Christianity Down To Earth
Where We Are and Where We Should Be Going
by Edwin Walhout
Published by Edwin Walhout
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2010 Edwin Walhout
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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The Scripture quotations contained herein are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A., and are used by permission.
Cover design by Amy Cole (amy.cole@comcast.net)
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Table Of Contents
1 Orientation
Part I: The Hebrew-Christian Mindset: Concurrence
2 God and Creation
3 God and Humankind
4 God and Sin
5 Sin and Punishment
6 God and Covenant
7 God and Israel
8 God and Jesus
9 Jesus and the Apostles
10 The Apostle Paul
11 The Apostle John
Part II: The Greco-Roman Mindset: Docetism
12 Greek Philosophy
13 Christology
14 The Old Roman Creed
15 The Nicene Creed
16 Chalcedon and Beyond
17 Church Organization
Part III: The Medieval Mindset: Papism
18 Papism
19 The Medieval Mission
20 The Renaissance
21 The Reformation
Part IV: The Modern Mindset: Phenomenalism
22 Enlightenment
23 Subjectivism
24 The Social Gospel
25 Fundamentalism
26 Neo-orthodoxy
27 Concluding Perspective
Orientation
What I propose to do in this book can be articulated in two steps:
a. Isolate four major worldviews (mindsets) involved in the history of Christianity.
b. Trace the effect these mindsets have had upon the Christian church and its theology.
I take the original mindset of the Bible writers, the Hebrew-Christian mindset, as normative and definitive, judging subsequent developments in the history of the church by that standard. I find much of what has entered the tradition of Christian theology to be incompatible with the original thought patterns of such people as Moses, David, Jeremiah, John, Paul, Luke, etc.
What I propose to do, accordingly, is to analyze the major worldviews that have appeared in western thought (I call them mindsets), especially the original Hebrew mindset within which Christianity first emerged, and then utilize that mindset as the definitive standard by which to evaluate certain developments that took place as the gospel moved into the Greco-Roman world, then into the barbarian world of the middle ages, and thence into the modern world.
I will be isolating these four major mindsets: a) that of the ancient Hebrew-Christians, b) of the Greco-Roman world, c) of the medieval barbarians, d) and of the modern Enlightenment movement. In each case I will be trying to analyze not only the basic philosophy of life of the times, but also then how this way of thinking affected how people thought about Jesus and the gospel, how this carried over into the way the church was organized and run, and what effect that contemporary style of Christianity has had upon the way western culture developed. All of this in constant interaction with the Biblical norm.
Part One
The Hebrew-Christian Mindset: Concurrence
God and Creation
It is of more than casual significance that the book of Genesis begins with an affirmation that God created the heavens and the earth. Whether or not this implies that God created the universe out of nothing, the overwhelming emphasis of the first chapter of the Bible is that there was a process in the formation of the world as we know it, and that this process was a direct function of God. Step by step God formed and shaped the materials of the physical universe into the cosmos which now exists. There are several implications of this Hebrew affirmation that call for articulation.
a) God and the world are inseparably connected.
When we think of God we must also immediately and invariably think of the world which he has created. Similarly when we think of the world we must immediately and invariably think of God as its creator.
We do not normally do either of these things. It is customary, for example, in books on Systematic Theology to spend considerable time on the Doctrine of God, analyzing his attributes and various other matters. Eventually one comes to the matter of creation, but one has examined the concept of God first without that reference. On the other hand when scientists do their work they customarily think first about their subject matter and then sometimes as an afterthought try to connect what they learn with God.
The original Hebrew mindset did not so separate God from the world and from its function and its history. For example, when the ancient Hebrews thought about the omnipotence of God they did not do so as an abstract attribute of God in himself, they did so in the concrete cares and concerns of daily living. They saw his power in the affairs of daily life. Likewise his love and justice. Always within the context of life and reality. Never in the abstract.
Here is a typical sample, and hundreds like it could be cited. Then they shall know that I am the LORD their God because I sent them into exile among the nations, and then gathered them into their own land. I will leave none of them behind; and I will never again hide my face from them, when I pour out my spirit upon the house of Israel, says the Lord GOD. (Ezekiel 39:28-29) It is God who sent the Israelites into exile, and it is God who will bring them back and put his spirit in them. A modern historian might simply search the historical data available and detail the events and personages involved, without any reference to God at all.
What does it mean that God is eternal, for example? We think of God in the abstract, as an incomprehensible transcendent mystical Being existing completely independent of the world, all by himself, outside of time, with neither beginning nor ending. Obviously it is possible to think of God this way. We do it all the time. But it needs strong emphasis that this is not the way the ancient people of Bible times thought about God. They thought about him always and invariably in the context of life and history, seeing him at work not only in the world of external nature but in the ongoing affairs of human interactions. If they were to speak of God’s eternity they would mean not timelessness but permanence throughout the constant passage of time.
