This paper was presented at the American Society of Church History Conference on Women in Christianity at Stanford University, a Berkeley History Department Colloquium, and a Harvard Divinity School Colloquium. Appreciation extends to Prof. William Courtenay, University of Wisconsin at Madison; Prof. Sara van den Berg, Ohio State University; and Rabbi Michael Signer, Hebrew Union College, Los Angeles, for thoughtful reading of earlier drafts of this paper. The research was funded by a Haynes Foundation Grant through Occidental College and by a Research Associateship at Harvard Divinity School.

¹ Gen 1:26–27:

καὶ εἰπεν ὁ θεός Ποιήσωμεν ἄνθρωπον κατ᾽ εἰκόνα ἡμετέραν καὶ καθ᾽ ὁμαίωσιν, καὶ ἀρχέτωσαν τῶν ἰχθύων τῆς θαλάοσης καὶτῶν πετεινῶν τοῦ οὐρανοῦ καὶ τῶν κτηνῶνκαὶ πάσης τῆς γῆς και πάντων τῶν ἑρπετῶν τῶν ἑρπόντων ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς. καὶ ἐποίησεν ὁ θεὸς τὸν ἄνθρωπον, κατ᾽ εἰκόνα θεοῦ ἐποίησεν αὐτόν, ἄρσεν καὶ θῆλυ ἐποίησεν αὐτούς. Et ait: Faciamus hominem ad imaginem et similitudinem nostram: et praesit piscibus maris, et volatilibus caeli, et bestiis, universaeque terrae, omnique reptili quod movetur in terra. Et creavit Deus hominem ad imaginem suam: ad imaginem Dei creavit ilium: masculum et feminam creavit eos.

The Hexaglot Bible (6 vols.; ed. Rev. Edward Riches de Levante; London: Dickinson and Higham, 1874).Google ScholarRSV trans, with following Phyllis Trible, God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1978).Google Scholar For an excellent multidimensional elucidation of the centrality of Gen 1:27 for contemporary understanding of the Bible, see Trible, Rhetoric of Sexuality, esp. 12–23. Another significant interpretation is forthcoming in Phyllis Bird, “‘Male and Female He Created, Them,’ Gen 1:27 in the Context of the Priestly Account of Creation.” The major source for medieval knowledge of variant early Greek translations of the Hebrew text was Origen's Hexapla (Smalley, Beryl, The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages [Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame, 1964] 13)Google Scholar. The variants noted by Origen preserved the notion of a generic human species divided into two sexes: Hexapla Origenis, Gen 1:27 (PG 15. 155–58).

² Børresen, Kari Elisabeth, “Male-Female, A Critique of Traditional Christian Theology” Temenos 13 (1977) 31–32.Google Scholar

³ Popularizations include Russell, Letty M., ed., The Liberating Word: A Guide to Nonsexist Interpretation of the Bible (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1976)Google Scholar, and Hageman, Alice, ed., Sexist Religion and Women in the Church: No More Silence! (Women's Caucus of Harvard Divinity School; New York: Association, 1974).Google Scholar

⁴ Conversations with the following authors: Trinkaus, Charles, “In Our Image and Likeness”: Humanity and Divinity in Italian Humanist Thought (London/Chicago: University of Chicago, 1970)Google Scholar, and Baker, Herschel, The Image of Man: A Study of the Idea of Human Dignity in Classical Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Renaissance (New York: Harper & Row, 1961).Google Scholar In studying the question whether woman was viewed in the image of God, I am attempting to treat at the level of one unit-idea the complex issue of whether the idea of the dignity of man included the dignity of woman. See also, Horowitz, Maryanne Cline, “The Stoic Synthesis of the Idea of Natural Law in Man: Four Themes,” Journal of the History of Ideas 35 (1974) 3–16.Google Scholar

⁵ Garin, Eugenio, “La ‘Dignitas Hominis’ e la letteratura patristica,” La Rinascita 1 (1938) 102–46, and Charles Trinkaus (Our Image and Likeness) have appropriately emphasized the key role that commentary on Gen 1:26 has played in the development of the idea of the dignity of man.Google Scholar

⁶ Bond, R. Warwick, ed., The Nobility of Woman, by William Bercher 1559 (London: Roxburghe Club, 1904) Intro., 45–55Google Scholar, 81. Emile Telle, L'Oeuvre de Marguerite d'Angoulême Reine de Navarre et la querelle des femmes (1937; reprint ed., Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1969) 45–55.

