Talk:Ichthys

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Contents 1 Missing Information: pronunciations? 2 Christian section 3 Other Symbolism?? 4 Yoni / earth mother symbol 5 Perhaps Astrological 6 Darwin Fish 7 Primary Sources? 8 Merge 9 Intriguingly 10 Merge to Fish shaped religious symbol thing 11 Spelling/transliteration variants 12 Diacritics? 13 C'thulhu as an anti-religious icon? 14 The whole fish thing. 15 Image comment 16 astrological age 17 Genitive or Nominative? 18 Original research 19 More original research? 20 Anti-Semitism??? 21 Fables? 22 Rediculous 23 Incorrect interpretation 24 Visnu and the icthys symbol 25 Parodies of the ichthys symbol

[edit] Missing Information: pronunciations?

Does anyone have any information on how to corectly pronounce each of the Greek words in the acronym, and the acronym itself? Wave or MP3 files in male and female voices would be ideal. ~Sandra 3 April 2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.174.202.197 (talk) 17:27, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Christian section

I have added the disputed section tag to the christian section, after an unnamed IP added a lot of stuff which appears, at least to me, to be at the very least highly speculative, and contradicts NPOV. If you are the author of this section, please explain and give references. HyDeckar 14:06, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Other Symbolism??

Just wondering if others agree with me that the `other symbolism associated with the fish' section needs a (reputable) source to establish its use quicksmart, otherwise contains info that honestly has no place in such an article. HyDeckar 14:10, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Yoni / earth mother symbol

Thinking of expanding the article with a section on the pagan symbol of the Yoni - the symbol of the 'Great Mother' - one school of thought is that it was the origin of the Christian symbol (they are virtually identical but the Christian one is tilted 90 degrees.) This predates Christianity by several thousand years. Possibly also mentioning the early paintings of Christ using the symbology of the yoni for depicting him inside Mary's womb. Sources, if anyone wants to check beforehand, are : The Women's encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (B. Walker) Man and His Gods (H. Smith) Religion in Greece and Rome (H.J. Rose) Oriental religions in Roman Paganism (F. Cummon) Bible Myths and their parallels in other Religions (T. Duane) Probably mentioned in some others I'm planning to check out, so dont take this as an exhaustive list. The Rev of Bru 15:32, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I think that might be more appropriate in Vesica piscis CheeseDreams 20:01, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Hmm. Well its much more like the fish symbol without the arcs,The Rev of Bru

The arcs should not be on the diagram, this is an error of understanding what "the flesh of the fish" (translated into latin this is "Vesica Piscis") actually is. I think I am going to have to edit the diagram. CheeseDreams 20:35, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I have, in fact, spent some time re-drawing the diagram on the Vesica piscis page, so that the identity with the fish symbol is clearer. CheeseDreams 21:36, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

and if the fish symbol was originally a pagan symbol that was simpy adapted for christianity, that should be represented on this page, surely? What does everyone think?The Rev of Bru

That is why I have proposed the merge, below. CheeseDreams 20:35, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Perhaps Astrological

On the sermon on the mount, Jesus only had 5 loaves of bread and two fish to feed the masses. One assertion is that he was referring to the five books of Moses and the sign of the age: pisces (two fish) Also notable is the reference to a man carrying water as the sign to go to the upper room for the last supper (aquarius). The sign of Jonah, while representing death and rebirth also is the sign of a fish. Am I stretching? perhaps. The authors of the time used a multitude of methods to convey meaning, symbols, in the age of exudus, were used as words, you have to consider that words are used as symbols thoughout the old and new testament.

[edit] Darwin Fish

Darwin reference: I don't think that a reference to Darwin is appropriate for an article regarding the biblical and historical basis for ICHTHYS, the abbreviation for a secret code of early Christians.

The Darwin Fish is one of the more important modern reactions to the symbol, and certainly belongs in a paragraph about modern usage. See Wikipedia:NPOV. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 23:15, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Meelar. Discussion of modern usage is certainly appropriate. RickK 23:19, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)

A mocking parody of ICHTHYS hardly belongs in an article which is exclusively about the religious connotation. I recommend making a subsection on modern uses of the fish symbol rather than interjecting it in the middle of the religious discussion. I want to keep it, but try to make the article more unified with a whole analysis of the modern uses. --G3pro July 18 2004