Hence, at the very outset of our investigation of the Hebrew way of thinking we must do our best to grasp this, to us elusive, way of thinking about God. Do not think of God only when you go to church or when you pray, but always and everywhere. Let it become part of your personal and mental makeup that you are aware every moment of the presence of an active and speaking God, a creator on whom you are dependent every moment for everything you are. We are always in the presence of the God who made us and who loves us and who is enabling us to be what he created us to be. Learn to see the hand of God not only in your own personal life but also in the affairs of world tensions.
One might respond that it is possible and proper, even granting the connection of Genesis 1, to isolate the concept of God simply for the purpose of defining the term, much as one might isolate one item from a group merely for the purpose of clarity. This process, it might be argued, will indeed result in an abstract discussion of the nature of God, so that it is not only acceptable but imperative to do so. Be clear as to what you mean when you employ the term God.
One might indeed argue this way, justifying the abstract character of some doctrines of God, but the fact remains that the Bible itself does not do this, and the Hebrew mentality does not. We would be arguing from some modern point of view, some contemporary mindset, but we would not be speaking from within the Biblical mindset. The Bible simply does not speak of God in the abstract, but always in the concrete. Never in purely intellectual terms, but always in the active terms of speaking and doing within the totality of the universe he created.
b) God works within the universe.
There is another feature of the story of creation in Genesis that is sometimes missed. The spirit of God is hovering over the unformed chaotic mass of matter out of which the universe is about to be formed. It is to be understood that it is precisely this spirit (wind, breath) of God that is the energy or power by which this chaotic mass is being formed and shaped into the cosmos that it eventually became.
Modern scientists talk about a big bang that exploded some aboriginal mass of matter and set in motion the long long process of developmental formation of the galaxies, suns, stars, planets, moons, orbits – in short, the sum total of nature. We should learn to see this process, however it may eventually be described in scientific language, as the same as the pre-scientific terminology of Moses. Both accounts, Genesis 1 and modern science, posit a long developmental process by which the earth was gradually formed to become a suitable habitation for the human race.
That spirit or wind or breath, as Moses puts it, is the spirit or breath of God. It is God at work within the mass of matter that constitutes the universe. We must, accordingly, learn to think of God not only as supernatural, far distant from us, but as actively involved in the continuing formation of the natural world. In terms of our planet earth we must see such natural phenomena as hurricanes, volcanoes, tsunamis, thunderstorms, earthquakes, as well as the regular and more normal functions of natural law as the continuing creative power of God at work. This is how God has been working, within the natural processes of the universe, ever since the beginning of time, so that what we usually think of as natural law is in fact the spirit of God at work.
c) The world itself is the means whereby God speaks.
We should not overlook the repeated emphasis in Genesis 1 that God brought all the modifications of the universe into existence simply by speaking. And God said. … We do not customarily use this language in our theological talk today.
How does God speak? What does God say, if indeed he says anything at all? Genesis 1 says God spoke the world (nature) into existence. It seems clear enough from this Biblical perspective that if we want to listen to God we need to listen to nature. Nature is what God spoke, and for that matter, what he continues to speak. That is an essential part of the message of Genesis 1.
People sometimes do not want to think God speaks in nature, or at least not in all of nature. Does God speak in destructive hurricanes, in devastating floods, in severe droughts and famines, in genetic anomalies, in nuclear warfare, in incurable disease?
The Hebrew answer, difficult as it may be, is: if it happens, God is speaking in it. God created the entire world by speaking, so that his speech pervades everything that exists and everything that happens within the world. Not just his action, but also his speech. Notice how in the following psalm, God is said to speak not only to nature but also to Israel.
Praise the LORD, O Jerusalem!
Praise your God, O Zion!
For he strengthens the bars of your gates;
he blesses your children within you.
He grants peace within your borders;
he fills you with the finest of wheat.
He sends out his command to the earth;
his word runs swiftly.
He gives snow like wool;
he scatters frost like ashes.
He hurls down hail like crumbs—
who can stand before his cold?
He sends out his word, and melts them;
he makes his wind blow, and the waters flow.
He declares his word to Jacob,
his statutes and ordinances to Israel.
He has not dealt thus with any other nation;
they do not know his ordinances.
Praise the LORD!
(Psalm 147:12-20)
People sometimes think that God speaks only in the good things, but that the bad things of life are to be attributed to some other demonic force. Not so. In Psalm 147 God not only sends the hail but also melts it. The Hebrew mentality saw God active in everything that happened, and they likewise heard his voice in everything that happened. It was part of the mentality of all God-fearing Jews to acknowledge that even in evil situations God is involved and is speaking.