⁷ Henrici Cornelli Agrippa von Nettesheim, De Nobilitate & Praecellentia Foeminei Sexus (Cologne, 1567) sib. A6^v–A7^r.

⁸ That Agrippa's general position of female preeminence was rare in the Renaissance is indicated by Kelso, Ruth, Doctrine for the Lady of the Renaissance (Urbana: University of Illinois, 1956) chap. 1.Google Scholar

⁹ Agrippa von Nettesheim, De incertitudine et vanitate scientarum et artium (Cologne, 1568); Nauert, Charles G., Agrippa and the Crisis of Renaissance Thought (Urbana: University of Illinois, 1965)Google Scholar; and Popkin, Richard, History of Scepticism from Erasmus to Descartes (expanded ed.; Berkeley: University of California, 1979) 23–25.Google Scholar

¹⁰ O'Faolain, Julia and Martines, Lauro, Not in God's Image: Women in History from the Greeks to the Victorians (New York: Harper & Row, 1973).Google Scholar

¹¹ Gratian's Decretum (ca. 1140) states: “Hec imago Dei est in homine, et unus factus sit ex quo ceteri oriantur, habens imperium Dei, quasi unicarius eius, quia unius Dei habet imaginem, ideoque mulier non est facta ad Dei imaginem. Sic etenim dicit: ‘Et fecit Deus hominem: ad imaginem Dei fecit ilium.’ Hinc etiam Apostolus: ‘Vir quidem,’ ait, ‘non debet uelare caput, quia imago et gloria Dei est; mulier ideo uelat, quia non est gloria aut imago Dei” (Italics mine). Corpus Iuris Canonici (eds. Richter, A. and Friedberg, A.; 2 vols. Leipzig, 1879–1881) 1.2.33, q. 5, c. 13. Cited in O'Faolain and Martines, Not in God's Image, 130.Google Scholar

¹² ἀνὴρ μὲν γὰρ οὐκ ὀϕείλει κατακαλύπτεσθαι τὴν κεϕαλήν, εἰκὼν καὶ δόξα θεοῦὑπάρχων^. ἡ γυνὴ δὲ δόξα ἀνδρός ἐστιν. οὐ γάρ ἐστιν ἀνὴρ ἐκ γυναικός, ἀλλὰ γυνὴ ἐξἀνδρός^. καὶ γὰρ οὐκ ἐκτίσθη ἀνὴρ διὰ τὴν γυναικόα, ἀλλὰ γυνὴ διὰ τὸν ἄνδρα. Vir quidem non debet velare caput, quoniam imago et gloria est Dei: Mulier autem gloria viri est. Non enim vir ex muliere est, sed mulier ex viro: Etenim non est creatus vir propter mulierem, sed mulier propter virum (The Hexaglot Bible, 1 Cor 11:7–9).

¹³ Quaestiones Veteris et Novi Testamenti, 127 (CSEL 50). Ivo of Chartres, Decretum, 8.95 (PL 161. 603), and Panormia, 7.44 (PL 161. 1291).

¹⁴ Aquinas, Thomas, Summa Theologiae (ed. Fathers, Dominican; London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1963) vol. 13.Google Scholar Translation mine. Cited in O'Faolain and Martines, Not in God's Image, 131–32. To analyze Thomas' brand of sexism critically, particularly in the context of the pressing issue of women in the priesthood, scholars need to confront critically his absorption of Aristotle's sexist hierarchy. See Horowitz, , “Aristotle and Woman,” Journal of the History of Biology 9 (1976) 183–213.Google Scholar

