The “image of God” almost certainly is not a reference to physical appearance.
The term ‘almost’ suggests that you are not certain, are you?
Could you please give an example where “image” in the Bible is clearly NOT a reference to physical appearance?
This one seems to fit that question, @AntoineSuarez:
Gen 5:3
And Adam … begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth…
Seth is the only child of a human so described. It would seem to have something to do with his taking the mantle of the Adam kindred lineage.
Otherwise, ALL the males of every male would be in the image of Adam, yes?
Thanks George for coming back to this thread you originally initiated!
In my view, Genesis 5:1-3 clearly confirms that “image” means a “reference to physical appearance”.
Indeed, one has always to keep in mind also Genesis 9:6:
“Mankind” is and remains “in the Image of God” also after the Fall.
Accordingly, “Mankind” is in God’s likeness and after God’s image, the same way as Seth is in Adam’s own likeness and after Adam’s image.
A straightforward way to make sense of all this is the following:
Seth is after Adam’s image because both share the same type of body.
“Adam” (referring to the first accountable corporal creatures) is after God’s image because “Adam” shares the same type of body God chooses and shapes to become flesh (incarnate). By this choice God defines humanity: God calls the first accountable corporal creatures “Mankind” just as Adam calls his son “Seth”.
Accordingly, it is Jesus Christ’s flesh which defines the human flesh and body
We are human not because we are genealogically descended from Adam and Eve, but rather because we share the type of body God prepared (through evolution) for His Son to incarnate.
Notice that this explanation does not bear any “Tasmanian problem”: Tasmanians (like other possibly extant uncontacted peoples today, even aliens) are human and deserve the dignity referred to in Genesis 9:3-6, not because they are genealogically descended from Adam and Eve, but because they share a body like Jesus Christ’s body.
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This looks like an interesting comment.
What do you mean by “separate creation”?
Do you mean that the creation of animals and the creation of humankind are two separate creations of God?
Or do you rather mean that animals were created at the moment when humankind receives authority to name them?
Thanks for clarifying.
Thank you. Well, I wonder if the relationship of God with His creation is a continuuum based in large part upon consciousness. I don’t really think there was an Adam; but in this way, I think that there’s not only increasing relationship with God as we increase in consciousness, but also increasing responsibility. It’s just speculation, but interesting (I am not holding to it as dogma!). Thank you for your discussion.
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I only hold to a single creation on day 6. There was a distinction on day 6 within hours, not millenia. The distinction was that the very first humans were given authority and the right to name the rest of creation.
On the 8th day God commenced the manipulation of the creation. Placing Adam in a Garden is an example of God still at work. It makes no sense that all humans were given the same particular task. Adam being the representative of the human race indicates others were given tasks as well. We have been given no record other than Adam’s. We agree there is a distinction between mankind and the rest of creation, and it is not just consciousness. Humans are not the only creation with that distinction. Nor are we distinct in biological evolution. The distinction was being in the image of God. Which was lost when Adam disobeyed. Thus the distinction made with Seth and Cain. It is plausible Cain was born prior to the fall, as he was not part of the fall, and thus still in the Garden, where sin was still outside. If Adam was different now, other humans would definitely know Adam, and leave him alone. However Cain had to be marked to show that sin had corrupted him, and he was not to be touched by other humans. Mankind was indeed still in God’s image, even with wickedness going on. Adam and his offspring were not. It is assumed that when any one from humankind had sexual relationship with Adam’s offspring it was physical and resulted in biological evolution. Not the other way around.
The argument later on, about this image and death, was of human making when they had to argue they were created in God’s image to keep that fact alive, and as an artificial excuse to remain in control. The problem is that they “were”. Not that they actually still maintained the Image of God. Which could be anything, especially for those who had no knowledge of God at all. Jesus was born in Adam’s likeness as God. Jesus did not reveal his God likeness to all. Nor was he the full image of God until he received the post resurrection body not touched by sin. Paul said we, in Christ, would receive the same body/image upon physical death. Thus holding to the point this Image of God was no longer available in the physical, but a spiritual future.
Nothing at all in Scripture about evolving “into”. Now we are to work out God’s Spirit in our lives, but that is not biological evolution.
Genesis 9:3-2 clearly suggests a time after which all anatomically modern humans are in God’s Image. After this time each human is accountable for killing another human but is allowed to use animals for food.
If you discard such a time , your “continuum” may be tricky, as we would be led to assume that certain peoples are more Image of God than other ones…
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I can’t imagine anyone being able to confidently say that this group is “more of the image” than some other group.
As for making deductions about Genesis 9:3-2, you really only have one choice that makes sense:
Prior to 9:3-2, all humanity was in the image of God, but it wasn’t until 9:3-2 that murder was universally prohibited.
I would say all humanity except Adam’s descendants as noted in the distinction of God’s image and Adam’s image. Genesis 5:
1 This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created Adam, in the likeness of God made he him,
2 Male and female created he them, and blessed them, and called their name Adam in the day that they were created.
3 ¶ Now Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a child in his own likeness after his image, and called his name Seth.
4 And the days of Adam, after he had begotten Seth, were eight hundred.
400 years ago it seemed that Adam was the whole of humanity. This is carried out today in stating the account is just a metaphor.
But Genesis 1:27 states that God created multiple humans both male and female. Adam being a single representative of humanity. Not that the story of Adam was a metaphor of humanity. This distinction of Adam’s likeness (current humanity) and the created human race in God’s image seems to refute both the evolution of mankind and that humanity currently displays what such an image of God actually is.
