Some say that the image of God in man means that man is like God in being a rational and moral creature. Others say that it means that man is like God in having dominion over the earth. These things are both related to the image. Man’s rationality and morality mean that he alone among all God’s earthly creatures is capable of bearing the image, and God gave him the image to make him capable of exercising dominion. But, according to Scripture itself, the image consists of righteousness, holiness and true knowledge of God. Put on the new man which was created according to God in true righteousness and holiness (Eph. 4:24). The phrase according to God is a direct reference to the image. The believers in Colosse had put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him (Col. 3:10). The image is not that God made man a moral creature but that he made him morally like himself, that is holy and without sin.
This is also the testimony of the great confessions of the Reformed and Presbyterian churches from the time of the Reformation. The Westminster Confession (IV.2) teaches that God… created man, male and female, with reasonable and immortal souls, endued with knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness, after his own image. And the Heidelberg Catechism, to quote only one of the three confessions of the Reformed churches, teaches us that God created man good and after His own image, in righteousness and true holiness, that he might rightly know God his creator, heartily love Him, and live with Him in eternal blessedness, to praise and glorify Him (Q&A 6). The Belgic Confession (Art. 14) and the Canons of Dort (III,IV.1) teach the same thing.
We must distinguish the image from the capacity to bear it (rationality and morality) and the purpose for it (dominion).
This confusion about the image has lead also to confusion about what happened to the image when Adam and Eve fell into sin and brought death on themselves and the whole human race (Rom. 5:12-14). Many teach that remnants of the image remain in man after the fall. If by this they mean that man remains a rational and moral creature, there is no problem. It is obvious that he does, though even his powers of reason have been dimmed by the fall. If they mean that man retains dominion over the earthly creation, that too is indisputable. His dominion exists but is perverted by a fundamental rebellion against God. He rules, but, not acknowledging God as his master, claims the earth as his own.
But if the idea is that there remains in man some remnants of his original righteousness, holiness and knowledge, both the Scriptures and the confessions dispute it. Paul says of the natural man that he is dead in sin (Eph. 2:1), that the carnal mind is enmity against God, not subject to his law, and not capable of being subject (Rom. 8:7), that in his flesh dwells no good thing (Rom. 7:18), and that whatever is not from faith is sin (Rom. 14:23). The Heidelberg Catechism asks the question, Are we so depraved that we are completely incapable of doing any good and inclined to all evil? The answer is unequivocal: Yes, unless we are born again by the Spirit of God (Q&A 8). The Westminster Confession is just as straightforward: By this sin they [our first parents] fell from their original righteousness, and communion with God, and so became dead in sin, and wholly defiled in all the faculties and parts of soul and body (VI.2). All of man’s original righteousness is gone. The image is not only defaced but lost, and, apart from regeneration, we now bear the image of the Devil. You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do (Jn. 8:44).
The doctrine that some remnants of our original righteousness remain in us contradicts the doctrine of total depravity, that we are wholly incapable of doing any good and inclined to all evil. There are those who say that total depravity means that we are corrupt in all our parts, but not totally corrupt in all our parts. An incomplete corruption is not death in trespasses and sins. There is still life in someone who can do a little righteousness, though the life may be very feeble. And the Westminster’s statement is very explicit: wholly defiled in all the faculties and parts of soul and body.
Another point of confusion has risen. Some will respond to this doctrine of total depravity that it means that man is as bad as he can be. That also is not true. That he is incapable of doing any good that is acceptable to God does not mean that he commits every possible sin. He does not necessarily desire every possible evil, and fear of punishment, desire for the good opinion of his fellows, and many other things may restrain him from doing many things that he wants to do. He may even do good things for his neighbors. But the key point is this, that even his “good works” are displeasing to God, because they do not proceed from faith and are not done for his glory.
Those who maintain that at least remnants of the image remain commonly use two passages to support their position. The first is Genesis 9:6: Whoever shed’s man blood, by man his blood shall be shed; for in the image of God he made man. There are two ways to look at this. The first is not that murder is an attack on the image of God, but that man, as God’s appointed image bearer, is under obligation to put the murderer to death. The loss of the image has not relieved him of his duty, any more than it has relieved us of keeping all the commandments of God. The second is that the passage refers to man’s original, no longer existing, state as image bearer. Because he once bore the image, his murderer must be put to death. The verse does not say that man is in God’s image but that God made him in his image.
The other passage is James 3:9: With it [our tongue] we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. Throughout his letter James is concerned with relations among brethren in the church. The same is true here. We sometimes curse even our brothers and sisters in Christ, who have indeed been remade in God’s image. That is a great sin, but the tongue is a world of iniquity.
These two doctrines, total depravity and the loss of the image of God in man, stand or fall together. If we compromise on the doctrine of depravity, we must also compromise on the loss of the image of God, and vice versa. To the extent that the image is lost man is depraved. To the extent that the image remains, man is still holy and righteous. But the Scriptures teach both the total loss of the image and total depravity. We are indeed dead in sin and wholly corrupted in all our parts.