Jesus Fish Vs. Darwin Fish – A Retrospective
We take a look at one of the best known car accessories out there – the classic Jesus Fish symbol and its most popular parody – The Darwin / Evolve Fish. We all know the symbols too well: Jesus Fish, probably emblazon on the back of someone who is driving way too slow, or just cut you off, or accompanied by a Pro-Life / “Jesus is My Co-pilot” bumper sticker, it has been a symbol for Christianity since the times of Ancient Greece – called “Ichthys” – means simply “fish” in Greek.
If you don’t know the bible story – Jesus once turned a few tiny fish into a cornucopia of eats for a village – one of his many miracles. The “Jesus Fish” or “sign of the fish” was used as a secret symbol for Christians back when it was a start-up religion, like Scientology
The most popular argument to the Jesus Fish is of course its polar opposite – The Darwin Fish. Also known as the Evolve Fish, This logo features the classic Christian Fish logo, with the addition of little feet and sometimes the words “Darwin” or “Evolve” placed inside. The Darwin Fish is usually facing in the opposite direction as the Jesus Fish – heading right as though “evolving” from the left, a political statement. It’s a parody, but also stands for, obviously, the Charles Darwin scientific theory of evolution.
The Darwin Fish is not nearly as old as the Christian Fish – it was created in 1983 by two friends involved in the southern California atheist and free thought movements, Al Seckel and John Edwards. There is also some speculation that the famous Star Trek logo is a parody of the Jesus Fish.
But whether or not a person sports religious ideology on their vehicle or strong disbelief of it we can agree on one thing: regardless, they’re probably poor drivers.
Just to pick you up on your comment that the Icthus Fish comes from Jesus feeding the 5000. In actual fact although your right that Icthus means Fish, to the early Christians it meant so much more.
Each Greek letter stood for something. Yee = Yesus, X = Christos, Theta = Theo, Y = Youios, Sigma = Sauta. Meaning Jesus Christ, God’s Son Saviour. when they saw this it was a secret code that the persecuting Romans thought just said fish but to early Christians being Persecuted they would read the code and know that the house or person displaying it was a safe place for them to go to escape the persecution.