What the Image of God Means
Not willingly, but because they have forced me.
So let those who babble such things be silenced, as the ignorant people they are; let them keep quiet and not meddle with what is beyond their power, or rather, let them stop speaking against God.
For God is above all creation: he is not conceived as a body, nor in bodily forms or shapes.
He is simple, immaterial, without form, and not composite; he is not put together from parts, limbs, or members as we are.
Rather, as the Scriptures say, he is spirit (John 4:24); he looks upon all things, is present everywhere, fills all things, and is absent from nothing.
For he fills heaven and earth (Jeremiah 23:24).
The statement that man was made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27) bears another sense and points to another meaning.
For of all the living creatures on earth he alone is rational and compassionate, with an aptitude for every virtue, and he has also been given the power to rule.
Greek
ἄφρων, οὐχ ἑκὼν μᾶλλον, ἀλλὰ παρ' αὐτῶν ἠναγκασμένος. ἐπιστομιζέσθωσαν τοίνυν οἱ ταῦτα φλυαροῦντες, ὡς ἀμαθεῖς, καὶ ἠρεμείτωσαν μὴ ἁπτόμενοι τῶν ὑπὲρ δύναμιν, μᾶλλον δὲ μὴ καταλαλεί 605 τωσαν τοῦ Θεοῦ. ὁ γὰρ Θεὸς ὑπὲρ πᾶσαν κτίσιν ἐστὶν, οὔτε σῶμα νοούμενος, οὔτε ἐν τύποις ἢ σχήμασι σωματικοῖς, ἀλλ' ἔστιν ἁπλοῦς, ἄϋλος, ἀνείδεος, ἀσύνθετος, οὐκ ἐκ μερῶν ἢ μελῶν ἢ μορίων συγκείμενος καθάπερ ἡμεῖς, πνεῦμα δὲ μᾶλλον, κατὰ τὰς γραφὰς, καὶ τὰ πάντα ἐφορῶν, πανταχοῦ ὢν καὶ τὰ πάντα πληρῶν, καὶ οὐδενὸς ἀπολιμπανόμενος· πληροῖ γὰρ οὐρανὸν καὶ γῆν. τὸ δὲ κατ' εἰκόνα Θεοῦ πεποιῆσθαι τὸν ἄνθρωπον, ἑτέρας ἐμφάσεις καὶ ὑπονοίας ἔχει. μόνος γὰρ αὐτὸς παρὰ πάντα τὰ ἐπὶ γῆς ζῷα λογικός ἐστι, φιλοικτίρμων, ἐπιτηδειότητα πρὸς πᾶσαν ἀρετὴν ἔχων, λαχὼν δὲ καὶ τὸ ἄρχειν