What Does It Mean to Be Made in the Image of God?
Genesis says that humanity was created in the “image and likeness” of God. Orthodox Christianity has never understood this to mean that God has a human-shaped body. Rather, the Fathers associated the divine image with qualities such as reason, freedom, personal existence, moral responsibility, dominion, and humanity’s capacity for communion with God. Some Fathers distinguish “image” from “likeness” more sharply than others, so the distinction should not be oversimplified. What remains clear is that sin damages our resemblance to God without erasing the dignity of the divine image.
A Remarkable Statement
Genesis gives human beings a description it gives no animal:
“Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness.”
— Genesis 1:26
Verse 27 immediately adds:
“So God created man in His own image.”
This does not mean that God has arms, legs, skin, or a biological body.
Jesus says:
“God is Spirit.”
— John 4:24
So what exactly is the image?
Reason, Freedom, and Moral Responsibility
The Fathers answer the question in several complementary ways.
St. John of Damascus associates the image especially with humanity’s rational mind and free will. He distinguishes this from “likeness,” which he associates with becoming like God through virtue.
St. Gregory of Nyssa likewise connects humanity’s resemblance to God with freedom, reason, virtue, and our extraordinary dignity among created beings.
This makes sense of Scripture.
Humans can know.
Choose.
Love.
Create.
Exercise responsible dominion.
Recognize moral truth.
And enter conscious communion with God.
The image therefore refers not to one physical feature but to something about the entire human vocation.
Image and Likeness: An Important Qualification
You will sometimes hear a very simple Orthodox formula:
Image = what God gives us.
Likeness = what we grow into.
There is real patristic support for this distinction, especially in writers such as St. John of Damascus.
But we should not pretend every Father uses Genesis 1:26 with exactly the same technical vocabulary.
St. Gregory of Nyssa, for example, can use “image” itself dynamically when discussing humanity’s resemblance to divine goodness.
So it is safest to say this:
The Fathers commonly understand humanity as created with God-given capacities that are meant to mature into an ever-deeper resemblance to God.
That captures the theological point without forcing every Father into an identical formula.
Did the Fall Destroy the Image?
No.
Sin terribly damages the way the image is expressed, but Scripture continues to speak of fallen human beings as bearing God's image.
After the Fall, Genesis 9:6 condemns murder precisely because:
“In the image of God He made man.”
James likewise condemns cursing human beings because they have been “made in the similitude of God” (James 3:9).
The Orthodox Church therefore does not divide humanity into people who possess dignity and people who do not.
Every human life possesses profound worth.
The image may be obscured.
It may be disfigured by terrible sin.
But the sinner does not cease to be human.
The OCA summarizes Orthodox teaching by saying that humanity remains the created image of God even after the Fall, though that image no longer reflects God with its intended purity.
Christ Shows Us True Humanity
The deepest Christian answer is Christ.
Paul calls Christ:
“the image of the invisible God.”
— Colossians 1:15
Christ does not merely reveal God to humanity.
He also reveals what humanity looks like when perfectly united to God.
The goal of Christian life is therefore not simply “being a decent person.”
It is becoming increasingly Christlike.
Reflection
To call someone an image-bearer of God is an astonishing statement.
Human worth is not based on intelligence, wealth, health, usefulness, nationality, social status, or power.
It comes from God.
And the image is also a calling.
We were created not merely to exist but to become increasingly like the One whose image we bear.
Sources
Scripture: Genesis 1:26–27; 5:1; 9:6; Psalm 8; John 4:24; Colossians 1:15; 3:10; James 3:9.
St. John of Damascus, Exact Exposition II.12.
St. Gregory of Nyssa, On the Making of Man, especially chapters 4–5 and 16.
St. Gregory of Nyssa, On Virginity 12.
Orthodox Church in America, “Man” and “Sin.”