And 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 fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.
All Commentaries on Genesis 1:26 Go To Genesis 1
John Chrysostom
AD 407
Some others base themselves on our arguments by asserting that God possesses an image in common with us, but they do not understand correctly what has been said. We did not speak about an image of being but about an image of command, as we will explain below. In fact, as a proof that divinity has no human form, listen to Paul’s words: “But for a man it is not right to have his head covered, since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man.” This is why—he says—“she must wear a veil on her head.” And in truth, in this passage he has called “image” this absence of difference of form with regard to God, and man is called image of God because God also possesses this figure: in their opinion, therefore, it should not be said that man only is the image of God but the woman as well. For man and woman have in common a single figure, character and resemblance. Why then is man called image of God, while the woman is not? Because Paul does not mean the image appearing in the form but the image concerning the command, which was given to man, not woman. Man in fact is subject to no creature, while woman is subject to man, according to God’s words: “Your movement will be toward your husband, and he will rule you.” This is why man is the image of God. He has no creature over him, and there is nobody over God: he rules on everything. Woman, on the other hand, is the glory of man, because she is subject to man.