Listen, for example, to Job, as he cries out against the injustice of what is happening to him, God gives me up to the ungodly, and casts me into the hands of the wicked. I was at ease, and he broke me in two; he seized me by the neck and dashed me to pieces. (Job 16:11-12) Job does not understand why God is doing this, but he does not doubt that it is God who does it. He may not understand, at this point, what God is saying to him by the troubles he endures, but in time he will hear at least something from God. Job may not get all the answers he wants but he does hear God challenge him, Will you even put me in the wrong? Will you condemn me that you may be justified? And Job’s response will be, I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me. … Therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes. (Job 42:3-6)
The world is what it is precisely because God made it that way, and he made it that way by speaking it into existence. The world is the product of God’s speech and the avenue by which he continues to speak. Accordingly, if we really want to hear what God says we need to hear that divine creative voice mediated and transmitted by the events that happen within the world he created. Everything. If we cannot manage to do that we will not manage to understand the mentality of the people who wrote the Old Testament.
This point cannot be overstressed. The Old Testament mentality begins with the understanding that the world itself is the product of God speaking, with the corollary that nature is the vehicle by which God’s word is expressed.
On the contrary, our mentality today, when asked pointblank, How does God speak? responds almost without thinking, By the Bible. To recognize that the Bible itself begins with a different answer is no denigration of the authority of the Bible. The Hebrew mindset begins with listening to God, not only in the vibrations of the physical environment, but also in the vicissitudes of human life and history. The Hebrew mindset sees God everywhere, and it hears God everywhere. If we wish to enter into that mindset we must begin where the Hebrew people themselves began, learning to hear God’s speech via the course of nature and of history.
This is my Father’s world, and to my listening ears
all nature sings, and round me rings the music of the spheres.
This is my Father’s world, I rest me in the thought
of rocks and trees, of skies and seas, His hand the wonders wrought.
In the rustling grass I hear Him pass, He speaks to me everywhere.
d) The term heavens and earth means the totality of the physical universe.
In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. (Genesis 1:1-2)
This is an unfamiliar translation of the opening words of Genesis, but the point to be made here is that the two terms heaven and earth together form the entirety of the created universe, the cosmos. Whether the first verse is an independent clause or a subordinate clause is immaterial at this point. The heavens and the earth, taken together, constitute the whole world.
This is a usage of the term heaven that is no longer customary among Christians in the twenty-first century. In Genesis the term heaven means that part of the universe that is not the planet earth. It would include the moon, the sky, the planets, the stars, galaxies, and everything in space. Interestingly, the name of one of our planets, Uranus, is directly derived from the Greek word for heaven, ouranos). However, the term heaven usually means nothing of the sort, nothing physical at all. If you ask someone if he is going to heaven you are not asking him if he is going to Uranus, you are asking if he is going to go to be with God after he dies.
This is not yet the place to examine the term heaven in detail, or why it has acquired such a different meaning, but the point is merely that we should be aware that our present usage of the term heaven is vastly different from what it was in the Old Testament. We are not going to understand the Hebrew mentality if we ignore or forget what the ancient Hebrews meant by the term. They simply had no interest in or concern for the kind of question we ask when we wonder whether or not we will go to heaven when we die.
e) The term day in Genesis 1 means an indefinite period of time.
The story of creation in Genesis 1 is organized into seven sections called days. the Hebrew word is yom. God spoke various changes into existence, and Moses refers to the sequence of these changes as days. The primary meaning of the term day, both in Hebrew and in the English translation, is a twenty-four hour period, among the Israelites reckoned from sunset to sunset.
Both languages, however, employ the term in a variety of ways, indicating some other duration of time. The term sometimes means daylight as contrasted with night time, Day and night will not cease. It can mean a period of indefinite time. For example, one might say to someone who is complaining about something or other, You will get your day in court. He may never get into a legal procedure, but the meaning would be simply that the truth of the matter will eventually be shown. One might ask what the term connotes in the phrase, the day of the Lord. Twenty-four hours? Probably simply the indefinite time in the future when the Lord will achieve his purpose.
The point is that one cannot insist that the process of creation as described in Genesis 1 is one literal week of seven days. Once this is recognized the way is opened up to accept any length of time which competent scientists may suggest. The meaning of the days would simply be that there are recognizable stages in the process whereby God brought our world into existence. That process is clearly a step by step preparation of the planet Earth for human habitation. Adam and Eve could not have survived in any of Genesis’ first five days of creation.
f) Genesis 1 suggests a natural process under the creative direction of God.
Scientists who examine Genesis 1 sometimes fault the author (whom we assume to be Moses) for specifying a sequence of events that is impossible. How could there be light on Day 1 without the sun and moon light-bearers of Day 4, for example?
