Signs & Mysteries: Revealing Ancient Christian Symbols

by Mike Aquilina, Lea Marie Ravotti (Illustrator)

Imagine the dangerous life of a First Century Christian. You've embraced your newfound faith in Christ but fear the risk of persecution or death at the hands of the pagans living around you. Then a trusted friend tells you about some of Jesus followers who secretly meet. He whispers into your ear, Look for a fish carved into the entranceway to the burialchambers beside the Via Tiburtina. You smile in gratitude.

Comparatively, modern society is awash in those same Christian symbols that kept early Christians safely they appear on churches, bumper stickers, mugs even mints and stuffed animals. Yet, we are often ignorant of the origins of these symbols having lost the urgency of our spiritual ancestors hostile environment.

Noted author Mike Aquilina conducts an intriguing tour of symbols that guided the first four centuries of the Church s existence. He explains how Christians borrowed pagan and Jewish symbols, giving them new, distinctly Christian meanings. Recover the voice and urgency of our spiritual ancestors symbolic language and discover the impact the symbols still have.

Black and white illustrations by Lea Ravotti of artifacts uncovered throughout the Middle East beautifully complement the text, showing the variety of contexts in which they were found and the range of skills displayed in their execution.

Genres: Nonfiction, Religion, Church History, Christianity, Catholic, History

188 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Mike Aquilina is author or editor of more than thirty books, including The Fathers of the Church, The Mass of the Early Christians, and A Year with the Church Fathers. He has co-hosted eight series that air on the Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN). He has co-authored books with Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington, D.C., and theologian Scott Hahn. He is past editor of New Covenant magazine and The Pittsburgh Catholic newspaper. He appears weekly on Sirius Radio's "Sonrise Morning Show." Mike and his wife, Terri, have six children, who are the subject of his book Love in the Little Things.

In 2011 Mike was a featured presenter of the U.S. Bishops' Diocesan Educational/Catechetical Leadership Institute. He also wrote the USCCB's theological reflection for Catechetical Sunday in 2011.

His reviews, essays and journalism have appeared in many journals, including First Things, Touchstone, Crisis, Our Sunday Visitor, National Catholic Register, and Catholic Heritage. He contributed work on early Christianity to the Encyclopedia of Catholic Social Thought.

Mike is a also poet whose works have appeared in U.S. literary journals and have been translated into Polish and Spanish. He shared songwriting credits with Grammy Award-winner Dion DiMucci on the forthcoming album "Tank Full of Blues."

Reviews

[Joseph R. · Rating 5 out of 5]

The earliest Christians used a wide variety of symbols in many different contexts. The most viewed nowadays are those on graves in catacombs. But Christians also used symbols in decorating where they worshiped (they didn't always have churches, so again some of those decorations are in catacombs where the superstitious Romans wouldn't go) and where the early Christians lived. Sacred vessels and vestments were adorned with images of fish, birds, vines, and wheat, among other symbols. Rings had an anchor or a Chi-Rho symbol on them; household items also had faith-inspired decorations. Aquilina goes through twenty-five different images that can be traced back to the earliest years of the church.

Each symbol has a meaning that is explained, though sometimes the intent of the artist can be ambiguous. When discussing depictions of the cross (which is now a central symbol of Christian Faith), Aquilina acknowledges that all sorts of intersecting lines could be interpreted as crosses. Some clearly are; others could be happenstance. The chapters end with references to ancient and modern authors who have discussed these symbols.

Each chapter includes five to ten images of ancient art and artifacts that have the symbol discussed. The images are black and white, giving a sense of their ancient and timeless character. The art is both distant and familiar. I am sure the black and white was also to save publishing costs, but it is effective nonetheless.

Highly recommended.

[Steven R. McEvoy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Signs and Mysteries-Revealing Ancient Christian Symbols by Mike Aquilina and Lea Marie Ravotti is a great new book. It examines the signs and symbols of the Christian tradition from three perspectives - the historical archeological perspective, a theological perspective and from the view of what they can mean to us today. The book is written for the casual student of church history to the most devoted practitioner of the Catholic faith and the full range in between. The book is fantastically illustrated so that the images will have an original feel rather than look like photos from an art history book.

