Genesis 1:26 God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the sky, and over the livestock, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 God created man in his own image. In God’s image he created him; male and female he created them. 28God blessed them. God said to them, “Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” 29 God said, “Behold, I have given you every herb yielding seed, which is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree, which bears fruit yielding seed. It will be your food. 30 To every animal of the earth, and to every bird of the sky, and to everything that creeps on the earth, in which there is life, I have given every green herb for food;” and it was so. 31 God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. There was evening and there was morning, a sixth day. WEB
From verses 3 through 25, we have had a sparse and rather impersonal language regarding what is being created. At verse 26, this changes with the creation of humanity as God has a conversation within Himself. After this creation, He blesses and speaks to them at verse 28. (Our favorite Jewish rabbi would say this is the first commandment of the Torah – be fruitful and multiply). As each type of animal is created in verses 21-25, we see the words “after their kind”. This wording creates a distinction between the animals and humans who were created in God’s likeness and image.
A different Hebrew verb is used in verse 26 (translated as “make”) versus the word translated as “created” earlier. There are some scholars who want to make a distinction between “make” and “create”. Of greater importance to us is that this verb is repeated three times to drive home the point. This is significant.
Psalm 8:3 When I look up at the heavens, which your fingers made, and see the moon and the stars, which you set in place, 4 Of what importance is the human race, that you should notice them? Of what importance is mankind, that you should pay attention to them, 5 and make them a little less than the heavenly beings? You grant mankind honor and majesty; 6you appoint them to rule over your creation; you have placed everything under their authority, 7including all the sheep and cattle, as well as the wild animals, 8 the birds in the sky, the fish in the sea and everything that moves through the currents of the seas. NET
Psalm 8 is a commentary of Genesis 1:26-28. It extols the grandeur and significance of humanity and man’s resemblance to God.
We have a pretty quick answer when it comes to “us” and “our” in verse 26 and there are Jewish commentaries that acknowledge that Christians use this as a basis for the Trinity. Jews will typically go in one of three directions on this wording. First is that it is a “royal” we (similar to English royalty). A second approach is that it refers to angels and the court of Heaven (Job 1, for example), i.e., an invisible world that is filled with the active agents of God. The problem here is that the angels and court of Heaven had no part in the creation of man. The third is that it is a way to connect with the image of God as male and female.
Before creation, God has to consider what will happen if man is created and given the capacity to think, choose and decide. If man chooses wrongly, then how will that affect God? There has to be a plan to reclaim those who stray away from God which we see in Ephesians 1:4, Acts 2:23 and Revelation 13:8
In our translations there is no “and” between image and likeness although it does appear that way in the Greek and Latin text. Image is like a reflection in a mirror as there is a resemblance between us and God (see Psalm 8:5). In terms of likeness, humanity is like God but in practice, our lives can move toward or drift away from God.
The early church distinguishes between image and likeness. Image is a gift that everyone has and no one can lose (although you might ding it up and knock some of the luster off). We regard humans as valuable because they bear this image of God. (See Psalm 8:5). Likeness reflects our freedom to make choices. These choices allow us to act in a manner that is pro-God or against God – bringing us closer to God or separating us from God. The early church said that while we can move away from likeness, we still have dignity (image). Dominion is the category that interprets image and likeness, i.e., because we are in the image and likeness of God, we have dominion as God’s representatives to oversee what has been created. Scripture is about restoring us to likeness through faith with the focus on healing rather than punishment.
What distinguishes us from animals starts with reason. Almost everyone in the early church was familiar with Plato, Aristotle, et al. so they understood the concept of reason. The second distinguishing factor is freedom or more specifically, the freedom of choice. The combination of these two allow us to choose either right or wrong. As part of this, we have the capacity to exert control over the world. A problem that can arise is that if our intrinsic value is simply related to our ability to reason, does that mean that babies or people who are mentally challenged have no intrinsic value? Absolutely not! Aside from reason, another aspect of image we share with God is love, in particular the possibility to love without expectation of receiving anything in return (agape love) and also to receive love. We have the ability to have a relationship with God by loving Him and allowing Him to love us
The modern church as gone in a little different direction viewing this as the capacity to have a relationship with God and with each other. They will tie this back to the question posed of Jesus about what is the most important commandment. The word used is stewardship. That is certainly a factor based upon who we are as Christians yet the idea of such a limited role seems to fall a little short of the authority implied in the Hebrew word used is defined as “to rule or to dominate” (Strong’s Hebrew 7287). We will talk about this in greater detail next.