But one must understand that what we have in Genesis 1 is primitive science, not the product of investigation and research such as we have today. Surely there is light that does not originate in the sun or moon, for example static electricity and lightning. Or perhaps the term should be understood as meaning light in the form of energy or power, as if God said, Let there be energy. This is not to rewrite the Bible but to acknowledge that the ancient Hebrew terms cannot be forced into modern English meanings. Those ancient terms often have a wide breadth of meaning, as do many English words.
At any rate, the process which Moses presents in the first chapter of Genesis is a continuous, sequential, progressive process culminating in the preparation of earth to receive and support humankind. Its duration is open-ended so far as the backward look is concerned; we do not know when it began; we can accept whatever estimate reliable scientists suggest.
First there is light; let us think energy. This light-energy permeates the chaotic, formless mass out of which God is shaping a world. It causes change. We visualize enormous energies at work violently within the whirling substances. Out of it gradually come the galaxies and constellations and the planets and the small sphere we now call Earth.
Second, around this Earth came an atmosphere. In the sky appeared clouds bearing moisture that in time would fall as rain upon the earth. Water began to collect upon the surface of the earth as well.
In the meantime, thirdly, on the surface of the earth changes were taking place that resulted in high mountains and deep canyons. The canyons were filled with water forming oceans and lakes and rivers. As these waters appeared, dry land also appeared between them, and on this dry land vegetation gradually began to grow.
Fourth, all the while these thing were happening on the surface of the planet Earth, the roiling process of change continued in space (heaven). Sun, moon, and stars were developed around the earth, shedding light and power upon its surface, enabling the processes of vegetative life and plant growth.
Fifth, life began to develop into a great variety of forms: fish in the sea and birds in the air.
Sixth, life continued to expand and diversify, producing all kinds of animals on the earth itself. We could well include the age of dinosaurs in this category, the sixth day. Then, after the animals have appeared, God created humans, on the same day as the animals, which suggests by the same process. The same divine energy that had caused all the changes in the universe and on the planet Earth now on the sixth day of creation brought the process to a climax in the creation of animals and humankind.
Accordingly, when we read this Genesis account in the twenty-first century we need to make accommodation for the primitive nature of the science being reported. If we do this openly and honestly, then it will appear that Moses is by far the most insightful and profound philosopher of ancient times, much closer to the truth than the speculations of the early pre-Socratic Greek philosophers. What Moses wrote is, as the Apostle Paul wrote a millennium later, inspired by God and profitable for our study and reflection.
It may well be that our modern scientific advances far outstrip Moses and the ancient Hebrews who absorbed his teaching, but when all is said and done, we can still affirm that what modern science is doing is putting meat on the bones of Genesis 1. Moses has presented a bare but very perceptive outline of how he envisioned the way in which the earth was prepared for human occupation, and modern science is filling in the details.
When, however, we speak of Moses as the author of Genesis, we need always to remind ourselves that it is God who inspired him to write as he did. Similarly, when we examine the natural processes by which the Earth came to be what it is, we need also to remind ourselves that this too is the work of God. We must not eliminate God from the writing of Genesis, and we must not eliminate God from the process of natural change.
By the same token, when we say God created the heavens and the earth we must not eliminate the natural processes that the creative work of God brought into play. And, in the same vein, when we say God inspired the scriptures we must not eliminate the human persons who penned them. To say that God inspired the Bible does not imply that Nahum and Haggai and James and Jude did not write it. To say that God created the world does not imply that there was no natural function by which he did it. On the contrary, God formed the world by means of the natural laws which he brought into operation. Similarly he inspired the Bible by means of the real persons whom he nudged to write.
g) The divine and the natural are concurrent.
We often think of what God does and what humans do as two separate items. Similarly we think what nature does and what God does are two different things. We would not be able to say God makes it rain if we take that position seriously. We know the natural forces that cause rain to fall from the clouds, so if nature does it, God does not do it. We do not think there can be two causes for one result.
But Moses in Genesis 1 and 2 suggests a different relationship. In Genesis 2:5, for example, he writes that there was not yet any vegetation growing in the ground for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and water the whole face of the ground. Moses affirms that there are natural laws governing the fall of rain and the growth of plants, but he does not eliminate God from those processes. It is God who is in the process of creating nature and developing its functions. Moses wants us to understand that both are active simultaneously: God is doing what he does, and nature is doing what it does. Both at the same time and in the same events. This is what the term concurrent is intended to say. For the same event, the growth of plants, there is a divine cause and there is a natural cause, working concurrently.
Both insights are required for us to have adequate knowledge of the truth of the matter. Hence to provide a scientific answer to some question is not to deny the need for a theological answer as well. And vice-versa, to suggest a divine answer to some human question is not to deny the need for a natural answer. To say that there is a divine origin to the universe is not to deny there is a natural origin. To say there is a natural origin is not to deny that there is a divine origin. In the ancient Hebrew mindset both are not only valid but required. We do not have a grasp of the whole truth if we have only the scientific answer, and we do not have a grasp of the whole truth if we have only the theological answer. We need them both for a full understanding of the truth. God created the world, but he created it by bringing about the operation of powerful natural forces.