If I understand well you claim that God made humans in God’s Image, and thereby defined humanity, before He made all humans accountable and universally prohibited murder, that is, prior to Genesis 9:3-6.
Thereby you confirm that “being in God’s Image” is not only a reference to a “moral feature” but primarily to a “bodily appearance”:
We humans are in the Image of God because the Son of God (the Word) became flesh and we share in this very flesh.
God’s Incarnation, is the very aim of Creation. Since the Big Bang the evolution of the universe and life worked to prepare what we celebrate the Holy Night:
Happy Christmas to you George and all the readers of this thread!
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Your description of my view is half right… the first part is fine.
The 2nd part? It almost certainly has NOTHING to do with physical appearance!
In Genesis 9:5-6 God proclaims:
“And from each human being, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being. Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made mankind.”
In my view, these Genesis’ words clearly mean that humanity currently and universally still displays the image of God. And this is the reason why murder is universally prohibited by God.
I would be thankful to know whether or not you agree to this view. And if not, which alternative interpretation of Genesis 9:5-6 would you propose?
But then, what do you mean by claiming that:
Thanks for explaining.
Genesis 1 says humans are in the image of God. If Genesis 1 is a veiled reference to the pre-adamite population, then it goes without saying that Adam and Eve (Genesis 2) also share that quality. And that Genesis 9 is notable not because the image of God is a new idea… but because murder has finally been prohibited.
So…we are left with the riddle of what is this image. We have non-biblical references to a tribe of Africans that hide in the jungle - - this tribe is almost certainly a reference to a band of gorillas.
In the eyes of many, even Gorillas fill the bill of “the appearance of human”.
But if we read cuneiform stories about Gilgamesh, it wasnt his appearance that was crucial… but his mental evolution. He looked the same… but his nature and his mental state became more civilized … especially as his contact with women became increasingly irreversible.
Dr Suarez,
Thank you for your note. I’m not sure of the relevance of Noah’s description of an accounting of the lifeblood–is that the area you are referencing?
Yes, there’s a time God talked about “in the image of God created He Him,” --but Gen is highly symbolic, and as noted elsewhere, this is liturgical rather than scientific. Genesis also ascribes days to stages of creation, which do not mirror evolution.
Also, Enns’ discussion that “image of God” means representative of the ruler seems more related to functionality than to anatomy.
Thank you!
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If there are pre-adamite humans in the image of God,
who then are Adam and Eve?
How do you define these characters?
Thanks George for your answer.
They were miraculously created to introduce God’s plan into a primate population that God wanted to keep from going feral!
If I may chime in here–I don’t think A & E existed. I think that they were part of a symbolic way of God to communicate his desire for relationship to people; just as Noah didn’t exist, but represented folks’ understanding of how God holds people accountable (but I don’t think God would kill every living thing).
God’s interaction with beings (dolphins, dogs, chimps, humans) is on a deeper level for those with a forebrain; but that would not be to say there is no interaction with other beings of less forebrain.
This goes along with Lamoureux’ and Rachel Held Evans’ view (and Enns’).
Thanks.
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I apologize for the mistake; the passage I am referencing is Genesis 9:3-7
3 Everything that lives and moves about will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.
4 “But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it.
5 And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each human being, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being.
6 “Whoever sheds human blood,
by humans shall their blood be shed;
for in the image of God
has God made mankind.
7 As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it.”
As Gordon Wenham following Claus Westermann [ Word Biblical Commentary I, Genesis 1-15, Word books: Dallas, 1987] claims, Genesis 9:3-7 explain “why human life is specially protected, but animal life is not”, and proclaim “the inviolability of human life” that follows from “the unique right of God over life and death”: “Every single violation of this limit, be it based on national, racial or ideological grounds is here condemned” [p. 251]. Indeed the remark in Genesis 9:3 concerning food indicates a degree of distinction between humanity and the animal kingdom that was lacking in the vegetarian diet of Genesis 1:29 [p. 263-264]; and in Genesis 9:5-7 appears for the first time the prohibition of killing any creature belonging to humanity because mankind is made in the image of God.
So the reason God gives to condemn murder is that "for in the image of God has God made mankind.” (Genesis 9:6)
By contrast God gives non-human animals to humans for food (Genesis 9:3).
Hence by stating that “God made humans in the image of God” the Genesis’s author is not merely using a “highly symbolic language”, but claiming two crucial things:
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At the time of this declaration there is a clear distinction between humans and non-human animals, as clear as it is today.
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Since then all humans have for God a value and dignity that animals do not have.
So the question arises, why do humans have a dignity non-human animals do not have?
The obvious answer is that God became a human in order humans become God, as we are taught by St. Irenaeus and other Greek Fathers.
So at the end of the day, being in the image of God means that we share a body like Jesus Christ’s body.
This does not exclude other meanings as that you refer to:
In my view, the “Image of God” is likely the most profound statement in the Bible, and the best summary of all the Christian teaching and theology. Among other things it principally means:
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The aim of creation (of evolution) is to bring about humanity and prepare God’s incarnation.
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Because the Son of God (the word) became human flesh, humanity is in the Image of God and has a dignity and value that non-human animals do not have.
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Because the triune God is relationship between three Persons, human marriage and family is in the image of God as well, a way to unfolds God’s creative life and become like God.
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And because “through the Son of God all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made” (John 1:3) and “the Son is […] the exact representation of his [God’s] being, sustaining all things by his powerful word” (Hebrews 1:3), humanity (image of the incarnate Son) is called to rule the universe as God’s representative: Human work is continuation and completion of God’s creative power.
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