The Bible term “according to the Image” refers to the initial stage of man that enables him to reach the ultimate stage of “according to the likeness” with the use of free will that was bestowed upon the created image. However, albeit having given the “image” to all humans, the “likeness” is the stage that can be attained with the person’s free will, but only with the synergy of the the Holy Spirit.

But one will probably ask why the Bible says “according to the image” and “according to the likeness”?  Why doesn’t it say “in the image and the likeness”?

To understand the difference between the usage of “the image” (per se) and “according to the image”, we could use a simplified example: 

Let's imagine an artist who wants to paint a portrait of us.  We would pose before him, and he would paint a picture of us. The object that he created as he watched us is referred to as an image of us.

After having painted that image of us and we (the subjects) depart, he takes that image of us that he painted, places it in a suitable spot, then, by observing that painting, he  makes a copy of it. This second image that he now paints is not with us present again, but it is painted exactly like the first image that he had painted. This second painting is not an image of us having posed again; it is a painting made “according to the image” that was previously made of us.

Can you see the difference between the terms “in the image of” and “according to the image of”?

The former denotes that which is formed or created, based on the original subject.

The latter denotes that which is created – but NOT based on the original subject; it was created “according to the image of the original subject”.

So, when we read that God said: “Let us (=the Trinity) make man according to Our image and according to Our likeness”, He was saying He would make man according to His image (Jesus) and according to His likeness (Jesus), and not in the image and likeness of the invisible-intangible God the Father.

But why is there this difference? Why the discrimination? Why doesn't it say that we are the images of God, but instead that we are “according to the image” of God?

Let's try to clarify the difference.

The Bible clearly tells us that God resembles absolutely nothing of His creations.  He is a Being completely unlike anything we humans have seen and know.  How, then, could an image be formed out of something that is completely unlike anything we can imagine?

In Isaiah, 46:5 and 40:18,25, it says: “5 With what did you resemble Me” and “18 with what did you compare the Lord and with what likeness did you liken Him?” and “25 and now what did you compare Me to and I have lifted up?”.  And similarly in 1 Timothy 6:16 it says: “Who alone has immortality, Who dwells in an inapproachable light, Whom no-one of men has seen, nor is able to see...”  That is why He also said to Moses in Exodus 33:20: “you cannot see My person, for no man can see My person and live.”

This is also the reason the Bible says “according to the image” and “according to the likeness”. Since God is not like anything that we know and can comprehend, there is no way that we humans could ever be a direct image of God, nor be directly alike to God in any way – alike to something that we can't even perceive.

So, since we are created “according to the image” and “according to the likeness” of God, this clearly hints that there is “something” in between us and God, which plays a role in the making of our kind. And this “Something” has to also resemble God, and mankind that can resemble “It”.

The Bible reveals to us that there is indeed such an image. In Colossians 1:15, it tells us it is Jesus Christ: “Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all Creation”. This reassures us that when it says we are created according to the image of God, it means we were given the physical form that the (also beginningless) Christ had taken on, during His incarnation.

Specifically, the “prototype” that God had in His Mind when creating mankind, was His Son Jesus Christ (after His enfleshed Birth). And this is precisely why Jesus Christ is not only God or only a man. The hypostasis of our Lord Jesus Christ is God-human. He is both God in heaven, but after taking on the human form, He also became a Man on earth – thus is both God-like and human-like.  

If this seems odd to someone (because there were humans on earth before the Birth of Christ in the flesh), one must remember that God is beginningless, Timeless. God is beyond Time. To God, our "Present, Past and Future" are one endless "Present".  As such, it was the pre-eternal will of God that the Son Jesus Christ was to be the prototype for humankind. Hence, the Son was according to God’s pre-eternal “design” or “image” - based on Whom mankind was to be fashioned; and not only fashioned after the Son’s image: also fashioned to be after the Son’s likeness.

 This is why the Apostle John in 1 John 3:2 tells us that “we shall be alike to Him” – that is, alike to Christ.  And  -being the (tangible) image of the invisible God- Jesus Christ says, in John 14:9: “Whoever has seen Me, has seen the Father, so how can you say ‘show us the Father’?”.

 Being the (tangible) image of the invisible God, Jesus Christ could also say, in John 14:6,7: “If you knew Me, you would have known my Father also; and from now on, you know Him and have seen Him”.

 However, the Son Jesus Christ is not only the “model” based on which we humans were created;  He is also the standard, which we must strive for, in order to become “according to the likeness” of the Son. “We shall be alike to Him”, says John (1 John 3:2).

 This is why Saint John Kavasilas, in his work “On the in-Christ Life, Seven Discourses”, says the following:

 “The old Adam was not the model of the young Adam, but the new one of the old. And if it is mentioned that the new Adam was born in the likeness of the old one, it is mentioned in reference to the deterioration that the old Adam had introduced. Of course, in accordance with the natural order of things, our archetype is the old Adam as our predecessor. For God, however, who has everything ‘before His eyes’, the old Adam is a replica of the new one, as he had indeed been created according to His idea and image, but he did not remain in it”.

 Saint Sophronius of Essex also says in his book “We shall see God as He is” (ch. 13):

 “Christ, being in the form of God, that is, of God Who is beginningless in essence, through incarnation took on the form of our servile existence. The human however hypostasis undergoes theosis (deification) by Grace, through which the fullness of the Divine Image is actualized. In the hypostatic beginning of man, inherent is the likeness to Him."