Humanity was Created in the Image of God

 

‘Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness,…” So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.’ Genesis 1:26 - 27

 

Generally, this creation in God's image is considered to be figurative. Humans aren't mirror images of God, but are like God in some fashion – we’re both rational, we can both love others, etc. Following Harding (e.g. his article on Transubstantiation), contrarily, I shall assume that the meaning is literal. Humans are literally created in the image of God.

 

The question that follows from this then, is, what is God’s image? What does God look like? I should emphasize that I am not interested in how God looks to others, which obviously might vary depending upon conditions and who the others are. I am interested in what God looks like for himself; after all, he is best placed to know how he looks.

 

This seems to make the task doubly hard, I have to both find God and find out what he looks like for himself. Fortunately, we’ve been provided with a solution to both these problems – the incarnation. God came down to earth as Jesus, and Jesus told us what he looked like, for himself: “The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.” (Matthew 6:22). “The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thine eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light; but when thine eye is evil, thy body also is full of darkness.” (Luke 11:34). Admittedly, this does sound figurative rather than literal too. How can one have but a single eye? And what does it mean to have a body of light?

 

However, take a look in the mirror. How many eyes does your reflection have? For most people, the answer is two. But, how many eyes do you, not your reflection, have? Only you can answer, but I suspect the answer is one, in the sense that there is no division in your field of vision. [If you had to answer ‘one’ to the number of eyes possessed by your reflection, then it is quite permissible to answer, ‘none’ to the number of eyes you yourself have. After all, whatever you have is very different from that one eye of your reflection. If that’s one, you’ve got none. If visual experiments are inaccessible to you, other experiments are available at: The Headless Way].

 

Just as your eye is single, how does your body seem to you? It’s useful to make comparisons with other people’s bodies. Clearly other people’s bodies are in the world. When they move, they move through their environment– one body moving through a world of other bodies. But, when you move, you remain still, and the world moves through you. This can be seen most clearly when travelling at high speed, but once seen can be observed at all velocities. Whereas other bodies are places in the world, you are a place for the world. Your body, for you, is light (as in transparent), certainly not dark. You therefore have a single eye and a body of light, just like Jesus – in other words, you are created in the image of God. QED.

 

You might complain that all this is childish, rather than adult and sensible (“Of course I have two eyes,” "Of course I move through the world," and so on). But, "I tell you the truth, unless you turn around and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3) You need to look and see how things actually are, as a child does, rather than how you think they are. How do you look for yourself at 0cm, as opposed to how you look when the observer is 30cm away (as you appear in a mirror)?

 

You do indeed look like everyone else at 30cm away; and if someone takes a video of you moving, you do indeed move through the world just like every other body. But at 0cm, that all changes; you are a single eye with a transparent body. A video taken with the camera at 0cm shows the world moving, not you moving (cf. first person video games). The adult response is that this is just perspective; that's how the world has to look from a single point. But that again is using adult familiarity to miss the childlike wonder that there is a point of view, a here/now. The whole world is just uncountably many there/thens, bodies at particular points at particular times (points with spatial and temporal co-ordinates). And presumably, before life, that was all there was. But now there is also one unique here/now. Somehow, a unique reference point was created from out of a sea of qualitatively indistinguishable there/thens. And for that unique point to see any of the other points, it must be light, transparent, so that it can receive them. If it too were a solid body, or even a diaphanous one, something with its own nature, it could not perceive other natures. In other words, it's no good to be figuratively like God, you have to be created in the image of God to see the world.

 

 

Seeing how things actually are makes the strongest case for the literal claim, but it can take courage to say what you see. So it is worth considering the sayings of some of the greatest mystics and seers (who might be expected to know more about God, than the average person). Talk of inner light and single eyes are quite common, as may be seen in the following quotes. Take them literally rather than figuratively.

