical Theology
• Public Theology

Discover the Gospel & Christianity

Explore the bible, navigate the christian life, early christianity (until a.d. 590).

• Early Christianity and the New Testament Canon with Andreas Köstenberger & Michael Kruger

The Middle Ages (A.D. 590–1517)

• Scholastics & Doctors of the Middle Ages

Protestant Reformation (A.D. 1517–1700)

Post-reformation (a.d. 1700–present), historical figures, whole-bible studies, old testament studies.

• Kingdom, Covenants & Canon of the Old Testament

New Testament Studies

Gospels & life of christ.

• Life & Teachings of Christ with Dan Doriani

Pauline Epistles

Hermeneutics, original languages, ecclesiology, church planting & missiology.

• Questions: Baptism & The Lord's Supper

Ministry Practice

• Women's Ministry

Corporate Worship

• Fundamentals of Expository Preaching with John MacArthur & Steven Lawson
• Marriage & Family Counseling

Urban Ministry

• Theological Foundations: Scripture, God, Sin, Christ, & Salvation
• The "I AM" Statements of Jesus

The Holy Spirit

• Questions: God's Work In Salvation
• Questions: The Lost & Salvation

Creeds and Confessions

Theology for children by songs for saplings.

• Christ & His Work
• The Lord's Supper & Baptism
• Christ & His Return

Christian Growth

• Joy: Theology & Practice
• Suffering & Persecution
• Questions: Pain & Suffering

Relationships, Sexuality, & Parenting

• Sexuality, Friendships, Dating, & Gender
• Parenting: Equipping for Life with Andreas & Margaret Köstenberger
• Questions: Children & Parenting

Faith and Work

• Creativity: God's Imagination & Ours

Evangelism, Apologetics, Philosophy, & Ethics

Current issues.

• The Beginning of Life & Abortion
• Marriage, Divorce, & Remarriage

Literary Criticism

• Featured Essay The Love of God An essay by Sam Storms Read Now
• Faithfulness of God
• Saving Grace
• Adoption by God

Most Popular

• Gender Identity
• Trusting God
• The Holiness of God
• See All Essays

• Best Commentaries
• Featured Essay Resurrection of Jesus An essay by Benjamin Shaw Read Now
• Death of Christ
• Resurrection of Jesus
• Church and State
• Sovereignty of God
• Faith and Works
• The Carson Center
• The Keller Center
• New City Catechism
• Publications
• Read the Bible
• TGC Pastors

U.S. Edition

• Arts & Culture
• Bible & Theology
• Christian Living
• Current Events
• Faith & Work
• As In Heaven
• Gospelbound
• Post-Christianity?
• The Carson Center Podcast
• TGC Podcast
• You're Not Crazy
• Churches Planting Churches
• Help Me Teach The Bible
• Word Of The Week
• Upcoming Events
• Past Conference Media
• Foundation Documents
• Regional Chapters
• Church Directory
• Global Resourcing
• Donate to TGC

To All The World

The world is a confusing place right now. We believe that faithful proclamation of the gospel is what our hostile and disoriented world needs. Do you believe that too? Help TGC bring biblical wisdom to the confusing issues across the world by making a gift to our international work.

Course Introduction

The articles of faith, god the father, jesus christ.

The History, Use, Details, and Significance of the Apostles' Creed

There are many denominations, divisions and theological disputes in the modern church. But despite these types of disunity, there is a common core of belief that all faithful Christians have affirmed throughout history. And for almost two millennia, this core of belief has been summarized in the Apostles’ Creed. This series explains the history and use of the Apostles’ Creed, as well as the details and significance of each of its articles of faith.

Course Goals:

• Introduce viewers to the history and value of the Apostles’ Creed.
• Explain each of the doctrines listed in the Apostles’ Creed.
• Demonstrate the relevance of these doctrines to the modern church.

The mission of Third Millennium Ministries is to prepare Christian leaders to lead a transformation of the world into God’s Kingdom by providing biblical education, for the world, for free.

Their top priority is to spread the will of God to every corner of the earth through the gospel of Christ. So, Third Millennium Ministries is preparing an in-depth biblical education for Christian leaders around the world in their languages, for their lands, and absolutely free.

This mission is being fulfilled at this very moment using various mediums for distributing learning content: DVD, online streaming, radio, satellite, TV broadcast, smartphone apps, USB flash drives, and SD cards.

To learn more about Third Millennium Ministries, click here.

This lesson looks at the Apostles’ Creed as a summary of the articles or doctrines that must be affirmed by all those who would call themselves “Christian.” It speaks of the history of the Creed, provides an overview of its statements, and focuses on the importance of its doctrines for today.

• Download the Study Guide
• Read the Lecture Transcript
• Download Lecture Audio

A companion video to lesson 1 of the same series that asks the following questions:

• Why should we pay attention to a document like the Apostles’ Creed?
• Doesn’t a focus on creeds somehow challenge our commitment to Scripture as our only absolute standard of truth?
• Why was only one creed called the Apostles’ Creed?
• Why was it important for the early church to summarize the teachings of the New Testament in a simple document like the 
Apostles’ Creed?
• Why did the early church think it was valuable to provide a
systematic way of thinking about doctrine?
• Why should modern Christians use an ancient creed instead of writing their own?
• Why does the creed place such a strong emphasis on the doctrine of God? What’s so critical about this doctrine?
• Does our doctrine of God really affect how we live? What practical differences do our beliefs about God actually make in our lives?
• Where does the Bible teach the doctrine of the Trinity?
• Why did the early church concentrate so much attention on the doctrine of the Trinity?
• What are the logical relationships among the various systematic teachings of the creed? How do they all fit together?
• Why does the creed only mention personal salvation after going through so many other biblical teachings?
• How does the Apostles’ Creed demonstrate that early Christians believed in the theological unity of the Scriptures?
• How can Christians work toward the kind of doctrinal purity we find in the Apostles’ Creed without sacrificing its level of doctrinal unity?

This lesson addresses the basic idea of God, looking at some general things the Bible teaches about his existence and nature. It focuses on the phrase “Father Almighty,” paying attention to some distinctive qualities of the first person of the Trinity. And it explores the Father’s role as the Maker, or creator, of everything that exists.

A companion video to lesson 2 of the same series that asks the following questions:

• Can Scripture teach us reliable truths about God, or is its human language insufficient for this task?
• Do our beliefs about God have any practical relevance for followers of Christ?
• Do all people have some beliefs about God that are so important that they influence nearly everything else they believe?
• Why are human beings prone to turn away from God?
• Do people of other religions actually worship the same God that Christians worship?
• What are some of the common ways the doctrine of the Trinity has been misunderstood?
• Does the Father’s authority mean that he forces his will on the Son and the Holy Spirit?
• In what ways is God similar to and different from our earthly, human fathers?
• What are some practical applications that human fathers can draw from God’s fatherhood?
• How can we encourage Christians that have had poor fathers to view God’s fatherhood in a positive light?
• What kinds of implications does God’s fatherhood have for pastoral ministry?
• How can we be sure that God’s purposes for us will actually be fulfilled?
• How can an unchangeable God change his mind?
• What is the ultimate goal of humanity’s redemption?
• What are the main Evangelical interpretations of the days of creation in Genesis chapter 1?
• How can people with the same basic commitments to the authority and infallibility of Scripture read Genesis chapter 1 in such different ways?
• What practical implications can we draw from the fact that the creation reflects God’s goodness?
• How should Christians feel about the fact that God has ultimate authority over everything?

Survey ten of God's attributes in this course curated by Dr. Fred Zaspel.

Explore the distinctive and central doctrine of the Christian faith in this course curated by Dr. Fred Zaspel.

This lesson speaks of the divinity of Jesus Christ, looking at things like the nature of his divinity, and his relationship to the other members of the Trinity. It looks at his humanity, and discusses the relationship between his divine and human natures. And it talks about his work both during and after his earthly ministry.

A companion video to lesson 3 of the same series that asks the following questions:

• How important is the doctrine of Christ’s divinity?
• Is Jesus’ sonship different from ours as children of God?
• How can Jesus be God and still subject to the Father’s authority?
• Why should we think that the New Testament Greek word  kurios  refers to anything more than earthly human authority and honor, even when it is applied to Jesus?
• Does Jesus’ miraculous conception make him less human?
• What did the Old Testament say about who the Messiah would be?
• According to the Old Testament, what was the Messiah expected to do?
• How can God be both free in his sovereignty and bound by his covenants?
• How is Jesus’ role as Christ similar to Adam’s role as the first human being?
• How could Jesus be both fully human and fully divine?
• How did the incarnation make the Son of God a more effective high priest?
• How did Christ’s death atone for sin?
• What is the relationship between Jesus’ atonement and the Old Testament sacrifices?
• Why is the resurrection of Jesus an indispensable part of the gospel message?
• What work is Jesus doing in heaven right now?
• How important is the doctrine of the last judgment?

This lesson talks about the Holy Spirit’s divinity, his full membership in the Godhead. It considers his personhood, noting that the Holy Spirit is a true person and not simply a divine force. And it explores the work that the Holy Spirit did in the past, and that he continues to do today.

A companion video to lesson 4 of the same series that asks the following questions:

• Has the church always affirmed that the Holy Spirit is an equal member of the Trinity?
• Does Scripture demonstrate that the Holy Spirit is fully God?
• What are some aspects of the Holy Spirit’s divine work that are most beneficial to believers?
• Do Christians benefit from the fact that the Holy Spirit is a person?
• What are some personal and pastoral implications of the Holy Spirit’s indwelling?
• What are we supposed to do with our spiritual gifts?
• Do unbelievers benefit from being involved in the life of the church?
• What kinds of truth does the Holy Spirit reveal through general revelation?
• How does illumination affect our understanding of God’s revelation?
• What role does inward leading play in a Christian’s life?
• How can we verify the illumination and inward leading we think we’ve received?
• How should we respond to the Holy Spirit in our worship and prayers?

Explore how the Holy Spirit seeks to glorify Jesus Christ by graciously providing power for life and ministry in this 7-part course provided in partnership with Bethlehem College & Seminary.

This lesson looks at the divine sanction of the church, and at the facts that the church is holy, catholic or universal, and a communion.

A companion video to lesson 5 of the same series that asks the following questions:

• What is the church?
• Why is it helpful to consider the church’s Old Testament background?
• How similar were God’s purposes for the Old Testament church and the New Testament church?
• How is the Old Testament church’s relationship to Christ similar to the New Testament church’s relationship to Christ?
• Why do Christians need the church?
• What is God’s holiness?
• What does the church’s identity as a kingdom of priests and a holy nation imply about its modern obligations?
• What is the proper role of ordained ministers in the church?
• How can pastors adapt their teaching to audiences that include unbelievers?
• What are some responsible applications we can draw from our beliefs about the visible and invisible church?
• How should the church treat the unbelieving world?
• When should our charitable giving remain with those in the church, and when should it go to people outside the church?
• What are some practical ways that churches can carry out the Great Commission?
• Can a well-meaning person be saved without coming to faith in Christ?
• What does the Bible say should be our attitude toward the suffering and persecution we endure?
• What does it mean to be “in Christ”?
• What are some of the benefits of union with Christ?
• Should each means of grace be administered every time the church gathers for worship?
• How can we promote unity and reconciliation between believers?

