St. Peter's Foot: Imago Dei

Imago Dei

Fr. Rand York

Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."
So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.

(Genesis 1:26-27)

Imago Dei, the image of God. What does it mean? Those who complain that the phrase is simply presented without explanation seem not to have read beyond the first page of the story. The imago Dei in us is foundational to the Great Story, and so it comes first and is unpacked as the story unfolds. One way to understand the phrase is found in the definition offered by Wayne Grudem: “The nature of man such that he is like God and represents God.”[1] We will call this the Unitary stance, and it is the understanding of most in the West and of many in the East. But there is also a differentiation to which many of the Eastern fathers subscribe, which we will call the Binary stance, in which image and likeness are distinguished from each other. For these fathers, “The image…denotes man’s potentiality for life in God, the likeness his realization of that potentiality.”[2] This is in close kinship with the anthropology of the Middle Ages, which held that, “the image of God is a natural gift, which is ours by virtue of creation and belongs to our essential nature…The likeness of God, in contrast, is a supernatural gift…In the fall, Adam lost this likeness to God, this supernatural gift.”[3] And so for all mankind the image remains, though the likeness has been lost. Stanley Grenz calls this the “Structural View.”[4]

For those who by contrast hold the Unitary stance equating image and likeness, there is still more than one way to discover the meaning of it, for the Hebrew words used in Genesis 1:26, tselem (“image”) and demût (“likeness”) both refer to similarity, but tselem also has a representative aspect to it.[5] In this way, mankind is not only like God, but acts as God’s representative to creation, to cause to be accomplished those things for which creation was made. In other words, mankind was made in God’s image in order to, “fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”[6]

However, that is but the application of the underlying purpose. Both East and West are in agreement as to God’s purpose in creating us in his own image. For the East, Panagiotes Chrestou says, “This purpose is none other than reaching the point where they will glorify God worthily and will partake of his blessings abundantly.”[7] I was taught this very same answer when I was eight years old in confirmation class at Lookout Mountain Presbyterian Church: “Man’s chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.”[8]

The Reformers developed the Unitary stance that is reflected in Grudem’s definition and which Grenz refers to as the “Relational View.” Martin Luther taught (and John Calvin agreed) that what the scholastics regarded as divine likeness is really the original righteousness included in the divine image at the beginning. Without this righteousness, the image itself is “frightfully deformed.”[9] And the damage to the divine image may be deepened still. Leanne Payne contends that, since we are made worshiping beings, we will worship, and there are only two alternatives: to worship the creator or to worship the creature. Then, says Payne, “when we worship the creature, the self, we are given over to all manner of uncreative and destructive behavior. We further mar and diminish the image of Elohim in us; we lose our identity as sons of God. We are no longer God-conscious, but self-conscious.”[10]

The other side to this story, however, is what Grenz refers to as the “Dynamic View,” and is related to what the Orthodox call theosis or deification. Luther suggested that the imago Dei, “can be restored through the Word and the Holy Spirit,” and Calvin expanded on this by saying that this restoration happens progressively.[11] In this, the Reformers were rediscovering what the Eastern church never lost. Whether from a Unitary stance of restoring the image, or a Binary stance of restoring the likeness, this progressive restoration is what is known in the East as the “deification of man.” It was St. Athanasius who said, “He was made man that we might be made god,” and St. Basil the Great insists that becoming god is what we were made for and what we have been ordered to do.[12] This is made possible through Christ, but does not happen all at once. Indeed, a proper Orthodox answer to the question, “Are you a Christian?” is, “No, but by God’s grace I am becoming one.”

The Eastern church, however, teaches that theosis, while the prescriptive cure for our fallen condition, is also “our original and unique call.”[13] In other words, it is not predicated on the Fall. That which we were called to do from the beginning remains our calling in spite of the Fall, only now it also brings healing. Indeed, it was this calling that prompted the temptation in the Garden of Eden. We are made to be like God, and so Satan would try to make us look like himself.

