Chapter III.
Of the shape and bodily visible figure of God.
Mr Biddle’s question:—
Is God in the Scripture said to have any likeness, similitude, person, shape?
The proposition which he would have to be the conclusion of the answers to these questions is this, That, according to the doctrine of the Scriptures, God is a person shaped like a man; — a conclusion so grossly absurd that it is refused as ridiculous by Tully, a heathen, in the person of Cotta (De Nat. Deor. lib. i. 6), against Velleius the Epicurean, the Epicureans only amongst the philosophers being so sottish as to admit that conceit. And Mr B., charging that upon the Scripture which hath been renounced by all the heathens who set themselves studiously to follow the light of nature, and, by a strict inquiry, to search out the nature and attributes of God, principally attending to that safe rule of ascribing nothing to him that eminently included imperfection,1 hath manifested his pretext of mere Christianity to be little better than a cover for downright atheism, or at best of most vile and unworthy thoughts of the Divine Being. And here also doth Mr B. forsake his masters.2 Some of them have had more reverence of the Deity, and express themselves accordingly, in express opposition to this gross figment.
According to the method I proceeded in, in consideration of the precedent questions, shall I deal with this, and first consider briefly the scriptures produced to make good this monstrous, horrid assertion. The places urged and insisted on of old by the Anthropomorphites3 were such as partly ascribed a shape in general to God, partly such as mention the parts and members of God in that shape, his eyes, his arms, his hands, etc.; from all which they looked on him as an old man sitting in heaven on a throne, — a conception that Mr B. is no stranger to. The places of the first sort are here only insisted on by Mr B., and the attribution of a “likeness, image, similitude, person, and shape” unto God, is his warrant to conclude that he hath a visible, corporeal image and shape like that of a man; which is the plain intendment of his question. Now, if the image, likeness, or similitude, attributed to God as above, do no way, neither in the sum of the words themselves nor by the intendment of the places where they are used, in the least ascribe or intimate that there is any such corporeal, visible shape in God as he would insinuate, but are properly expressive of some other thing that properly belongs to him, I suppose it will not be questioned but that a little matter will prevail with a person desiring to emerge in the world by novelties, and on that account casting off that reverence of God which the first and most common notions of mankind would instruct him into, to make bold with God and the Scripture for his own ends and purposes.
1. I say then, first, in general, if the Scripture may be allowed to expound itself, it gives us a fair and clear account of its own intendment in mentioning the image and shape of God, which man was created in, and owns it to be his righteousness and holiness; in a state whereof, agreeable to the condition of such a creature, man ing created is said to be created in the image and likeness of God, — in a kind of resemblance unto that holiness and righteousness which are in him, Eph. iv. 23, 24, etc. What can hence be concluded for a corporeal image or shape to be ascribed unto God is too easily discernible. From a likeness in some virtue or property to conclude to a likeness in a bodily shape, may well befit a man that cares not what he says, so he may speak to the derogation of the glory of God.
2. For the particular places by Mr B. insisted on, and the words used in them, which he lays the stress of this proposition upon: the first two words are דְּמוּת and צֶלֶם; both of which are used in Gen. i. 26. The word דְּמוּת is used Gen. v. 1, and צֶלֶם, Gen. ix. 6; but neither of these words doth, in its genuine signification, imply any corporeity or figure. The most learned of all the rabbins, and most critically skillful in their language, hath observed and proved that the proper Hebrew word for that kind of outward form or similitude is תֹּאַר; and if these be ever so used, it is in a metaphorical and borrowed sense, or at]east there is an amphiboly in the words, the Scripture sometimes using them in such subjects where this gross, corporeal sense cannot possibly be admitted: כִּדְמוּת חֲמַת־נָחָשׁ, — “Like the poison of a serpent,” Ps. lviii. 4. There is, indeed, some imaginable, or rather rational, resemblance in the properties there mentioned, but no corporeal similitude. Vide Ezek. i. 28, xxiii. 14 (to which may be added many more places), where if דְּמוּת shall be interpreted of a bodily similitude, it will afford no tolerable sense. ‘The same likewise may be said ofצֶלֶם. It is used in the Hebrew for the essential form rather than the figure or shape; and being spoken of men, signifies rather their souls than bodies. So it is used, Ps. lxxiii. 20; which is better translated, “Thou shalt despise their soul,” than their “image.” So where it is said, Ps. xxxix. 6, “Every man walketh in a vain show” (the same word again), however it ought to be interpreted, it cannot be understood of a corporeal similitude. So that these testimonies are not at all to his purpose. What, indeed, is the image of God, or that likeness to him wherein man was made, I have partly mentioned already, and shall farther manifest, chap. vi.; and if this be not a bodily shape, it will be confessed that nothing can here be concluded for the attribution of a shape to God; and hereof an account will be given in its proper place.