What does it mean that human beings are made in the image of God?
Few biblical teachings have greater consequences for how we understand human dignity, morality, purpose, and redemption. Scripture distinguishes humanity from the rest of earthly creation with these words:
“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” — Genesis 1:26
The next verse deliberately includes both sexes:
“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.” — Genesis 1:27
Men and women therefore share equally in this God-given dignity.
The fall has profoundly corrupted humanity, yet Scripture continues to describe fallen human beings as possessing God’s likeness. At the same time, salvation renews believers “after the image” of their Creator.
To understand the image of God properly, we therefore need to distinguish what belonged to man’s original righteousness, what remains after the fall, and what Christ restores through redemption.
What Is the Image of God?
Scripture does not reduce the image of God to one human ability or characteristic.
It certainly does not mean that God possesses a physical body resembling ours. “God is a Spirit” (John 4:24), and the divine nature is incorporeal.
The Westminster Standards especially emphasize man’s original moral likeness to God. WSC 10 says:
“God created man male and female, after his own image, in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, with dominion over the creatures.”
This language comes directly from Paul’s description of renewal in Christ. Colossians 3:10 speaks of the new man being “renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him,” while Ephesians 4:24 describes the new man as “created in righteousness and true holiness.”
These passages help us understand what Adam originally possessed.
He knew God truly. His moral nature was righteous. His affections were holy. He possessed no inward corruption pulling him away from his Creator.
Yet Scripture associates God’s image with more than these lost moral qualities. Humanity remains distinctively image-bearing after the fall, possesses rational and moral capacities, is appointed to dominion, and retains a dignity that places human life under particular divine protection.
It is therefore useful to speak of the image in a broader and a narrower sense.
In the broader sense, fallen human beings remain God’s image-bearers.
In the narrower moral sense, the original knowledge, righteousness, and holiness were lost through sin and are restored only through Christ.
The Image Includes Knowledge, Righteousness, and Holiness
Adam and Eve were created morally upright.
Their knowledge of God was not darkened by unbelief. Their wills were not enslaved to sin. Their loves were properly ordered.
This original righteousness matters because the fall is not man’s ascent from moral primitiveness toward greater maturity. It is a descent from created holiness into corruption.
Ecclesiastes 7:29 says:
“God hath made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions.”
The gospel’s work of renewal confirms the same point from the other direction.
When Paul describes believers being restored in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, he uses creation language because salvation renews something sin has ruined.
Sanctification is therefore profoundly connected with the image of God. WSC 35 describes sanctification as God’s gracious work by which “we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God.”
God is making His people increasingly what man was originally created to be.
The Image Includes a Calling to Dominion
Genesis closely connects image-bearing with dominion:
“Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion…” — Genesis 1:26
Human beings occupy a unique place within the visible creation. God appoints them to exercise responsible rule over the creatures beneath Him.
Psalm 8 marvels at this dignity. Man appears small beneath the heavens, yet God has crowned him “with glory and honour” and given him dominion over the works of His hands.
This does not mean that domination itself defines the image, as though rulers were more fully human than those who possess little power. Male and female alike bear God’s image before any particular act of dominion is performed.
Rather, dominion is one expression of humanity’s image-bearing vocation.
We are creatures entrusted with meaningful responsibility within God’s world.
Male and Female Bear the Image Equally
Genesis 1:27 deliberately states that God created humanity “male and female” in His image.
The man does not bear a greater portion of God’s image than the woman, nor does the woman derive her image-bearing dignity merely from the man. Both stand before God as fully human creatures made in His likeness.
This equal dignity should not be confused with interchangeability. Genesis 2 distinguishes man and woman bodily and gives their relationship an ordered form, especially within marriage.
Yet whatever distinctions Scripture establishes between men and women cannot be used to diminish the humanity or God-given dignity of either sex.
The image belongs equally to both.
Is the Image of God Lost After the Fall?
Sin radically corrupts humanity, but Scripture does not teach that fallen man ceases altogether to bear God’s image.
After the flood, God says:
“Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.” — Genesis 9:6
The reason murder is so serious is that the victim belongs to a race God made in His image.
James makes the same point concerning sinful speech. With the tongue, he says, men curse other people “which are made after the similitude of God” (James 3:9).
Both passages concern fallen humanity.
The image therefore remains.
Yet something enormous has been lost. WLC 25 describes fallen humanity as lacking the righteousness in which man was created and possessing a corrupted nature that is opposed to spiritual good.
The mind remains a human mind, but it is darkened.
The will remains a human will, but it is morally corrupt.
The affections remain human affections, but they are disordered by sin.
Man remains God’s image-bearer while no longer reflecting God’s moral likeness as he did in his original uprightness.
