Appendix: The Commonitory and the Athanasian Creed

There is so close an agreement, both in substance and often in wording, between the preceding sections, 36 to 42, and the so-called Athanasian Creed, that it led Antelmi, in his New Inquiry into the Athanasian Creed, to name Vincent as its author, and to suppose that in it we have the fulfillment of the promise referred to here. If, however, the Creed was Vincent’s work, it can hardly be the work promised at the close of section 41. Vincent’s words point to a fuller and more explicit treatment of the subjects referred to, whereas the Athanasian Creed, though its subjects are the same, treats them far more briefly and concisely. [a]

Whoever the author was, however, if it was not Vincent, he must at least, as the extracts below seem to prove, have known the Commonitory well, and Saint Augustine’s writings too; the Creed bears clear traces of both. I add the following instances of agreement between the Commonitory and the Creed. Antelmi gives several others. The Commonitory, section 36, says that the church “confesses one Christ Jesus, not two, the same both God and man, the one as truly as the other.” The Creed, verse 28: “So the right faith is that we believe and confess that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is God and man alike.” [c]

The Commonitory, section 37: “There is one Person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Spirit.” The Creed, verse 5, has the very same words. The Commonitory, section 37: “One and the same Christ, God and man, the same equal to the Father and inferior to the Father, the same begotten of the Father before time, the same born of his mother in time; perfect God, perfect man.” The Creed, verses 29 and 30: “God, of the substance of the Father, begotten before the ages; man, of the substance of his mother, born in time; perfect God, perfect man.” The Commonitory, section 37: “One, not by some corruptible confusion of Godhead and manhood, whatever that might be, but by a certain complete and singular unity of Person.” The Creed, verse 34: “One altogether, not by confusion of substance, but by unity of Person.” The Commonitory, section 40: “As the Word in flesh is flesh, so man in God is God.”

The Creed, verse 33: “One, not by the changing of the Godhead in flesh, but by the taking up of the manhood in God.” [d]