What does "literal" mean?

[rave phillaphia]

It doesn't say in any scripture until the medieval period that we are literally made in Gods image. The bible says we are made in Gods image but what part. Want to see the Rabbinical debates throughout time? Read the Midrash and Talmud. It is interesting.

[Ravening]

Why would they add that? To elevate man?

[rave phillaphia]

I don't think they really were doing that, I think it was more that humans feel that they have the deepest connection and relationship with God, so I guess you would want to look like God and be like God because it is your parent and is the ultimate 'perfection'. More deeply, humans want the deep relationship with God but are limited by the physical realm. It is hard to think of God without giving God some sort of way to understand it (meaning giving God physical features so we can develop a relationship). Kind of think of it as you have a parent but have never seen them, they have never talked to you, and you have to have a relationship with them. It is hard so we make up ways of what the parent looks like to help guide us. It takes anxiety off.

[Ravening]

Are we literally made in the image of God?

[rave phillaphia]

thats the question, it says we were made in the image of God but what part? Some Jewish stories also said that this was the "light of God" and that it was taken from us when Adam and Eve left the garden, but it can also be metaphorically.

[Ravening]

Light can be symbolic of truth.  But as often as not, humans are not truthful.

[ravinclaw]

This is just my opinion and it could be way off. I think what it meens is our ability to feal emotion. People say we cant understand god because we dont know how he thinks....what if we do to a certain extent? If were going by god in the bible, and we are for the purpose of this thread, he can feal things like love, anger, ect.

[Muerte]

  A good theory, but I find it hard to swallow.  If we think on it GOD is so many steps above us there is no possible way for us, as mere humans, to assume to know what GOD thinks.  I know we give GOD the title of "HE" (or in some cases a "SHE"), but we are talking about a being that has the possiblity of never having a physical form.  After all GOD existed before everything else, so if GOD did have a physical form, where would have GOD Lived?

  The bible makes reference that we were created in "HIS" image, but that's coming from the bible, a text that is really nothing more than borrowed stories rewritten to better suit a Christian mind set.  No I am not purposefully bashing Christianity again, if I were going to go there I would say "A priest, a rabbi, and a Father walk into a bar.....  What I am saying is that some things are written to give explanation to those who wish to do as little thinking as possible.  They ask questions and a person in authority gives them an answer that sounds sufficiently mysterious and yet at the same time plausible.  It makes them feel better.