The Image
The Image
Words referring to the fact that the idol is hewn into a certain shape or image are Semel (), 2Ch 33:7; 2Ch 33:15 (Manasseh’s idol), and Eze 8:3; Eze 8:5 (‘the image of jealousy’); and perhaps Tsir (), Isa 45:16, ‘makers of idols.’ Temunah (), ‘likeness,’ is used in Job 4:16. It does not, however, refer to an idol, but to some form or outline which presented itself in vision. The same word is used in Exo 20:4, in the prohibition from making the ‘likeness’ of anything; also in Deu 4:23; Deu 4:25; Deu 5:8, and Psa 17:15 (‘I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness’). The LXX rendering is generally , similitude.
Tselem (, Ass. tsalmu), a representation, answering to the Greek , image, is the word used in Gen 1:26-27; Gen 5:3; Gen 9:6, with reference to the fact that man was made in the image of God in Num 33:52 it is used of molten images, and it occurs in the following passages:–1Sa 6:5; 1Sa 6:11 (the images of mice and emerods); 2Ki 11:18 (the images of Baal); 2Ch 23:17; Eze 7:20; Eze 16:17; Eze 23:14 (images of men); Amo 5:26 (Moloch and Chiun); Dan 2:31, &c., and 3:1, &c., the image of which Nebuchadnezzar dreamed, and that which he set up in the plain of Dura. The word is also used in Psa 73:20, ‘When thou awakest, thou shalt despise their image,’ that is to say, their form or appearance; and in Psa 39:6, ‘Man walketh in a vain shadow’ (lit in an image).
In Lev 26:1 the ‘graven image’ is Mascith (), which is supposed to refer to hieroglyphics, or to little figures of Thoth and other Egyptian gods. this word also occurs in Eze 8:12, where reference is made to the ‘chambers of imagery,’ that is to say, chambers with figures painted and carved in relief, suc has still exist in Egypt and Assyria in Num 33:52, and Pro 25:11, MasciThis rendered pictures; and in Psa 73:7, and Pro 18:11, there is reference to the mental process which we call picturing up, or imagination.
NT Teaching on Images
The word means a resemblance or figure, whether bodily or moral. It is used with reference to idolatry in Rom 1:23, where St. Paul speaks of those who changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the resemblance of an image of a corruptible man. When our Lord is said to have been made in the likeness of men, the same word is used, but with what a difference! No lifeless stock or stone shaped by man’s h and after the pattern of his fellowman, but a living Being partaking of all that is essential to human nature, yet absolutely free from stain of sin, and with a body destined to see no corruption, sent into human life, not from nothingness, but from the bosom of the Heavenly Father, and from that glory which He had before the foundation of the world.
The first passage in the N.T in which the word used gives a good idea of its meaning; it is with reference to the denarius of which our Lord asks, ‘Whose is this image and superscription?’ (Mat 22:20). It is curious to observe that whilst idolaters are condemned for changing the glory of God into the similitude of the image of a corruptible man (Rom 1:23), we are expressly told that man is ‘the image and glory of God’ (1Co 11:7). Christ is said to be the image of God (2Co 4:4, Col 1:15); the Christian is now in a moral and spiritual sense to be changed into the same image from glory to glory (Rom 8:29, 2Co 3:18, Col 3:10); and hereafter, so far as his body is concerned, a similar resemblance shall be accomplished (1Co 15:49).
The word also adopted by St. John when he describes the image of the Beast in Rev 13:14, &c.
A hot controversy was called forth shortly after the Reformation in Engl and by the fact that in the English translations of the Scriptures the word w as translated image. Martin, in his controversy with Fulke, laid down that an idol signified a false god; Dr. Fulke, on the contrary, held that it meant an image, and that this was the best word, as it included a representation of the true God. Mart in held, and rightly, that Pesel (), which is usually translated a graven image, only meant a graven thing (Lat. sculptile), and had no reference to an image; and he made a similar criticism on the word Massecah (), which is rendered a molten image. Fulke, however, answered that the object of the engraving in the one case, and of the melting in the other, was to make the material into an image which was intended to represent. the invisible God, or to imitate one of his works, and so to be worshipped. this answer, coupled with the fact that also answers to the Hebrew temunah, as above noticed, may fairly justify our translators, and also their predecessors whose work was being criticised in translating by the word image.
Other Objects of Worship
We now pass to the consideration of words which represent certain specific objects which were closely connected with old forms of idolatry. of these the first to be named is the pillar, statue, or standing image, the Hebrew name for which is Matsevah (), derived from the verb natzav, to stand, and used of the object which symbolised Baal in the Canaanitish idolatry. The LXX usually adopts , a pillar, as its representative. It is first referred to in an idolatrous sense in Exo 23:24, where the command is given to break down the ‘images’ of the Canaanite gods; so in Exo 34:13, where it is connected with ‘groves;’ it is also found in Lev 26:1; Deu 7:5; Deu 16:22; 1Ki 14:23; 2Ki 3:2 (image of Baal), 10:26, 27, (images of Baal), 17:10, 18:4, 23:14; 2Ch 14:3; 2Ch 31:1; Jer 43:13; Hos 3:4; Hos 10:1-2; Mic 5:13.
Another word used is Chamonim (), sun-images, perhaps discs, or perhaps pyramidal stones in the shape of a flame. this last is the idea which Gesenius inclines to, as in accordance with certain old Phoenician inscriptions which speak of Baal Hanan, the sun-god. The word occurs in Lev 26:30, ‘I will cut down (cut off or smite) your images;’ 2Ch 14:5; 2Ch 34:4; 2Ch 34:7; Isa 17:8; Isa 27:9; Eze 6:4; Eze 6:6.