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Private Creeds and
their Troubled Authors

ANDREW RADDE-GALLWITZ

This article defends the disputed label “private creeds” as a useful one for
describing a number of fourth-century texts. Offering such a confession
was the normal method for clearing one’s name on charges of heterodoxy
in fourth-century Greek Christianity, though writing such a creed made the
author susceptible to charges of innovation. A number of letters on Trinitarian
doctrine by Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nyssa should be read in light
of the tradition of private creeds. Indeed, the writings of Basil and Gregory
provide unparalleled evidence for the roles such creeds played in Christian
disputes of the fourth century.

In January 360, a small council of bishops met in Constantinople to insti-

tutionalize the victory of the Homoian communion over its rivals in the
East.1 In the wake of the council, Homoiousian bishops across the East
were cast out and replaced by Homoians. One of those rewarded with a
bishopric was Eunomius. It was most likely at this council that Eunomius

Earlier versions of this paper were presented at the Boston Colloquy in Historical
Theology in July 2011, Loyola University Chicago in April 2012, and the University of
Durham in June 2012. The argument has been improved by critical feedback on those
occasions from Lewis Ayres, Michel Barnes, Mark DelCogliano, Steve Hildebrand,
and Susan Wessel, as well as from two anonymous reviewers for JECS.
1. Socrates, historia ecclesiastica (HE) 2.43. For this event as the “victory” of
Homoianism, see Lewis Ayres, Nicaea and its Legacy: An Approach to Fourth-Century
Trinitarian Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 164–66. For the his-
tory of Homoians in the eastern Roman Empire, see Hans Christof Brennecke, Studien
zur Geschichte der Homöer: Der Osten bis zum Ende der homöischen Reichskirche,
Beiträge zur Historischen Theologie 73 (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 1988)
and Timothy D. Barnes, “The Collapse of the Homoeans in the East,” SP 29 (1997):
3–16. For the western Roman Empire, see the introduction to Roger Gryson, ed. and
trans., Scolies Ariennes sur le Concile d’Aquilée, SC 267 (Paris: Éditions du Cerf,
1980) and Daniel H. Williams, Ambrose of Milan and the End of the Nicene-Arian
Conflicts, Oxford Early Christian Studies (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995).

Journal of Early Christian Studies 24:4, 465–490 © 2016 Johns Hopkins University Press
466 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

delivered some version of the text we know as his Apology.2 In giving this
name to his text, Eunomius invoked an entire tradition of Greek forensic
oratory. Such speeches had typical parts: they began with a prologue, in
which the speaker appealed to the jury’s sympathies; they then turned to
a narration of the events or a setting forth of the legal issues involved;
next came the confirmation or proof. This section often began with a kind
of summary or heading (κεφάλαιον) of the argument, followed by more
elaborate proofs.3
Eunomius’s text itself does not name the accusers against whom he had
to defend himself, or what they found objectionable in his teaching. For
Basil of Caesarea, who would write a response some four or five years
later, these omissions meant that the Apology failed to execute its genre
properly, since a defense is required only in the case of accusers.4 Basil’s
criticism might lead one to overlook the many ways in which Eunomius
successfully draws on the tradition of apologetic speeches. To be sure, the
accusers and the accused are not named. The same, however, could be said
for other texts from the period. Moreover, if Eunomius was face-to-face
with his accusers at a synod, there was no need for him to recount the
accusations. We might surmise that Eunomius was accused of teaching
that the Son is unlike the Father, since his teacher Aetius was condemned
by the council on this charge.5 Regardless, the doctrinal allegiance of
Eunomius’s Apology is less important for the purposes of this study than
is Eunomius’s method of defending himself.

2. Richard Paul Vaggione, ed. and trans., Eunomius: The Extant Works, Oxford
Early Christian Texts (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987), 5–9.
3. See, e.g., Pseudo-Hermogenes, On Invention 3.4 (ed. and trans. Hugo Rabe and
George A. Kennedy, Invention and Method: Two Rhetorical Treatises from the Her-
mogenic Corpus, Writings from the Greco-Roman World 15 [Atlanta: SBL, 2005],
73–79). A summary could also appear in the exordium: Cicero, On Invention 1.23;
Quintilian, Institutes 6.1.1–2. The brief summary of the topics at the beginning of
the argument was called the partitio (Cicero, On Invention 1.32).
4. Basil of Caesarea, Against Eunomius (Eun.) 1.2: “Yet his deceptive tactic of
employing apology is refuted because the drama of his apology is staged without any
characters, as he cannot name the accuser against whose charge he makes a pretense
of fighting” (Bernard Sesboüé, ed. and trans., Basile de Césarée. Contre Eunome,
SC 299 [Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1982], 150; trans. Mark DelCogliano and Andrew
Radde-Gallwitz, St. Basil of Caesarea: Against Eunomius, FC 122 [Washington, DC:
Catholic University of America Press, 2011], 84); cf. Eun. 2.1.
5. Or perhaps for contradicting himself: compare Philostorgius, HE 4.12 and 5.1.
Socrates ascribes the condemnation to his obscure and contentious writing style: HE
2.35; Sozomen’s list of charges against Aetius is also broader and vaguer: Sozomen,
HE 4.12 and 4.24, as is the letter cited by Theodoret, HE 2.24.
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 467

After a prologue in which he appeals for an impartial jury, he offers a

statement of faith of his own composition.6 In his creed, Eunomius claims
“to speak in summary fashion as in an overview” (ὡς ἐν ἐπιδρομῇ κεφαλαι-
ωδέστερον εἰπεῖν). That is, this creed provides the headings or summary of
the argument to follow. The creed, he avers, expresses the “simpler faith”
which is “common” to all Christians; it omits both disputed questions and
matters which are absolutely undisputed. Eunomius proceeds to unfold
the sense of this faith through more precise arguments.7 Although the ini-
tial creed occupies just seven lines in Vaggione’s edition, the demonstra-
tions go on for several pages, and starting with Basil, the more extensive
proofs are where readers of Eunomius have focused, with particular atten-
tion to Eunomius’s claims about the incomparable and unbegotten divine
substance. Undoubtedly, much of the interest of the Apology lies in those
proofs, but the opening creed is nonetheless necessary to the work as a
whole. It is clear from remarks in Eunomius’s exordium that the creed
itself ought to be sufficient for his self-defense: “We thought it would be
advantageous for us as an apology (πρὸς ἀπολογίαν) and for those who
uncritically accept what has been said [about us] as an assurance (πρὸς
ἀσφάλειαν), if we put forth a written confession (ἔγγραφον . . . ἐκθέσθαι . . .
τὴν ὁμολογίαν) of our own opinion for you.”8 In this sentence, it is the
confession that serves as his defense and to give assurance to those who
have been listening to his slanderers. After citing the creed, he claims that
it is only the perversity of the calumniators that forces him to elaborate
further beyond the creed; if not for such depravity, the confession itself

6. Eunomius, Apology (Apol.) 5 (Vaggione, 38). Vaggione’s translation of the creed

reads as follows: “We believe in one God, the Father almighty, from whom are all
things; And in one only-begotten Son of God, God the Word, our Lord Jesus Christ,
through whom are all things; And in one holy Spirit, the Counsellor, in whom is given
to each of the saints an apportionment of every grace according to measure for the
common good” (Vaggione, 39); cp. his recapitulation at Apol. 26–27 (Vaggione, 68–73).
7. Eunomius, Apol. 6 (Vaggione, 38–40): δεῖ τινων ἀκριβεστέρων λόγων πρὸς τὴν
διανοίας ἐξάπλωσιν. According to Eunomius, perverse interpretation of this simple creed
has diluted its power to exclude falsehood, especially Sabellian falsehood, from eccle-
siastical communion. The term ἐξάπλωσις is common for naming a detailed exposi-
tion or exegesis (as opposed to a summary): see Galen, Art of Medicine pref. (ed. and
trans. Ian Johnston, On the Constituion of the Art of Medicine; The Art of Medicine;
A Method of Medicine to Glaucon, LCL 523 [Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 2016], 156); Gregory of Nyssa uses the verbal root (ἁπλόω) and compounds
for this purpose: Catechetical Oration 38 (ed. Ekkehard Mühlenberg, Opera minora
dogmatica, Part IV: Oratio Catechetica, GNO 3.4 [Leiden: Brill, 1996], 98); Apologia
in hexaemeron (ed. Hubertus R. Drobner, Gregorii Nysseni In Hexaemeron: Opera
Exegetica in Genesim, Pars I, GNO 4.1 [Leiden: Brill, 2009], 7).
8. Eunomius, Apol. 1 (Vaggione, 34), translation mine.
468 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

would have sufficed.9 While Eunomius’s confession might seem theologi-

cally bland to modern readers and non-committal on the issue of the Son’s
likeness to the Father, when seen in light of the generic expectations that
Eunomius assumed, it is indispensable to the work.
In the years following Constantinople 360, Eunomius’s Apology was
seized on by the opposition to the council. Most famously, around 364/5,
a young Basil, not yet bishop of Caesarea, was commanded to write a refu-
tation. It is likely, though not certain, that Basil received this order from
Eustathius of Sebasteia, who was a friend and role model for Basil at this
point.10 Eustathius’s own views are difficult to reconstruct, but it would
appear that he was a Homoiousian, one of many from this camp who
would come to embrace the Nicene Creed in the 360s, though Eustathius
himself later repudiated this creed. In a later letter, Basil recalls himself
“dictating objections to the heresy” for Eustathius’s use at the Synod of
Lampsacus in 364.11 Basil’s Against Eunomius most likely had its origins
in this milieu. Although the two would eventually part ways, Basil’s affec-
tion for Eustathius at this point was beyond doubt.12
In addition to faulting Eunomius for not naming his accusers, Basil
also balked at how Eunomius used his statement of faith in the Apology.
Basil reports an unsubstantiated rumor that Eunomius’s creed was origi-
nally composed by Arius. But Basil did not find Eunomius’s creed itself
objectionable; he merely criticized how Eunomius moved from this rather
bland statement to his abominable heresy, which he did by offering clever
demonstrations purportedly following from the statement of faith.13 How,

