Tackling Tradition 54: Doug Wilson On the Imago Dei

 So God created man in his own image,

in the image of God he created him;

male and female he created them.  (Genesis 1:27, ESV)

From the pen of Doug Wilson:

11. How did God imprint His image on the human race?

He did this by creating us male and female. Any attempts to reconfigure this arrangement are therefore explicit assaults on the image of God.

How?  God has no sexual characteristics & no sexual attributes.

Other than a functionally polytheistic worldview in which idols & the pseudodeities & their minions who underwrite them, the only road to this conclusion runs through the use / utilization of the human image itself as a sufficient epistemic warrant for human sexual ethics — which Romans 1:18 - 32 specifically condemns. 

On this view — that if Doug Wilson & his followers, after indicting humanity for suppressing God’s image & authority & substituting any number of created images (including the human image) as a sufficient epistemic warrant for sexual ethics…

The sin starts with rebellion and ingratitude. That is the first step. God takes our heads in both His hands, and points our head towards the greatness of His glory. We refuse to look because to do so would obligate us. We take the greatness of His glory and thrust it away from us, holding it under, suppressing it.The second stage is to substitute something else in place of God—images of men, or birds, or beasts, or crawling things. The final stage of judgment (remember, this is the wrath of God) is subversion. The glory of God in the image of God (man) is still too clear, and so that image must be dishonored. That dishonor takes the form of homosexual practices.

…then turns around & points us to the human image — not God’s image itself (which has no sexual characteristics & no sexual attributes) in order to do sexual ethics.  

Such sexual activity is not the kind of thing that can ever culminate in a one flesh union. Inside the covenant, and between eligible participants, human sexuality is an expression of God’s creation design (Gen 2:22-24)

That’s at the root of his beliefs about homosexuals, women, male hegemony, & church order.     

Homosexuals, according to Wilson, have Daddy issues.  Women are subservient & objects of sexual desire to be conquered.   Men are the despotic or quasi-despotic rulers of the home, the churches, & society in general. Any attempt to displace men is an attack on the image of God itself. 

This shows up in misogynistic, homophobic online material he produces.    

Why is any attempt to “subvert” the pattern of creation established by God in Genesis 1:27 & 2:22 - 24 seen as an attack on the very image of God? Why homosexual men & women have daddy issues? Why do wives need to be led with a firm hand? 

This sort of thinking & behavior is a direct result of looking to the created image of man instead of at the Creator.   Suppressing the glory of God (God’s existence, attributes, & authority) & supplanting it with the human image (and/or any number of created images) is at the root of this point of view that, if / when allowed to flourish, can grow into the Cult of Male Hegemony. 

Men are at the top of the tower, &, from this POV, a society that no longer endorses & enforces the ideology of (Heterosexual) Male Hegemony is a society of absent fathers.   Absent fathers beget homosexuals who are allegedly out of touch with what it means to be “real” man or “real” woman.  In addition, women need a firm hand because some (and increasingly all) women suffer from absentee &/or neutered father syndrome.   Women & the Radical Feminist Movement are responsible & Maje Hegemony in the home, church, & civil / governmental spheres is seen as its antidote. 

If any of this is true, then — since worship ethics relative to who God is & what God is like & how the 3 Persons of the Godhead relate to each other conduces to a view in which the Father is the Despotic Monarch of the Holy Trinity.  On this view the Son & Spirit are either not at all co-equal or are co-equal in a de jure sense only, much like women are said to be co-equal but are systematically & deliberately barred from key major leadership positions/offices in the home, ecclesiastical institutions/fellowships, & the society at large (especially Government).  

We stand against Federal Visionism at & in PAPC. We also stand against the use & utilization of the human image (and any & all created images) as a sufficient epistemic warrant for worship, sexual, ecclesiastical, familial, & civil/governmental ethics. 

Christus Victor! Amen!