Genesis 1 builds to a high point. After the light, the sea, the land, the plants and the animals, God makes human beings:
Then God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. Let them rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the earth, and over every creature that moves along the ground.”
Several decisions in the record for this verse are worth knowing, and one of them is a question no one can settle for certain.
“Let us make”
Until now God has said “let there be”. Here he says נַֽעֲשֶׂ֥ה, “let us make”, and the next verse goes back to the singular: “God created”.
The record lists the ways the plural has been read:
- God speaking to the heavenly beings who serve him, as in 1 Kings 22:19–20, or Isaiah 6:8: “who will go for us?”
- a plural that expresses God’s fullness or majesty.
- God deliberating with himself.
- for Christian readers, a first hint of more than one person in God, since the New Testament links the Son with creation (John 1:3).
The decision is marked uncertain, and the translation simply says “us”, which leaves every reading open. The record adds one point that holds whichever reading is right: the next verse is clear that God alone creates.
Image and likeness
The two key words are צֶלֶם, “image”, and דְּמוּת, “likeness”. The record takes them together, not as two different parts of a person such as body and soul.
An image is a statue or a copy. Kings in the ancient world set up images of themselves to show where they ruled. A likeness is a resemblance. Together, the words say that human beings are made to resemble God and to represent him on the earth. That is why the verse goes straight on to give them rule over the living creatures, with a verb used of a king’s rule. The king of Psalm 72 rules for the good of those in his care.
Balanced and Readable say “to be like us” for “according to our likeness”, so the meaning is plain.
“Humankind”, or “man”?
The word for the human beings God makes is אָדָם. It becomes the personal name Adam only later in the story (4:25; 5:1–3). Here it has no article, and the words that follow, “let them rule” and “male and female”, show that it means human beings as a whole.
So the default wording is inclusive: “humankind” at the Literal level, “human beings” at Balanced, “people” at Readable. But many readers know these verses with “man”, the traditional English word in this sense, and that is a question of wording, not meaning. So it is a reader setting. Switch the gender setting to traditional and the verse reads “Let us make man in our image”. See Settings change wording, never meaning.
Verse 27 then gives the three lines of poetry that answer verse 26:
So God created human beings in his image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
Each line has the verb used only of God, “created”, and the record reads the repetition as marking the high point of the account. The second line says God created “him”, singular, since humankind is one whole; the third says “them”, male and female. Both sexes bear the image of God, and the blessing and task of verse 28 are given to both.
“A helper who matches him”
Genesis 2 tells the story again, closer up. Here, for the first time, something in creation is not good: the man alone. God says he will make him עֵ֖זֶר כְּנֶגְדּֽוֹ:
Then the LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be on his own. I will make him a helper who matches him.”
The first word, עֵזֶר, is often translated “helper”, and in English that can sound like a junior assistant. The record says the Hebrew does not suggest a lower rank. It is most often used of God himself as the helper of his people (Exodus 18:4; Psalm 121:1–2). It names someone who gives help that is needed.
The second word joins “like” and “opposite”. The helper will be his equal and his match, someone who stands face to face with him, as no animal can. Balanced says “who matches him” to keep both sides. Readable goes further and says “a partner who is just right for him”. That rendering decision is marked uncertain, and Literal and Balanced keep “helper”.
Open Genesis 1 and tap verse 26 to see the whole record.