THE IMAGE OF GOD IN MAN - Tyndale House

62 TYNDALE BULLETIN
II. THE PROBLEM OF THE PLURAL. IN GENESIS 1:26
Since Barth has raised once again the problem of the plural
let us' in Genesis 1:26, which has proved an embarrassment to
exegetes 43 ever since the time of the Jewish scholars who were
said to have produced for King Ptolemy the 'corrected' version
let me', 44 we shall do well to clarify our position on the question
before we embark on the subject of the image itself. The meaning
of the plural in Genesis 1:26 is, to be sure, peripheral to the
interpretation of the image; nevertheless it is not without value
to enquire 'In whose image is man made?' Who are the ‘us’
of Genesis 1:26?
Those who are impressed by the theological statements of
ecumenical councils will have little difficulty with this plural,
for the First Council of Sirmium in AD 351 not only affirmed
that the faciamus of Genesis 1:26 was addressed by the Father to
the Son as a distinct Person, but also excommunicated those
who denied it! 45 We set beside this statement those of two modern
Catholic exegetes: ‘The Old Testament reader can recognize
here no "vestigium Trinitatis"’; 46 ‘Whoever understands the
verse of the trinity forgets that Genesis 1 is part of the Old
Testament.’ 47 We can only agree that it is the primary task of
the Old Testament exegete to expound the sense intended by
the author of the passage and that such was not the sense needs
no proof. Yet we do not necessarily deny that the Church's
interpretation of the plural as a reference to the Trinity has
some validity. We have a right to hope, indeed to expect, that
the interpretation we offer as Old Testament exegetes of this
plural will not be incompatible with a proper Christian exegesis
which sees here the co-operation of the Godhead in the work of
creation. But we shall not lay down in advance the form which
43 Very few have denied any significance to the plural; E.A. Speiser translates
simply 'I will make man in my image, after my likeness' (Genesis (Anchor Bible),
Doubleday, New York (1964) 4, 7), and A. R. Johnson thinks the oscillation between
singular and plural in verses 26f could be a mere matter of idiom (The One and the
Many in the Israelite Conception of God 2 , University of Wales Press, Cardiff (1961)
28 n. I).
44 Cf. J. Jervell, Imago Dei. Gen. 1, 26f im Spätjudentum, in der Gnosis and in den
paulinischetz Briefen, Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, Göttingen (1960) 75.
45 For this and other early Christian interpretations of the image, see the useful
collection of passages in H. H. Somers, ‘The Riddle of a Plural (Gen 1:21 (sic)):
Its History in Tradition’, Folia:. Studies in the Christian Perpetuation of the Classics 9
(1955) 63-101.
46 H. Junker, Genesis, Echter-Verlag, Würzburg (1949) 13.
47 P. Heinisch, Das Buch Genesis, Aschendorff, Bonn (1930) 100.