In this course curated around a lecture series including Tim Keller and others, the meaning, marks, descriptions, activities, ministry roles, and realities of the church are explained.

This discussion of salvation addresses the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the nature of everlasting life.

A companion video to lesson 6 of the same series that asks the following questions:

• Why do fallen human beings need a Savior?
• Why did Adam’s fall into sin have such terrible consequences for humanity and creation?
• What problem has sin created in our relationship with God?
• Why is Jesus the only one that can save us?
• Is Jesus the loving God who saves us from the Father’s wrath?
• Were people saved the same way in both the Old Testament and the New Testament?
• What benefits do we receive as a result of God’s forgiveness?
• If we can be forgiven just because we ask, does that cheapen grace?
• Are there any benefits to modern Christians if we regularly repent of and confess our sins?
• What will our glorified bodies be like?
• When our souls are in heaven and our bodies are in the grave, are we in two places at the same time?
• Did the Old Testament saints believe in a future resurrection?
• What is eternal life?
• When does eternal life begin?
• What’s the difference between everlasting life and eternal existence?
• What kinds of blessings do we receive as a result of Jesus’ resurrection?
• What might our life in heaven be like?
• What will the new heavens and new earth be like?
• How should we respond to God’s gift of salvation?

Discover the meaning and aspects of the Good News of Jesus in this course curated by The Gospel Coalition.

The course with addresses from Bethlehem College & Seminary explores the doctrine of perseverance and its practical significance for every Christian.

• What Is the Apostles' Creed?

The Apostles’ Creed

I believe in God, the Father Almighty, the Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord: Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; (He descended into hell.) 1 On the third day He rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father; from which he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit; the holy catholic church; 2 the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins; the resurrection of the body; and the life everlasting.

1 This clause does not appear in the earliest mss. of the creed but has become part of the traditional formulation.

2 This clause does not refer to the Roman Catholic Church, but rather the universal church as a whole.

As the earliest extra-biblical Christian confessional document, the Apostles’ Creed has stood the test of time as the preeminent testament to creedal orthodoxy. The creed, attributed to the earliest missionary followers of Jesus, distills the basic outline of what it means to be a Christian into a short summation that belies the depth and richness of what it proclaims.

The Apostles' Creed: Table of Contents

• Meaning of 'God' in the Creed
• Meaning of 'Jesus' in the Creed
• Incarnation in the Creed
• Music Video

What Is the Apostles’ Creed?

1. Doxological Confession

It’s possible that we have become so familiar with the creed that we’ve become blind to some of its unique qualities. The creed is not merely a catalog of doctrines but is phrased as a confession. “We believe,” it urges us to say. Sincere recitation of the creed requires faith in the God who has accomplished these great things and belief that these great things were accomplished.

In this way, the Apostles’ Creed is not just theology, but doxology, and as it is so often included in the liturgy of Christian worship services, it is meant to be recited together, as a body of believers, as an act of worship.

The creed is a confession in the truest sense of the word: Christians confess with the creed that these are things they must believe to be saved.

2. Proclamation of the Gospel

The creed is a narrative and tells the gospel story!

• Beginning with the one true God—who is self-sufficient and needful of nothing—creating the universe.  
• It then goes on to detail the incarnation of God in flesh, giving us the historical detail of Christ’s birth and life and death.  
• Then it moves on to the next plot point in the grand tale of redemption: the resurrection; then the ascension.  
• And this is why the Holy Spirit, who is the third person of the triune Godhead, doesn’t appear until the latter portion of the creed. Confession of the Spirit coincides narratively with the sending of the Spirit at Pentecost after the ascension of Christ. The Spirit empowers the gospel of Christ then to build the church, unite the saints in their spirits, and save the lost.  
• Finally, the creed ends with the new beginning when the dead in Christ are raised incorruptible and the Lord’s return ushers in the eternal joy of the new heavens and the new earth. This is what “the life everlasting” corresponds to – Jesus’ renewing all things, not simply our receiving a ticket to heaven when we die.

When we read the creed in this way, then—as doxological confession and as a proclamation of the gospel storyline of the Scriptures—we help ourselves see the powerful depth and beauty in the old familiar lines.

Apostles’ Creed Origin

The Apostles’ Creed is not the invention of theologians, just as it was not the invention of the apostles. It was formulated by them, of course, but it came from what really happened in history and what really happened in their hearts and lives as a result of what really happened in history.

At our best, apart from God’s intervention, we would not have created a philosophy that confessed God’s supremacy and glory. Our creed would have asserted (not confessed) the accomplishments of ourselves. It would include the phrases “We think” and “We feel.” But the gospel at the center of the Apostles’ Creed is the shaper of the lives who confess it. It “makes” the confession “We believe.”

The Apostles’ Creed Meaning: God

“I believe,” the Creed says, not in some gods (as if multiple deities exist) or in a god (as if God is some vague, unknowable higher power we hope exists). “I believe,” it says, “in God.” The way the confession is phrased asserts exclusivity and identity. This God is the one true God.

We are not “the maker of heaven and earth.” God is. Heaven and earth didn’t just appear in a magical moment of self-actualization; they didn’t just always exist; they didn’t just develop by happenstances. They were made by God. That’s (part of) what makes him God – he’s the maker of everything.

God is a Person, but he’s not a mortal or created person. God is spirit, so he is a perfect, eternal, spiritual Person. He is personal; he has a personality. God is not a “life force” or some impersonal mystical vibe floating around outer space. He thinks things and says things. He relates to his creation. He takes joy, he is jealous, he is love, he is just, he has anger and wrath, he has grace and mercy.

The creed gives us tremendous insight into the personal way our God relates to us. We believe in God, the Father . When Jesus began teaching his disciples how to relate to God, he referred to God with the word “abba,” or “father.” More literally, “abba” is like our words “dad” or “daddy.” The concept of God as Father wasn’t new to the people of Jesus’ day, but it certainly wasn’t the dominant way people referred to God. But Jesus came to show us what the one true God is like: a loving father to dependent children.

God as Father shows us that his God-ness consists of paternal love, mercy, and patience. But the Creed reminds us that this God while being Father, is still God. He is “the Father Almighty .”

Biblical Attributes of God

1. Omnipotence. God is all-powerful. God is eternal, and there is nothing impossible for him. ( Jeremiah 32:17 )

2. Omnipresence . God is all-present. Because God is sovereign and spirit, he literally sees everything at once and is everywhere at once. ( Jeremiah 23:23 , 1 Kings 1:27 , and Psalm 139:1 )

3. Omniscience. Because God is all-powerful and all-present, he is all-knowing. ( Psalm 147:5 , Proverbs 15:3 , and Hebrews 4:13 )

4. Sovereignty. God is truly all-mighty, and therefore he is in control. God cannot be thwarted precisely because he is God. ( Proverbs 16:9 , Exodus 4:11 , Psalm 115:3 )

5. Holiness . God is utterly perfect, utterly “other,” and utterly just. ( Revelation 4:8 )

The Apostles’ Creed Meaning: Jesus Christ

“…and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord”

The Bible speaks of Jesus as “son” in two primary ways: Son of Man and Son of God. Both are important titles that are alike in some ways but also unique.

• The title “Son of Man” traditionally carries apocalyptic significance. It is a messianic title, and it typically conveys a sense of divine royalty and messianic fulfillment. When the Bible prophesies about the coming Son of Man, foretelling the arrival of Christ, it refers to the climactic appearing of the divine king ordained by God to set his people free and set all to rights. “Son of Man” does not inherently mean that the bearer of the title is God. But the other main way the Bible speaks of Jesus’ sonship in fact does.  
• The title of “Son of God” speaks not just to Jesus' special relationship to the Father but to his unique nature shared with the Father. Another ancient document of the orthodox faith, the Nicene Creed explains: “…the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.”

In one sense, of course, all believers are sons and daughters of God. But not in the same essential sense that Jesus is God’s Son. In fact, John 1:12 tells us that it is only through Jesus’ Sonship (which John 1 and other texts teach us is eternal) that we receive the right to become children of God ourselves.

7 Keys to Understanding the True Value of Biblical Piety Today

When the Bible (as in 1 Corinthians 1:9 ) and the Apostles’ Creed refer to Jesus as Son, they are confessing his deity. ( John 5:18 , John 10:30 , John 10:33 )

The word Christ (which means “anointed one”) is a reference to Jesus’ kingship. Like the designation “Son of Man,” the title “the Christ” refers to Jesus’ role as the messiah of Israel.

Calling Jesus “the Christ” bestows on him the fulfillment of the Jewish expectation of the coming King, the one sent by God to finally set all to rights, restore the kingdom, and usher in the age of shalom.

But biblically speaking, Jesus’ kingship is not on par with the kings who came before. And while the Jews did not expect that the messiah would be God — a common anachronistic mistake of contemporary Christians — the truth revealed in the new covenant is lurking in the shadows of the old covenant, nonetheless. Throughout the prophets, God promises to be Israel’s king himself. See Isaiah 43:15 , Isaiah 44:6 , and Isaiah 9:6 for example.

The New Testament connects Jesus’ kingship with his deity as well. Paul in Romans 9:5 tells us that Christ is God over all. In Hebrews 1:8 we read, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,” and this is said to the Son.

Jesus’ Lordship is an affirmation of his sovereignty, and an affirmation of sovereignty — especially the kind of total sovereignty ascribed in Hebrews 1:3 , Colossians 1:15 , and Revelation 5:13 — is an affirmation of deity.

When the Scriptures say Jesus is Lord, they are not just saying he is in charge but that he is in charge as God is in charge because in fact, he is God (e.g. Hebrews 1:3 “the radiance of his glory and the exact imprint of his nature”). Throughout the Gospels, in fact, references to Jesus as “Lord” include employments of the Old Testament use of the divine name LORD (Yahweh), equating the Great I AM with the incarnate Word.

Faithful Trinitarianism is integral to orthodox Christianity, and the Apostles’ Creed helps us in this regard. They are each distinctly but totally and eternally and simultaneously the one God.

In this way, the Creed is a faithful guide to saving belief. If we would believe in Christ for salvation, we must make sure it is the real Christ we believe in.

The Apostles’ Creed and the Incarnation 

“…Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,

born of the virgin Mary…”

This short phrase encapsulates the doctrine we call “the Incarnation,” which means Jesus Christ was both fully God and fully man. The second person of the Triune Godhead, the eternally begotten Son, inhabited flesh. He was God incarnate.

The Apostles’ Creed doesn’t attempt to explain the logic of this mind-boggling truth, but simply affirms it by reminding us that Jesus had no earthly biological father. The Virgin Mary’s pregnancy was accomplished through the power of the Holy Spirit, the promise of which was chronicled in Luke 1:35 .

