The Narrative Lectionary begins the Year 4 cycle with this lesson. The Revised Common Lectionary includes it for Holy Trinity Sunday (Year A); it is also part of the Easter Vigil
Summary: In Genesis 1 order is not a bad thing. The enemy seems to be a lack of structure, authority and clarity. To be brought into God's creative task, namely, to be reestablished in his image, is to be brought into the task of organizing creation. This is likely surprising because much of the creative task of today's world seems to be the breaking free of authority.
Fragmented or autonomous living is not the intention of God's creation. I do not argue, nor do I think Genesis 1 justifies, huge systems that simply promote uniformity if not excessive consumption of resources. Yet, Genesis 1 does speak against an understanding, particularly 21st century American, that autonomy is the goal of the human, if not even the spiritual human.
- There is no simply linguistic analysis that will solve this debate, as in, this is what this word originally met. You can't undo 3,000 year of reflection on this with one look in a Hebrew dictionary!
- Genesis 1:26 isn't the only data on what it means to be in the image of God. Even if one does not look at all of Scripture, certainly one needs to consider all of Genesis 1, seeing who God is and then reflecting on what being in that image might mean.
- My suggestion is that the image of God is less about an individual capacity but rather a collective capacity -- let us make humankind in our image -- does not read like a statement about one human.
- When used elsewhere in the Old Testament, it often refers to idols of gods. It is helpful to consider that idols were believed in themselves to have power -- to be portals to the gods and even their eyes in the world.
- What might this mean then for us to be THE God's idols, the God's portals and sentinels in the world? The NET captures discussions about this topic very well, crouching its discussion within the confines of the book of Genesis: The "image of God" would be the God-given mental and spiritual capacities that enable people to relate to God and to serve him by ruling over the created order as his earthly vice-regents.
כבש (c-v-sh, "enslave", Gen 1:28) In every other Biblical instance this word means some kind of conquering, subduing, enslaving or possibly even raping. This is difficult for us as modern readers because we do not want to understand our relationship to the earth as one of enslaving it. While the word rule (רדה, Gen 1:26-1:28) is slightly less problematic, we cannot escape כבש! My thoughts are
- Farming before technology was difficult work. Clearing and plowing fields would have felt like an act of battle in many ways against the forces - the ground, the weather, the insects, the other animals. In this context, that kind of combat verb might have made sense.
- Second, everything that God tells the humans is governed by them being in God's image. The kind of rule and even dominion that we are to offer is to reflect God's intended rule.
- Third, there is a parallel structure in Genesis 1, with days 1 and 4; 2 and 5 and 3 and 6 corresponding to each other. This means that our ruling is previously modeled by the moon and sun, providing organization and order.
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