The Bible tells us man is made in the image of God. The Latin term for this is imago dei. But what does it mean that man is made in God’s image? Theologians down through history have taken stabs at explaining it.

INTELLECT
Thomas Aquinas (1225–74) believed the imago dei resides in man’s intellect and his ability to reason. Man is like God, Aquinas thought, because of his ability to reason and think. Animals, however, are creatures of instinct, not intellect.

Aquinas erroneously taught that the fall did not affect man as a whole but only in a part. The will of man was fallen but his intellect was not. His reason—his mind—was pure and perfect, just as God’s mind is pure and perfect. Aquinas’s theology was the precursor of the Enlightenment or Age of Reason that placed unfettered faith in the untainted intellect of man.

DOMINION
John Calvin (1509–64) taught that the imago dei consists in our authority or dominion over animals and plants, which continues despite our sinfulness. Psalm 8:4, 6 reads, “What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him? You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet.”

Calvin’s views are often referred to as dominion theology, or the cultural mandate.

God established a divine order in which he has delegated to us the responsibility to care for the creation. We are like God in that we have the capacity to rule. We are the crown of creation (anthropic principle) and God rules his creation indirectly through mankind. This is alluded to in Genesis 1:26, “Let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

RELATIONSHIP
Karl Barth (1886–1968) taught that it is our ability to have relationships with others that make us like God. God is a relational being. God’s relational nature is demonstrated in his trinitarian nature, and this is perhaps why God is referred to as “us” in Genesis 1:26. Barth taught that the social ability of man is reflected in verse 27 when God creates “them male and female.” This is repeated in Genesis 5:1, 2, “When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. He created them male and female and blessed them. And when they were created, he called them ‘man.’” Barth believed our maleness and femaleness combined constitute the image of God.

SPIRIT
Emil Brunner (1889–1966) says the imago dei refers to spiritual nature of mankind. God is first and foremost spirit. Genesis 1:2 establishes that “the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.” Man is also first and foremost a spirit. Brunner taught that the spiritual nature of man is reflected in the tendency of all societies to have forms of worship. Man is by nature spiritual and religious and longs to worship the Creator. Psalm 42:1, 2 says, “As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God?”

So which view is right? All of them! I would say all these theologians express aspects of the imago dei. But what they all express is that man is unique and special and that God took great care to create you. This is best explained in Psalm 139:13-16:

For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

________

* All Scripture quotations are from the New International Version, unless otherwise indicated.