God and Creation: Are Humans the Only Ones Made in the Image and Likeness of God?
While it is true that humanity has been made in the image and likeness of God, I have always found it difficult to believe that this is true only for humanity. I admit, it is the assumption of many, and this is what we find in the majority of Christian literature. The Catechism of the Catholic Church itself suggests this:
“God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them.” Man occupies a unique place in creation: (I) he is “in the image of God”; (II) in his own nature he unites the spiritual and material worlds; (III) he is created “male and female”; (IV) God established him in his friendship (CCC 355).
Now I agree that humanity does have a special place in the order of creation, and this is because humanity was chosen as the vehicle of the incarnation on earth. Indeed, this could be used to describe what it means for us to be in the image of God: we are of the same nature of the New Adam, Jesus, who is God in the flesh. Our creation was made in the light of the incarnation. The Catechism even suggests this kind of understanding:
Disfigured by sin and death, man remains “in the image of God,” in the image of the Son, but is deprived “of the glory of God,” of his “likeness.” The promise made to Abraham inaugurates the economy of salvation, at the culmination of which the Son himself will assume that “image” and restore it in the Father’s “likeness” by giving it again its Glory, the Spirit who is “the giver of life” (CCC 705).
Saying that our being in the image of God means we are in the image of the Son, Jesus, is one way we can interpret Scripture. This is one way we can show how we were made in the image of God in a rather unique way. This affirms what is important in the traditional reflection on humanity: we have a special place in God’s creation. This is a necessary consequent of the incarnation, but one which has all kinds of stipulations and expectations upon us — we were made in this manner so we could be mediators in the world, uniting spiritual realities to the physical world at large. We pray for the kingdom to be here on earth as it is in heaven, and God has put it in our hands to help bring this about. We are expected to be priests of God in the world at large: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, that you may declare the wonderful deeds of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1Peter 2:9 RSV).[1]
Now, having said that humanity in a unique fashion is in the image of God, I think all creation, in another sense, is also capable of being seen as a reflection of God’s image. Now, I admit, this seems to go against the grain. Most authors reflect upon how humanity is made in the image of God means nothing else is. There seems to be three reasons for this. The first is the silence of anything else being described in those terms in Scripture, the second, a rather primitive understanding of the world (and especially biology), and the third, the confusion of humanity’s uniqueness and not realizing how that uniqueness is not disturbed if others are also said to be in the image of God. The first response is really an argument from silence, and the second really does not hold dogmatic appeal, just as ancient astronomy does not hold dogmatic appeal, and the third, probably the most important, I hope has been adequately answered above.
When reflecting on whether or not animals could be said to be in the image of God, obviously, we cannot simply dismiss tradition, but on the other hand, if modern biological science suggests a greater unity between humanity and the animal world than what ancient authors understood, perhaps this justifies a re-examination of this question.[2] There are actually many ways this could be done. Some authors suggest we look at animals as being in the image of humanity. If this is the case, then they are still in the image and likeness of God, but in a derivative sense. The closer animals resemble us, the more they would also be described as being in the image and likeness of God.[3] This to me makes some sense. It could be a fruitful way to engage this question, although it is not the way I would normally do so. Instead, there are two main sources of my own contemplation of this topic.
The first is Nicholas of Cusa. His theology is rather sophisticated, and there are many works of his which have helped me in my own theological reflections. However, what is probably the most important for this discussion is his way of seeing God relationship to all things, as seeing everything as being the not-other to God because God, in defining himself, defines everything else:
I. The definition, which defines itself and everything, is that which is sought by every mind.
II. Whoever sees that it is most true, that the definition is not other than the definition, sees that the Not-other is the definition of the definition.
III. Whoever sees that the Not-other is not other than the Not-other, sees that the Not-other is the definition of the definition.
IV. Whoever sees that the Not-other defines itself and is the definition defining everything, sees that the Not-other is not another from every definition and from everything defined.[4]
While it would be invaluable to go through his long series of theses, the central point of his work and where he is going with it can be seen in his first four points. God as the Not-other defines himself, and in defining himself, is not-other than definition itself; all definitions find themselves as being defined in and by the defining work of God’s self-definition. One could say that all entities are therefore relative reflections of the one and only true Definition. They reflect something of God by the fact that they have their own self-definition which they express by the fact they exist. And yet, we must not neglect the difference between what we see with God and the rest of creation: God’s self-definition is absolute and simple, given to him by himself, while everything else is composite and finite and given to them by another. The potential of each creation determines the kind of image they represent of God: the greater the potential the more like God they are, though all things are infinitely separated from God by the fact of God’s complete otherness. Indeed, one can say anything which exists in creation is more like anything else in creation than they are like God.
