The Different Opinions on Btzelem Elokim

(26) And God said, “Let us make man btzelem Elokim, after our likeness. They shall rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the cattle, the whole earth, and all the creeping things that creep on earth.” (27) And God created man btzalmo, btzelem Elokim He created him; male and female He created them.

(4) כדמתנו AFTER OUR LIKENESS — with the power to comprehend and to discern.

(3) כדמותנו, in our [angels'] intellectual faculties. Indeed, when man’s spiritual decline is described in Psalms 49,3 his intelligence at that time is compared to a בהמה, a domesticated mammal.

(2) ... In this chapter it is our sole intention to explain the meaning of the words ẓelem and demut. I hold that the Hebrew equivalent of "form" in the ordinary acceptation of the word, viz., the figure and shape of a thing, is toär. Thus we find "[And Joseph was] beautiful in toär ('form'), and beautiful in appearance" (Gen. 39:6): "What form (toär) is he of?" (1 Sam. 28:14): "As the form (toär) of the children of a king" (Judges 8:18). It is also applied to form produced by human labour, as "He marketh its form (toär) with a line," "and he marketh its form (toär) with the compass" (Isa. 44:13). This term is not at all applicable to God. The term ẓelem, on the other hand, signifies the specific form, viz., that which constitutes the essence of a thing, whereby the thing is what it is; the reality of a thing in so far as it is that particular being. In man the "form" is that constituent which gives him human perception: and on account of this intellectual perception the term ẓelem is employed in the sentences "In the ẓelem of God he created him" (Gen. 1:27)... and in the phrase "Let us make man in our ẓelem" (Gen. 1:26), the term signifies "the specific form" of man, viz., his intellectual perception, and does not refer to his "figure" or "shape." Thus we have shown the difference between ẓelem and toär, and explained the meaning of ẓelem.

(5) והיה תמים, acquire the maximum degree of perfection human being are capable of attaining. Be intelligent so that you can acquire more intimate knowledge of Me through recognising the way I operate in the universe. As a result you will be emulate My attributes to the degree that this is possible for humans. The deeds of man reflect his having emulated G'd when he tried to do so. This is what Moses had in mind when he asked G'd: הודיעני נא את דרכיך ואדעך, "make know to me Your ways so that by this means I will get to know You." (Exodus 33,13) This is the ultimate perfection that the human species is able to achieve. This was G'd's objective for man when He created him, when he added the word בצלמנו, "in our image," when announcing that He was about to create man with the words נעשה אדם בצלמנו כדמותנו, "let us make man in our image" (Genesis 1,26).

(1) LET US MAKE MAN. [Rejects certain approaches] ... I will now explain. Note that all the works of creation came into being by God’s command for the sake of man. Scripture relates that the earth and water brought forth plants and all living creatures. After all plants and living creatures had been created, God said to the angels, Let us make man; i.e., We, rather than the earth and water, will occupy ourselves with his creation. We know that the Torah spoke the language of man, for it was given to humans who speak and hear. Now a human being cannot speak of things above or below him without employing human terminology. Hence Scripture uses such terms as the mouth of the earth (Num. 16:30), the hand of the Jordan (Num. 13:29), and the head of the dust of the world (Proverbs 8:26). Far be it from us to believe that God has an image. Scripture clearly refutes such a notion by stating, To whom then will you liken Me, that I should be equal (Is. 40:25). It is because man’s upper soul is eternal and is compared in its existence to God and because man’s soul is incorporeal and fills the body, which is a microcosm, in the same way that God fills the universe that Scripture states, in our image, after our likeness. May God’s name be blessed. He commenced with the macrocosm and concluded with the microcosm. The prophet also says that he saw God’s glory appear in human form (Ezek. 1:26). God is one. He is the creator of all. He is all. I cannot explain further. Man was originally created with two faces; man is thus one but also two. In the image of God means in the image of the angels. Man was created both male and female. The words Be fruitful, and multiply are a blessing not a command, just as they are with regard to the creatures brought forth by the waters (Gen. 1:22). Nevertheless, there is in fact a commandment to be fruitful and multiply transmitted by our sages, of blessed memory, which they attached to this verse in order to remember the commandment.