Making it a subsection would require a lot more information about modern usage than I currently know. Given that the "modern usage" section is currently pretty short, I feel that the article as now written flows well and clearly delineates the ancient and modern usages. There's no need for a subheading at this level of coverage. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 23:23, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How is this article exclusively about the religious connotations of ICHTHYS? The title says Icthys NOT Icthys (religious connotations) CheeseDreams 20:57, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Well, the article reads like it is about the religious connotations. It's first and main section is "Ichthus as a Christian symbol" and every further section is discussion the symbol in this first section. ~ 71.199.123.50 (talk) 17:23, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

I would be willing to elaborate on several modern uses of the fish and make it a stub. I would love to explore the reasoning and popularity behind the adaptations for the fish. --G3pro July 18 2004

Well, you're welcome to create a "modern usage" heading level in the current article--more material would be interesting. Feel free to add your material, but please don't just remove material. Best wishes, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 23:27, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I added the section on adaptations of ICHTHYS. Please discuss here before making substantial edits to this section.

Hey, can anybody come up with universal codes to make the Greek characters display properly on all systems? I tried adding standard letters with the two non-standard Greek characters as numerical values. However, the "O" shaped letter--I am too lazy to look it up now--is still not displaying properly and then too there is no guarantee that it will display properly on other moniters. The big thing is trying to get it to display in standard ASCII rather than Unicode.

Shouldn't the greek letters be recognizable by all browsers and systems? Look up how to format text properly on the help menu to the side. It's an ampersand followed by the greek letter text. Like this (without the space): & iota;

Do the characters show up correctly in your browser? In mine, they're just boxes representing where letters ought to go.

You could try <math>\iota\chi\theta\epsilon\sigma</math>, which renders as ιχθεσ. (Meaning that it'll come out as an image for people who know their browsers can't render HTML math.) 'Course, there are a lot of downsides to that, too. But it's an option. Greek language uses Unicode numbers, (they're there because someone pasted in Greek letters, which the edit-box converted into Unicode entities---it'll do that if you paste in Japanese or Chinese and hit 'preview' as well) which are hard to edit (who memorizes a table of numbers?!) and should be emulated by the named-entities (e.g., &lambda; should print λ.) grendel|khan 15:06, 2004 Aug 6 (UTC)

By O shaped letter do you mean omicron, omega, phi, or theta? CheeseDreams 20:38, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Primary Sources?

I would like to know what the primary sources are for such tales of people drawing this symbol on the ground

I don't have the primary sources on this, but in my search, I found that the first account of the fish was by Clement of Alexandria (c.150-c.215). Also noted was that when a Christain met face to face with someone of an unknown faith, the Christian would draw half the symbol and wait for the other to finish the rest. --G3pro

Given that its virtually impossible to draw an arc of a circle freehand (one is considered a genius if it is acheived), I should like to see a demonstration of this CheeseDreams 20:59, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

If the article said "draw a geometrically perfect arc of a circle freehand," I'd say you had a point. However, for practical purposes, most people can draw an approximation of one adequate to the purpose described.

Septegram 14:43, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Merge

Obvious duplication of subject matter with Ikhthus. No opinion on which spelling to use for the final title. --Michael Snow 00:19, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Whatever relevant material there is in Ikhthus should be put into this article. Ikhthus is not a correct transliteration of ΙΧΘΥΣ, and most of the material in that article is related to astrology, which should not be considered in the Chritian use of the symbol. --G3pro August 3rd 2004

I merged ikhthus, but I left the astrological material in its own section. If it's incorrect, remove it, but even if most Christians now consider astrology to be a superstition, there was a long period when it was more respectable, so I think it might still be encylopedic. Gdr 15:19, 2004 Aug 5 (UTC)

I don't know, I just find the astrological information completely unncessecary when talking about a symbol used most famously in early Christianity. I just think that the astrology adds unwanted de-emphasis of the strong Christian meaning in the symbol. G3pro

I don't mind the astrology being there, but calling that section "Other Christian symbolism..." is hardly fair -- the symbolism discussed isn't Christian at all. We could talk about the "barque of Peter" or the anchor in a section with that title, but it doesn't seem all that necessary either. Also, we should modify the title to get rid of the link within the section title. (Style guide). Mpolo 15:59, Nov 2, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Intriguingly

I was not aware that intriguingly could be considered POV. It just seems a chatty style. Would you prefer "it is increadably boring to note"? CheeseDreams 21:01, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I've had such things reverted on me many a time until I learned to avoid it. The point is, the idea is only "intriguing" if you hold the point of view that is supported by this line of reasoning. Someone who didn't agree with that point of view might say "preposterously" instead of "intriguingly". Or someone who wasn't truly interested, might say "boringly". We should let the reader make up his own mind what is intriguing, boring or otherwise. Compare Wikipedia:Avoid peacock terms. Mpolo 15:54, Nov 2, 2004 (UTC)

