This section of posts in the God Series explores the meaning of the term “In His Image” and then offers an alternative meaning and discusses the implications of that alternative meaning.

IN HIS IMAGE

Review of previous posts

The previous post discussed attributes of man’s imagination.

Preview of this post

This post continues the investigation of the attributes provided to man by his imagination.

Sense of humor

It appears that only man has a highly-developed sense of humor. It is man’s imagination which gives him this ability. It is the ability to understand a given situation that has been set up by certain circumstances and form a mental image of the incongruity between that situation and reality or other situations which is the basis of man’s sense of humor. For example, a joke often begins by describing one scenario and then finishes with a totally different scenario. However, the scenarios require the listener to have a mental image of a situation and then have a mental image of the incongruity between the set up situation and the actual situation defined at the end of the joke, or in the punch line, that makes the joke funny. Without an ability to imagine, the joke is meaningless.

It is also the sense of humor which allows men to withstand and accommodate many otherwise intolerable situations. Man’s ability to laugh also provides a relief valve to many otherwise tense situations. Therefore, man’s imagination which supports man’s sense of humor allows men to survive and progress.

The ability to laugh, especially at one’s self, is most fully developed in humans. This ability gives humans the strength to survive the consequences associated with mistaken actions – either of their own actions or the actions of others. Because humans have the ability to interact with other humans on a scale far larger and more sophisticated than other animals, the interactions of humans can have far greater consequences and more serious consequences than the interactions of other animals. If humans did not have the ability to laugh at themselves, then some of these interactions could have serious, or even deadly, consequences. A simple trip or slip on a banana peel, may lead to fights or worse if humans did not have the ability to see humor in such a situation. A hiker taking a wrong turn and trespassing into a neighboring country could be taken as an act of aggression, but could also be laughed at as the hiker misreading a simple map. The examples are legion. A sense of humor permits humans to live together and share our space.

A full discussion of man’s sense of humor is far beyond the scope of this post or series of posts.

Preview of the next post

The next post, the final post in the “In His Image” Section of the God Series, presents several further thoughts on the concept of “In His Image.”