What is the significance of the ecclesiastical confessions? Karl Barth, the most important author of the Barmer Theological Declaration, was an interpreter and sharp critic of church confessions. The study examines Barth's understanding of the ecclesiastical creed and sees in it a way beyond denominational positivism and a liberal creed. This enables a new appreciation of church confessions that leaves the fruitless alternative of forgetting tradition and exaggeration of tradition behind.