9. Eunomius, Apol. 6 (Vaggione, 38): ἀσφαλῆ τὴν ἡσυχίαν ἡμῖν ἐγγυωμένης τῆς
ὁμολογίας.
10. Basil, Eun. 1.1. For the date and addressee, see DelCogliano and Radde-Gallwitz,
Against Eunomius, 33 and 81n6.
11. Basil, ep. 223.5 (ed. Yves Courtonne, Saint Basile. Lettres, 3 vols. [Paris: Les
Belles Lettres, 1957–1966], 3:14).
12. See Basil’s later report: ep. 244.1. In addition to their shared ascetic vision,
there was their shared public confession of faith, at least up until 372. Eustathius
accepted the Nicene faith during his mission to Rome in 367, an acceptance ratified
at a synod of Homoiousians-turned-Nicenes in Tyana that year (on which, see Sozo-
men, HE 6.10–12). Basil would use this anecdote against Eustathius later, accusing
him of flip-flopping: epp. 244.9, 263.3.
13. Basil, Eun. 1.4. Basil’s report is that the Arius “proposed this faith to Alexan-
der in order to deceive him” (DelCogliano and Radde-Gallwitz, Against Eunomius,
88), which implies that the faith would appear orthodox to Alexander. It is possible
that Basil has conflated three creeds: (1) Eunomius’s creed; (2) Arius’s creedal letter
to Alexander; and (3) the creedal letter of Arius and Euzoius to Constantine in 327.
Arius’s letters are discussed below at 471, 473–74. It is possible that letter (3) is not
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 469

Basil chides, could he cite this as if it were the inerrant rule and criterion
of doctrine, but then proceed to supplement it or even correct it with fur-
ther argumentation?
In fact, Eunomius’s method of apology would later prove useful to Basil
himself and to his younger brother Gregory of Nyssa. Two years after
Basil’s consecration as bishop of Caesarea, his cordial relationship with
Eustathius was broken as accusations started to swirl, some of them regard-
ing Basil’s teaching on the Holy Spirit. Each side began to employ spies
to keep watch on the other.14 Around the same time, Basil, in a number
of letters, offered brief statements of faith. In some, he promised to pro-
vide in person more detailed scriptural demonstrations of this faith than
he was able to offer in the letters themselves; in other letters, he sketched
such proofs. This essay places these texts, as well as similar works writ-
ten by Gregory of Nyssa, within the tradition of apologetically-motivated
private creeds.

PRIVATE CREEDS

To call these statements of faith “creeds” raises the problem of whether it

is coherent to speak of private creeds. The category of “Privat-Symbole”
gained currency with the third edition of G. L. Hahn’s Bibliothek der Sym-
bole und Glaubensregeln der alten Kirche, published in 1897.15 Nonethe-
less, some scholars have rejected the category as confused, since, on their
view, creeds are by definition public.16 Others continue to use the term.

on Basil’s mind at all. However, given that letter (3) is generally regarded as bland
and uninformative, Basil’s remark makes more sense if he is thinking of that docu-
ment than if he is thinking of letter (2). If he is thinking of the content of letter (3),
his identification of Alexander as the letter’s addressee suggests he is confusing let-
ters (2) and (3). Letter (2) is certainly conciliatory in tone, but it is hard to view it
as so vague as to be deceptive, especially if one follows Rowan Williams in viewing
the letter as precipitating Arius’s condemnation, rather than as an attempt to regain
communion (see below, n.24).
14. Note Basil’s admission of employing informants at ep. 223.7.
15. August Hahn, G. Ludwig Hahn, and Adolf von Harnack, eds., Bibliothek der
Symbole und Glaubensregeln der alten Kirche, 3rd ed. (Breslau: Verlag von E. Mor-
genstern, 1897), 253–363. The second edition in 1877 included a similar section
entitled “Symbole einzelner Kirchenlehrer” (183–288). Although I am arguing that
there was indeed a tradition of “private creeds,” I have included a somewhat differ-
ent sampling of the tradition.
16. See, e.g., Wolfram Kinzig and Markus Vinzent, “Recent Research on the Origin
of the Creed,” JTS (n. s.) 50 (1999): 535–59, at 541, 553, and the citation of Har-
nack at 556n74 (for further discussion, see below, n.39); Tarmo Toom, “Marcellus
470 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

Caroline Humfress, for instance, argues that “the use of private creeds
and anathemas in the fourth and fifth centuries . . . underscores the flu-
idity of Christian doctrine, and the taxonomical process at work in the
formation of an agreed set of ‘orthodox’ beliefs in any given context, at
any given time.”17
To wade through this disputed territory, we must first clarify how pri-
vate creeds relate to other creeds. There is general consensus over two
other kinds of creed in the fourth century, which we might call conciliar
creeds and declaratory, catechetical creeds.18 Both were public documents,
the products, respectively, of gatherings of bishops and of local baptismal
traditions rather than of individual authors. Conciliar and catechetical
creeds shared certain features: in both cases, the statement of faith fol-
lows a Trinitarian order, Father, Son, and Spirit. In some cases, additional
material is added. Specific anathemas appear in conciliar creeds, but not in
catechetical ones. In the fourth century, as in subsequent centuries, neither
of these two types of creed was envisioned as replacing the other kind:
the creed of the Council of Nicaea (325), for instance, did not replace the
creed learned during catechesis and recited by a baptizand in Milan, even
if the bishop of Milan defended the Nicene Creed as the proper touch-
stone of orthodoxy.19
Debate emerges, however, when we turn to individually-authored state-
ments of faith, which fit under neither the conciliar nor the catechetical

of Ancyra and Priscillan of Avila: Their Theologies and Creeds,” VC 68 (2014):

60–81, at 62n7.
17. Caroline Humfress, Orthodoxy and the Courts in Late Antiquity (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2007), 228.
18. From the end of the second century, there is widespread evidence of churches
using short, interrogatory creeds at baptism: the evidence comes from North Africa,
Rome, Palestine, Cappadocia, and Alexandria. As the catechumenate became more
formalized, in the later fourth century, longer declaratory creeds emerged. These were
ritually handed over to catechumens in the final weeks of preparation and ritually
recited shortly before baptism. See Paul F. Bradshaw, “The profession of faith in early
Christian baptism,” Evangelical Quarterly 78 (2006): 101–15; Kinzig and Vincent,
“Recent Research,” 542–50.
19. C. H. Turner, The History and Use of Creeds and Anathemas, 2nd ed. (London:
SPCK, 1910), 24. For a helpful summary focusing on the Latin churches, see Daniel H.
Williams, “Constantine and the ‘Fall’ of the Church,” in Christian Origins: Theology,
Rhetoric, and Community, ed. Lewis Ayres and Gareth Jones (New York: Routledge,
1998), 117–36 at 127–29. The Nicene Creed, as revised at Constantinople (381), did
gradually assume a liturgical function within the eucharistic liturgy, but not until the
sixth century in the East, a practice which was accepted in the West gradually and
with regional variations between the sixth and eleventh centuries: see J. N. D. Kelly,
Early Christian Creeds, 3rd ed. (New York: David McKay Company, 1972), 348–57.
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 471

label. Let us first review a selection of the evidence before addressing some
criticism of the label “private creeds.”20 The origin of such compositions
is murky, but seems to lie in the practice of ecclesiastical investigation
of the kind we see for the first time in the third century in the cases of
Heraclides and Paul of Samosata.21 In the Dialogue, Heraclides offers a
brief statement of faith before the text proceeds to Origen’s questioning.
Regardless of the third-century background, the earliest extant, written
example of a private creed is Arius’s creedal letter to his bishop Alexander
of Alexandria, from around 321 c.e.22 There has been some debate as to
what prompted Arius’s creed. Rowan Williams argues that “the obvious
context for it would be either as a response to Alexander’s demand for
clarification when Arius was first delated for heresy, or as a submission to
be read out at the synod [of Alexandria] itself.”23 For Williams, then, the
creed predates the official condemnation of Arius. Richard Hanson, by
contrast, maintains that the creed is a petition for readmission following
the condemnation.24 Unfortunately, there is no external evidence to help
one decide the matter. In either case, the apologetic intent of the creed is
not in question.