¹⁵ See Glossa Ordinaria referred to in n. 81. Calvin is particularly clear on this point; John Calvin, Mosis libri V, cum Johannis Calvini commentariis (Geneva: Stephanus, 1563) Gen 1:26. For an analysis of 1 Cor 11:7–8, see Jervell, Jacob, Imago Dei Geni. 26f in Spätjudentum, in der Gnosis und in den Paulinischen Briefen (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1960) 292–312.Google Scholar Recent scholarship has made a good case that Paul's negative statements on women, including 1 Cor 11:7–8, are not authentically Pauline but are instead early glosses and interpolations. See Walker, William O. Jr., “I Corinthians 11:2–16 and Paul's Views Regarding Women,” JBL 94 (1975) 94–110.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Peter Abelard, Introductio ad theologiam (PL 178.991): “‘Faciamus hominem, ’quam faciam, ‘ad imaginem,’ inquit, ‘et similitudinem nostram’ [Gen 1:26]; virum quidem ad imaginem, mulierem vero ad simultidinem. Vir quippe juxta Apostolum, imago Dei est, non mulier (I Cor. XI, 7). Sed sicut vir imago est Dei, ita et mulier imago dicitur viri.” Also see, Expositio in Hexaemeron (PL 178. 763–64). For the Christian Church, the earliest document of a denial I have found is based on a correct edition of Paul. Diodore of Tarsus (330–ca. 392), an Antiochene, held that the image consisted in domination, which he thought was not a characteristic of the female since according to Paul, she is subject to man.(PG 33. 1564). Graef, H. C., “L'image de Dieu et la structure d'après les Peres grecs.” VSpir 22 (1952) 332–33.Google Scholar Diodore's disciple Theodore of Mopsuestia quoted the opinion in Quaest. in Gen., chap. 1, Interr. 10(PG90.107–10). However, the more influential disciple John Chrysostom (ca. 347–407), who passed down to the Latin Fathers Diodore's linkage of the image with domination, clearly asserted that domination was given to the female as well as the male (Gen. homil. 10.4; PG 53. 86). There does not appear to be evidence to support the contention of Arnold Williams that “In the early Church it was often thought that woman was not made in the image of God”(The Common Expositor: An Account of the Commentaries on Genesis 1527–1633 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1948) 87.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Javelet, Robert, Image et resemblance au douzième siècle de saint Anselme à Alain de Lille (ca. 1128–1202) (2 vols; Strasbourg: Letouzey & Ane, 1967) 1. 236–45; 2. 206–11.Google Scholar

¹⁸ In women's studies of the Judeo-Christian tradition there is a tension between what I label “feminist reinterpretation” and “feminist outrage”: this tension existed in the late medieval and renaissance debates on women as well. Critically examining the outrageous biblical statements on women is a necessary part of scholarly women's studies but would require popular communication of a complex and subtle hermeneutics in order to improve the position of women among people who consider the Bible authoritative. In the religious ages, “feminist reinterpretation” was recognized as the better tactic. As an example, see Maire de Gournay, “L'Egalité des hommes et des femmes” (1622) and “Grief des dames” (1626) in Schiff, Mario, La Fille d'alliance de Montaigne, Marie de Gournay (Paris: Honoré Champion, 1910).Google Scholar In the former she lined up classical and religious authorities to prove the equality of man and woman; in the latter she expressed grief and outrage at how men, particularly her contemporaries, had scorned women. The decline of religious belief in the last few centuries has provided the backdrop to the rise of the “feminist outrage” school, and that approach has further advanced the decline of religious belief. As a prominent example of “feminist outrage” driving a woman out of a church, see Daly, Mary, “Feminist Post-Christian Introduction,” The Church and the Second Sex (2d ed.; New York: Harper & Row, 1975).Google Scholar A classic work which set the tone for both modern “feminist reinterpretation” and “feminist outrage” and whose history reveals the danger that women's studies on religious subjects may alienate from its ranks religious women is Stanton's, ElizabethThe Woman's Bible (1895: reprint ed., New York: Arno, 1972).Google Scholar A current theoretical presentation of “feminist reinterpretation” is Trible, Phyllis, “Depatriarchalizing in Biblical Interpretation,” JAAR (1973) 30–48.Google Scholar

¹⁹ The Babylonian Talmud, trans, into English with notes, glossary, and indices under the editorship of Rabbi Isidore Epstein (35 vols.; London: Soncino, 1952).Google Scholar Higher criticism of the Talmud has appeared in scholarly print only since 1973. See Neusner, Jacob, “History of Earlier Judaism: Some New Approaches,” HR 16(1977) 212–36Google Scholar, and idem. “Comparing Judaisms,” HR 18 (1978) 177–91.Google Scholar

²⁰ Kasher, Menahem, ed., Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation: A Millennial Anthology (New York: American Biblical Encyclopedia Society, 1953) 1. 66, 171.Google Scholar

²¹ Kasher, Encyclopedia, 66, 254. Graves, Robert and Patai, Raphael, Hebrew Myths: The Book of Genesis (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1964) 61–62. Folklore on the extraordinary physical appearance of the first man seeped into Christian popular tradition as well (Williams, Common Expositor, 71–72).Google Scholar

²² Boas, George, Primitivism and Related Ideas in the Middle Ages (New York: Octagon Books. 1966) 35–36, 52, 76–77.Google Scholar

²³ While for clarity I shall refer to the treatment by the Talmudic authors and by the Church Fathers of the contrasts between “Genesis 1” and “Genesis 2,” the reader should note that the division of the Bible into chapters was introduced into the Christian tradition by Stephen Langton (d. 1228) Smalley, Bible in the Middle Ages, 222–24).

