Human beings, we read in Genesis 1, are created in God’s image and likeness. Throughout the centuries theologians have struggled with these terms, trying to ascertain their precise meaning. Some have concluded that they refer to the fact that humans, unlike other creatures, have the ability to reason and so to communicate with God. Others believe that they point to the human ability to establish relationships, and still others that they must be interpreted in a functional sense, referring to the fact that human beings were appointed as God’s vice-regents with the specific task of ruling the rest of creation.
- From Reformed academic
Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
Genesis 1:26-27
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
Colossians 1:15
The concept of man as the image or likeness of God tells us that man as he was created was to mirror [i.e. to make visible the Invisible] and to represent God [i.e. to act as God, under God and for God's creation].
Anthony A. Hoekema Created in God's Image, pg. 67
We must learn to know what the image of God is by looking at Jesus Christ. What must therefore be at the center of the image of God is not characteristics like the ability to reason or the ability to make decisions...but rather that which was central in the life of Christ: love for God and love for man.
Anthony A. Hoekema Created in God's Image, pg. 22
| Title |
Notes |
Men and Women in the Image of God  |
John M. Frame |
The Image of God in Man (.pdf)  |
Gordon H. Clark |
Human Dignity and the Human Heart  |
John Warwick Montgomery |
Beyond the Fire of Prometheus: The Capacity for Human Speech, Empirical Evidence of the Image of God  |
James G. Bohn (.pdf) |
What Is Mankind? The Image of God  |
Dr. Richard Pratt |
What is the image of God?  |
Peter May |
Some Perspectives on the Image of God in Man  |
Robert C. Newman |
John Calvin on the Image of God  |
in his Commentary on Genesis |
The Image of God in Man  |
Abraham Kuyper |
The Image of God in Man  |
Robert South 1638–1716 |
Two Adams, Two Covenants of Works  |
Meredith G. Kline Caution!: Reading this may rock your world! (pdf) |
Male and Female He Created Them in the Image of God  |
John Piper |
What Is Man? Reflections on Abortion and Racial Reconciliation  |
John Piper - Psalm 8 |
What is Man?  |
Stan Reeves |
Imago Dei: The Heights of Humanity, the Depths of Depravity  |
Charles Biggs |
Imago Dei, Part 1  |
P. G. Mathew, M.A., M.Div., Th.M. |
Imago Dei, Part 2  |
P. G. Mathew, M.A., M.Div., Th.M. |
Human Dignity and the Human Heart  |
Issues, Etc. |
Anthropology: The Study of Man  |
Stanford Murrell |
The Importance of Reformed Anthropology for Ethics  |
John Cooper |
The image of God in man  |
Paul Mizzi |
After effects of the fall  |
Paul Mizzi |
Universal belief in God  |
Paul Mizzi |
Man's duty to God  |
Paul Mizzi |
No excuse  |
Paul Mizzi |
Made in the Image of God  |
Bill Green - Genesis 1:1-3 and 2 Corinthians 3:18 |
Imago Dei: Man in the Image of God (Part I)  |
Rev. Charles R. Biggs - The Heights of Humanity, the Depths of Depravity |
Imago Dei - (Part II)  |
Rev. Charles R. Biggs, The Heights of Humanity - the Depths of Depravity: Life-Work |
Doctrine of Man - Creation of Man in the Image of God (MP3)  |
Wayne Grudem - Systematic Theology |
The Image of God in Humanity  |
Nathan Lewis |
The Image of God  |
Charles Lee Feinberg |
Images of God: A Biblical Theology of Leadership  |
Massimo Lorenzini |
The Imago Dei: The Fall, Redemption and Ethics (MP3)  |
Ken Samples |
The Essentiality of Transcendence and the Failure of Religious Answers  |
John Warwick Montgomery - Foundations of Human Dignity |
Male-Female Equality and Male Headship: Genesis 1-3  |
Raymond C. Ortlund Jr. |
Garden Temple  |
Gregory K. Beale |
Image Of God  |
Thomas Manton |
The Greatness and Miserableness of Man  |
Herman Bavinck |
Imago Dei (MP3 Series)  |
Doug VanderMeulen - Community Baptist Church of Fargo |
The Image of God in Man: A Reformed Reassessment  |
Rev. Angus Stewart |
Some Perspectives on the Image of God in Man from Biblical Theology  |
Robert C. Newman  |
The Image of God in Man  |
D. J. A. CLINES |
Designed for Dignity  |
Jerry Bridges |
Conformed to His Image  |
Greg Bailey |
Dust to Dust  |
Burk Parsons |
Sanctity of Life  |
John Davis |
Jesus as the Imago Dei (.pdf)  |
stanley j. grenz |
Image of God (.pdf)  |
The Westminster handbook to evangelical theology |
Image of God (.pdf)  |
Walter A. Elwell |
Imago Christi, Dei, John Calvin  |
Charles Partee |
The Significance of God's Image in Man (.pdf)  |
Gerald Bray |
An Introduction to ‘Theological Anthropology’ (.pdf)  |
Charles Cameron |
The Imago Dei And Christian Aesthetics (.pdf)  |
William A. Dyrness |
The Original State of Adam: Tensions Within Reformed Theology (.pdf)  |
Mark W. Karlberg |
Investiture with the image of God  |
Meredith G. Kline |
The Liberating Image? Interpreting the Imago Dei in Context (.pdf)  |
J. Richard Middleton |
On the Nature of Man (.pdf)  |
SAMUEL J. MIKOLASKI, D. PHIL. |
THE IMAGO DEI AS FAMILITAS (.pdf)  |
RANDALL E. OTTO* |
DOES THE CHRISTIAN HAVE "FLESH" IN GAL 5:13, 26? (.pdf)  |
WALTER BO RUSSELL, III |
In Search of the Image of God: Theology of a lost paradigm? (.pdf)  |
Paul Wells |
The Origin of the Soul: New Light on an Old Question (.pdf)  |
John C. Yates. |
Basics of the Reformed Faith: Divine Image Bearers  |
Kim Riddlebarger |