20. The following survey is not exhaustive. It is limited to Greek texts and omits,
for instance, Arius’s Letter to Eusebius of Nicomedia and the fragments of Asterius
the Sophist.
21. For the former, see Origen, Dialogue with Heraclides, and the latter, Eusebius,
HE 7.30. See the review of scholarly positions in Hamilton Hess, The Early Devel-
opment of Canon Law and the Council of Serdica, Oxford Early Christian Stud-
ies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 12–15. The letter written to Paul only
partially anticipates the conciliar creeds of the fourth century: it contains the typical
formula ἔκθεσις τῆς πίστεως, but not a creed. It is long and rambling, rather than a
short exposition: see Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, 207.
22. This creed is preserved in Athanasius, De synodis 16; Epiphanius, Panarion
69.7; and Hilary, De trinitate 4.12ff. and 6.5ff. It is edited as Urkunde 6 by H.-G.
Opitz, Athanasius Werke III. Band. 1. Teil. Urkunden zur Geschichte des Arianischen
Streits 318–328 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1935), 12–13. An English translation can
be found in William G. Rusch, ed. The Trinitarian Controversy, Sources of Early
Christian Thought (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1980), 31–32. See the arguments regarding
the date of the work in Rowan Williams, Arius: Heresy and Tradition, rev. ed. (Grand
Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2002), 52, with the chronological table of Arius’s works on 58.
23. Williams, Arius, 52
24. R. P. C. Hanson, The Search for the Christian Doctrine of God: The Arian
Controversy, 318–381 (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2005), 7–8. Like Opitz, Hanson
places the “Letter to Alexander” in roughly 320 after the “Letter to Eusebius of Nico-
media.” Williams, by contrast, places the “Letter to Alexander” first. In any case,
Arius’s is the first extant “private creed” of the fourth century. Sara Parvis prefers a
slightly later date (spring 322) for the outbreak of literary controversy in Alexandria:
Marcellus of Ancyra and the Lost Years of the Arian Controversy, 325–345 (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2006), 69.
472 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

Such an intent is clear also in the letter from Alexander of Alexandria

to his namesake in Byzantium regarding Arius. After a lengthy account
of Arius, in which Alexander plays the prosecution, he pivots to the
defense. He first recounts the charge: he has been accused of teaching
that there are “two unbegottens.”25 He immediately proceeds to offer his
own statement of faith, which is obviously tailored to rebut this accusa-
tion without relenting on Alexander’s general point in the letter about the
Son’s indescribable generation.26 Given these specific features, there is no
reason to think that Alexander, or Arius for that matter, was adapting a
creed “properly designed for use at baptism.”27 No doubt Alexander, like
Arius, is employing a form known to him from a baptismal context; but
we should not envision him editing a text. Like Arius’s creed, Alexander’s
is of his own composition.
We find a creed in Eusebius of Caesarea’s letter to his diocese following
the Council of Nicaea.28 Eusebius says he read it at the council; presumably

25. Alexander, Letter to Alexander 44 (preserved in Theodoret, HE 1.4.46ff. and

edited as Urkunde 14 by Opitz, Athanasius Werke III.1, Urkunde 14.44, 26).
26. Alexander, Letter to Alexander 46 (Opitz, Athanasius Werke III.1, Urkunde
14.46, 26–27): “Concerning these matters, we ourselves believe in the way that seems
best to the apostolic church: in a sole unbegotten Father, who has no cause of his being,
is unchangeable and unalterable, who is always consistent and the same, admitting
neither growth nor diminution, giver of the law, the prophets, and the gospels, Lord
of the patriarchs, apostles, and all the saints; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-
begotten Son of God; born not from nothing, but from the one who is Father, nor in
the manner of bodies with cuttings or discharges from separations, as Sabellius and
Valentinus think, but ineffably and indescribably, according to the statement which
we cited above, ‘his birth who can tell?’ (Isa 53.8), since his hypostasis is beyond
investigation for every nature that has an origin, just as the Father is beyond inves-
tigation because the nature of rational beings cannot contain the knowledge of the
Father’s divine birthing.” Alexander does eventually include a clause on the Spirit at
Letter to Alexander 53.
27. Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, 206.
28. Preserved in Athanasius, De decretis 33.4–6 (ed. H.-G. Opitz, Athanasius Werke
II.1. De decretis [Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1935], 29): “Just as we received from
our bishops at our initial catechesis, and when we received the bath; and just as we
learned from the divine scriptures and as we believed and taught in the presbyterate
and the episcopate itself; so too we now believe our faith which we publicize to you.
It is as follows: We believe in one God, Father, almighty, maker of all things, visible
and invisible; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God, God from God, light
from light, life from life, only-begotten Son, firstborn of all creation, born from the
Father before all ages, through whom all things came into being, who for our salva-
tion was incarnate and dwelt among human beings, suffered and rose on the third
day, ascended to the Father, and will come again in glory to judge the living and
the dead. We believe also in one Holy Spirit. We believe each of these to exist and
subsist: Father truly Father, Son truly Son, and Holy Spirit truly Holy Spirit, just as
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 473

his aim was to clear his name for re-admittance to communion follow-
ing his excommunication earlier that year at a council in Antioch.29 The
creed begins with an autobiographical touch aimed at showing Eusebius’s
constancy: this is the faith he has always believed—as a catechumen, as
a student of the Scriptures, and then as presbyter and bishop. What fol-
lows is sometimes taken as a citation of the Caesarean church’s baptismal
creed. To be sure, Eusebius expects his Caesarean audience to recognize it
as representing their shared faith. There are, however, obvious expansions,
such as his claim that this formula represents Eusebius’s faith “from the
time when we were self-aware.”30 It is impossible to state exactly where
the personal expansions by Eusebius begin and end within the document.
What matters here is that he used a creed with at least some personal
touches for apologetic purposes. At Nicaea, Eusebius sought to ensure that
a favorable decision regarding his present-day creed can be retroactively
applied to his former life, mitigating the disgrace of his condemnation. It
is the only case studied here in which an author is concerned with prov-
ing his orthodoxy not only in the present, but also in the past—a topic
we shall return to in this article’s conclusion.
The apologetic motive is clear in the letter Arius and Euzoius sent to
Constantine in 327, which contains a creed.31 Athanasius and Socrates

our Lord said when he sent forth his disciples to preach: Go, make disciples of all
nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit (Matt 28.19). Regarding these things, we strongly affirm that it is so and that
this is how we think and have done from long ago and will stand for this faith until
death, anathematizing every godless heresy. Having always thought these things in
our heart and soul, from the time when we were self-aware, we testify that we now
think and speak truthfully in the presence of God almighty and our Lord Jesus Christ,
and are able to show through proofs and persuade you that this is how we believed
and preached in previous times.”
29. See Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, 224.
30. See the full citation in n.28.
31. Preserved in Socrates, HE 1.26.2 and Sozomen, HE 2.27.6, and edited as
Urkunde 30 by H.-G. Opitz, ed. Athanasius Werke III.2 Urkunden zur Geschicte
des Arianischen Streits 318–328 (Berlin and Leipzig: Walter de Gruyter, 1935), 64:
“We believe in one God, the Father Almighty. And in the Lord Jesus Christ, his
Only-begotten Son, who was begotten from him before all the ages, God the Word,
through whom all things were made both in the heavens and on earth, who came
down, took flesh, suffered, rose again, ascended into the heavens, and will come
again to judge the living and the dead. And in the Holy Spirit, in the resurrection of
the flesh, in the life of the coming age, in the kingdom of the heavens, and in one
Catholic Church of God which extends from border to border. This is the faith we
have received from the holy Gospels, when the Lord said to his disciples, Go, make
disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and
of the Holy Spirit (Matt 28.19).”
474 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

offer some context for the letter’s composition. According to Socrates,

a presbyter in the imperial household persuaded the emperor of Arius’s
orthodoxy, indeed, of his adherence to the Nicene Creed. Constantine then
summoned Arius. Arius brought Euzoius with him and they convinced the
emperor of their orthodoxy in person. Socrates dubiously claims that they
satisfied Constantine by assenting to the Nicene Creed; still, some such
meeting likely occurred. Constantine reported this meeting in a letter to
the bishops and presbyters assembled in Jerusalem for the dedication of
the Church of the Resurrection. That council’s letter, which summarizes
Constantine’s letter to them, is quoted in Athanasius’s De synodis 21.
Unlike Socrates, the council fathers whose summary Athanasius provides
are not specific about what was said during the viva voce exchange between
Constantine and the Arians, and they make no mention of Nicaea. Atha-
nasius’s report and Socrates agree that it was only after this meeting that
Constantine requested that the Arians in question pen a written statement
of faith. The emperor subjoined copies of this statement to his own letter
urging the bishops to readmit tous peri Areion to communion. The written
statement of faith produced by Arius and Euzoius was included in order
to convince bishops of their orthodoxy, coupled with Constantine’s testi-
mony regarding their interview with him. For Constantine, the interview
itself was apparently sufficient. Naturally, Arius and Euzoius could not
give direct interviews to all the bishops and presbyters involved at Jeru-
salem, and so their letter and creed stood in their place.
Another private creed can be found in Marcellus of Ancyra’s apologetic
“Letter to Julian,” bishop of Rome, from 340/1. This document in fact
contains a creed within a creed: there is Marcellus’s creed which frames the
citation of another creed, a Roman baptismal creed that is quite similar to
the Apostles’ Creed that Rufinus would comment on decades later in 404.32
Roughly contemporary with Marcellus is Theophronius of Cappadocian
Tyana’s creed at the Dedication Council in Antioch in 341, perhaps defend-
ing himself against suspicions of Marcellanism.33 As in the cases of Eusebius

