What are the Earliest Creeds in Christian History? With Gary Habermas

This is the episode I’ve wanted to record since starting my podcast in 2017! When we talk about “historic Christianity,” what do we mean? Was early Christianity so theologically diverse that we can’t know what the earliest Christians believed? Historian and New Testament scholar Dr. Gary Habermas joins me to talk about the earliest Christian creeds that predate the New Testament by decades. We discuss the gospel as understood in the first century, as well as the deity of Jesus’ being affirmed by the earliest followers of Christ.

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[gary]

Exhomosexuaĺ, been saved almost 40 yrs, this is one of the best videos ever, brought to tears several times, went to Moody, never knew this

[l.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.l]

The way you guys described the creeds being passed down really strengthened me in my new journey to Christ. Thank both of you.

[dr.frankw.r.benoit]

What a great interview with Dr. Habermas! When I graduated from Dallas Seminary in 1984, just a year or two later I acquired Dr. Habermas' book on evidence for Jesus outside of the Bible, which was a great help on defending the veracity of Jesus as a real, historical Person. Thanks, Alisa, for letting us listen to Dr. Habermas' teaching on these early creeds that are in the NT! Keep up the good work and God bless you and your ministry!

[badgerden]

Alisa is such a gentle and kind person. I enjoy listening to her very much.

[MatthewGrace]

Watching this for a second time a month later... fantastic guest.

[Uniquely]

Great interview....this type of knowledge is important for us today

[jameymassengale]

ALISA, THIS VIDEO IS SO BEAUTIFUL, TO SEE GARY SPEAKING AND YOU GRASPING AND THINKING ABOUT THE HOW OF SHARING. I'M WEEPING IN JOY AS I WATCH. THIS IS HALACHA.

[naastradamus]

I love these talks with Gary Habermas. Hard to put into words how much I value this type of material. It the REAL DEAL

[Yawnyaman]

Recently started reading the early church fathers. This instruction in them has been really helpful, but also it really helps interpreting scripture. There are several good translations.

[TheAmericanGarage]

Dr. Habermas speaks of the early church, but the scholars he quotes only date back within the last hundred years. I applaud his studying and knowledge, but I would encourage you to not just talk about the early church, but to read what they said in the first couple of centuries. The letter of Clement on Christian Unity is a great place to start, Ignatius, Justin and Polycarp. Irenaeus' writing- Against Heresies- and the passionate Christian life of Origen. These men were all martyred for their faith, (correction- Origen was tortured but died naturally within a couple years)and they had to deal with all the incorrect things that people tried to inject into Christianity. Upon reading the writings of these, you see the threats of the Gnostic and Arius heresies, how the early church dealt with these things even in the first century. Irenaeus was the first to identify the four Gospels that we have today. All the creeds spoken of here lead up to the Nicaean Creed and Apostle's Creed which we have to this day, and were identified by these men filled with the Holy Spirit at the council of Nicaea in direct response to the Arius teaching that Jesus was not God. Santa Claus was among those who helped identify this false teaching and put it down. Good info- but dig deeper. If you want to be well-read, then you need to read these.

[MerBlack]

Dr Habermas is one of my favorite teachers

[JoseGonzalez-zbxx]

Woh, the preaching was right away. Definitely, Jesus is the only historical figure with early evidence 🙌

[angelbianchi]

Also...LOVE Alisa's gray hair! Hope mine will be as beautiful 😍

[springray]

Great video. I like how thoughtful and respectful Alisa is and how she just lets the guest speak. His info about the creeds and high Christology was interesting. His comments about suffering really spoke to me.

[johblonerider]

So refreshing not to hear about sowing a seed (money) in order to be blessed. This interview/teaching is a blessing on its own. Thank you

[JGaryEllison]

I just shared this video with my Christology students at Joy Bible Institute, Port Vila, Vanuatu. Thanks so much!

[Uniquely]

Absolutely Fascinating 💯 love the content of your video and found it quite enlightening and edifying. Keep up the great work. God bless you.

