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153 Fish. Why 153 large fish in John 21 in the bible ? What was the meaning and significance of the miraculous catch or draught of 153 fish? Why 153 Fish in John 21:11 ? Read the Answer which answers all the Questions. |
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| In Luke 5:1-11 there is another, The Miraculous Catch) | |
| Scholars have suggested numerous possible meanings for John’s reference to “153 Fish.” These suggestions are greatly varied, and tend to be extremely speculative. How could the Apostle John have expected his readers to see any of those connections? This article is based on two key principles. The Bible points us to a context that holds the key as to what St. John meant by 153 large fish. The fact that John does not offer an explanation for the 153 fish highly suggests that he knew his meaning would have been so obvious to those whom he was writing that no explanation was required. This web page examines all these
suggestions. And, it explains how we can see a reasonable proof that
there is only one answer that we know John could have expected his readers
to
recognize. |
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The early church fathers offered many different meanings for the “153 Fish.” No sustainable argument has been presented that defends or explains how Saint John could have known his readers would have made the connections that the early church fathers did. When the early church father’s disagree amongst themselves, we are not required to agree with them. This is explained in more detail further down on this web site. Scripture scholar Raymond Brown explains |
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But John was one of the four great evangelists. He spent his life communicating his message, not hiding it. The reason there is so much disagreement as to what John meant by 153 fish is because people are trying to figure it out by looking from the standards and the perspectives of their own culture. Judging by modern standards it can be difficult to see how 153 fish represented or alluded to Archimedes and his wisdom. But the key to figuring out what John meant is to study and learn the standards and the perspective of his culture - where he lived and worked - that is, the first century Greeks in Ephesus. First, we need to look at the context to which the Bible points us. John’s Purpose What meaning did John intend by his reference to “153 fish” ?
John was fully engaged at trying to help the Greeks convert to the Gospel. Primary Obstacle For The Greeks The Greeks excelled in natural wisdom. And they took pride in their great accomplishments. They even looked to mathematical wisdom as the key on how to live. See more details at this web site below. However, they had mistakenly thought that their natural wisdom contradicted and precluded the possibility of the supernatural wisdom of Jesus’ revelation as being true.
1 Corinthians
1:22-24 Above all else the Greeks esteemed wisdom. The greatest mathematical minds of antiquity were all Greek. There was Archimedes, Euclid and Pythagoras, and not to mention Plato. Plato the philosopher had an inscription carved over the archway of his Academy: “Let no one ignorant of geometry enter here.” The Greek Gentiles had viewed there to be a contradiction between their natural wisdom and the wisdom of Jesus’ revelation. They saw the Gospel as foolishness. And without the gift of faith, the idea of Jesus who is God, Who dies on a cross for sinners is hard to accept from a worldly point of view. So, St. John as a pastor wants to correct this impasse, this seemingly logical contradiction between the natural wisdom the Greeks possessed and the wisdom Jesus came to reveal. So, John uses the analogy of “153 fish” to represent all wisdom. The Greeks will recognize “153 fish” to symbolize first and foremost Archimedes’ work on π, but in a secondary way all Greek Wisdom including the Pythagoreans and Euclid. This is demonstrated at this web site. See Archimedes, and Calculating the Size of the Fish In the analogy, the Apostles have no fish until Jesus appears. Jesus is the source (and master) of the 153 fish. Therefore, Jesus could command Peter to bring him some. The 153 fish represents all wisdom. And, according to John’s analogy, the one net contains all the fish. By analogy it contains both the wisdom that comes from Jesus as well as the natural wisdom of the Greeks. Because there is no inconsistency or conflict between these two wisdoms the same one net which contains them both does not tear.
John 21:11 John was not just a communicator, he was also an Evangelist, par excellence. He recognized the spiritual needs of the heart. By having 153 fish swim into the net, Jesus was enabling John to use his skills as an evangelist. John, being the ultimate evangelist, knew how to meet his prospective converts where they were at and to acknowledge the natural strengths, their natural wisdom, and to build on that. Compare how St. Paul built on the partial truths of the pagans in Acts 17:23. See more on reasons why it was How did John know that his Greek readers in Ephesus would make the connection between “153 fish” and wisdom? To answer this question we need to understand the cultural context in which John wrote. We need to understand the importance of Archimedes in that culture. We need to examine his most important work – the work most widely used by others, his work on Pi – where he derives a new and accurate method for calculating the value of Pi. It would be a mistake to merely examine it as written in modern notation. Rather, we need to see it from the same style in which John and his readers, the Greeks, would have seen it. So, we need to understand the limitations they had in expressing mathematical concepts. For example, the
use of the decimal point to express fractions of a whole number would
not be introduced to this area until hundreds of years later. The
same is true of the horizontal fraction bar. So, a portion of a
whole number would have to be expressed as a ratio (a fraction) of two
numbers. And this would be expressed in a linear or horizontal
format. For example, they would have used the format “1:8”, but
they would not have used the vertical format of ⅛ and
they definitely would not
have used 0.125.
See more on Archimedes’ work on Pi. |
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| Sections : Introduction |
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The meaning and significance of the measure of 153 large fish.
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