 

 

If you have the idea that you are something with form, that you are limited by this body, and that being within this body you have to see through these eyes, God and the world also will appear to you as form. If you realise you are without form, that you are unlimited, that you alone exist, that you are the eye, the infinite eye, what is there to be seen apart from the infinite eye? Apart from the eye there is nothing to be seen. Ramana Maharshi (Day by Day with Bhagavan. 18 April, 1946.)

 

It is the wish of Wakan-Tanka (The Great Spirit) that the light enters into the darkness, that we may see not only with our two eyes, but with the one eye which is of the heart, and with which we see and know all that is true and good. Black Elk of the Oglala Sioux

 

When My Beloved Appears

When my Beloved appears,

With what eye do I see Him?

 

With His eye, not with mine

For none sees Him except Himself.

Ibn Arabi (Translated by: Reynold A Nicholson)

 

From me everything is born; on me everything is supported; into me everything is again dissolved. I am this Brahman, One-without-a-second -- Of inconceivable power am I; without eyes I see; without ears I hear. Kaivalya Upanishad

 

To comprehend and to understand God above all similitudes, as He is in Himself, is to be God with God, without intermediary, and without any otherness that can become a hindrance or an intermediary.

Whosoever wishes to understand this must have died to himself, and must live in God, and must turn his gaze to the eternal light in the ground of his spirit, where the Hidden Truth reveals Itself without means. Ruysbroek

 

This affair is like the bright sun in the blue sky, shining clearly, changeless and motionless, without diminishing or increasing. It shines everywhere in the daily activities of everyone, appearing in everything. Though you try to grasp it, you cannot get it; though you try to abandon it, it always remains. It is vast and unobstructed, utterly empty. Ta-hui

 

He that beholds his own Face – his light is greater than the light of the creatures.

Though he die, his sight is everlasting, because his sight is the sight of the Creator. Rumi

 

If you would know God, and worship and serve God as you should do, you must come to the means He has ordained and given for that purpose. Some seek it in books, some in learned men, but what they look for is in themselves, yet they overlook it. The voice is too still, the Seed too small, and the Light shineth in darkness…. The woman that lost her silver found it at home after she had lighted her candle and swept her house. Do you so too, and you shall find what Pilate wanted to know, viz., Truth. The Light of Christ within, who is the Light of the world, and so a light to you that tells you the truth of your condition, leads all that take heed unto it out of darkness into God’s marvelous light; for light grows upon the obedient. William Penn

  

 

Original Sin

This is a short primer on the meaning of ‘original sin’ as opposed to its history. Original sin is best thought of as the name we give to our estrangement from God. Since this estrangement is a metaphysical estrangement rather than an everyday, commonsense separation, the term describes a metaphysical rather than a psychological or moral condition.

 

It is unfortunate that the name includes the word ‘sin’ which is generally taken to mean doing (relatively) bad things. Original sin has nothing to do with this sort of sin, except that such sinning can be seen as a consequence of original sin. So, all other things being equal, the best human imaginable is as much a victim of original sin as the worst. We are all original sinners.

 

Since original sin is the estrangement of humanity from God, this is the problem for humanity. And, for Christianity, the solution to this problem is the death and resurrection of Jesus. The problem is a metaphysical one and accordingly, so is the solution. Which is why neither problem nor solution make any everyday sense. Why should I suffer for something that I haven’t done? What use, to me, now, is someone dying and then coming back from the dead 2,000 years ago?

 

The problem that Christianity sets itself to solve is described in chapters 2 and 3 of Genesis. So mercifully, the whole thing is wrapped up in those couple of chapters and the passages in the Gospels about the death and resurrection of Jesus. Chapter 1 of Genesis also includes an account of the creation of humanity but since it doesn’t detail a Fall, it’s not really relevant, so it will be ignored here.

