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Problems with the Heidelberg Catechism's Description of Faith
by Robert P. TerryUpdated February 23, 2025
The Heidelberg Catechism is an important exposition of doctrine for Reformed believers. The catechism consists of 129 questions and answers that can be divided in four basic units: man's misery, man's redemption, thankfulness, and prayer. The catechism was mainly composed by Zacharius Ursinus (1534–1583) and was published in 1563. The original document was written in German, but there are at least two English versions that I have seen. In this article, I will be criticizing the catechism's description of faith based on the English version found here, but everything I say in regard to that version equally applies to the English version found in Philip Schaff's "Creeds of Christendom Volume III" available here. I am unable to read German, but I did translate the German version found in Schaff's work using Deepl to confirm roughly that the English version I used for this critique adequately reflected the German.
Although I have already refuted the idea that we "may be assured of our faith by its fruits" as taught in Lord's Day 32 (see my articles here, here, here, here, here, and here), in this article I will be focusing on the description of faith given in Lord's Day 7. The catechism says the following (omitting the Scripture cross references available here):
Q20 Are all men, then, saved by Christ just as they perished through Adam?
A20 No. Only those are saved who by a true faith are grafted into Christ and accept all his benefits.
Q21 What is true faith?
A21 True faith is a sure knowledge whereby I accept as true all that God has revealed to us in his Word. At the same time it is a firm confidence that not only to others, but also to me, God has granted forgiveness of sins, everlasting righteousness, and salvation, out of mere grace, only for the sake of Christ's merits. This faith the Holy Spirit works in my heart by the gospel.
As I've written elsewhere on this website (such as here), we should be wary any time the word "faith" is modified by adjectives like "true," "hearty," "upright," etc. Those modifiers indicate that a sleight of hand is at play, in which the word "faith" will be hijacked and transformed into an "appropriating instrument" that must be used to accept or receive the benefits of the Gospel through some activities or "heart work." And this is exactly how the catechism describes so-called "true faith" in A20. However, the word "faith" (Gr. pistis, which could also be translated as "belief," since it is the cognate noun of the verb "to believe") as used in the Bible and in every other realm of life is not an appropriating instrument, and the only thing faith can receive are propositions that it regards as being true. The benefits of the Gospel are not aspects or elements of faith, nor can faith appropriate them. Rather, the benefits of the Gospel are things that are simply true of people who believe the Gospel. And because they are true of people who believe the Gospel, people who believe the Gospel come to enjoy them. For example, when we say that assurance is of the essence of faith (based on Hebrews 11:1), what we mean is that we are assured that the content of some proposition is true. In the case of the Gospel, we are assured that the content of the Gospel is true. However, it would be a mistake to think that by assurance we mean the benefits of the Gospel, which might include what some people call "Gospel assurance." The benefits of the Gospel are enjoyed after believing the Gospel. (If you are unsure about the content of the Gospel and the nature of saving faith, please see my articles What is the Gospel and the Nature of Saving Faith? and Q&A on Faith). Having said this, we must move on because my real intention in this article is to examine A21.
Getting into A21, I'd like to skip the first sentence for the time being. As mentioned above, I certainly disagree with the use of the adjectival noun "true faith" and the nuance and implications of the cross reference to James 2:19 (see my article here), but I'd like to focus on the second sentence where it says that faith consists in a "firm confidence that not only to others, but also to me..." This sentence is problematic because Christ did not die for each and every person individually, and thus the proposition "Christ died for me" cannot be part of the Gospel. However, even if Christ did die for "the sin of the whole human race" (see A37), a "firm confidence that [Christ died for me]" would still require appropriating what isn't applicably and efficaciously true until it is believed through some elusive and mystical working in the heart (ascribed, of course, to the Holy Spirit). However, for justification by faith to be wholly apart from works, what "Christ did for sinners" cannot be mixed with what "Christ does in sinners." However, appropriating the proposition "Christ died for me" through "heart work" (regardless of whether such "heart work" is ascribed to the Holy Spirit or not) would fall within the realm of what "Christ does in sinners." In this case, justification would no longer be wholly apart from works, but would involve a transformative element in the heart, which if taken to its logical conclusion, would make it practically no different from the justification taught by Arminians, where the cross of Christ is merely the ground of justification instead of the all-sufficient work of justification. In other words, this act of appropriating "Christ died for me" cheapens and essentially nullifies what "Christ did for sinners" by requiring what "Christ does in sinners" through that mysterious act of appropriation in the heart. The catechism essentially requires sinners to appropriate to themselves the status of the elect. (See my article "Christ Died for Me" is NOT the Gospel for a more detailed explanation, but in short, we can come to understand that "Christ died for me" individually as an implication that can be drawn from believing the content of the Gospel. The problem with the catechism is that it distorts the Gospel and essentially turns it into "another gospel" by hijacking the word "faith" and turning it into something that requires much more than belief in the content of the Gospel.)
