(26) God said, “Let us make humanity in our image, after our likeness. They shall rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the cattle, the whole earth, and all the creeping things that creep on earth.” (27) God created human beings in the divine image, in the image of God were they created; male and female God created them.
(1) This is the record of Adam’s line.—When God created humanity, God made the human-being in the likeness of God; (2) male and female God created them. And when they were created, God blessed them and called them Adam.—
The Divine Image as God-Given Worth
Ben Azzai taught: This is the record of Adam’s line. –When God created man, He made him in the likeness of God, male and female he created them (Gen. 5:1-2) is a great principle of the Torah. Rabbi Akiva said: You shall love your neighbor as yourself (Lev. 19:18) is an even greater principle. On the contrary, [Ben Azzai’s principle is greater because] you must not say, “Since I am despised, let my neighbor also be despised.” Rabbi Tanchuma said: If you do so, know whom you despise, for He made him in the likeness of God. (Sifra Kedoshim 4:12, Genesis Rabbah 24:7)
The Divine Image as Intellectual Perception and Moral Decision-Making
In man the “form” is that constituent which gives him human perception: and on account of this intellectual perception the term “image” is employed in the sentence, “In the image of God He created him” (Gen. 1:27). (Moses Maimonides, Guide for the Perplexed I:1)
The human species is unique in the world – there being no other species like it in the following respect; namely, that a person by himself, and by the exercise of intelligence and reason, knows what is good and what is evil, and there is none who can prevent the human person from doing what is good or that which is evil. (Moses Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, Laws of Repentance 5:1)
The Divine Image as Imitation of God
Rabbi Chama said in the name of Rabbi Chanina: What does the following verse mean: After the Eternal One your God you shall follow (Deuteronomy 13:5)? Is it actually possible for a mortal to follow after God’s Presence in this world? Does it not also say: The Eternal One your God is a consuming fire (Deut. 4:24)?
Rather, it means to follow after the Holy Blessed One’s attributes… Just as the Holy Blessed One visits the sick, for so it says, The Eternal One appeared to him [Abraham] by the oaks of Mamre (Genesis 18:1), so should you visit the sick... (Babylonian Talmud Sotah 14a)