The Jesus was a historical man is beyond (nearly) all doubt. His existence is attested to by ancient historians both religious and secular. Jesus’ humanity is not typically the objection people have to the claims of Christian theology. It is not his birth to a young woman named Mary that so many reject. No, instead, it is Jesus’ divinity that raises the eyebrows and prompts the challenges. But the Scriptures reference the deity of Christ in numerous places ( Philippians 2:6 , Colossians 1:15 , 1 John 1:20 , 2 Peter 2:1 , Acts 20:28 , and John 10:30-33 ).

Jesus was born of a virgin, the creed maintains. Many skeptics today will counter that “virgin” in the biblical and historical sense may refer simply to a young girl of marry-able age. This is no doubt true. But this is not the sense with which the biblical authors understood “virgin” to mean. Even if Isaiah could not have foreseen the full import of his own Spirit-breathed prophecy ( Isaiah 7:14 ), Matthew’s Gospel gives us the fullness of meaning: “[Joseph] knew her not until she had given birth to a son.”

The biblical evidence for Jesus’ deity is abundant. That many Jews in the first century began to worship him as God ought to give us even more indication that the evidence of his divinity was felt to be quite strong, even overwhelming. But that has not stopped challenges throughout the centuries.

Nevertheless, orthodox Christianity will always stand on Peter’s hell-conquering confession that Jesus is “the Christ, the Son of the living God” ( Matthew 16:16 ).

We will stand on this confession because we know that it is integral to Christ’s gospel. To deny that Jesus was either fully God or fully man is to deny the salvation that Jesus the God-Man has purchased. The Incarnation is crucial to the good news of forgiveness of sins and the gift of eternal life. The reality is this: only man should pay the price for the sins of mankind, but only God could pay the price for the sins of mankind. Thus, in Jesus Christ, the “man should” and the “God could” unite in perfect payment and pure pardon.

The Apostles' Creed Music Video

Jared C. Wilson  is the author of  Your Jesus Is Too Safe ,  Abide ,  Gospel Wakefulness , and  Seven Daily Sins  as well as articles and essays appearing in numerous publications. He is the pastor of Middletown Church in Middletown Springs, Vermont, where he lives with his wife and two daughters. Visit him online at www.gospeldrivenchurch.com . 

Article Image: Mosaic of Last supper by Giacomo Raffaelli

4 Key Insights into God's Plan for Your Life

Unraveling the Bible’s Definition of a Lie

A 9-Step Guide on How to Be Wise

Morning Prayers to Start Your Day with God

The Best Birthday Prayers to Celebrate Friends and Family 

What are the 10 Commandments? List, Origin, and Bible Meaning

35 Prayers for Healing the Sick and Hurting

What does God want to carry onto completion in your life? What is your perspective on this area of your life?

Bible Baseball

Play now...

