Alphabet symbol of faith. The mystery and meaning of the prayer “Creed”

We are called Orthodox Christians, that is right, Right glorifying God. In order to be sure that you are doing something correctly, you need to know a lot, learn a lot. Read books, ask experienced people. If a person doesn’t know anything and doesn’t want to know, but is completely sure that he’s doing everything right, expect trouble. A simple example. A certain person is completely unaware of the rules of the road, but he confidently gets behind the wheel and starts driving the car. Very little time will pass and he will realize that he is doing something wrong: he is driving on the left side of the road, but for some reason all the cars are rushing towards him, honking, and he barely has time to dodge them. He approaches a traffic light, the light turns red, but this eccentric is sure that he can continue driving, because he doesn’t know the rules! I think it’s clear what will happen next. Very soon this unfortunate man will have an accident and, thank God, if he survives. But if in ordinary, material everyday life we ​​understand perfectly well that we must study the laws and rules, observe safety precautions so as not to get into trouble, then even more so in spiritual life. There, too, there are laws established by God, and there are safety rules. And the harm that we can cause to ourselves by not knowing these laws or by neglecting them is much greater than from ignorance of the laws of the physical world. For we can cause irreparable damage not to the body, but to the soul.

How to learn the rules of spiritual life, how to believe correctly? For this there is the Word of God Himself - Holy Bible, you need to read it, study it, you need to build your life according to it. There are commandments that God Himself also gave us, and we, Orthodox people, also have a huge experience of the Church, an experience that is already 2 thousand years old in the world and a thousand years old in Rus'. Many millions of people have passed this way, from the birth of Christ to the present day. We have Church, the Lord Jesus Christ created it and put into it everything that is needed for our salvation. “I will build My Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it” ( Matt. 16:18). The church treasury also includes the experience of the holy fathers and ascetics of 2 millennia of Christianity.

The Orthodox Church is called that way because it has preserved in its entirety and intactness, without distortion, the teaching given to us by God Himself. We know how to correctly believe in God, how to glorify Him correctly, He himself revealed this to us, therefore our faith is right, our faith is Orthodox

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Symbol of faith, or confession of Christian Orthodox faith is a prayer book that contains all the basic provisions and dogmas of the Orthodox faith. The teaching of the Church in the “Symbol” is presented in a brief but very precise form.

The Creed was composed in the 4th century by the Fathers The First and Second Ecumenical Councils. In the ancient Church there had previously been symbols of faith, but with the emergence and strengthening of false teachings about God, it was necessary to draw up a more accurate and dogmatically impeccable confession of faith, which could be used by the entire Universal Church.

First Ecumenical Council was convened in the city of Nicaea regarding the false teaching of the presbyter Arius, who taught that the Son of God, Jesus Christ, was created by God the Father and is not the true God, but only the highest creation. The Council condemned this heresy and set forth Orthodox teaching, compiling the first seven members of the Creed. At the second ecumenical council, convened to condemn the heresy of Macedonius, which rejected the Divinity of the Holy Spirit, the following five members of the Creed were given.

Everyone needs to know the Creed Orthodox Christian by heart, in order to have correct knowledge about God and one’s own faith, and also to always be able to give an answer to everyone who asks us: “how do you believe?”

You need to know the Creed even before baptism, because it is necessary to have correct knowledge about God and the fundamentals of the doctrine even before accepting this sacrament and entering the Church. When infants are baptized, the Creed is read for them by their godparents, and they are also, of course, required to know it by heart and read it without errors. It is not difficult to learn the Creed, because it is part of the morning prayers, and every Orthodox Christian reads it when praying in the morning. Also, the Creed is sung every liturgy, in church by all the people, and a person who regularly prays in the morning and goes to Sunday and holiday liturgies will very soon remember it.

But we should not only know the text of the Creed, but also understand its meaning, for this we need to study it.

Symbol of faith

In Church Slavonic

1. I believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, visible to all and invisible.

2. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, who was born of the Father before all ages: Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, uncreated, consubstantial with the Father, by whom all things were.

3. For our sake, man and our salvation came down from heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human.

4. She was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried.

5. And he rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures.

6. And ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father.

7. And again the coming one will be judged with glory by the living and the dead, His Kingdom will have no end.

8. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Life-Giving One, who proceeds from the Father, who is with the Father and the Son, is worshiped and glorified, who spoke the prophets.

9. Into one Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

10. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins.

11. I hope for the resurrection of the dead,

12. and the life of the next century. Amen.

Russian translation

1. I believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, of everything visible and invisible.

2. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, begotten of the Father before all ages; Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not created, one being with the Father, by Him all things were created.

3. For us, for the sake of people and for the sake of our salvation, he came down from heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human.

4. He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, suffered, and was buried.

5. And rose again on the third day, according to the Scriptures.

6. And ascended into heaven, and sat on the right side of the Father.

7. And He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead, and of His kingdom there will be no end.

8. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father, who is worshiped and glorified equally with the Father and the Son, who spoke through the prophets.

9. Into the one, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

10. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins.

11. I look forward to the resurrection of the dead,

12. and the life of the next century. Truly so.

ABOUT THE FIRST MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

I believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, of everything visible and invisible.

Christianity, as the only true religion, is primarily distinguished by its teaching about God. We perceive God and turn to Him as our Heavenly Parent. God is called Father because He begets the Son from eternity (this will be discussed later), but also because He is the Father to us all. In the prayer that the Lord Savior gave us, we say: “Our Father...” (Our Father). The Holy Apostle Paul says, addressing Christians: “you have not received the spirit of slavery<…>, but received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry: “Abba, Father!” This very Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God” (Rom. 8:15-16). Word " Abba" in Aramaic corresponds to our " dad"- children's confidential appeal to their father.

The Holy Apostle John the Theologian says that “God is love” (1 John 4:8). These words express the most important property of God. This determines the entire structure of a Christian’s spiritual life. Our relationship with God is based on mutual love. Heavenly Father loves us with a perfect and absolute love. We, believers, can perceive the fruits of this love only when we love God with the fullness of our being. Therefore, love for God is the first and main commandment. The Holy Scriptures reveal the basic properties of God in close connection with the Economy of human salvation.

God is the all-perfect Spirit. He is eternal. Has neither beginning nor end. God is Almighty. In the Holy Scriptures He is called Almighty, since He holds everything in His power and authority.

The Holy Fathers teach us not only to believe in God, but to trust Him in everything, because He All-good and Humane. The Lord's mercy extends to every person. If a person always wants to be with God and turns to Him, then He does not leave the person under any circumstances. One ancient Byzantine manuscript contains the comforting admonition of a holy elder: “Someone told me that one man always prayed to God so that He would not leave him on his earthly path, and, as the Lord once descended with His disciples on their way to Emmaus (see: Lk 24:13-32), so that He would also descend with him along the road of his life. And at the end of his life he had a vision: he saw that he was walking along the sandy shore of the ocean (of course, mean the ocean of eternity, along the shore of which the path of mortals passes). And, looking back, he saw the prints of his feet on the soft sand, going far back: this was the traveled path of his life. And next to the prints of his feet were the prints of a couple more feet; and he realized that it was the Lord who had descended with him in life, just as he had prayed to Him. But in some places along the path he saw the prints of only one pair of feet, which cut deeply into the sand, as if indicating the severity of the path at that time. And this man remembered that it was then when there were especially difficult moments in his life and when life seemed unbearably difficult and painful. And this man said to the Lord: you see, Lord, in difficult times of my life you did not walk with me; You see that the prints of only one pair of feet in those days indicate that then I walked alone in life, and You see from the fact that the footprints cut deep into the ground that it was very difficult for me to walk then. But the Lord answered him: My son, you are mistaken. Indeed, you see the prints of only one pair of feet in those times of your life that you remember as the most difficult. But these are not the prints of your feet, but of Mine. Because in the difficult times of your life, I took you in My arms and carried you. So, My son, these are not the prints of your feet, but of Mine.”

God has Omniscience. The entire past was imprinted in his endless memory. He knows everything and sees everything in the present. He knows not only every human act, but every word and feeling. Lord knows the future.

God Omnipresent He is in Heaven, on earth. The contemplation of the Divine omnipresence evokes joy and poetic tenderness in the psalmist David:

« If I ascend to heaven - You are there; If I go down to the underworld, you will be there too.

Should I take the wings of the dawn and move to the edge of the sea, and there Your hand will lead me, and Your right hand will hold me"(Ps. 139:8-10).

God - Creator heaven and earth. He is the Cause and Creator of the entire visible and invisible world. Our world, the universe is incredibly complex and wisely structured, and of course, only the Supreme, Divine Mind could create all this. The entire Divine Trinity participated in the creation of the world. God the Father created everything with His Word, that is, the Only Begotten Son, with the assistance of the Holy Spirit.

God has Wisdom. Psalm 103 is a majestic hymn to God, who created everything with His wisdom and continues to care not only for man, but also for His other creatures: “You water the mountains from Your heights, the earth is satisfied with the fruits of Your works. You make grass grow for livestock, and greenery for the benefit of man, to bring forth food from the earth” (Ps. 103:13-14).

Besides the fact that God is the Creator of visible things, material world He also created the spiritual world, invisible to us. The spiritual, angelic world was created by God even before our material world. All angels were created good, but some of them, led by the supreme angel Lucifer, became proud and fell away from God. Since then, these angels have become dark spirits of malice, wishing all harm to people, as God’s creation. They try in every possible way to seduce people into sin and destroy them. But God has greatly limited their power and influence on people, moreover, every Christian has his own guardian angel who protects and protects him from evil, including from the influence of devilish forces.

ABOUT THE SECOND MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, begotten of the Father before all ages; Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not created, one being with the Father, by Him all things were created.

The second member of the Creed is dedicated to the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, and here it is time to talk about the mystery of the Holy Trinity.

Cognizing the Divine properties, a believer gradually prepares to perceive the cornerstone truth of Christianity - the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. God is one in essence, but has three faces(Hypostases), each of which possesses the fullness of Divinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Holy Fathers, revealing and explaining the dogma of the Trinity, define the relationship between the three Persons with the following concepts "consubstantial" And "equal" At the same time, they also point to the personal properties of each Hypostasis. The Father is not created, not created, not begotten; The Son is eternally born from the Father; The Holy Spirit proceeds eternally from the Father. We prayerfully confess the Trinity with the words: “In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen". What is our faith based on? On the Holy Gospel: Go therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit(Mt 28:19). The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are one.

The earthly human mind cannot rise to this mystery on its own without God. Other monotheistic religions(Judaism, Islam), based on natural reason, and not on Revelation, could not rise to this mystery.

Already in the Old Testament there are indications of the mystery of the Divine Trinity. Already at the beginning of the Holy Bible, God speaks of Himself in the plural: “And God said: Let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over all the reptiles that creep on the earth. And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female he created them” (Gen. 1:26-27). The words “let us make man” indicate the plurality of persons, while “he created him” indicates the unity of God. There are two more such passages in the book of Genesis:

And the Lord God said: Behold, Adam has become like one of Us (Genesis 3.22).

And the Lord said: Behold, there is one people, and they all have one language... let us go down and confuse their language there (Gen. 11:6-7).

When Patriarch Abraham was sitting under a tree near the oak grove of Mamre, he saw three travelers come. He ran to meet them and, bowing to the ground, said: Master! If I have found favor in Your sight, do not pass Your servant by” (Genesis 18:3. Three men appeared, and Abraham addresses them as one - Master.

The doctrine of the Trinity is not only theological and theoretical. In the New Testament sacred books it is revealed in the closest connection with the great events of the Incarnation and Redemption. The Lord Jesus Christ repeatedly speaks about His Sonship of God and about the fact that the Father sent Him (John 5:36) so that “the world might be saved through Him” (John 3:17). The Holy Spirit participates in all matters of the Economy of the salvation of mankind. He quickens and sanctifies. Anyone participating in the Holy Sacraments and prayer life of the Church does not doubt this truth; it is an integral part of his religious consciousness. Anyone who has studied the dogmatic teaching of our Church could not help but be amazed at the internal consistency of its parts. Such a person is convinced that this slender and majestic building is unthinkable without its cornerstone - the dogma of the Holy Trinity.

The human mind cannot fully comprehend the mystery of the Holy Trinity. But we can use certain analogies, which, however, are very simplified and limited, in order to at least partially understand the unity and relationship between the persons of the Holy Trinity.

The Holy Fathers cited the sun as an image of the Trinity. The visible part of the sun is a circle, from which light is born and heat emanates.

The image of the Holy Trinity can serve human soul created in the image and likeness of God. This example is given by Saint Ignatius Brianchaninov: “Our mind is the image of the Father; our word (we usually call the unspoken word a thought) is the image of the Son; spirit is the image of the Holy Spirit. Just as in the Trinity-God the three Persons unfused and inseparably constitute one Divine Being, so in the Trinity-Man the three Persons constitute one being, without mixing with each other, without merging into one person, without dividing into three beings. Our mind has given birth to and does not cease to give birth to a thought; a thought, having been born, does not cease to be born again and at the same time remains born, hidden in the mind. Mind cannot exist without thought, and thought cannot exist without mind. The beginning of one is certainly the beginning of the other; the existence of the mind is necessarily the existence of thought. In the same way, our spirit comes from the mind and contributes to thought. That is why every thought has its own spirit, every way of thinking has its own separate spirit, every book has its own spirit. Thought cannot exist without spirit; the existence of one is certainly accompanied by the existence of the other. In the existence of both is the existence of the mind.”

So the second member of the Creed tells us that the second hypostasis of the Holy Trinity is the Only Begotten Son of God, who born Father before the creation of all things visible and invisible, even before the creation of time. He was born and not created, this is said to refute the false teaching of Arius, who taught about the creation of the Son of God, as well as all subsequent heretics. The name Jesus means Savior, and Christ means Anointed One. Since ancient times, kings, prophets and high priests have been called anointed. The Savior combined all three of these ministries.

God the Father created the whole world, visible and invisible, by His Son. This is stated in the Gospel of John: “All things came into being through Him, and without Him nothing came into being that was made” (John 1:3).

ABOUT THE THIRD MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

For us, for the sake of people and for the sake of our salvation, he came down from heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human.

In order to save the human race, the Lord at a certain historical moment “in the days of King Herod” (Matthew 2:1) descends to earth to be incarnate, through influx, assistance Holy Spirit from Virgin Mary, take on our human nature and be born in Palestine, in the city of Bethlehem.

He took on all human nature, soul and body, in order to recreate, deify, save it. The divine nature in Christ did not swallow up human nature, as some heretics teach, but the two natures in Him will remain forever unfused, unchangeable, inseparable and inseparable.

The Savior did not have a human father, for his Father was God Himself. His conception in the womb of the Mother of God took place without the seed of a husband, which is why it is called “immaculate”, “seedless”. The Church in its hymns says that the flesh of Christ, by the power of God, is inside the womb of the Virgin Mary exhausted. We know that normal human conception involves a husband's seed, but Christ's conception was supernatural. Even after the Fall, Adam and Eve were given a promise-prophecy from God about wife's seed, which will strike the head of the serpent. (Gen. 3:15). But we know that a wife cannot have a seed, only a husband can have a seed.

Saint Philaret of Moscow (Drozdov), says that this is an indication “of a sacrament that is above nature; - for birth, about which nature asks: what will this be like, where I don’t know a husband? (Luke 1:34), and about which grace answers: The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you (35); - for the miraculous birth of the Son from a wife without a husband, for the birth of Christ, the God-man, from the Virgin.” The Church calls the Mother of God the Ever-Virgin, that is, She was a virgin before the birth of Christ, did not lose her virginity at the moment of birth, and remained a Virgin after the birth of the Savior. The Mother of God did not experience pain during the birth of Jesus, for the same reason: because “The Virgin did not break her virginity with her birth,” says St. John Chrysostom.

How could this happen? Nothing is impossible for God. He created this world with His Wisdom and Word. God created the first man Adam from the “fiber of the ground” and breathed into him the breath of life, and the miracle of birth without the participation of a husband is also subject to Him. The 3rd century Christian writer Tertullian writes:

“Just as the earth (at the creation of the first man Ed.) was turned into this flesh without the seed of a man, so the Word of God could pass into the matter of the same flesh without a connecting principle.”

The Savior, having taken upon himself human flesh and soul, appears and at the same time true God and true man, in everything except sin.

He came to our land, to completely go through human life. He worked for His food, He experienced cold, heat, hunger and thirst, He was also pursued by temptations and temptations from the devil and human weakness, but He defeated them and the temptations did not touch Him. The Lord worked tirelessly for people: he preached, healed the sick, and raised the dead.

The Lord accepted our nature, lived human life in order to heal, to recreate our nature, corrupted by sin, about O live it and show us the path of salvation, the path of true Christian life. As St. Athanasius of Alexandria said: “God became man so that man could become God.” And now, everyone born of Christ through baptism in His Church becomes a new creation, “who were born neither of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:13).

ABOUT THE FOURTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, suffered, and was buried.

The sacrifice of Christ the Savior on the cross for us is an act of the highest Divine love. “For God loved the world so much that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). And the Lord Jesus Christ Himself speaks about His sacrifice on the cross: “Greater love has no one than this, if someone lays down his life for his friends. (John 15:13) For your friends, this means for you and me, for all the children of God. death on the cross was the most painful and shameful execution in the Roman Empire, a person experienced incredible suffering for many hours, and life seemed to come out of him drop by drop. Christ was crucified under the governor of the emperor, the rulers of Judea, Pontius Pilate. His name is included in the “Symbol” to confirm the historical reality of the event. Non-Christians often cannot understand why we carry on our chests cross, we depict the sign of the cross on ourselves, we crown the domes of our churches with a cross and, in general, we greatly honor the cross. They say: why do you honor the cross, because your God was crucified on it? But that is why for us the cross of Christ is a shrine. After all, he constantly reminds us: what a huge sacrifice was made for people and how great Divine love for people is. God not only created humanity and takes care of the people he created, but if necessary, He is ready to go to death and crucifixion for His sinful and unworthy children. God ascends to the cross to offer Himself as a sacrifice for the sins of people, and thereby deliver them from sin and eternal death. God created the world with immutable spiritual and physical laws. One of the spiritual laws is that sin and crime must have consequences, punishment. The punishment for the sins of mankind was eternal death. “Whatever a man sows, that he will also reap” (Gal. 6:7). The sins of people have multiplied so much that humanity on its own could no longer rise from the abyss of sin, therefore the punishment that people should have received is taken by the Lord Himself. “The punishment of our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we were healed” (Is. 53:5), says the prophet Isaiah about the Divine sacrifice. You can use an image that is undoubtedly quite conventional and simplified.

