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 seems to be speaking to someone else. It is only natural for us to ask, “Whom?”
Catholics have one answer. Mormons have another.
According to the LDS website,
This plural construction makes it sound like God is talking to someone else—because he is. Joseph Smith taught, “In the beginning, the head of the Gods called a council of the Gods; and they came together and concocted [prepared] a plan to create the world and people it” (History of the Church, 6:308). This council included the Lord Jesus Christ and others (see Moses 2:26–27; Abraham 4:26–27).
But here is an objection: if God the Father is speaking to a council of the Gods, 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 plurality of other gods, then we would expect him 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.
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 has nothing to say about a council of Gods. Instead, this interpretation has been superimposed from LDS teachings onto the cryptic verses of Genesis 1:26-27.