Nicholas of Cusa brings a very Western approach, one which looks at the unity of God as the starting point. It is a valid approach, but it is also one which is complemented by something rather similar in the East as we find in my second major influence, that of St Maximus the Confessor. Here, we enter into the realm of Logos theology which finds its foundation in the opening of the Gospel of John:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made (John 1:1-3 RSV).
What we see here is that the Word (Logos) is the foundation of all things, so that all things are made in and through him. The meaning of this is that the Logos is to be seen as the Logos of all logoi — that every creature with its logos (rule of being) finds itself as a logos in participation with the Logos. Their very nature, as with the nature of truth itself, is all a reflection of the Logos “The whole Logos of God is neither diffuse nor prolix but is a unity embracing a diversity of principles, each of which is an aspect of the Logos. Thus he who speaks the truth, however fully he deals with the subject, speaks always about the one Logos of God.”[5] This leads St Maximus to his cosmic understanding of the work of the Logos, where Christ has come to bring about the universal harmony of creation and to unite creation as one as he works for their salvation:
And simply, to speak concisely, the logoi of everything that is divided and particular are contained, as they say, by the logoi of what is universal and generic, and the most universal and generic logoi are held together by wisdom, and the logoi of the particulars, held fast in various ways by the generic logoi are contained by sagacity, in accordance with which they are first simplified, and releasing the symbolic variety in the actions of their subjects, they are unified by wisdom, receiving congruence making for identity from the more generic. For the wisdom and sagacity of God the Father is the Lord Jesus Christ, who holds together the universals of being by the power of wisdom, and embraces their complementary parts by the sagacity of understanding, since by nature he is the fashioner and provider of all, and through himself draw into one what is divided, and abolishes war between beings, and binds everything into peaceful friendship and undivided harmony, both what is in heaven and what is on earth (Col 1:20), as the divine Apostle says.[6]
The Word in this sense can be seen as the one who establishes the nature of every entity, and their nature finds their ground not in themselves, but in the Word himself. They are words of the Word, reflections of the Logos.
Now, it might seem that this contradicts the unique position I put humanity in at the opening of this discussion. This is not the case. While everything has their logos from the Logos, the logos of humanity itself is the same nature which the Logos took to become incarnate. We are made in the nature of the incarnate God, of God in the flesh. We participate in the Logos in a two-fold manner, both according to his divine nature in the way all creation reflects the divine nature, but also according to his human nature. According to his divinity, we are a logos in the Logos. But our logos was given enough potentiality in being so as to make it a fitting logos for God’s incarnation. According to his incarnate nature, the second nature of the person of the Logos, we are united to the Logos, for this nature is the same as ours. Just as the Logos is consubstantial with the Father in eternity due to his divine nature, he is consubstantial with is in creation due to his human nature. But then, how is it that we can be said to be made in the image of God, if it appears that incarnated himself into our image? It is because in eternity, Jesus in his humanity is ontological prior and the foundation for our being, but in time, the revelation of this ontological truth is revealed later in creation, just as humanity itself is revealed later in earthly time without interfering with our own ontological place in eternity. As St Maximus also shows, the whole of creation shares in the grace of the incarnation, but it does so through its unity with us. Our nature has become a focal point whereby God works to unify that which has been divided by sin. This leads us to understand why we are to be seen as the priestly mediators of creation. Since their salvation is done in and through our nature, if we follow through with what is natural, we will follow through with the work of Christ and continue his work upon the earth as his co-workers, bringing about what he has done in eternity into earthly manifestation.
In this way, there is a two-fold way of understanding animals (and the rest of creation) as being in the image of God. One reflects on God via divine simplicity and the self-definition of God so that all things define themselves only in relation to God’s own self-definition. The second relies upon the way this definition occurs which is through the work of the Logos, who establishes the different logoi of creation through his act of creation. They are reflections of the Logos according to his being Logos, though they do not share in the Logos in the unique double-participation in the Logos as we find in humanity. This is possible because of the absolute infinity and transcendence of God leads also to his immanence in everything, where their very being can only be from his act, a perfect and eternal act which all of creation participates in.