Now, looking at A21 as a whole, what I see is this: (1) "sure knowledge," (2) "accept as true all," and (3) "firm confidence." Ignoring the problems created by the modifiers "sure," "all," and "firm," the catechism describes faith in terms of the three components commonly referred to by theologians as notitia (the content of something to be believed), assensus (the conviction or persuasion that the content is true), and fiducia (which as a bare minimum includes an appropriating personal trust and reliance, but can include other things such as "surrender of the soul," as described by Reformed theologian Louis Berkhof on page 505 of his Systematic Theology). In contrast, the definition of faith that I've defended repeatedly on this website (see here, here, here, here, and here) as "a persuasion or conviction of the mind that a proposition is true" only requires notitia and assensus. Please understand this: if we really believe that "Christ did it all" (John 19:30, etc.), then faith can require no more than notitia and assensus. The introduction of fiducia as an element of faith requires an appropriating act on the part of the sinner to supplement "Christ's work for sinners." What the catechism is really doing is teaching mysticism and works salvation.
Let's consider this excerpt from the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy on the topic of Belief:
We believe that there is coffee over there; we believe the special theory of relativity; we believe the surgeon; some of us believe in God. But plausibly what is fundamental is believing that something is the case – believing a proposition, as it is usually put. To believe a theory is to believe the propositions that make up the theory, to believe a person is to believe some proposition advanced by them; and to believe in God is to believe the proposition that God exists. Thus belief is said to be a propositional attitude or intentional state: to believe is to take the attitude of belief to some proposition. It is about what its propositional object is about (God, the operation, or whatever). We can think of the propositional object of a belief as the way the belief represents things as being – its content, as it is often called.
This explanation and the conclusion in the last two sentences align with everything I've been saying on this website about the nature of faith (Gr. pistis = belief). This excerpt describes what faith means in every realm of life, including religion, from the secular standpoint of the encyclopedia's contributors. However, it is only in the realm of religion that theologians smuggle this fiducia and other baggage into the meaning of faith, thereby hijacking faith, holding it hostage, and transforming it into something that bears the name "faith" but is actually something entirely different. But as I have described in several articles on this website (see those linked above, but especially here and here), we have the biblical testimony that what faith means in every other realm of life is exactly what it means when applied to the Gospel (see, for example, Jesus' description of "believing" in John 3:11-12, John the Baptist's in John 3:32-36, the Apostle John's in 1 John 5:9-10, and the author of the Hebrews' description of faith in Hebrews 11:1. See also my commentary on James 2:14-21 here).
The Heidelberg Catechism's description of faith is counterfeit, unbiblical, and dangerous. As described in the encyclopedia above, faith represents its object. In terms of justification, the object of faith must be the Gospel. But since the catechism misunderstands the nature of faith, it also misunderstands the Gospel. It is because of documents like the Heidelberg Catechism that millions of Reformed believers live their lives either deluded, thinking that they appropriated justification by "Holy Spirit-produced" fiducia, or they live with great anxiety because they doubt the quality of their fiducia. Little do they know that they are practicing mysticism and works salvation under the guise of so-called "true faith." In contrast to the mystical "heart work" of fiducia whereby the sinner must appropriate to himself things that aren't true until they are believed, when God through His Holy Spirit wants to open the eyes of one of His elect to see the things that are true regardless of whether or not they are believed, He shines upon him the "content of the Gospel" to give him knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (Acts 26:18, 2 Corinthians 4:3-6).