ABSTRACT

The Genesis formulations about man being ‘created in the image and likeness of Gad’ have given rise to an immense body of scholarly commentary and controversy, spanning both the Jewish and Christian traditions. The Old Testament suggests that the ‘image of God’ is something which relates to the First Man (Adam) from the moment of creation and is not lost by the Fall. The New Testament reinterprets this reading somewhat, claiming that the ‘image of God’ belongs in the full sense only to Christ-the image now being seen as a perfect reflection of the Divine prototype, which the human believer may come to participate in by means of an eschatological hope.1