(1) AND G-D SAID: ‘LET US MAKE MAN.’ There was a special command dedicated to the making of man because of his great superiority since his nature is unlike that of beasts and cattle which were created with the preceding command.
The correct explanation of na’aseh (let us make) [which is in the plural form when it should have been in the singular] is as follows: It has been shown to you that G-d created something from nothing only on the first day, and afterwards He formed and made things from those created elements. Thus when He gave the waters the power of bringing forth a living soul, the command concerning them was Let the waters swarm. The command concerning cattle was Let the earth bring forth. But in the case of man He said, Let us make, that is, I and the aforementioned earth, let us make man, the earth to bring forth the body from its elements as it did with cattle and beasts, as it is written, And the Eternal G-d formed man of the dust of the ground, and He, blessed be He, to give the spirit from His mouth, the Supreme One, as it is written, And He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. And He said, In our image, and after our likeness, as man will then be similar to both. In the capacity of his body, he will be similar to the earth from which he was taken, and in spirit he will be similar to the higher beings, because it [the spirit] is not a body and will not die. In the second verse, He says, In the image of G-d He created him, in order to relate the distinction by which man is distinguished from the rest of created beings. The explanation of this verse I have found ascribed to Rabbi Joseph the Kimchite, and is the most acceptable of all interpretations that have been advanced concerning it.
The meaning of tzelem is as the word to’ar (appearance), as in ‘Vetzelem’ (And the appearance) of his face was changed; similarly, Surely ‘b’tzelem’ (as a mere appearance) man walketh; When Thou arousest Thyself ‘tzalmam’ (their appearance) Thou wilt despise, that is, the appearance of their countenance. And the meaning of the word d’muth is similarity in form and deed, as things that are akin in a certain matter are called similar to each other. Thus man is similar both to the lower and higher beings in appearance and honor, as it is written, And Thou hast crowned him with glory and honor, meaning that the goal before him is wisdom, knowledge, and skill of deed. In real likeness his body thus compares to the earth while his soul is similar to the higher beings.

(4) כדמותנו, acting intelligently like the angels, though from free choice, not like the angels who act under Divine compulsion. In this respect, though the angels are celestial beings, they do not resemble man. In this respect man is a little more like G’d Himself than are the angels, though our habitat is in the “lower” regions of the universe. The principal difference between G’d’s total freedom of action and that of man’s is that G’d’s freedom of action is always put to a constructive use, whereas man frequently abuses his G’d given freedom to oppose the expressed will of His Creator. At any rate, not being hampered by the limitations imposed by having a body, the qualitative freedom of G’d is far superior to that of man, and this is why the Torah uses the comparative כדמותנו, to show that the comparison is limited.

(7) Let us make man in our image: The image of G-d is free will, without any natural external inclination, only from free will and intellect. ... Free will is a condensation of G-dliness, because G-d provides place for his creations to do as they choose, and removed from their actions, the decree and the decision on an individual level...The torah speaks in the way that people speak - let us leave a place for man's personal choice, that he won't be forced in any of his actions, and in the obligation of his thoughts, to be free to do good or evil as he desires. He will be able to do things against his more natural state, and against those things which are straight in the eyes of G-d.....

(4) כדמותנו [Following his first suggestion] ... A different exegesis of the word: כדמותנו: seeing that it is impossible to compare human beings to the Creator, seeing that Isaiah 40,8 has already stated that this is impossible, (Isaiah 40,18) but on the other hand, it is also impossible to compare human beings to the creatures G-d had created before He created the human species, as in that case what advantage would this species have over the beasts created before him, there was no other way to describe our superiority except by comparing it to Divinity in some degree, i.e. as “a shadow of our essence,” בצלמנו כדמותנו; The common denominator between G-d and man on the one hand, and man and beast on the other, is that just as G-d is our ruler, so we rule over the other creatures in the universe.

(1) According to this model, He (blessed be He), as it were, created man and appointed him to rule over the multitude of powers and numberless worlds, and assigned them to him so that he should be their spokesman and govern them via all the minute details of his actions, speech, thoughts, and the larger scale aspects of his behavior, whether for good, or (heaven forefend) for the opposite.