In the opinion of the most recent writers on the subject the Christian
Fish symbolism derives directly from the Jewish, the Jews, on their
side having borrowed freely from Syrian belief and practice.[36]
What may be regarded as the central point of Jewish Fish symbolism is
the tradition that, at the end of the world, Messias will catch the
great Fish Leviathan, and divide its flesh as food among the faithful.
As a foreshadowing of this Messianic Feast the Jews were in the habit
of eating fish upon the Sabbath. During the Captivity, under the
influence of the worship of the goddess Atargatis, they transferred
the ceremony to the Friday, the eve of the Sabbath, a position which it
has retained to the present day. Eisler remarks that "in Galicia one
can see Israelite families in spite of their being reduced to the
extremest misery, procuring on Fridays a single gudgeon, to eat,
divided into fragments, at night-fall. In the 16th century Rabbi
Solomon Luria protested strongly against this practice. Fish, he
declared, should be eaten on the Sabbath itself, not on the Eve."[37]
This Jewish custom appears to have been adopted by the primitive
Church, and early Christians, on their side, celebrated a Sacramental
Fish-meal. The Catacombs supply us with numerous illustrations, fully
described by the two writers referred to.
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