Compare it to what? CheeseDreams 19:57, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Merge to Fish shaped religious symbol thing

I would like to propose merging this article with that of Vesica piscis. The object in question is the same, and they are really just uses of the same thing by different peoples. I think there should be a section on "Christian use of THAT SHAPE" and "Pre-Christian use of THAT SHAPE" in the surviving article, and then any other bits that are in each article as well. However, I do not know what the resulting article ought to be called, maybe Fish shaped religious symbol thing CheeseDreams 20:10, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Definitely not. Ichthus is a separate article in itself with a long history and usage. Nobody knows what vesica piscis is but everyone knows what ichthus is. Leave the articles as they are.

( 22:27, Nov 2, 2004 User:G3pro -- sig from history, added by Mpolo)

I really think that the two articles are better off separate. For one thing, Vesica piscis doesn't look anything like the Ichthys... at least to my eye. That some scholars say they're related because of the name of the Vesica piscis could warrant links between the two articles, but I really think the material doesn't overlap. We don't gain anything by merging. It doesn't hurt to have two articles. In fact we lose by merging because we end up with a manufactured page title that is unintuitive for the reader. Mpolo 20:30, Nov 2, 2004 (UTC)

The Vesica Piscis isn't the picture in the diagram, it is the resulting fish shape. The diagram is wrong. Unfortunately I don't know how to correct it - I can't draw the appropriate diagram, overlaying the fish shape onto two much fainter overlapping circles. Pythagoras used the shape. He called it the Vesica Piscis, he wasn't referring to the circles, he was talking about the fish. Even the name of the shape (Vesica Piscis) says fish, it translates from Latin as "the flesh of the fish". The greek translation is "Sarca Ichthouca" i.e. "Sarca" of "Ichthys". Its the same thing. CheeseDreams 21:05, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Please see the new diagram on Vesica piscis for explanation of the connection between the two articles. CheeseDreams 21:31, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Spelling/transliteration variants

Just for grins, I Google'd the various versions of the spelling and came up with these results:

• Ichthus - 71,400
• Icthus - 32,400
• Ikhthus - 216
• Ikthus - 757
• Ixthus - 1,840
• Ichthys - 23,700
• Icthys - 516
• Ikhthys - 61
• Ikthys - 218
• Ixthys - 628
• Ichthis - 71
• Icthis - 44
• Ikhthis - 12
• Ikthis - 16
• Ixthis - 24

Since "Ichthus" and "Icthus" are so common, I added them to the article intro para (per Wikipedia policy, which says: we try to make sure that all "inbound redirects" are mentioned in the first couple of paragraphs of the article). I will make sure all the more common ones exist as redirs, as well (although I'm not going to list them all in the intro - the "etc" I added should handle them). Noel (talk) 16:05, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Diacritics?

Should the Greek in the first paragraph be changed to ἰχθύς (polytonic, as in Koine)? Perhaps ιχθύς (monotonic)? Is that different from ιχθύς? Google thinks so... Character encoding makes my head hurt. -leigh (φθόγγος) 05:23, Jan 11, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] C'thulhu as an anti-religious icon?

I'm pretty sure that the Lovecraftian Great Old One magnets are intended more of as humorous than any sort of argument, religious or otherwise. It's fan peraphenalia, no different than a C'thulhu Plushie. Druminor 21:49, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The whole fish thing.