The image is therefore marred but not erased.
The Image of God and Human Dignity
Because human dignity rests upon God’s act of creation rather than human achievement, it does not increase and decrease according to usefulness, intelligence, health, wealth, strength, race, sex, or social status.
This has enormous ethical significance.
A child in the womb does not need to acquire usefulness before human life deserves protection. A person with profound intellectual disability does not possess less human dignity because certain abilities are impaired. Age does not erase image-bearing dignity when the body weakens or the mind declines.
Nor can race or social rank establish degrees of humanity.
Every person belongs to the one human race descended from Adam and lives before the God whose image humanity bears.
It is better, however, to speak of human beings possessing profound or inviolable God-given dignity rather than “infinite worth.” Infinity belongs properly to God. Human dignity is extraordinary precisely because the infinite God has bestowed it upon finite creatures.
The Image of God Changes How We Treat Others
James 3 makes this doctrine remarkably practical.
Human speech matters because the person being addressed bears God’s likeness. Contempt, cruelty, exploitation, dehumanization, and unjust violence therefore carry a theological significance greater than ordinary breaches of etiquette.
We are dealing with creatures God made.
The doctrine of the image gives Christians reason to protect vulnerable life, reject racial superiority, care for the disabled and elderly, treat the poor as human beings rather than inconveniences, and refuse to measure a person’s dignity by economic productivity or social usefulness.
It should also shape ordinary life.
The spouse with whom we are impatient, the employee we overlook, the stranger who inconveniences us, the person whose opinions provoke us, and even the enemy we find difficult to love all possess a dignity grounded in creation.
A high doctrine of God should produce a serious regard for those who bear His likeness.
The Image of God Does Not Mean Man Is Divine
Being made in God’s image does not blur the distinction between Creator and creature.
Human beings are not fragments of deity, small gods, or beings capable of developing into divinity.
The image depends upon God. God does not depend upon the image.
A reflection receives whatever glory it possesses from what it reflects. In the same way, human dignity should lead us upward toward the Creator rather than inward toward self-worship.
The doctrine exalts man above the rest of earthly creation while simultaneously humbling him beneath God.
We are made in His image.
We are not Him.
Christ Is the Image of the Invisible God
The New Testament brings the language of God’s image to its highest point in Jesus Christ.
Paul calls Christ:
“the image of the invisible God.” — Colossians 1:15
Hebrews calls the Son “the express image of his person” (Hebrews 1:3).
We must distinguish Christ’s image-bearing from ours. The eternal Son does not merely resemble God as a creature resembles its Creator. He shares the Father’s divine nature and perfectly reveals Him.
Jesus can therefore say, “he that hath seen me hath seen the Father” (John 14:9).
Yet through the incarnation the eternal Son also becomes the perfect Man.
Where Adam failed to reflect God faithfully, Christ lives in complete obedience. He loves His Father perfectly, fulfills righteousness, exercises holiness without defect, and accomplishes the vocation entrusted to Him.
The true image is therefore displayed before us in the God-man.
The Image Is Renewed in Believers
Salvation involves more than forgiveness from guilt.
God renews His people.
Paul tells believers that they have “put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him” (Colossians 3:10). Ephesians similarly speaks of the new man “which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness” (Ephesians 4:24).
These are the very qualities Westminster uses to describe man’s original creation.
The connection is deliberate.
Through union with Christ and the sanctifying work of the Holy Ghost, God renews the image in His people. Their minds are increasingly brought under truth, their lives increasingly conformed to righteousness, and their affections increasingly directed toward holiness.
This renewal remains incomplete in the present life. Every Christian continues to struggle with remaining corruption.
But the direction has changed.
Grace is restoring what sin corrupted.
The Image Will Be Perfected in Glory
What begins in regeneration and sanctification will be completed when Christ returns.
John writes:
“We know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.” — 1 John 3:2
Paul likewise contrasts Adam and Christ:
“And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.” — 1 Corinthians 15:49
Redemption therefore brings the doctrine of the image to its final goal.
God created humanity in His image.
Sin corrupted that image.
Christ, the perfect image, redeems His people.
The Spirit renews them after God’s likeness.
And in glory they will finally reflect their Creator without sin.
This gives the doctrine both weight and hope. Every person we meet possesses dignity as God’s creature. Every believer is also becoming something more: increasingly conformed to the image of God’s Son (Romans 8:29).
The Christian should therefore look at humanity neither with naïve optimism nor with contempt.
We know how deeply sin has corrupted man.
We also know what God created man to be and what grace will finally make Christ’s people.
Westminster references: WCF 4.2; 6.2–4; 13.1; WLC 17, 25, 75; WSC 10, 18, 35.