At the end of the first creation account in Genesis, we read these perplexing verses:
God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over [the other things that God had created]. . . . So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (1:26-27).
In using the plural form—“Let us make man in our image, after our likeness”—God clearly is speaking to someone else. It is only natural for us to ask, “Whom?”
Catholics have one answer. Mormons have another.
The LDS Church teaches that we have a heavenly Father and a heavenly mother. According to the official LDS website, God the Father in Genesis 1:26 is speaking to his wife. They see this explanation as “rooted in scriptural and prophetic teachings.”
But here is an objection: if God the Father is speaking to a heavenly mother, why does he switch back to singular in the next verse? After all, Genesis 1:27 goes on to say, “So God created man,” meaning both men and women, “in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” But if this were a conversation between our heavenly father and a heavenly mother, then we would expect God to maintain the plural.
St. Augustine made a similar argument in his work on the Trinity (between 400 and 416). He argued that God said, “Let us make man in our image” to show that human beings are made in the image of the three persons of the Trinity: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. He concluded that God shifted back to the singular in Genesis 1:27, “lest it be supposed that in the Trinity we ought to believe in three gods when the same Trinity is but one God.” Augustine’s argument against polytheism here works against Mormonism, too.
The early Church writer Tertullian agrees: “Thus it was that the Father did say beforehand to the Son: ‘Let us make man in our image and likeness. And God made man,’—that is, the creature which he fashioned—‘to the image of God,’—of Christ, of course—‘He made him.’” And this same interpretation is reflected in the Letter of Barnabas, written before A.D. 133; by St. Irenaeus, before the year 200; and by St. Jerome, between 408 and 410). (See doctrinal index number 233.)
This interpretation of the earliest Christians is consistent with the Bible as well. Our newest Doctor of the Church, St. John Henry Newman, wrote a masterpiece on the development of Christian doctrine, in which he taught that doctrines are like seeds. The cryptic verse from Genesis 1:26-27 is explained more clearly by verses later on in the Bible. Specifically, we can look at Matthew 28:19, where Jesus tells the apostles to go and baptize the nations “in the name (singular) of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” Again, we see the use of the singular personal pronoun where we should expect to see the plural.
For Newman, the enigmatic verses found especially at the beginning of the Bible are like little seeds in a garden. For example, the cryptic Genesis 3:15 is understood more fully in the context of Revelation 12 at the end of the Bible. In the time when they were written, these verses would take thousands of years to be understood in a fuller sense. And for Newman, the end of the Bible did not mark the end of these doctrinal developments; rather, development continues throughout the life of the Church.
Newman wrote that “no one can add to revelation.” “That was given once for all—but as time goes on, what was given once for all is understood more and more clearly.” So when it comes to divine revelation, there is nothing missing from the Bible, and any “new” Catholic Church teachings are developed from what is found there. It is the job of theologians and the Magisterium of the Catholic Church to understand ever more deeply what has been planted in the Bible from the beginning.
On the other hand, the Mormon interpretation of Genesis 1:26-27 breaks these enigmatic verses off the Bible and patches them with other Mormon writings. For the LDS, the Bible is an imperfect part of the divine revelation, and not the totality. The Book of Mormon contains additional divine revelation, and their living prophet receives revelations as well.
The LDS website states,
As the Bible was compiled, organized, translated, and transcribed, many errors entered the text. . . . Latter-day Saints believe in an open scriptural canon, which means that there are other books of scripture besides the Bible (such as the Book of Mormon) and that God continues to reveal his word through living prophets.
St. Paul warned us in the Bible about adding additional gospels to what Jesus did in Israel 2,000 years ago. If you visit the Catholic cathedral in Salt Lake City, the Cathedral of the Madeleine, you will see painted on the wall a quote from Galatians 1:8-9: “But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, ‘If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed’” (1:8-9, KJV).
Mormon teaching explicitly contradicts this warning. Joseph Smith made his own corrections to the Bible, and these can be found in the LDS Joseph Smith translation of the KJV. Surprisingly, he left Galatians 1:8-9 untouched.
Now that we have seen that the first Christians understood that God made human beings in the image of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, we can ask what difference this makes to us here and now.
The LDS have great respect for the calling of marriage. They should: marriage is a beautiful gift from God, and it is clearly God’s will that many people get married. It makes sense that the LDS would have a high regard for marriage, because they believe that our heavenly father is married to a heavenly mother. However, contrary to the LDS position, Jesus taught that there is a calling even higher than marriage.
In Matthew 19:1-12, Jesus teaches his disciples that they should not divorce. They respond that if they can’t divorce, then it would be better not to get married in the first place. Jesus responds by speaking of eunuchs—royal servants who cared for a king’s wives, and were castrated to make sure they wouldn’t do anything untoward:
Not all men can receive this precept, but only those to whom it is given. For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. He who is able to receive this, let him receive it.
The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible here notes, “The Council of Trent (Sess. 24, can. 10) teaches in accord with Scripture that the objective state of celibacy is higher than the married state, although both vocations are important for the Church’s life.”
One reason why the Catholic Church teaches that the life dedicated to serving God is the highest calling could be because we read Genesis 1:26-27 differently from how LDS do. Catholics don’t believe that God the Father is married to a heavenly mother. Instead, God the Father spoke to God the Son and to the Holy Spirit all the way back in Genesis. The unmarried person is called by the Catholic Church to live a life united to God.
This article draws our attention to a reoccurring problem for Catholics in dialogue with Mormons. I have often seen that LDS theology is superimposed on the Bible. Mormons take a Bible verse that sounds confusing (like Gen. 1:26-27) and then use their other scriptures to interpret what the Bible meant to say. This is tricky, because if you do not know the Bible well, the LDS interpretation sounds plausible. However, a close study of the Bible shows what is going on. What the LDS Church teaches is not actually in the Bible. Instead, Mormons are adding ideas that the Bible does not teach.
The Bible does not teach that we have a heavenly mother, as Mormons suppose. Instead, that interpretation has been superimposed from LDS teachings onto the cryptic verses of Genesis 1:26-27.