32. Reported in Epiphanius, Panarion 72.2–3. See Kinzig and Vinzent, “Recent
Research,” 550; Toom, “Marcellus of Ancyra and Priscillan of Avila.” Unfortunately,
Toom only refers to the Roman creed that Marcellus includes as Marcellus’s creed,
neglecting that it is surrounded by a lengthier statement of faith that is clearly of
Marcellus’s own composition. Acknowledging this would lead him to revise his skep-
ticism regarding the very category of “private creeds,” as expressed at “Marcellus
of Ancyra,” 62n7.
33. Reported in Athanasius, De synodis 24; cf. Humfress, Orthodoxy and the
Courts, 228.
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 475

and Arius-Euzoius, Theophronius’s creed was submitted to a council; like

them, Theophronius gained the prelates’ signatures on his creed.
We therefore see the same method of apology being used by church-
men of various parties in the two decades from 321 to 341. Put simply,
there was a well-established tradition that Eunomius, Basil, and Gregory
of Nyssa employed in their own defense. The method did not fade with
the accession of Valens or Theodosius. In 375, Vitalius, the Apollinarian
bishop of Antioch, defended his teaching to Pope Damasus with a creed,
complete with anathemas.34 In 383, Theodosius sought to effect a recon-
ciliation among all the sects and summoned their heads to the city. Various
methods were proposed for achieving the sought after unity. Ultimately,
the emperor, in consultation with Nectarius, the Nicene bishop of Con-
stantinople, informed the head of each party to compose a creed defending
himself and his communion. Since both the Novatian and non-Novatian
leaders supported the homoousion, they submitted their creeds jointly, and
unsurprisingly were the sole winners, a verdict Theodosius himself declared
after prayerful consideration. Despite their affinity for Nicaea, Socrates’s
report implies that Nectarius and Agelius, the Novatian bishop, crafted
a new creed for the occasion.35 Among those condemned once again was
Eunomius, though we are fortunate to possess his confession from this occa-
sion. Similarly to the way he frames his creed in the Apology, Eunomius
implies that his confession will serve as an apology (πρὸς ἀπολογίαν).36
The same terminology was used to name these private creeds as was
used for conciliar creeds. Familiar labels like “the faith” (ἡ πίστις), “the
exposition of the faith” (ἡ τῆς πίστεως ἔκθεσις), and “the confession” (ἡ
ὁμολογία) occur for the individually-authored summaries. Sometimes, we
have only the text without any framing or title; sometimes one of these
titles is modified by the term “written,” presumably in order to distin-
guish it from the kind of oral profession given either at baptism or in a
face-to-face inquiry as in the case of Heraclides. Moreover, the private
creeds often bear the same form as that used at Nicaea and other councils:
a summary of belief, typically in Trinitarian order, followed by anathe-
mas.37 The individual creeds also have similarities with catechetical creeds
in their allusions to the practice of baptism. Eusebius and Arius-Euzoius

34. See Hans Lietzmann, Apollinaris und seine Schule: Texte und Untersuchungen
(Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1904), 1:273; cf. Gregory of Nazianzus, ep. 102.3.
35. Socrates, HE 5.10.
36. Eunomius, Expositio fidei 1 (Vaggione, 150).
37. Cf. A. M. Ritter, “Creeds,” in Early Christianity: Origins and Evolution to
AD 600, ed. I. Hazlett (London: SPCK, 1991), 92–100, at 96–97.
476 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

explicitly cite the baptismal formula of Matthew 28.19, as do Basil and

Gregory, as we will see.38
One clear difference between private creeds and either conciliar or cat-
echetical creeds is the individual authorship. In this sense, they are like
the earlier summaries known as “rules of faith,” which were written by
individuals such as Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Origen. But are private creeds
simply fourth-century versions of “rules of faith”? Naturally, one notes
similarities in form and content between the two groups of texts, and there
is a similar appeal to the authority of a broad ecclesiastical tradition rather
than that of the individual author. Kinzig and Vinzent have concluded
that private creeds are no different from the earlier rules of faith.39 They
rightly note that it would be question-begging to say that two sets are
generically different because of the different time periods in which they
were composed. But they do not consider the difference in the intended
purposes of the two sets of texts, which is the source of the generic dis-
tinction I am drawing. In addition to summarizing the church’s baptismal
faith, rules of faith as they appear in second- and third-century literature
were primarily meant to be used by a reader to adjudicate the orthodoxy
of some third party. The author sets forth the norm that the reader can
apply to the case at hand; the obvious intention in authors like Irenaeus
or Tertullian is to show the heterodoxy of a specific opponent or set of
opponents. There can be defensive motives as well—in Against Praxeas,

38. Eusebius in fact employed variant texts of Matt 28.19. See H. Benedict Green,
“Matthew 28:19, Eusebius, and the lex orandi,” in The Making of Orthodoxy:
Essays in Honour of Henry Chadwick, ed. Rowan Williams (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1989), 124–41. For a translation of Arius and Euzoius’s statement,
see n.31 above.
39. Kinzig and Vinzent, “Recent Research,” 541: “All those texts that are classified
by scholars as ‘private creeds’ are, in fact, nothing else than ‘rules of faith,’ even if
their authors do not appeal to a κανὼν τῆς ἀληθείας/ τῆς πίστεως or to a regula veritatis/
fidei. To distinguish between the ‘rule’ and ‘private creeds’ [here they footnote the work
of von Campenhausen and Ritter] only adds to the confusion with which research
on the creeds already abounds.” In the note, they say, “there are various reasons,
however, why such a differentiation in fact rather muddies things. (a) It seems diffi-
cult to see why the ‘private creed’ has a function at variance with the ‘rule of faith’:
in both cases an author appeals to an ‘orthodox’ consensus over against ‘heterodox’
views. (b) The fact that the theological debate becomes more sophisticated does not
change the basic fact that the function remains the same. (c) Finally, even though it is
correct that ‘private creeds’ no longer appeal to the ‘rule of faith,’ the appeal to the
Scriptures is by no means meant to be less authoritative. In both cases it is an appeal
to tradition as opposed to one’s ‘personal authority’” (Kinzig and Vinzent, “Recent
Research,” 541n27). See now also the useful guide and literature review in Everett
Ferguson, The Rule of Faith: A Guide (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2015).
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 477

for instance, Tertullian mentions critics of his own views in addition to

Praxeas’s errors.40 The principal aim, however, is to expose and refute
Praxeas. If rules of faith are primarily prosecutory, private creeds are pri-
marily used by the defense, that is, by someone who has been accused of
heterodoxy. In one case, which will be discussed below, a private creed
was drawn up by a third party and given to a defendant in order for the
accused to clear his name.41 Regardless of the shift in authorship from
the defendant to an interested third party, the apologetic intent is the
same. In accordance with the difference in intention, private creeds and
rules of faith envision different roles for their implied audiences. Rules of
faith appear in works with various implied audiences. Despite the vari-
ety, readers are not expected to judge the rule itself; instead, they are to
use the rule to judge someone else. The explicit or implicit audience for
private creeds is more specific. Readers function as a jury—often, though
not always, consisting of bishops—whose task it is to judge the author
and his creed. The audience’s putative sympathies with the accused range
from warmth, as in Alexander’s Letter to Alexander, to suspicion, as in
Arius’s Letter to Alexander.
To say that the apologetic intention is a trait of private creeds does not,
of course, imply that such documents have no other uses. As noted in the
case of Eunomius’s Apology, a privately-authored creed could function in
an author’s development of a theological idea or as a refutation of some
problematic doctrine. Self-defense was not necessarily the only purpose
one might have in writing one’s own creed; I hope to show, nonetheless,
that defense was an essential motive as far as we can tell from the extant
examples. Further studies are needed to examine how authors use such
creeds in their theological argumentation; for present purposes, I will focus
primarily on these documents’ apologetic purposes.
If it makes sense to consider private creeds as a distinct form of extant
literature emerging in the fourth century (recall that the third-century prec-
edent of Heraclides is not a written text), then we need to bring different
assumptions to them than we bring to conciliar and catechetical creeds or
to rules of faith. At the same time, we must underscore that the authors
of private creeds wished to downplay their own originality and accord-
ingly alluded to the language of rules of faith, catechetical creeds, and, in
Basil’s case, to conciliar creeds. Here balance is needed: while the texts
in question only make sense as individual compositions, they are highly
formulaic. This is not to say that they are simply milquetoast formulae