I know the story, but is it fair to present it as fact. Also, the origins, should Christianity really be credited as the origin of the symbol? I've heard arguments linking the symbol to older pagan religions and even the suggestion that a pagan symbol was chosen so that the Romans would not catch on. I'm not sure about the validity of any argument, christian or otherwise, but the wording of the article presents some things as fact which may not be fact. --Lucavix 03:16, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I've heard the same thing as well. My understanding is that aside from Greek pagans, the fish symbol was also used by worshipers of the Semitic god, Dagon - god of agriculture and ... well ... fish. (not Lovecraft's "Dagon"). Also have heard some references to the Pope's hat being similar to the ritual priest outfits of Dagon worshipers (Its suppose to look like a fish head). Why Christians would adopt it as a symbol, who's to knows, but the article does a good job presenting some of them. --Trippz 05:53, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Early Christians usurped many pagan symbols and rituals. Celebrating the birth of Jesus at around the winter equinox, for example. It was "Winter Holiday" long before it was "Christmas". Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 08:31, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, thats pretty much a given. Afterall, the whole Christmas Tree thing is a bit of a giveaway. In fact, some people point out passages within the Bible that express distaste with the Northern Pagan ritual of Pine Tree Slaughter. Anyhow, the fish symbol was used by pagans long before the modern Christian adoption in the 1960's and even before Romanized Christians. Aphrodite and Eros were often symbolized by a fish as well, from which we get Pisces. A Christian connection could be argued as a translation to Mary and Jesus. I agree that the article doesn't really give enough significance to the pagan origins. For example, I'd suggest the information about Origins be sectionalized and placed toward the top of the article. As it is, the Origin information of the Ichthys is buried within a section called Early Christian Church, I think it should really be sectionalized and moved up to the front of the article and simply titled Origins of, currently the article reads more like one that should be properly titled "The Ichthys in Christianity". Not that an article of such a nature wouldn't find a good home on WP, but if this article is really about the symbol it should have more Origin information, which inherently encompasses more then Christianity. Maybe one of the main contributors wouldn't mind making the change. I'd even accept a "Theories Concerning Origins of" title to the new section. It would provide a place to elaborate more on this particular aspect of the Ichthys without muddying the current sections. --Trippz 10:02, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

However, it is unlikely that the word "ichthys" was previously a pagan acronym and was then coincidentally adopted as the acronym of the Greek for "Jesus Christ, God's Son, Saviour". Speaking of saving, lest we forget: Jesus Saves. Moses Invests. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 14:32, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Image comment

There is an image of a stone with a caption that reads "Overlaying the letters in ΙΧΘΥΣ results in an ichthys wheel like this one in Ephesus." This is incorrect. That is not an "ΙΧΘΥΣ" or fish symbol at all. It is however a very common early Christian symbol, this ancient monogram is rarely seen in today's churches. It is formed of two Greek letters. The "I" is the first letter of the Greek name of Jesus (IHCOYC), and the "X" is the first letter of the Greek word for Christ (XPICTOC).

Arturo Méndez (arturo.mendez@gmail.com)

I noticed this too and removed the pic from the page (follows if anyone wants to fix):

--Andymussell 22:52, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] astrological age

From near the end:

"In astrology, an astrological age is determined by the constellation in which the Sun appears during the vernal equinox. Since each sign on the zodiac belt shifts an average of one degree in 70 years, while 360/12 = 30, each astrological age lasts 70 x 30 = 2,100 years. The astrological age of Pisces coincided with the birth of Jesus Christ — approximately 2,000 years ago."

But the article on astrological age says Pisces didn't begin until around 500CE.

I know practically nothing about astrology, unfortunately, so am not gonna even try to clear this up. Does anyone else feel up to it? --Andymussell 22:26, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

See Talk:498 - AnonMoos 03:03, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Genitive or Nominative?

Should the Genitive or Nominative case of the Greek word for "Savior" be used? If the Genitive Σωτῆρος is understood as an Attributive / Descriptive (rather than a Possessive) then it seems a viable option. This would fit with the subject, Χριστὸς, as well as (or better than) the Nominative case, would it not?

Ps. Regardless of the case adopted, wouldn't the Eta take a circumflex accent, not an acute? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 4.253.11.176 (talk • contribs) 08:18, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I have never seen the ΙΧΘΥΣ understood with anything other than "soter", so I wouldn't belive a reading with "soteros" without sources. Regarding the acute versus circumflex accent, you can see that it is an acute in the nominative case and a circumflex in the genitive case in various online sources, for example here (PDF). (Unfortunately the online classical Greek dictionaries at [1] don't show accents). Kusma (討論) 15:20, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I thought I had seen nom. / gen. constructions with σῶς in the NT, but now I can't seem to find any, my mistake. Regarding the accent, I see the circumflex applies with the gen. (the ultima is short and the accent falls on the long penult), but with the nom. the accent falls on a long ultima, which I think allows it to take a circumflex or an acute. However, seeing as the lexical form is acute and no other word follows it in the expression, it appears that acute would be correct here. Sorry for the confusion! - 4.253.13.130 22:46, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

No problem, it's good this was sorted out. Kusma (討論) 23:11, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Original research

It seems that this article contains a bundle of unsourced claims and possibly speculative information, the "Pagan"-section in particular. For example:
Ichthys was the lover-son of the ancient Babylonian sea goddess Atargatis, and was known in various mythic systems as Tirgata, Aphrodite, Pelagia or Delphine. The word also meant "womb" and "dolphin" in some tongues, and representations of this appeared in the depiction of mermaids. The fish is also a central element in other stories, including the Goddess of Ephesus (who has a fish amulet covering her genital region), as well as the tale of the fish that swallowed the penis of Osiris, and was also considered a symbol of the vulva of Isis.
It would seem that it unscrupulously connects mostly unrelated info in a dubious way. Would anyone be interested in trying to clean it up? Satanael 18:15, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More original research?