While it is beyond the scope of this reflection, the consequences of this suggestion — that all of creation can be said to be in the image of God in various, relative ways according to their potentiality — are intriguing. One of the important is how it opens up the possibility of reason within the animal real. It has often been said that animals (beyond humanity) cannot possess reason because only humanity is in the image and likeness of God. However, if we see the image and likeness of God is capable of being represented in a variety of forms, some greater and more like God than others, this also allows us to look at reason, and the power of reason, in the same way. We can see reason as a gradation of quality within the animal realm instead of seeing it as a distinction between humanity and the rest of creation. This, of course, is what I have suggested elsewhere.
Footnotes
[1] Of course, one must not read that as sacramental priests
[2] In this text, I am not really engaging the findings of biological sciences per se, but providing the means by which I could engage them and their rather important findings about animals.
[3] See, for example, Elizabeth Theokritoff, Living in God’s Creation: Orthodox Perspectives in Ecology (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2009), 239.
[4] Nicholas of Cusa, “On the Not-Other” in Toward a New Council of Florence. Trans. William F. Wertz, Jr. (Washington, DC: The Schiller Institute, 1993), 455.
[5] St Maximus the Confessor, “Second Century on Theology” in The Philokalia: The Complete Text. Volume Two. Trans. G.E.H. Palmer, Philip Sherrard and Kallistos Ware (London: Faber and Faber, 1983), 142.
[6] St Maximus the Confessor, “Difficulty 41″ in Maximus the Confessor. Trans. and Intr. Andrew Louth (London: Routledge, 1996), 161-2.
Comments are closed.
Henry:
“God created man in his own image” is one of many bible phrases which has, through bone-headed anthropocentric misinterpretation, done a lot of damage to humanity. If you’re asking for a vote, I’ll go for “all of creation” is created in God’s image. Not just for the sake of Theology (I’m no expert in that area), but for the sake of Peace on Earth.
I think it’s interesting that even those evil Darwinist-atheists tend to award humanity a special place. If you google for images with the search term “evolution” and examine the ones which are intended to be taken seriously, they usually show how “primitive” forms lead to “humans.” Natural selection is just not like that at all — all forms are under continual selective pressure, and all species, whether large multicellular creatures such as ourselves or bacteria and viruses are under continual selective pressure.
Creation evolves continually, and evolution itself is God’s image.
Frank
Yes, I think that “God created man in his own image” has indeed caused such problems. I think it is because it is a misunderstanding of meaning and implications — which is why I wrote this. It is to show the whole of creation is also in the image of God, but more than that, we are in a unique way made in the image of God via the incarnation, but that uniqueness means we are to be ministers of God’s work instead of the dominators we have become.
As for evolutionists, I know some who are very anthropomorphic, and some who are not. But I think it is always important to realize and emphasize our responsibility which is what I have been trying to do with a few posts of late.
I am particularly fond of the Augustinian approach. The term image is reserved for the resemblance between God and man as being-intellect-will. Likeness refers to the possibility of friendship in Christ. The angels are included in both of these categories, but non-intellectual natures have a lesser resemblance and are said to be “vestiges” rather than images of God.
Charles,
Yes, Augustine’s psychological interpretation is an important one in history. It is an important one – but we must not assume that just because we have intellect that we are the only ones. The problem is if we address the assumption, it is a difficult one to actually establish as having validity. As for vestiges, while we can use the word, why does it mean “not an image”?
It’s not exactly that it does not mean “image” in some sense, it just means that there is not a proper proportionality between non-intellectual beings and God. For that reason, Augustine wanted to reserve the term “image” for something that bears proper proportion to the perfections of the Trinity: existence, knowledge and will. Of course, it still remains an analogy, but a proper analogy (analogy of proper proportion) exists between the intellectual creature and God but not between irrational creatures and God. The latter bear an improper proportion to God, and so their image-bearing quality is more along the lines of simile(analogy of improper proportion).
Also, this will apply to any intellectual nature whatsoever.
Charles,
There is no proper proportionality between any creature and God. The analogy of being itself presupposes the radical distinction between the two. Indeed, this had led many great and saintly theologians to note the unity of being in all that is created in relation to God (St Maximus does this quite often). With the infinite depth of God, all things can reflect that depth in various levels of reflection. Moreover, when coming to the animal realm, it is still an assumption that they are non-rational, and it is an assumption which, at least for higher forms of animals, biological sciences have shown to be false. So what exactly is “proper proportion” between finite and infinity: all things will end up infinitely out of proportion.
