Image of God
| Latin | Imago Dei |
|---|---|
| Treatise | Summa theologiae I, question 93 |
| Controlling authority | Catechism 355–357; Gaudium et Spes 12 and 22 |
| Doctrinal standing | Man created in God's image is doctrine; locating the image principally in the mind's acts is Thomistic theology |
| School | Thomism |
| Branch | Theological anthropology |
Image of God, in the Thomistic reading of Genesis, is the created likeness of the Trinity in man, found principally in the rational mind as it knows and loves God, and restored by grace.
A revealed name, a scholastic map
Sacred Scripture says that God created man in his image and likeness. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, 355–357, teaches that this image is the dignity of the human person, created to know and love God, and that it is the basis of the equality of persons. Gaudium et Spes 12 and 22 take up the same confession and add that Christ, the image of the invisible God, reveals man to himself.[1][2]
Those are the governing sentences. They do not yet decide whether the image is the whole composite, the soul alone, or a set of acts. Summa theologiae I, question 93, is the Thomistic map of that question. It is theology in the service of Genesis, not a second Genesis.[3]
Image in the mind
Aquinas holds that an image requires a specific likeness, not any resemblance. Every creature is a vestige of God as caused. Man is an image because he can know and love, as God knows and loves. The image is principally in the mind. The body shares in the image as the mind's instrument and as a nature assumed by the Word. The famous triad of memory, intellect, and will is an analogical likeness of the Trinity, not a small Trinity inside the skull.
Question 93 also distinguishes degrees. The image of creation is in all men by the natural powers of knowing and loving. The image of re-creation is in the just by grace. The image of likeness is in the blessed who know and love God in act. Sin wounds the image; it does not erase the first degree. That distinction lets Catholic theology confess both the dignity of the sinner and the need of grace.
Doctrine and school
That man is the image of God, that this dignity is in every person, and that it is fulfilled in Christ, is Catholic doctrine. Locating the image principally in intellectual nature, and describing three degrees of image, is the Thomistic synthesis. Other Catholic theologies may emphasize the image in dominion, in relation, or in the whole composite. They remain Catholic if they do not deny the spiritual soul or reduce the image to a social role.
The 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia article on man records the traditional teaching that the image is in the soul's spiritual nature. It is public-domain catechesis, not a definition of Aquinas's article-by-article conclusions. The encyclopedia therefore presents the Thomistic map as a privileged reading, not as the only sentence the Church has ever spoken.[4]
Moral and ecclesial consequences
If the image is in the power to know and love God, then the education of intellect and will is a work of justice toward the image, not a luxury. If the image is in every human being, then the unborn, the poor, and the enemy bear it. If grace restores the image, then the sacraments and charity are not ornaments on a finished nature.
The image also limits speech about God. We name God from creatures because the mind is his image, and we deny that our naming exhausts him because the image is finite. Analogy, prayer, and the prohibition of idolatry meet in that one fact.
References
- Back to citation Catechism of the Catholic Church, 355–368 — Authoritative anthropology of the human person as a unity of body and soul, the soul as form of the body, and the soul's immediate creation and immortality.
- Back to citation Second Vatican Council, Gaudium et Spes 12–22 — Pastoral constitution on the human person created in the image of God, the dignity of body and soul, and Christ as the revelation of man to himself.
- Back to citation Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, question 93 — Primary treatise on man as made to the image of God, located principally in the mind according to the acts of knowing and loving God.
- Back to citation Catholic Encyclopedia (1913), Man — Public-domain anthropology of man as image of God, a rational animal composed of body and soul.