Saintly Millionaire

Bible Jeopardy

Bible Trivia By Category

Bible Trivia Challenge

• Search Menu

Sign in through your institution

• Browse content in Arts and Humanities
• Browse content in Archaeology
• Anglo-Saxon and Medieval Archaeology
• Archaeological Methodology and Techniques
• Archaeology by Region
• Archaeology of Religion
• Archaeology of Trade and Exchange
• Biblical Archaeology
• Contemporary and Public Archaeology
• Environmental Archaeology
• Historical Archaeology
• History and Theory of Archaeology
• Industrial Archaeology
• Landscape Archaeology
• Mortuary Archaeology
• Prehistoric Archaeology
• Underwater Archaeology
• Urban Archaeology
• Zooarchaeology
• Browse content in Architecture
• Architectural Structure and Design
• History of Architecture
• Residential and Domestic Buildings
• Theory of Architecture
• Browse content in Art
• Art Subjects and Themes
• History of Art
• Industrial and Commercial Art
• Theory of Art
• Biographical Studies
• Byzantine Studies
• Browse content in Classical Studies
• Classical History
• Classical Philosophy
• Classical Mythology
• Classical Literature
• Classical Reception
• Classical Art and Architecture
• Classical Oratory and Rhetoric
• Greek and Roman Papyrology
• Greek and Roman Epigraphy
• Greek and Roman Law
• Greek and Roman Archaeology
• Late Antiquity
• Religion in the Ancient World
• Digital Humanities
• Browse content in History
• Colonialism and Imperialism
• Diplomatic History
• Environmental History
• Genealogy, Heraldry, Names, and Honours
• Genocide and Ethnic Cleansing
• Historical Geography
• History by Period
• History of Emotions
• History of Agriculture
• History of Education
• History of Gender and Sexuality
• Industrial History
• Intellectual History
• International History
• Labour History
• Legal and Constitutional History
• Local and Family History
• Maritime History
• Military History
• National Liberation and Post-Colonialism
• Oral History
• Political History
• Public History
• Regional and National History
• Revolutions and Rebellions
• Slavery and Abolition of Slavery
• Social and Cultural History
• Theory, Methods, and Historiography
• Urban History
• World History
• Browse content in Language Teaching and Learning
• Language Learning (Specific Skills)
• Language Teaching Theory and Methods
• Browse content in Linguistics
• Applied Linguistics
• Cognitive Linguistics
• Computational Linguistics
• Forensic Linguistics
• Grammar, Syntax and Morphology
• Historical and Diachronic Linguistics
• History of English
• Language Evolution
• Language Reference
• Language Acquisition
• Language Variation
• Language Families
• Lexicography
• Linguistic Anthropology
• Linguistic Theories
• Linguistic Typology
• Phonetics and Phonology
• Psycholinguistics
• Sociolinguistics
• Translation and Interpretation
• Writing Systems
• Browse content in Literature
• Bibliography
• Children's Literature Studies
• Literary Studies (Romanticism)
• Literary Studies (American)
• Literary Studies (Asian)
• Literary Studies (European)
• Literary Studies (Eco-criticism)
• Literary Studies (Modernism)
• Literary Studies - World
• Literary Studies (1500 to 1800)
• Literary Studies (19th Century)
• Literary Studies (20th Century onwards)
• Literary Studies (African American Literature)
• Literary Studies (British and Irish)
• Literary Studies (Early and Medieval)
• Literary Studies (Fiction, Novelists, and Prose Writers)
• Literary Studies (Gender Studies)
• Literary Studies (Graphic Novels)
• Literary Studies (History of the Book)
• Literary Studies (Plays and Playwrights)
• Literary Studies (Poetry and Poets)
• Literary Studies (Postcolonial Literature)
• Literary Studies (Queer Studies)
• Literary Studies (Science Fiction)
• Literary Studies (Travel Literature)
• Literary Studies (War Literature)
• Literary Studies (Women's Writing)
• Literary Theory and Cultural Studies
• Mythology and Folklore
• Shakespeare Studies and Criticism
• Browse content in Media Studies
• Browse content in Music
• Applied Music
• Dance and Music
• Ethics in Music
• Ethnomusicology
• Gender and Sexuality in Music
• Medicine and Music
• Music Cultures
• Music and Media
• Music and Religion
• Music and Culture
• Music Education and Pedagogy
• Music Theory and Analysis
• Musical Scores, Lyrics, and Libretti
• Musical Structures, Styles, and Techniques
• Musicology and Music History
• Performance Practice and Studies
• Race and Ethnicity in Music
• Sound Studies
• Browse content in Performing Arts
• Browse content in Philosophy
• Aesthetics and Philosophy of Art
• Epistemology
• Feminist Philosophy
• History of Western Philosophy
• Metaphysics
• Moral Philosophy
• Non-Western Philosophy
• Philosophy of Language
• Philosophy of Mind
• Philosophy of Perception
• Philosophy of Science
• Philosophy of Action
• Philosophy of Law
• Philosophy of Religion
• Philosophy of Mathematics and Logic
• Practical Ethics
• Social and Political Philosophy
• Browse content in Religion
• Biblical Studies
• Christianity
• East Asian Religions
• History of Religion
• Judaism and Jewish Studies
• Qumran Studies
• Religion and Education
• Religion and Health
• Religion and Politics
• Religion and Science
• Religion and Law
• Religion and Art, Literature, and Music
• Religious Studies
• Browse content in Society and Culture
• Cookery, Food, and Drink
• Cultural Studies
• Customs and Traditions
• Ethical Issues and Debates
• Hobbies, Games, Arts and Crafts
• Natural world, Country Life, and Pets
• Popular Beliefs and Controversial Knowledge
• Sports and Outdoor Recreation
• Technology and Society
• Travel and Holiday
• Visual Culture
• Browse content in Law
• Arbitration
• Browse content in Company and Commercial Law
• Commercial Law
• Company Law
• Browse content in Comparative Law
• Systems of Law
• Competition Law
• Browse content in Constitutional and Administrative Law
• Government Powers
• Judicial Review
• Local Government Law
• Military and Defence Law
• Parliamentary and Legislative Practice
• Construction Law
• Contract Law
• Browse content in Criminal Law
• Criminal Procedure
• Criminal Evidence Law
• Sentencing and Punishment
• Employment and Labour Law
• Environment and Energy Law
• Browse content in Financial Law
• Banking Law
• Insolvency Law
• History of Law
• Human Rights and Immigration
• Intellectual Property Law
• Browse content in International Law
• Private International Law and Conflict of Laws
• Public International Law
• IT and Communications Law
• Jurisprudence and Philosophy of Law
• Law and Politics
• Law and Society
• Browse content in Legal System and Practice
• Courts and Procedure
• Legal Skills and Practice
• Primary Sources of Law
• Regulation of Legal Profession
• Medical and Healthcare Law
• Browse content in Policing
• Criminal Investigation and Detection
• Police and Security Services
• Police Procedure and Law
• Police Regional Planning
• Browse content in Property Law
• Personal Property Law
• Study and Revision
• Terrorism and National Security Law
• Browse content in Trusts Law
• Wills and Probate or Succession
• Browse content in Medicine and Health
• Browse content in Allied Health Professions
• Arts Therapies
• Clinical Science
• Dietetics and Nutrition
• Occupational Therapy
• Operating Department Practice
• Physiotherapy
• Radiography
• Speech and Language Therapy
• Browse content in Anaesthetics
• General Anaesthesia
• Neuroanaesthesia
• Clinical Neuroscience
• Browse content in Clinical Medicine
• Acute Medicine
• Cardiovascular Medicine
• Clinical Genetics
• Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics
• Dermatology
• Endocrinology and Diabetes
• Gastroenterology
• Genito-urinary Medicine
• Geriatric Medicine
• Infectious Diseases
• Medical Toxicology
• Medical Oncology
• Pain Medicine
• Palliative Medicine
• Rehabilitation Medicine
• Respiratory Medicine and Pulmonology
• Rheumatology
• Sleep Medicine
• Sports and Exercise Medicine
• Community Medical Services
• Critical Care
• Emergency Medicine
• Forensic Medicine
• Haematology
• History of Medicine
• Browse content in Medical Skills
• Clinical Skills
• Communication Skills
• Nursing Skills
• Surgical Skills
• Browse content in Medical Dentistry
• Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery
• Paediatric Dentistry
• Restorative Dentistry and Orthodontics
• Surgical Dentistry
• Medical Ethics
• Medical Statistics and Methodology
• Browse content in Neurology
• Clinical Neurophysiology
• Neuropathology
• Nursing Studies
• Browse content in Obstetrics and Gynaecology
• Gynaecology
• Occupational Medicine
• Ophthalmology
• Otolaryngology (ENT)
• Browse content in Paediatrics
• Neonatology
• Browse content in Pathology
• Chemical Pathology
• Clinical Cytogenetics and Molecular Genetics
• Histopathology
• Medical Microbiology and Virology
• Patient Education and Information
• Browse content in Pharmacology
• Psychopharmacology
• Browse content in Popular Health
• Caring for Others
• Complementary and Alternative Medicine
• Self-help and Personal Development
• Browse content in Preclinical Medicine
• Cell Biology
• Molecular Biology and Genetics
• Reproduction, Growth and Development
• Primary Care
• Professional Development in Medicine
• Browse content in Psychiatry
• Addiction Medicine
• Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
• Forensic Psychiatry
• Learning Disabilities
• Old Age Psychiatry
• Psychotherapy
• Browse content in Public Health and Epidemiology
• Epidemiology
• Public Health
• Browse content in Radiology
• Clinical Radiology
• Interventional Radiology
• Nuclear Medicine
• Radiation Oncology
• Reproductive Medicine
• Browse content in Surgery
• Cardiothoracic Surgery
• Gastro-intestinal and Colorectal Surgery
• General Surgery
• Neurosurgery
• Paediatric Surgery
• Peri-operative Care
• Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery
• Surgical Oncology
• Transplant Surgery
• Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgery
• Vascular Surgery
• Browse content in Science and Mathematics
• Browse content in Biological Sciences
• Aquatic Biology
• Biochemistry
• Bioinformatics and Computational Biology
• Developmental Biology
• Ecology and Conservation
• Evolutionary Biology
• Genetics and Genomics
• Microbiology
• Molecular and Cell Biology
• Natural History
• Plant Sciences and Forestry
• Research Methods in Life Sciences
• Structural Biology
• Systems Biology
• Zoology and Animal Sciences
• Browse content in Chemistry
• Analytical Chemistry
• Computational Chemistry
• Crystallography
• Environmental Chemistry
• Industrial Chemistry
• Inorganic Chemistry
• Materials Chemistry
• Medicinal Chemistry
• Mineralogy and Gems
• Organic Chemistry
• Physical Chemistry
• Polymer Chemistry
• Study and Communication Skills in Chemistry
• Theoretical Chemistry
• Browse content in Computer Science
• Artificial Intelligence
• Computer Architecture and Logic Design
• Game Studies
• Human-Computer Interaction
• Mathematical Theory of Computation
• Programming Languages
• Software Engineering
• Systems Analysis and Design
• Virtual Reality
• Browse content in Computing
• Business Applications
• Computer Security
• Computer Games
• Computer Networking and Communications
• Digital Lifestyle
• Graphical and Digital Media Applications
• Operating Systems
• Browse content in Earth Sciences and Geography
• Atmospheric Sciences
• Environmental Geography
• Geology and the Lithosphere
• Maps and Map-making
• Meteorology and Climatology
• Oceanography and Hydrology
• Palaeontology
• Physical Geography and Topography
• Regional Geography
• Soil Science
• Urban Geography
• Browse content in Engineering and Technology
• Agriculture and Farming
• Biological Engineering
• Civil Engineering, Surveying, and Building
• Electronics and Communications Engineering
• Energy Technology
• Engineering (General)
• Environmental Science, Engineering, and Technology
• History of Engineering and Technology
• Mechanical Engineering and Materials
• Technology of Industrial Chemistry
• Transport Technology and Trades
• Browse content in Environmental Science
• Applied Ecology (Environmental Science)
• Conservation of the Environment (Environmental Science)
• Environmental Sustainability
• Environmentalist Thought and Ideology (Environmental Science)
• Management of Land and Natural Resources (Environmental Science)
• Natural Disasters (Environmental Science)
• Nuclear Issues (Environmental Science)
• Pollution and Threats to the Environment (Environmental Science)
• Social Impact of Environmental Issues (Environmental Science)
• History of Science and Technology
• Browse content in Materials Science
• Ceramics and Glasses
• Composite Materials
• Metals, Alloying, and Corrosion
• Nanotechnology
• Browse content in Mathematics
• Applied Mathematics
• Biomathematics and Statistics
• History of Mathematics
• Mathematical Education
• Mathematical Finance
• Mathematical Analysis
• Numerical and Computational Mathematics
• Probability and Statistics
• Pure Mathematics
• Browse content in Neuroscience
• Cognition and Behavioural Neuroscience
• Development of the Nervous System
• Disorders of the Nervous System
• History of Neuroscience
• Invertebrate Neurobiology
• Molecular and Cellular Systems
• Neuroendocrinology and Autonomic Nervous System
• Neuroscientific Techniques
• Sensory and Motor Systems
• Browse content in Physics
• Astronomy and Astrophysics
• Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics
• Biological and Medical Physics
• Classical Mechanics
• Computational Physics
• Condensed Matter Physics
• Electromagnetism, Optics, and Acoustics
• History of Physics
• Mathematical and Statistical Physics
• Measurement Science
• Nuclear Physics
• Particles and Fields
• Plasma Physics
• Quantum Physics
• Relativity and Gravitation
• Semiconductor and Mesoscopic Physics
• Browse content in Psychology
• Affective Sciences
• Clinical Psychology
• Cognitive Psychology
• Cognitive Neuroscience
• Criminal and Forensic Psychology
• Developmental Psychology
• Educational Psychology
• Evolutionary Psychology
• Health Psychology
• History and Systems in Psychology
• Music Psychology
• Neuropsychology
• Organizational Psychology
• Psychological Assessment and Testing
• Psychology of Human-Technology Interaction
• Psychology Professional Development and Training
• Research Methods in Psychology
• Social Psychology
• Browse content in Social Sciences
• Browse content in Anthropology
• Anthropology of Religion
• Human Evolution
• Medical Anthropology
• Physical Anthropology
• Regional Anthropology
• Social and Cultural Anthropology
• Theory and Practice of Anthropology
• Browse content in Business and Management
• Business Ethics
• Business Strategy
• Business History
• Business and Technology
• Business and Government
• Business and the Environment
• Comparative Management
• Corporate Governance
• Corporate Social Responsibility
• Entrepreneurship
• Health Management
• Human Resource Management
• Industrial and Employment Relations
• Industry Studies
• Information and Communication Technologies
• International Business
• Knowledge Management
• Management and Management Techniques
• Operations Management
• Organizational Theory and Behaviour
• Pensions and Pension Management
• Public and Nonprofit Management
• Strategic Management
• Supply Chain Management
• Browse content in Criminology and Criminal Justice
• Criminal Justice
• Criminology
• Forms of Crime
• International and Comparative Criminology
• Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice
• Development Studies
• Browse content in Economics
• Agricultural, Environmental, and Natural Resource Economics
• Asian Economics
• Behavioural Finance
• Behavioural Economics and Neuroeconomics
• Econometrics and Mathematical Economics
• Economic History
• Economic Systems
• Economic Methodology
• Economic Development and Growth
• Financial Markets
• Financial Institutions and Services
• General Economics and Teaching
• Health, Education, and Welfare
• History of Economic Thought
• International Economics
• Labour and Demographic Economics
• Law and Economics
• Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics
• Microeconomics
• Public Economics
• Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics
• Welfare Economics
• Browse content in Education
• Adult Education and Continuous Learning
• Care and Counselling of Students
• Early Childhood and Elementary Education
• Educational Equipment and Technology
• Educational Strategies and Policy
• Higher and Further Education
• Organization and Management of Education
• Philosophy and Theory of Education
• Schools Studies
• Secondary Education
• Teaching of a Specific Subject
• Teaching of Specific Groups and Special Educational Needs
• Teaching Skills and Techniques
• Browse content in Environment
• Applied Ecology (Social Science)
• Climate Change
• Conservation of the Environment (Social Science)
• Environmentalist Thought and Ideology (Social Science)
• Natural Disasters (Environment)
• Social Impact of Environmental Issues (Social Science)
• Browse content in Human Geography
• Cultural Geography
• Economic Geography
• Political Geography
• Browse content in Interdisciplinary Studies
• Communication Studies
• Museums, Libraries, and Information Sciences
• Browse content in Politics
• African Politics
• Asian Politics
• Chinese Politics
• Comparative Politics
• Conflict Politics
• Elections and Electoral Studies
• Environmental Politics
• Ethnic Politics
• European Union
• Foreign Policy
• Gender and Politics
• Human Rights and Politics
• Indian Politics
• International Relations
• International Organization (Politics)
• International Political Economy
• Irish Politics
• Latin American Politics
• Middle Eastern Politics
• Political Behaviour
• Political Economy
• Political Institutions
• Political Methodology
• Political Communication
• Political Philosophy
• Political Sociology
• Political Theory
• Politics and Law
• Politics of Development
• Public Policy
• Public Administration
• Quantitative Political Methodology
• Regional Political Studies
• Russian Politics
• Security Studies
• State and Local Government
• UK Politics
• US Politics
• Browse content in Regional and Area Studies
• African Studies
• Asian Studies
• East Asian Studies
• Japanese Studies
• Latin American Studies
• Middle Eastern Studies
• Native American Studies
• Scottish Studies
• Browse content in Research and Information
• Research Methods
• Browse content in Social Work
• Addictions and Substance Misuse
• Adoption and Fostering
• Care of the Elderly
• Child and Adolescent Social Work
• Couple and Family Social Work
• Direct Practice and Clinical Social Work
• Emergency Services
• Human Behaviour and the Social Environment
• International and Global Issues in Social Work
• Mental and Behavioural Health
• Social Justice and Human Rights
• Social Policy and Advocacy
• Social Work and Crime and Justice
• Social Work Macro Practice
• Social Work Practice Settings
• Social Work Research and Evidence-based Practice
• Welfare and Benefit Systems
• Browse content in Sociology
• Childhood Studies
• Community Development
• Comparative and Historical Sociology
• Economic Sociology
• Gender and Sexuality
• Gerontology and Ageing
• Health, Illness, and Medicine
• Marriage and the Family
• Migration Studies
• Occupations, Professions, and Work
• Organizations
• Population and Demography
• Race and Ethnicity
• Social Theory
• Social Movements and Social Change
• Social Research and Statistics
• Social Stratification, Inequality, and Mobility
• Sociology of Religion
• Sociology of Education
• Sport and Leisure
• Urban and Rural Studies
• Browse content in Warfare and Defence
• Defence Strategy, Planning, and Research
• Land Forces and Warfare
• Military Administration
• Military Life and Institutions
• Naval Forces and Warfare
• Other Warfare and Defence Issues
• Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution
• Weapons and Equipment

A newer edition of this book is available.

