thinking bible.

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what might 'in our image, after our likeness' have meant to an ancient israelite audience?

The passage, plainly, with room to sit with it.

Genesis 1:26-27

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.

This passage comes from the creation account in Genesis, often attributed to priestly sources during or after the Babylonian exile (around the 6th-5th centuries BCE). It describes the creation of humanity as the pinnacle of God's work, after establishing the cosmos and filling it with life.

What responsibilities might flow from being created in God's image?

Keep thinking

Read alongside it

  • Psalm 8:4-6

    Echoes the theme of humanity's exalted, yet dependent, place in creation.

  • Genesis 9:6

    Connects the shedding of human blood to the idea of humanity bearing God's image.

  • James 3:9

    Refers to cursing people, who are made 'in the likeness of God'.

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