²⁴ Graves and Patai, Hebrew Myths, 65–69. Ginzberg, Louis, The Legends of the Jews (7 vols.; Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1913) 1.64–69 and nn. in vol. 7. For a woman's skillful recounting of the first story of Eve, see Sanh. 39a.Google Scholar

²⁵ Sullivan, J. E., The Image of God: The Doctrine of St. Augustine and Its Influence (Dubuque, IA: The Priory, 1963).Google ScholarRobbins, Frank Egleston, The Hexaemeral Literature, A Study of the Greek and Latin Commentaries on Genesis (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1912) 64.Google Scholar

²⁶ Biblia Latina cum postillis Nicolai Lyrra (4 vols.; Venice, 1481) l.Gen 1 [:26–27], sig. C2^v col. 2-C3^r col. 1. Viewing the passage as an anticipation of Genesis 2, he twice declared, “Human nature was first created in the masculine sex alone: and afterwards woman was formed from the side of man” (na[tura] humana p[rimo] sit formata in sexu masculine t[ant]um: et postea mulier sit formata de costa viri).

²² Martin Luther, Enarrationes in I librum Mose (1535–45), WA 42, on Gen 1:27. Translation from Lectures on Genesis, Chapters 1–5 in Luther's Works (ed. Pelikan, Jaroslav; St. Louis: Concordia, 1958) vol. 1, Gen 1:27.Google Scholar

²³ Irenaeus, Adv. Haer., 1.18.2, and Clement of Alexandria, Exc. Theod., 21.1, cited in Pagels, Elaine, The Gnostic Gospels (New York: Random House, 1979) 89.Google Scholar Also, see Pagels, , “What Became of God the Mother? Conflicting Images of God in Early Christianity,” Signs: A Journal of Women and Society 2 (1976)Google Scholar reprinted in Womanspirit Rising: A Feminist Reader in Religion (ed. Christ, Carol P. and Plaskow, Judith; New York: Harper & Row, 1979) 107–19Google Scholar; Arthur, Rose, “Feminine Motifs in Eight Nag Hammadi Documents” (Th. D. diss.; Graduate Theological Union, 1979).Google Scholar

²⁹ The Zohar (1280–86), trans. Sperling, Harry and Simon, Maurice (5 vols.; London: Soncino, 1931) 1.Google ScholarBer.21b–22a, 34b, 37b; “Kabbala,” EncJud 10. 638–46; Blau, Joseph, The Christian Interpretation of the Cabala in the Renaissance (New York: Columbia University, 1944); Elizabeth Stanton (Woman's Bible, 106–12) recognized that the Zohar could be utilized by those seeking to de-masculinize the Western language for describing God.Google Scholar

³⁰ Plato, Symposium, 189C–193E.

³¹ Midrash Rabbah, trans. Freedman, H. and Simon, Maurice (London: Soncino, 1951 vol. 1.Google Scholar

³² The Pentateuch and Rashi's Commentary (eds. Isaiah, Rabbi Abraham ben and Sharfmin, Rabbi Benjamin; Brooklyn, NY: S.S.& R., 1949) vol. 1Google Scholar, Gen. 2:18. Rashi's commentary has been a classic Jewish introduction to the Bible and is still widely distributed within the Jewish community. Its influence on Christian exegesis is evidenced by the contact of Hugh of St. Victor (ca. 1141) and Andrew of St. Victor (1110–75) with the schools at Troyes founded by Rashi (1041–1105). He was the “Rabbi Solomon” often quoted by Hebraicist Nicholas of Lyra, and his works were available in the 16th and 17th centuries in Latin printed editions (“Rashi [Rabbi Shelomoh ben Yishaq],” NCE 12. 85–86, and Smalley, Bible in the Middle Ages, 83–195,365–66). For John Milton's (1608–74) extensive use of the helpmeet vs. the help-against-him theme, see Fletcher, Harris Francis, Milton's Rabbinical Readings (Urbana: University of Illinois, 1930) 174–75Google Scholar, and Halkett, John, Milton and the Idea of Matrimony: A Study of the Divorce Tracts and Paradise Lost (New Haven: Yale University, 1970) 59–97.Google Scholar