Re: vestige/image distinction. A vestige is a trace, whereas an image is a reflection. Images are also vestiges, in that they carry a trace of the thing they represent, but not all vestiges are images. A deer’s droppings are vestiges of the deer, but not images of it. Etc.
Even within the vestige/image framework, finer gradations are possible. In Bonaventure’s Itinerarium, for example, the contemplation of God can occur both through and in vestiges and images, and the contemplation of God *in* vestiges (as opposed to through them–through being the lesser way) gets pretty close to what your proposing here. Every created thing, to the extent that it produces out of itself an intelligible species that mediates its substance to the perceiver, replicates the procession of the Word from the Father. This is all developed from within the vestige framework, but the isomorphism here is rather more than what we normally expect from vestiges.
WJ
Some might point out that a deer’s droppings do contain their cells within them and remain, in that fashion, an image of the deer itself. But the point is a worthy one. Nonetheless, I think the “that’s a vestige” vs “that’s an image,” if one wants to follow that way of thinking, is often done by choice and is a human construct — what one person sees as a vestige,another could see as an image. Nonetheless, I do think those traces of God’s work are related to God (Palamas), and so it is not as easily cut off as the Western tradition wants. I also think Augustine is good — but I also think his example of image is one possible way (and not the only way) to talk about images, and I think more in nature would have that kind of image than we have assumed. More or less, Frank is right in saying we have a history of disregarding the rest of creation with a special pleading that has no basis for it. The incarnation itself, which is as I pointed, a way to read we were made in the image of God (and a popular one pre-Augustine) gives justification for one distinction, but not the others.
Henry,
It is my understanding that the author(s) of Genesis, by saying that man was created in the “image and likeness of God,” meant that humans physically resembled God, who in Genesis does things like come down and walk in the garden.
David,
One could read it in that way, but most do not. Most do not think Genesis itself was understood to be as literal as it was later taken.
Granting that higher order mammals may be said to act on the basis of some degree of reason, it still appears that there is an important qualitative distinction between these mammals and humans that “reason” doesn’t capture. That distinction has to do with the moral responsibilty that follows from reasonableness. Howevermuch dolphins or chimps may be said to exemplify certain elements of practical reason, we do not hold them to be morally responsible for their actions; we therefore do not attribute to them freedom. This seems to me to be quite a big difference between us and them–we can be said to owe God and ourselves a certain manner of action.
WJ
The we depends upon who you are talking to. For example, Buddhists really see they have their own dharmas, and if they fulfill them properly, it leads to their betterment (karma) as with every other creature. I would also say that one of the reasons we have not (normally) asked about their morality has been the assumption that they are not free persons who can reason (interestingly enough, though, such assumptions were not always the norm, and one of the reasons we do find animals being put in trial at various points in time). I myself disagree with that assumption and think it should at least be left open — it is hauntingly similar to how we treated other humans in the not too distant past, and often had the same kinds of arguments. Freedom has to deal with potentiality; even with a limited potentiality, I do think there is room for freedom, relative to the level of potential in them.
Here is something for many people to consider. Look into a mirror with a mirror. What do you get? Image of an image of an image of an image. The further the repetition, the less than image is and yet it is still an image of the original.
“There is no proper proportionality between any creature and God.”
What I mean by proper proportionality is the proportion of one proportion to another; so, the proportion between finite being and finitude is proprotionate to the proportion between infinite being and infinity. I’m not entirely clear on how this works in Thomas’ thought yet, but there is a sense in which there is a proportion between man and God, but not between God and man. Also, I think that ignorance of animal intelligence has more to do with enlightenment thought than classical thought, and yet I would not hesitate to say that on this planet, only man is rational.
Also, we can’t say that there is no proportion between man and God; this would render the notion that man is in God’s image completely meaningless. The proportion that exists between men and God must be qualitatively different than that between irrational beings and God. I see these as exigencies of intelligibility.
Charles
It would not be meaningless. As I pointed out, we all have distinct potentialities –and that is where difference really can be established.
“As I pointed out, we all have distinct potentialities –and that is where difference really can be established.”
