Imago Dei (Central Pres)

1. Academy for Christian Thought
Thinking Things Through in a Theological Safe Space
Imago Dei
“What is Man that thou art mindful of Him?” Psalm 8:5
We are made in the image of God,
called to privileges and responsibilities

2. We are called to be a
human being (biological), being human (theological)
It is possible to exist as a person and yet not live and behave as
one worthy of having been made in the image of God.

3. 1. Related to God - theology
biblical anthropology
2. Related to other minds - philosophy
Theory of Mind & God consciousness
3. Related to nature - science
paleoanthropology, genomics & cognitive neuroscience
4. Privilege of Choice
Love
5. Responsibility of Stewardship
Kindness

4. Sep 08
Related to God’s mind - theology
Biblical anthropology

5. What is Man that thou art mindful of Him?
Psalm 8:5
The psalmist marvels that God bothers to be mindful of
mankind.
We are the only life form we know of that considers the
existence of our creator.
We are Homo spiritualis, called to live the beyond our biologies.

6. The Biblical Image & Likeness of God
Gen 1:26-27 – relationship
Gen 3:5 – knowledge of good and evil
Gen. 3:22 –birth & agriculture
Gen 9:6 – God regulates human dominion.

7. Gen 1:26-27
Relationship with God
Functionally like God, with dominion & rule over the rest of
creation

8. Gen 3:5
Knowledge of good and evil
Like God, when they ate of the tree of knowledge of good and
evil, they achieved moral cognition

9. Gen. 3:22
Birth and Agriculture
Knowledge gave humans the powers to create life (birth) and
produce agriculture (till the land).
Humans were not made to be immortal.

10. Gen 9:6
God regulates human dominion.
Abuse of dominion brought the execution of divine justice
(Flood) because humans are the image of God.
Life belongs to God.

11. We are not entirely at the mercy of nature
Like God, they possess the mind to have some measure of
control over their circumstances.
Think of our collective mastery of and over the land, water, air,
under the ground and surface of the water. Although they are
not total masteries, it remains amazing what we can do
compared to the rest of nature.

12. Land, Sea, Air & Space (Inner & Outer) 1
We can resist gravity in building tall structures, survive anywhere
on earth, build vehicles to push us over 200 mph at sea, over
700 mph on land, and over 25,000 mph in the air, reach from
1400 feet below sea level to 18,029 feet above, float on the
oceans, lakes and rivers, fly in the air up to outer space, and
the Moon.

13. Land, Sea, Air & Space (Inner & Outer) 2
We can descend into the deep cave systems of the world, resist
the pressures of ocean depths, traverse at high speed under
the surface for months at a time (nuclear submarines). Apart
from geographic achievements, we also possess scalar
achievements.

14. Land, Sea, Air & Space (Inner & Outer) 3
With our scopes, we can ‘see’ into the distant past as light from
distant stars reach us billions of years after they began
sending electromagnetic signals. We can see the very small
with our electron microscopes. We can detect the living
functions of the brain with fMRI, PROSCAN, CAT scan, etc.

15. History of the Imago Dei 1
In the long history of Christian theological doctrine, biblical
anthropology can be traced back to the earliest biblical books
of the Bible.
Indeed, the writer of Psalm 8:5 marvels that God bothers to be
mindful of mankind.
Augustine stated that our heart is not at rest till we find rest in
God. What makes a human a human rests with our natural
desire to relate to God.

16. History of the Imago Dei 2
Irenaeus: image (rationality & freedom) & likeness (ethics)
Augustine: memory, intellect and will plus rationality & freedom
Aquinas: man’s power of reason.
Luther: original righteousness with ethical relationality.
Calvin: adopted Irenaeus, Aquina & with Luther (rationality,
reason, righteousness, relational).
Barth: Relationality rather than rationality.
Wolterstorff: Responsibility or ethical relationality.
Each theologian was dealing with the existential challenges of
his day, often ignoring the context of the bible passages.

