John Robert Howell
Genesis 1:27 states: "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him." It is worth noting that the Hebrew word here for "man" is "Adam". In Genesis 12:7 man is said to be formed of the dust of the ground, and that "man" is also "adam". Around this fleshly axle theological material mindedness and slavish literalness to the text have been wrapped and tangled for over two millennia.
Without Mary Baker Eddy and her glorious Discovery, we might never have known better. Her inspired and inspiring definition on pages 475-477* of her Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures is alone worth the cost of the volume. Students of Christian Science are thus blessed with a knowledge that the man of our heavenly Father God's creating is something much more glorious than the descendants of a couple of wardrobeless sinners cavorting about the Garden of Eden.
*Let me quote from some of the passages in Science and Health:
"Question. -- What is man?
"Answer. -- Man is not matter; he is not made up of brain, blood, bones, and other material elements. The Scriptures inform us that man is made in the image and likeness of God. Matter is not that likeness. The likeness of Spirit cannot be so unlike Spirit. Man is spiritual and perfect; and because he is spiritual and perfect, he must be so understood in Christian Science. Man is idea, the image, of Love; he is not physique."
"The real man cannot depart from holiness, nor can God, by whom man is evolved, engender the capacity or freedom to sin. A mortal sinner is not God's man. Mortals are the counterfeits of immortals. They are the children of the wicked one, or the one evil, which declares that man begins in dust or as a material embryo. In divine Science, God and the real man are inseparable as divine Principle and idea."
"When speaking God's children, not the children of men, Jesus said, 'The kingdom of God is within you;' that is, Truth and Love reign in the real man, showing that man in God's image is unfallen and eternal. Thus Jesus taught that the kingdom of God is intact, universal, and that man is pure and holy."