 

Clearly, the Genesis account is not a literal one. Humans were not formed from clay figurines, there was no Garden of Eden, through which a God the Father liked to saunter in the evening. Nor was there a tree of knowledge of Good and Evil or a cunning serpent, and so on. It is a mythic, poetic account, the meaning of which is important, not the literal details. Fortunately, the meaning of the account is quite clear. God takes a bit of clay and forms Adam from it. Obviously, the clay figurine is lifeless. So, God breathes his own spirit (ruach) into it and the figure comes to life. This is the first incarnation. God freely places his spirit within the restricted point of view of the creature Adam (Vedantaists may compare Brahman and Atman here). The life of the creature is the life of God.

 

And this life was fine, except it was probably a bit boring. To be a story worth hearing, there needs to be some irruption in the daily cycle of life, something about which there can be a story. And God sets out to achieve this. The trouble with being God is that you know everything that’s ever happened and everything that is going to happen, so it’s a bit difficult to surprise yourself. Adam as he was – God looking out through the eyes of a clay figurine – was not going to be tricked by a sly old serpent: “Hello, Lucifer, lovely day, eh? No fruit for me today, thank you.” So, God puts his self in the clay figurine to sleep (or in a trance). He purposefully forgets who he is and dreams that he is not God, but the inhabitant of a body. He is no longer creator but part of creation. We can see this because he is now aware of and concerned about all the relative values of the world. He knows about what is good and evil for him; he learns to distinguish other polarities such as male and female; and finally he learns about the most significant duality, from which all others flow, of him and not him. From this follows the polarity of life and death, and as God had previously explained (not threatened), if you are alive, you will die, since the two go together. So eating of the fruit does bring death, because as with all dualities, you can’t have one without the other (you can’t have all up and no down).

 

This voluntary forgetting is the original sin, for it is from that that the story of humanity arises. A number of analogies are used here, it is like being in a dream or trance, or God is like an actor in a play who is so immersed in their part that they forget that it is just a play and they are just an actor. There is no point in asking why this has happened and expecting a literal answer. As humans, we only know the lines of the play, and we cannot peer outside of the play to see why it might have been written. All our language is within the play; we do not know the words for what happens outside (“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:8-9). So we can but resort to our analogies, or keep silent. Within these analogies, it is generally held that God freely decided to do this (he was not forced by necessity or otherwise, nor was it a mistake), though the apophatic “neither freely nor not freely” (for neither is appropriate) should always be remembered.

 

And this has consequences for how we end our estrangement with God. Firstly it must be said that the goodest good news is that we are not estranged from God, but only dream we are. For we are “God asleep” and as you cannot be fundamentally estranged from yourself, we are not fundamentally alienated from God. Secondly, it is God’s choice to forget who he is, so there is nothing wrong in this forgetting. God chooses to forget and God chooses to remember. So you may read this piece, think it sounds reasonable, and then totally forget it (or you may think it’s barking mad and totally forget it). It may not be for you, or it may not be for you now, but in 20 years time. But thirdly, this explains why you can’t do anything (why original sin can be seen as so discapacitating). The you who wants to save your self and reunite it with God is but a dream figure or a character in a play (pick your analogy), not someone able to do things. Put simply, you can’t save yourself because you (as a free-willing agent) don’t exist. Thus one depends upon grace – the undeserved favour of God – which cannot be forced or cajoled or bribed or tricked. You feel as if you should be able to do something, for the performance is a very good one and you seem so life-like, but all you are is a trick of “your” memory and anticipation.

 

All this is just words, a reading of an old text, which is no good to you as it stands. The story has to be about you and be felt to be about you. I would suggest that the best way of doing this is via the experiments of Douglas Harding. Any book (or article e.g. see The Headless Way) by him will do – they all ask the same question: Who really are you? If you point to any object (or idea or anything), the object will exclude another in some way. This is most obvious with solid objects, but it even applies to ideas or emotions – one thing gets in the way of another in some fashion. The only thing that this doesn’t apply to, is you. You don’t get in the way of things, rather the opposite: you’re space for things to be. If you point to yourself, you’re pointing to a void in which things exist. But the void isn’t a thing, it’s what allows things to be. Metaphysically, it’s of a different order than things, and that’s why original sin is metaphysical rather than “physical” where here ‘physical’ just means things of any and every sort of the natural world.