40. Tertullian, Against Praxeas 3.

41. Basil, ep. 125.
478 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

intended to cloak more controversial views, a judgment that has fueled

some of the neglect of these texts. Speaking of Arius and Euzoius’s brief
to Constantine, R. P. C. Hanson complained of its “entirely colourless
creed which has been carefully divested of any controversial wording,”
inferring that the document is “without theological significance.”42 Mar-
cellus’s creed has been judged similarly, beginning with Epiphanius.43 Basil
criticized Eunomius along these lines, as did Gregory Nazianzen in the
case of Vitalius. We can see the problem with this line of criticism if we
recall our earlier distinction between creed and argument: in many cases,
such as Eunomius’s Apology, a text offers first a statement of faith and
then further elaboration or proof. One assumption lying behind the criti-
cism of private creeds as disingenuous is that what truly mattered for the
authors of private creeds is the elaboration. But we must bear in mind the
role a creed is playing within a work as a whole. When viewed from the
perspective of the work itself, the elaboration serves to buttress the creed.
No elaboration was needed; we have a number of cases in which the bare
creed (sometimes coupled with anathemas) did the work of self-defense.
The elaboration serves the creed, and the creed serves the work’s overarch-
ing goal of self-defense. Of course, this analysis is not intended to deny the
interest of the more elaborate arguments, but to clarify the place of those
arguments within apologetic texts. We will return in the article’s conclu-
sion to the matter of how a creed could prove an author’s innocence. For
now, let us turn to the evidence Basil provides for private creed-writing.

BASIL AND EUSTATHIUS

As mentioned earlier, Basil offers statements of faith of his own composi-

tion in a few letters. In order to grasp why Basil felt compelled to author
his own creeds, we must place his doctrinal work in the context of his
role of imperially-sanctioned oversight of churches in Armenia.44 In 372,
he was entrusted with the task of appointing bishops for Armenia. Basil
was to work with Theodotus, bishop of Nicopolis in Armenia Minor. Like
Basil, Theodotus was a supporter of Nicaea. Yet, Theodotus distrusted
Basil because of his known communion with Eustathius, whom Theodotus
suspected of heresy, presumably having to do with denial of the Spirit’s
divinity, for which Eustathius would become notorious. Beginning around

42. Hanson, Search, 8–9.

43. See Toom, “Marcellus of Ancyra,” 67.
44. For a fuller account, see Philip Rousseau, Basil of Caesarea (Berkeley: Univer-
sity of California Press, 1994), 270–87.
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 479

374, Basil would openly attack him on these grounds; two years earlier,
Theodotus was apparently an early opponent. The Eustathian side had
started its attack on defenders of the Spirit. A certain Poimenos, a pres-
byter under Eustathius in Sebasteia, accused Basil in 372 of heterodoxy.45
In 372, Basil was still seeking reconciliation. Basil sought to assure The-
odotus of Eustathius’s orthodoxy—and vice-versa. Basil first had a face-
to-face meeting with Eustathius and became convinced that he remained
orthodox. However, Basil failed to secure from Eustathius a “written con-
fession” (ἔγγραφον . . . ὁμολογίαν) which he could have used to assuage
Theodotus’s doubts. Basil’s solution was to have Theodotus provide a
“written profession of faith” (γραμματεῖον πίστεως), which he could then
present to Eustathius for his signature.46 Although this never happened,
it is worth noting that Basil assumed that both Eustathius and Theodotus
were capable of producing written creedal statements. Even though there
is an implicit test of Eustathius’s orthodoxy here, Basil’s broader intention
is to work as an advocate for his defense.47
Basil described all this in a letter to Terence, a Roman general holding
the rank of comes and a pro-Nicene Christian. Terence was a friend and
the recipient of two other letters from Basil. Like Basil, he had an inter-
est in Christian affairs in Armenia and in Antioch, despite his retirement
from public duty to a life of ascetic withdrawal, a retirement punctuated
by public engagement in church affairs in Antioch.
Ultimately, in 373, Basil met with Eustathius and presented him with
a creed of his own composition.48 He even secured Eustathius’s signature
on it. Basil’s creed tries to avoid novelty. Within the document, Basil cites
the Nicene Creed verbatim (ἡ αὐτὴ ἡ πίστις ἡ κατὰ Νίκαιαν συγγραφεῖσα).49

45. Basil, ep. 99.2.

46. Basil, ep. 99.3 (Courtonne, 1:216).
47. Indeed, if we accept Basil’s account of Eustathius’s early career in ep. 263.3 at
face value, then we must conclude that during the fourth century the normal practice
of making apology when accused of heterodoxy, at least in the regions of Cappadocia,
Pontus, and Armenia Minor, was to offer a confession of faith either to an accusing
bishop or publicly to the people. It seems Eustathius had presented statements to
bishop Hermogenes of Caesarea and to his own people on different occasions. See
also Basil, ep. 244.9. For general comment on the rise of “Creeds as Tests of Ortho-
doxy,” see Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, chap. 7, esp. 206–7; Turner, Creeds and
Anathemas, 24–29. Recall again Origen’s Dialogue with Heraclides, in which Origen
employs an interrogative creed to test Heraclides’s orthodoxy.
48. This is extant as Basil, ep. 125; cf. ep. 223.7 (Courtonne, 3:16), where Basil
refers back to this as “a summary of faith” (ὑπογραφῇ τινι πίστεως), and says that the
motive for presenting it to Eustathius was to allay the suspicions of others.
49. Basil, ep. 125.1. Note his other ways of naming the creed in this letter: τὴν
ὑπὸ τῶν μακαρίων Πατέρων ἐν τῇ κατὰ Νίκαιάν ποτε συγκροτηθείσῃ συνόδῳ γραφεῖσαν
480 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

He notes, in a fashion that will become typical for him, that the only point
left unaddressed at Nicaea was the question of the Spirit, because the ques-
tion had not yet been raised; he also expresses his concern that Nicaea be
interpreted in a non-Sabellian direction.50 In the form of anathemas, Basil
fills in what was lacking:
We must anathematize those who say that the Holy Spirit is a creature and
those who think in this way, as well as those who do not confess that it
is holy by nature—as the Father is holy by nature and the Son is holy by
nature—but who alienate it from the divine and blessed nature. Proof of the
right way of thinking is not to separate it from Father and Son (for we must
be baptized as we have received, and believe as we are baptized, and offer
praise as we have believed: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit), and to abstain
from communion with those who call it a creature, since they are open
blasphemers.
It is agreed—and the remark is necessary because of slanderers—that
we do not call the Holy Spirit unbegotten, since we know that there is
one unbegotten and one first principle of beings, the Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ. Nor do we call it begotten, since we have been taught in the
tradition of the faith that the Only-begotten is one. Having learned that the
Spirit of truth proceeds from the Father, we confess that it is from God in
an uncreated manner. And we anathematize those who say call the Holy
Spirit is a minister, since through this statement they drag it down to the
rank of something created. After all, scripture taught us that the ministering
spirits are created when it said that All are ministering spirits sent to serve
(Heb 1.14).51

Basil also anathematizes those who disturb the order established by the
Lord, placing the Spirit before the Father or between the Father and the Son.
After signing it, Eustathius immediately disavowed Basil’s statement of
faith. Basil officially kept his silence for two to three years. Although he

πίστιν; . . . ὅτι πιστεύσουσι κατὰ τὰ ῥήματα ἐκτεθέντα ἐν τῇ Νικαίᾳ καὶ κατὰ τὴν ὑγιῶς
ὑπὸ τῶν ῥημἀτων τοῦτων ἐμφαινομένην διάνοιαν; . . . ἐν ταύτῃ τῇ πίστει . . . (all from
ep. 125.1; Courtonne, 2:30–32). Basil can refer to the creed as “this faith” or as
“the faith written by the blessed Fathers”; or he can refer to the “words according
to which” people believe, which were “set forth at Nicaea,” and which contain a
sound “sense.” In epp. 113 and 114, Basil similarly recommends a minimum set of
standards for reconciliation with Pneumatomachians: acceptance of the Nicene Creed
and confession that the Spirit is not a creature. For discussion, see Michael Haykin,
“And Who is the Spirit?: Basil of Caesarea’s Letters to the Church at Tarsus,” VC
41 (1987): 377–85.
50. See Stephen M. Hildebrand, The Trinitarian Theology of Basil of Caesarea: A
Synthesis of Greek Thought and Biblical Truth (Washington, DC: Catholic University
of America Press, 2007), 84–85.
51. Basil, ep. 125.3 (Courtonne, 2:33–34).
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 481

spoke about the Holy Spirit, he never rebuked Eustathius until around
375. When Basil made his break with Eustathius public, he acknowledged
that he had been accused of innovation regarding the Spirit.52 In a later
letter, Basil commented on his reason for composing this creed. He says
he wrote the creed at the request of presumably sympathetic parties in
Nicopolis. He complied with their request, saying that it fulfilled two aims:
“I expected both to persuade the Nicopolitans not to think ill of the man
[i.e., Eustathius], and to shut the mouths of my calumniators.”53 The goal
of his writing is, therefore, not simply to transmit doctrine, but principally
to defend himself and Eustathius in the face of suspicion.

