Human worth, from a Christian perspective, is rooted in the identity of humans as image-bearers of God. We are told in the very first chapter of the Bible that:
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,
Genesis 1:26-27, ESV
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.
God created man (i.e. humanity) in His own image. We know that this applies to both men and women because Genesis 1:27 tells us that God created “them” male and female, in His image.
But what does it actually mean to be made in the “image of God”?
This concept of being made in the image of God is expressed with the Latin phrase imago dei, which simply means “image of God”. What does this actually mean for human beings?
Various Views
A number of suggestions have been proposed as to the defining essence of the imago dei. Certainly, it is something that humans are created in that the rest of creation is not. Nowhere in Scripture are we told that God made whales, storks, or squirrels in His image and likeness. The imago dei, on at least one level, separates us from the animal kingdom.
This seems obvious enough but it doesn’t really answer the heart of the question. Yes, we know (at least in a Christian worldview) we are distinct from the rest of the animal kingdom. But what exactly sets us apart? What makes us human and more specifically, made in the image of God, as opposed to animal?
Thinkers have tried to define the essence of the imago dei by following this human-animal-distinction trail of reasoning. They will look at traits or abilities that humans have that the rest of organic creation does not share and conclude that somewhere in the uniquely human properties lies the essence of the imago dei. Michael Heiser lists a number of proposals including intelligence, emotions, language, free will, and the presence of a soul/spirit.¹ (He subsequently rejects them all.)
Heiser rejects the idea that the essence of the imago dei can be found in any human-animal distinction. He writes, “Defining image bearing as any ability is a flawed approach.”² He rejects this idea on solid grounds: “There is nothing in the text to suggest that the image has been or can be bestowed incrementally or partially. You’re either created as God’s image bearer or you aren’t. One cannot speak of being partly or potentially bearing God’s image.”³ If the essence of the imago dei is free will for example, at what point does that free will actually get exercised enough to qualify? An infant doesn’t have “free will” in the same way that you and I have. A conceived child in the womb “is not self-aware; it has no intelligence, rational thought processes, or emotions; it cannot speak or communicate; it cannot commune with God or pray; and it cannot exercise its will or respond to the conscience.”⁴ Does this mean that an embryonic child in the womb is not “made in the image of God”? Of course not!
I believe that Heiser’s analysis is convincing in rejecting a narrow definition of the imago dei based on human abilities that animals do not share. Wayne Grudem writes, “much of the controversy over the meaning of “image of God” is seen to be a search for too narrow and too specific a meaning.”⁵ Grudem goes on to argue that the essence of the imago dei is actually a general reference to the fact…that man is like God and represents God.“⁶
The Image of God & the Adamic Commission
This last notion of “representing God” opens a door into another interpretation of the imago dei that I believe fits well in the context of Genesis 1.
Keep in mind that the introduction of the imago dei concept is made in Genesis 1:26 where Adam’s “dominion mandate” is also described.
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.”
Genesis 1:26, ESV
The mandate is repeated to Adam and Eve directly in verse 28:
And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
Genesis 1:28, ESV
In this way, the dominion mandate for Adam and Eve and their progeny serves as an “inclusio” to the concept of the imago dei. In other words, the imago dei concept is sandwiched between two references to the dominion mandate. In biblical form and literature, this indicates an emphasis on the center concept and ties all the ideas together.
This leads us to interpret the essence of the imago dei, not through the lens of human-animal distinctions, but rather in the context of the commission of humanity in Adam to “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion…” Man, made in the image of God, is a divinely-appointed representative of God’s reign over creation. Commenting on Psalm 8, Bruce Waltke and Fred Zaspel write, “God manifests his royal splendor in the heavens, but on earth he mediates his royal splendor through his image bearers…As vast and incomprehensible as the heavens are, and though the mortal seems in contrast to them so fleeting, small, and insignificant, human beings have a higher dignity as God’s vice-regents over creation”.⁷
It is this notion of humanity as God’s “vice-regents” mediating His sovereignty in creation that lies at the heart of the imago dei. Heiser puts it this way: “The image is not an ability we have, but a status. We are God’s representatives on earth.”⁸
G.K. Beale helpfully adds historical context to this interpretation of the imago dei when he writes, “Such a functional view of the image is suggested by images of gods in the ancient Near East, which neither represented the actual form of the god nor indicated primarily the attributes of the god…but rather were the place through which the god manifested his presence and conveyed his blessings. When an ancient Near Eastern king was conceived to be an image of a god, the idea of the god’s subduing and ruling through that king is in mind…Adam represents God’s sovereign presence and rule on earth.”⁹
Conclusion
Therefore, based on the context of Genesis 1:26-28 as well as the common ancient conception of kings as “images” of deities, manifesting their rule, the imago dei can be interpreted as Man’s essence as God’s created “image-bearer”. Every person is made in the image of God. From conception to death, we hold, as humans, the dignity of being created by God and commissioned to reflect His glory and mediate His rule and reign over creation.
Of course, we fail in this commission every day. But thanks be to God, Jesus Christ came as the “last Adam” to succeed where Adam (and the rest of us) had failed. “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.” (Col. 1:15) As the perfect Image of God, Jesus Christ perfectly reflects the glory of God and perfectly rules the world as the divine-human King of all creation (Heb. 1:3-4).
Furthermore, in union with Christ, we are growing to bear God’s image more and more. Paul writes in Romans 8:29: “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.” Our conformity to the image of Christ is our conformity to the perfect image of God. To restore the imago dei in human lives, we must believe in Christ and take an active role in the Spirit’s work of conforming us to Christ’s image.
Footnotes
¹ Michael Heiser, The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible, (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2015), p. 40.
² Ibid, p. 41. Emphasis is Heiser’s.
³ Ibid, p. 41. Emphasis is Heiser’s.
⁴ Ibid, p. 41.
⁵ Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000), p. 443.
⁶ Ibid, p. 442. Emphasis is Grudem’s.
⁷ Bruce K. Waltke and Fred G. Zaspel, How to Read and Understand the Psalms, (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2023), p. 218.
⁸ Heiser, The Unseen Realm, p. 43.
⁹ G.K. Beale, Union with the Resurrected Christ, (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2023), pp. 22-23.