• < Previous chapter
• Next chapter >

6 The Role of Creeds

Author Webpage

• Published: January 1984
• Cite Icon Cite
• Permissions Icon Permissions

A creed explains how the pursuit of a particular religious way will achieve the goals of that religion. It does that by explaining in what salvation consists (e.g. in what the blessedness of Heaven consists), and how pursuing a certain sort of life will enable you to achieve it (e.g. because, if you live such a life, God will then take you to Heaven). This is illustrated by showing how the different items of the Nicene Creed have consequences for how we should worship and serve God and thereby mould our characters so that we would be happy in Heaven. One trusts God (and so has faith in the crucial sense) to the extent to which one acts on the assumption that if one lives in this way, God will provide for one the goals of religion. An appendix considers Christian views of the different fates for humans in the afterlife.

Personal account

• Sign in with email/username & password
• Get email alerts
• Save searches
• Purchase content
• Activate your purchase/trial code
• Add your ORCID iD

Institutional access

Sign in with a library card.

• Sign in with username/password
• Recommend to your librarian
• Institutional account management
• Get help with access

Access to content on Oxford Academic is often provided through institutional subscriptions and purchases. If you are a member of an institution with an active account, you may be able to access content in one of the following ways:

IP based access

Typically, access is provided across an institutional network to a range of IP addresses. This authentication occurs automatically, and it is not possible to sign out of an IP authenticated account.

Choose this option to get remote access when outside your institution. Shibboleth/Open Athens technology is used to provide single sign-on between your institution’s website and Oxford Academic.

• Click Sign in through your institution.
• Select your institution from the list provided, which will take you to your institution's website to sign in.
• When on the institution site, please use the credentials provided by your institution. Do not use an Oxford Academic personal account.
• Following successful sign in, you will be returned to Oxford Academic.

If your institution is not listed or you cannot sign in to your institution’s website, please contact your librarian or administrator.

Enter your library card number to sign in. If you cannot sign in, please contact your librarian.

Society Members

Society member access to a journal is achieved in one of the following ways:

Sign in through society site

Many societies offer single sign-on between the society website and Oxford Academic. If you see ‘Sign in through society site’ in the sign in pane within a journal:

• Click Sign in through society site.
• When on the society site, please use the credentials provided by that society. Do not use an Oxford Academic personal account.

If you do not have a society account or have forgotten your username or password, please contact your society.

Sign in using a personal account

Some societies use Oxford Academic personal accounts to provide access to their members. See below.

A personal account can be used to get email alerts, save searches, purchase content, and activate subscriptions.

Some societies use Oxford Academic personal accounts to provide access to their members.

Viewing your signed in accounts

Click the account icon in the top right to:

• View your signed in personal account and access account management features.
• View the institutional accounts that are providing access.

Signed in but can't access content

Oxford Academic is home to a wide variety of products. The institutional subscription may not cover the content that you are trying to access. If you believe you should have access to that content, please contact your librarian.

For librarians and administrators, your personal account also provides access to institutional account management. Here you will find options to view and activate subscriptions, manage institutional settings and access options, access usage statistics, and more.

Our books are available by subscription or purchase to libraries and institutions.

• About Oxford Academic
• Publish journals with us
• University press partners
• What we publish
• New features  
• Open access
• Rights and permissions
• Accessibility
• Advertising
• Media enquiries
• Oxford University Press
• Oxford Languages
• University of Oxford

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide

• Copyright © 2024 Oxford University Press
• Cookie settings
• Cookie policy
• Privacy policy
• Legal notice

This Feature Is Available To Subscribers Only

Sign In or Create an Account

This PDF is available to Subscribers Only

For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual subscription.

My Pedagogic Creed By John Dewey

The Full Text Of ‘My Pedagogic Creed’ By John Dewey

by Terry Heick

What did John Dewey believe?

While known by teachers for his work in education (he was a professor of philosophy at Columbia University from 1904 until 1930), he was also a psychologist and philosopher who interested in governing and social improvement and saw public education as a critical component of a functional democracy.

Philosophically, he was a pragmatist and instrumentalist who believed that the ‘truth’ of a ‘thing’ mattered less than the usefulness and effect of the thing. (I write about this a lot–in What Is The Relationship Between Quality And Effect? , for example.)

John Dewey’s Work In Education

Dewey is often quoted and referenced–in our best quotes about teaching , for example–but have you actually read the ideas for yourself? If not, Democracy and Education (1916) is the centerpiece of his education philosophy but in 1897, he wrote an article for School Journal called ‘My Pedagogic Creed,’ an essay structured around ‘I believe…’ statements that describe what school ‘is’ and should ‘do’ (something we explore often–in Characteristics Of A Good School , for example).

What did John Dewey do for education? While his contributions are too broad to cover in an intro to one of his essays, one of the most important things Dewey did for education is push for it to question itself–its motives, models, and human outputs. In that way, Dewey can be considered one of the pioneers for progressive teaching and learning. To fully understand the significance of the work would require us to be embedded in turn-of-the-century education in the late 1800 and early 1900s. Context is everything, of course. The power of these kinds of ideas comes in their contrast to prevailing thought. Once that thinking is accepted, it will be less interesting because it has done its job: changed how we think of education.

So, below is the full text of ‘My Pedagogic Creed’ by John Dewey.

My Pedagogic Creed

by John Dewey

School Journal vol. 54 (January 1897), pp. 77-80

ARTICLE ONE. WHAT EDUCATION IS

I believe that all education proceeds by the participation of the individual in the social consciousness of the race. This process begins unconsciously almost at birth, and is continually shaping the individual’s powers, saturating his consciousness, forming his habits, training his ideas, and arousing his feelings and emotions. Through this unconscious education the individual gradually comes to share in the intellectual and moral resources which humanity has succeeded in getting together. He becomes an inheritor of the funded capital of civilization. The most formal and technical education in the world cannot safely depart from this general process. It can only organize it; or differentiate it in some particular direction.

I believe that the only true education comes through the stimulation of the child’s powers by the demands of the social situations in which he finds himself. Through these demands he is stimulated to act as a member of a unity, to emerge from his original narrowness of action and feeling and to conceive of himself from the standpoint of the welfare of the group to which he belongs. Through the responses which others make to his own activities he comes to know what these mean in social terms. The value which they have is reflected back into them. For instance, through the response which is made to the child’s instinctive babblings the child comes to know what those babblings mean; they are transformed into articulate language and thus the child is introduced into the consolidated wealth of ideas and emotions which are now summed up in language.

I believe that this educational process has two sides – one psychological and one sociological; and that neither can be subordinated to the other or neglected without evil results following. Of these two sides, the psychological is the basis. The child’s own instincts and powers furnish the material and give the starting point for all education. Save as the efforts of the educator connect with some activity which the child is carrying on of his own initiative independent of the educator, education becomes reduced to a pressure from without. It may, indeed, give certain external results but cannot truly be called educative. Without insight into the psychological structure and activities of the individual, the educative process will, therefore, be haphazard and arbitrary. If it chances to coincide with the child’s activity it will get a leverage; if it does not, it will result in friction, or disintegration, or arrest of the child’s nature.

I believe that knowledge of social conditions, of the present state of civilization, is necessary in order properly to interpret the child’s powers. The child has his own instincts and tendencies, but we do not know what these mean until we can translate them into their social equivalents. We must be able to carry them back into a social past and see them as the inheritance of previous race activities. We must also be able to project them into the future to see what their outcome and end will be. In the illustration just used, it is the ability to see in the child’s babblings the promise and potency of a future social intercourse and conversation which enables one to deal in the proper way with that instinct.

I believe that the psychological and social sides are organically related and that education cannot be regarded as a compromise between the two, or a superimposition of one upon the other. We are told that the psychological definition of education is barren and formal – that it gives us only the idea of a development of all the mental powers without giving us any idea of the use to which these powers are put. On the other hand, it is urged that the social definition of education, as getting adjusted to civilization, makes of it a forced and external process, and results in subordinating the freedom of the individual to a preconceived social and political status.

I believe each of these objections is true when urged against one side isolated from the other. In order to know what a power really is we must know what its end, use, or function is; and this we cannot know save as we conceive of the individual as active in social relationships. But, on the other hand, the only possible adjustment which we can give to the child under existing conditions, is that which arises through putting him in complete possession of all his powers. With the advent of democracy and modern industrial conditions, it is impossible to foretell definitely just what civilization will be twenty years from now. Hence it is impossible to prepare the child for any precise set of conditions. To prepare him for the future life means to give him command of himself; it means so to train him that he will have the full and ready use of all his capacities; that his eye and ear and hand may be tools ready to command, that his judgment may be capable of grasping the conditions under which it has to work, and the executive forces be trained to act economically and efficiently. It is impossible to reach this sort of adjustment save as constant regard is had to the individual’s own powers, tastes, and interests – say, that is, as education is continually converted into psychological terms. In sum, I believe that the individual who is to be educated is a social individual and that society is an organic union of individuals. If we eliminate the social factor from the child we are left only with an abstraction; if we eliminate the individual factor from society, we are left only with an inert and lifeless mass. Education, therefore, must begin with a psychological insight into the child’s capacities, interests, and habits. It must be controlled at every point by reference to these same considerations. These powers, interests, and habits must be continually interpreted – we must know what they mean. They must be translated into terms of their social equivalents – into terms of what they are capable of in the way of social service.

ARTICLE TWO. WHAT THE SCHOOL IS

I believe that the school is primarily a social institution. Education being a social process, the school is simply that form of community life in which all those agencies are concentrated that will be most effective in bringing the child to share in the inherited resources of the race, and to use his own powers for social ends.

I believe that education, therefore, is a process of living and not a preparation for future living.

I believe that the school must represent present life – life as real and vital to the child as that which he carries on in the home, in the neighborhood, or on the play-ground.

I believe that education which does not occur through forms of life, forms that are worth living for their own sake, is always a poor substitute for the genuine reality and tends to cramp and to deaden.

I believe that the school, as an institution, should simplify existing social life; should reduce it, as it were, to an embryonic form. Existing life is so complex that the child cannot be brought into contact with it without either confusion or distraction; he is either overwhelmed by multiplicity of activities which are going on, so that he loses his own power of orderly reaction, or he is so stimulated by these various activities that his powers are prematurely called into play and he becomes either unduly specialized or else disintegrated.

I believe that, as such simplified social life, the school life should grow gradually out of the home life; that it should take up and continue the activities with which the child is already familiar in the home.

I believe that it should exhibit these activities to the child, and reproduce them in such ways that the child will gradually learn the meaning of them, and be capable of playing his own part in relation to them.

