Ι... Iota... Iesous... Jesus
Matthew 1:20-21
"Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your
home. For it is through the holy Spirit that this child has been conceived in
her. She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus, because he will save his
people from their sins."
Χ... Chi... Christos... Christ (annointed)
John 1:15-17
"John testified to him and cried out, saying, 'This was he of whom I said,
The one who is coming after me ranks ahead of me because he existed before me. '
From his fullness we have all received, grace in place of grace, because while
the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus
Christ"
Θ... Theta... Theou... God's
Υ...Upsilon......Yios ...Son...
Matthew 16:15-16
"He said to them, 'But who do you say that I am?' Simon Peter said in
reply, 'You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.'"
John 1:34
"Now I have seen and testified that he is the Son of God."
Σ...Sigma........Soter...Savior
John 4:41-42
"Many more began to believe in him because of his word, and they said to
the woman, "We no longer believe because of your word; for we have heard for
ourselves, and we know that this is truly the savior of the world."
From the Catholic Encyclopedia article, Symbolism of the Fish:
"The word Ichthys, then, as well as the representation of a fish, held for Christians a meaning of the highest significance; it was a brief profession of faith in the divinity of Christ, the Redeemer of mankind. Believers in this mystic Ichthys were themselves "little fishes", according to the well-known passage of Tertullian (De baptismo, c. 1): "we, little fishes, after the image of our Ichthys, Jesus Christ, are born in the water"(baptism).
"The association of the Ichthys with the Eucharist is strongly emphasized in the epitaph of Abercius (Read more HERE, and HERE) the second
century Bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia, and in the somewhalater epitaph of Pectorius of Autun. Abercius tells us on the aforesaid monument that in his journey from his Asiatic home to Rome, everywhere on the way he received as food 'the Fish from the spring, the great, the pure," as well as "wine mixed with water, together with bread.'"Pectorius also (Catacomb of St. Callixtus, Rome) speaks of the Fish as a delicious spiritual nurture supplied by the "Saviour of the Saints". In the Eucharistic monuments this idea is expressed repeatedly in the pictorial form; the food before the banqueters is invariably bread and fish on two separate dishes. The peculiar significance attached to the fish in this relation is well brought out in such early frescoes as the Fractio Panis scene in the cemetery of St. Priscilla, and the fishes on the grass, in closest proximity to the baskets containing bread and wine, in the crypt of Lucina."
Sometimes people get the acronym, ICHTHYS mixed up with the accusation of the Romans that was posted about Jesus head on the cross, INRI, which stands for “Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum” and translated as Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews. As found in John 19:19-20:
"Pilate also had an inscription written and put on the cross. It read, 'Jesus
the Nazorean, the King of the Jews.' Now many of the Jews read this
inscription, because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and
it was written in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek."
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