³³ Mosis libri V, cum Johannis Calvini commentaris, Gen 5:2: “Quod nugantur Judaei, solos coniuges vocari Adam, refellitur ex creationis historia, nee sane aliud voluit spiritus hoc loco quam post ordinatū coniugium, fuisse virū & uxorem instar unius hominis.” Calvin, however, in his commentary of Gen 1:27, approached the Jewish view when he indicated that the male is half of human nature, and that together with the female, he becomes one: “Acsi virum dixisset esse dimidium hominem, hac lege additam fuisse illi sociam mulierem ut ambo unum sint…. ” Luther's commentary on Gen 5:2 is based on Nicholas of Lyra, Gen 5:2.

³⁴ Gen 1:28 is the command to Adam and Eve to multiply and to subdue the earth. Rashi, Gen 1:28, pointed out that the Hebrew word which has been read “and subdue it,” may be read “and he shall subdue her.” He drew the moral that the man masters the female that she may not be a loose woman, and thus implying that both the command to be fruitful and to subdue were given to man alone, Rashi justified subordination in marriage as part of the God-created state before mankind's fall. That Rashi's interpretation was only one among several medieval Jewish interpretations is indicated by Nachmanides (1195–1270) who stressed the image in man and woman and stated that the command to have dominion over the earth applied to both man and woman (Rambon [Nachmanides], Commentary on the Torah, trans. Rabbi Charles Chavel [New York: Shilo, 1971] Genesis 1–2.) Note the development within Christian exegesis of the minority view that the command to dominate was given to man alone in n. 16 above.

³⁵ Caro, Joseph, Code of Hebrew Law (Shulhan 'aruk), Hebrew text and English trans. by Denberg, Chaim (Montreal: Jurisprudence, 1954) chap. 145.Google Scholar

³⁶ Wolfson, Harry Austryn, Philo: Foundations of Religious Philosophy in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (2 vols.; Cambridge: Harvard University, 1947) 1. 3–115.Google Scholar

³⁷ N. W. Porteous, “Image of God,” IDB 2. 682–84; Crouzel, Henri, Théologie de l'image de Dieu chez Origène (Paris: Aubier, 1956) 33–40.Google Scholar

³⁸ Philo, Op. Mund., 23.69.

³⁹ “Anthropomorphism” and “Man, Nature of,” Enc Jud. For the most influential Jewish de-anthropomorphizing statement, see Maimonides, Moses, The Guide of the Perplexed, trans. Pines, Shlomo (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1963) 21–23.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ It is Gerhart Ladner's stimulating thesis that as the Church Fathers freed themselves from a corporeal notion of imago Dei, Christian art took on its unique spiritual qualities which distinguished it from classical art, and that the Romanesque trend towards naturalization of human features corresponded to the reawakening of the notion of the unity of the body and soul. Ladner's passages from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries do not come from discussions specifically on the “image of God.” Ladner, Gerhart, Ad Imaginem Dei: The Image of Man in Medieval Art (Latrobe, PA: Archabbey, 1954). For reference to exceptional Jewish medieval visual portrayals of God and of Adam and Eve see “Anthropomorphism,” EncJud. 3. 57–58.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Bréhier, Emile (Les idées philosophiques et religieuses de Philon d'Alexandrie [Paris: Librarie Philosophique, 1925] 121–26) indicates Philo's confusions between the two concepts of man.Google Scholar

⁴² Dodd, C. H., The Bible and the Greeks (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1935) 151.Google Scholar Coincidentally, androgynous views appear in speeches of “Philo” to “Sophia” in Ebreo, Leone, Philosophy of Love (Dialoghi d'amore, 1501–2), trans. Friedeberg-Seeley, F. and Barnes, John H., intro. by Cecil Roth (London: Soncino, 1937) 348–65.Google Scholar

⁴³ Baer, Richard A. Jr., Philo's Use of the Categories of Male and Female (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1970) 20–21, 83–84, 87–88.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ “From a spouse, she has become your sister, from a woman, a man, from a subject, an equal … under the same yoke she hastens with you towards the kingdom of heaven.” Jerome, Ep. 71 ad Lucinum, quoted in Eleanor Commo McLaughlin, “Equality of Souls, Inequality of Sexes: Women in Medieval Theology,” Religion and Sexism: Images of Woman in the Jewish and Christian Traditions (ed. Reuther, Rosemary; New York: Simon and Schuster, 1974) 73.Google Scholar Early origins of the linking of virginity with manliness and spirituality trace to Philo as well as to Gnostic sources extant in his time (Grant, R. M., Gnosticism and Early Christianity [New York, 1959] 125).Google Scholar