[dabbler]

REVISED Post: (1st, what I started with): Very glad this has been posted. Busy now but hope to catch up with this later. I am quite curious to see if he will talk about:
The DIDACHE
Clement of Rome
Polycarp
Ignatius . . . . . . . . .and now, after video, pt.2:

(ohhh man)....
The Topic was-- the earliest creeds of Christian History.
I would have hoped that somewhere along the way, we'd hear from some historical commentary that: Churches founded by Peter believed this, or the early churches in Antioch (where the disciples were first called Christians, right?) believed this-n-that. (Maybe the "Confessions" book they mentioned talks more about that? But i was hoping for more, in the video-talk).
But No. sigh.

Instead, we hear alot about Christology, alot about Son of Man, etc, , also Pinkus LaPede (spelling?), a couple New testament scholars that recently died, and scholars dating epistles. But not really Doctrine and teachings. (Creeds).
More on 1st Corinthians 15 and greek langauge. and appearances of christ, but what about doctrine? and teachings? There HAD to be more than whether or not he was the Son of Man or Son of God. Surely there was more than one issue. And what about teachings AFTER Paul? Unaddressed.
What about 10yrs. after Jesus's crucifixion? Were churches washing members feet? If yes, when did it stop?
Were people still speaking in tongues when ORIGEN was alive and writing about the Christian faith?
Is Baptism different now than it was in the Book of Acts? Why?
What about qualifications in the church for being an Elder? What about having sex with one of your slaves and having a son or daughter by them? (like Abraham?) When did that stop?

John's Gospel talks about "the Word" (Logos?). What did Matthew or Mark think about the Logos? Who, in History, would tell us?
Who was Marcion? Did his teachings infiltrate the Churches?
Did Churches in Thessalonia or Laodicia, or Phillipi have services that included "the Sinners Prayer" or "the 4 spiritual laws"? NO? Then, why do we? Where is the Biblical authority? Who started these? What year? (see History of the Sinners Prayer on Youtube. also charles finney, Billy SUNDAY, then Billy Graham and Bill Bright. But almost no one bothers to look). Let's consider 80A.D. So let's ask, AFTER 70AD, ten years LATER, what did the early church believe about "the Rapture" in 80AD? Who, back then, wrote about it? It's another Creed. It's relevant.
I'm betting the Churches in Ephesus or Colossians never heard about "Calvinism". What was their Doctrine?
Would Peter have approved? None of this was talked about in the video. I don't know if the Book they mentioned talks about any of these things.

In James 5:16 it talks about confessing your sins TO ONE ANOTHER: "Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working." (English Standard Version). But TODAY, you probably pray to GOD for forgiveness of your sins, but who goes around to fellow church members?!? Why AREN'T we, if it says to do it?
When did it change? Why? and we could go on. But those things weren't talked about, and they DO pertain to "Creeds". That would have been relevant. We could make a long list.

What did people who lived much closer to the time of the early church say they believed? And taught?
Wasn't Polycarp a disciple of, and taught by the Apostle John? What did Polycarp say about early church Creeds?
It didn't come up in this video.
What did Clement of Rome say? We weren't told.
The DIDACHE was, supposedly, the Teachings of the 12 Apostles. Any comments on that? None.
What about any commentary from Ignatius? Again, nothing.

l feel like i don't really know any more than when I started. At least about the TITLE-topic of the video. So much was unaddressed.

I LIKE alot of what Habermas has said in some of his other videos!
I consider him very knowledgeable, and more willing than many to take on the tough, or embarassing, questions, or sensitive topics than some fellow apologists. Kudos to him for that! For example, it may surprise some of you that he's done some videos on near-death experiences. (Sidenote: Will this cause him to become a Spiritualist, later on? I don't know. Maybe not. The claims, from people who say they've had a near-death experience seem to have gotten more outlandish, and less consistent these days, than back in the 70's. And if you haven't noticed, REINCARNATION is now creeping quite a bit heavier into the Near-Death testimonies and Youtube videos. When Dr. Raymond Moody wrote "Life After Life" in 1975, it wasn't like that). But THIS video, to me, sounded like it danced around and didn't really confront the topic directly enough. It was a lecture on Christology. But that wasn't the Title. I still like him, though. He's done other videos that are better.

[godsgospelgirl]

Listened via podcast, but liking and commenting here so it gets more views. :) I loved this!

[heptaasteras]

"The earliest Christology is the highest Christology."