 

That’s the explanation, the theory. But what matters is seeing it for yourself. Seeing it once is good and fine, but ideally you should try to live with a consciousness of this void all the time. Doing that is very hard – we’re all original sinners most of the time – but if grace is given, that’s how we should live.

 

Another way of putting all this is the Christian story of the incarnation, death and resurrection of Jesus. That is a symbolization of seeing and living from the void that is your true nature. Again we have an incarnation (all humans are an incarnation of God), but this time, instead of forgetting who he really was, Jesus remembers. This is symbolized by the crucifixion as the death of the imagined self (or putting it in its rightful place) and the resurrection and ascension as the remembrance of one’s true nature. They are a physical symbolization of the metaphysical truth. Whether the events actually occurred or not doesn’t matter, since it’s the meaning for you not a physical event elsewhere and elsewhen which matters. Everyone is an incarnation, and what matters is whether you see this or not.

The Devil: Is he all bad?

Alan Watts has remarked that in some ways, Satan is the most significant character in Christianity (Myth and Ritual in Christinaity). Nowadays, he has mainly descended to become a comic buffoon, primarily concerned with crude and mindless violence and the inflicting of pain. Though perhaps that describes, in outcome at least, what we, via our elites have become.

 

Still, Satan, Lucifer, the devil has a much more interesting history and role, if one is prepared to dig a little. Christianity inherits much of its scriptures from Judaism, and thus it inherits the Jewish fall. However, it may feel to Jews, I think to Christians, the fall of Adam and Eve seems slightly odd. The punishment of the expulsion from Paradise for eating an apple from a tree that God has planted in his garden (why plant it, if it’s so bad!?), when tempted by a particularly sneaky creature which God has also created, seems incredibly harsh.

 

One can rationalize the story as, not God punishing humanity for disobeying him, but the expulsion from Eden being simply the natural consequence of learning of good and evil. The story is an allegory for what it means to be human. One imagines that animals and human babies don’t distinguish themselves from their environment. The world happens, and part of that happening is what they do, but they don’t know it is them doing it. Becoming human is learning to distinguish yourself from your environment – those clouds over there moving is nothing to do with me; this arm reaching up for an apple is me. This basic polarity between me and not-me gets extended and refined, and itself differentiated until we are who we are. Allegorically, this polarity might be represented by male-female, or even better knowledge of good and evil. The world is not all of a piece, but some bits are good (especially me) and some bits are evil (especially bits which want to hurt or kill me).

 

Thus, allegorically, to be human is to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And eating of it necessarily means death, because life and death are one of the primordial polarities and a very strong basis for good and evil. If you can distinguish yourself from the universe, then there is a ‘you’, and since nothing lasts for ever, to distinguish is to die.

 

So, the tale can be made to make sense, but as a tale, it seems a bit lame. God sets up a wonderful garden, in which all wants and needs are catered for. But for some reason, God has planted a poisonous tree amongst all the rest, and just to make sure, he points out that the delicious looking fruits are actually evil (though Adam and Eve don’t understand that yet) and will kill them (they don’t understand that concept either). And, just to make doubly sure, God creates a sly serpent and pops that into the garden too. The phrase “I could have written the script” immediately comes to mind. Having neatly baited the trap, the innocent humans blunder into it and God responds with an entirely disproportionate punishment.

 

However this may seem to Judaism, to Christians, this seems a bit unfair. Punishment is okay if one has knowingly done something wrong, but the ultimate sanction for being placed in a situation where you can simply roll like a ball down a slope does not seem just. And not only the ultimate sanction for Adam and Eve, but for all humanity…that’s not something which an individualistic Westerner can accept.