Let's say a certain young man, almost still a teenager, committed a crime. He must suffer a very severe punishment for it, for example, spend many years in a maximum security camp, and maybe even die. His father was present when the crime was committed. And so the father, knowing that his son will not be able to bear the punishment, that his whole life will be distorted, spoiled by prison, and maybe he will never leave the camp at all and will perish there forever, decides on a feat. He, being innocent himself, takes upon himself the crime of his son and bears the punishment for it. Thus, he saves his son from suffering and death and gives an example of the highest love and self-sacrifice.

Christ is called the second Adam. Why? We all, according to the flesh, according to human nature, descend from our common forefather, Adam. He once sinned by not preserving his original dignity. After the Fall, both the spiritual and physical nature of man became distorted, and illness and death entered the world. We, as people, as descendants of the first Adam, inherited his nature corrupted by sin. But then the Savior comes into the world. He lived on earth without sin, having overcome temptations and sin, He made a sacrifice for us on the cross and was resurrected. The Lord Jesus Christ renewed our fallen nature, and now everyone who is born of Christ, as from the Second Adam, and follows the path indicated by Him, crucifying “the flesh with its passions and lusts” (Gal. 5:24), inherits eternal life with Christ.

ABOUT THE FIFTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

And rose again on the third day, according to the Scriptures.

Resurrection Our Lord Jesus Christ is the foundation of our Christian faith. “If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, and our faith is also in vain” (1 Cor. 15:14). Feast of the Resurrection of Christ, Easter- the most important Christian holiday. It is called in the Easter canon “the holiday of holidays and the triumph of celebrations.” Every week we remember the event of the Resurrection of Christ, celebrating Sunday.

Why would our faith be futile and meaningless without the Resurrection? Because Christ came to earth, suffered and died in order to resurrect our human nature and gain victory over the devil, hell and death. And if there had been no resurrection, all this would have been impossible. It would all end with Good Friday and the death and burial of Christ. But Christ has risen and now we have faith and hope to rise with Him.

Before the resurrection of Christ, all people after death went to hell, to the underworld of the earth. In Hebrew this place was called Sheol. Even the souls of the Old Testament righteous were there. After His death, Christ also descended into the underworld. The Lord descends into hell to preach there and bring out of it the souls of all those who waited for Him with faith. The Lord was in the underworld until the day of His Resurrection, as it is sung in the Easter hymn: “In the grave in the flesh, in hell with the soul, like God.” On the third day, Christ rose again and by his resurrection destroyed the power of hell and brought out of it those who were waiting for His coming, as well as those who accepted the news of salvation. From now on, hell has no power over those who are followers of Christ and live according to His commandments.

The Creed says that the Savior rose from the dead on the third day, according to Scripture. What scriptures tell us about the resurrection? Firstly, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself constantly spoke about his future resurrection, predicted it; just remember the Gospel of Matthew: “From that time Jesus began to reveal to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders, high priests and scribes , and be killed, and on the third day rise again” (Matthew 16:21). Christ's predictions about his resurrection from the dead are contained in all four Gospels. As for the Old Testament prophecies, here, first of all, we can cite the words of the prophet David spoken about the Messiah: “You will not leave my soul in hell and you will not allow Your holy one to see corruption” (Ps. 15: 10) Also the stay of the prophet Jonah for three days and three nights in the belly of a whale prefigured the resurrection of Christ the Savior. The Savior Himself refers to this prototype of the resurrection: “As Jonah was in the belly of the whale for three days and three nights, so the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights” (Matthew 12: 39-40).

After his resurrection, the Lord repeatedly appeared to his disciples:

1) Mary Magdalene (John 20:11-18; Mark 16:9)

2) Other women (Matthew 28:8-10)

3) Peter (Luke 24:34; 1 Cor. 15:5)

4) To two disciples on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-35; Mark 16:12)

5) To the eleven disciples (except for the Apostle Thomas - Luke 24:36-43; John 20:19-23)

6) Later to the twelve disciples (1 Cor. 15:5; John 20:24-29)

7) To the seven disciples near the Sea of ​​Tiberias (John 21:1-23)

8) Five hundred followers (1 Cor. 15:6)

9) Jacob (1 Cor. 15:6)

10) To the apostles at the time of the ascension (Acts 1:3-12).

The cave where the body of Christ was buried was guarded by a detachment of soldiers of the Roman army, one of the best, trained and disciplined in the world. If Christ’s disciples had come at night to carry away His body, as the Jews later said, at least one of them would have noticed them and grabbed them, besides, the entrance to the cave was blocked by a large, heavy stone that could not be rolled away silently. Even if the abduction had been successful, the apostles would have been captured, and they would have been tortured into revealing the location of the Teacher's body. But we know that they walked around freely, without hiding at all. If Jesus’ body had been taken by His enemies, then, of course, they would not have hidden this fact and very soon would have shown it to the people in order to refute Christ’s lifetime testimony about His resurrection.

ABOUT THE SIXTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

And ascended into heaven, and sat at the right hand of the Father.

After his resurrection, the Lord remained on earth for another forty days with his disciples to assure them of the truth of the resurrection, strengthen their faith and give the necessary instructions.

Ascension happened on the Mount of Olives. It is known that the Savior loved this mountain and often retired there to pray. This is how the evangelist Luke describes this event: “And he led them out of the city as far as Bethany and, lifting up his hands, blessed them. And when he blessed them, he began to move away from them and ascend to heaven. They worshiped Him and returned to Jerusalem…” (Luke 24:50-52).

Lord Jesus Christ ascended to Sky, By His humanity, and by His Divinity, he always remained with God the Father. The sky into which the Lord ascended is a place of the special presence of God, a mountain place, that is, an exalted place, the Kingdom of God. Christ walked the entire path of our human life and ascended into heaven, with this He glorified our human nature and showed the way to the Heavenly Fatherland, to the heavenly Jerusalem. He opened it to all his true followers.

The words of the Creed about the ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ into heaven have a basis in Holy Scripture: “He who descended, he also ascended above all the heavens, to fill all things” (Eph. 4:10).

The Symbol says that Christ sat down on the right side of the Father. But we know that God is omnipresent, He is everywhere. These words about sitting on the right hand indicate that the Son of God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, has the same power and glory with the Father. “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30), He says about Himself.

ABOUT THE SEVENTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

And He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead, and His kingdom will have no end..

The first coming to earth of the Lord Jesus Christ was humble; He took upon Himself “the form of a servant” (Phil. 2:7). His second coming will be different, He again will come, but already how Judge, in order to judge the affairs of all people, both those who lived to see His second coming and those who had already died.

The second coming will be very formidable. The Lord Himself speaks of him this way: “just as lightning comes from the east and is visible even to the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man,” and further: “the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of heaven will waver. Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven; and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He will send His angels with a loud trumpet; and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from the end of the heavens to the end thereof” (Matthew 24:27-31).

When will it happen? The Savior tells us: “But about that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but only My Father alone” (Matthew 24:36).

Both before and in our time, all sorts of false prophets often appeared who prophesied about the end of the world and even called the exact date this event. No one who will tell the date or exact time Last Judgment it cannot be believed, because it is unknown to anyone except God. In addition, for any of us, every day of our life could be the last, and we will have to answer to the Unflattering Judge. This is what St. Ignatius Brianchaninov says about the end of this world, and about our own end: “The day and hour are unknown when the Son of God will end the life of the world by coming to judgment; the day and hour are unknown when, at the command of the Son of God, the earthly life of each of us will end, and we will be called to separation from the body, to give an account of earthly life, to that private judgment, before the general judgment, that awaits a person after his death. Beloved brothers! Let us stay awake and prepare for the terrible judgment that awaits us on the brink of eternity for the irrevocable decision of our fate forever. Let us prepare ourselves by stocking up on all the virtues, especially mercy, which contains and crowns all the virtues, since love, the motivating cause of mercy, is "totality" Christian “perfections” (Col. 3:14). Mercy makes people filled with it godlike (Matt. 5:44,48; Luke 6:32,36)! “Blessed are the merciful, for they will obtain mercy; judgment without mercy to him who showed no mercy” (Matthew 5:7; James 2:13).

Before the end of the world there will be, as predicted in the Holy Scriptures, wars, unrest, earthquakes, famine and national disasters. There will be a decline in faith and morality. The “man of destruction” will appear, the Antichrist, the false messiah - a man who wants to stand in place of Christ, take His place and have power over the whole world. Having achieved supreme earthly power, the Antichrist will demand that he be worshiped as God. The power of the Antichrist will be destroyed by the coming of God.

After His coming, the Lord will judge all people. How will the Last Judgment take place? Saint Philaret of Moscow (Drozdov) writes that God “will judge in such a way that the conscience of every person will open before everyone and not only all the deeds that someone has done throughout his entire life on earth will be revealed, but also all the words spoken, secret desires and thoughts " Another Saint John (Maksimovich), Archbishop of Shanghai and San Francisco also says:“The Last Judgment does not know witnesses or protocol records. Everything is written in human souls and these records, these “books” are revealed. Everything becomes clear to everyone and to oneself, and the state of a person’s soul determines him to the right or to the left. Some go in joy, others in horror.

When the “books” are opened, it will become clear to everyone that the roots of all vices are in the human soul. Here is a drunkard, a fornicator - when the body has died, someone will think that sin has also died. No, there was an inclination in the soul and sin was sweet in the soul.

And if she did not repent of that sin, did not free herself from it, she will come to the Last Judgment with the same desire for the sweetness of sin and will never satisfy her desire. It will contain the suffering of hatred and malice. This is a hellish state.

"Gehenna of fire" is inner fire, this is the flame of vice, the flame of weakness and malice, and “there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” of impotent malice.

The Lord Jesus Christ will judge the world. “For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son” (John 5:22). Why? Because the Son of God is also the Son of Man. He lived here on earth, among people, experienced sorrow, suffering, temptation and death itself. He knows all the sorrows and infirmities of man.

The last judgment will be terrible, because all human deeds and sins will be revealed to everyone, and also because after this judgment nothing can be changed, and everyone will receive what they deserve according to their deeds.

How a person lived on earth, how he prepared to meet God, and what state he achieved, then he will go with him to eternity. And the worthy, the righteous will go into eternal life with God, and sinners into eternal torment prepared for the devil and his servants. After this, the eternal Kingdom of Christ will come, the Kingdom of goodness, truth and love.

But the Lord is not only a Terrible Judge, He is also a Merciful Father, and of course He, in His mercy, will use every opportunity not to condemn, but to justify a person. Saint Theophan the Recluse writes about this: “The Lord wants everyone to be saved, therefore, you too... The Lord at the Last Judgment will not only demand how to condemn, but how to justify everyone. And he will justify everyone, as long as there is even the slightest opportunity.”

ABOUT THE EIGHTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father, who is equally worshiped and glorified with the Father and the Son, who spoke through the prophets.

Holy Spirit- the third hypostasis, the face of the Holy Trinity. The Holy Spirit is consubstantial and equal to the Father and the Son, therefore He is also named in the Creed Lord.

Holy Spirit named Life-giving giving life, firstly: because He, together with the Father and the Son, participated in the creation of the world. In the book of Genesis, when describing the creation of the earth, it says: “and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God hovered over the waters” (Gen. 1:2). “The Spirit of God created me” (Job 33:4), says the righteous Job. Secondly, the Holy Spirit, together with the Father and the Son, gives spiritual life to people, imparting to them divine energy. “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (John 3:5).

Prophets and heralds of the word of God wrote their books not on their own, but according to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, which is why the Holy Scriptures are called Inspired.

The Lord Jesus promised to send His disciples, the holy apostles, the Holy Spirit, whom He calls Comforter: “When the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, comes as the Comforter, whom I will send to you from the Father” (John 15:26). And on the fiftieth day after the resurrection of Christ, when the apostles were gathered in one place, in the upper room of Zion, the Holy Spirit descended on them in the form of tongues of flame and imparted to them gifts of grace.

The Holy Spirit acts in the life of the Church, especially communicating his gifts in the holy sacraments. Saint Basil the Great compares the Holy Spirit to sunlight, warming and giving life: He... is like the radiance of the sun - everyone enjoying it is as if alone, meanwhile this radiance illuminates the earth and the sea and dissolves in the air. So the Spirit dwells in each of those who receive Him, as if inherent in Him alone and in all, sufficiently pours out the full grace that those who partake enjoy, according to their own ability to receive, and not to the extent possible for the Spirit.”

ABOUT THE NINTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

Into the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

Church has not human, but divine origin, it was founded and established by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, coming to earth and gathering the first community of His disciples - followers. “I will build My Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18). Christ is also the head of the Church, as the Holy Scriptures also testify to. The Apostle Paul says that God the Father “has set Him above all things, to be the head of the Church, which is His Body. (Eph. 1:22-23). It is not by chance that the Word of God, the Holy Scriptures, uses the name Body of Christ. The Savior Himself says: “I am the vine, and you are the branches” (John 15:5). Just as branches grow on a tree, come from it, receive life and bear fruit, feeding on the juices of the trunk, and all together form a single tree, so Christians also come from Christ, take origin and life from their Teacher and God, and together form a single A church that bears the fruits of faith. “You are the body of Christ, and individually members” (1 Cor. 12:27).

The Church is made up of all people who unitely profess the Orthodox faith, living all over the world, which is why the Church is called Universal. The Church belongs not only to Orthodox Christians now living on earth, but also to all its children who have now passed on to another world, for “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for with Him all are alive” (Luke 20:38). The Mother of God, all the saints, as well as the heavenly army of archangels, angels and all heavenly disembodied forces, also form one Church with all of us. Thus, the Church is one, but is divided into earthly And heavenly. The Church does not consist only of saints and righteous people, but is called saint, because it was founded by the Lord Himself and preserves intact and holy the teaching given by Him.

The Lord created the Church and put into it everything necessary for our salvation: true, Orthodox teaching, church hierarchy, holy sacraments.

Saint Philaret of Moscow defines the Church as “a society established by God of people united by the Orthodox faith, the Law of God, the hierarchy and the Sacraments.” All this: faith and hierarchy, and the sacraments are of divine origin, therefore those people who say that they believe in God, but do not recognize the church, consider it some kind of later human invention, sin and are deeply mistaken. About such people, Hieromartyr Cyprian of Carthage said: “To whom the Church is not a mother, God is not a Father.” You cannot call yourself an Orthodox Christian and not believe in the Church established by Christ, deny the church hierarchy, which was also given by the Savior and has direct inheritance from the apostles themselves, and not begin the sacraments that have existed since early Christian times, and which all have their basis in the Holy Scriptures . By denying the Church, it is impossible to be saved: "Without the Church there is no salvation"- as Hieromartyr Hilarion (Troitsky) said.

In the Church founded by the Savior, the Holy Spirit operates. He participates in the life of the Church, establishes the church hierarchy and teaches His gifts of grace in the sacraments and sacred rites of the church. The Apostle Paul addresses the elders (priests) of the city of Miletus with the following speech: “Take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of the Lord and God, which He purchased with His blood” (Acts 20:28).

The Lord acquired and acquired His Church, shedding His Divine blood for it, enduring suffering and death itself. He appointed apostles, giving them the authority to perform the holy sacraments: “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive will be forgiven; on whom you leave it, it will remain on him” (John 20: 21-23), this is said about the sacrament of confession, in which the Lord, through the clergyman, absolves a repentant person from sin. The Savior gave the apostles the authority to perform other sacraments: Communion, Baptism, and Priesthood. The holy apostles received episcopal power from Christ; they appointed and ordained successors, other bishops. Since then, apostolic reception in the Church through an uninterrupted chain of ordination has not ceased. Each of the existing Orthodox bishops has succession from the apostles themselves. That is why our Church is called apostolic. Both the apostles and subsequent bishops ordained elders and priests. Elders can also perform all sacraments except ordination. Priesthood is the second degree church hierarchy after the bishop. Only a bishop can ordain and ordain a person to the priesthood.

The church is called cathedral, because we all, headed by Christ the Savior and the hierarchy, constitute one council, a meeting of believers. The word Church, in Greek ecclesia, translated as a meeting of believers. Also, the Church is conciliar, since the highest power in it belongs to the Ecumenical Councils. They gather to discuss very important church issues and condemn false teachings. Bishops are present at Ecumenical Councils, if possible, from the entire Ecumenical Church. Also, the life of the Church is governed by local councils, which meet regularly in local Orthodox churches. Local Churches are churches located in different countries, each of them has its own primate, the chief bishop of the church, but all are members of the one Ecumenical Orthodox Church.

The Church, as a divine-human organism, is eternal and will remain, according to the Savior’s promise, until the end of time.

ABOUT THE TENTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

I confess one baptism for the remission of sins.

I confess, which means I believe, I undoubtedly acknowledge. Why "one baptism"? “One Lord, one faith, one baptism” (Eph. 4:4), teaches the Apostle Paul. This means that there is only one true Church, established by the One true God, and in it there are saving sacraments, since the grace of God operates in the Church. The uniqueness and uniqueness of Baptism was included in the Creed also because during the time of the first Ecumenical Councils there were disputes about how to receive heretics who had fallen away from the Church, whether it was necessary to repeat the sacrament of Baptism over them or not? Therefore, the Second Ecumenical Council supplemented the “Symbol” with the words that there can be only one Baptism. It was decided to accept the fallen through repentance.

The Creed calls it a sacrament Baptism, but no other sacraments are mentioned. Baptism is the sacrament of entry into the Church; without it one cannot become a Christian, a follower of Christ and a member of His Church. By entering the Church through Baptism, as through some kind of gate, a person gains the opportunity to begin other sacraments and sacred rites of the Church. There are seven sacraments in the Church: baptism, confirmation, communion, confession, unction (or unction), wedding and priesthood.

So, the spiritual life of a Christian begins with Baptism; he is born in this sacrament for a new life, life with Christ. The Lord sends the apostles to preach His teaching, the word of God to all people and baptize everyone who believes in Christ and wants to follow him: “Go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things.” that I commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20). In another Gospel, written by the holy evangelist Mark, the Savior says about Baptism: “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved; and whoever does not believe will be condemned” (Mark 16:16). A necessary condition Baptism is faith and living by faith. Baptism is not only a new birth, but also death for another life, sinful, carnal: “If we died with Christ, then we believe that we will also live with Him” (Rom. 6:8) - we read the words of the Apostle Paul at sacrament of Baptism.

Before immersing in the Holy Font with the invocation of the name of the Holy Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the one approaching Baptism renounces the devil and “all his deeds,” that is, from a sinful life,” for “he who commits sin is from (). And he is united with Christ, promises to keep faith in the Lord and faithfulness to Him, promises not to resist the will of God and to live according to His commandments.

In the waters of baptism, a person drowns his sins, his fallen nature, emerging from the font cleansed and renewed, and receives grace and strength to fight the devil and sin. Therefore, the Creed says that Baptism is performed “for the remission of sins.” When an adult begins the sacrament of baptism, he is required not only to have faith, but also to repent of his sins.