I believe that this is a psychological necessity, because it is the only way of securing continuity in the child’s growth, the only way of giving a background of past experience to the new ideas given in school.

I believe it is also a social necessity because the home is the form of social life in which the child has been nurtured and in connection with which he has had his moral training. It is the business of the school to deepen and extend his sense of the values bound up in his home life.

I believe that much of present education fails because it neglects this fundamental principle of the school as a form of community life. It conceives the school as a place where certain information is to be given, where certain lessons are to be learned, or where certain habits are to be formed. The value of these is conceived as lying largely in the remote future; the child must do these things for the sake of something else he is to do; they are mere preparation. As a result they do not become a part of the life experience of the child and so are not truly educative.

I believe that moral education centres about this conception of the school as a mode of social life, that the best and deepest moral training is precisely that which one gets through having to enter into proper relations with others in a unity of work and thought. The present educational systems, so far as they destroy or neglect this unity, render it difficult or impossible to get any genuine, regular moral training.

I believe that the child should be stimulated and controlled in his work through the life of the community.

I believe that under existing conditions far too much of the stimulus and control proceeds from the teacher, because of neglect of the idea of the school as a form of social life.

I believe that the teacher’s place and work in the school is to be interpreted from this same basis. The teacher is not in the school to impose certain ideas or to form certain habits in the child, but is there as a member of the community to select the influences which shall affect the child and to assist him in properly responding to these influences.

I believe that the discipline of the school should proceed from the life of the school as a whole and not directly from the teacher.

I believe that the teacher’s business is simply to determine on the basis of larger experience and riper wisdom, how the discipline of life shall come to the child.

I believe that all questions of the grading of the child and his promotion should be determined by reference to the same standard. Examinations are of use only so far as they test the child’s fitness for social life and reveal the place in which he can be of most service and where he can receive the most help.

ARTICLE THREE. THE SUBJECT-MATTER OF EDUCATION

I believe that the social life of the child is the basis of concentration, or correlation, in all his training or growth. The social life gives the unconscious unity and the background of all his efforts and of all his attainments.

I believe that the subject-matter of the school curriculum should mark a gradual differentiation out of the primitive unconscious unity of social life.

I believe that we violate the child’s nature and render difficult the best ethical results, by introducing the child too abruptly to a number of special studies, of reading, writing, geography, etc., out of relation to this social life.

I believe, therefore, that the true centre of correlation of the school subjects is not science, nor literature, nor history, nor geography, but the child’s own social activities.

I believe that education cannot be unified in the study of science, or so-called nature study, because apart from human activity, nature itself is not a unity; nature in itself is a number of diverse objects in space and time, and to attempt to make it the centre of work by itself, is to introduce a principle of radiation rather than one of concentration.

I believe that literature is the reflex expression and interpretation of social experience; that hence it must follow upon and not precede such experience. It, therefore, cannot be made the basis, although it may be made the summary of unification.

I believe once more that history is of educative value in so far as it presents phases of social life and growth. It must be controlled by reference to social life. When taken simply as history it is thrown into the distant past and becomes dead and inert. Taken as the record of man’s social life and progress it becomes full of meaning. I believe, however, that it cannot be so taken excepting as the child is also introduced directly into social life.

I believe accordingly that the primary basis of education is in the child’s powers at work along the same general constructive lines as those which have brought civilization into being.

I believe that the only way to make the child conscious of his social heritage is to enable him to perform those fundamental types of activity which makes civilization what it is.

I believe, therefore, in the so-called expressive or constructive activities as the centre of correlation.

I believe that this gives the standard for the place of cooking, sewing, manual training, etc., in the school.

I believe that they are not special studies which are to be introduced over and above a lot of others in the way of relaxation or relief, or as additional accomplishments. I believe rather that they represent, as types, fundamental forms of social activity; and that it is possible and desirable that the child’s introduction into the more formal subjects of the curriculum be through the medium of these activities.

I believe that the study of science is educational in so far as it brings out the materials and processes which make social life what it is.

I believe that one of the greatest difficulties in the present teaching of science is that the material is presented in purely objective form, or is treated as a new peculiar kind of experience which the child can add to that which he has already had. In reality, science is of value because it gives the ability to interpret and control the experience already had. It should be introduced, not as so much new subject- matter, but as showing the factors already involved in previous experience and as furnishing tools by which that experience can be more easily and effectively regulated.

I believe that at present we lose much of the value of literature and language studies because of our elimination of the social element. Language is almost always treated in the books of pedagogy simply as the expression of thought. It is true that language is a logical instrument, but it is fundamentally and primarily a social instrument. Language is the device for communication; it is the tool through which one individual comes to share the ideas and feelings of others. When treated simply as a way of getting individual information, or as a means of showing off what one has learned, it loses its social motive and end.

I believe that there is, therefore, no succession of studies in the ideal school curriculum. If education is life, all life has, from the outset, a scientific aspect; an aspect of art and culture and an aspect of communication. It cannot, therefore, be true that the proper studies for one grade are mere reading and writing, and that at a later grade, reading, or literature, or science, may be introduced. The progress is not in the succession of studies but in the development of new attitudes towards, and new interests in, experience.

I believe finally, that education must be conceived as a continuing reconstruction of experience; that the process and the goal of education are one and the same thing.

I believe that to set up any end outside of education, as furnishing its goal and standard, is to deprive the educational process of much of its meaning and tends to make us rely upon false and external stimuli in dealing with the child.

ARTICLE FOUR. THE NATURE OF METHOD

I believe that the question of method is ultimately reducible to the question of the order of development of the child’s powers and interests. The law for presenting and treating material is the law implicit within the child’s own nature. Because this is so I believe the following statements are of supreme importance as determining the spirit in which education is carried on:

      1. I believe that the active side precedes the passive in the development of the child nature; that expression comes before conscious impression; that the muscular development precedes the sensory; that movements come before conscious sensations; I believe that consciousness is essentially motor or impulsive; that conscious states tend to project themselves in action.

I believe that the neglect of this principle is the cause of a large part of the waste of time and strength in school work. The child is thrown into a passive, receptive or absorbing attitude. The conditions are such that he is not permitted to follow the law of his nature; the result is friction and waste.

I believe that ideas (intellectual and rational processes) also result from action and devolve for the sake of the better control of action. What we term reason is primarily the law of orderly or effective action. To attempt to develop the reasoning powers, the powers of judgment, without reference to the selection and arrangement of means in action, is the fundamental fallacy in our present methods of dealing with this matter. As a result we present the child with arbitrary symbols. Symbols are a necessity in mental development, but they have their place as tools for economizing effort; presented by themselves they are a mass of meaningless and arbitrary ideas imposed from without.

    2. I believe that the image is the great instrument of instruction. What a child gets out of any subject presented to him is simply the images which he himself forms with regard to it.

I believe that if nine-tenths of the energy at present directed towards making the child learn certain things, were spent in seeing to it that the child was forming proper images, the work of instruction would be indefinitely facilitated. 

I believe that much of the time and attention now given to the preparation and presentation of lessons might be more wisely and profitably expended in training the child’s power of imagery and in seeing to it that he was continually forming definite, vivid, and growing images of the various subjects with which he comes in contact in his experience.

      3. I believe that interests are the signs and symptoms of growing power. I believe that they represent dawning capacities. Accordingly the constant and careful observation of interests is of the utmost importance for the educator.

I believe that these interests are to be observed as showing the state of development which the child has reached.  

      I believe that the prophesy the stage upon which he is about to enter.

I believe that only through the continual and sympathetic observation of childhood’s interests can the adult enter into the child’s life and see what it is ready for, and upon what material it could work most readily and fruitfully.

I believe that these interests are neither to be humored nor repressed. To repress interest is to substitute the adult for the child, and so to weaken intellectual curiosity and alertness, to suppress initiative, and to deaden interest. To humor the interests is to substitute the transient for the permanent. The interest is always the sign of some power below; the important thing is to discover this power. To humor the interest is to fail to penetrate below the surface and its sure result is to substitute caprice and whim for genuine interest.

      4. I believe that the emotions are the reflex of actions.

      I believe that to endeavor to stimulate or arouse the emotions apart from their corresponding activities, is to introduce an unhealthy and morbid state of mind.

      I believe that if we can only secure right habits of action and thought, with reference to the good, the true, and the beautiful, the emotions will for the most part take care of themselves.

      I believe that next to deadness and dullness, formalism and routine, our education is threatened with no greater evil than sentimentalism.

      I believe that this sentimentalism is the necessary result of the attempt to divorce feeling from action.

ARTICLE FIVE. THE SCHOOL AND SOCIAL PROGRESS

I believe that education is the fundamental method of social progress and reform.

I believe that all reforms which rest simply upon the enactment of law, or the threatening of certain penalties, or upon changes in mechanical or outward arrangements, are transitory and futile.

I believe that education is a regulation of the process of coming to share in the social consciousness; and that the adjustment of individual activity on the basis of this social consciousness is the only sure method of social reconstruction.

I believe that this conception has due regard for both the individualistic and socialistic ideals. It is duly individual because it recognizes the formation of a certain character as the only genuine basis of right living. It is socialistic because it recognizes that this right character is not to be formed by merely individual precept, example, or exhortation, but rather by the influence of a certain form of institutional or community life upon the individual, and that the social organism through the school, as its organ, may determine ethical results.

I believe that in the ideal school we have the reconciliation of the individualistic and the institutional ideals.

I believe that the community’s duty to education is, therefore, its paramount moral duty. By law and punishment, by social agitation and discussion, society can regulate and form itself in a more or less haphazard and chance way. But through education society can formulate its own purposes, can organize its own means and resources, and thus shape itself with definiteness and economy in the direction in which it wishes to move.

I believe that when society once recognizes the possibilities in this direction, and the obligations which these possibilities impose, it is impossible to conceive of the resources of time, attention, and money which will be put at the disposal of the educator.

I believe it is the business of every one interested in education to insist upon the school as the primary and most effective instrument of social progress and reform in order that society may be awakened to realize what the school stands for, and aroused to the necessity of endowing the educator with sufficient equipment properly to perform his task.

I believe that education thus conceived marks the most perfect and intimate union of science and art conceivable in human experience.

I believe that the art of thus giving shape to human powers and adapting them to social service, is the supreme art; one calling into its service the best of artists; that no insight, sympathy, tact, executive power is too great for such service.

I believe that with the growth of psychological science, giving added insight into individual structure and laws of growth; and with growth of social science, adding to our knowledge of the right organization of individuals, all scientific resources can be utilized for the purposes of education.

I believe that when science and art thus join hands the most commanding motive for human action will be reached; the most genuine springs of human conduct aroused and the best service that human nature is capable of guaranteed.

I believe, finally, that the teacher is engaged, not simply in the training of individuals, but in the formation of the proper social life.

I believe that every teacher should realize the dignity of his calling; that he is a social servant set apart for the maintenance of proper social order and the securing of the right social growth.

I believe that in this way the teacher always is the prophet of the true God and the usherer in of the true kingdom of God.