This book will cover a great breadth. The chapters of the book are:

The Background
The Fish
The Orant
The Shepherd
The Vine
The Philosopher
The Phoenix
The Dolphin
The Peacock
Milk
The Lamp
Moses
The Plow
Vessels
The Lamb
The Dove
Bread and Sheaves
The Crown
The Banquet
The Lighthouse
The Ankh
The Cross
The Anchor
Ships and Boats
The Labarum (Chi-Rho)
Alpha and Omega

Through the process of examining these symbols, a believer will encounter deeper meaning in elements of the tradition with which they are already familiar and will encounter new symbols that can bring deeper meaning into their faith and worship life. The book can even be used for a series of meditations as you read about each sign, learn about it, meditate upon its meaning and how it can impact your faith. What does the peacock (usually associated with pride or vanity) have to do with Catholicism? What does the Ankh, usually a Goth symbol of death, mean to early Christians and what can it mean to us? Many of these signs have corrupted or perverted representations in general culture. Now we can reclaim these items and when we see them misused know their true meaning (and maybe use it as a tool to pray for those people.)

This book is an excellent addition to Catholic History and to your faith life. Pick it up and explore new elements of tradition, history and practical faith.

[Nancy Almodovar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful lessons on Early Christian Iconography

Loved this book. When studying for my ThM in Early Church History, I was introduced to iconography. Growing up evangelical pictures were forbidden. I'm glad I learned the earliest of Christians drew images to help speak volumes.
The Author includes examples and plenty of other resources.

[Fr. Peter Calabrese · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book itself is pretty good. It gives a few brief pages on the ancient symbols of the Church. It has nice references and a good bibliography. It has a major production flaw it has a sepia like color in its text. I know it is there to reflect antiquity but made the book very hard to read I hope subsequent editions revert to regular black for the text. Nice job otherwise

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting and with lovely illustrations and a beautiful design but I wish it was meatier.

[Calenmarwen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very interesting, but could do with more detail.

[Zachary · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a great tool for Catechists. I used this book to supplement catechetical instruction for 5th graders, 6th graders, and an age diverse RCIC class. Children love learning the meanings of symbols, and are especially excited if some of the symbols are in their own church (symbol-hunting was a fun game; they were actually having fun in Church). The articles on the symbols are not very scholarly, but the book is not meant to be; as a popularizing book, it serves its purpose well.

One of the main problems in catechesis today is that far too little information is being effectively communicated to the students (the current philosophy of feeding them on sentimental ''God loves you'' garbage gets in the way of a real study of the rationality of Church teaching). One way to counter this is to teach the meanings and implications of ancient Christian symbols.

[Renee · Rating 4 out of 5]

I should have known that a book written by Mr. Aquilina would be scholarly and not light summer reading. Twenty-five Christian symbols are explained citing ancient sources and are accompanied by reproduced illustrations of the ancient originals. This book is best read a chapter at a time to digest the information instead of trying to read it in one sitting. I foresee coming back to this book in the future when my high school children are studying early Church history; it will be a great supplement to their text.

My one complaint about the book is the color of the typeset; I found it difficult to read brown type on cream pages. I think the intent was for it to look ‘old’ but for this middle-aged woman, it made reading difficult.

[Katelis Viglas · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent symbological study by Mike Aquilina. But, he should take into consideration: first, more early Christian symbols, second, to combine in a more successful way the ancient sources with the modern studies he used as bibliography, third, to have more references from these latter, and not only to put them at the end in a catalogue as bibliography.
Of course Aquilina gave life to the ancient Christian symbols, with his faith and knowledge, but this book can't be considered as an innovative and original study. Nevertheless, it is a very artistically beautiful book, with remarcable illustrations, and with a very vivid spirituality, which is inspired by the Divine Word (Logos), aiming at inspiring by the same way the reader.

[Lee]

Not a review yet. This is about the physical book: I've only just begun to read this but wanted to say that I'll have to read the ebook. The text of the printed book was too light for my poor old eyes to read. Light colored text in an unusual font on a non-white background: it's pretty. Pretty hard to read, that is! The ebook keeps the unusual font (which is thin, skinny) is still a bit of a strain on my eyes with no option to change it to something more readable. But I can make it larger so there's that.

[Kevin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A simple but informative overview of the symbols, and their multiple meanings, of the early church. Aquilina is a Catholic but this has little impact on the story he tells given the time period and figures involved; but it does flavor the perspective a bit. A very useful introduction with some nice illustrations that really help you get a feel for the symbols as they were used.

[Thadeus · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a very good book with good explanations of different symbols and signs. It ended with the signs of the labarum (Chi Rho) and the Alpha and Omega which were probably my favorite.

All the descriptions were insightful and give references to ancient sources. I see it as being a very useful reference text.

Recommended.