We baptize infants according to the faith of their parents and godparents, who are sureties for them before God. Both parents and godparents must be believers who know their faith and live according to it. They must raise the child in faith. The prototype of New Testament Baptism was the Old Testament rite of circumcision; it was performed on infants on the eighth day after birth. We also perform baptism on infants, for the Apostle Paul directly calls Baptism “circumcision made without hands” (Col. 2:11-12); Even the holy apostles performed baptisms over entire “houses”, families, in which, of course, there were small children. The Lord Himself commanded not to hinder children from coming to Him: “Let the children come to Me, and do not forbid them, for of such is the Kingdom of God” (Luke 18:16). The fact that the grace of God can be communicated through the faith of other people is clear from the Gospel. When people turned to Christ with faith, asking for the healing of their relatives and friends, the Lord performed miracles according to the faith of those asking. For example, when the synagogue leader Jairus asked to heal his daughter, when a Syrophoenician woman prayed to cast out a demon from her daughter, or when four people came to the Lord and brought their paralytic companion. “Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven you” (Mark 2:5).

For any Orthodox believer with children, it is unthinkable for our children to remain outside the grace of God, which is taught in the saving Sacraments of the Church. That's why Orthodox Church established the need for infant baptism with its canonical rules. For example, in Canon 124 of the Council of Carthage it is said: “whoever rejects the need for the baptism of small children and newborns from the mother’s womb, or says that although they are baptized for the remission of sins, they do not borrow anything from Adam’s ancestral sin that should be washed in the bath of rebirth ( that is, Baptism Ed.), from which it would follow that the image of baptism for the remission of sins is used over them not in its true, but in a false meaning, let him be anathema.” Thus, it becomes clear that infants, although they do not have personal sins, also need purification and the grace of God acting in the sacraments, since they, like all people, inherit the general ancestral depravity, the inclination to sin.

ABOUT THE ELEVENTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

I'm waiting for the resurrection of the dead,

Man was created by God as an immortal being. After Adam's fall, the human body began to get sick, grow old, deteriorate, and lost its immortal properties. People are born, live on earth, and then die. The immortal soul is separated from the body; after bodily death, the Lord judges all the affairs of a person’s earthly life and determines the place of residence of the soul until the day of the Last Judgment. At the end of the world, on the day of the Last Judgment, God will resurrect, will restore the bodies of dead people in order to pronounce His final judgment on humanity and separate those worthy of the Eternal Kingdom of Bliss with God from those who, due to their sins, are unworthy of the Kingdom of God. Unrepentant sinners will go into “eternal torment” (Matthew 25:46), “into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angel” (Matthew 25:41), that is, to a place devoid of divine light, where they will remain in eternal torment , along with Satan and his servants.

The current state of the deceased, that is, the existence of the soul without a body, is not final and incomplete. Man is not only a soul, but a soul and a body together. And therefore, for the Judgment of all people and further eternal life, the Lord will resurrect the dead in the body. Those people who will be alive at the time of the second coming of Christ will also appear at the judgment of God.

Almost all peoples have the concept of the immortality of the soul, for in man, as an initially immortal being, there is a feeling, a sense of his eternity.

The Lord Jesus Christ, having walked the full path of human life from birth to death, showed us the path that awaits all departed people. He was resurrected and His soul was united with the body. The Apostle Paul speaks about this: “If we believe that Jesus died and rose again, then God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will not warn those who have died; because the Lord Himself, with a proclamation, with the voice of the archangel and the trumpet of God, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first, then we who remain alive will be caught up with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so always with the Lord we will" (1 Sol. 4: 14-17).

In the Holy Scriptures, both New and Old Testament Many times it is said about the future resurrection of the dead. The Lord gave the prophet Ezekiel a vision that has historical significance (tells about the restoration of the kingdom of Israel), but is also a prototype of the general resurrection of bodies. The prophet saw a field full of dead, dry human bones. And so God says that he will introduce spirit into them, cover them with veins, grow flesh on them and cover them with skin. And everything happens according to the word of the Lord, then “the spirit entered into them and they came to life and stood on their feet - a very, very great army” (Ezek. 37: 1-10).

It is difficult for the human consciousness, accustomed to thinking in earthly, limited categories, to imagine how the resurrection of long-dead people and the restoration of decayed flesh can occur. But we know that the Lord created the first man from “the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life” (Gen. 2:7), that is, he gave him an immortal soul. Earth, “dust of the earth,” is a set of chemical elements from which all nature, including humans, consists. When the body dies, it decomposes and returns to the state of dust. After the Fall, God tells Adam that “you ... will return “to the land from which you were taken” (Gen. 3:17-19). Of course, God, Who once created the human body from the nature of the earth, will be able to restore the decayed human body back.

To assure us of the future resurrection of bodies, the Apostle Paul uses the image of grain thrown into the ground: “Someone will say: How will the dead be raised? and in what body will they come? Reckless! what you sow will not come to life unless it dies. And when you sow, you do not sow the future body, but the naked grain that happens, wheat or something else; but God gives him a body as he wishes, and to each seed his own body... So it is at the resurrection of the dead” (1 Cor. 15, 35-33, 42).

“If the seeds do not die first, do not rot and do not decay, they will not grow an ear. And just as you, when you notice that a seed is subject to damage and decay, not only do not doubt, but thereby become even more firmly convinced of its resurrection (for if the seed had remained intact without damage and destruction, it would not have been resurrected), so reason and about your body,” he also says Saint John Chrysostom.

ABOUT THE TWELFTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

and the life of the next century. Truly so.

After the general resurrection and the Last Judgment, the earth will be renewed and transformed through fire. On the new earth it will be established Kingdom of God, as stated in holy scripture, Kingdom of truth: “According to the promise of the Lord, we look forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness alone will reign” (2 Pet. 3:13). The Holy Apostle John the Theologian, in a revelation about the future destinies of the world, saw “a new heaven and a new earth” (Rev. 21: 1). There will be nothing sinful, unclean or unjust on the new earth. Both nature and human nature will also be renewed. The Apostle Paul writes that people’s bodies will be similar to the resurrected body of the Savior: “But our citizenship is in heaven, from where we look for the Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body so that it will be like His glorious body, by the power by which He acts and subdues all things to Himself (Phil. 3:20,21). In the Kingdom of God there will be no illness, no suffering, no sorrow.

What will it be life what it will look like new heaven and earth? It's hard for us to imagine. But one thing is certain, that both the Kingdom of God and life in it will be incomparably, incommensurably more beautiful than all the current earthly beauties and joys. “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man what God has prepared for those who love Him (1 Cor. 2:9), says the Apostle Paul. We can give the following example. There lives a man who suffers from severe eye disease from birth; he is almost deprived of light; he distinguishes surrounding objects and people only as vague silhouettes. And so he undergoes an operation, and after a while all the colors, all the beauties of the surrounding world become available to him for contemplation. Or a person who was deaf from birth was given hearing, and a wonderful world of sounds, words and musical harmonies was opened to him. Yes, it is difficult for us to imagine what “God has prepared for those who love Him,” but we believe that life with the Lord, in constant divine light and love, will be blissful and beautiful. Our present, earthly joys cannot give us an idea of ​​that other joy and happiness. Even spiritual joys, from love, gratitude to God, prayers are only a weak beginning, a thin sprout of what will be there, in the new Kingdom of Truth. For us, the expectation of the life of the next century is a matter of faith, our hope, and one can only feel sorry for people who do not have this hope, that is, do not believe in a future life. There is a parable about this.

Two twins talk in the belly of a pregnant woman. One of them is a believer, and the other is an unbeliever. The unbeliever believes that their whole life is living in this cramped and dark room, where they can only move slightly, and there is no other life. Another baby, on the contrary, believes that their current situation, temporary, is only the beginning of a real, wonderful life, that someday they will see the light, the beauty of the world, they will eat food with their mouths and walk with their own feet. And most importantly, this baby believes they will see their mother. To which the non-believer replies that believing in a mother is simply madness, we don’t see her, which means she doesn’t exist. His believing brother tries to dissuade him, saying that the mother is with them, she takes care of them, gives them life and food, the mother is everywhere, she is around them. But the unbelieving twin stands his ground.

The creed ends with the word "Amen", which means: truly, undoubtedly so. By this we confirm and testify that we accept, as true Orthodox Christians, this confession of faith, left to us by the holy fathers, and approved by the ecumenical councils.

1. I believe (recognize) in one God the Father, the Almighty, Who holds everything in His power, the Creator of heaven and earth, visible to all and invisible (visible and invisible - the Angelic world).

2. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, (who) was born of the Father before all ages (before all times) of Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not created, consubstantial (of the same nature with God the Father) to the Father, in Whom all things were (all things were created).

3. For our sake, man and our salvation came down from Heaven and became incarnate (took a body) from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human (became human).

4. She was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried.

5. And he rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures (as was foretold in the Holy Scriptures).

6. And ascended (ascended in the flesh) into Heaven, and sat on the right hand (seated on the right side) of the Father.

7. And again (again) the one to come (coming) with glory to judge (to judge) the living and the dead, His Kingdom will have no end.

8. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the life-giving, (who gives life) Who proceeds from the Father, (who proceeds from the Father) Who with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified, (We bow to Him and glorify Him together with the Father and the Son) spoken by the prophets (The Holy Spirit spoke through the prophets.)

9. Into one, holy, catholic (universal) and apostolic Church.

10. I confess (recognize) one baptism for the remission (forgiveness) of sins.

11. I tea (expect) the resurrection of the dead.

12. And the life of the next century (future life in Paradise). Amen. (truly so).

Symbol of Faith in Russian

1. I believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, the Creator of heaven and earth, of everything visible and invisible.

2. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, begotten of the Father before all ages: Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, one being with the Father, by Him all things were created.

3. For the sake of us people and for the sake of our salvation, he came down from Heaven, and took flesh from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became a man.

4. He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried,

5. And rose again on the third day, according to the Scriptures.

6. And ascended into Heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father.

7. And coming again in glory to judge the living and the dead, His kingdom will have no end.

8. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord who gives life, who proceeds from the Father, together with the Father and the Son, worshiped and glorified, who spoke through the prophets.

9. Into one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.

10. I acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.

11. I look forward to the resurrection of the dead,

12. And the life of the next century. Amen (truly so).

Те Creаd In English

1. I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.

2. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Only-begotten, begotten of the Father before all ages; Light of Light: true God of true God; begotten, not made; оf one essence with the Father; by Whom all things were made;

3. Who for us mеn, аnd for оur salvаtion, саmе down from hеаvеn, аnd wаs inсаrnаte оf thе Holy Spirit аnd thе Virgin Mary, аnd beсаmе mаn;

4. And was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried;

5. And arose again on the third day according to the Scriptures;

6. And ascended into Heaven, and sittеth аt thе right hand оf thе Father;

7. And shаll come аgain, with glory, to judge both the living аnd thе dead; Whose kingdom shall have no end.

8. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life; Who proceeds from the Father; Who with the Father and the Son together is wоrshipped and аnd glorified; Who spake by the prophets.

9. In One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.

10. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins.

11. I look for the resurrection of the dead,

12. And the life of the age to come. Amen.

What is the Creed

The Creed is a prayer that briefly and accurately states the most important truths Christian faith. Every Orthodox Christian must believe as the Creed teaches. The Creed should be known by heart and read with morning prayers.

The Creed, which we will explain here, was compiled by the fathers of the First and Second Ecumenical Councils. At the First Ecumenical Council the first seven members of the Symbol were written, at the Second - the remaining five. The First Ecumenical Council took place in the city of Nicaea in 325 after the Nativity of Christ to confirm the apostolic teaching about the Son of God and against the incorrect teaching of Arius. Arius taught that the Son of God was created by God the Father and is not the true God. The Second Ecumenical Council took place in Constantinople in 381 to confirm the apostolic teaching about the Holy Spirit against the false teaching of Macedonius, who rejected the Divine dignity of the Holy Spirit. For the two cities where these Ecumenical Councils took place, the Creed is called Nicene-Constantinopolitan.

The Creed consists of 12 members (parts). The 1st member speaks about God the Father, the 2nd to 7th members talk about God the Son, the 8th - about God the Holy Spirit, the 9th - about the Church, the 10th - about baptism, the 11th and 12th The second one is about the resurrection of the dead and eternal life.

Questions: (1) What is the Creed? (2) When and where was the Creed written? (3) How many members (parts) does the Creed consist of? (4) Where was the First Ecumenical Council held? (5) What false teaching did this council condemn? (6) Where did the Second Ecumenical Council take place? (7) What false teaching did this council condemn? (8) What do the different parts (members) of the Creed say?

First member of the Creed

I believe in one God the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, visible to all and invisible.

To believe in God means to be firmly convinced that God exists, that He cares about us, and to wholeheartedly accept what He told us through His Son, through the prophets and apostles.

Faith should not be limited only to our minds, like abstract science, but it should warm our hearts with love for God and people. In other words, it is not enough just to admit that God exists, but we must also live the way God wants.

A true Christian is one who believes correctly and lives according to the Commandments of God.

It is necessary that our faith in God be so strong that no temptations, dangers, sufferings, or death itself could force us to renounce God or violate His holy will. Only living and strong faith saves our soul, as Holy Scripture teaches: “We believe with our hearts for righteousness, and with our lips we confess for salvation.”(Rom. 10:10).

Examples of firm faith are the holy martyrs. For the sake of faith in God and the fulfillment of His Commandments, they abandoned all the blessings of earthly life, were subjected to persecution, terrible torment and even death.

The words of the Creed: “in one God” teach that a Christian must recognize only ONE true God. There is no other god in the universe except Him - the one, great and omnipotent. Wild and superstitious people who recognize many gods and serve idols are called pagans.

God is a supreme, supramundane, supernatural Being. It is impossible to fully understand the being of God. It is beyond knowledge not only for people, but also for angels.

However, we can and must know God. We are taught about God by the nature that He created, as well as the Holy Scriptures, in which God revealed Himself to people through His prophets and apostles. Considering the world around us, its beauty and harmony, as well as reading the Holy Scriptures, we learn the following properties of God.

God is the Creator. Everything that exists: visible and invisible - the entire vast universe was created by God. At the same time, God can do everything in an instant and without difficulty. Therefore we call Him almighty.

God is Almighty because He holds everything in His power. Without His will nothing can happen.

God is Spirit. He is not material and simple in His essence.

God is inexhaustible Life. All living things: plants, animals, people, angels and other creatures - everything received and receives its life from God.

God has always existed and will always exist - He is eternal.

God is everywhere and penetrates everything with Himself, although He does not mix with anything. He is omnipresent.

God knows everything: everything that was, what is and what will be - the thoughts and desires of all beings. Nothing can be hidden from Him; He is omniscient.

God is infinitely wise. No one can invent or do anything better than Him. He is wise.

God is infinitely good. He pities and loves everyone, takes care of everyone like a Father. He is Love.

God is supremely just. Every person will sooner or later receive what he deserves. God is all-righteous.

God is in eternal bliss and gives joy and bliss to those who love Him. He is the all-blessed one.

God doesn't change. He's always the same. Everything else in the world is born and grows, then dies and disintegrates.

God is one, but not alone, because God is one in His essence, but trinity in Persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit - the Trinity is consubstantial and indivisible. The Unity of Three Persons who endlessly love each other.

The mutual relationship between the Persons of the Most Holy Trinity is that God the Father is not born and does not come from another person; The Son of God was born from God the Father before all ages; and the Holy Spirit proceeds from God the Father before all ages. All three Persons of the Holy Trinity, in essence and properties, are completely equal to each other. Just as God the Father is the true God, and the Son of God is the true God, so God the Holy Spirit is the true God, but all three Persons are one Deity - one God.

How one God exists in three Persons is a mystery incomprehensible to our minds. We believe in it because the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, taught us to believe. Sending the apostles to preach, He said: “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19). The Apostle and Evangelist John explains that the Persons in God have one essence: “Three testify in heaven (about the Divinity of the Son of God): the Father, the Word and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one” (John 5:7). The Apostle Paul writes: “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all” (2 Cor. 13:13).

To explain the mystery of the Holy Trinity, we can point to the following examples. Speech among all peoples of the earth has three faces: I (we), you (you) and he (they); time has: past, present and future; state of matter: solid, liquid and gaseous; all the variety of colors in the world is made up of three primary colors: red, blue and yellow; a person manifests himself through: thought, word and action; action, in turn, has a beginning, middle and end; the sun has a circle, warmth and light; salvation of the soul is achieved through three virtues: faith, hope and love.

We can understand the mystery of the Holy Trinity more with our hearts than with our minds. If we love God and live according to His commandments, then our heart will feel the truth of the mystery of the Holy Trinity and everything that the Lord Jesus Christ taught.

God first created the invisible, and then - visible world. Angels belong to the invisible or spiritual world - spirits, incorporeal beings (therefore invisible) and immortals, gifted with mind, will and power.

The word "angel" is Greek and means "messenger" in Russian. God sends angels to proclaim His will to people. Every Christian has his own guardian angel, who invisibly helps him in the matter of salvation and protects him from all evil. There are also evil spirits - fallen angels: demons or demons. God created them good, but they became evil due to their pride and disobedience. Good angels live in Heaven, and demons live in hell.

The visible world is the world in which we live. God created it out of nothing many millions of years ago. Man is a complex creature. His soul is invisible and immortal. She was created in the image and likeness of God. The human body is made of earth, just like the bodies of animals.

Questions: (1) What does it mean to “believe in God?” (2) Who is a true Christian? (3) Who left us an example of firm faith? (4) What kind of God do we believe in? (5) Can we fully know God? (6) Why do we call God the Creator of heaven and earth? (7) Why do we call God Almighty? (8) Why do we say that God is Trinity, Spirit, Life, Love, that He is all-righteous, all-knowing, all-wise and all-blessed? (9) Name the three Persons of the Holy Trinity. (10) What is the relationship between the Persons of the Holy Trinity? (11) What do we call the invisible world? (12) What does the word angel mean?

Second Creed

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, who was born of the Father before all ages. Light from Light, true God from true God, born, uncreated, consubstantial with the Father, to Whom all things were.

The Lord Jesus Christ is the Only Begotten Son of God, that is, the only Son of God the Father, born from the being of the Father. Just as light is born from light, so from the true God the Father was born the true God the Son. Therefore, the Son of God has the same divine essence as God the Father, or, as the Creed says, He is “consubstantial with the Father.” Jesus Christ Himself said: “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30).

The Son of God was born from God the Father before all ages, that is, before the beginning of time - initially. Just as God the Father eternally exists, so the Son of God eternally exists, and the Holy Spirit eternally exists.

If angels and holy people can be called “sons of God,” then not by their essence, but by the grace of God. God the Father adopted us as His sons - for the sake of His Only Begotten Son, Who died for us to cleanse us from sins and make us saints.

