I have been reading a few books about words and punctuation this week. Yes, people write books about origins of words and make them interesting! I have been paying more attention to words, syntax and punctuation because of these books. I am a bit nervous to write anymore, because I am sure that I am punctuating incorrectly; but I will try my best.
I discovered an answer to a question that I never seem to look up, so I thought I'd share this discovery with you.
I have always wondered why people have a fish symbol on their cars. I knew that it is a religious symbol, but that is as far as my knowledge extended. Now I know what the fish stands for! However, I do not know why they put it on their cars. (I'm not much of a car decoration fan; bumper stickers and those vinyl stick-figured family things drive me crazy.)
The information I am about to share comes from a book called The Word Snoop by Ursula Dubosarsky. Early Christians (along with other people!) used acronyms to save space and time in writing (much in the same way we do with texts LOL!). The way to say “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior” in Greek is this: Iesous Christos Theou Huios Soter. Thus, the acronym is ICHTHUS, which is the Greek word for “fish”.
The explanation really is that simple! That is how the fish symbol became associated with Christianity.
Now I know- and you do too!
why did this post make me feel dumber instead of smarter? I guess I know who to call on any punctuation inquiries. BTW, I am sure my writing style drives MANY punctuation lovers insane. I take many liberties. For instance, try to find one of my posts that doesn't have..........in it. Oh, well. :-) I admire your thirst for knowledge.
ReplyDeleteCool! I had always wondered too, but never got around to looking it up -- Thanks!
ReplyDeleteBTW your punctuation is fine. I have noticed through the years that "accepted" styles change quite quickly, and we are now in a time that allows a lot of personal innovation. Which also sometimes makes for confusion. But anyway -- keep up your great blogs. We love them!
Now I know too! Thanks.
ReplyDeleteYou learn something new every day! (I've secretly always wondered what it was too...and never knew it had anything to do with religion.) Hey, nice punctuation on your first paragraph with your ","'s and ";"'s in all the right places! You go girl!
ReplyDelete