 

Christianity, of course, has its own Fall, which is very much more to its liking. Lucifer was, is, the greatest of God’s creation – the most beautiful, the most intelligent, the best. And, that is his problem, with his mighty intellect, he foresees something which is wrong. He foresees that God will do something which is wrong. What a bind that puts him in. God, the creator and sustainer of everything, the very being of Lucifer’s being, will do something that is wrong. Lucifer can clearly foresee this, what should he do? Most people know that he should do all that he can to stop it, even though this means pitting himself against his boss, and not just any boss, but the boss of everything. Once rebellion is made, there is nowhere to hide, because God is everywhere. Most people, despite knowing what they ought to do, would, of course, do nothing and acquiesce in whatever crime was being planned.

 

But not Lucifer. He stands up for what he believes is right and he is defeated and exiled. It is never really clear what Lucifer thought was wrong. It is said that Lucifer objected to the elevation of coarse, smelly humanity to a position above his own – that he should bow down to Adam who was given dominion over the earth, or to Mary designated as Mother of God, or even to the human form of the son of God.

 

There is something in this, of course. A basic notion of fairness, of just desserts, says that Lucifer, as the greatest being of creation should have that position recognized. But I think that there must be something more to the story to make sense. Rank and precedence is really rather childish as an ultimate principle. It’s the product of a courtly mindset (as is much of the symbolism for the Christian God), and though no doubt it it’s a delightful game if you’re in that environment, it shouldn’t really be the fundamental issue of the universe, and one would hope that the most wonderful creature in all creation was above such silly games

 

Ivan Karamazov gives us a more compelling reason for Lucifer’s rebellion. The Grand Inquisitor confidently asserts that the Church now works for Satan. He also asserts that the Church does so out of love for the people. Because, whatever God may say, the situation he has created does not look like love. It looks like love for the few and nothing for the many. One can imagine that as Lucifer gazed upon the divine plan, he was horrified to see that this is what was to pass. That, as the Grand Inquisitor shows, is something noble enough to justify rebellion.

 

This seems far more reasonable as a cause of the fall. Rather than the greatest creature in all creation worrying over a courtly snub, he is motivated by good, by love of humanity. The only question then, is the one that Ivan raises, how can a good God seemingly only save a very few?

The Grand Inquisitor

Within Dostoyevsky’s novel The Brothers Karamazov, there is a short, but very powerful piece in which Ivan describes to his brother, Alyosha, a poem which he was thinking of writing, called, The Grand Inquisitor. It describes a return to earth by Jesus, and his meeting with the eponymous Inquisitor. It puts forward a particular stance upon Christianity, which is relevant to this blog.

 

In summary, Jesus returns to earth, to 16^th century Seville, not as a second coming, but as a consolation for the faithful. Even though he does not speak, the people recognize him as Jesus and follow him. He performs various miracles, curing a man’s blindness and raising a young girl from the dead.

 

However, he is observed by the Grand Inquisitor, who orders his men to seize Jesus and throw him in jail. That night, the Inquisitor visits Jesus in prison and confesses to him what the church has done. The Inquisitor puts before Jesus, the three temptations which Jesus suffered at the hands of the devil in the desert – that Jesus should cause the people to love him by feeding them; that he should cause them to love him by performing a miracle; that he should assume rule over the world and unite all people into one kingdom under him. The Inquisitor notes that Jesus rejected these three stratagems for turning the people to him, since they would have meant that the people were not freely loving Jesus. Jesus wanted the people to freely love him above all else.

 

But, the Inquisitor observes, this is placing far too heavy a burden on most people. Most of humanity is weak, most are like children, and they cannot live up to what Jesus is expecting of them. So, whatever he may say about loving the people, Jesus does not actually do so. How can setting someone an impossibly high goal, and requiring that they achieve it, be loving them?

