The Dove: How a Simple Image Became a Christian Symbol
A historical exploration of how the dove emerged, spread, and endured as one of Christianity’s most recognizable symbols.
The dove is one of the earliest and most enduring symbols to appear in Christian history, recognized across centuries for its distinctive presence in Christian texts, art, and communal memory. As a symbol rather than a physical object or historical event, the dove became notable within Christianity because it provided a visual and narrative shorthand through which early Christians expressed ideas inherited from Jewish Scripture and reshaped by the developing Christian tradition. Its importance lies not in a single moment of origin, but in how it gradually entered Christian symbolic language and remained embedded in the faith’s historical identity.