C.S. Lewis contends, “It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations.”[14] These two destinations are the places where we either become fully human, or by contrast lose our humanity altogether. The devil seeks the latter destination for us, and according to St. Philotheos of Sinai, “Forcing his way into our intellect, our enemy tries to compel us – created in God’s image though we are – to eat the dust and to creep on our bellies as he does. This is why God says: ‘I will put enmity between you and him.’”[15] Vladimir Lossky concludes, “Thus the image – which is inalienable – can become similar or dissimilar, to the extreme limits: that of union with God, when deified man shows in himself by grace what God is by nature, according to the expression of St. Maximus; or indeed that of the extremity of falling-away which Plotinus called ‘the place of dissimilarity’ (τόποζ τηζ άνομοιώ-τητοζ), placing it in the gloomy abyss of Hades.”[16]

From the vantage point of obedience, St. Antony the Great says, “A man is in the image of God when he lives rightly and in a way that conforms to God.”[17] From the vantage point of grace, a person is truly human to the extent that he or she partakes of the divine nature, and, “Man created ‘in the image’ is the person capable of manifesting God in the extent to which his nature allows itself to be penetrated by the deifying grace.”[18]

When God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness,” to whom was he referring? Who is the “us” in this passage? Is it God and the angels? Is it the Holy Trinity? In whose image are we actually made? Those who subscribe to what Gregory Boyd and Paul Eddy term as the “Fundamental View”[19] see the answer as God and the angels, because the Trinity is understood to be a New Testament concept. But on something so fundamental, does it really matter if Moses understood what he was writing? God either said this or he didn’t, and what we are trying to discern is God’s meaning behind his own words, not Moses’ understanding of what God said. The key to the meaning of God’s own words is not to be found in the experience of the historiographer. And so we cannot conclude that just because Moses did not know about the Trinity, God could not have been referring to his triune self. Perhaps indeed, “Moses was communicating more than he understood.”[20] For that matter, we cannot conclude that the author of the Pentateuch did not know about the Trinity, given his inclusion of the theophany at the Oaks of Mamre.[21]

But simpler than this is the observation that after God decided to make man “in our image,” he fulfilled it by making man, “in his own image, in the image of God.”[22] Note that it is in his own image, not in their own image. No, the “us” in Genesis 1:26 is most likely to refer to the one God, the Holy Trinity, as expounded in the “Relational View” presented by Boyd and Eddy.[23] The Roman Catholic church sees a “foreshadowing of the Trinity” in this passage.[24]

And so, mankind is created to be in relationship, for the Trinity is the source of all relationship and the fountainhead of love. “It is not good for man to be alone.”[25] Indeed, man in isolation is not man in the image of God. The beginning of human interrelationship is the relationship between the sexes, for God’s first choice of a companion for Adam was Eve, not Steve.[26] “Male and female he created them.”[27]

Finally, what was the actual temptation that resulted in the damage to image or the loss of likeness? Daniel Migliore notes that Adam and Eve were, “Driven to disobedience by their desire to be gods or ‘like God.’”[28] It is ironic that the temptation to which our ancestors yielded was the very thing they already had. They were already like God (or becoming like God) in every way except knowing good and evil. In obtaining the knowledge of good and evil, they gave up their likeness to God in every other way, an impossibly high cost that could ultimately be paid only by God himself through Jesus Christ.

So, what does it mean to be like God? Migliore highlights a number of implications, none of which are meant to be exclusive, from physical resemblance to rational nature to dominion over the earth to human freedom to human life in relationship.[29] Ultimately, though, it is our calling to be a reflection of God, and Migliore does not miss this point. We are to reflect God in such a way that we become the answer to our own petition in the Lord’s Prayer: “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”[30] So that any time someone wants to know what is going on in heaven, they have only to look at us. Any time someone wants to see Jesus, they have only to look at us. As the Moon reflects the Sun and brings light in the darkness, so are we to reflect the Son, who is the light of the world.[31]

Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will behas not yet appeared;

but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.

