Irenaeus

152 Irenaeus: Life, Scripture, Legacy

b. that the traditio was directed not to repeating a trinitarian credal statement at
baptismal interrogation, but to a christological confession and that this is reflected in
Irenaeus’ citation of the rule of faith, regula fidei, at this point;
c. that this christological confession took place at the syntaxis—the formal pre-
baptismal profession of faith—and constituted the credal affirmation of Irenaeus’s bap-
tismal rite.
Scholarly orthodoxy anticipates that the earliest forms of baptismal profession were
interrogatory and trinitarian; this has prevented us from reading this text in its plain
sense. It is hard to see where this orthodoxy has come from, though in the Anglophone
world the finger of suspicion would seem to point to Carpenter;^3 that this orthodoxy is
widespread, however, will be illustrated when we deal with Kelly’s treatment of Irenaeus.

The Traditio
The first indisputable evidence for a rite of traditio is from the latter part of the third
century. In a letter to his Diocese, preserved by Athanasius in an appendix to his De
decretis, Eusebius states that he presented the creed of Caesarea as defense of his ortho-
doxy, “as we have received from the bishops who preceded us, both in catechesis and
when we received baptism [ἐν τῇ κατηχήσει καὶ ὅτε τὸ λουτρὸν ἐλαμβάνομεν] .”^4 The
catechetically received creed is employed somehow in the baptismal rite. Is the same,
we must ask, true of the rite known to Irenaeus approximately a century earlier? In
particular, if the rule of faith, the regula fidei, had a role in catechesis, it is possible
that some communication of the regula might be part of baptismal ritual; this, after
all, is what Irenaeus is saying. Since the context is the knowledge of the scriptures that
is held by and bestowed upon the faithful Christian, this is clearly delivery to rather
than from the candidate, either as part of the baptismal rite or as part of the complex
of catechumenal rites, or both.
The christological postscript to the statement of the regula fidei here has clear simi-
larities to the christological sequence of other creeds. Thus we may compare the sec-
ond part of the baptismal creed found in Traditio apostolica:^5

Irenaeus “Hippolytus”

and the coming and the

birth from the virgin

and the passion

and the resurrection from the dead

and the bodily reception into the heavens of

the beloved, our Lord Jesus Christ,

and his coming again from the heavens in the

glory of the Father for the consummation of

all things

Christ Jesus, the son of God,

who was born of the Holy Spirit and

Mary the virgin

and was crucified under Pontius Pilate

and was dead [and buried]

and rose on the third day alive from

the dead

and ascended in the heavens

and sits at the right hand of the Father

and will come to judge the living and

the dead.