17. Marks of the imago Dei
Reason (Logic)
Faith (Future apprehension)
Emotional empathy (ToM)
Relationship (Imagination)
Co-creators (creativity and dexterity)

18. Conclusion
The theological interpretations of the imago Dei have rarely
been exegetically biblical as they shifted between rationality
and relationality, often prompted by the existential concerns
of the spiritual leaders within their geohistorical contexts.
Next week – the imago Dei related to other minds

20. Sep 15
Related to other minds – philosophy
ToM & God consciousness

21. Philosophical anthropology
Philosophical ideas of what makes humans uniquely different
from animals have ranged from
- morphologies (their body structures) to
- capacities (how the structures are used) to
- mental abilities (how the mind works).

22. The Mental abilities of the Brain
functioning as the Mind
The two most important mental abilities are called
- Theory of Mind (ToM) and
- God consciousness.

23. Theory of Mind
ToM, with up to 6 levels of intentionality.
All animals are capable of consciousness.
Some of self-consciousness.
But humans alone have achieved up to six levels of intentionality.

24. God-consciousness 1
God-consciousness is a major new field of study in the
philosophy of religion.
It is sometimes called the cognitive science of religion (CSR).
But its conclusions are basically philosophical rather than purely
scientific in nature.

25. God-consciousness 2 (HADD)
Justin Barrett claims that the human mind evolved HADD
(Hypersensitive Agent Detection Device) and ToM in order to
detect and assume the existence of divine agency.
Thus, the default nature of the human mind is theistic rather
than atheistic.
In this view, God consciousness evolved from HADD.

26. God-consciousness 3 (Consciousness)
Until another species can be shown to possess a qualitatively
similar capacity of consciousness that we display, it remains a
live claim that humans are cognitively unique – and therein
lies our imago Dei.

27. Mirror Neurons & Reflective Love
In order to evolve HADD and God consciousness, we are required
to imaginatively think beyond ourselves (ToM) and to
empathize (mirror neurons), so that we may reflectively love
(as opposed to reciprocitively/responsively love).

28. Conclusion
The philosophical speculation into what makes a human a
human rests with our capacity to relate to other minds.

30. Sep 22
Related to nature – science
paleoanthropology and genomics

31. a) Paleoanthropology: From fossil evidence, we find that modern humans are unique
in 5 ways – We
-stand upright full-time and can run on two feet for long-distances
-evolved large brains with an architecture that permits a wide range of capacities
-evolved to speak languages with symbolic thought (comparative linguistics show that
languages evolve over time just as biological specimens).
-learned to control fire and cook our food
b) Human genomics: Our genome is not very different from other animal genome.
While only 3% of our DNA is used, much of the 97% of so-called junk DNA is used
in regulating and switching on other active genes.
c) Cognitive psychology: The combination of symbolic thought and intuition gives rise
to our powers of reasoning and creativity respectively. This powerful combination
of rationality and emotive capacities permit us to dream, to fantasize and to
imagine beyond the scope of the perceptibles, such as what can be seen visually,
heard audibly, smelt olfactorilly, felt tactilly or tasted gustorilly.

32. Our advanced cognitive powers are liberated beyond the biological
boundaries set by our bodies and range wherever our minds can take us. It
is this realm of consciousness that we can perceive the presence of God in
ways that language fails to describe.
speech of symbolic language. Individual words change in its meanings so
rapidly that in less than 10,000 years, its impossible to trace relationships
between them. But this deficit is the very character of language that
allows us to trace the movement of peoples around the Earth. Cognitive
psycholists investigate individual sound components rather than individual
words to trace relationships. These phonemes are more bound to biology
than ideas are. The further away from Africa and hence the more recently
colonized by Homo sapiens, the fewer phonemes exist in a language, e.g.,
the ‘click’ languages of Africa (over 100), English (45), Hawaii languages
(13).
It appears that the biological structures evolve in anticipation of subsequent
functional uses – feathers, legs and symbolic speech.

