“In our image, after our likeness.”

These familiar words from Gen 1:26 have been a cause of difficulty for some.

The plural pronouns us our have been seized by certain as plain teaching of the doctrine of the Trinity Plain, forsooth? What sort of logic is this? It I say to a friend We hope to vacation in California next year, is he at liberty to assume that I am taking two wives with me? The Trinitarian who dares to quote these words in support of his case thereby proclaims to all the world what a precarious case he has.

Then why the plural pronouns? The answer is easy and simple The reference is to the angels busy in the work of Creation Job 38:7 makes this plain When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy — the context of these words is a poetic description of Creation.

Was man made in the image of the angels? Definitely yes! In every account of angelic appearance, the heavenly visitant is described as being like a man, and is sometimes actually called a man, e g: the man Gabriel, Dan 9:21 On at least three occasions angels were mistaken for men. It is also to be noted that the name of God used in Gen 1:26 is precisely that which is used in several places about the mighty ones of the Lord.

But now a further question arises Is there any special significance in the repetition in our image, after our like­ness “

The second expression suggests gradual growth, as though the likeness was something to be achieved by degrees If so, it can only refer to progressive approximation to a moral likeness of the angels who in all things do only the will of God, Bless the Lord, ye his angels, that excel in strength, that do His commandments, hearkening unto the voice of His word Ps 103:20.

Gen 1:26 is alluded to with precise­ly this Idea in several places in the N T.

Paul in his discourse at Athens de­clared that men were made by God that they might feel after Him and find Him.

Col. 3:9-10 has a series of sustained references to Genesis: “Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds, and have put on the new man which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of him which created him.”

The parallel passage in Eph. 4:22-27 is packed with similar allusiveness: — “The old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts — put on the new man, which after God is created in right­eousness and true holiness; wherefore putting away lying . . . neither give place to the devil.”

All of the foregoing Scriptures rein­force the inference from Gen. 1:26 that man was not only made in the physical likeness of the angels, but was also in­tended to grow into their moral likeness. Hence the Lord’s Prayer: “Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.”