There have been modern thinkers who say that the more scientific data we discover, the less we need God. If we can explain everything by describing the natural forces that cause it, then what do we need God for? But this way of thinking assumes that it is either/or not both/and. Moses writes that God and nature are both/and; these modern thinkers assume that God and nature are either/or.
The basic mindset of ancient Hebrew thinking is that in the entirety of nature, including man and human history, God is active and functional and speaking, sovereign over the way nature functions, including the way humans function. This way of thinking does not eliminate the reality of natural law, nor does it eliminate the reality of human choice and decision. What it does insist on is that we see and hear God in everything that happens in nature and also in everything that happens in human life. This is the doctrine of concurrence, and I employ the term to embrace the entire Hebrew-Christian mindset.
God and Humankind
All of the above in Chapter 2 should be understood and taken for granted when we examine the Genesis account about how God created Adam and Eve. God himself is deeply involved in the existence of humans. In Genesis 2 God breathes his own spirit into Adam in order to bring him to life. We simply cannot analyze human life and history without always factoring in this divine origin and continuing presence in our lives. The ancient Hebrew mindset was thoroughly imbued with the ways and will of God, not only in external nature, but especially within the ongoing development of human life, civilization, and history.
What follows now is an analysis of the major features of the Biblical accounts of the creation of Adam and Eve, and an attempt at articulating some of its implications for the way in which the ancient Hebrews viewed the relation between God and man.
a) Adam is a symbol of the whole human race.
Genesis 1:26 says, Let us make humankind in our image. The Hebrew word for humankind is adam. So when we think of Adam as one individual person we should also think of Adam as the entire human race. Whatever Genesis says about Adam it is intending to say about everybody. To use a different English idiom we could say Adam is Everyman.
b) Humans are created out of the same materials as everything else.
Genesis 2:7 says, The Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground. In Hebrew there is a play on words here. The English word man is adam in Hebrew, and the English word ground is adamah in Hebrew. The implication is that man, humankind, is somehow identical with the ground. That is what we are made of, the same thing that the ground or earth is made of. That is why God can later remind Adam, You are dust, and to dust you shall return. (Genesis 3:19)
In more contemporary terms we might say that we are made of the same elements and genetic structures that everything in the world is made of. So it should not be surprising to us to learn that the human body is more than 97 % identical genetically, for example, with that of apes. That is what Genesis teaches us already long ago.
c) Human beings are created by the breath of God.
Genesis 2:7 says that God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. A casual reading of this passage would suggest something like a sculptor fashioning a lifesize model out of clay, shaped like a human being, and then giving the clay model mouth to mouth resuscitation, bringing the clay model to life. In Moses’ parable we visualize God doing something like that, making a body out of the mud and bringing it to life by breathing into its nostrils.
It should give sincere Christians no difficulty to recognize that this too, as all of Genesis 1 and 2, is a pre-scientific way of writing. The essential elements are that God has been causally involved in the appearance of humans in the world, and that humans are made of the same materials as everything else. We should not be misled by the visualization we sometimes make about a clay model coming to life. Nor should we be upset when conscientious scientists do their best to explain the origins of the human species. They are trying to fill in the scientific details of the outline given by Moses in Genesis.
What then is the breath of God that transforms the body of dust into a living being? What does that mean in terms more up to date than those of Moses?
We may begin to answer that question by stating first what it is not. It is not what we sometimes refer to as a soul. There is nothing in the Genesis accounts, either chapter 1 or chapter 2, that even remotely suggests that there was some pre-existing entity called soul that God injected into the body of dust. Genesis does not teach the pre-existence of the soul, nor even for that matter, that there is any such thing as a soul. It cannot be found in these two chapters.
What Genesis 2 does say is that God breathed into the body in such a way that the body became a living being. The word breath in Hebrew is ruach and is translated either as breath or as wind or as spirit. It is the same word as used in Genesis 1:2, a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.
So we should make a connection between what was happening throughout the entire creation process and what is happening here in the creation of Adam as a living being. It is part of the same process. The spirit of God, or the wind of God, or the breath of God – all the same thing – swept over the entire mass of matter out of which the universe was being formed, and it also, as part of that creative process, swept into that tiny bit of matter that became the human race. That is what Moses writes under the inspiration (breath, wind, spirit) of God.
This breath of God should not be understood as mere raw power, as if only the sheer creative power of God was the cause of our human existence. As we have noticed in the case of the creation of the earth, the appearance of humans on the earth is a product also of the speaking of God. Let us make man in our image, says God. And that is what happened, humans appeared on the earth. The point here is that the word and the power of God go together. When God says something, something happens; and vice-versa, when something happens, like the world being shaped or humans appearing, it is because God is speaking. The event is the same as the speech of God.