⁴⁵ John 1:14, 12:45, 16:9; 2 Cor 4:4; Col 1:15, 3:14–15. See, e.g., Ladner, Gerhart, The Idea of Reform (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1949) 53–60Google Scholar, 83–107, 185–203; Cairns, David, The Image of God (London: SCM, 1959).Google Scholar

⁴⁶ H. Crouzel, “Origen and Origenism,” NCE 10. 767–77; Lubac, Henri de, On First Principles—Origen (Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith, 1973) intro.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Origen, Homiliae in Genesim (PG 12. 146–262); Crouzel, Théologie de l'image, 66–70, 153–56.

⁴⁸ For other references in Origen's corpus to the double creation, see Crouzel, Théologie de l'image, 148 n. 8.

⁴⁹ Commentaria in Evangelium secundum Joannum (PG 14. 619–30); Crouzel, Théologie de l'image, 114–52, particularly n. 23; idem, Virginité et mariage selon Origène (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1962) 17–18, 26.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Commentaria in Evangelium secundum Matthaeum (PG 13. 1227–30); Crouzel, Théologie de l'image, 150–52, particularly n. 23; idem, Virginité et mariage, 17–18.

⁵¹ Crouzel, Virginité et mariage, 136–39. I disagree with Crouzel's interpretation of the equivalence of the female element with the flesh (p. 137), for Origen in this allegory was making both male and female stand for spiritual faculties of the “interior homo.”

⁵² For numerous authors who accepted the Philonic view that the image is only in the soul, see Robbins, The Hexaemeral Literature, 32–33, n. 4.

⁵³ For multiple examples of the allegory, see Proppe, Katherine M., “Reason and Sensuality: Patristic Psychology and Literary Aesthetic Theory in the Late Medieval Period,” (doctoral diss., University of California, Los Angeles, 1974).Google Scholar

⁵⁴ City of God, 12.17 (PL 41. 778); S.T. 3.81.3, 4.

⁵⁵ Paris dignitatis amborum formati sexus, paresque sunt horum actiones, paria praemia, par eorum damnatio. … Quandoquiden igitur feminae pari viris dignitate accepere ut ad Dei sint imaginem, pari dignitate virtute pollent, bonorumque operum edunt specimen. … ” [κβ᾽] “Καὶ ἐποίησεν ὁ Θεὸς τὸν ἄνθρωπον κατ᾽ εἰκόνα.”—“Τὸν ἄνθρωπος, ϕησὶν ἡ γυνή, τί πρὸς ἐμέ; ὁ ἀνὴρ ἐγένετο^. οὐ γὰρ εἰπε τὴν ἄνθρωπον, ϕησίν, ἀλλὰ τῆ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου προσθήκῃ τὸ ἀρρενικὸν ἐνέϕηνεν.” Ἁλλ᾽ ἵνα μὴ ἀμαθῶς τις τῆ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου προσηγορίᾳ ἐπὶ τοῦ ἀνδρὸς ᾐ μόνου κεχρημένος, προσέθηκεν^. “Ἃρσεν καὶ θῆλυ ἐποίησεν αὐτούς.” Καὶ ἡ γυνὴ ἔχει τὸ κατ᾽ εἰκόνα Θεοῦ γεγενῆσθαι, ὡς καὶ ὁ ἀνήρ. Ὁμοἰως ὁμότιμοι αἱ ϕύσεις, ἴσαι αἱ ἀρεταί, ἀθλαἵσα, ἡ καταδίκη ὁμοία. Мὴ λεγέτω.” Basil the Great, De hominis structura oratio 1 (PG 30. 34–35). A good critical edition is Basile de Césarée: Sur l'origine de l'homme (Hom. X et XI de l'Hexaemeron) SC 160. 213–17.

⁵⁶ Ainsi parle apres le grand Saint Basile: La vertue du l'homme et de la femme est mesme chose, puis que Dieu leur a descerné mesme creation et mesme honneur: ‘masculum et foeminam fecit eos.’” Marie de Gournay, “L'Egalité des hommes et des femmes,” 70,77. See n. 18.