To the word “born,” in the Creed, the word “uncreated” is added. This addition was made to refute the false teaching of Arius, who argued that the Son of God was not born, but created.

The words that all things were by Him mean that by Him, the Son of God, everything was created: both the visible and the invisible world. “Without Him (the Son of God) nothing began to be,” it is written in the Gospel (John 1:3).

The Son of God, when born on earth, received the name Jesus Christ. The name Jesus is Greek translation Hebrew name Yeshua, which means Savior. This name was indicated twice by God through an Angel before the Nativity of Christ, because the eternal Son of God came to earth precisely to save people.

The name Christ is Greek and means Anointed One. In Hebrew it corresponded to the word "Messiah." In the Old Testament, prophets, high priests and kings were called anointed, who upon assuming their office were anointed with oil and through this received the gifts of the Holy Spirit necessary for the performance of their duties.

The Son of God is called the Anointed One (Christ) because of His human nature because He received all the gifts of the Holy Spirit: prophetic knowledge, the holiness of a high priest, and the power of a king.

Questions: (1) From whom was the Son of God born? (2) What does the word "Only Begotten" mean? (3) Why do we say “begotten, not made”? (4) When was the Son of God born, as God, and how long ago was He born on Earth, as a man? (5) What do the words “It all happened to them” mean? (6) What does the name "Jesus" mean? (7) What does the name "Christ" mean? (8) What do the words “Consubstantial with the Father” mean?

Third Article of the Creed

For our sake, man and our salvation came down from Heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human.

The third part of the Creed speaks of the incarnation of the Son of God. Being a perfect God, the Son of God descended from Heaven into our world and became human, that is, he became a perfect man, without ceasing to be the omnipotent and omnipresent God.

As a man, Jesus Christ had soul and body and became like us in everything except sin. His human nature was pure, like Adam's before the Fall. Since Jesus Christ had and continues to have two natures - Divine and human, He is the God-man.

The Son of God came into our world to save us: to deliver people from the power of the devil, sin and eternal death and to make us righteous people.

All people are born sinners. Sin appeared in people from the devil, who, back in paradise, seduced Eve, and through her Adam, and persuaded them to break the commandment of God, that is, to sin. This sin corrupted the nature of Adam and Eve. Since then, all their descendants are born damaged by sin. Sin deprived people of God's grace, darkened their minds, weakened their will, and brought illness and death into their bodies. People began to suffer and die, and on their own they could no longer overcome sin within themselves.

Seeing the powerlessness of people in the fight against sin, the merciful Lord promised Adam and Eve that the Savior of the world would come to earth, Who would deliver people from sin and from the power of the devil.

Then, for many generations, God, through His prophets, prepared people for the coming of the Son of God to earth and indicated the signs of His coming into the world. Here are some of the most important predictions about the Savior:

The prophet Isaiah predicted that the Savior would be born of a virgin (Isaiah 7:14) and with amazing clarity predicted His suffering and resurrection (Isaiah 53rd chapter).

The prophet Micah predicted that the Savior would be born in Bethlehem (Mic. 5:2; Matt. 2:4-6).

The prophet Malachi predicted that the Savior would come to the newly created Jerusalem temple and that a Forerunner (John the Baptist), similar to the prophet Elijah, would be sent before Him (Malachi 3:1-15).

The Prophet Zechariah predicted the Savior's triumphal entry into Jerusalem on a colt (Zechariah 9:9).

King David in the 21st Psalm depicted the Savior’s suffering on the cross with such precision, as if he himself had seen it at the Cross.

For 490 years, the Prophet Daniel predicted the time of the appearance of the Savior, His death on the cross, predicted the subsequent destruction of the temple, Jerusalem and the spread of the Christian faith (Dan. 9 chapter).

When the time of salvation came, the Son of God moved into the immaculate Virgin Mary and, through the action of the Holy Spirit, took on human nature from Her. The further development of the infant Christ in the womb of the Virgin Mary proceeded naturally until, nine months after conception, He was born from Her in the city of Bethlehem.

Many righteous people learned about the birth of the Savior in Bethlehem. So, for example, the eastern sages (magi) recognized Him by the star that appeared in the east before the birth of the Savior. The Bethlehem shepherds learned about Him from angels. Elder Simeon and the prophetess Anna recognized Him by the revelation of the Holy Spirit when He was brought to the temple. John the Baptist recognized Him on the Jordan River during baptism, when the Holy Spirit descended on the Lord in the form of a dove and God the Father said: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17). Many recognized Him by the loftiness of His teaching and especially by the miracles He performed.

By honoring the Savior, we also honor His Most Pure Mother. The Blessed Virgin Mary came from the family of Abraham and King David and was the daughter of the righteous Joachim and Anna. Out of love for God, She promised not to marry, that is, to remain a virgin. She remained a virgin even after the birth of the Savior, which is why She is called the Ever-Virgin (“always a virgin.”) We also call the Virgin Mary the Mother of God, because in the flesh She gave birth to the true Son of God. We honor Her above all created beings, not only people, but also angels: “More honorable than the cherubim and more glorious than the seraphim.”

Everything that the Lord Jesus Christ did was aimed at the salvation of the sinful human race: His teaching, the example of His life, His death and resurrection from the dead.

The teaching of Jesus Christ saves us when we accept it with all our souls and act in imitation of the life of the Savior. Just as the false word of the devil, accepted by the first people, became the seed of sin and death in people, so the true word of Christ, sincerely accepted by Christians, becomes in them the seed of holy and immortal life.

Questions: (1) Why did the Lord Jesus Christ come to earth? (2) What does the human nature of the Lord Jesus Christ consist of? (3) Is the Lord Jesus Christ true God and true Man? (4) Why are all people born sinners? (5) What did the prophets predict about Jesus Christ? (6) From whom and how was the Lord Jesus Christ born? (7) How did Jesus Christ save us? (8) From what family was the Blessed Virgin Mary? (9) Why do we call the Virgin Mary the Mother of God?

Fourth Article of the Creed

She was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried.

This member of the Creed speaks of the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ during the time of Pontius Pilate, the ruler of Judea. Jesus Christ, as omnipotent God, could have avoided suffering, but He voluntarily suffered and died on the cross in order to wash away our sins with His blood. Out of His infinite love for us, He took upon ourselves our sins and endured all the suffering that would await us for our sins.

The execution on the cross was the most shameful and cruel that people could come up with. The Romans crucified the most dangerous criminals on crosses. The Lord voluntarily accepted this terrible execution out of His endless love for us.

The Lord Jesus Christ was crucified on Friday before the Jewish Passover at a place called Golgotha ​​(place of skull), near Jerusalem. The Savior did not suffer by His Divine nature, which cannot suffer, but as a man. After the death of the Savior, Joseph of Arimathea buried His body in a stone cave near Golgotha. The high priests assigned Roman guards to the cave, and put their seal on the stone rolled up to the cave.

After the Savior died on the cross, He descended with His soul into hell, and from there He brought out the souls of all believers and virtuous people, starting from Adam and Eve. Hell is a place of suffering, far from God and devoid of light. Satan reigns there. Since all people were sinners, until the death of the Savior on the cross no one could enter heaven, not even righteous people.

On the cross, the Lord achieved a great victory over evil. He washed away the sins of the whole world, took away the devil's power over people and defeated death. The Lord sanctified the cross with His most pure blood and gave it spiritual strength, with the help of which we overcome devilish temptations. Thanks to the Savior’s suffering on the cross, even the most desperate sinner has hope through repentance and faith in the Savior to receive forgiveness of his sins and the Kingdom of Heaven. The thief who repented on the cross was the first to enter heaven.

We Christians must always remember at what terrible cost the Lord Jesus Christ washed away our sins. Therefore, we must make every effort not to sin and live righteously.

If the Lord loved us so much that He gave His life for us, then we should love Him with all our hearts.

Note

1. The words in the Creed “suffered and buried” were spoken against the ancient heretics who falsely taught that the Lord did not suffer on the cross, but only pretended to suffer.

2. As the Evangelists write, during the hours of the Savior’s suffering on the cross, “darkness fell over all the earth” (Luke 23:44). Pagan writers also testify to this darkness: the Roman astronomer Phlegon, Phallus, Julius Africanus. One of them exclaimed: “One of the gods has died!” The famous philosopher from Athens, Dionysius the Areopagite, was at that time in Egypt, in the city of Galiopolis. Observing the sudden darkness, he said: “Either the Creator suffers, or the world is destroyed.” Subsequently, after the preaching of the Apostle Paul, Dionysius converted to Christianity and was the first bishop of Athens.

Questions: (1) Under what ruler was the Lord Jesus Christ crucified on the cross? (2) Was the suffering of the Lord Jesus Christ real, or only apparent? (3) On what day of the week was the Lord Jesus Christ crucified? (4) Where was He buried? (5) Where did the Lord Jesus Christ descend in soul after His death? (6) Why do we say in the Symbol that she suffered and was buried? How did the Lord Jesus Christ save people?

Fifth Article of the Creed

And he rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures.

The fifth member of the Creed says that Jesus Christ conquered death by His death and on the third day rose again: He came to life and came out of the tomb with His renewed flesh. The Resurrection of the Savior is the greatest miracle that opened the way for people to renewal and eternal joy.

The Old Testament prophets predicted the death, burial and resurrection of the Savior, which is why it is said in the Symbol: “according to the Scriptures” - that is, all this happened as it is written in the Holy Scriptures. Jesus Christ died on Friday, the eve of the Jewish Passover, at about three o'clock in the afternoon, and rose again at night after Saturday. Since then, the first day after Saturday began to be called “Resurrection” or “Lord’s Day.” On this day Christians gathered for thanksgiving prayer God and for communion.

The state of Jesus Christ after His death and before the resurrection is depicted by the Orthodox Church as follows: “You were in the tomb in body, in hell with your soul as God, in paradise You were with the thief, and on the Throne You were, Christ, with the Father and the Spirit, all filling with Himself, the Incomprehensible One."

The Resurrection of Christ is different from the resurrections of other people. By the divine power of the Lord Jesus Christ, the son of the widow of Nain, the maiden Tabitha, Lazarus and others were resurrected. These were temporary resurrections, since the souls of the dead returned to their former earthly and corruptible bodies. After some time, these resurrected people died again.

Jesus Christ rose from the dead in His completely transformed and renewed body. At the resurrection, His body became spiritual and heavenly. Therefore, Christ left the cave where He was buried, without rolling away the stone or breaking the seal. He was invisible to the soldiers guarding the coffin.

The Lord revealed His resurrection to the apostles first through an angel who rolled away the stone from the door of the tomb. Then the angels announced the resurrection of Jesus Christ to the myrrh-bearing women. Finally, Jesus Christ Himself appeared to all the apostles on the evening of the first day of His resurrection. Then, over the course of forty days, the Savior repeatedly appeared to His disciples, with many sure proofs of His resurrection: He allowed the disciples to touch His wounds from the nails and from the spear, ate in front of them and talked with them about the Kingdom of God.

The Day of the Resurrection of Christ is also called Easter and is the most joyful holiday for us. This is because by His death the Lord defeated the devil, death and all evil and laid the foundation for our resurrection. Therefore, on Easter we sing: “Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death (having conquered), and giving life (life) to those in the tombs.”

Now the Lord dwells forever in Heaven in this new resurrected body. At the general resurrection, we will rise from the dead with a renewed and spiritualized body, similar to the body of the risen Savior.

Then the ancient prediction of the prophet Hosea will be fulfilled: “I will redeem (save) them from the power of hell, I will deliver them from death. Death, where is your sting? Hell, where is your victory?!” (Hosea 13:14).

Questions: (1) Where was the Savior's death and resurrection predicted? (2) On what day did Christ die and on what day was he resurrected? (3) What day was it after His death? (4) How did the resurrected Jesus Christ emerge from the tomb? (5) How was the Savior's body after the resurrection different from the body He had before His resurrection? (6) Where was the soul of the Lord Jesus Christ before His resurrection? (7) Who was the first to know about His resurrection? (8) Why is the resurrection of the Savior the most joyful holiday for us?

Sixth Article of the Creed

And ascended into Heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father.

This member of the Creed speaks of the ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ into Heaven, where He sat at the right hand (on the right side of) God the Father.

The Ascension of the Savior took place forty days after His resurrection. He ascended to Heaven with His flesh and soul, as a man, and by His Divinity He always remained with the Father, as the Son of God the Father.

Sitting “on the right side of the Father” means that Jesus Christ, having ascended into Heaven, received Divine power over the world together with God the Father.

By His Ascension, our Lord Jesus Christ united the earthly with the heavenly and showed us that our thoughts and desires should be directed towards Heaven.

The Lord Jesus Christ promised: “To him who overcomes (evil, sin) I will give to sit with Me on My throne, just as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne” (Rev. 3:21).

Questions: (1) What does the sixth article of the Creed say? (2) How did the Savior ascend to Heaven, by His Divine or by His human nature? (3) On what day after the Resurrection did He ascend to Heaven? (4) What does the words “sat at the right hand of God the Father” mean? (5) Where should our thoughts and desires be directed?

Seventh Article of the Creed

And again the coming one will be judged with glory by the living and the dead, His Kingdom will have no end.

The seventh article of the Creed speaks of the second coming of the Savior, when he will return to Earth to judge all people living and dead. After this, His Kingdom will begin, which will have no end.

The second coming of the Savior is predicted in the Holy Scriptures. For example, when Jesus Christ ascended into heaven, angels appeared to the apostles and said: “This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come again in the same way as you saw Him going into heaven” (Acts 1:11).

The second coming of Christ will be completely different from the first. The first time He came in the humble form of a man to suffer for us and thereby save us. He was born in a cattle cave, lived in poverty, was overworked, hungry and thirsty, suffered insults from sinners and died among the evildoers on the cross. The second time He will come in all His greatness - the King of the universe surrounded by angels. “As lightning comes from the east and is visible even to the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man” (Matthew 24:27).

The second coming of Christ the Savior will be extraordinary: Then “the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken; then the sign of the Son of Man (the Cross) will appear in heaven; and all the tribes of the earth will weep when they see the Son of man, coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He will send angels with a loud trumpet, and they will gather His elect" from all parts of the world (Matthew 24:29-30).

“Then He will sit on the throne of His glory, and all nations (who have lived on the earth since the foundation of the world) will be gathered before Him,” and He will judge all people: righteous and sinners (Matthew 25:31-46).

This judgment is called “The Terrible,” because then the inner state of each person will be revealed and not only all his deeds, but also all the words he has spoken, secret desires and thoughts will be revealed to everyone.

According to the judgment of Christ, the righteous will go into eternal life, and sinners into eternal torment - because they did evil deeds for which they did not repent and which they did not atone for. good deeds and correction of life. People who have never heard of God (pagans) will be judged by the voice of their conscience: whoever did as his conscience told him will be acquitted, and whoever acted contrary to the voice of his conscience will be condemned.

“The time will come,” says the Lord, “in which all who are in the graves will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who have done good will come out to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of condemnation” (John 5:28-29).

When exactly the Lord will come to earth for the second time is hidden from everyone. This is a secret that no one knows, not even the angels of God, but only the Heavenly Father. Therefore, we must always be ready to appear before the judgment of God.

Although the day of the coming of Christ is unknown, some signs of the approaching coming of the Lord are revealed in the Holy Scriptures.

1. Before this, the Gospel will be preached throughout the world.

2. Jews in large numbers will turn to Christ and become Christians.

3. Before the end of the world, people will become extremely corrupt, faith in them will completely weaken, they will hate each other and do evil; some will practice witchcraft and worship demons.

4. Many false prophets will appear who will deceive people with their fictitious teachings and false miracles.

5. Disagreement and bloody wars will intensify in the world; there will be famine, disease, strong earthquakes and storms.

6. Finally, when evil increases extremely, the Antichrist will appear among people.

The word "Antichrist" means the enemy of Christ. He will appear before the end of the world and will reign for three and a half years. People will rely on him as a wise ruler, but he will try by all means to destroy the Christian faith. During his time, Christians will be greatly persecuted, demanding that they recognize the Antichrist. Christians faithful to Christ will then neither be able to get a job, nor sell, nor buy. Then many people will be tempted, deny Christ and betray each other. All who renounced Christ and submitted to the Antichrist will perish in hell, and Christians will be saved by remaining faithful to Christ to the end.

Christ will come, and the reign of the Antichrist will end with the terrible death of himself, his followers and the devil himself.

After this there will be the resurrection of the dead, the Last Judgment and the eternal Kingdom of Christ will begin.

Questions: (1) What does the seventh article of the Creed say? (2) How will the second coming of Christ differ from the first? (3) In what form and how will the second coming of Christ take place? (4) Does anyone know when the second coming will be? (5) What events will happen in the world before the second coming of Christ? Describe these events. (6) Who is the Antichrist and what events will happen under him? (7) What will happen after the second coming of Christ?

Eighth Article of the Creed

I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the life-giving, who proceeds from the Father, who is worshiped and glorified with the Father and the Son, who spoke the prophets.

The eighth member of the Creed speaks about the Third Person of the Holy Trinity - the Holy Spirit, namely, that He is the same true God as God the Father and God the Son. Therefore, we must glorify Him and worship Him equally with the Father and the Son.

The Holy Spirit is called the Life-Giving Spirit because He, together with the Father and the Son, gives life to everyone - especially spiritual life to angels and people. He is the Creator of the world, along with the Father and the Son. Therefore, it was said at the creation of the world that “the Spirit of God hovered over the waters” (the deep, Gen. 1:2).

Jesus Christ said about the need for a person to be regenerated by the Holy Spirit: “Unless a person is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (John 3:5).

The words: “Who proceeds from the Father” - Who proceeds from the Father - indicate the personal property of the Holy Spirit, by which He differs from God the Father and from God the Son, namely, that He proceeds from God the Father. The Lord Jesus Christ said this to His disciples: “When the Comforter comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me” (John 15:26). The Holy Spirit is called the "Comforter" because He gives us such great joy that we forget about our sorrows.

The words “who spoke the prophets” mean that the Holy Spirit spoke through righteous people: prophets and apostles. They predicted the future and wrote sacred books not according to their own desire or natural human inspiration, but according to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, their Scriptures - books in the Bible - are called God-inspired and contain pure Divine truth. All books of the Bible are the word of God.

Since the day of His descent on the apostles on the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit has continuously abided in the Church of Christ. He keeps its teaching intact and gives Christians His Divine Gifts. The Holy Spirit enlightens believers with the light of Christ's teaching, cleanses them from sinful filth, warms their hearts with love for God and neighbor, gives zeal and strength to live righteously in order to make us saints. Everything good that we have or want to receive is given to us by the Holy Spirit.