So God is speaking by means of the appearance of humans on earth, as well as exercising his almighty power. Our very existence as humans in the world should, accordingly, challenge us to hear what God is saying to us about why we exist and what we should be doing with our lives.
d) Human beings are created in the image of God.
The affirmation that human beings are created by the breath of God does not, in itself, suggest any sense of uniqueness for humans. On the contrary, it suggests sameness, for it is the same spirit of God that was the formative energy in the creation of the universe that is now also the formative energy in the creation of humans.
The uniqueness, that is, the difference between humans and the other animals God created on the sixth day, Moses defines by the term image of God. So we may appropriately say that we humans are animals like all the rest of them, since we too are created from the dust of the earth, but unique since we only are designated as in the image of God. Chimpanzees are not created in the image of God.
That term, however, image of God, can be an elusive term. What does it mean? What does Moses want us to understand by it?
Negatively, the term does not mean physical resemblance. We cannot look at our bodies and conclude that God is like that, only much larger and grander.
Positively, the term means living in such a way as to resemble the way God lives.
This brief definition implies that we do not merely look at the differences between animals and man, such as having a mind and larger brains, to define the image of God. On the contrary, it implies more what we do with our unique traits and skills than merely possessing them. This understanding of the image of God means that the term is not only a noun but also a verb – it includes not only having certain potentials but using them in a certain way, in such a way as to reflect the character and nature and work of God himself. How do humans live in contrast to the way chimpanzees live?
Christians sometimes argue about whether or not it is possible to lose the image of God. The uncertainty comes from the dual nature of the term, both a noun and a verb. The answer is simple enough once this duality is recognized. It is not possible to lose the image of God as a noun, but it is possible to lose it as a verb. Which is to say that what God created us to be in the beginning can never be uncreated, but that how we use what God created can diverge considerably from what God desires.
Part of the image of God in us, then, considered as a noun, is the possession of what we call the intellect and will, the ability to choose between various ways of doing things. This ability cannot be lost (except by dying), since it is part of the humanity which God gave us. Even hardened sinners cannot live without exercising their minds and wills in one way or another, and they can do this because God enables them to do so. We cannot lose this gift even when we misuse it.
But the very idea of will carries also the connotation of doing something, choosing to do one thing rather than another. In that sense, in the sense of a verb, it is possible for us to choose to do things that are contrary to what God wishes us to choose, contrary also to our best interests. Accordingly, in the sense of a verb it is certainly possible for us to lose the image of God; meaning it is possible for us to live in such a way that does not reflect the way God lives and works. When we think of the image of God, we must include this verbal connotation as well as the nominative; in fact, this verbal use should be primary and decisive. We are created for the purpose of reflecting God in the way we use the life and abilities he gives us.
e) Living in the image of God implies dominion over the earth.
Then God said, Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.
So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. 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 air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth. (Genesis 1:26-28)
It is significant that, no sooner does Moses describe God as creating us in his image, than he continues by explaining that this means to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it. Image of God implies action, doing, accomplishing something, working.
Historians and anthropologists often speak in terms of various ages. The Ice Age. The Age of Dinosaurs. The Iron Age. Moses is speaking in Genesis 1 of the Human Age. He is saying that once God brings humans to the earth a new age is beginning, an age dominated no longer by the weather or by certain classes of animals but by humans.
He writes that this is not only what happens but that this is what God wants to have happen. Moses puts it in the form of a command from God. You do this, Adam. You and your wife, be fruitful and multiply until the earth is full of people. And in the process, figure out how to control your environment. How to use the world of nature all around you. How to build up a civilization. How to be the dominant creature in the world. But never forget that you are called upon to do this in such a way as to reflect how I myself live and work. Do it right, image me.
That is what it means to be created in the image of God. To do something and to do it right. Theologians often refer to this command as the Cultural Mandate, and it is a good term. God is mandating his image to subdue the earth, to develop a culture (a civilization). This is what God is requiring of all human beings on earth. It is a command given to Adam who is the symbolic representative of all humans. It is still in effect, still the requirement of God for all nations and peoples. Develop a civilization and make it one that reflects the nature of God. Do it right. The cultural mandate.
f) God created us capable of what he commands us to do.
If God commands us to dominate the earth, then it should follow that we are capable of doing just that. Hardly anyone would argue, however, that the human race has done this rightly since we first appeared on earth. On the one hand we see wonderful civilizations, for example, of ancient Egypt and Babylon and Persia and Greece and Rome, China, Axtec, Inca, and other civilizations of Europe and America. There simply are no other creatures on earth who have ascended to such a position of dominance. In this respect we may conclude that the human race is indeed doing what God created it to do.
