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One Plus One Equals One

Representin'

In my previous article, "Maintaining Our Image (of God)," I argued that the author of Genesis is borrowing a practice from his ancient Near Eastern neighbors when recounting the creation of mankind in God's image. The practice that I'm referring to was the attribution of the divine image to the king and to him alone. So, in Genesis, we read that God created all people in His image, essentially one-upping those cultures who reserved this status for royalty alone.

In this article, I'd like to take these conclusions and explore their application to our male-female relationships specifically. To begin this discussion, consider the following quote regarding the word "image:"

What does it mean to be created in the image of God? As we transport ourselves in our imaginations back to the time when Genesis was first written and ask ourselves what the word image meant, we get help in our understanding. Ancient kings of the Near East, who ruled vast territories, knew that they could not be physically present everywhere in their kingdoms, so they commissioned statues of themselves to be placed in all the major cities of their realms. When people looked at these statues, they were reminded of the authority of the king who ruled them. The statue was not the same as the king, but it represented the king and was due the same glory and honor. To dishonor the statue of the king was sacrilege, treason.¹

The word for "statues" here comes from the same word that is rendered "images" in Genesis 1. So, it would be accurate to say that a king would place his image throughout the kingdom in order to represent his authority to the people. In the same way, since we are created in the "image of God," we are to be God's representatives to His kingdom, which, in the context of Genesis 1, is His creation.

It Takes Two to Make a Thing Go Right

The particular subject I'm interested in addressing here has to do with how we as men and women reflect or embody God's image. I'll start by highlighting the piece of Genesis 1:26-28 that will be relevant to this article:

So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them
(v. 27, NIV, emphasis mine).

The reason I separated this verse into three clauses is to illustrate the parallelism between the second and third lines.² In fact, let me make this even clearer visually:

A: in the image of God
     B: he created him;
A': male and female
     B': he created them.

If we wanted to bring this structure out verbally, we'd say, "in the image of God he created him; in other words, male and female he created them." The second line here is meant to further define the first line. Now what does this mean practically?

It means that whenever we look at one gender only, we can only see a partial view of God's image. When we look at the two genders collectively, however, we begin to see a fuller view of His image. And, where does this fuller view most obviously manifest itself? Marriage. This is because God set marriage up as the place where a man and a woman become one flesh. Of course, since we're all fallen, many marriages resist this unity, trying to continue to live as two rather than one.

This is especially easy for us men who look forward to being "married bachelors;" that is, our desire to get married does not entail the desire to become one flesh or to present our wife as holy, but to have "biblically-approved" sex (or sometimes to put an end to our loneliness). Ironically, although sex is supposed to be the most tangible expression of oneness, this attitude undermines this purpose by breeding disunity.

ESL: English as a Stupid Substandard Language

Because of a severe misunderstanding of biblical language, many of us may secretly harbor the belief that God is male, rather than female. In fact, this mischaracterization of God has led many to go to the other extreme, declaring God to be female, even recasting Jesus as a woman. Unfortunately, this debate glosses over the truth that is presented here in Genesis.

God is not a male and God is not a female. Just because the pronoun "He" was typically used to refer to God does not mean that we can conclude that this signified gender. Unfortunately, the English language does not provide much clarity for us here. This is because, unlike many foreign languages, our nouns do not carry an inherent gender. Consider the following:

Notice that each of the words has nothing to do with its having male or female characteristics as we typically think of them. In other words, just because the Spanish word for "house" is categorized as feminine does not mean that Spanish-speakers think of houses as female-like. Likewise, those who speak Hebrew do not consider the word "day" to be more like a man than a woman. Thus, just because Yahweh or Elohim or any of the other words for "God" or "Lord" are masculine, or are the antecedent for masculine pronouns (i.e., He, Him, His), does not mean that their referent is a man. (Please note here that I'm not making a case for or against any sort of gender-neutral Bible. I am not discussing the translation of pronouns; rather, I am talking about the non-genderness of God.)

Why was this digression important to my point? It is important because, in order to have a biblical view of God, as well as a biblical view of men and women, we must realize that neither the male nor the female gender has a monopoly (or even a majority) of His image, though each sex does manifest a partial picture of His image. Instead, His image is embodied most fully in the unity of a man and a woman.

C O F F E E  S H O P

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Do you believe that the union between a male and a female presents a full picture of God's image?

Join the discussion!

Now, does this idea of unity mean that we lose our identities as men and women when we enter into marriage? Absolutely not, but we'll get to that in a later article. For now, I simply want to make the point that when we accept the oneness found in uniting a man and a woman, we display God's image in all its glory. If we reject this oneness by refusing to get married (for reasons other than being called to lifelong celibacy) or by failing to work together in marriage, the image that we present will only be a shattered and distorted one.