Jesus Christ warned: “Every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people; but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven” (Matthew 12:31). “Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit” is called conscious and bitter opposition to Christ’s truth, “for the Spirit is the Truth” (John 5:6). Stubborn resistance to the truth leads a person away from humility and repentance, and without repentance there can be no forgiveness. This is why the sin of “blasphemy against the Spirit” is not forgiven.

The Holy Spirit revealed itself to people in a visible way: at the baptism of the Lord in the form of a Dove, and on the day of Pentecost He descended on the apostles in the form of tongues of fire. When the Holy Spirit works in us, we are calm, kind, obedient, courageous, strongly believe in God, and want to love everyone.

Therefore, a Christian must try with all his might to receive and preserve the grace of the Holy Spirit. There is nothing more valuable in the world. We receive this grace in the holy sacraments, in divine services, in fervent home prayer, from reading the Holy Scriptures and from good deeds.

Questions: (1) Who is the eighth article of the Creed talking about? (2) What Person of the Holy Trinity is the Holy Spirit? (3) What does “life-giving” mean? (4) What does “Who proceeds from the Father” mean? (5) What does it mean, “He who is with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified”? (6) What does “who spoke the prophets” mean? (7) What should we care about first? (8) How do we receive the grace of the Holy Spirit? (9) How do we feel when the Holy Spirit works in us? (10) Why is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit not forgiven?

Ninth Article of the Creed

I believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.

The ninth article of the Creed speaks of the Church of Christ, which Jesus Christ founded for the sanctification and salvation of people.

The Church is all Orthodox Christians - living and dead. The Church is a big family, a universal organization. The Church is the Kingdom of God, which came down from Heaven, spread across the earth and consists of millions of people and angels.

Sometimes the building (temple) in which we pray is called a church. But here we are not talking about a building, but about the unity of all true believers.

We, the children of the Church of Christ, are united by one faith, the same commandments of God, mutual love and the grace of the Holy Spirit. Every Orthodox Christian, if he believes and lives as the Lord Jesus Christ and His Apostles taught, is a member of the Church of Christ.

Jesus Christ is the Head of the Church, and the Church is the spiritual body of Christ. Through Communion, Christ invisibly dwells in believers.

The Lord Jesus Christ entrusted the visible structure and management of the Church to the holy apostles and their successors - bishops, shepherds of the Church, and through them He invisibly governs the Church.

Whoever obeys the Church obeys Christ Himself, and whoever does not obey and rejects it, rejects the Lord Himself. If anyone “does not listen to the Church, let him be to you as a pagan and a tax collector,” said the Lord (Matthew 19:17).

The Church of Christ is invincible and will exist forever, as the Lord promised: “I will build My Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it... I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matt. 16:18; Matt. 28:20) .

The truth of God is kept in its purity only in the Church of Christ, as the Apostle Paul wrote: “The church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth” (Tim. 3:15). Jesus Christ promised the apostles: “But the Comforter, the Holy Spirit (Spirit of truth), whom the Father will send in My name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything that I have told you.” He “will abide with you forever” (John 14:26 and 14:16). Other non-Orthodox churches have departed from the truth to a greater or lesser extent.

We believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.

1. The Church of Christ is one because it is one spiritual body, has one head - Christ and is animated by one Spirit of God (Eph. 4:4-6). It has one goal - to sanctify people; one Divine teaching, one sacrament. Just as a living body cannot be divided, so the Church cannot disintegrate or be separated into parts. Heretics and schismatics can separate from it, but by falling away, they cease to be members of the Church. The Church remains united. Just as the body consists of many members, so the Church of Christ consists of many local or national churches: Greek, Russian, Serbian, Romanian, Bulgarian, Jerusalem, Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, American and others. All these local churches believe and teach the same, and all have bishops descended from the apostles. Only each church has its own language.

2. The Church of Christ is holy because it is sanctified by the Lord Jesus Christ: His sufferings, His Divine teaching and the holy sacraments established by Him, in which the grace of the Holy Spirit is given to believers.

Like an entity gemstone does not change from the dust that has collected on it, so the Church does not lose its holiness from the sinfulness of people. All Christians must cleanse themselves from sins by repentance, confession and communion of the Holy Mysteries. If any of them remains an unrepentant sinner, he falls away from the Church, like a dry branch from a tree.

3. The Church of Christ is conciliar, because it gathers into itself all true believers - regardless of their nationality, education or social status. The Church is not limited by space, time, or people. That is why the Church is also called universal (catholic). All important questions in the Church it is not one person who decides, but a council of bishops. Councils of bishops from all local churches are called Ecumenical Councils.

4. The Church of Christ is also called apostolic, because it preserves the apostolic teaching and apostolic grace. The Holy Apostles, having received the gifts of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, transferred them through sacred ordination to the shepherds of the Church. Thus, continuously from the apostles to the present day, the grace of God is transmitted successively from bishop to bishop.

The one holy, catholic and apostolic Church is also called Orthodox (in Greek, ortho-dokeo), because it thinks correctly and teaches correctly.

Questions: (1) What is called the Church? (2) Is the Church limited to the Earth where we live, or is there a Church in Heaven too? (3) How long will the Church last? (4) Who is the Head of the Church? (5) What unites Orthodox believers into one Church? (6) What types of local churches are there? (7) Why is the Church called holy? (8) Why is it called cathedral? (9) Why is it called apostolic? (10) How is the grace of the Holy Spirit transmitted to priests from apostolic times to our time? (11) What does the name Orthodox Church mean?

Tenth Article of the Creed

I confess one baptism for the remission of sins.

The tenth member of the Creed speaks of the sacrament of baptism. A sacrament is a divine service in which the grace of the Holy Spirit is given to a person in an invisible way (“secretly”). There are seven sacraments: baptism, confirmation, repentance (confession), communion, marriage, priesthood and consecration of oil.

The Creed only mentions baptism, because it is the first sacrament that gives a person access to the other sacraments of the Church.

Sacrament of Baptism

The sacrament of baptism is a sacred act in which a believer in Christ, through three times immersion in water, invoking the name of the Most Holy Trinity - the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, is washed from all sins, is born spiritually and becomes a member of the Church.

The sacrament of baptism was established by our Lord Jesus Christ. First, He sanctified baptism by His own example by being baptized in the Jordan. Then, after His resurrection, He commanded the apostles: “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19).

Baptism is necessary for everyone who wants to be saved. “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God,” said the Lord (John 3:5).

Since apostolic times, it has become a custom to baptize not only adults, but also their children, with the condition that parents and successors will then take care of the Christian upbringing of baptized children. The fact is that children, although they do not have personal sins, are born damaged by the original sin of Adam and Eve, which was inherited from their parents. If someone dies before baptism, then original sin prevents him from entering the Kingdom of Heaven. That is why parents, caring about the salvation of their children, try to baptize them early.

Since baptism is a spiritual birth, and a person will be born one day, the sacrament of baptism is performed on a person once in a lifetime.

Sacrament of Confirmation

Confirmation is a sacrament in which the newly baptized is given the gifts of the Holy Spirit, which guide and strengthen him in the Christian life.

Initially, the holy apostles performed the sacrament of confirmation by the laying on of hands. But since the number of Christians was increasing, and the apostles and their closest disciples did not have time to lay hands on all the baptized, they began to consecrate the oil, which they gave to their assistant priests so that on their behalf they would anoint the newly baptized with this oil and give it to them the grace of the Holy Spirit. This specially consecrated oil is called "mirror."

The holy myrrh for the sacrament of Confirmation is prepared from olive oil with special aromatic substances and is consecrated by the bishops on Maundy Thursday. It is given to the priests as needed and is kept in the altar on the throne.

When performing the sacrament, the following parts of the body of the believer are smeared with the holy myrrh in a cross shape: forehead, eyes, ears, mouth, chest, arms and legs - with the words pronounced: “Seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit, amen.”

Sacrament of Repentance

Repentance is a sacrament in which the believer confesses (orally reveals) his sins to God in the presence of a priest and through the priest receives forgiveness of sins from the Lord.

The Lord said to the apostles: “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven; those whose sins you retain, they remain” (John 20:23).

To receive forgiveness (resolution) of sins from the confessor (repentant) the following is required: reconciliation with all neighbors, sincere regret for the sins committed and verbal recognition of them (confession) and a firm intention to correct one’s life.

In special cases, a penance (translated from Greek as prohibition) is imposed on the penitent, consisting of pious deeds and some deprivations aimed at overcoming sinful habits.

Sins, like dust, little by little collect in our soul. They need to be cleansed by confession so that the soul is pure and so that the Holy Spirit dwells in us.

Sacrament of Communion

Communion is a sacrament in which the believer, under the guise of bread and wine, receives the Body and Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Through this sacrament, a believer is united with Christ and becomes a partaker of eternal life.

The sacrament of communion was established by the Lord Jesus Christ during the Last Supper, on the eve of His suffering on the cross. The Gospel says that the Lord “took bread and thanked (God the Father for all His mercies to the human race), broke it and gave it to the disciples, saying: “Take, eat: This is My Body, which is given for you; Do this in remembrance of Me." He also took the cup and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying: "Drink from it, all of you; For this is My Blood of the New Testament, which is shed for you and for many for the remission (forgiveness) of sins."

Having established the sacrament of Communion, Jesus Christ commanded His disciples: “Do this in remembrance of Me,” that is, perform this sacrament, remembering everything that I have done to save people.

According to the commandment of Christ, since apostolic times the sacrament of communion has been constantly celebrated in the Church of Christ and will continue to be celebrated until the end of the world. The service at which it is celebrated is called the Liturgy.

During the Liturgy, bread and wine are changed by the action of the Holy Spirit into the true Body and true Blood of Christ.

Christians of the first centuries took communion every Sunday.

We should try to receive communion more often, at least once a month and on the day of our angel (name day), and at least once a year during Lent.

In communion we unite with the God-man Christ. This is why communion gives us joy and great spiritual strength. Having received communion, we must thank God for His mercy towards us and try to live righteously, as Jesus Christ lived.

Sacrament of marriage

Marriage is a sacrament in which, with the promise of mutual fidelity to each other, the marital union of the bride and groom is blessed, and the grace of God is given to them for mutual love, unanimity, for the birth and Christian upbringing of children.

Marriage brings a lot of joy when spouses live like Christians, love and help each other. Husband and wife are obliged to maintain mutual love and respect, mutual devotion and fidelity throughout their lives. The Lord does not allow divorce. Having entered into marriage, you must God's help overcome all family difficulties and correct yourself.

Before marriage, a man and woman must live a pure and chaste life.

Sacrament of the Priesthood

The priesthood is a sacrament in which a person, through episcopal ordination, receives the grace of the Holy Spirit for the sacred service of the Church of Christ.

This sacrament is performed only on persons who sincerely wish to serve God and people, who are blameless in their personal lives and have completed the necessary training. There are three degrees of priesthood: deacon, presbyter (priest) and bishop (bishop).

Anyone ordained as a deacon receives the grace to serve at divine services and assist the priest.

Anyone ordained to the priesthood (presbyter) receives the grace to lead believers to salvation and perform divine services and sacraments.

Anyone who is ordained a bishop (bishop) receives the grace to rule the church, lead divine services, perform all the sacraments and ordain others to perform the sacraments. Bishops bear the fullness of apostolic grace.

The Sacrament of Anointing

Blessing of oil is a sacrament in which, during the anointing of a sick person with consecrated oil, the grace of God is invoked upon him to heal him from physical and mental illnesses.

The Sacrament of Unction is also called Unction, because several priests gather to perform it, although, if necessary, one priest can perform it.

Questions: (1) What is a sacrament? (2) How many sacraments are there? Name them. (3) What is the sacrament of baptism? (4) What words are spoken when a person is baptized? (5) Who and when established the sacrament of baptism? (7) Why is baptism not repeated? (8) What happens to a person in the sacrament of baptism? (9) What sacrament gives us the grace of the Holy Spirit to help us live as Christians? (10) Why is it necessary to confess? (11) What is the name of the service at which communion is celebrated? (12) With whom do we unite during communion? (13) How often should one take communion? (14) Name the three degrees of the priesthood.

Eleventh Article of the Creed

Tea of ​​the resurrection of the dead.

This member of the Creed speaks of the general resurrection of the dead.

The resurrection of the dead, which we “anticipate,” that is, we expect, will occur at the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. According to His Divine word, the souls of all the dead will return to their restored bodies, and all people will rise alive.

Belief in the resurrection of the dead was expressed by Job during his suffering: “And I know that my Redeemer lives, and on the last day He will raise from the dust this decaying skin of mine, and I will see God in my flesh” (Job 19: 25-26). The prophet Isaiah predicted: “Your dead will live, your dead bodies will rise! Arise and rejoice, you cast in the dust: for Your dew is the dew of plants, and the earth will cast out the dead” (Isaiah 26:19).

Saint Ezekiel, in a prophetic vision, saw the very resurrection of the dead, when many dry bones scattered across the field, by the power of the Spirit of God, began to unite with one another, become covered with body and skin, and finally rose up as living people (Ezek. Chapter 37).

Jesus Christ spoke about the resurrection of the dead: “The time is coming in which all who are in the tombs will hear the voice of the Son of God, and having heard, they will live. And those who have done good will come out to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of condemnation” (John 5:25). -29).

Answering the unbelieving Sadducees to their question about the resurrection of the dead, Jesus Christ said: “You are mistaken, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God. Regarding the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what God said to you: I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? is the God of the dead, but of the living" (Matt. 22:29, 31, 32).

The Apostle Paul says: “Christ has risen from the dead, the firstborn of those who have fallen asleep. For as death came through man (Adam), so through man (Christ) was the resurrection of the dead. As in Adam all died, so in Christ all shall live” (1 Cor. 15 :20--22).

At the moment of the general resurrection, the bodies of dead people will change. In essence they will be the same as we now have, but in quality they will become different: they will become spiritual and immortal. At the moment of the general resurrection, the bodies of those people who will still be alive at the time of the second coming of the Savior will also change. The Apostle Paul says: “A natural body is sown, a spiritual body is raised... we will not all die, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet: for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we (the survivors) will be changed.” (1 Cor. 15:44-52).

Resurrected people will have different appearances. The righteous will shine like the sun, but the wicked will look dark and ugly. Then the inner state of each person will be revealed in his outer appearance.

Then the earth and everything on it will burn up. The whole world will change: from perishable it will turn into imperishable and spiritual - it will become a new heaven and a new earth.

The state of the souls of people who died before the general resurrection is not the same. Thus, the souls of the righteous are in Heaven, awaiting eternal bliss, and the souls of sinners are in hell, awaiting eternal torment. This state of the souls of the dead is determined by God immediately after the death of each person.

Death is the limit by which earthly life ends and eternity begins. What a person sows in this life, he will reap in the next. But the judgment immediately after death is not final, because the general Last Judgment still awaits. Therefore, the souls of believers, but sinners, can receive relief from suffering in the afterlife and even completely get rid of them through the prayers of their loved ones and the Church for them, and also through good deeds performed for them by the living. In order to help the dead in their afterlife, it is established in the Orthodox Church to pray for them at funerals, memorial services and liturgies, when believers serve memorials with prosphora.

Questions: (1) What does the eleventh article of the Creed say? (2) What does the word “tea” mean? (3) What did the Lord say about the resurrection of the dead? (4) When will the resurrection of the dead take place? (5) Which people will be resurrected? (6) What will the righteous and sinners look like after the resurrection? (7) How will a person’s body after the resurrection differ from the body he had before? (8) Where are the souls of the dead now? (9) How can we help the dead?

Twelfth Article of the Creed

I look forward to the life of the next century. Amen.

The last member of the Creed speaks of future eternal life, which will come after the general resurrection of the dead, the renewal of the world and the general judgment of Christ.

For righteous people, eternal life will be so joyful and blissful that in our present state we cannot even imagine or depict it. The Apostle Paul says: “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor entered into the heart of man the things that God has prepared for those who love Him” (1 Cor. 2:9).

Such bliss of the righteous will come from contemplating God in the light and from union with Him. The body, which will be glorified by the light of God like the body of the Lord Jesus Christ during His Transfiguration on Mount Tabor, will also participate in the bliss of the soul of the righteous. “Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father,” said the Savior.

Now “(the body) is sown in humiliation, is raised in glory, is sown in weakness, is raised in power,” explains the Apostle Paul (1 Cor. 15:43). The righteous will receive different degrees of bliss, according to the moral dignity of each: “There is one glory of the sun, another glory of the moon, another of the stars; and star differs from star in glory. So it is at the resurrection of the dead” (1 Cor. 15:41-42).

For unbelievers and unrepentant sinners, that life will be eternal torment. The Lord will say to them: “Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. And they will go away into everlasting punishment” (Matthew 25:41-46).

Sinners will be far from God and from heavenly life. They will suffer from reproaches of their conscience and from shame for their crimes. They will suffer from the proximity of evil spirits and similar sinners, from eternal fire and darkness.

Thus, sinners will be punished not because God wanted them to perish, but they themselves “perish because they did not accept the love of the truth for their salvation,” that is, they did not believe the word of Christ and did not correct themselves (2 Thess. 2:10).

The Creed ends with the word amen, which means: “truly” or “so be it.” By saying these words, we testify that we believe in the truth of everything that is said in the Creed.

1. I believe in one God the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, visible to all and invisible. I believe in one God the Father: I believe that God contains everything in His power and controls everything, that He created heaven and earth, the visible and invisible world. With these words we are saying that we are sure that God exists, that He is One and there is no other besides Him, that everything that exists (both in the visible physical world and in the invisible, spiritual), i.e. the entire vast universe was created by God. And we accept this faith with all our hearts. - this is confidence in the real existence of God and trust in Him. God is one, but not lonely, because God is one in His essence, but trinitarian in Persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit - the Trinity is consubstantial (i.e. the three Persons of the Holy Trinity have one essence) and inseparable. The Unity of Three Persons who endlessly love each other.

2. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, who was born of the Father before all ages, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not created, consubstantial with the Father, by whom all things were. I believe that our Lord Jesus Christ is the same One and Only God, the second Person of the Holy Trinity. He is the Only Begotten Son of God the Father, born before the beginning of time, that is, when there was no time yet. He, like Light from Light, is also inseparable from the sun. He is the True God, born of the True God. He was born, and not at all created by God the Father, that is, He is one being with the Father, Consubstantial with Him. By Him, everything that happened means that everything that exists was created by Him, as well as by God the Father, the Creator of heaven and earth. This means that the world was created by one God - the Holy Trinity.

3. For our sake, man and our salvation came down from heaven, and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human. I believe that for the salvation of our human race He appeared on earth, became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human, that is, he took on not only the body, but also the human soul and became a perfect man, without ceasing at the same time to be God - became a God-man. The Holy Orthodox Church calls the Virgin Mary the Mother of God and honors Her above all created beings, not only people, but also Angels, since She is the Mother of the Lord Himself.