About The Author

Teachthought staff.

You Are What You Believe: How the Creed Defines Our Identity in Relation to God, Ourselves, and Others

Ancient Christian confessions like the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed define the boundaries and content of the Christian faith in accordance with Scripture. But they also function as essential identity formation. These creeds are much more than checklists of personal beliefs. Their propositional and narrative content together offer a unified account of reality in relation to God, ourselves, and one another. In reality, these creeds are one credo , one “I believe”—so in this essay I’ll refer to them in the singular.

The creed describes not only who God is but also who we are. In these ways, the creed is both a no and a yes. “The Nicene Creed was written to say no , in the strongest possible terms,” Phillip Cary explains, to heresy. But the creed “said no by saying yes to who God really is, and who Jesus is . . . and sometimes it says who God is by saying what he has done to make us who we are: God’s creatures who he raises from death to everlasting life in Christ .”

The question of identity is perennial. And in the modern West, the question seems to generate even more existential angst than in the past, as we became unmoored from traditional identity anchors of faith, family, place, and even from biology itself. Numerous identity alternatives have been proposed as solutions, and many thoughtful Christians have responded to this question with powerful calls to find our identity in Christ. It’s a vital case to make—but one that frequently remains abstract and intangible. What does it really mean to encourage people to find their identity in Christ? How am I anchored beyond myself, my thoughts, and my feelings? Is Christianity just another identity choice among many?

The creed helps us move beyond the abstract into the realm of the concrete, revealing that Christianity is a deeply rooted identity-gift of ultimate and eternal significance, anchored in the God who is . This is the God who speaks the world into existence by the word of his power, the God who is the Word made flesh, the God who gives gifts to his people through words that mean something and sacraments that do something. The creed recounts and revels in this Triune God’s work of creation, redemption, and sanctification revealed in his word; and as we believe, it also shapes our identity. In confessing the creed, we’re led further up and further in (as C. S. Lewis might say) to this deepest reality of knowing God and ourselves. We are what we believe—because what we believe, as given in the creed, is reality.

The creed defines who we are in three fundamental ways: In relationship to God, to self, and to others, which I’d like to explore together in connection with the creed’s three articles. But first, we should consider how competing stories—cultural creeds—also shape us as we believe them.

Confounded by Creating Ourselves: How Stories Form or Malform Us

Humans are storytelling creatures. And our stories shape our identity. Countless competing narratives attempt to tell us who we are. Consider the Darwinian creed, which tells us we are just material stuff, here by accident. Or the consumerist creed, which presents humanity as customers who find meaning in their possessions. So too, the creed of expressive individualism, which tells us that our internal desires are who we are, manifest in everything from Moralistic Therapeutic Deism—which George Barna flatly calls “fake Christianity”—to the LGBTQ+ identities exploding even among professing Gen Z Christian s.

No matter what story or cultural creed tempts us, the common thread linking them together is a vision of the human person as self-defined and self-creating. The various cultural creeds might be summed up best with this simple statement of faith: I believe in myself.

At first, self-creation seems freeing: We get to throw off stodgy external structures and limiting moral codes—no more cramping my style! But for anyone who takes life just the least bit seriously, self-creation easily morphs into an anxiety-inducing burden bigger than our shoulders were designed to bear. Alan Noble calls this “the fundamental lie of modernity: that we are our own.” He suggests that “until we see this lie for what it is, until we work to uproot it from our culture and replant a conception of human persons as belonging to God and ourselves, most of our efforts at improving the world will be glorified Band-Aids .” The self-help Band-Aids aren’t stopping the bleeding and are actually making things worse, considering rising anxiety, depression, and suicide. While “no single cause can explain the presence of such social ills,” Noble suggests that they all “share important characteristics: they are systemic in nature, they are inhuman, and they all rely on a particular set of assumptions about what it means to be human.” A cultural creedal identity untethers humans from God and from external structures of meaning and morality. Ironically, this creates a boomerang effect in which all those responsibilities are sent reeling back toward us, leaving us on our own to find, formulate, or even fabricate meaning for our lives.

How do we avoid getting crushed under the weight of having to invent ourselves—to be our own creators and sustainers and redeemers? Noble points to a way out by remembering that we are not our own. This is a profoundly countercultural move: “An anthropology defined by our belonging to God is diametrically opposed to the contemporary belief that we are autonomous, free, atomistic individuals who find our greatest fulfillment in breaking free from all external norms.” The creed concretizes this “no”toward cultural self-identity with clear doctrinal claims and a compelling narrative structure for our life in Christ, uniting the worlds of fact and story, the objective truth outside us, and the subjective truth about us. As Irenaeus, bishop of Lyon, put it more than eighteen hundred years ago, “Faith is established upon things truly real, that we may believe what really is, as it is.”

I Believe: Formed and Re-formed by the Creed

Each time we recite and reflect on the creed, we are brought further into its story and its story is brought further into us. We’re doing more than stating bare facts or reinforcing social bonds in the local congregation. We’re responding to what God has said and done by saying “this faith is mine; this is my story.” But not just mine. It’s the same faith confessed by Irenaeus and Athanasius, by Anselm and Aquinas, by Luther and Calvin, by peasants and kings, by mothers and fathers, by sisters and brothers, by friends and enemies, by rich and poor. When you recite the creed, you join millions of living Christians in thousands of languages in hundreds of countries—with untold numbers of faithful saints who have gone before—echoing together the true story and meaning of the cosmos. Talk about an identity-making event that many of us experience every Sunday!

The creed, however, shouldn’t then be set aside until the following Sunday. It can form our daily life in Christ. Peter Bender explains,

It is intended to be used daily in the life of the Christian and the Christian family for the purpose of faithful meditation upon the Word of God. The Creed anchors meditation in what is true, not for the self alone, but for every Christian for all time . . . [and] stands as a grid or framework through which the text of the Scriptures is to be properly understood.

Historically, we Christians receive the creed as an apostolic deposit given to us in our baptism, that provides us with the language and grammar to think and speak about God, ourselves, and one another. Already in the second century, Irenaeus referred to the long-established rule of faith, or “rule of truth,” that is “received by means of baptism” and that this “truth proclaimed by the Church is immovable.” Irenaeus then described the rule within the trinitarian structure and language familiar to anyone who knows the creeds:

The Church, though dispersed throughout the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and their disciples this faith: [It believes] in one God, the Father Almighty, who made the heaven and the earth and the seas and all the things that are in them; and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who was made flesh for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit, who made known through the prophets the plan of salvation, and the coming, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the bodily ascension into heaven of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord, and his [future] manifestation from heaven in the glory of the Father “to gather all things in one,” and to raise anew all flesh of the whole human race, in order that to Christ Jesus, our Lord, and God, and Saviour, and King, according to the will of the invisible Father, “every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth and that every tongue should confess” to Him, and that He should execute just judgment towards all.

The Church, having received this preaching and this faith, although scattered throughout the whole world, yet, as if occupying but one house, carefully preserves it. . . . For although the languages of the world are dissimilar, yet the import of the tradition is one and the same.

We have all received the weight and wisdom of this shared sacred tradition.

I Am a Creature: The First Article and My Relation to God

God, the Father, uncreated, uncontainable, invisible; one God, the creator of all: this is the first article of our faith.

The creed’s first article begins by expressing our faith in the work of God the Father as Creator, which simultaneously tells us something about ourselves: We are creatures. God alone is uncreated; we as humans can’t help being creatures. So where do we ultimately find our identity? In the forces of nature or nurture? Society or self? Because we confess God as Creator, we confess that we receive our identity from another because we receive our very existence from another. As Irenaeus put it, “God indeed makes, but man is made.”

We may not think of creatureliness as good news. Being a creature can be rather disgusting at times. Smelly. Messy. Unsexy. Richard John Neuhaus notes that “the word ‘creature’ is hardly ever used today except negatively. Horror movies have creatures from the deep, and we speak of bothersome insects as creatures, but most people would not call their pet dog a creature, never mind their best friend.” Neuhaus sees this as “a triumph of Gnosticism in our popular culture,” a rejection of the gift of bodily life, and “the desire to be like God on our own terms .” Neuhaus encourages us to remember “the most elementary fact about what and who we are—creatures. We are not the Creator; we are not God.”

The creed’s first article frees us from trying to be God. We are embodied, contingent beings with in-built limits—and this is indeed good news. We have a Creator who, as Luther says, “has made me and all creatures; . . . he has given me my body and soul, eyes, ears, and all my members, my reason and all my senses, and still takes care of them. . . . All this he does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in me.”

“If we belong to ourselves,” Noble explains, “then we set our own limits—which means we have no limits except our own will. If we belong to God, then knowing and abiding by His limits enables us to live as we were created to live, as the humans He designed us to be.” The creed’s first article reveals a Creator whose actions are driven by love—nay, who is love. We are defined in relation to this fatherly Creator as creatures who are loved with an eternal and unending love, a love that takes on flesh. The God who made us as bodily beings and pronounced it as all “very good” enters history bodily. This further defines our identity.

I Am Christian: The Second Article and My Relation to Self

And the second article: The Word of God, the Son of God, Christ Jesus our Lord, who was revealed by the prophets according to the character of their prophecy and according to the nature of the economies of the Father, by whom all things were made, and who, in the last times, to recapitulate all things, became a man amongst men, visible and palpable, in order to abolish death, to demonstrate life, and to effect communion between God and man.

The creed’s second article about the Son’s work of redemption helps to define the self. Now, confessing our beliefs in relation to ourselves may sound dubious after all my earlier warnings about the dangers of self-creation and navel gazing. But it’s in the second article that we see how Christ remakes and redefines human identity around himself. For believers, self-identity is now Christ-identity. Saint Paul writes, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20). Christ in me. Jonathan Linebaugh describes the identity-forming power of Paul’s words here as “the meeting of the christological past and a personal pronoun, a pairing that gives peace to ‘a trembling and troubled heart’ and ‘rest to your bones and mine.’”

The ancient church testifies to this comprehensive understanding of identity in Christ, as evidenced in their frequent confession of Christianus sum (“I am Christian”) in the face of persecution. Christianus , in both its Latin and Greek equivalents, is suggestive of something more than simply a lifestyle choice or an individualistic decision. When someone says “I am a Christian” today, it just doesn’t quite capture the weight and force of the original. When Christians confessed Christianus sum , they weren’t making a claim of personal perspective or wishful thinking; it was primal and real. There were now of Christ, belonging to Christ; Christ was in them, and they were in him. Such an ultimate claim reordered their allegiance under the world’s rightful king, Jesus, to whom they were united. They saw themselves as part of a new humanity constituted around the risen and glorified Christ, made up of people from all tribes, nations, tongues, and peoples. The claims of the creed radically changed Christian self-identity. No longer did the early Christians primarily identify as citizens of this or that country, or members of this or that family or class. This is not to say that their personal distinctiveness was lost or absorbed. Those things weren’t erased but transformed as they were now in Christ, who took on flesh, lived, died, and rose again proving his divinity and victory over the forces of evil and the empires of this world by the foolishness of his cross. Now that is a self-identity worth reclaiming—and urgently so, considering the scope and breadth of our contemporary identity crises.