BASIL’S PRIVATE CREEDS

Before the affair with Eustathius, Basil had commented on creeds in let-
ters and had reflected extensively on the divinity of the Son and Spirit in
Against Eunomius. He had not yet, to our knowledge, written a creed of
his own. Around the time of the ill-fated creed that Eustathius signed and
then renounced, Basil wrote two expositions of faith in private letters.
One came in a letter to Terence’s daughters, who, according to the letter’s
inscription, were deaconesses. Philip Rousseau helpfully calls attention to
this “nugget of catechesis,” though he does not intend “catechesis” in its
ordinary usage since the addressees are deaconesses.54 Basil refers to their
profession of faith in the past tense and does not presume an uninstructed
audience. Instead, he assumes that his presentation will conform to what
they have already professed, presumably in their baptismal vows:
You have believed in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; do not betray this sacred
trust.
Father, the first principle of all things;
Only-begotten Son, begotten from him, true God, perfect from perfect,
living image, showing the Father entirely in himself;
Holy Spirit, having its existence from God, fount of holiness, life-giving
power, grace which perfects, through which men are made sons, and
mortals are made immortal, connected with Father and Son in all respects:
in glory and eternity, in power and kingship, in sovereignty and divinity, as
even the tradition of saving baptism testifies.
But, as for those who say that the Son or the Spirit is a creature, or who
generally draw the Spirit down into the rank of minister and slave, they are

52. Basil, ep. 226.3; cf. ep. 223.

53. Basil, ep. 244.2 (Courtonne, 3:75); cf. ep. 130.
54. Rousseau, Basil of Caesarea, 166.
482 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

far from the truth. We ought to avoid communion with them and to turn
away their words, since they are snares for the soul.
But if the Lord ever grants that we should meet, we will set forth for
you in fuller detail (πλατύτερον)55 the rationale of the faith, so that, with
scriptural proofs (μετ’ ἀποδείξεων γραφικῶν), you will recognize that the
truth is strong and the heresy is unstable.56

Basil defers the fuller presentation of “the rationale of the faith” to a

face-to-face meeting, where “scriptural proofs” will be shared, marking
what he has just offered as a summary. It follows the familiar pattern of
fourth-century creeds: Father, Son, Spirit, and anathemas. It has features
characteristic of Basil, particularly in the section on the Spirit. The confes-
sion that the Spirit is “connected with Father and Son in all respects” is
central to Basil, as well as to Gregory of Nyssa. He makes his characteris-
tic appeal to the baptismal formula of Matt 28.19, which he interprets as
establishing that the three persons are connected in all respects (in glory,
eternity, power, kingship, sovereignty, and divinity). Yet, while he alludes
to a baptismal profession of faith, the goal of Basil’s creedal summary is
something different from that of a baptismal profession. Its purpose is not
initiation. Basil maintains that the baptismal profession “testifies” to it,
which implies that the two are not identical. As opposed to the multiple
anathemas of Letter 125, there is only one position anathematized here.
The position he rejects is that of drawing down the Spirit into the rank or
order of a minister or a slave (εἰς τὴν λειτουργικὴν καὶ δουλικὴν . . . τάξιν). The
reference, again, is to Hebrews 1.14 and the use of it to support an angelic
pneumatology. So, we have the typical formulae of private creeds, though
the broader purpose of the creed is not made explicit in the letter itself.
Basil offers fuller proofs in his letter to another father-daughter pair,
this time to the otherwise unknown Eupaterius and his daughter. The
letter—number 159—has been dated variously from 373 to 375. In it,
Basil praises their inquiry into the faith which prompted them to write
him. He offers his characteristic history: we honor Nicaea, and seek “to
walk in the footsteps” of the saints who met there. Yet, since the question
of the Spirit had not yet arisen, they passed it over in silence. He reasons

55. For similar uses of the adverbial πλατύτερον to mark a fuller discussion than
can be found in the present text, see Sextus Empiricus, Pyrrhoniae hypotyposes
2.219; Athanasius, De decretis 5.7; Basil, ep. 159, below at 483. Cf. also the council
of Antioch (344) in Athanasius, De synodis 26.10, where πλατύτερον characterizes a
new statement of faith as a fuller discussion than a previous creed published by the
same council fathers at Antioch in 341 and Eunomius, Apol. 27 (Vaggione, 72–73),
where it probably points to a different part of the same text.
56. Basil ep. 105 (Courtonne, 2:6–7).
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 483

that it is necessary to “add a discussion of [the Spirit] which follows the

sense of the scripture,” and it reads as follows:
As we are baptized, so also do we believe. As we believe, so also do we
offer praise. So then, since baptism has been given to us by the Savior in
the name of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we offer the confession of faith
in accordance with baptism, and in accordance with the faith we offer
praise, glorifying the Holy Spirit along with Father and Son, since we are
convinced that it is not foreign to the divine nature. For what has been
alienated in virtue of its nature would not have shared the same honors.
We pity those who say that the Spirit is a creature, since by saying such
a thing they fall into the unpardonable error of blasphemy against it. After
all, for those who are even a little versed in the scriptures, there is no need
for an argument showing that the created order is divided from the divinity.
For the created order serves, but the Spirit sets free. The created order needs
life, but it is the Spirit that gives life. The created order needs instruction,
but it is the Spirit that teaches. The created order is sanctified, but it is the
Spirit that sanctifies. And even if you mention angels or archangels or all
the heavenly powers, they receive the sanctification of the Spirit, whereas
the Spirit has natural sanctity, not receiving it by grace, but as co-essential
with it. For this reason, it also has in a distinctive way received the title of
“Holy.” So then, we ourselves do not allow anyone to separate and sever
from the blessed Trinity that which is holy by nature—as the Father is
holy by nature and the Son is holy by nature; nor do we accept those who
carelessly classify it with the created order.
Let these statements, as a summary (ἐν κεφαλαίῳ), be sufficient for your
piety. For from small seeds you will produce by cultivation the greater part
of piety, the Holy Spirit cooperating with you. . . . But we shall postpone
a fuller explanation until we shall have a meeting face to face, which will
enable us to remove objections, and to furnish more detailed testimony
from the scriptures (πλατυτέρας τὰς ἐκ τῶν Γραφῶν . . . μαρτυρίας), and to
confirm the entire sound rule of faith. But for the present grant pardon to
my brevity.57

In this letter, Basil is not writing the text that he wants to be added to
the Nicene Creed. Instead, he is offering a summary of the principles that
should guide such writing. We see that any such addition must: (1) conform
to the baptismal confession; (2) glorify the Spirit along with the Father
and Son (and avoid severing it from them); and (3) clearly reject (perhaps
through anathemas) any notion of the Spirit as created.
These two private letters and their expositions of faith have an obvious

57. Basil ep. 159.2 (Courtonne, 2:86–87; following the translation in Roy J.
Deferrari, Basil of Caesarea: Letters 59–185, LCL 215 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University, 1928), 395–99).
484 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

pedagogical intent. Basil presumed an interest in and capacity for the subtle-
ties of doctrine, and looked forward to teaching them advanced dogmatic
exegesis of Scripture. But was the motive simply pedagogical? In both
cases, Basil was responding to a letter; in both cases, we can tell that those
initial requests communicated to Basil that their senders were orthodox.
We cannot say much about Eupaterius and his daughters. We know more
about the daughters of Terence. They lived in Samosata, the bishopric
of Basil’s friend Eusebius. Around the time of their correspondence with
Basil, Eusebius was being driven into exile by Valens. Perhaps Terence’s
daughters simply requested clarification during this confusing time. Yet,
also around the time of the correspondence, Basil had exchanged letters
with Eusebius regarding the affair with Theodotus and Eustathius.58 Per-
haps the staunchly Nicene Terence and his household, ever concerned with
Armenia, had come to suspect Basil for his associations with Eustathius. If
so, Basil was not merely teaching them, but also clearing his name.
Around 374, Basil wrote a letter—number 175—to a Magnenianus who
is given the title comes in the inscription.59 Basil was responding to a letter
from Magnenianus that “expressly commanded us to write, among other
things, concerning the faith.” Basil spells out why Magnenianus made this
demand: “you seem to me to be surrounded by people there who do noth-
ing but say things to slander us, as if they established themselves by doing
this, even if they falsely allege the vilest things against us.”60 Unlike the
cases of Terence or Eupaterius, however, Basil refused the request, saying
that he “does not want to leave behind a treatise on the faith or to write
various creeds” (Διὰ δὲ τὸ μὴ βούλεσθαι περὶ πίστεως σύνταγμα καταλιμπάνειν
μηδὲ γράφειν διαφόρους πίστεις).61 He does close the letter with a very brief
set of instructions, including essentially verbatim the line from Letter 159
and elsewhere about believing as we are baptized (and so on), as well as
an insistence on preserving the names used in baptism. However, there
is no exposition of the nature or activities of Father, Son, and Spirit, no
anathemas, and no mention of scriptural proofs. Basil’s point is specific:

58. Basil, epp. 100, 127, and 128.

59. Basil also addressed ep. 325 to a Magnenianus, who appears to be a high-
ranking layperson from the fact that Basil calls him “your reverence” (τῆς σεμνοτητός
σου) though the title of comes is not used there (Courtonne, 3:197). Like Terence
and Eupaterius, the Magnenianus of ep. 325 had at least one daughter whom Basil
praised and considered his own daughter—presumably a reference to baptism and
perhaps ascetic vocation. It cannot be known whether this is the same Magnenianus
as in ep. 175.
60. Basil, ep. 175 (Courtonne, 2:111–12), reading ἐργαζομένων in place of Cour-
tonne’s apparent typo ἐργέμζοανων.
61. Basil, ep. 175 (Courtonne, 2:111).
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 485

it is not that he refuses any and all instruction, but that he refuses to write
a creed in the manner he writes elsewhere. He had been accused of com-
posing various creeds around this time, and had become sensitive to the
charge.62 In Letter 175, we have not an apologetically-motivated creed,
but an apologetically-motivated refusal of a creed. Perhaps this refusal
sheds light on the other letters in which Basil did respond to his friends
with creeds, though without exposing his motives in doing so. If Basil’s
overarching purpose in the letters that do contain creeds were straightfor-
wardly and exclusively pedagogical, there would be no reason to refuse
such instruction to Magnenianus. In fact, he does leave him with a glimpse
of his position; he is not unwilling to instruct Magnenianus. He refuses
to write a fuller statement because of what authorship would say about
him. I would suggest that when he granted requests for creeds, he did so
as much to verify his own credentials as to teach.63 This is not to deny
that Basil is offering instruction when he sent creedal letters; it is merely
to note his awareness that such correspondence was closely monitored
and always playing on more than one register.

GREGORY OF NYSSA

Gregory of Nyssa provides invaluable testimony to the occasions and

anxieties surrounding the writing of private creeds in Letter 5, Letter 19,
and To Eustathius. After Basil’s death in 378, Gregory assumed new lev-
els of responsibility in the imperially-sponsored efforts at reconciling the
various church leaders who held sympathies with the Nicene confession.64
In 379, a council of pro-Nicene bishops met in Antioch to cement the

62. See Basil, ep. 244.2 (Courtonne, 3:75): “as if we had promulgated a new creed.”
Regarding the accusation of novelty, see ep. 226.3 again (n.52).
63. Because of its complex textual transmission, I have left to the side the creed
Basil includes in his ascetic preface On Faith (see Basil of Caesarea, Ascetic Works,
trans. M. Monica Wagner, FC 9 (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America
Press, 1962), 63–65. Incidentally, this was the only “private creed” that Hahn included
from Basil in Hahn et al., Bibliothek der Symbole, 269–70. Despite the putatively
“friendly” audience of the document (consisting of monks who were in some sense
were under Basil’s authority), he expressly says that he introduces it in order “to
provide grounds for certainty both for you yourselves and any others who desire to
place their confidence in us” (Basil, Ascetic Works, 63). That is, it is meant to reas-
sure the monks of Basil’s orthodoxy.
64. For a good overview of the events discussed here, see Pierre Maraval, “Biog-
raphy of Gregory of Nyssa,” in The Brill Dictionary of Gregory of Nyssa, ed. Lucas
Francesco Mateo-Seco and Giulio Maspero, Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae 99
(Leiden: Brill, 2010), 103–16 at 109–10. For the date of Basil’s death, see Anna Sil-
vas, Gregory of Nyssa: The Letters (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 32–39.
486 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

alliance between Meletius of Antioch and Pope Damasus that Basil had
sought unsuccessfully. The council sent Gregory of Nyssa on a mission to
Ancyra to reconcile the old Nicene flock, originally led by Marcellus, to
the pro-Nicene cause—a difficult task given the common association of
Marcellus with Sabellius. Gregory was apparently successful in effecting
a reconciliation, but was too lax in the eyes of some. As he puts it in his
Letter 5, following his work there, two charges began to circulate against
him: that he held views contrary to Nicaea and that he admitted the Mar-
cellans to communion “without discernment and examination.”65 He made
his “written defense” (τὴν ἀπολογίαν . . . ἔγγραφον) in a letter that is dis-
tinct from Letter 5 itself (δι’ ἑτέρων γραμμάτων). Interestingly, however, it
was not the accusers who prompted Gregory to write, but rather “certain
like-minded brothers” (τινες τῶν ὁμοψύχων ἀδελφῶν). The apologetic let-
ter Gregory wrote to reassure them is not extant; it cannot be correlated
with any surviving work. All he tells us is that the work answered both
charges sufficiently.
Though he believed his original apology to be “sufficient,” nonetheless
once again “certain like-minded brothers” (τινες τῶν ὁμοψύχων ἀδελφῶν)—
it is not clear whether they are the same brothers as before—asked Gregory
“privately in our own voice” (ἰδίως ἐκ τῆς ἡμετέρας φωνῆς) to offer “the
exposition of faith by which we give assurance” (τὴν τῆς πίστεως ἔκθε-
σιν καθ’ ἥν πεπληροφορήμεθα).66 In the exposition itself, Gregory uses the
term “assurance” (πληροφορίαν), which would later become the typical
term for apologetic, private creeds.67 In the forensic context of answer-
ing accusations, to give assurance (πληροφορία) is to provide a pledge of
one’s orthodoxy; put differently, Gregory’s term πληροφορία is parallel to
the term ἀσφάλεια in Eunomius and Basil.68 The confession of faith is the
means by which assurance is given. Like Eunomius and Basil, Gregory
claims to offer the faith in a summary (βραχέα) fashion, following the

65. Gregory of Nyssa, ep. 5.1 (Georgius Pasquali, Gregorii Nysseni Epistulae, edi-
tio altera, GNO 8.2 [Leiden: Brill, 1959], 31).
66. Gregory of Nyssa ep. 5.3 (GNO 8.2:32); for “assurance,” cf. ep. 5.7 (GNO
8.2:33). Cf. ep. 19.13, where Gregory uses a similar expression for an embassy that
summoned Gregory from Ibora in Pontus to Sebasteia.
67. See, e.g., R. Y. Ebied, A. van Roey, and L. R. Wickham, Peter of Callinicum:
Anti-Tritheist Dossier, Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 10 (Leuven: Department
Oriëntalistiek, 1981), 24.
68. See above, n.8; cf. Basil, Eun. 1.1, where he tells his addressee (presumably
Eustathius) that he is writing the work out of devotion to his command and “as assur-
ance for ourselves”: that is, the act of refuting Eunomius proves Basil’s orthodoxy.
Gregory’s language is not original: Basil refers to the creed he wrote at the Nicopoli-
tans’ request as τινὰ πληροφορίαν πίστεως (ep. 244.2 [Courtonne, 3:75]).
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 487

“God-inspired utterances and the tradition of the fathers.” This creedal

summary is passed down as Letter 5. In the introductory narrative section
of To Eustathius, which is yet another apologetic text, Gregory appears to
refer back to the time when he wrote Letter 5, saying that he then defended
himself both “publicly before all and privately to readers.”69 Letter 5 is a
private apologetic letter addressed to allies who were aware of ongoing
suspicion against Gregory.70 In the letter, Gregory appears to be distanc-
ing himself especially from tritheism, though it is not unlikely that other
charges were lurking in the background.71 Like Basil before him, Gregory
had to simultaneously defend himself against opposite charges of Sabel-
lianism and tritheism. Unlike Basil, however, Gregory makes no appeal
to Nicaea. Instead, he makes Matthew 28.19 central; Christ’s words are
woven seamlessly with Gregory’s commentary. The relatively lengthy
exposition of faith in Letter 5 reads as follows:
4. We confess that the Lord’s teaching, which he gave to the disciples when
he handed over to them the mystery of piety, is the foundation and root
of the right and salutary faith, and we believe that nothing else is loftier
or surer than that tradition. Now, the Lord’s teaching is this: Go, he says,
teach all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son
and the Holy Spirit (Matt 28.19).