4. She was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried. I believe that the Lord Jesus Christ, during the time of the Roman governor of Judea, Pontius Pilate, was crucified on the cross for us people, that is, for our sins and for our salvation, because He Himself was sinless. At the same time, He really suffered, died and was buried. The Savior suffered, of course, not as Divinity, which does not suffer, but as humanity; He suffered not for His sins, which He did not have, but for the sins of the entire human race.

5. And he rose again on the third day, according to the Scriptures. I believe that He rose again on the third day after His death, as foretold in Scripture. The Lord Jesus Christ truly died for us - as the True Immortal God, and therefore He rose again! Since in the writings of the prophets of the Old Testament it was clearly predicted about the suffering, death, burial of the Savior and His resurrection, that is why it is said: “according to the scriptures.” The words “according to the scriptures” refer not only to the fifth, but also to the fourth member of the Creed. Jesus Christ died on Good Friday at about three o'clock in the afternoon, and rose again after midnight on Saturday on the first day of the week, called from that time "Sunday". But in those days, even part of a day was taken as a whole day, which is why it is said that He was in the tomb for three days.

6. And ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father. I believe that the Lord Jesus Christ, on the fortieth day after His Resurrection, ascended into heaven with His most pure flesh and sat down at the right hand (on the right side) of God the Father. The Lord Jesus Christ ascended into heaven with His humanity (flesh and soul), and with His Divinity He always remained with the Father. “Sitting at the right hand of the Father” means: on the right side, in first place, in glory. These words express that the human soul and body of Jesus Christ received the same glory that Christ has according to His Divinity. By His ascension, our Lord Jesus Christ united the earthly with the heavenly, and glorified our human nature, exalting it to the throne of God; He showed us that our fatherland is in heaven, in the Kingdom of God, which is now open to all who truly believe in Him.

7. And again the one who comes with glory will be judged by the living and the dead, and His kingdom will have no end. Paki - again; coming - the One who will come. I believe that Jesus Christ will come to earth again to judge all people, both living and dead, who will then be resurrected; and that after this Last Judgment the Kingdom of Christ will come, which will never end. This judgment is called terrible because the conscience of every person will open before everyone, and not only the good and evil deeds that someone has done throughout his life on earth will be revealed, but also all the words spoken, secret desires and thoughts. According to this judgment, the righteous will go into eternal life, and the sinners into eternal torment - because they did evil deeds, which they did not repent of and which they did not atone for with good deeds and correction of life.

8. (I believe) And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Life-Giving One, who proceeds from the Father, who is worshiped and glorified with the Father and the Son, who spoke the prophets. Who proceeds from the Father - Who proceeds from the Father; Who is worshiped and glorified with the Father and the Son - Who should be worshiped and Who should be glorified equally with the Father and the Son. The prophets spoke - the one who spoke through the prophets. I believe that the third Person of the Holy Trinity is the Holy Spirit, as true the Lord God as the Father and the Son. I believe that the Holy Spirit is the Life-Giving Spirit, He, together with God the Father and God the Son, gives life to everything, especially spiritual life to people. He is the same Creator of the world, along with the Father and the Son, and He should be worshiped and glorified in the same way. I also believe that the Holy Spirit spoke through the prophets and apostles, and by His inspiration all things were written Sacred Books. We are talking here about the main thing in our faith - about the mystery of the Holy Trinity: our one God is the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit revealed itself to people in a visible way: at the baptism of the Lord in the form of a dove, and on the day of Pentecost He descended on the apostles in the form of tongues of fire.

9. (I believe) In one holy, catholic and apostolic Church. I believe in one, Holy, Catholic Church (in which all believers participate), founded by the Apostles. Here we are talking about the Church of Christ, which Jesus Christ founded on earth for the sanctification of sinful people and their reunification with God. The Church is the totality of all Orthodox Christians, living and dead, and the love of Christ, the hierarchy and the holy sacraments. Each individual Orthodox Christian is called a member, or part of the Church. Consequently, when we say that we believe in one holy, catholic and apostolic Church, then here by the Church we mean all the people who profess the same Orthodox faith, and not the building where we go to pray to God, and which is called temple of God.

10. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins. I acknowledge and openly declare that for spiritual rebirth and forgiveness of sins only needs to be accepted once holy baptism. The Creed only mentions baptism, because it is, as it were, a door to the Church of Christ. Only those who have been baptized can participate in other church Sacraments. A sacrament is such a sacred action through which the grace of the Holy Spirit (i.e., the saving power of God) is secretly, invisibly given to a person.

Listen to the Creed in mp3 format:

11. I hope for the resurrection of the dead. I expect (tea) with hope and confidence that a time will come when the souls of dead people will again unite with their bodies and all the dead will come to life. The resurrection of the dead will follow simultaneously with the second and glorious coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. At the moment of the general resurrection, the bodies of dead people will change; In essence, the bodies will be the same as those we now have, but in quality they will be different from the current bodies - they will be spiritual: incorruptible and immortal. The bodies of those people who will still be alive at the second coming of the Savior will also change. According to the change of man himself, the entire visible world will change, namely, from the corruptible to the imperishable.

12. And the life of the next century. Amen. I expect that after the resurrection of the dead, the judgment of Christ will be completed, and for the righteous there will come the endless joy of union with God. The word Amen means confirmation - truly so! Only in this way can the truth of our faith be expressed and cannot be changed by anyone.

The Creed is a brief and precise statement of the fundamentals of Christian doctrine, compiled and approved at the 1st and 2nd Ecumenical Councils. The entire Creed consists of twelve members, and each of them contains a special truth (dogma) of the Orthodox faith.

The 1st member speaks about God the Father, the 2nd-7th members talk about God the Son, the 8th – about God the Holy Spirit, the 9th – about the Church, the 10th – about baptism, the 11th and 12th – about resurrection of the dead and eternal life.

How is the Creed read?

1. I believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, visible to all and invisible.
2. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all ages, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not created, consubstantial with the Father, by whom all things were.
3. For our sake, man and our salvation came down from heaven, and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human.
4. She was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried.
5. And he rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures.
6. And ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father.
7. And again the coming one will be judged with glory by the living and the dead, His kingdom will have no end.
8. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the life-giving, who proceeds from the Father, who with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified, who spoke the Prophets.
9. Into one Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.
10. I confess one Baptism for the remission of sins.
11. I hope for the resurrection of the dead.
12. And the life of the next century. Amen.

How to translate the Creed into Russian?

I believe - I believe, I am convinced;
Only Begotten - the only one;
before all ages - before all time, from eternity;
consubstantial with the Father - having the same being (same nature) with God the Father;
By Him all things were - and by Him, that is, the Son of God, everything was created;
incarnate - having taken upon Himself a human body;
becoming human - becoming a man, but without ceasing to be God;
resurrected - revived (after death):
according to Scripture - according to the Holy Scriptures, where the prophets predicted that He would rise from the dead on the third day;
ascended - ascended;
at the right hand - on the right side of God the Father;
paki - again, again, again, again;
the dead - the dead who will then be resurrected;
There will be no end to His Kingdom - after the Judgment, His endless Kingdom will come;
Life-giving - life-giving;
worshiped and glorified - the Holy Spirit should be worshiped and glorified (honored) along with the Father and the Son, that is, the Holy Spirit is equal to God the Father and God the Son;
The prophets spoke - the Holy Spirit spoke through the prophets;
Conciliar - consonant, unanimous, embracing people from all over the universe;
I confess - I openly acknowledge (testify) in word and deed;
tea - (wish) I expect;
And the life of the next century - and eternal life (which will come after the general Judgment).

1. I believe in God, the One, who holds everything in His hands, who created heaven and earth, everything that we see and do not see.
2. (I believe) in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, begotten by God before time began. He is Light from Light, true God from true God, He is born of God, not created, and in essence He is the same God from Whom all things came.
3. For us people and our salvation, He (Jesus Christ) came down from heaven, was born from the Virgin Mary by the power of the Holy Spirit and became Man.
4. He was crucified during the reign of Pilate of Pontus, He suffered and was buried.
5. And he rose again on the third day, as it was said in the Holy Scriptures.
6. He ascended (ascended) into heaven and now dwells with His Father.
7. He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead, and His Kingdom will have no end.
8. (I believe) in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, who makes all things alive, whom we glorify, whom we worship with the Father and the Son, and who spoke through the prophets.
9. (I believe) in a single Catholic Church (in which everyone participates), founded by the Apostles.
10. (I) recognize one baptism for the remission of sins.
11. (I) look forward to the Resurrection of the Dead.
12. And future eternal life.

When and why was the Creed composed?

Since apostolic times, Christians have used so-called “articles of faith” to remind themselves of the basic truths of the Christian faith. The Ancient Church had several short creeds. In the 4th century, when false teachings about God the Son and the Holy Spirit appeared, the need arose to supplement and clarify the previous symbols.

At the First Ecumenical Council the first seven members of the Symbol were written, at the Second – the remaining five. The First Ecumenical Council took place in the city of Nicaea in 325 after the Nativity of Christ to establish the apostolic teaching about the Son of God against the incorrect teaching of Arius, who believed that the Son of God was created by God the Father and therefore is not the true God. The Second Ecumenical Council took place in Constantinople (Constantinople) in 381 to confirm the apostolic teaching about the Holy Spirit against the false teaching of Macedonius, who rejected the Divine dignity of the Holy Spirit. For the two cities in which these Ecumenical Councils took place, the Creed is called Nicene-Constantinopolitan.

The symbol of faith is pronounced by those receiving baptism (catechumens) during the Sacrament of Baptism. At the baptism of an infant, the Creed is pronounced by the recipients. In addition, the Creed is sung collectively by believers in church during the Liturgy and is read daily as part of the morning prayer rule.

The meaning of the Symbol is the preservation of a single confession of the immutable truths (dogmas) of the faith, and through this the unity of the Church.

What does each part of the Creed say?

The first member speaks about God, namely, about the first hypostasis of the Holy Trinity, about God the Father and about God as the Creator of the world.
In the second member - about the second hypostasis of the Holy Trinity, about the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
The third part is about the incarnation of the Son of God.
The fourth part is about the suffering and death of Jesus Christ.
The fifth clause is about the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
The sixth part is about the ascension of Jesus Christ to heaven.
The seventh part is about the second coming of Jesus Christ to earth.
In the eighth member - about the third hypostasis of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Spirit.
The ninth clause is about the Church.
In the tenth clause - about Baptism (where other Sacraments are implied).
In the eleventh clause - about the future resurrection of the dead.
In the twelfth term - about eternal life.

Why does the Creed talk about faith in the One God, the Almighty, the Creator?

To believe in God means to have living confidence in His being, properties and actions and to accept with all your heart His revealed word about the salvation of the human race.

God is one in essence, but trinity in Persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the Trinity is consubstantial and indivisible. In the Creed, God is called Almighty, because He contains everything that is in His power (power) and His will. The words of the Creator to heaven and earth, to those visible to all and to those invisible, mean that everything was created by God, and nothing can exist without God. The word invisible indicates that God created the invisible, or spiritual world, to which the Angels belong.

Why is Jesus called “Christ”, “Lord”, “Son of God”, “Only Begotten”, “true God”, how can God have a Son? What does “Consubstantial with the Father” mean?

The Son of God is the second Person of the Holy Trinity according to His Divinity. He is called Lord because He is the true God, for the name Lord is one of the names of God. The Son of God is called Jesus, that is, the Savior, this name was given by the Archangel Gabriel himself. The prophets called Him Christ, that is, the Anointed One - this is how kings, high priests and prophets have long been called. Jesus, the Son of God, is so called because all the gifts of the Holy Spirit are immeasurably communicated to His humanity, and thus to Him belong in the highest degree the knowledge of a Prophet, the holiness of a High Priest, and the power of a King. Jesus Christ is called the Only Begotten Son of God because He is the only (and only) Son of God, born from the being of God the Father, and therefore He is of one being (nature) with God the Father. The Creed says that He was born of the Father, and this depicts the personal property by which He differs from the other Persons of the Holy Trinity. It was said before all ages, so that no one would think that there was a time when He did not exist. The words of Light from Light in some way explain the incomprehensible birth of the Son of God from the Father. God the Father is eternal Light, from Him is born the Son of God, Who is also eternal Light; but God the Father and the Son of God are one eternal Light, indivisible, of one Divine nature. The words of God are true from God, true, taken from the Holy Scriptures: The Son of God came and gave us light and understanding, that we might know the true God and that we might be in His true Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life (see 1 John 5:20). The words begotten, uncreated were added by the holy fathers of the Ecumenical Council to denounce Arius, who wickedly taught that the Son of God was created. The words consubstantial with the Father mean that the Son of God is one and the same Divine being with God the Father. The words of Him who were all show that God the Father created everything with His Son as His eternal wisdom and His eternal Word.

How could the Son of God come down from heaven? For what?

For our sake, man, and for our salvation, the Son of God, according to His promise, came to earth not for just one people, but for the entire human race in general. He came down from heaven - as he says about himself: No one ascended into heaven except the Son of Man who came down from heaven, who is in heaven (see John 3:13). The Son of God is omnipresent and therefore always abides in heaven and on earth, but on earth He was previously invisible and became visible only when He appeared in the flesh, became incarnate, that is, took upon Himself human flesh, except for sin, and became Man, without ceasing to be God . The Incarnation of Christ was accomplished with the assistance of the Holy Spirit, so that the Holy Virgin, just as she was a Virgin before conception, remained a Virgin at conception, after conception, and at birth itself. The word becoming man was added so that no one would think that the Son of God took on one flesh or body, but so that in Him they would recognize a perfect Man, consisting of body and soul. Jesus Christ was crucified for us - by His death on the cross He delivered us from sin, curse and death.

How could the Son of God suffer, die and rise again? How can He sit in heaven next to God the Father?

The crucifixion of Jesus Christ was not one kind of suffering and death, as some false teachers said, but real suffering and death. He suffered and died not as a Divinity, but as a Man, and not because he could not avoid suffering, but because he voluntarily wanted to suffer.

Our Lord Jesus Christ, by the power of His Divinity, rose from the dead in the same body in which He was born and died. He rose again exactly as it was prophetically written about in the books of the Old Testament.

The words of one who sits on the right hand (sitting on the right side) must be understood spiritually. They mean that Jesus Christ has equal power and glory with God the Father.

Why is the Holy Spirit called “Lord,” “Life-Giving”? What does “who spoke through the prophets” mean?

The Holy Spirit is called Lord because He, like the Son of God, is true God. He is called the Life-Giving One because, together with God the Father and the Son, he gives life to creatures, including spiritual life to people: unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God (John 3:5). The Holy Spirit is due to be worshiped and glorified, equal to the Father and the Son - Jesus Christ commanded to baptize people (all nations) in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit (see Matt. 28:19).

Prophecy was never pronounced by the will of man, but the saints spoke it God's men, being moved by the Holy Spirit (2 Pet. 1:21). One can become a participant in the Holy Spirit through right faith, church sacraments and earnest prayer: if you, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him (Luke 11:13).

Why is the Church called One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic?

The Church is One because “there is one body and one spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in us all” (Eph. 4:4-6).

The Church is Holy, because “Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for her (i.e. for all believers - members of the Church) in order to sanctify her (having sanctified every Christian with baptism), cleansing her with the washing of water through the word (i.e. baptismal water and with the sacramental words of baptism), in order to present her to Himself as a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing, but that it might be holy and without blemish” (Eph. 5:25-27).

The Church is Catholic, or Catholic, or Ecumenical, because it is not limited to any place, time, or people, but includes true believers of all places, times and peoples.

The Church is Apostolic because it has continuously and unchangeably preserved since the time of the Apostles both the teaching and the succession of the gifts of the Holy Spirit through consecrated ordination. The True Church is also called Orthodox, or True Believers.

Why is a single Baptism mentioned in the Creed?

Baptism is a Sacrament in which a believer, by immersing his body three times in water, with the invocation of God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, dies to a carnal, sinful life and is reborn from the Holy Spirit into a spiritual, holy life. Baptism is one, because it is a spiritual birth, and a person is born once, and therefore is baptized once.

What does “resurrection of the dead” and “life of the age to come” mean?

The resurrection of the dead is an action of the omnipotence of God, according to which all the bodies of dead people will be united again with their souls, will come to life and will be spiritual and immortal.

The life of the future century is the life that will happen after the Resurrection of the dead and the General Judgment of Christ.

(26 votes: 4.5 out of 5)

We are called Orthodox Christians, that is right , Right glorifying God . In order to be sure that you are doing something correctly, you need to know a lot, learn a lot. Read books, ask experienced people. If a person doesn’t know anything and doesn’t want to know, but is completely sure that he’s doing everything right, expect trouble. A simple example. A certain person is completely unaware of the rules of the road, but he confidently gets behind the wheel and starts driving the car. Very little time will pass and he will realize that he is doing something wrong: he is driving on the left side of the road, but for some reason all the cars are rushing towards him, honking, and he barely manages to dodge them. He approaches a traffic light, the light turns red, but this eccentric is sure that he can continue driving, because he doesn’t know the rules! I think it’s clear what will happen next. Very soon this unfortunate man will have an accident and, thank God, if he survives. But if in ordinary, material everyday life we ​​understand perfectly well that we must study the laws and rules, observe safety precautions so as not to get into trouble, then even more so in spiritual life. There, too, there are laws established by God, and there are safety rules. And the harm that we can cause to ourselves by not knowing these laws or by neglecting them is much greater than from ignorance of the laws of the physical world. For we can cause irreparable damage not to the body, but to the soul.

How to learn the rules of spiritual life, how to believe correctly? For this there is the Word of God Himself - Holy Bible , you need to read it, study it, you need to build your life according to it. There are commandments that God Himself also gave us, and we, Orthodox people, also have a huge experience of the Church, an experience that is already 2 thousand years old in the world and a thousand years old in Rus'. Many millions of people have passed this way, from the birth of Christ to the present day. We have it, the Lord Jesus Christ created it and put into it everything that is needed for our salvation. “I will build My Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it” (). The church treasury also includes the experience of the holy fathers and ascetics of 2 millennia of Christianity.

The Orthodox Church is called that way because it has preserved in its entirety and intactness, without distortion, the teaching given to us by God Himself. We know how to correctly believe in God, how to glorify Him correctly, He himself revealed this to us, therefore our faith is right, our faith is Orthodox

Symbol of faith , or confession of the Christian Orthodox faith, is a prayer book that contains all the basic provisions and dogmas of the Orthodox faith. The teaching of the Church in the “Symbol” is presented in a brief but very precise form.

The Creed was composed in the 4th century by the Fathers The First and Second Ecumenical Councils. In the ancient Church there were previously symbols of faith, but with the emergence and strengthening of false teachings about God, it was necessary to draw up a more accurate and dogmatically impeccable confession of faith, which could be used by the entire Ecumenical Church.

