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Results from: Answered Bible Questions, Answers, Unanswered Bible Questions, Notes Ordered by Verse | ||||||
Results | Verse | Author | ID# | |||
1 | Distiction in "will" not "rationality" | Gen 3:1 | Lionstrong | 154010 | ||
Ps 94:9 He who planted the ear, does He not hear? He who formed the eye, does He not see? Hi Doc, I apologize in advance for this quick answer. If a thing possesses a degree of the image of God, then to that extent it is the image of God, which is why it is false that animals are the image of God. Man only is image God. Never in Scripture is the image ascribed to animals. Nor is the body of man or animals the image of God, and so, the sense organs of the body are not the image of God. God, who made the sense organs, perceives without them. If we die before Jesus returns, we will be with the Lord and perceive him without sense organs. Both animals and man perceive, but we perceive and understand what we perceive. Animal perceive but they have no understanding. So, perception is not the image of God. The image of God is rationality. And thanks for the correction. God is spirit. Iron sharpens iron! |
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2 | Distiction in "will" not "rationality" | Gen 3:1 | DocTrinsograce | 154038 | ||
Dear Lionstrong, You pretty much stand alone in your thesis that rationality (i.e., the ability to reason) is the sense in which man is made in the image of God. Aristotle might have agreed with you -- but Aristotle didn't believe in the God of the Bible. However, he is the one who first stated that the ability to reason was what distinguished man and beast. Augustine, in "City of God" goes to great length to show that man has a triune nature that reflects the Trinity. From then on, no theologians take your position. Indeed, I do not find a single commentator on these verses in Genesis to hold your position. I'll admit that these facts don't invalidate your argument in and of themselves. But Christian discussion of the Imago Dei over the centuries seem a bit more persuasive... at least to me. ;-) In Him, Doc "In the mind perfect intelligence flourished and reigned, uprightness attended as its companion, and all the senses were prepared and moulded for due obedience to reason; and in the body there was a suitable correspondence with this internal order. But now, although some obscure lineaments of that image are found remaining in us; yet are they so vitiated and maimed, that they may truly be said to be destroyed. For besides the deformity which everywhere appears unsightly, this evil also is added, that no part is free from the infection of sin." --John Calvin "As there are two kinds of attributes in God, according to our way of conceiving of him, his moral attributes which are summed up in his holiness and his natural attributes of strength, knowledge, etc., that constitute the greatness of God; so there is a two-fold imago Dei in man, his moral or spiritual image, which is his holiness and man's natural image, consisting in man's reason and understanding, his natural ability and dominion over the creatures, which is the image of God's natural ability." --Jonathan Edwards "Man's creation in the image of God does not first and foremost entail his rational facilities, but his built-in teleology as a receptacle and reflector for the divine glory-presence." --Geerhardus Vos "Love is central in the image of God." --Anthony Hoekema "From the doctrine that man has been created in the image of God flows the clear implication that that image extends to man in his entirety. Nothing in man is excluded from the image of God. All creatures reveal traces of God, but only man is the image of God. And he is that image totally, in soul and body, in all faculties and powers, in all conditions and relationships. Man is the image of God because and insofar as he is true man, and he is man, true and real man, because and insofar as he is the image of God." --Herman Bavinck |
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