What is The Apostles' Creed?

The Apostles' Creed was so named, not because it was written by the Apostles , but because it was thought to embody within it the "Apostles' Doctrine" mentioned in Acts Ch2 v 42.

Like all the major Creeds , it was developed in order to give a summary of those beliefs that were held to be the heart of genuine Christian belief. The time of the original Apostles was drawing to a close and it was felt necessary to have a set of standard teachings to work to - so that all Christians had a similar starting point and reference. As heresy and error began to creep into the teachings of the early Church it became necessary to formulate means of summarising "standard" or " catholic " doctrines so that there was a ready benchmark by which to measure what was being taught. Much of this process can already be seen within the Scriptures but the scriptures were not readily available to the Christians of the early centuries.

As stated above, the Apostles' Creed was almost certainly not written by the Apostles but a statement very much like it (sometimes known as the Roman Creed) was around very soon after the time of the Apostles and certainly soon after 100AD.

What if I cannot agree with all of the Creed

Does that mean I'm not a Christian?

Not necessarily. If you disagree with EVERYTHING in it you're probably not a Christian but many Christians have had problems with parts of it.

Some Christians have started out with lots of problems which gradually got sorted out. That's one of the reasons for study groups and for WWW sites like this that invite dialogue.

Some time earlier this century a man by the name of Frank Morison used to say the Creed regularly but always had difficulty over the resurrection . He set out to write a book to prove that the resurrection had not happened. It was to be called "Jesus, the Last Phase". As he researched the book he came to a very different conclusion to the one he had expected. The result was that he wrote a different book entitled "Who Moved the Stone" which showed very conclusive evidence for the resurrection.

There is room for honest doubt - but it should always be accompanied by honest research and never by simply rejecting that which is difficult or challenging.