The First Ecumenical Council was convened in the city of Nicaea regarding the false teaching of the presbyter Arius, who taught that the Son of God, Jesus Christ, was created by God the Father and is not the true God, but only the highest creation. The Council condemned this heresy and set forth Orthodox teaching, compiling the first seven members of the Creed. At the second ecumenical council, convened to condemn the heresy of Macedonius, which rejected the Divinity of the Holy Spirit, the following five members of the Creed were given.

It is necessary for every Orthodox Christian to know the Creed by heart in order to have correct knowledge about God and their own faith, and also to always be able to give an answer to everyone who asks us: “how do you believe?”

You need to know the Creed even before baptism, because it is necessary to have correct knowledge about God and the fundamentals of the doctrine even before accepting this sacrament and entering the Church. When infants are baptized, the Creed is read for them by their godparents, and they are also, of course, required to know it by heart and read it without errors. It is not difficult to learn the Creed, because it is part of the morning prayers, and every Orthodox Christian reads it when praying in the morning. Also, the Creed is sung every liturgy, in church by all the people, and a person who regularly prays in the morning and goes to Sunday and holiday liturgies will very soon remember it.

But we should not only know the text of the Creed, but also understand its meaning, for this we need to study it.

Symbol of faith

In Church Slavonic

1. I believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, visible to all and invisible.

2. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, who was born of the Father before all ages: Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, uncreated, consubstantial with the Father, by whom all things were.

3. For our sake, man and our salvation came down from heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human.

4. She was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried.

5. And he rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures.

6. And ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father.

7. And again the coming one will be judged with glory by the living and the dead, His Kingdom will have no end.

8. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Life-Giving One, who proceeds from the Father, who is with the Father and the Son, is worshiped and glorified, who spoke the prophets.

9. Into one Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

10. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins.

11. I hope for the resurrection of the dead,

12. and the life of the next century. Amen.

Russian translation

1. I believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, of everything visible and invisible.

2. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, begotten of the Father before all ages; Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not created, one being with the Father, by Him all things were created.

3. For us, for the sake of people and for the sake of our salvation, he came down from heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human.

4. He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, suffered, and was buried.

5. And rose again on the third day, according to the Scriptures.

6. And ascended into heaven, and sat on the right side of the Father.

7. And He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead, and of His kingdom there will be no end.

8. And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father, who is worshiped and glorified equally with the Father and the Son, who spoke through the prophets.

9. Into the one, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

10. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins.

11. I look forward to the resurrection of the dead,

12. and the life of the next century. Truly so.

ABOUT THE FIRST MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

I believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, everything visible and invisible

Christianity, as the only true religion, is primarily distinguished by its teaching about God. We perceive God and turn to Him as our Heavenly Parent. God is called Father because He begets the Son from eternity (this will be discussed later), but also because He is the Father to us all. In the prayer that the Lord Savior gave us, we say: “Our Father...” (Our Father). The Holy Apostle Paul says, addressing Christians: “you have not received the spirit of slavery<…>, but received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry: “Abba, Father!” This very Spirit bears witness to our spirit that we are children of God” (). Word " Abba" in Aramaic corresponds to our " dad" - children's confidential appeal to their father.

The Holy Apostle John the Theologian says that “God is love” (). These words express the most important property of God. This determines the entire structure of a Christian’s spiritual life. Our relationship with God is based on mutual love. Heavenly Father loves us with a perfect and absolute love. We, believers, can perceive the fruits of this love only when we love God with the fullness of our being. Therefore, love for God is the first and main commandment. The Holy Scriptures reveal the basic properties of God in close connection with the Economy of human salvation.

God is the all-perfect Spirit. He is eternal. Has neither beginning nor end. God is Almighty. In the Holy Scriptures He is called Almighty , since He holds everything in His power and authority.

The Holy Fathers teach us not only to believe in God, but to trust Him in everything, because He All-good and Humane. The Lord's mercy extends to every person. If a person always wants to be with God and turns to Him, then He does not leave the person under any circumstances. One ancient Byzantine manuscript contains the comforting admonition of a holy elder: “Someone told me that one man always prayed to God so that He would not leave him on his earthly path, and, as the Lord once descended with His disciples on their way to Emmaus (see. :), so that you can walk with him along the road of his life. And at the end of his life he had a vision: he saw that he was walking along the sandy shore of the ocean (of course, mean the ocean of eternity, along the shore of which the path of mortals passes). And, looking back, he saw the prints of his feet on the soft sand, going far back: this was the traveled path of his life. And next to the prints of his feet were the prints of a couple more feet; and he realized that it was the Lord who had descended with him in life, just as he had prayed to Him. But in some places along the path he saw the prints of only one pair of feet, which cut deeply into the sand, as if indicating the severity of the path at that time. And this man remembered that it was then when there were especially difficult moments in his life and when life seemed unbearably difficult and painful. And this man said to the Lord: you see, Lord, in difficult times of my life you did not walk with me; You see that the prints of only one pair of feet in those days indicate that then I walked alone in life, and You see from the fact that the footprints cut deep into the ground that it was very difficult for me to walk then. But the Lord answered him: My son, you are mistaken. Indeed, you see the prints of only one pair of feet in those times of your life that you remember as the most difficult. But these are not the prints of your feet, but of Mine. Because in the difficult times of your life, I took you in My arms and carried you. So, My son, these are not the prints of your feet, but of Mine.”

God has Omniscience. The entire past was imprinted in his endless memory. He knows everything and sees everything in the present. He knows not only every human act, but every word and feeling. Lord knows the future.

God Omnipresent He is in Heaven, on earth. The contemplation of the Divine omnipresence evokes joy and poetic tenderness in the psalmist David:

« If I ascend to heaven - You are there; If I go down to the underworld, you will be there too.

Should I take the wings of the dawn and move to the edge of the sea, and there Your hand will lead me, and Your right hand will hold me » ().

God - Creator heaven and earth. He is the Cause and Creator of the entire visible and invisible world. Our world, the universe is incredibly complex and wisely structured, and of course, only the Supreme, Divine Mind could create all this. The entire Divine Trinity participated in the creation of the world. God the Father created everything with His Word, that is, the Only Begotten Son, with the assistance of the Holy Spirit.

God has Wisdom. Psalm 103 is a majestic hymn to God, who created everything with His wisdom and continues to care not only for man, but also for His other creatures: “You water the mountains from Your heights, the earth is satisfied with the fruits of Your works. You grow grass for livestock, and greens for the benefit of man, to produce food from the earth” ().

In addition to the fact that God is the Creator of the visible, material world, He also created the spiritual world, invisible to us. The spiritual, angelic world was created by God even before our material world. All angels were created good, but some of them, led by the supreme angel Lucifer, became proud and fell away from God. Since then, these angels have become dark spirits of malice, wishing all harm to people, as God’s creation. They try in every possible way to seduce people into sin and destroy them. But God has greatly limited their power and influence on people, moreover, every Christian has his own guardian angel who protects and protects him from evil, including from the influence of devilish forces.

ABOUT THE SECOND MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, begotten of the Father before all ages; Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not created, one being with the Father, by Him all things were created

The second member of the Creed is dedicated to the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, and here it is time to talk about the mystery of the Holy Trinity.

Cognizing the Divine properties, a believer gradually prepares to perceive the cornerstone truth of Christianity - the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. God is one in essence , but has three faces (Hypostases), each of which possesses the fullness of Divinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Holy Fathers, revealing and explaining the dogma of the Trinity, define the relationship between the three Persons with the following concepts "consubstantial" And "equal" At the same time, they also point to the personal properties of each Hypostasis. The Father is not created, not created, not begotten; The Son is eternally born from the Father; The Holy Spirit proceeds eternally from the Father. We prayerfully confess the Trinity with the words: “In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen". What is our faith based on? On the Holy Gospel: Go therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit (). The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are one.

The earthly human mind cannot rise to this mystery on its own without God. Other monotheistic religions (Judaism, Islam), based on natural reason and not on Revelation, could not rise to this mystery.

Already in the Old Testament there are indications of the mystery of the Divine Trinity. Already at the beginning of the Holy Bible, God speaks of Himself in the plural: “And God said: Let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over all the reptiles that creep on the earth. And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female he created them" (). The words “let us make man” indicate the plurality of persons, while “he created him” indicates the unity of God. There are two more such passages in the book of Genesis:

And the Lord God said: behold, Adam has become like one of Us ().

And the Lord said: behold, there is one people, and they all have one language... let us go down and confuse their language there ().

When Patriarch Abraham was sitting under a tree near the oak grove of Mamre, he saw three travelers come. He ran to meet them and, bowing to the ground, said: Master! if I have found favor in Your sight, do not pass by Your servant.” Three men appeared, and Abraham addressed them as one—the Master.

ABOUT THE THIRD MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

For us, for the sake of people and for the sake of our salvation, who came down from heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human

In order to save the human race, the Lord at a certain historical moment “in the days of King Herod” () descends to earth to incarnate, through influx, assistance Holy Spirit from the Virgin Mary, take on our human nature and be born in Palestine, in the city of Bethlehem.

He took on all human nature, soul and body, in order to recreate, deify, save it. The divine nature in Christ did not swallow up human nature, as some heretics teach, but the two natures in Him will remain forever unfused, unchangeable, inseparable and inseparable.

The Savior did not have a human father, for his Father was God Himself. His conception in the womb of the Mother of God took place without the seed of a husband, which is why it is called “immaculate”, “seedless”. The Church in its hymns says that the flesh of Christ, by the power of God, is inside the womb of the Virgin Mary exhausted . We know that normal human conception involves a husband's seed, but Christ's conception was supernatural. Even after the Fall, Adam and Eve were given a promise-prophecy from God about wife's seed , which will strike the head of the serpent. (). But we know that a wife cannot have a seed, only a husband can have a seed.

How could this happen? Nothing is impossible for God. He created this world with His Wisdom and Word. God created the first man Adam from the “fiber of the ground” and breathed into him the breath of life, and the miracle of birth without the participation of a husband is also subject to Him. A 3rd century Christian writer writes:

“Just as the earth (at the creation of the first man Ed.) was turned into this flesh without the seed of a man, so the Word of God could pass into the matter of the same flesh without a connecting principle.”

The Savior, having taken upon himself human flesh and soul, appears and at the same time true God and true man , in everything except sin.

He came to our land to completely walk the path of human life. He worked for His food, He experienced cold, heat, hunger and thirst, He was also pursued by temptations and temptations from the devil and human weakness, but He defeated them and the temptations did not touch Him. The Lord worked tirelessly for people: he preached, healed the sick, and raised the dead.

The Lord accepted our nature, lived human life in order to heal, to recreate our nature, corrupted by sin, about O live it and show us the path of salvation, the path of true Christian life. As the saint said: “God became man so that man could become God.” And now, everyone born of Christ through baptism in His Church becomes a new creation “who were born neither of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of a man, but of God” ().

ABOUT THE FOURTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, suffered, and was buried.

The sacrifice of Christ the Savior on the cross for us is an act of the highest Divine love. “For how God loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life” (). And the Lord Jesus Christ Himself speaks about His sacrifice on the cross: “Greater love has no one than this, if someone lays down his life for his friends. () For your friends , this means for you and me, for all the children of God. Death on the cross was the most painful and shameful execution in the Roman Empire; a person experienced incredible suffering for many hours, and life seemed to come out of him drop by drop. Christ was crucified under the governor of the emperor, the rulers of Judea, Pontius Pilate. His name is included in the “Symbol” to confirm the historical reality of the event. Non-Christians often cannot understand why we carry on our chests cross , we depict the sign of the cross on ourselves, we crown the domes of our churches with a cross and, in general, we greatly honor the cross. They say: why do you honor the cross, because your God was crucified on it? But that is why for us the cross of Christ is a shrine. After all, he constantly reminds us: what a huge sacrifice was made for people and how great Divine love for people is. God not only created humanity and takes care of the people he created, but if necessary, He is ready to go to death and crucifixion for His sinful and unworthy children. God ascends to the cross to offer Himself as a sacrifice for the sins of people, and thereby deliver them from sin and eternal death. God created the world with immutable spiritual and physical laws. One of the spiritual laws is that sin and crime must have consequences, punishment. The punishment for the sins of mankind was eternal death. “Whatever a man sows, that he will also reap” (). The sins of people have multiplied so much that humanity on its own could no longer rise from the abyss of sin, therefore the punishment that people should have received is taken by the Lord Himself. “The punishment of our peace was upon Him, and by His wounds we were healed” (), says the prophet Isaiah about the Divine sacrifice. You can use an image that is undoubtedly quite conventional and simplified.

Let's say a certain young man, almost still a teenager, committed a crime. He must suffer a very severe punishment for it, for example, spend many years in a maximum security camp, and maybe even die. His father was present when the crime was committed. And so the father, knowing that his son will not be able to bear the punishment, that his whole life will be distorted, spoiled by prison, and maybe he will never leave the camp at all and will perish there forever, decides on a feat. He, being innocent himself, takes upon himself the crime of his son and bears the punishment for it. Thus, he saves his son from suffering and death and gives an example of the highest love and self-sacrifice.

Christ is called the second Adam. Why? We all, according to the flesh, according to human nature, descend from our common forefather, Adam. He once sinned by not preserving his original dignity. After the Fall, both the spiritual and physical nature of man became distorted, and illness and death entered the world. We, as people, as descendants of the first Adam, inherited his nature corrupted by sin. But then the Savior comes into the world. He lived on earth without sin, having overcome temptations and sin, He made a sacrifice for us on the cross and was resurrected. The Lord Jesus Christ renewed our fallen nature, and now everyone who is born of Christ, as from the Second Adam and follows the path indicated by Him, crucifies “the flesh with passions and lusts” (), inherits eternal life with Christ.

ABOUT THE FIFTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

And rose again on the third day, according to the Scriptures

Resurrection Our Lord Jesus Christ is the foundation of our Christian faith. “If Christ has not been resurrected, then our preaching is in vain, and so is our faith” (). Feast of the Resurrection of Christ, Easter - the most important Christian holiday. It is called in the Easter canon “the holiday of holidays and the triumph of celebrations.” Every week we remember the event of the Resurrection of Christ, celebrating Sunday.

Why would our faith be futile and meaningless without the Resurrection? Because Christ came to earth, suffered and died in order to resurrect our human nature and gain victory over the devil, hell and death. And if there had been no resurrection, all this would have been impossible. It would all end with Good Friday and the death and burial of Christ. But Christ has risen and now we have faith and hope to rise with Him.

Before the resurrection of Christ, all people after death went to hell, to the underworld of the earth. In Hebrew this place was called Sheol. Even the souls of the Old Testament righteous were there. After His death, Christ also descended into the underworld. The Lord descends into hell to preach there and bring out of it the souls of all those who waited for Him with faith. The Lord was in the underworld until the day of His Resurrection, as it is sung in the Easter hymn: “In the grave in the flesh, in hell with the soul, like God.” On the third day, Christ rose again and by his resurrection destroyed the power of hell and brought out of it those who were waiting for His coming, as well as those who accepted the news of salvation. From now on, hell has no power over those who are followers of Christ and live according to His commandments.

The Creed says that the Savior rose from the dead on the third day, according to Scripture. What scriptures tell us about the resurrection? Firstly, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself constantly spoke about his future resurrection, predicted it; just remember the Gospel of Matthew: “From that time Jesus began to reveal to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders, high priests and scribes , and be killed, and on the third day rise again" (). Christ's predictions about his resurrection from the dead are contained in all four Gospels. As for the Old Testament prophecies, here, first of all, we can cite the words of the prophet David spoken about the Messiah: “You will not leave my soul in hell and will not allow Your holy one to see corruption” () Also, the stay of the prophet Jonah for three days and three nights in the womb China's vision was prefigured by the resurrection of Christ the Savior. The Savior Himself refers to this prototype of the resurrection: “As Jonah was in the belly of the whale for three days and three nights, so the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights” ().

After his resurrection, the Lord repeatedly appeared to his disciples:

1) Mary Magdalene (; )

2) Other women ()

3) Peter (Luke 24:34:)

4) To two disciples on the road to Emmaus (; )

5) To the eleven disciples (except for the Apostle Thomas? ; )

6) Later to the twelve disciples (; )

7) To the seven disciples near the Sea of ​​Tiberias ()

8) Five hundred followers ()

9) Jacob ()

10) To the Apostles at the moment of ascension ().

The cave where the body of Christ was buried was guarded by a detachment of soldiers of the Roman army, one of the best, trained and disciplined in the world. If Christ’s disciples had come at night to carry away His body, as the Jews later said, at least one of them would have noticed them and grabbed them, besides, the entrance to the cave was blocked by a large, heavy stone that could not be rolled away silently. Even if the abduction had been successful, the apostles would have been captured, and they would have been tortured into revealing the location of the Teacher's body. But we know that they walked around freely, without hiding at all. If Jesus’ body had been taken by His enemies, then, of course, they would not have hidden this fact and very soon would have shown it to the people in order to refute Christ’s lifetime testimony about His resurrection.

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And ascended into heaven, and sat at the right hand of the Father

After his resurrection, the Lord remained on earth for another forty days with his disciples to assure them of the truth of the resurrection, strengthen their faith and give the necessary instructions.

Ascension happened on the Mount of Olives. It is known that the Savior loved this mountain and often retired there to pray. This is how the evangelist Luke describes this event: “And he led them out of the city as far as Bethany and, lifting up his hands, blessed them. And when he blessed them, he began to move away from them and ascend to heaven. They bowed to Him and returned to Jerusalem..." ().

Lord Jesus Christ ascended to Sky , By His humanity, and by His Divinity, he always remained with God the Father. The sky into which the Lord ascended is a place of the special presence of God, a mountain place, that is, an exalted place, the Kingdom of God. Christ walked the entire path of our human life and ascended into heaven, with this He glorified our human nature and showed the way to the Heavenly Fatherland, to the heavenly Jerusalem. He opened it to all his true followers.

The words of the Creed about the ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ to heaven have a basis in the Holy Scriptures: “He who descended, He also ascended above all heavens, to fill everything” ().

The Symbol says that Christ sat down on the right side of the Father . But we know that God is omnipresent, He is everywhere. These words about sitting on the right hand indicate that the Son of God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, has the same power and glory with the Father. “I and the Father are one” (), He says about Himself.

ABOUT THE SEVENTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

And He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead, and His kingdom will have no end.

The first coming to earth of the Lord Jesus Christ was humble; He took upon Himself “the image of a servant” (). His second coming will be different, He again will come, but already how Judge, in order to judge the affairs of all people, both those who lived to see His second coming and those who had already died.