 

The church has seen what is happening, and has turned to those whom Jesus rejects and shown them love. The Church has given into the temptations in the desert and it uses miracle, mystery and authority to cause the people to love them and so save them from the dreadful freedom that is otherwise on offer. The people think that they are following Jesus and loving him, but they are really following bread and miracles. Still, the people are happy; the only unhappy ones are those in the Church who know of the deception. They are the ones who are strong enough to choose freedom and follow Jesus, but don’t; they follow the devil, because they love the people and want to make them happy.

 

Essentially, Ivan has raised a form of the problem of predestination. It seems as if God has created the majority of humanity to be damned, with just a small percentage strong enough to be saved. Most people are naturally revolted by the picture painted by the problem of predestination. It seems monstrous, and some of the solutions offered – that God is wonderful for saving anyone, for instance – put one in mind of small boys burning ants with a magnifying glass and letting a few get away.

 

To his credit, the Grand Inquisitor has reacted to this situation by offering hope to the people. Instead of condemning them, or ignoring them, the Church ministers to the weak. The church proclaims miracle, mystery and authority. And sometimes the church has given real bread to the poor. The church remains rich and the poor poor, but the poor can be grateful for whatever crumbs fall from the church’s table.

 

But how much easier is it for the Church to offer us this compelling case, than to directly proclaim what Jesus has to offer? – himself, and nothing more. He is not offering freedom from want; or life after death; or heavenly justice to compensate for all the injustice that is suffered upon earth. He is simply offering himself, whatever that may mean. That is a tough sell. Much easier to sell the opposite, and much more comforting. Much kinder to people – one gives them hope, rather than cruelly dashing it from their lips.

 

And, for the Church, for those who know, it is perhaps hard. They know the dreadful truth that there is nothing. But, for the sake of the people, the children, who are too weak to bear this nothing, they smile and say that all will be well. They know that the showers are really gas chambers, but it is kinder to the children not to say this. Better to play the games and sing the songs and smile than to tell the terrible truth and blight the little bit of life that they can cling to.

 

Who else would not do the same? If life is tragic rather than comic, there are few who can bear the tragedy and come out the other side. Better to pretend that life is comic. There is a nobility to tragedy and one can imagine Lucifer would bear it well (isn’t that what his story is about?). But perhaps nobility is somewhat over-rated. The tragic hero tends to take an awful lot of people with him as he thrashes around under his fate (and how many tragic non-heroes die for no gain at all?). The comic hero muddles through, somehow saving his comrades through his foolishness.

Master or Servant?

For many years, I have felt bothered by the resurrection of Jesus. Not by the fact that it occurred (or didn't), but by the fact that it didn’t seem to fit with the rest of the story. For some 30 years, there was a poor man living in Palestine; after he died, he became the Lord of the Universe, for ever.

Obviously, people’s situations change, and the phrase “rags to riches” is in common use, but what seemed odd to me was that the message of the first 30 years (or the two to three years of ministry which we are presented in the Gospels) seemed very different from the Lord of the Universe, seated at the right hand of God picture which is running now and for ever. The first thirty years were ones of service, the suffering servant and so on. The rest of forever, is one of dreadful majesty. This seemed quite a contrast.

Now, one can of course rationalise and explain this, and the Church has spent the last 2,000 years doing so. But, just in terms of a pre-rationalized set of images, the before and after are very different, and they send very different messages. In the context of ruling for ever, a few years slumming it with the poorest seems a little like a gap year working in the third world,  between public school and a place at Oxford. It looks good on the C.V. but, thankfully, it is over now. The experience was had, but now one can get back to the serious business of taking one’s rightful place and ruling the universe. The service was real, but it wasn’t forever. What is, forever, is the ruling.

Now, how does this present itself to the human mind? Is God, “Lord” or is God “servant”? I would suggest the former rather than the latter. Assuming that Jesus had a message, which he delivered during his ministry, it wasn’t really “Lord”. So, what has gone on here? And have we perhaps ended up with the wrong message and the wrong Jesus?