King Seleucus I inscription with anchor and dolphins
Like other Hellenistic monarchs, Antiochus I, the son of Seleucus I, adopted the surname “Soter,” Greek for “Savior,” the title later applied to Jesus. (As we have seen, St. Clement of Alexandria directly invoked Seleucus’s use of the anchor symbol as a precedent for Christians using it to represent Jesus Christ.)
Here is a gold coin issue of Seleucus’s son, Antiochus, with himself as “the Savior” on one side and a nude Apollo (his divine grandfather) on the other:
Antiochus the Savior, and Apollo
Seleucid symbolism was picked up in the coinage of the Jewish kingdom of the Hasmonean dynasty after the Hasmoneans successfully revolted from Seleucid oppression. Greek culture was still strong, however, especially along the new coast of their newly conquered kingdom, so it is not surprising that anchor images associated with Seleucid royalty appear on the Jewish state’s first coins, like this one:
Hasmonean coin, 103-76 BCE
Of course, since graven images of the divine were proscribed under Jewish law, on Jewish coins the anchor did not symbolize Apollo, or even the Jewish god, Jehovah or Yahweh. This was forbidden. Even these anchor images probably did not appear on the Hasmoneans’ coins until after their conquest of the coastal towns.
Other pagan symbolism such as the lily and the cornucopia were adopted for use on the coinage of Hasmonean kings. (1) The Herodian kings that followed them also showed the anchor on their coins as they sought to demonstrate continuity with the previous dynasty and legitimize their rule. The anchor was never, however, a Jewish religious symbol as it was for Christians from the start. It was used on their coins strictly for political purposes.
It is also certain that we would never find any fish or dolphins associated with the anchor image on a Jewish coin since graven images of God, whether animal or human, were forbidden by Jewish law along with any form of “idol worship.” (2) No human representations of any kind are therefore present on Hebrew coin issues, and certainly no representations of an animal, an emperor, or anything symbolic of God could appear on their coins, either. Instead, we only find natural objects such as a palm tree, a pomegranate, or a star, or man-made objects associated with the Temple and its rituals, such as a trumpet, a menorah, or the Temple itself.
In contrast, Greek and Roman coin issues liberally feature the faces of gods, nude emperors, quasi-divine kings, animals representing gods, and all things anathema to Jews of that era.
The closest use of symbols found in Jewish coins to represent a person, perhaps, was a star that represented the Messiah—a very human and not a divine messiah since monotheistic Jews necessarily rejected the idea of human divinity. On one coin issued by the Hasmonean Alexander Jannaeus we find the anchor on one side and the eight-pointed star of the Messiah on the other:
Jewish coin with anchor and messianic star, early 1st Century BCE
So strict were contemporary Jews in adhering to their law against graven images that foreign coins depicting pagan deities could not even be used to purchase animals for sacrifice at the Temple in Jerusalem. Jewish and Hellenistic pilgrims were required to exchange their currency for coins acceptable under Jewish law through the “money changers”—who were famously attacked by Jesus in the Gospels.
Although Pauline Christians clearly abandoned this strict Jewish proscription of graven images, it is still noteworthy that St. Clement of Alexandria failed to cite any Jewish precedent for using the anchor as a Christian symbol. Even though he might well have been aware that Jewish coins adopted this image from the pagan Seleucids, he only cites the Seleucids as his justification for its Christian use.
Other Roman emperors also used anchors and dolphins in their official propaganda, as we can see in this 2nd Century coin minted in the reign of Hadrian, showing the god Oceanus (whose river surrounded the entire world, according to Greek myth) carrying an anchor, much as Neptune is often depicted carrying a trident. The god is reclining on a dolphin:
Hadrian coin: Oceanus with anchor reclining on dolphin
However, during the precise point in time that concerns us the only source of the same dolphin-and-anchor symbolism Christians employed appears to be the coins minted by the very emperor who fulfilled Jesus’s prophecy, Titus.
Titus
This Christian motif was used by the Flavian emperors Titus and—for a few months—his brother Domitian. In his own short reign, Titus released millions of coins with this symbol.
Dolphin-and-anchor motif in Titus’s coins
So common is this motif on Titus’s coins that it would have been impossible not to associate him with the symbol in contemporary minds.
Compare another object of Roman symbolism dated to the 1st Century—prior to any known archeological evidence of Christianity—proving that these Flavian artifacts range from bronze, silver and gold coins minted for the masses to an expensive cameo carved for the upper classes:
1st Century Titus coin and 1st Century cameo from the Hermitage
The emperor who vanquished Jerusalem was the first to use the dolphin-and-anchor symbol on Roman coins, and he did so in abundance. As we shall see, Titus used similar dolphin-and-anchor symbolism at public works, as well, decades prior to the existence of any confirmed Christian archeology. The Flavian connection to these symbols is clear; evidence of Christians using them, according to the accepted archeological view, would not exist until early in the 2nd Century.
By the time the second Jewish uprising and final war with the Romans in Judea occurs under Hadrian, a limited minting of Titus’s symbol was struck by this emperor, as well, but only in the east in Alexandria. At that date, and in this part of the Empire, the symbol cannot be a reference to the Flavian Emperor Titus anymore, but to Apollo or Christ.
Hadrian coin with dolphin-and-anchor motif, Alexandria, c. 125 CE
Hadrian, who conducted an empire-wide restoration of religious culture (excluding “Jewish” Christianity with which Rome was again at war) may have aligned himself with “Roman” Christianity as a way of promoting harmony with Roman rule. At the war’s conclusion Hadrian may have even sent Christians to the vanquished city of Jerusalem to replace the expelled Jews.
The 4th Century Christian historian Eusebius reports both the total expulsion of the Jewish people from their homeland following the Second Jewish Revolt and the city’s complete recolonization by Romans. Of note, he also reports the appointment of the first Gentile “Bishop” of Jerusalem’s “Christian” Church. Eusebius further reports the Emperor Hadrian’s favorable treatment of Christians, in general—but characterizes that same emperor’s ruthless slaughter of Jewish women and children (“destroying at one stroke unlimited numbers of men, women and children alike”) as entirely deserved (their leader was a “bloodthirsty bandit” who as “the instigator of their crazy folly paid the penalty he deserved”). (3)
In any event, recognizably Christian archeology had already begun to emerge by Hadrian’s time—and these were the symbols Christians were using. The same symbol employed by the first Roman conqueror of Judea, Titus, was employed by the next Roman conqueror of Judea, Hadrian, at a time when the symbol no longer represented Flavian rule but, at least in part, may well have publicly represented Christianity.