Skillen on Politics and the Bible
In an audio lecture James Skillen says that ‘Humans as God’s image-bearers’ is more basic than the ‘Creator-creature distinction’.
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Without diminishing the creator-creature distinction, I think that this is true. Divergence from proper representation lies at the heart of the scriptural drama, because it was what Adam failed to do – image God properly. Instead of ruling the animals (and particularly a “more crafty” one) on God’s terms, he became the image-bearer of the one that said “God lied”.
Maintaining the ontological (“of being”) distinction between Creator and creature is therefore a concern tangentally; ascription of ‘divinity’ is implied when man treats an animal as the source of his own image-bearing or worship-obligation. But the real issue is representation, because that returns to the core themes and purpose of man’s creation.
Thus, in almost every case in which idols are discussed, the real issue is not the C/c distinction (though that is always implied), but rather the sort of character Yahweh has, as opposed to that of the idols. God wishes man to be restored to Himself, having again a god-like (life-giving) character and task for creation, and so He laments the inability of man’s dumb idols to do what He can do, and to be like He is. For, man will be shaped into the image of the god he serves, and will not be restored to Yahweh’s image while serving idols.
Therefore, the 1st and 2nd commandments are primarily guards to preserve the source of man’s image and his reflection of that image, rather than primarily a guard against a C/c mix-up. The reason we have traditionally highlighted the C/c distinction, and developed such rules as no-pictures-of-Jesus, is because (IMHO) that’s the emphasis of our philosophical heritage.
At the very least, it seems to me that we ought to humbly consider whether, given the account of man’s creation, Skillen is correct.