Genesis 1:26. “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness…”

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness…

Here I would like to focus on the words image and likeness.

Image in Hebrew is the word “Tselem” and Strong’s renders it’s meaning as this;

from an unused root meaning to shade; a phantom, i.e. (figuratively) illusion, resemblance; hence, a representative figure, especially an idol:–image, vain shew.

Likeness is from the Hebrew, “Dmuth”.

…resemblance; concretely, model, shape; adverbially, like:–fashion, like (-ness, as), manner, similitude.

It is tempting to spend all my time thinking about how we are a shadow of God. This idea of our image being some type of illusion dovetails with another line of thinking I have had about creation being similar to a virtual reality or a simulation. But that really doesn’t relate to pregnancy in any meaningful way.

The reason these words are important to this study is because they are the same words the bible uses to describe the birth of Seth to Adam.

Genesis 5:3 And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth:

This is the only other time in scripture this word is used. So as tempting as it is for me to focus on the shadowy, illusion type usage of the word “image”, we have a link to the birth of a child, which is as tangible and mundane as one could imagine. And of course this is tremendous because the bible is comparing our creation by God to the birth of a child. This makes God a father figure to Adam and so, by extension, to us.

So it seems that we have right here in the first chapter of the bible a direct link to the fatherhood of God to at least some of mankind. Of interest the words are not used to describe Cain or Abel. I don’t know that this means that they were any less made in the image and likeness of Adam. The scriptures simply don’t say.

The inclusion of the “image” and “likeness” words for Seth gives added validity to Jesus comments about being the Son of God, as he was a literally a son of Seth, and thus literally a son of God.

Clearly there is something about an image that shows parentage. One of the first questions asked when a baby is born is “who does he look like?”

Perhaps this is why God prevents the Israelites from creating images to prevent idolatry. During the creation only man was created in gods image. Worshipping any other image would not be worshipping him. Worse still is the hubris of creating an image to be worshipped. The very act puts us in the position of the creator. In effect we displace God by creating the image.

Think about what Jesus said when asked about paying taxes. To a Jewish audience he asked the question, “Whose image is on the coin?” In so doing he was pointing out the violation of Jewish law that the coin represented. By pointing out that homage was due God he refocused the question to what proper worship was. That he used the image of Cesar as the issue pointed backward to the worship of Nebuchadnezzar’s image and forward to the Antichrists image from Revelation. The irony of the situation is greater because the man asking the question is God’s son, or in the genesis language God’s image. Sitting right there!

When we study the language in the book of Romans we find ourselves “in Christ”. When the Holy Spirit cries out for us it says “Abba” or father. Through Christ we are calling out to our Father in deed.

Genesis 1:2 “…and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.”

Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

This passage should be the greatest encouragement to the infertile or barren. The first description of the world here is that of the barren, the desolate, the empty. Strong’s concordance tells us that the words formless and empty are “bohuw” and “tohuw”.

Bohuw
from an unused root (meaning to be empty); a vacuity, i.e. (superficially) an undistinguishable ruin:–emptiness, void.

Tohuw
from an unused root meaning to lie waste; a desolation (of surface), i.e. desert; figuratively, a worthless thing; adverbially, in vain:–confusion, empty place, without form, nothing, (thing of) nought, vain, vanity, waste, wilderness.

These are the adjectives and self descriptions that infertile woman frequently use to describe their lack. The word bohuw even sounds like the cry of the inconsolable. “Boo hoo” we might write over the head of a weeping cartoon figure. The words show a yearning for life and order and meaning to be brought into a desolate waste of emptiness.

Think of the earth as a ball floating in space. Even if it were smooth as a pool ball it would be odd to describe it as empty. Using the word empty is so suggestive of a container that needs to be filled. So as an obstetrician I hear dark barren container filled with formless water waiting to be infused with life and light and order and well…somehow that seems to relate to pregnancy!

So why does the first picture give comfort to the barren? Look what God is doing. He is hovering over the situation. Brooding, moving…the Hebrew word is

rachaph and also means to “flutter, move, shake”.

Think of a mother hen or one of those “helicopter” parents that hovers over their children.

Their are only two other times the bible describes hovering. Here they are.

Deuteronomy 32:11
like an eagle that stirs up its nest and hovers over its young, that spreads its wings to catch them and carries them aloft.

Isaiah 31:5
Like birds hovering overhead, the Lord Almighty will shield Jerusalem; he will shield it and deliver it, he will ‘pass over’ it and will rescue it.”

Both verses convey the idea of parental concern and protection, and both use birds as similes.

We see the same idea in the design of the ark of the covenant with the wings of the cherubim covering the place where the blood of the sacrifice was placed.

Exodus 25:20
The cherubim are to have their wings spread upward, overshadowing the cover with them. The cherubim are to face each other, looking toward the cover.

Certainly the interposition of the blood of the sacrifice was supposed to bring new life to the Israelites. This is no doubt an archetype of Jesus’s death on the cross which remits our sins. But Look at how these hovering bird like creatures are described to be overshadowing the ark. Where else do we see overshadowing?

Luke 1:35
The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.

Luke describes a picture of the Virgin Mary that harkens back to the original creation of the world. The spirit of god hovers over her the way the spirit hovered over the waters of creation. God can bring life to the barren void of the world. In fact it is the first thing we know about Him. And in the same way it is in his character to bring life to the empty womb.

Genesis 1:1. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Here we have the beginning of all things. I had planned to skip the first couple of chapters of genesis with the idea that they dealt with the creation of the physical universe. How can we have a discussion of pregnancy before people even existed? But the words here are so suggestive I think it might be worth considering.

Verse one gives all the credit for creation to God. It also says he created three things. Three you say? Look at the word heavens. It is plural in the Hebrew. The word is “shamayim” and it is a dual form of an unused singular word “shameh”. The word means sky but it has a dual form. Some people think this means the air which makes up the “sky” plus the region of the planets and beyond which we call “outer space”.

Lets look at 1 Thessalonians 5:23

May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

This verse is frequently quoted to support the idea that man is made up of three parts. The body, soul and spirit. Could the three parts of physical creation correspond to the three parts of man?

Ok, you say, I can see how the Earth symbolizes the body, but what about the heavens corresponding to the air and outer space? I mean even scientists would disagree about where the sky stops and outer space begins. Is it the outer edge of the thermosphere or maybe the magnetosphere? That seems like a fine line that is difficult to determine. What makes you think they should be separate things at all?

The soul and the spirit are just as hard to distinguish. Where does one stop and the other start? The bible acknowledges this difficulty and says that only God can tell the difference.

Hebrews 4:12
For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

Maybe the dual nature of the heavens has nothing to do with outer space though, what if it means day and night? The scripture still provides a link to the nature of the soul and spirit.

Isaiah 26:9
My soul yearns for you in the night;
in the morning my spirit longs for you.

Perhaps Genesis 1:1 also tells us something about God himself. The trinity is composed of two parts spirit and one part physical. The heavens and the earth might represent this as well. Jesus is the earthly manifestation of God. The Spirit represents the part of God that we live in while standing on the Earth as our foundation. The outer heavens might represent God the father containing us and yet infinitely more than we can imagine and ultimately always beyond knowing completely.

So as we set out to understand what God tells us about pregnancy, I think it makes sense to look at the verses that deal with the nature of the object of that new creation as well as the creator.