The Religion Teacher
You may have seen a simple fish symbol as a bumper sticker on cars, but it is actually a very ancient symbol for Jesus. There are a lot of references to fish in the Bible, but the symbol doesn’t actually refer to a Biblical story. It actually refers to the Greek word for fish: ICHTHYS.
It was illegal to be a Christian in the Roman Empire for hundreds of years. Christians in the early Church had to worship in secret to avoid persecution and death. So, they used many symbols to secretly refer to Jesus Christ. One of those symbols was a fish.
The word for fish in Greek is Ichthys (or Ichtus). Christians turned that word in to an acronym: ΙΧΘΥΣ. ICHTHUS means:
I = Iesus (Jesus)
CH = Christos (Christ)
TH = Theos (God)
Y = Yios (Son)
S = Soter (Savior)
Therefore, the Jesus fish symbol means ICHTHYS, or “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.”
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