On the other hand, it is not so obvious that we are doing it in such a way as to image God. The way in which the human race has exercised its powers of intellect and will, of knowledge and skill, of science and technology is simply amazing during the brief time it has been dominant in the earth. Yet it does not take much analysis to see the widespread and persistent flaws in the civilizations we have constructed. On the one hand we do reflect the creativity of God in our creative use of nature, but on the other hand we do not very well reflect his goodness and love and compassion in the way we treat our fellow humans. We fight and make war, we kill and enslave, we promote ourselves at the expense of the suffering of others. This is not godlike.
The way to understand this is to recall that being in the image of God means two things: as a noun it means possessing the unique abilities that distinguish us from other animals, and as a verb it means exercising them in a way that honors the Creator who fashioned them. We are succeeding admirably in the first but are stumbling rather badly in the second.
But what needs emphasis at this point is that God created us capable of doing what he commands us to do. He commands us to subdue the earth and have dominion over it, and he equips us with the necessary mentality, ingenuity, creativity, to do just that. He made us capable of imaging him, and hence responsible, in the way we develop our civilization. And, to jump ahead, the gospel of Jesus Christ is precisely the instrument that enables us to do so.
g) Our minds are in tune with external creation.
God created us with minds that are in tune with the rest of the creation. This is the epistemology of Genesis. We are capable of understanding how nature works, that is, the laws by which nature does what it does. We are capable of utilizing this understanding in such a way as to invent a wide variety of tools and gadgets designed to make our lives more productive, interesting, beautiful, and comfortable. Science and technology are two aspects of what God commands: understand how the world works, and use this knowledge to develop a godly civilization.
We are able to see, to hear, to taste, to feel, to smell the creation all around us. These senses bring us into contact with the external world in such a way that its various characteristics and qualities can be perceived, understood, and used. God gave us these senses to take in what he put out there, and he further gave us such abilities as to think, to speak, to develop a language, to create art, to fashion tools, to make inventions, all utilizing the knowledge that comes to us via our senses.
In the history of philosophy this position is sometimes called naïve realism or commonsense realism. Naïve because it is the way people who seldom or never think about it do actually live; commonsense because that is the way we humans in common think and live. We simply assume that what we see does actually exist out there just as we see it. For example, when we look at the tulips in our garden we see some of them to be red and some of them to be yellow. Without even thinking about it we simply assume (naively) that the flowers out there are indeed some red and some yellow. Why would we even think to doubt it? We see them and that is enough proof for us.
The term realism then means simply that the flowers are really out there and that they are really red and yellow. So: naïve realism. What needs a reminder is that this is the way the ancient Hebrew people thought, as evidenced by the writings in the Old Testament. It is part of their overall mindset. Moses gives us the way to understand it by combining the creation of Adam in the image of God with the command to subdue the earth. God made Adam to be a creature that is capable of learning how nature works and of utilizing that knowledge in developing a civilization. Inherent to that way of thinking is this matter of naïve realism.
There is another philosophical way of describing this situation: correspondence. This term means simply that our human minds are related to external nature. God made nature to be what it is: winds to blow, grass to be green, lions to roar, honey to be sweet, ice to be cold. And he made our human senses capable of detecting these qualities and to manipulate that knowledge into inventive technology and progress. There is, accordingly, a correspondence between what actually exists in outward nature and what subsequently comes to exist in our inner mentality. We see what God put there. We hear what actually makes sounds out there.
We sense, in other words, what nature is like, simply because God made us capable of doing so, our knowledge corresponding with the actuality of nature. It is that correspondence which makes us capable of being God’s image and of gaining dominion over nature. We process what our senses tell us into ideas and thoughts, and then utilize this knowledge to invent the things that go into the making of a civilization.
God and Sin
One of the persistent problems of Christian people is how to understand sin and evil, particularly God’s connection with it. There would not be any sin if there weren’t any human beings. Only human beings sin. If God did not create human beings there would be no sin. So, is God responsible for sin?
Furthermore, if we agree with the ancient Hebrews that God created everything and is actively directing the process by which the world is developing, then it seems that even when humans sin they are functioning within the parameters of God’s sovereign control of life and history and universal development. Does this imply that God intended us to sin?
Yet, how would this comport with the recognition that God himself is good, with no evil and certainly no sin? Did God somehow make a mistake when he created us capable of choosing to sin? Or did what he created good somehow get out of control and spin away from his divine purpose? How do we understand the reality of the incontrovertible fact that all of us do things from time to time that are just plain wrong?
In this chapter we will examine the Hebrew view as set forth by Moses, particularly in Genesis 3, regarding the nature and reality of sin. Sin is a major constitutive part of the ancient Hebrew mindset.
a) The possibility of sin is inherent in the image of God.
