We had this study in our home group last Wednesday evening (29 Oct 2008). A much less complex study than Study 1, and so not half as much fun or grist for discussion.
Still, worth having rather than not.
An aspect of our studies I do not like is that they often amount to comprehension tests, and do not seem to be structured to promote reflection or any depth of consideration of the subject passage; one can take the questions as far as one likes, of course, but for most, they can tend to produce less than penetrating discussion.
"In God's image" did promote some lively conversation; with one person thinking that it meant that we looked physically like God! Imageness has attending it something of a communion of capability and epistemological confidence, I think, in that to the extent of the 'image-ness' we can have a high level of certainty that our rationality will be a conduit for truth, truth about our setting (the world we are in, with much relief to empiricists), and truth as a reliable result, at least potentially, of our thinking. Naturally there are limits to this, particularly introduced by the Fall, but I think we are given access to thinking 'true' thoughts, and thoughts that correspond with the external 'truth' of what is about us. Our thinking might not produce a thorough veracity, but to the extent that it does take us toward that destination, it does so genuinely.
We had a bit of a laugh over the question of 'rule' in vs. 28: ruling over the fish? Fish, for goodness sake!! How do we 'rule' over fish?
We then discussed 'subdue' a fair bit; noting that the scene was that of God forming a set of interdependent relationships with mankind a participant in those relationships, this being the circumscription for 'subdue'. Therefore not 'subdue' as in exploit and demean the very good that God had created, but serve it for its prosperity (and therefore ours) but in a non consumerist and deeply enjoyable and sustainable manner.
Of course the great rent in history, the Fall, changed all that with its besmirching of the 'very good'; and we live with the results of that brokenness to this day.
Naturally, the 'divine command for vegetarianism' came up. The answers here surprised me, with some people taking this as either a serious or not serious 'command' and not seeing it in the 'flow of biblical history' to adopt Schaeffer's term. Rather than a command, it is simply a statement. If there was no death of living beings, as death came with the fall, then animals were not for food (except stuff like milk, and wool too, if that could be eaten :-)! ). Its a pretty obvious 'rule' of textual construction that if something is specifically given, then the things not given are excluded. We then talked about the 'rule' being overturned in Gen 9:1-4, where the fall's effect on all life had an end result for the relationship between man and animal.
God's 'very good' of all his work on the preceeding days was regarded by all of us as a kind of summation of satisfaction; and an indicator of completion, given the 'mere' 'goods' preceeding.
The final question was an effort to get some practical use out of the study: what would it mean to reflect the image of the creator in the coming week?
Well, as were are made in the image, marred as it is by the Fall, there's not much we can do but reflect it. We will think, communicate, reason and love, and organise and create inevitably throughout the week; we will also act as though we can truly know things, within our cognitive limits and as though truth is at least a possibility in our discourse and thought lives. We will also act as though our mental lives are congruent with a truely 'there' external world. How could we do otherwise?
Some people wanted to put a moral tint on the notion of 'image' and while that is certainly there, it does not exhaust the concept, IMO. I rashly asserted that even Hitler (why do we always choose him, and not the greater mass murderers of Stalin or Mao?) reflected the image of the creator! Just not completely!!