From the article:

Though there is no direct evidence, the ichthys may simply be an adaptation of the mystic/mathematical symbol known as the Vesica Piscis. The length-height ratio of the vesica piscis, as expressed by the mystic and mathematician Pythagoras, is 153:265, a mystical number known as "the measure of the fish." In a biblical story in which Jesus aids his disciples to catch fish, they catch exactly 153 fish (John 21:11).

The words "though there is no direct evidence" and "may", put together in a single sentence, make this a remarkably tenuous assertion. Can anyone provide verifiable mainstream sources that say this? In particular, a cite for '...known as "the measure of the fish."' would be particularly useful. -- The Anome 07:39, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

There are lots of references to this in Tim Freke's book The Jesus Mysteries Mike0001 16:10, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Anti-Semitism???

While I don't want to do it myself without any consensus, I think it would be more than appropriate to remove the claim that the Darwin parody of the Jesus fish is comparable to anti-Semitism. The Darwin fish is not an expression of hatred toward Christians. It simply expresses an ideological difference with the Christian faith. Furthermore, the spirit of the Darwin fish, at least as I understand it, is not an evolutionist/atheistic statement so much as it is commentary on the absurdity of placing a symbol of faith on the rear bumper of an automobile. I'm not saying whether I agree with it or not, I'm simply stating that comparisons to anti-Semitism are irresponsible and myopic, and should be removed from the article. -C.B.

Yeah dudes the jesus fish !!!!!

[edit] Fables?

I ran into an eyesore on this page where the man is discussing the "fish mathmatics" and how coincidentally there are some pagan storys that are similar to the ones found in the gospels.

I find the term "Christ's fables" to be innapropriate so I changed that a bit.

2Pe 1:16 "For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty."

Rush4hire 10:48, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rediculous

I'm so tired of seeing these on cars. Jesus is a character and this is his cartoon fish.

I find it ridiculous that somebody in the same species of me could be so unintelligent. The creditability of your statement is identical to me saying, “Darwin is just a character and the evolution fish his ‘cartoon fish’.” To each his own, but Jesus did exist. Whether you believe he did what he did is entirely up to you. I wish you well. - Darth Fury

[edit] Incorrect interpretation

It's a bit subtle, but the stated interpretation of the acronym is not correct => i.e. Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior. It's a common misconception dating back to early commentaries.

For one, it's not good grammatical Greek (hinging in part on whether or not the "TH" word is genitive or nominative), but most importantly, the acronym is a chiasm (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiasmus) which can be demonstrated most easily in a visual depiction of the chiasm:

  ----- Iesus                      Jesus -----
  |                                          |
  |  -----Christos            Christ -----   |
  |  |                                   |   |
  |  |  Theos (Theou) --------- God('s)  |   |
  |  |                                   |   |
  |  -----hUios                  Son -----   |
  |                                          |
  ----- Soter                     Savior -----

Because:

    Jesus (Yoshua) MEANS savior
    Christ (annointed) MEANS son (adopted - as in King)
    and God is whom Jesus is declared to be - as opposed to simply son of God.

If the genitive case is assumed, then the chiastic structure is broken: AABBC If the nominative case is assumed, the chiastic structure is apparent: ABCBA

~~mjd 2007-06-06 21:52:00 EDT

[edit] Visnu and the icthys symbol

"A symbol similar to ichthys, inclusive of the tails, is associated with the Hindu deity Vishnu, occurring twice in the written representation of his name."

Can someone explain this to me? Visnu written in Devanagari script reads as विष्णु — and I cannot find any fishes in that. —Raga 14:36, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Parodies of the ichthys symbol

Could you guys read that section? I changed it a bit to try to make it sound as neutral as possible. Please comment. Hamsterlopithecus (talk) 06:40, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I removed the "weasel words" tag. Hamsterlopithecus (talk) 15:42, 27 May 2008 (UTC)