There is no possibility of avoiding the conclusion that when God created us in his image he created us with a will. Having a will means being able to choose. And being able to choose means not only being able to choose between two equally acceptable alternatives, but to choose between an acceptable alternative and an unacceptable alternative; in other words, to choose between right and wrong.
To be in the image of God is actively to reflect the activity of God. But it also means that we have to choose to do so. Choosing means choosing between alternatives, and it implies that we have the capability of choosing to live in a way that does not mirror the life of God. That choice is what we call sin: the choice to live in such a way that does not point to the holiness, righteousness, and goodness of God. So we must not hesitate to acknowledge that when God created us he created us with the possibility of choosing to live contrary to his express desire for us.
b) The necessity of choice is symbolized in the two trees of Eden.
This is the significance of Moses’ parable of the two named trees of Eden. Moses provides names to these two trees in order to suggest their symbolism. The Tree of Life, of which Adam and Eve are free to partake, symbolizes life itself, including not only the fact of physical existence but also the proper exercise of that life.
The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, on the other hand, is a tree of death. This forbidden tree represents the wrong exercise of human will, a choice to live in a way contrary both to the will of God and to the welfare of the human person. One goes wrong by choosing to eat from that tree rather than from the Tree of Life. When Adam and Eve decided to eat from the forbidden tree they were saying to God, We think we will have a better life this way than the way you have created for us, we think we know better than you what a good human life is like. They were saying that they know better than God what is the difference between good and evil.
We need to remind ourselves, however, that no one can possibly uncreate himself or herself. Which is to say that no one can become unhuman in the sense of becoming so wicked that there are no vestiges of the image of God. Simply having a will, the ability to make choices, is in itself an exercise of the gifts that God has given uniquely to humans. No one can extirpate the image of God in the sense of a noun, even though one may abuse it seriously in the sense of a verb.
c) The motivation to sin does not come from within human nature.
This is a negative observation, but it is part of Moses’ parable. Moses (or whoever wrote Genesis 3) wans to illustrate how it is that we humans do sin even though God created us to be good. In that parable there are two external symbols that combine to persuade Eve and Adam to disobey God: a forbidden tree and a speaking serpent. The serpent calls attention to the attractiveness of the tree and persuades Eve and Adam that it will be to their advantage to eat its fruit.
Why would anyone want to live wrong? Why would anyone want to live in such a way that violates his or her own proper nature? Because somehow or other he or she is persuaded that a better life will result.
To be human carries with it the necessity of making a great variety of choices every day. At bottom every choice is a moral choice, either right or wrong, even though in the hurly-burly of daily life it is not always clear which is which. There seems always to be something attractive about deciding to do something you know, or sense, is not right. You can always provide a rationalization. The fruit looks good, probably tastes good too; try it. You don’t have to let anyone else run your life, not even God; you can make your own decisions as to what you want to do; just do it. Be your own master.
So in the Genesis story the serpent represents all those rationalizations that we can and do make to justify our decisions, even when we know deep inside we are in the wrong. We do as a matter of actual fact make such decisions, sometimes fully knowing we should not, and we find some fallacious reasons for doing so. That is what the serpent in the story symbolizes.
It is, however, also to be noted that this motivation, temptation, to choose wrongly does not arise within the human nature that God created for Adam and Eve. It comes from outside, from some other aspect of nature, represented by the serpent. It is a misreading of nature, a mishearing of the word of God. It is an intentional misreading and mishearing. We must not imagine that God created human nature with any inherent element of badness. He did create us with the necessity of making choices, but with no inherent pressure or necessity to choose wrongly.
d) The image of God implies freedom of choice.
We might ask why God has created us capable of choosing wrongly.
God created us this way, with a will, for the precise purpose of enabling us to be his image. Freedom of choice, with an understood free choice to do right, would be the way that image would be expressed. We would not be human at all if we were incapable of making the choice between right and wrong. If all we could do was do right, then we would be no different from the rest of the animal kingdom. We would be virtual robots, incapable of doing anything other than what we were programmed for.
When God created us in his image he intended for us to choose the right voluntarily, without any compulsion whatsoever. But in order for this to happen there has to be an alternative, and that is what is implied by having a will as part of the image of God in us.
e) Nature is God’s language.
We turn now to the question of how God speaks to us in regard to right and wrong. How do we know what God wants us to do?
The Old Testament is full of passages which state in one way or another that the word of God came to this or that person. Genesis 1 simply says repeatedly, and God said. The question involved is this: What language does God employ when he speaks to us? The question may seem insincere, spurious. It is not.
In Genesis 1 there was no one to whom God spoke. He simply spoke to the swirling mass of unformed matter, and something happened as a result. What kind of language is that?
After God created Adam and Eve he forbade them to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. But Adam and Eve had just been created; presumably they did not yet have a developed language. How could they understand what God was saying? What language did God use to communicate this prohibition to them?