I Am Communal: The Third Article and My Relation to Others

And the third article: The Holy Spirit, through whom the prophets prophesied and the patriarchs learnt the things of God, and the righteous were led in the path of righteousness, and who, in the last times, was poured out in a new fashion upon the human race renewing man, throughout the world, to God.

The creed’s third article on the Spirit’s role as sanctifier reminds us of our relational nature. The creed tells us that we are not solitary, mechanistic units but created to be in living relation to a people and a history. In the church, not in isolation, the gifts of God are distributed to the people of God: communion, forgiveness, resurrection, and everlasting life.

In his explanation of the Apostles’ Creed, Luther highlights the inseparability of the individual and communal. Not only has “the Holy Spirit . . . called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith,” but also “in the same way he calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian church on earth, and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. In this Christian church he daily and richly forgives all my sins and the sins of all believers.” The Spirit makes us new creatures in the image of Christ, our new head, which situates our rich and robust individual Christian identity in his larger body, the church where we all have varying gifts and roles. Confessing “one baptism for the forgiveness of sins” roots us in our relationship to God as redeemed sinners and in community with other sinful saints where we together receive God’s spoken and sacramental gifts. Here, both self and other are properly placed in relation to God. Each individual is valued for their unique identity, but they are also united into one body. Christianity is particularly applied to individuals in each locale and community but is also universal in scope and application. All of this provides us with a firm place within the larger ordering of the cosmos—a position from which to live with assurance and purpose.

Being Formed by the True Story of the World

This creedal identity frames my relation to God, myself, and others. How can this not have significant influence in my daily life? The creed calls us to a life properly ordered toward the world’s master key, its deepest reality and unifying principle: Christ the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and the one in whom all things hold together (John 14:6; Col. 1:17). Here are a few starting points for further meditation on how a creedal rather than a cultural identity transforms everything about who we are and how we live.

Creedal Identity Is Subversive

Confessing the creed is a countercultural act that places us in a new community, in a new body, with a new king, and his name is neither Self nor Caesar. In the church’s confession, all our stereotypes and assumptions are turned upside down. Societal outcasts and social butterflies, truck drivers and doctors, those who clean toilets and those who design them are equally humbled and honored. All are united with our king and with one another in God’s paradoxical kingdom as we confess where our ultimate allegiances lie.

This dislocates us by reminding us that we’re pilgrims in a world that confesses different creeds. But it also locates us, anchoring us to a place and a people in a way that heals worldly divisions. From the church’s earliest days, this reality came through as our baptismal creed established a new community—a chosen race and royal priesthood that is a foretaste of the New Jerusalem, elevating the status of those who were considered lower, and breaking down the dividing wall of hostility between Jew and Gentile (Eph. 2:14).

Creedal Identity Is Anchored to the Body

Being a creature means that our bodies are gifts to be received and embraced, not rejected or deconstructed. Life in the body has limits, and it is from such a place of finitude and contingency that wisdom, virtue, and day-by-day faithfulness can grow. Consider the extreme inefficiency of caring for a young toddler or an elderly parent, or the long agonizing hours of conversation and presence required to walk together with someone through despair, grief, or depression. These are highly inconvenient but deeply human and deeply beautiful expressions of belonging to Christ and his body. Today, the body frequently seems not only too limited but also expendable, a waste product to be disposed of as neatly and quickly as possible. There is little thought of the body’s inherent value, its creation by God, or its ultimate resurrection. Our bodies have inherent value, however, and should be treated with respect and care, both during life and in our final Christian act: what we do with our bodies upon death.

Creedal Identity Is a Gift

Quite distinct from self-constructed and self-made forms of identity, the creed grants us an identity-gift, reminding us that God plants us in webs of mutual interdependence and support. At our birth, our name is given, our place is given, our family is given, our community is given. And if we take our cues from the church fathers, the rule of faith is gifted to us as well. The apostolic deposit is exactly that—a deposit we receive and inherit. The language of creedal and baptismal inheritance is common throughout the early church. Irenaeus notes how the faith has been “handed down to us . . . [which] exhorts us to remember that we have received baptism for the remission of sins . . . [as] the seal of eternal life and rebirth unto God, that we may no longer be sons of mortal men, but of the eternal and everlasting God.” In a culture that sees only self-chosen commitments and identities as authentic, we see in the creed a vision not of an identity we choose but one we receive by grace.

Creedal Identity Connects Us to Milestones and Rhythms

The creed frames the passage of time and seasons as structured by the church and marked by the milestones of God’s work in word and sacrament. It places us on a path rich with meaning, with accompanying rites to mark life’s journey: baptism, the Eucharist, Christian death and burial—all of which are explicitly referenced in the creed in the life of Christ and thus anticipated in the life of believers. These milestones are enacted and re-enacted in the church’s weekly rhythm of Lord’s Day rest. Kelly Kapic suggests that the concept of Sabbath is “one of the most countercultural and radical ideas in the Bible.” We cannot keep running the modern rat-race endlessly—we will perform ourselves to death. Structuring our lives around, and resting in, the rhythms of God’s gift of rest and word frees us to step off the tyrannical treadmill and into the Sabbath of God. These milestones and rhythms also ensure that our beliefs are embodied in our practices and that there is wholeness between our hearts and our heads, our bodies and our brains.

Creedal Identity Has a Destiny

The creed also clearly points us to our journey’s end. The pilgrim church daily confesses our faith in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting. The goal of human identity runs much deeper than individual choice or lived experience, personal achievement or social status, race or sexual preference. Your true purpose is found not in your own name, history, or constructed identity, but in the name, history and identity of Christ given in the ancient creed. This is an earth-shaking and life-altering identity that offers hope for this world and the next, knowing that what awaits us in the eschaton is the fullest expression of human identity imaginable: a glorified humanity in full communion with the Trinity and with one another.

The creed tells me that I am fundamentally a creature, a Christian, and communal. It tells me that you and I are in Christ and thus belong to each other. Despite the false and fleeting alternative identities we try to create for ourselves or adopt from our culture, Irenaeus has been right all along: “The glory of God is man fully alive.” Let’s embrace the creed’s call to be defined by what we believe because we belong to the One in whom we believe. Let’s embrace reality.

Phillip Cary, The Nicene Creed: An Introduction (Bellingham, WA: Lexham, 2022), 2.

George Barna, “American Worldview Inventory 2021, Release #02: Introducing America’s Most Popular Worldview—Moralistic Therapeutic Deism,” Cultural Research Center , April 27, 2021; Paul Bond, “Nearly 40 Percent of U.S. Gen Zs, 30 Percent of Young Christians Identify as LGBT, Poll Shows,” Newsweek (October 20, 2021).

Alan Noble, You Are Not Your Own: Belonging to God in an Inhuman World (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2021), 5.

“Youth Risk Behavior Survey: Data Summary and Trends Report,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention , https://www.cdc.gov/healthyyouth/data/yrbs/pdf/YRBS_Data -Summary-Trends_Report2023_508.pdf.

Noble, You Are Not Your Own , 17.

Noble, You Are Not Your Own , 6.

Irenaeus, On the Apostolic Preaching (New York: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1997), 41.

Peter Bender, “The Creed Defines the Scriptures and Strengthens the Faith,” in We Believe: Essays on the Catechism (Fort Wayne, IN: Concordia Theological Seminary Press, 2000), 44.

Irenaeus, Against Heresies , 1.9.4–1.9.5, vol. 1, p. 330, in The Ante-Nicene Fathers , ed. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson (1885–1887; repr., Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1994).

Irenaeus, Against Heresies , 1.10.1, 330.

Irenaeus, Against Heresies , 1.20.2, 331.

Irenaeus, On the Apostolic Preaching , 43.

To be sure, we understand that the work of creation is the work of all three persons of the Godhead (inseparable operations). But we also understand that there is a proper work to each Person of the Godhead when considering the economic Trinity, which the creed reflects: Father as Creator, Son as Redeemer, Spirit as Sanctifier.

Irenaeus, Against Heresies , 4.11.2, 474.

Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon: Meditations on the Last Words of Jesus from the Cross (New York: Basic Books, 2000), 120–21.

Martin Luther, Luther’s Small Catechism with Explanation (Saint Louis, MO: Concordia, 2017), 16.

Noble, You Are Not Your Own , 118.

Irenaeus, On the Apostolic Preaching , 43–44.

Jonathan Linebaugh, The Word of the Cross: Reading Paul (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2022), 72.

For an excellent short treatment of martyrdom and Christian identity in the early church, see William Weinrich, “Christian Martyrdom: Some Reflections,” Journal of Lutheran Mission , vol. 2, no. 2 (September 2014): 9–15.

Irenaeus, On the Apostolic Preaching , 44.

Luther, Luther’s Small Catechism with Explanation , 17–18.

Irenaeus, On the Apostolic Preaching , 42.

Kelly M. Kapic, You’re Only Human: How Your Limits Reflect God’s Design and Why That’s Good News (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2022), 219.

This is a frequently used paraphrase that is faithful to the more wooden translation: “For the glory of God is a living man; and the life of man consists in beholding God.” Irenaeus, Against Heresies , 4.20.7, 490.

Joshua Pauling

From the issue: the rule of faith, vol.32 , no.6 , nov/dec 2023, related resources, the rule of faith isn’t western.

Christians in the West often assume that missionaries from Britain and the United States were the first to bring the gospel to Asia and Africa. Within this broad assumption, we tend to make either of two false choices: some of us risk throwing out the baby of essential Christian faith and practice with the bathwater of Western prejudice, while others [...]

"The Nicene Creed: An Introduction," by Phillip Cary: A Review

The upcoming seventeen-hundredth anniversary of the Council of Nicaea in 2025 gives us an incentive to learn more about that pivotal time in history and the creed that came of it. To this end, one can scarcely find a more accessible source than Phillip Cary’s new book [...]

Snowstorm at midnight

In the stillness of the night, when the fire is burning low, and its bright and orange light dwindles to an ashen glow, [...]

The Rule of Faith Illumines the Bible by the Bible's Own Light

From the smallest insect to the greatest monster of the deep, from the weakest child to the mightiest of men, no creature can exist without God’s word, and without God’s word there is no life and salvation. God’s word does what it says [...]

“Modern Reformation has championed confessional Reformation theology in an anti-confessional and anti-theological age.” J. Ligon Duncan, III Senior Minister, First Presbyterian Church

Stay Connected

Keep up to date with all things Modern Reformation.

The Body of Christopher Creed Essay

Organize your thoughts in 6 simple steps, find the perfect quote to float your boat, tired of ads, cite this source, logging out…, logging out....

You've been inactive for a while, logging you out in a few seconds...

W hy's T his F unny?