(I John 3:2)

Bibliography

Boyd, G. A. and P. R. Eddy. Across the Spectrum : Understanding Issues in Evangelical Theology. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009.

Chrestou, Panagiotes C. Partakers of God. Brookline, MA: Holy Cross Orthodox Press, 1984.

Grenz, Stanley J. Theology for the Community of God. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000.

Grudem, Wayne. Systematic Theology. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2000.

Hardon, John A., S.J. The Catholic Catechism. New York: Doubleday, 1981 (Nihil Obstat).

Hughes, R. Kent. Genesis: Beginning and Blessing. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2004.

Lewis, C.S. The Weight of Glory. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1965.

Lossky, Vladimir. In the Image and Likeness of God. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1985.

Mantzaridis, Georgios I. The Deification of Man. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1984.

Migliore, Daniel L. Faith Seeking Understanding. Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 2004.

Palmer, G.E.H., Philip Sherrard, & +Kallistos Ware (eds.). The Philokalia: The Complete Text, Volume One. London: Faber & Faber, 1979.

Palmer, G.E.H., Philip Sherrard, & +Kallistos Ware (eds.). The Philokalia: The Complete Text, Volume Three. London: Faber & Faber, 1984.

Payne, Leanne. The Broken Image. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 1981.

Stavropoulos, Christoforos. Partakers of the Divine Nature. Minneapolis: Light & Life, 1976.

Ware, +Kallistos. The Orthodox Way. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1986.

[1] Wayne Grudem. Systematic Theology. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2000) 1244.

[2] +Kallistos Ware. The Orthodox Way. (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1986) 66.

[3] Stanley J. Grenz. Theology for the Community of God. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000) 170.

[4] Grenz Op. cit. 169

[5] Grudem Op. cit. 442.

[6] Genesis 1:28

[7] Panagiotes C. Chrestou. Partakers of God. (Brookline, MA: Holy Cross Orthodox Press, 1984) 16.

[8] Westminster Shorter Catechism, question 1.

[9] Grenz Op. cit. 170-171.

[10] Leanne Payne. The Broken Image. (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 1981) 141.

[11] Grenz Op. cit. 172.

[12] Georgios I. Mantzaridis. The Deification of Man. (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1984) 7. Please note the small “g” in “god.”

[13] Christoforos Stavropoulos. Partakers of the Divine Nature. (Minneapolis: Light & Life, 1976) 25.

[14] C.S. Lewis. The Weight of Glory. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1965) 14-15.

[15] G.E.H. Palmer, Philip Sherrard, & +Kallistos Ware (eds.). The Philokalia: The Complete Text, Volume Three. (London: Faber & Faber, 1984) 27.

[16] Vladimir Lossky. In the Image and Likeness of God. (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1985) 139.

[17] G.E.H. Palmer, Philip Sherrard, & +Kallistos Ware (eds.). The Philokalia: The Complete Text, Volume One. (London: Faber & Faber, 1979) 343.

[18] Lossky Op. cit. 139.

[19] Gregory A. Boyd and Paul R. Eddy. Across the Spectrum : Understanding Issues in Evangelical Theology. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009) 102-106.

[20] Boyd and Eddy Op. cit. 109.

[21] Genesis 18 (entire chapter).

[22] Genesis 1:27

[23] Boyd and Eddy Op. cit. 106-109.

[24] John A. Hardon, S.J. The Catholic Catechism. (New York: Doubleday, 1981 Nihil Obstat) 66.

[25] Genesis 2:18. This is in specific reference to the creation of Eve and the establishment of male-female relationship, but Adam was not only without a woman – he was in isolation from any other human contact.

[26] R. Kent Hughes, Genesis: Beginning and Blessing. (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2004) 63.

[27] Genesis 1:27

[28] Daniel L. Migliore. Faith Seeking Understanding. (Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 2004) 150. See Genesis 3:5.

[29] Migliore Op. cit. 140-141.

[30] Matthew 6:10

[31] John 8:12