The most remarkable outcome of this is the recognition of the fish as the symbol of Christ. The letters of the Greek name for fish ΙΧΘΥΣ (ichthus) can be interpreted as an acrostic, the component letters of the word taken in order being the first letters of the words Ἰησοῦς Χριστὸς Θεοῦ Υἱός, Σώτηρ (Jesous Christos Theou Uios Soter), which are in English "Jesus Christ Son of God, Saviour." This coincidence enabled the pagan worshippers of the fish-god to make their symbol or "totem" (using that word in a broad sense) the symbol of the Christian religion. Whether the use of the fish and of the letters of the Greek name for it was or was not independently started by the early Christians, its employment must have conciliated the fish-worshipping pagans, and rendered it easy to bring them into the fellowship of the Christian Church. Hence we see that a fish has more to do with Christianity than appears at first sight. It is quite possible that whilst the cult of the fish-god or fish-goddess may have involved at one period of its growth an abstention from the eating of fish or of particular species of fish as being sacred, yet the very ancient belief in "contagious magic" and the acquirement of the qualities of a man or an animal by eating his flesh, may have in the end prevailed and led to the eating of fish, the sacred symbol, on the fast days prescribed by the Church, when a special significance would be attached to such food as was sanctioned.
The evidence of the connexion of the early Christian Church with fish worship becomes convincing when once the importance of the great secret cult of the "Orpheists" and its connexion both with early Christianity and with fish worship is recognized.
It has long been known that there is a special association of the very ancient and primitive Greek cult of Orpheus, with the much later cult of Christianity. Many of the most important doctrines and practices of the widely spread secret society of the Orpheists closely resemble those of Christianity. Carvings and medals of Orpheus bringing all animals to his feet by his music were, by the earliest Christians, adopted as equally well representing Christ the Good Shepherd. But recent discoveries carry the matter much further. Orpheus is one of the names of a mythical hunter and fisherman of prehistoric times, who taught his people music, and by his magic helped them to successful catches of fish, and to the "netting" of beasts, as well as of fish. His followers adopted the fish as their "totem," or sacred animal, and they represented Orpheus (whether known by that or other names) as the warden of the fishes, a fish-god, and himself a fish--"the great fish"--and a "fisher of men." Fishes were kept in his temples and eaten solemnly (at first in the raw condition), in order to transmit to his worshippers his powers.