The Shack

[dysert]

I didn't say that.

No, I know. Hence the question mark. So I'm asking what you think: does being made in the image of God connote maleness or femaleness?

 

[Archivist]

No, I know. Hence the question mark. So I'm asking what you think: does being made in the image of God connote maleness or femaleness?

If we are made in the image of God, male and female, then yes. God is spirit but He has masculine and feminine aspects.

That is, of course, my opinion. Others are free to their own interpretations

 

[dysert]

double post

 

[dayhiker]

The image of God is not defined by God, by the Bible so I think anything that we say about what the image of God is our opinion.

One aspect for me that ties in with male and female in the image of God is the love relationship that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit have had for eternity. If we are to be like God then we too should have love relationships. Here I'm talking friendship, parent - child, spousal etc. Since the context is Adam and Eve's creation we can say there is a specific tie into the husband wife relationship, but I can't see it being limited to just that type of relationship.

 

[AACJ]

But Scripture tells us that mankind, male and female, were created in the image of God.

The passage you are referring to has more that one possible interpretation.To what extent was man or woman made in the image of God? This is an ongoing debate. If man was made in the image of God without sharing all of Gods characteristics--and he apparently did not share all those characteristics-- is it possible that woman was made in the image of God to a different extent than man? That is, man alone sharing God's gender? Even the angels of God are patterned after God's image to a certain extent.

Christ was the "express" image of God and he was male.

Look up "Imago Dei."

 

[mkgal1]

The image of God is not defined by God

Except we *do* have this: "God is love" (1st John 4). God is "good" and said (in Genesis) that humanity is as well.
1 Timothy 4:4
"For everything created by God is good"

Maybe that's what it means to be "made in the image of God"? But I agree....that "goodness" and "love" is meant for community (with God and creation).

 

[AACJ]

Thanks for sharing your knowledge. It wasn't my intent to say it did ascribe gender to God/Holy Spirit. God I don't see as a sexual being, Jesus as born of a woman and being a man would be by His virgin birth but not by His eternal existence. So any reference to God as male or female is more cultural and linguistic than a statement of gender for me.

I am not sure exactly what you mean.

Sexual function (sexuality) is not a necessary component of personhood as pertaining to spirits, resurrected bodies and gender. As pertaining to sexual function (sexual ability/reproduction), in our resurrected bodies we will not not loose our gender just becasue we have no sexual function (sexuality) (Mat 22:30). A Spirit (God) needs no sexual ability/function to be male or masculine in nature.

 

[Archivist]

The passage you are referring to has more that one possible interpretation.To what extent was man or woman made in the image of God? This is an ongoing debate. If man was made in the image of God without sharing all of Gods characteristics--which he was not-- is it possible that woman was made in the image of God to a different extent than man? That is, man alone sharing God's gender? Even the angels of God are patterned after God's image to a certain extent.

Christ was the "express" image of God and he was male.

Look up "Imago Dei."

And, as you said, there is more than one interpretation. We simply have to agree to disagree.

 

[mkgal1]

The authoritative Word of God describes God Almighty as "Father," as "Husband."

That is just a metaphor. There are many *other* metaphors as well. God is also depicted as a "birthing God" (for just one more example--there are many others):


Deut. 32:18 “You forget the rock who begot you, unmindful of the God who gave birth to you”
• Job 38:8 “Who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb?”
• Isaiah 42:14 “I groan like a woman in labor; I will gasp and pant”
• Isaiah 46: 3-4: “You who have been carried since birth, whom I have carried since time you were born” – incubating in God’s womb
• John 1:12: Those who believe in God are born of God
• John 4:7: Everyone who loves is born of God
• John 16:21: God is bringing forth a new humanity like the pangs of a woman in labor; Her hour has come

 

[AACJ]

That is just a metaphor.
There are many *other* metaphors as well. God is also depicted as a "birthing God" (for just one more example--there are many others):


Deut. 32:18 “You forget the rock who begot you, unmindful of the God who gave birth to you”
• Job 38:8 “Who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb?”
• Isaiah 42:14 “I groan like a woman in labor; I will gasp and pant”
• Isaiah 46: 3-4: “You who have been carried since birth, whom I have carried since time you were born” – incubating in God’s womb
• John 1:12: Those who believe in God are born of God
• John 4:7: Everyone who loves is born of God
• John 16:21: God is bringing forth a new humanity like the pangs of a woman in labor; Her hour has come
• Romans 8:22 From the beginning to now the entire creation has been groaning in one great act of giving birth (creation)

"Father," "Husband."
Even if these nouns are used solely as metaphors, they are descriptive nouns, not actions. Your examples are spiritual/metaphorical actions, not descriptive nouns. Not the same.
A noun is no more an action than an action is a noun. A metaphor is not an exact equivalence. A Father or husband is a person. An action is not a person.

