“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).

  It is sometimes asserted by Christians of a philosophical turn of mind, that the “image” of God does not involve the physical body, but only the soul.  Because of this teaching, all kinds of false doctrines have been brought in, alleging that the ‘real’ man is the soul, whereas the body is the ’shell’ or husk.  This teaching, when logically carried out, results in a denial of the need for physical resurrection.

   When one looks at the above verse, however, one must conclude that it makes no sense when understood in light of man’s theory.  Rather, the inspired text implies that the ‘real man’ has a physical body.  Else why the importance of ’male and female’? 

   (Genesis 5: 1-2) “In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made He him; male and female created He them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day they were created.”

  It so happens that Adam was created out of the dust of the ground BEFORE he was animated with the breath of life (Genesis 2: 7).  The entire man is composed of a body of clay PLUS the animating principle.  The first man was named “Adam,” which, etymologically speaking, denotes the ‘dust’ (Heb. Adamah) out of which he was formed.  Since Adonai Jehovah formed the female out of Adam’s side (and this creation was physical in nature), the creation of male and female as “one flesh” necessarily includes the physical. 

  The main problem that theologians have, is that if this view be correct,  then one must conclude that God the Father has a physical body.  Because tradition (derived largely from pagan Greek philosophy) teaches that God is an essence rather than a person (though most do not deny that the “essence” has personality), it is conceived impossible that the “image of God” can mean anything other than the immaterial.  And yet the inspired Scriptures emphatically declare that Jehovah Elohim exists in corporeal form!

   Abraham saw Jehovah as a man as he sat in his tent door (Genesis 18: 1-3).  He later spoke with Him over the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen. 18: 23-33), before He “went His way”!

  Moses, Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel saw the God of Israel, and the paved sapphire work under His feet (Exodus 24: 10-11).  They were not hallucinating.  For it is affirmed that “they saw God, and did eat and drink“!

  The Lord spoke “face to face” with Moses, as a man speaketh unto his friend (Exodus 33: 11).  Of course, due to His innate holiness, Jehovah’s glory was always veiled from human vision.  Moses saw Him in His glory, but only His “back parts” and not His face (Exodus 33: 21-23).

   During the reign of Ahab, king of Israel, Micaiah the son of Imlah saw “the Lord sitting on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing by Him on His right hand and on His left” (1 Kings 22: 19; 2 Chron. 18: 18).

  The prophet Isaiah saw the Lord “sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and His train filled the temple” (Isaiah 6: 1).  If this vision was merely symbolical, then what are we to make of the seraphims above the throne? (Isaiah 6: 2).  All agree that the seraphims exist in bodily form.  If they were seen positioned above the throne of God, then He that sitteth upon that throne must be tangible and real!

  Daniel later saw Him in prophetic vision, as the Ancient of Days (Daniel 7: 9).  In this vision, the Son of Man (Jesus Christ) is seen coming to the Ancient of Days and receiving dominion (Daniel 7: 13).  If the Ancient of Days is an incorporeal entity, then so must Christ be.  For it is an established law of interpretation that no symbol can be separated from itself.

   Dr. Paul Lee Tan writes:

   “When handling symbols, the interpreter must accept no symbol which is found separated or apart from itself.  Every symbol must behave as a composite unit, and not be seen in action separated or apart from itself.  Thus the 24 elders of Revelation 7 cannot be symbolical, because one of the elders is described as coming forward to talk with John (v. 13).  If the 24 elders were a symbol, it would mean that one-twenty-fourth part of a symbol came apart to talk with John!” (The Interpretation of Prophecy, pg. 161-162).

    Such a method of interpretation as endorsed by allegorists and vain philosophers, will lead us nowhere.  But we know that Christ ascended in His physical human body, and is the “man Christ Jesus” (1 Tim. 2: 5), Who shall yet return as the Son of Man to judge the world (John 5: 27; Matthew 24: 30).  Hence in Daniel’s vision, it is impossible to spiritualize one Person of the Godhead without spiritualizing the other.  Far from being any errant theology, our view actually provides a solid basis for refutation of Unitarianism, which mingles the three persons of the Godhead.

  Despite, however, the proof given in support of our position, it will be contested that “God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth” (John 4: 24).  That is indeed a blessed truth. However, when we consult the original Greek text, we find that there is no article before the word “spirit!”  The text simply says: ‘God is spirit.’  And this in no wise excludes the physical; for there are natural bodies and spiritual bodies (see 1 Cor. 15: 44). 

   Angels, too, are called ‘spirits‘ (Hebrews 1: 7).  But all Christians confess that they have bodies.  Some of them are even bound with “unseen chains” (Jude 6).  Their inability to be seen by ourselves does not render their physicality any the less real.  Our inability to see God in corporeal form, except through a process of ecstatic vision, does not mean that He must, of necessity, exist only as an incorporeal essence.

   There is no Scriptural or theological necessity for excluding the physical from the “image of man.”  Murder is expressly forbidden in the Scriptures.  “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made He man” (Genesis 9: 6).  We believe that murder is wrong because it is a desecration of the Divine image.  The image must include the body, for man can only destroy the body; he cannot destroy the soul!  (Matt. 10: 28).

  These facts should be sufficient to at least cause us to question man’s tradition regarding the “image of God.”  While we do not believe that the image excludes the rational, intellectual, or spiritual properties of man, neither does it exclude the natural.  In fact, we hold that the image is nothing less than the “entire man.”  As this image is defaced by sin and destroyed by death, so it must and will be restored through the redemptive work of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.