WE BELIEVE in God the Father Almighty, 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 Hades; on the third day, He rose again from the dead; He ascended into Heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of God, the Father Almighty; from thence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead. We 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.
Commonly referred to as the Apostles' Creed, its original Latinate form is Symbolum Apostolorum or Symbolum Apostolicum. It is also called, in some quarters, the Symbol of the Apostles. The Apostles' Creed is an ancient but still practical statement of Christian belief. The word creed (or creedor) explains the Latinate origin of the word Symbolum, or symbol, meaning this is a representation of the Christian faith.
Till today, the Apostles' Creed is still in wide use. Many Christian denominations adopt the Creed for both liturgical and catechetical purposes including the Presbyterians, Lutherans, Methodists, Wesleyans, Anglicans, Congregationalists and also the Evangelicals of the EFC order of which Hosanna EFC is a member church.
The Apostles' Creed was founded on Christian theological understanding of Canonical gospels including the epistles of the New Testament and to a lesser scale, contents within the Old Testament. Its basis seems to be the older Roman Creed, which was also referred to as the Old Roman Symbol.
The first time that the expression 'Apostles' Creed' was found to be used was in the letter of 390AD from a synod in Milan, Italy and may have been linked to a widely-embraced belief in the Fourth Century that under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, every one of the twelve Apostles had contributed to the article of the creed itself.
There are apparently many different English text versions of the Apostles' Creed and depending on the church and the denomination, you may find one that is in use or even slightly modified as in the use of certain words.
Hosanna EFC uses the version that has been adopted by the Church of England under the Book of Common Prayer, which finds its origins all the way back to the days of King Edward VI and later, removed by his sister, Queen Mary I before it was placed back in service by yet another sister of his, Queen Elizabeth I. Central to the establishment of the Book of Common Prayer was of course Thomas Cranmer, who served as the Archbishop of Canterbury, very delicately, under King Henry VIII followed by King Edward VI before he was burnt at the stake by Queen Mary I under the Catholic Restoration and banishment of the aforementioned Book.
Today, the Apostles' Creed is available in at least nine if not more versions. Of the ones popularly known, the Roman Catholics offer either the Catechism or the Mass of the Roman Rite versions. In the Church of England, two versions are available, namely, the Book of Common Prayer (which Hosanna EFC follows) and the Common Worship version, which uses slightly watered down English. The Lutherans use the Lutheran Service Book version while the Church of Denmark adopts the Grundtvig edition. Over at the Unity of the Brethren, they use a version that is loosely based on the Lutheran Creed. At the United Methodist Church, theirs is based on #881 of the United Methodist Hymnal. There is also the English Language Liturgical Consultation (ELLC), which uses the Ecumenical version.
The Anglican Church's Book of Common Prayer has, like the English Bible, seen a very bloodied but storied past. It is a name given to a collection of related prayer books that are used in the Anglican Communion. First published in 1549 under the reign of Edward VI, it was the by-product of the English Reformation to which Cranmer was central.
The 1549 version of the prayer book, being the first, was very complete, comprising all forms of services for daily and Sunday worship and of course, they were all entirely in readable English text. It contained the Morning Prayer, Evening Prayer, the Litany, the Holy Communion as well as the Apostles' Creed, not to mention comprehensive coverage of services for the orders of Baptism, Confirmation, Marriage and Funeral Rites.
