Eco-theological anthropology in Christianity: imago Dei and ecological preservation

Abstract

Genesis 1:26 states that humankind has been created in the image of God. There are three general interpretations of what this means. While the substantial view emphasises the essence of humankind and the relational view underscores the social aspect, the functional view highlights the responsibility of humankind to God’s creation. Recent studies have suggested that the substantial view was dominant in the pre-modern period and the functional view has become more popular in contemporary Christian theology.

Contribution: This study carries out a diachronic analysis that demonstrates that the functional view was always implicit in the substantial and relational views. Therefore, the responsibility that humankind bears towards the natural world is not a departure from the original denotation of imago Dei; rather, it is a faithful representation of it. The second encyclical of Pope Francis, Laudato si’, testifies to this. Pope Francis draws attention to the functional view of imago Dei as an implicit part of the substantial view because of the just dominion that humankind should exercise over the rest of God’s creation, which would reflect the dominion of God in a spatiotemporal way. Further, he asseverates that the vertical relationship with God cannot be extricated from the horizontal relationship with God’s creatures, thereby functionalising the relational view.