 

[AACJ]

The image of God is not defined by God.

I believe the first step in understanding the image of God is found in these two verses:

Heb 1:3 Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.

Joh 14:9 Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?

 

[Archivist]

"Father," "Husband."
Even if these nouns are used solely as metaphors, they are descriptive nouns, not actions. Your examples are spiritual/metaphorical actions, not descriptive nouns. Not the same.
A noun is no more an action than an action is a noun. A metaphor is not an exact equivalence. A Father or husband is a person. An action is not a person.

But was the term "Father" used because God is male or for the benefit of human beings in what was a very patriarchal society where women counted for very little?

 

[AACJ]

But was the term "Father" used because God is male or for the benefit of human beings in what was a very patriarchal society where women counted for very little?

Good question. Maybe a better question is: Should we interpret all biblical, descriptive nouns according to a specific time and place from which they sprang or interpret them within the context of all places and all times in which God ordained for His Word to eventually reach and be read? God's Word--pertaining to his nature, attributes/ordained principles are not cultural/time specific.

 

[mkgal1]

"Father," "Husband."
Even if these nouns are used solely as metaphors, they are descriptive nouns, not actions. Your examples are spiritual/metaphorical actions, not descriptive nouns. Not the same.
A noun is no more an action than an action is a noun. A metaphor is not an exact equivalence. A Father or husband is a person. An action is not a person.

Some have described God as a verb more than a noun.

Here's an example:

Lady Julian of Norwich (c. 1342-c.1416) is one of my favorite mystics. Julian experienced her showings, as she called them, all on one night, probably May 8, 1373. It was such a profound experience that she asked the bishop to enclose her in a small anchor-hold built onto St. Julian’s Church in Norwich, England. (We don’t know Julian’s real name; we call her by the name of this church.) From a window that looked into the sanctuary she would attend mass; from another window she would counsel people who came to visit her. Julian lived in the anchor-hold for perhaps twenty years and spent this time trying to communicate what she experienced in one night.

For me, Chapter 54 of Julian’s Showings is the best description I have read of the union of the soul within the Trinity. The mystics always go to the Trinitarian level because here God is a verb more than a noun, God is a flow more than a substance, God is an experience more than an old man sitting on a throne. And we are inside that flow of love. Julian writes:

Greatly ought we to rejoice that God dwells in our soul; and more greatly ought we to rejoice that our soul dwells in God. Our soul is created to be God’s dwelling place, and the dwelling of our soul is God. . . . [This is what some call inter-being.] It is a great understanding to see and know inwardly that God, who is our creator, dwells in our soul, and it is a far greater understanding to see and know inwardly that our soul, which is created, dwells in God in substance, of which substance, through God, we are what we are. [We share in the same substantial, ontological, and metaphysical unity.] And I saw no difference between God and our substance, but, as it were, all God; and still my understanding accepted that our substance is in God. [1]

Intimacy implies twoness, but twoness overcome and enjoyed. Julian preserves differentiation, the dance of partners. She is not a pantheist; she is not saying everything is God. She is saying everything is in God and God is in everything— which is panentheism.~https://cac.org/one-god-one-love-2016-12-13/

 

[jimmyjimmy]

The image of God is not defined by God, by the Bible so I think anything that we say about what the image of God is our opinion.

Are you saying that God cannot and has not done a good job at communicating who He is? Are you further saying that Jesus is not the image of the Father?

 

[dayhiker]

Are you saying that God cannot and has not done a good job at communicating who He is? Are you further saying that Jesus is not the image of the Father?

I didn't even hint at either of those ideas. My idea is that God hasn't told us exactly what His image in us is. I think we can have a pretty good idea by meditating on the topic. But those still end up being our thoughts on the topic and not God's.

 

[seashale76]

Heterodoxy. After hearing about this book, I am extremely unimpressed. I won't be reading it. I don't care to watch the movie.

 

[Archivist]

Heterodoxy. After hearing about this book, I am extremely unimpressed. I won't be reading it. I don't care to watch the movie.

Too bad. Both the book and the movie were excellent.

 

[seashale76]

Too bad. Both the book and the movie were excellent.

It doesn't sound even remotely appealing. You can keep it.

 

[Archivist]

It doesn't sound even remotely appealing. You can keep it.

Your call of course. As I said you are missing a good book and a good movie.