Let me just say, at our house, we like fish and history. And, as Paul had to clarify in his letters to the churches about traditional cultures and human judgements. Your salvation is held in your heart, not in your diet as Peter had to learn in Acts chapter 10:11-16. It’s to follow a religious teaching tied to clean animals, and a food used as a corporate fast to show unity without division. Why Fish on Fridays? Well, it’s a fasting tradition to show the world. Jesus is our redeemer, our one and only sacrifice for all time. In class Wednesday night, I shared the words, “do not be divided,” in several languages: His selfless act saved the world from its selfishness. Jesus is not divided into many different parts. “Do Not Be Divided” then, became the need. Why do you do a thing? Why do you choose the things you do every week, and how hard is it to change? Try getting a fisherman to use new tackle.Īs we study our way through First Corinthians, it becomes obvious that Corinth (a whale of a tale seaport) had more division than a fifth-grade math sheet. In 45 AD, Paul was trying to teach the people of Corinth the wisdom of Jesus, not the wisdom of the world, in spite of all the traditional and cultural practices that were at the root of all the confusion. The observation of fish on Friday is as muddled as the tale of a fisherman’s catch or his latest trip to Bass Pro. The religious tradition of codfish on Fridays was to honor fasting of warm-blooded meat, which has biblical roots all the way back to the Old Testament. “But the rulers of this world have not understood it if they had, they would not have crucified our Lord.” -1 Corinthians 2:8 Well, that fish symbol gave credit that some safety and trust could be found in that home. Like code, one person could draw the underside of the fish and the other person in need could draw the top part to complete the code. In towns where to identify as a Christian was to be hated, this symbol would pop up. So how did fish get mixed up in religion? The culture of the first century Jesus movement had a symbol.
Who is Paul Harvey, you ask? I feel old to think an entire two generations might not know Paul Harvey, but that’s why Google is handy for celebrity identification. Dried, baked, boiled, whole, strips, jerky, or filleted fish filled the need. Things that crawl on their belly or eat other warm-blooded things were not clean animals to eat, so the cultures close to bodies of water ate fish a lot of fish.
In biblical times, you could not redeem yourself or your family with fish like you could with birds, or specific warm-blooded animals. The simple answer is that fish is a cold-blooded leg-less creature. Anyone who knows me, knows my favorite question and learning point, is “why?”
Like most people, I know the tradition, but its explanation like many old traditions is spread across hundreds of years. It makes no sense, she said, fish is meat too.
Yet, in this story in the 1970’s the “codfish” had some huge impacts, big enough to make it into everyday life, books, and movies.Ī good friend asked me this week why, fish on Friday’s and fish on Lint. Now, name calling as well as bullying are terrible hurtful things, that can wedge into innocent minds and cause years of pain I don’t diminish that. “A codfish, a codfish”, yes Captain Hook, the evil bullying pirate, is reduced to shame and name calling by children.
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