The second coming will be very formidable. The Lord Himself speaks of him this way: “just as lightning comes from the east and is visible even to the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man,” and further: “the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of heaven will waver. Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven; and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He will send His angels with a loud trumpet; and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from the end of the heavens to the end of them” ().

When will it happen? The Savior tells us: “No one knows about that day and hour, not even the angels of heaven, but only My Father alone” ().

Both before and in our time, all sorts of false prophets often appeared who prophesied about the end of the world and even named the exact date of this event. No one who will report the date or exact time of the Last Judgment can be trusted, for it is unknown to anyone except God. In addition, for any of us, every day of our life could be the last, and we will have to answer to the Unflattering Judge. This is what the saint says about the end of this world, and about our own end: “The day and hour are unknown when the Son of God will end the life of the world by coming to judgment; the day and hour are unknown when, at the command of the Son of God, the earthly life of each of us will end, and we will be called to separation from the body, to give an account of earthly life, to that private judgment, before the general judgment, that awaits a person after his death. Beloved brothers! Let us stay awake and prepare for the terrible judgment that awaits us on the brink of eternity for the irrevocable decision of our fate forever. Let us prepare ourselves by stocking up on all the virtues, especially mercy, which contains and crowns all the virtues, since love, the motivating cause of mercy, is "totality" Christian ). Mercy makes people filled with it godlike (; )! “Blessed are the merciful, for they will obtain mercy; judgment without mercy to those who showed no mercy" (; ).

Before the end of the world there will be, as predicted in the Holy Scriptures, wars, unrest, earthquakes, famine and national disasters. There will be a decline in faith and morality. The “man of destruction” will appear, the Antichrist, the false messiah - a man who wants to stand in place of Christ, take His place and have power over the whole world. Having achieved supreme earthly power, the Antichrist will demand that he be worshiped as God. The power of the Antichrist will be destroyed by the coming of God.

After His coming, the Lord will judge all people. How will the Last Judgment take place? The saint (Drozdov) writes that God “will judge in such a way that the conscience of each person will open before everyone and not only all the deeds that someone has done throughout his entire life on earth will be revealed, but also all the words spoken, secret desires and thoughts.” Another saint of San Francisco also says: “The Last Judgment does not know witnesses or protocol records. Everything is written in human souls and these records, these “books” are revealed. Everything becomes clear to everyone and to oneself, and the state of a person’s soul determines him to the right or to the left. Some go in joy, others in horror.

When the “books” are opened, it will become clear to everyone that the roots of all vices are in the human soul. Here is a drunkard, a fornicator - when the body has died, someone will think - sin has also died. No, there was an inclination in the soul and sin was sweet in the soul.

And if she did not repent of that sin, did not free herself from it, she will come to the Last Judgment with the same desire for the sweetness of sin and will never satisfy her desire. It will contain the suffering of hatred and malice. This is a hellish state.

“Gehenna of fire” is an internal fire, a flame of vice, a flame of weakness and malice, and “there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” of impotent malice.

The Lord Jesus Christ will judge the world. “For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son” (). Why? Because the Son of God is also the Son of Man. He lived here on earth, among people, experienced sorrow, suffering, temptation and death itself. He knows all the sorrows and infirmities of man.

The last judgment will be terrible, because all human deeds and sins will be revealed to everyone, and also because after this judgment nothing can be changed, and everyone will receive what they deserve according to their deeds.

How a person lived on earth, how he prepared to meet God, and what state he achieved, then he will go with him to eternity. And the worthy, the righteous will go into eternal life with God, and sinners into eternal torment prepared for the devil and his servants. After this, the eternal Kingdom of Christ will come, the Kingdom of goodness, truth and love.

But the Lord is not only a Terrible Judge, He is also a Merciful Father, and of course He, in His mercy, will use every opportunity not to condemn, but to justify a person. The Saint writes about this: “The Lord wants to save everyone, therefore, you too... The Lord at the Last Judgment will not only demand how to condemn, but how to justify everyone. And he will justify everyone, as long as there is even the slightest opportunity.”

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And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father, who is worshiped and glorified equally with the Father and the Son, who spoke through the prophets

Holy Spirit - the third hypostasis, the face of the Holy Trinity. The Holy Spirit is consubstantial and equal to the Father and the Son, therefore He is also named in the Creed Lord.

Holy Spirit named Life-giving giving life, firstly: because He, together with the Father and the Son, participated in the creation of the world. In the book of Genesis, when describing the creation of the earth, it says: “and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God hovered over the water" (). “The Spirit of God created me” (), says righteous Job. Secondly, the Holy Spirit, together with the Father and the Son, gives spiritual life to people, imparting to them divine energy. “Unless someone is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God” ().

Prophets and heralds of the word of God wrote their books not on their own, but according to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, which is why the Holy Scriptures are called Inspired.

The Lord Jesus promised to send His disciples, the holy apostles, the Holy Spirit, whom He calls Comforter : “When the Comforter comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father” (). And on the fiftieth day after the resurrection of Christ, when the apostles were gathered in one place, in the upper room of Zion, the Holy Spirit descended on them in the form of tongues of flame and imparted to them gifts of grace.

The Holy Spirit acts in the life of the Church, especially communicating his gifts in the holy sacraments. The saint compares the Holy Spirit to sunlight, warming and giving life: He... is like the radiance of the sun - everyone who enjoys it is as if alone, while this radiance illuminates the earth and the sea and dissolves in the air. So the Spirit dwells in each of those who receive Him, as if inherent in Him alone and in all, sufficiently pours out the full grace that those who partake enjoy, according to their own ability to receive, and not to the extent possible for the Spirit.”

ABOUT THE NINTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

Into the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church

Church has not human, but divine origin, it was founded and established by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, coming to earth and gathering the first community of His disciples - followers. “I will build My Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it” (). Christ is also the head of the Church, as the Holy Scriptures also testify to. The Apostle Paul says that God the Father “has set Him above all things, to be the head of the Church, which is His Body. (). It is not by chance that the Word of God, the Holy Scriptures, uses the name Body of Christ . The Savior Himself says: “I am the vine, and you are the branches” (). Just as branches grow on a tree, come from it, receive life and bear fruit, feeding on the juices of the trunk, and all together form a single tree, so Christians also come from Christ, take origin and life from their Teacher and God, and together form a single A church that bears the fruits of faith. “You are the body of Christ, and individually you are members” ().

The Church is made up of all people who unitely profess the Orthodox faith, living all over the world, which is why the Church is called Universal. The Church belongs not only to Orthodox Christians now living on earth, but also to all its children who have now passed on to another world, for “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for with Him all are alive” (). The Mother of God, all the saints, as well as the heavenly army of archangels, angels and all heavenly disembodied forces, also form one Church with all of us. Thus, the Church is one, but is divided into earthly And heavenly. The Church does not consist only of saints and righteous people, but is called saint, because it was founded by the Lord Himself and preserves intact and holy the teaching given by Him.

The Lord created the Church and put into it everything necessary for our salvation: true, Orthodox teaching, church hierarchy, holy sacraments.

The Lord acquired and acquired His Church, shedding His Divine blood for it, enduring suffering and death itself. He appointed apostles, giving them the authority to perform the holy sacraments: “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive, they will be forgiven; on whom you leave it, it will remain on him” (), this is said about the sacrament of confession, in which the Lord, through a clergyman, absolves a repentant person from sin. The Savior gave the apostles the authority to perform other sacraments: Communion, Baptism, and Priesthood. The holy apostles received episcopal power from Christ; they appointed and ordained successors, other bishops. Since then, apostolic succession in the Church through an unbroken chain of ordinations has not ceased. Each of the existing Orthodox bishops has succession from the apostles themselves. That is why our Church is called apostolic. Both the apostles and subsequent bishops ordained elders and priests. Elders can also perform all sacraments except ordination. The priesthood is the second level of the church hierarchy after the bishop. Only a bishop can ordain and ordain a person to the priesthood.

The church is called cathedral , because we all, headed by Christ the Savior and the hierarchy, constitute one council, a meeting of believers. The word Church, in Greek ecclesia , translated as a meeting of believers. Also, the Church is conciliar, since the highest power in it belongs to the Ecumenical Councils. They gather to discuss very important church issues and condemn false teachings. Bishops are present at Ecumenical Councils, if possible, from the entire Ecumenical Church. Also, the life of the Church is governed by local councils, which meet regularly in local Orthodox churches. Local Churches are churches located in different countries, each of them has its own primate, the chief bishop of the church, but all are members of the one Ecumenical Orthodox Church.

The Church, as a divine-human organism, is eternal and will remain, according to the Savior’s promise, until the end of time.

ABOUT THE TENTH MEMBER OF THE SYMBOL OF FAITH

I confess one baptism for the remission of sins

I confess, which means I believe, I undoubtedly acknowledge. Why "one baptism "? “One Lord, one faith, one baptism” (), teaches the Apostle Paul. This means that there is only one true Church, established by the One true God, and in it there are saving sacraments, since the grace of God operates in the Church. The uniqueness and uniqueness of Baptism was included in the Creed also because during the time of the first Ecumenical Councils there were disputes about how to receive heretics who had fallen away from the Church, whether it was necessary to repeat the sacrament of Baptism over them or not? Therefore, the Second Ecumenical Council supplemented the “Symbol” with the words that there can be only one Baptism. It was decided to accept the fallen through repentance.

The Creed calls it a sacrament Baptism , but no other sacraments are mentioned. Baptism is the sacrament of entry into the Church; without it one cannot become a Christian, a follower of Christ and a member of His Church. By entering the Church through Baptism, as through some kind of gate, a person gains the opportunity to begin other sacraments and sacred rites of the Church. There are seven sacraments in the Church: baptism, confirmation, communion, confession, unction (or unction), wedding and priesthood.

So, the spiritual life of a Christian begins with Baptism; he is born in this sacrament for a new life, life with Christ. The Lord sends the apostles to preach His teaching, the word of God to all people and baptize everyone who believes in Christ and wants to follow him: “Go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things.” what I commanded you" (). In another Gospel, written by the holy evangelist Mark, the Savior says about Baptism: “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved; and whoever does not believe will be condemned" (). The prerequisite for baptism is faith and living by faith. Baptism is not only a new birth, but also death for another life, sinful, carnal: “If we died with Christ, then we believe that we will live with Him” () - we read the words of the Apostle Paul at the sacrament of Baptism.

Before immersing in the Holy Font with the invocation of the name of the Holy Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the one approaching Baptism renounces the devil and “all his works,” that is, from a sinful life,” for “he who commits sin is of the devil.” And he is united with Christ, promises to keep faith in the Lord and faithfulness to Him, promises not to resist the will of God and to live according to His commandments.

In the waters of baptism, a person drowns his sins, his fallen nature, emerging from the font cleansed and renewed, and receives grace and strength to fight the devil and sin. Therefore, the Creed says that Baptism is performed “for the remission of sins.” When an adult begins the sacrament of baptism, he is required not only to have faith, but also to repent of his sins.

We baptize infants according to the faith of their parents and godparents, who are sureties for them before God. Both parents and godparents must be believers who know their faith and live according to it. They must raise the child in faith. The prototype of New Testament Baptism was the Old Testament rite of circumcision; it was performed on infants on the eighth day after birth. We also perform baptism on infants, for the Apostle Paul directly calls Baptism “circumcision not made by hands” - (); Even the holy apostles performed baptisms over entire “houses”, families, in which, of course, there were small children. The Lord Himself commanded not to prevent children from coming to Him: “Let the children come to Me, and do not forbid them, for such is the Kingdom of God” (). The fact that the grace of God can be communicated through the faith of other people is clear from the Gospel. When people turned to Christ with faith, asking for the healing of their relatives and friends, the Lord performed miracles according to the faith of those asking. For example, when the synagogue leader Jairus asked to heal his daughter, when a Syrophoenician woman prayed to cast out a demon from her daughter, or when four people came to the Lord and brought their paralytic companion. “Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the paralytic: child, your sins are forgiven you” ().

For any Orthodox believer with children, it is unthinkable for our children to remain outside the grace of God, which is taught in the saving Sacraments of the Church. Therefore, the Orthodox Church, with its canonical rules, established the need for infant baptism. For example, in Canon 124 of the Council of Carthage it is said: “whoever rejects the need for the baptism of small children and newborns from the mother’s womb, or says that although they are baptized for the remission of sins, they do not borrow anything from Adam’s ancestral sin that should be washed in the bath of rebirth ( that is, Baptism Ed.), from which it would follow that the image of baptism for the remission of sins is used over them not in its true, but in a false meaning, let him be anathema.” Thus, it becomes clear that infants, although they do not have personal sins, also need purification and the grace of God acting in the sacraments, since they, like all people, inherit the general ancestral depravity, the inclination to sin.

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I'm waiting for the resurrection of the dead

Man was created by God as an immortal being. After Adam's fall, the human body began to get sick, grow old, deteriorate, and lost its immortal properties. People are born, live on earth, and then die. The immortal soul is separated from the body; after bodily death, the Lord judges all the affairs of a person’s earthly life and determines the place of residence of the soul until the day of the Last Judgment. At the end of the world, on the day of the Last Judgment, God will resurrect , will restore the bodies of dead people in order to pronounce His final judgment on humanity and separate those worthy of the Eternal Kingdom of Bliss with God from those who, due to their sins, are unworthy of the Kingdom of God. Unrepentant sinners will go into “eternal torment” (), “into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angel” (), that is, to a place devoid of divine light, where they will remain in eternal torment, along with Satan and his servants.

The current state of the deceased, that is, the existence of the soul without a body, is not final and incomplete. Man is not only a soul, but a soul and a body together. And therefore, for the Judgment of all people and further eternal life, the Lord will resurrect the deceased in the body. Those people who will be alive at the time of the second coming of Christ will also appear at the judgment of God.

Almost all peoples have the concept of the immortality of the soul, for in man, as an initially immortal being, there is a feeling, a sense of his eternity.

The Lord Jesus Christ, having walked the full path of human life from birth to death, showed us the path that awaits all departed people. He was resurrected and His soul was united with the body. The Apostle Paul speaks about this: “If we believe that Jesus died and rose again, then God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will not warn those who have died; because the Lord Himself, with a proclamation, with the voice of the archangel and the trumpet of God, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first, then we who remain alive will be caught up with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so always with the Lord we will" ().

The Holy Scriptures of both the New and Old Testaments speak many times about the future resurrection of the dead. The Lord gave the prophet Ezekiel a vision that has historical significance (tells about the restoration of the kingdom of Israel), but is also a prototype of the general resurrection of bodies. The prophet saw a field full of dead, dry human bones. And so God says that he will introduce spirit into them, cover them with veins, grow flesh on them and cover them with skin. And everything happens according to the word of the Lord, then “the spirit entered into them and they came to life and stood on their feet - a very, very great horde” ().

It is difficult for the human consciousness, accustomed to thinking in earthly, limited categories, to imagine how the resurrection of long-dead people and the restoration of decayed flesh can occur. But we know that the Lord created the first man from “the dust of the earth, and breathed into his face the breath of life” (), that is, he gave him an immortal soul. Earth, “dust of the earth,” is a set of chemical elements from which all nature, including humans, consists. When the body dies, it decomposes and returns to the state of dust. After the Fall, God tells Adam that “you ... will return “to the land from which you were taken” (). Of course, God, Who once created the human body from the nature of the earth, will be able to restore the decayed human body back.

To assure us of the future resurrection of bodies, the Apostle Paul uses the image of grain thrown into the ground: “Someone will say: How will the dead be raised? and in what body will they come? Reckless! what you sow will not come to life unless it dies. And when you sow, you do not sow the future body, but the naked grain that happens, wheat or something else; but God gives him a body as he wants, and to each seed his own body... So it is with the resurrection of the dead” ().

“If the seeds do not die first, do not rot and do not decay, they will not grow an ear. And just as you, when you notice that a seed is subject to damage and decay, not only do not doubt, but thereby become even more firmly convinced of its resurrection (for if the seed had remained intact without damage and destruction, it would not have been resurrected), so reason and about your body,” he also says Saint.

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and the life of the next century. Truly so.

After the general resurrection and the Last Judgment, the earth will be renewed and transformed through fire. On the new earth it will be established Kingdom of God, as the Holy Scripture says, Kingdom of truth: “We expect, according to the promise of the Lord, a new heaven and a new earth, where only one truth will reign” (). The Holy Apostle John the Theologian, in a revelation about the future destinies of the world, saw “a new heaven and a new earth” (). There will be nothing sinful, unclean or unjust on the new earth. Both nature and human nature will also be renewed. The Apostle Paul writes that people’s bodies will be similar to the resurrected body of the Savior: “But our citizenship is in heaven, from where we look for the Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body so that it will be like His glorious body, by the power by which He acts and subdues everything to Himself. (). In the Kingdom of God there will be no illness, no suffering, no sorrow.

What will it be life what it will look like new heaven and earth? It's hard for us to imagine. But one thing is certain, that both the Kingdom of God and life in it will be incomparably, incommensurably more beautiful than all the current earthly beauties and joys. “The eye has not seen, the ear has not heard, and what God has prepared for those who love Him has not entered into the heart of man,” says the Apostle Paul. We can give the following example. There lives a man who suffers from severe eye disease from birth; he is almost deprived of light; he distinguishes surrounding objects and people only as vague silhouettes. And so he undergoes an operation, and after a while all the colors, all the beauties of the surrounding world become available to him for contemplation. Or a person who was deaf from birth was given hearing, and a wonderful world of sounds, words and musical harmonies was opened to him. Yes, it is difficult for us to imagine what “God has prepared for those who love Him,” but we believe that life with the Lord, in constant divine light and love, will be blissful and beautiful. Our present, earthly joys cannot give us an idea of ​​that other joy and happiness. Even spiritual joys, from love, gratitude to God, prayers are only a weak beginning, a thin sprout of what will be there, in the new Kingdom of Truth. For us, the expectation of the life of the next century is a matter of faith, our hope, and one can only feel sorry for people who do not have this hope, that is, do not believe in a future life. There is a parable about this.

Two twins talk in the belly of a pregnant woman. One of them is a believer, and the other is an unbeliever. The unbeliever believes that their whole life is living in this cramped and dark room, where they can only move slightly, and there is no other life. Another baby, on the contrary, believes that their current situation, temporary, is only the beginning of a real, wonderful life, that someday they will see the light, the beauty of the world, they will eat food with their mouths and walk with their own feet. And most importantly, this baby believes they will see their mother. To which the non-believer replies that believing in a mother is simply madness, we don’t see her, which means she doesn’t exist. His believing brother tries to dissuade him, saying that the mother is next to them, she takes care of them, gives them life and food, the mother is everywhere, she is around them. But the unbelieving twin stands his ground.

The creed ends with the word "Amen", which means: truly, undoubtedly so. By this we confirm and testify that we accept, as true Orthodox Christians, this confession of faith, left to us by the holy fathers, and approved by the ecumenical councils.