⁵⁷ “Et femina enim ad imaginem Dei creata est secundum id quod et ipsa habebat mentem rationalem; sed addendum hoc de ilia non putavit scriptura quod propter unitatem coniunctionis etiam in ilia intelligendum reliquit.” Bede, Liber quattuor in principium Genesis (CChr) Gen 1:27,28. (PL 91.30 gives a slightly different punctuation.)

⁵⁸ Gloss attributed to Augustine: “Masculum et feminam creavit eos: noluit addere imaginem Dei q[uo]d unitate coniunctionis etiam in femina intelligendum reliquit.” Biblia Latina cum glossa ordinaria Walafridi Strabonis (4 vols. in 3; Strassburg: Rusch, 1481) vol. 1, Gen 1[:27], sig. A8^r col. 2. A gloss attributed to Bede is also included.

⁵⁹ Gregory of Nyssa, De hominis opificio (PG 44. 126–27).

⁶⁰ Migne included Homily 10 and 11 under Gregory (PG 44. 257A–298B) and under Basil (PG 30. 9A–61D). For the debate on authorship, see Leys, Roger, L'image de Dieu chez Saint Grégoire de Nysse (Rome: Pontifica Universitate Gregoriana, 1951) 130–38Google Scholar, and Javelet, Image et resemblance, 2.13, n. 12.

⁶¹ “Quod autem post haec redit ad expositionem opificii divini, cum ait, ‘Fecit eos marem ac feminam’: id opinor omnes homines perspicere, ab exemplo principe removendum esse. ‘In Christo enim Jesu,’ ut Apostolus inquit, ‘neque mas neque femina est.’ At vero Litterae sacrae diserte affirmant, hominem in marem feminamque divisum esse” (PG 44. 182).

⁶² Muckle, J. T., “The Doctrine of St. Gregory of Nyssa on Man as the Image of God,” Medieval Studies 7 (1945) 62–63Google Scholar, 69; Leys, “L'image de Dieu,” 106–11.

⁶³ “Et si homo non peccaret, in geminum sexum simplicitatis suae divisionem non pateretur. Quae divisio omnino divinae naturae imaginis et similtudinis expers est, et nullo modo esset, si homo non peccaret, sicut nullo modo erit post restaurationem naturae in pristinum statum, qui post catholicam resurrectionem cunctorum hominum manifestabitur.” De divisione naturae 4. 12 (PL 122. 799). John Scotus Erigena goes beyond Gregory of Nyssa in denying female bodies in the resurrection and thus differs from the mainstream Christian tradition (see n. 54).

⁶⁴ Smets and Van Esbroeck, Sur l'origine de l'homme, intro., 21–42, 127–52.

⁶⁵ See article by E. Garin, “Dignitas hominis,” 112, and Trinkaus, In Our Image and Likeness, 1. 185–87,395–96, nn. 17, 22. Pico della Mirandola utilized the homily and cited Basil, but not Gregory, as one of his sources (Trinkaus, Our Image and Likeness, 2. 507, 794, n. 12).

⁶⁶ Smets and Van Esbroeck, Sur l'origine de l'homme, 21–42, 127–52.

⁶⁷ Gregory of Nyssa, “Life of St. Macrina” (Ascetical Works: FC 58); Ruether, Rosemary, “Mothers of the Church: Ascetic Women in the Late Patristic Age,” Women of Spirit: Female Leadership in the Jewish and Christian Traditions (ed. Ruether, Rosemary and McLaughlin, Eleanor; New York: Simon and Schuster, 1979) 73–74.Google Scholar

⁶⁸ Hexaemeron libri sex (PL 14. 134–288). Jerome (ca. 345–420) also did not comment on the subject in his Liber Hebraicarum questionum in Genesim (PL 23. 988).

⁶⁹ The influence of Origen on Ambrose's concept of a divine painting is pointed out by McCool, Gerald A., “The Ambrosian Origins of St. Augustine's Theology of the Image of God in Man,” TS 20 (1959) 67–68.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ Robbins, Hexaemeral Literature, 59.

⁷¹ Augustine, Confessions, 6.3–4 (PL 32. 720–22). Other works to be cited are De Genesi ad litteram (PL 34. 246–66), De civitate dei (PL 41. 13–804), and De trinitate (PL 42. 819–1096). For Augustine's positive attitudes toward the body and for analysis of the development of his views, see Miles, Margaret R., Augustine on the Body (Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1979)Google Scholar

⁷² McCool, “Ambrosian Origins,” 65–66, 80.