I don’t understand. Do you mean that we distinguish between things in natural philosophy on the basis of distinct potentialities? If so, I agree, but do not see how this bears on being in the image of God because God has no potentialities in this sense.
Charles
Oh, but it has a major point here. When you read Aquinas on God, you will find a good discussion on potential vs act, and how in God, the two are united, but not in the rest of creation. This helps lead us to understand that potentiality is a way we can have analogous discussions between creation and God. The greater the potential, the greater the relation, and yet still infinitely distant. With the image being seen as a derivative of potentiality, this allows us to see various kinds of images being made.
Henry, you might find this reflection on sameness and difference in Catholic theology interesting:
http://web.archive.org/web/20050312014545/http://www.tcpc.org/resources/constellation/fall_04/nickoloff.htm
I just skimmed it but will have to go through it in more depth later. I saw it also has concerns of a “return to the subject.” I think the turn could be good IF and only IF it is done in a personalist, not individualist, way. But I fear the second.
He’s basically warning about the emphasis on difference in Catholic theology, seen both in liberationist movements of the past as well as rhetoric of “complementarity” in official Catholic sexual teaching. He is arguing that an emphasis on the primacy of sameness — what he calls anthropological homoousios — is truer and, indeed, more subversive, so long as it does not obscure difference as traditionalist emphasis on “unity” often does. He writes from his experience as a gay Catholic theologian and activist. The article does not mention the relationship between animals and humans, but you might be able to expand his argument such that it has something to say about the kinds of sameness that are present in that relationship.
Well, obviously unity and difference can both be used for good and ill, and it is the relative-non-dualism which we must somehow hold on to — a difficulty and yet I find Eastern thought has helped lead to a better way to discuss this than Western metaphysics. But I agree that difference has often caused problems (dualism). I was just reading Schmitt today. Talk about how this duality can be used for a rather nasty end: Schmitt talks about how the political comes from the duality of “friend” and ‘enemy” and the conflict which occurs between this. And a state must, by that nature, be known only in relation to enemies, without enemies there is no state. But in its assertion of its right to be as it is, it might be called to fight for its preservation against enemies, and in doing so, is able to do so without any sense of moral concern. He really rejects just war theory because he thinks it is just a way for enemies to subvert the state– and he says only the sovereign of the state has the right to determine when to go to war, and when it does, the question of morality of war (and objections to war) are to be summarily dismissed. Sound familiar? It sure does! And people you know where say there is no connection between fascism and modern American “conservatives.”
I do think homoousios is very important, and indeed, is central to many things I write — it is something so radical, and something yet people forget to engage — it is not just a word to discuss the Trinity!
I would not agree with any notion of saying that creation, or any part of it, is made in the image and likeness of God, either in the same way or to the same degree as man. There is both a qualitative and quantitative difference. (If there is some other rational, moral species out there, that could change this.)
However, creation does show a sort of reflection of God, and also of man.
One key concept I would suggest, is that because of man being in the image and likeness of God, we have certain God inspired responsibilities. Man’s dominion over the rest of creation is the prime example. God has dominion over all things, always. Man has a sort of dominion over the earth and its creatures. This is a God-like responsibility, and is evidence of, and consequence of, man’s particular relationship with God.
Rightly understood, emphasizing the unique way that man relates to God, should lead to a greater sense of man’s responsibilities toward stewardship of creation. If we suggest that the rest of creation has a similar relationship with God, it would tend to diminish the degree of man’s responsibility for stewardship of creation.
Finally, the question of the eternal soul should not be overlooked. Man has such an eternal soul and an intelligent mind and a capacity for moral reasoning. So far as we are aware, no other part of the physical creation has such properties. It is in light of this unique place in the physical world that we have such unique responsibilities.
“So far as we are aware, no other part of the physical creation has such properties.”
And yet it is an assumption and not one which is in accord with all philosophical understandings of soul. Indeed, this is a part of the greater debate. There have been all kinds of assumptions, and arguments made in favor of those assumptions often prove to be invalidated with actual encounter with animals. Indeed, there are examples of animal bodies being treated as relics — and of course we must remember Scripture puts animals in the eternal kingdom, and says Christ’s work is over the whole of creation, not just with us. Aristotle, I believe, really caused major problems in our understanding of animals, and, just like Ptolemy was too quick to be used for cosmology, Aristotle’s biology is off.