5. Therefore, the power which enlivens those who are born again from
death to eternal life comes through the Holy Trinity to the faithful who
are counted worthy of this grace. And likewise, the grace is incomplete if
any single one of the names of the Holy Trinity is ever omitted in saving
baptism. For the mystery of rebirth is not complete without the Father,
in Son and Spirit alone. Nor, if the Son is passed over in silence, does
complete life come through baptism in Father and Son. Nor is the grace
of the resurrection brought to completion in Father and Son if the Spirit is
set aside. For this reason, we place our entire hope and confidence for the
salvation of our souls in the three hypostases recognized72 through these
names. And we believe in the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Cor 1.3,

69. Gregory of Nyssa, To Eustathius On the Holy Trinity (F. Mueller, Opera Dog-
matica Minora, GNO 3.1 [Leiden: Brill, 1958], 5).
70. Pierre Maraval plausibly suggests that it was intended to be read in public,
though this does not negate Gregory’s own description of it at ep. 5.3 as private.
The latter refers to the authorship of the creed, whereas Maraval’s public refers to
its reception. See Maraval, Grégoire de Nysse: Lettres, SC 363 (Paris: Éditions du
Cerf, 1990), 158n1.
71. Maraval thinks ep. 5.5 was a refutation of the Sabellians and ep. 5.6 of the
Arians (Grégoire de Nysse: Lettres, 160–61nn1–2), which overlooks the overarching
apologetic purpose of the letter.
72. Read γνωριζομέναις instead of γνωριζομένην for sense; cf. ep. 5.9.
488 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

2 Pet 1.3), who is the source of life (Ps 35.10), and in the Only-begotten
Son of the Father, who is the Author of life (Acts 3.15), just as the Apostle
says, and in the Holy Spirit of God, about whom the Lord said that It is the
Spirit that gives life (John 6.63).

6. And since, for us who have been redeemed from death, the grace of
incorruptibility comes in saving baptism through faith in Father, Son, and
Holy Spirit (as we have said), being led by these, we believe that nothing
servile, created, or unworthy of the Father’s majesty is to be counted
together with the Holy Trinity. For we have one life which comes to us
through faith in the Holy Trinity. It takes its source from the God of the
universe, proceeds through the Son, and is actualized in the Holy Spirit.

7. So then, having this assurance (πληροφορίαν), we baptize as we have been

commanded, we believe as we baptize, and we glorify as we believe, so that
baptism, faith, and glorification resound in one voice in Father, Son, and
Holy Spirit.

8. But if someone proclaims two or three gods or three deities, let him be
anathema. And if someone, following Arius’s perversion proclaims that the
Son or the Holy Spirit came into being from nothing, let him be anathema.

9. But all who are line with the rule of truth and confess the three
hypostases which are piously recognized in their own distinctive features
and who believe that there is one deity, one goodness, one rule, authority,
and power, and thereby neither reject the power of the monarchy nor
fall into polytheism—neither do they confuse the hypostases nor do they
compose the Holy Trinity from heterogeneous and unlike elements but
instead admit the dogma of the faith in simplicity, entrusting the hope of
their salvation to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—in our judgment, these ones
hold the same opinions, and with them, we too pray that we might have a
part in the Lord (cf. John 13.8).73

The underlined portions contain the three-part creed properly speak-

ing and the anathemas. The remainder offers commentary and rationale,
linking the creed and anathemas with the teaching of the risen Christ in
Matthew 28.19. As in other works, Gregory here assumes that Christ was
teaching doctrine in this saying and that his teaching lies at the root of
Gregory’s own teaching.74 Creed must conform to baptism, through which

73. Gregory of Nyssa ep. 5.4–9 (Maraval, Grégoire de Nysse: Lettres, 158–62;
GNO 8.2:32–34), though note Pasquali’s different readings at ep. 5.5 (GNO 8.2:32,
lines 23–27).
74. Cf. Gregory of Nyssa ep. 24.1–3 (Maraval, Grégoire de Nysse: Lettres, 277–
78); To Eustathius On the Holy Trinity (GNO 3.1:7–8); Refutation of Eunomius’
Confession 1–4 (Wernerus Jaeger, Contra Eunomium Libri, Pars Altera: Liber III
(Vulgo III–XII), Refutatio Confessionis Eunomii (Vulgo Lib. II), GNO 2 [Leiden:
Brill, 1960], 312–13).
 RADDE-GALLWITZ / PRIVATE CREEDS 489

the Trinity grants the single divine life to the baptized. By claiming that
Jesus’s words, rather than his own, are the foundation of his faith, Gregory
is able to engage in writing without appearing to innovate.
Like Basil before him, Gregory is making explicit, under great external
pressure, what he is committed to and what he rejects in his teaching as a
bishop. That he does so with his own composition rather than by citing
the Nicene Creed is noteworthy. The convenience of using conciliar labels
to mark Basil and Gregory as “Nicene” or “pro-Nicene” thinkers could
lead one to assume that the Nicene formulae provide the “thesis state-
ment,” so to speak, that their doctrinal writings aim to defend. Instead,
as with Eunomius and the other examples cited above, one ought to look
to their own summary statements for the κεφάλαιον of their arguments.

WHAT KIND OF CRIME?

Greek and Roman forensic oratory had two parts, defense and prosecu-
tion. Christians of the pre-Constantinian era famously adopted the genre of
apology to defend the faith against Roman slander. Fourth-century Chris-
tians further adapted the defense speech for dealing with private accusa-
tions made by other Christians. Privately-authored creeds played a central
role in these defenses, though one might wonder how a creed could play
that role. It is easier to envision how creeds and anathemas could func-
tion to teach an authoritative summary of a shared faith or to exclude a
third party than it is to see them as certifying their author. Private creeds
played all of these roles, and they also gestured to baptismal professions
and to earlier rules of faith. But it is worth considering their apologetic
motivation alongside these doctrinal and catechetical roles.
If a creed of one’s own composition can be cited to prove one’s inno-
cence, then heresy must be a special kind of crime. As opposed to typical
apologies, which concern what happened or did not happen in the past,
the apologies studied here concern a crime that is happening or not hap-
pening in what the text envisions as the present.75 Had heresy been con-
sidered a crime committed in the past, a different kind of apology would
have been needed; being a crime of the present, a statement of present-
tense belief sufficed for clearing one’s name, given a receptive audience.
Heresy was therefore not a crime of action, but of thought. The idea of
such crimes was nothing new—one of the so-called “new charges” against

75. Even the crime of “impiety” (ἀσεβεία) was treated in Greek forensic rhetoric
as a matter of actions performed in the past; see Pseudo-Hermogenes, On Invention
2.5 (Kennedy, Invention and Method, 47).
490 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES

Socrates in Plato’s Apology of Socrates was that he did not believe in the
gods of Athens.76 There was also a possibly surprising Roman precedent.
In an important article from 1968, T. D. Barnes set out to clarify the legal
basis for the persecution of Christians by Romans before Decius. Separat-
ing wheat from darnel in the heap of evidence, he zeroed in on the decisive
role played by the correspondence between Pliny and Trajan. For Barnes,
this exchange fixed the unique legal status of Christians up to the time of
Decius: “After Trajan’s rescript, if not already before, Christianity was a
crime in a special category: whereas all other criminals, once convicted,
were punished for what they had done in the past, the Christian was pun-
ished for what he was in the present, and up to the last moment he could
gain pardon by apostasy.”77 What matters here is not Barnes’s reconstruc-
tion of the influence of Trajan’s letter, but his framing of the legal issue.
Christianity came into Roman legal consciousness as a thought crime. As
Barnes notes, the awkwardness of this status explains Christian apolo-
gists’ constant complaints that merely bearing the name “Christian” made
one a criminal. This quirk of the Roman tradition is echoed in Christian
leaders’ understanding of heresy as a crime committed in the present.78
Authors of private creeds found themselves in a double bind. On one
hand, there was an expectation that they respond to charges, whether at
the emperor’s command or in reply to a letter from friends. On the other
hand, the very act of writing a creed could lead to suspicion, as we saw in
the case of Basil.79 If innovation implies deviation, new creeds are suspicious
simply for being new. Authors of private creeds therefore sought to link
their creeds with recognized tradition and authority. When the performance
worked, the reader signed and the author, for the time being, was safe.

Andrew Radde-Gallwitz is Assistant Professor

in the Program of Liberal Studies at the University of Notre Dame
in Notre Dame, Indiana

76. Plato, Apology of Socrates 24b.

77. T. D. Barnes, “Legislation against the Christians,” JRS 58 (1968): 32–50, at 48.
78. The only exception in the texts discussed here is Eusebius of Caesarea’s creed
(see above, n.28). Even though heresy is implicitly a present-tense offense, the actions
of being baptized under a heretical bishop and of deserting the orthodox faith were
treated as past-tense sins and subjected to a life-long penance. See Basil, ep. 188.1;
Gregory of Nyssa, Canonical Letter to Letoius, Canon 1.
79. Athanasius’s De synodis also shows how a fourth-century author could frame
his opponents’ continual re-writing of creeds as evidence of a deceptive and mali-
cious intent.