Image and Personhood

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Image and Personhood

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By Stephen W. Hiemstra

Athanasius argues that the purpose for why God created us in his image was so that we might recognize him (Athanasius 1944, 26). He further argues that “No inconsistency between creation and salvation for the One Father has employed the same Agent for both works.” (Athanasius 1944, 13) Christ’s participation in creation makes the point that salvation in Christ is a re-creation event. Christ, like God the Father and the Holy Spirit, is an eternal person.

Personhood implies that part of the extension of God’s image in the law includes natural law. While one might deny that God gave us the Mosaic covenant, the physical laws of the universe cannot be dismissed as merely a devious set of stories passed on by our ancestors. The physicality of being created male and female in the image of God has special significance.

The Image

The creation account hints at this significance:

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. 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. (Gen 1:26-28)

Although God created animals prior to Adam and Eve and they were also commanded to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen 1:22), the animals could not reflect God’s ethical image and God did not give them dominion.

God also intended us also to share in his eternal nature, something that sin eclipsed. Because of sin, we only share in God’s eternal nature jointly with our spouses and only if we adhere to the creation mandate to be fruitful and multiple. By ourselves, we suffer the penalty of sin, melt away and die. Only in family life do we participate in God’s eternal nature.

The Christian Family

One of the defining characteristics of the Christian faith is honoring each individual, regardless of age, as being created in the image of God. The Apostle Paul’s writing is particularly clear on this point. He writes: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Gal 3:28) No ethic group is better than any other; no economic class is better than any other; and no gender is better than any other. Paul goes on to extend his concept to the family:

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father and mother (this is the first commandment with a promise), that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land. Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. (Eph 6:1-4)

Because we are all created in the image of God, no age group is better than any other. Neither a newborn, nor a senior standing at the gates of heaven is better than one another. Christians are to value life stages equally by honoring each stage, and not clinging to any particular stage as if it were intrinsically preferred.

An echo of the creation mandate can be found in the Christmas story where the love and care given by Joseph and Mary in the birth narratives of Jesus in Matthew 1 and Luke 2 offers a significant theological point. Jesus had dirty diapers like the rest of us and he later suffered a painful, dishonorable death on a cross. The author of Hebrews writes:

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (Heb 4:15-16)

In other words, when we face Christ on the Day of Judgment, we will face a judge that understands our weaknesses and sin because he lived among us. If God is merely high and mighty (that is, transcendent) individual, then this experience would be absent. Who has not benefited from parental love or faced a challenging family situation? If Christ has benefitted from family life, then that should be an example to the rest of us.

Footnotes in Creation

Guidance on relational issues in the creation accounts in Genesis is laconic. The marital relationship between Adam and Eve is highlighted and given divine approval. Other details are relegated to later discussion. The authorship is attributed to Moses, an Egyptian prince skilled in subtle, diplomatic communication.

Here Adam is often described as a regent of creation who has been given dominion over animals in the Garden of Eden. A cultural assumption in the ancient near east would have extended Adam’s dominion not only over the animals, but over a haram as well. Kings David and Solomon both had multiple wives, who did not share dominion in their husband’s dominion equally. If God meant husbands to have dominion over their wives, this would have been an easy place to say so. Instead, Adam and Eve are pictured as co-regents of creation.

Other relationships are not specifically addressed in the creation account, but the creation mandate silently precludes them. They are not part of the image of God and simply melt away, not participating in God’s eternal nature. Later stipulations in Leviticus describe alternative relationships as sin, but the harsher penalty is the melting away, not the shaming. God’s blessings and curses are hard coded in natural law.

References

Athanasius of Alexandria. 1944. On the Incarnation (Orig pub 319 AD). Translated by Sister Penelope Lawson. England.