⁷³ Translation given is the standard one (NPNF) used by O'Faolain and Martines, Not in God's Image; Augustine, De trinitate, 12.7.10 (PL 42. 1003).

⁷⁴ O'Faolain and Martines, Not in God's Image, 130.

⁷⁵ Ruether, “Misogynism and Virginal Feminism,” 156.

⁷⁶ Ibid., 158.

⁷⁷ “Et sicut una caro est duorum in masculo et femina, sic intellectum nostrum et actionem …” (PL 42. 999).

⁷⁸ “Efficimur etiam filii Dei per baptismum Christi. … Qui est ergo qui ab hoc consortio feminas alienet, cum sint nobiscum gratiae cohaeredes …” (Ibid., 1005).

⁷⁹ “Ut non maneat imago Dei, nisi ex qua parte mens hominis aeternis rationibus conspiciendis vel consulendis adhaerescit, quam non solum masculos, sed etiam feminas habere manifestum est” (Ibid.).

⁸⁰ A compatible interpretation may be found in a source brought to my attention by Ruether, , “Misogynism and Virginal Feminism,” 157: Børrensen, Subordination et équivalence: nature et rôle de la femme d'après Augustin et Thomas d'Aquin (Oslo: Universitetsforlaget, 1967) 34–39.Google Scholar

⁸¹ Biblia Latina cum glossa ordinaria, vol. 1, Gen 1 [.21], sib. A8^r col. 2; vol. 3,1 Cor 11 [:7–8], sig. A3^v cols. 1–2. The other gloss on the passage in Corinthians is attributed to “Ambrose,” a name which often disguised Ambrosiaster or Theodore of Mopsuestia who wrote on the Pauline epistles. Seen. 16 above, and Smalley, Bible in the Middle Ages, 15–18, 22.

⁸² See nn. 7, 55, 57.

⁸³ Brunner, Heinrich Emil, Man in Revolt: A Christian Anthropology (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1947) 105–7Google Scholar, 346. While his distinctions between man and woman follow many of the traditional stereotypes (352–61), his use of male-female dichotomy in Gen 1:27 to interpret the image of God to be expressed by love and fellowship is significant. On the contrast of Karl Barth and Emil Brunner, see Bailey, Derrick S., The Man-Woman Relation in Christian Thought (London: Longmans, 1959) 265–75.Google Scholar David Cairns, The Image of God in Man, 167–75 (third clause of Gen 1:27 only mentioned in relation to Barth); and Jewett, Paul King, Man as Male and Female (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1975).Google Scholar

⁸⁴ On the latter subject, see Trinkaus, Charles, “The Renaissance Idea of the Dignity of Man,” Dictionary of the History of Ideas (ed. Wiener, Philip P.; New York: Scribners, 1973–1974); and Herschel Baker, The Image of Man.Google Scholar

⁸⁵ Within this historical paper, I have labelled “Pauline” what the Church Fathers believed to be Paul's writings. See Walker, “I Corinthians 11:2–16 and Paul's View Regarding Women,” cited in n. 15.

⁸⁶ Appreciation extends to students at the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, for pointing out that some of their lifestyles are beyond the range of pre-modern Gen 1:27 commentary, and yet were chosen with intention to be “in God's image.” See Geller, Rabbi Laura and Koltun, Elizabeth, “Single and Jewish: Toward a New Definition of Completeness,” The Jewish Woman: New Perspectives (ed. Koltun, Elizabeth; New York: Schocken, 1976) 43–49.Google Scholar

⁸⁷ Stendahl, Krister, “Emancipation and Ordination,” The Bible and the Role of Women: A Case Study in Hermeneutics (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1966) 38–43Google Scholar; Ruether and McLaughlin, eds., Women of Spirit, esp. chaps. 11–13; Ruether, , “The Subordination and Liberation of Women in Christian Theology: St. Paul and Sarah Grimke,” Soundings: An Interdisciplinary Journal 41 (1978) 168–81Google Scholar: and Kendall, Patricia A., Women and the Priesthood: A Selected and Annotated Bibliography (Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania, 1976).Google Scholar

⁸⁸ For evidence of the impact on medieval Judaism and Christianity of non-biblical sexism, see Horowitz, “Aristotle and Woman,” 183–213.