THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
may be regarded as a kind of intermediate step between the shorter and longer Roman symbols. This consideration, however, is not so important as the fact that during the third and fourth centuries the great provincial Churches of the West produced different types. Four such types can be readily distinguished, the Italian, African, Gallican (including the Irish), and Spanish. As for the Gallican type, which is seen in our Apostolicum, it is characterized by such historical additions as are to be found in Oriental forms of faith or symbols (viz., " maker of heaven and earth," "suffered," "died," "descended into hell"; " catholic "). In its final form the Gallican type is not in every respect the richest or the longest of the Western symbols, but it is so as to its historical contents. In this important respect the final form of the Gallican type has completely preserved the distinguishing features of the old Roman symbol. It exhibits the same brief and severe style, and, nevertheless, also preserves all the significant historical features which became attached to the Symbolum Romanum in the course of its history. The Gallican Apostolicum also exhibits the same classical elaboration and ecumenical tendency as its Roman copy. (5) The less any Church was influenced by the Roman, the more did its symbol differ from the shorter Roman. The symbols of the Gallican Church differ relatively much from it. (6) In reducing all Western symbols to one archetype, without regard to the differences, the shorter Roman symbol is obtained without difficulty. From these observations it may be inferred with certainty (a) that the shorter Roman symbol was the source of all Western confessions of faith; (b) that the longer Roman symbol practically proceeded from the other, though not at Rome, and as a result received also the same attributes, which originally belonged to the shorter symbol.
The supposition is also justified that the shorter Roman symbol must have already existed before the middle of the third century, otherwise the facts that all Western Churches originally used this very symbol, and that, e.g., the African Church had already developed before the year 250 its special type on the basis of the Symbolum vetus Romanum can not be explained (cf. Cyprian in Hahn, §§ 28, 29). The Roman symbol must therefore have originated at least about the year 300; and this can be proved from the writings of Tertullian, as well as from a comparison of the shorter Roman symbol with the Eastern symbols, which are rich in additions, introductions, dogmatic remarks, etc., besides omissions. The Nica3no-Constantinopolitan creed made an end to this fluctuating state of the confession, and from about 430 superseded the other Eastern confessions, and to this day the Constantinopolitan creed has remained the symbol of the Byzantine Church.
Considering the state of affairs which existed in the East till the middle of the fifth century, it is difficult to characterize the fundamental type of the Eastern symbols. But, in spite of the many deviations, there exists a certain affinity with the shorter Roman symbol, the acceptance of which
was hindered by (1) the circumstance that the Christological section of the Roman symbol came into conflict with a Christological type already
established; (2) by the desire to give 9. Assump- fuller expression to the " higher " tion of an Christology in the creed. It was Asia Minor not till the time of the Arian con- Original of troversy that fixed symbols in the the Roman East began to be formed. From an Symbol, examination of the Rules of Faith,
and the fragments of those rules and formula-like sentences which are now familiar as belonging to the Eastern half of the Church from the middle of the first to the middle of the third century, scholars like Caspari, Zahn, Loofs, and others have inferred that there must have existed an Eastern symbol or, to be more precise, a symbol from Asia Minor, to which the old Roman symbol was related as daughter or sister. The assumption rests principally, if not exclusively, on what is found in Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus, Justin, and Ignatius; and the inference drawn therefrom is that in the East there existed in the second century a fixed symbol, or, rather, many symbols, related to the Roman symbol but independent of it. At best the Roman symbol is contemporaneous with the Asiatic or Syrian; more probably it is later. Harnack, who formerly shared this view, is now of opinion that the fact that single sentences seem to be echoes of the symbol, or tally with it, offers no guaranty that they themselves derive from one symbol. Before any symbol existed God was " almighty "; Jesus Christ was called " the only-begotten son, our Lord "; he was proclaimed as " begotten by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary," as having " suffered under Pontius Pilate," and as coming to " judge the quick and the dead." Without following the argument in refutation of the testimonies derived from early Fathers in detail, it can be stated that, while the existence of a primitive typical Eastern form up to a certain point is admitted, nevertheless it is insisted that the great feat of forming the symbol, and of therewith laying the foundation of all ecclesiastical symbols, remains the glory of the community at Rome. To this Roman symbol which is unhesitatingly to be traced back to about the middle of the second century, no doubt Tertullian refers {Hasr., xxxvi.). Had a symbol been established in Rome at the time of the fierce struggle with Gnosticism and Marcionitism (about 145-190), it would have run differently. On the other hand, it is not advisable to go back too far beyond the middle of the second century.
To sum up: The symbol originated in Rome about the middle of the second century. It was
based upon the baptismal formula
io. Sum- and on confessional formulas of a
mary. summarizing character (such as may
be identified from the New Testament and from Ignatius, Justin, and Irensus), which had been generally handed down, including Eastern formulas (Asia Minor, Syria), and was largely under the influence of the New Testament writings. In Rome itself the symbol was never altered. It made its way into the Western provinces from the end of the second century onward, without claiming