33. Adam & Eve
Note: The Apostles’ Creed does not mention of Adam & Eve
1. Recent ancestors (Created imago Dei 10 tya)
2. Recent representatives (Selected imago Dei 10 tya)
3. Ancient ancestors (Evolved and marked imago Dei 150 tya)
4. Ancient representatives (Selected imago Dei 150 tya)
5. Symbolic (Evolved 150 tya and gradually developed into the
imago Dei)

34. 1. Recent ancestors (Created imago Dei 10 tya)
2. Recent representatives (Selected imago Dei 10 tya)

35. 3. Ancient ancestors (Evolved and marked imago Dei 150 tya)
4. Ancient representatives (Selected imago Dei 150 tya)
5. Symbolic (Evolved 150 tya and gradually developed into the
imago Dei)

36. Conclusion: The scientific investigation into what makes a human a
human seems to rest with our capacity to imagine the
unimaginable.
What makes modern humans different from all other primates is the
cultural trigger that allows us to relate to God. Candidates include
the Theory of Mind (ToM, a personal possession) and speech of
symbolic language (a community experience).
The cognitive transformation of Homo sapiens from a nonlinguistic
nonsymbolic primate to a symbolic linguistic one is the most
mysterious and dramatic makeover in the history of life.
Thus, theology, philosophy and science together converge in their
understanding of the human mind as uniquely capable to think
about God.

37. How are we different from other animals?
1. We are the only surviving hominids today. Our symbolic
species, able to pass on vital information over time, possess
insight, and contemplate our future, has become the
supreme global predator, able to destroy life as we know it.
2. Our minds function beyond the need for survival. We alone
appear to wonder, philosophize and worship.

38. How are we different from other animals?
3. Man is the praying animal. God addresses us by his moral
word and we respond in prayer and worship, as creatures
made in His image.
4. Prayer demands moral cognition, transcends linguistic
expressions, and include gestures and objects.

39. How are we different from other animals?
5. The image of God is NOT an individual possession. Human
prayer is communal, for we were made in a corporate
creation. God created man (Heb: adam, mankind) in his own
image.
6. From a Christian viewpoint, what makes a human a human is
our natural desire to relate to God.

40. Made in the image of God (imago Dei)
Our biological brains give rise to our moral minds. But what
drives our drives?
Using symbolic thought, we are able to pass on vital information
over time, possess insight, and contemplate our future.
We have become the supreme global predator, able to adapt to
our environments or change our environments to our needs.

41. Conclusion
Science describes human existence as a marvel of fortuitous
chance. However, life is harsh and its end is unknown. Life is
an existential accident.
Theology describes human life as the result of a generous divine
will. Although all life forms face suffering and death, we are
morally cognitive beings answerable to God.

43. Sep 29
Privilege of Choice
Love

45. Oct 06
Responsibility of stewardship
Kindness

46. Alone among known creation, human beings possess the greatest powers of choice,
both mental and physical.
We have learned to
- control our immediate environment (pressure, air, water, access to food and shelter)
- accommodate our cyborg-bodies to different weather conditions
- correct any deficits and even enhance our sensory perceptions (spectacles, hearing
aids,
- create leisure time
- prolong our lives and health through pharmacology and medicine
a) Ecotheology
b) Life, death and renewal

47. How to be a human being, being human in the fullest sense of the
word.
1. Be mindful of God even as God is mindful of us
2. Be kind to fellow humans (especially those who suffer from the
indignities of physical hardships caused by ….) and other creatures
that God has created (ecological awareness).
3. Be resourceful (space travel, deep ocean navigation) while
respecting the gifts of life
4. Celebrate the joy of life, health and experience
5. Prepare for the next phase of existence

48. Conclusion
We anticipate an everlasting existence in a
renewed universe. Christ’s presence among
humanity anticipated the dwelling of God with
us in the ‘new heaven and new earth.’
The privilege of being God's children authorizes
and empowers us to love and offer kindness
with confidence and compassion, reaching out
to those who suffer.

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