The Commons
Part Two: Created in the Image
Trinity, Imago Dei, and the Commons
Written by Dan McDonald
{Then
God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have
dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the
cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon
the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created
him; male and female he created them.” – Genesis 1:26-27}
Michelangelo’s “Creation” – Sistine Chapel
A few years ago I passed through a
time of crisis in my Christianity. I discovered that my belief in the Trinity
was too close to being checklist orthodoxy. That is, I knew it was historically
considered an essential Christian doctrine to believe, but it did not seem
important to how I lived my everyday life. I then discovered through reading
Yaroslav Pelikan’s history of dogma in the early centuries how in the ancient
church the whole understanding of the Christian faith revolved around the
understanding of God as Trinity and the understanding of Christ as fully God
and fully man. My problem, these days, is to dialogue with those for whom the
Trinity remains a statement essential to be checked off in the “I believe”
department but then their expression of Christianity has almost no connection
with their belief in the Holy Trinity.
I am presently writing on the
subject of the commons. The theological subject of the commons is built around
the early Church in Jerusalem’s practice of having all things in common. (Acts
2:44-45; 4:34-35) I believe that St. Luke thought this phenomenon was important
to mention even if the exact practice of holding all things in common did not
seem to be copied as a universal method of communal living in other churches in
the New Testament. That suggests to my thinking that the exact practice while
not being universal is based on something of a universal principle important to
be recognized and applied in various ways in varied Christian settings.
I believe that we can see a basis
for a Christian understanding of having things in common in our understanding
of creation. Christians are reluctant to use Genesis chapter one as a proof of
the Holy Trinity, partly because we recognize that those with a Jewish faith
have other ways of understanding the first chapter of Genesis. Nevertheless the
apostles and the early church saw the first chapter of Genesis expressing in
embryo form the Christian understanding of the Deity of Christ and the Holy
Trinity. God creates the world through his word by his spirit.
The creation of man described in
Genesis 1:26-27 then takes on this interesting expression of mixed numbers. God
is referred to singularly as God, who then speaks in a plural form saying “Let
us make man in our image, after our likeness.” Then God creates man (a singular
construction) as “male and female he created them.” The Jewish explanation of
this is that God speaks of himself in a special construction, the “Majestic
Plural.” In all fairness, I believe Jewish and Christian believers can agree
that we are attempting to understand a mystery any time we try to understand
either God or creation. A wholly literalistic understanding seems to be
stretching the revelation God has given us in this passage. God’s existence is
greater than our linguistic categories of person, number, and gender. The Bible
refers to God in most instances as “He” but this in no way can be used to
describe only male human beings as created in God’s image. The woman God
created is also equally imago Dei (in the image of God) as the man. They are
created in God’s image.
A non-European artist’s conception of Adam and Eve
The point I wish to draw from this
passage teaching about God’s creation of man in God’s image is that singularity
and plurality and unity of both God and then of man seem important in this
creation account. St. Paul seeks to make us aware of this. None of us are
wholly independent human individuals. In the second chapter of Genesis it
becomes clear that for our first parents the unity of the man and the woman was
as much a demonstration of man created in God’s image, as each of the persons
who were created are likewise expressions of the image of God. As we broaden
our understanding of humanity we begin to realize that if the Trinitarian
representation of God is a true representation of the glory of God then our
humanity is capable of imaging God both as singular persons and as collective
humanity. This is an important foundation for understanding why this principle
of holding things in common is so essential to the Christian understanding of
human life.
A Christian understanding of
salvation recognizes how both individuality and the unity of a collective body
are dealt with in both God’s creation of humanity and the work of redemption in
Christ. Interconnectedness and unity of humanity is expressed in creation, in
our fall into sin, and in the work of redemption. Christ did not bypass our
human interconnectedness to bring us to a wholly individualistic salvation.
Rather, he entered the world fully God and fully man, the offspring of Mary and
descendant of Adam, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and David. He became man and died
for our sins, according to the Scriptures. He represented us in a collective
sense as well as for our individual beings. The work of salvation then was
committed through his disciples to be represented to humanity through the human
collective. Christ became the new leaven through which the whole lump of
humanity was to be renewed. He entered our humanity and human beings, members
of the human collective were given the message through which Christ in the
power of the Holy Spirit would be expressed to all of humanity.
Once we understand this we begin to
understand the mystery of both salvation and judgment, and how these are things
in which we are guided by the teaching of Scriptures to understand only in
part. We have a sense that each of us are individual but that also each of us
are conditioned and shaped by matters of culture, genetics, etc. It isn’t so
simple that we can imagine ourselves wholly individuals capable of acting
wholly apart from those things that have shaped us. This much is implied by
Jesus’ own teaching regarding how it would be better for those born in Sodom
and Gomorrah in Lot’s days, than those born in Capernaum and Bethsaida in Jesus’
day. In the end we realize there is mystery regarding the Day of Judgment that
only God the all wise is capable of sorting out.
Pieter Bruegel’s The Way to Calvary (in the midst of
humanity)
The church in Jerusalem understood
something else about the interconnectedness of humanity and the redemptive work
of Christ. It meant with Christ’s bringing us into redemption that our
redemption and our salvation was a shared salvation in which as we came before
God in Christ, we were one with our brother and sister in Christ. For the
church at Jerusalem it meant that some sold what they possessed in abundance to
ensure that those in poverty had every need met. In the middle ages, that meant
that European communities established “common lands” where the poor could
forage, pick berries, gather fruit, hunt mushrooms, collect herbs and provide
for themselves. What does it mean for us today? Does it mean the setting aside
of a portion of our income for the poor and needy? Does it mean that life is
meant to be as much a shared exploration of the abundant life in Christ as it
is a personal or individual search? The reality of having things in common is
surely in part built upon the reality that we have been created to image the
glory of God who is one God in the unity of three persons, according to our
understanding of the Christian faith.
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