Measuring the Image of God: The God Image Inventory and the God Image Scales

1997 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 214-226 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard T. Lawrence
Keyword(s):  
God Image ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Item Format ◽  
Internal Reliability ◽  
God Concept ◽  
Psychometric Instrument ◽  
Large N ◽  
And Control ◽  
The Image Of God ◽  
God Image Inventory

The God Image Inventory (GII) is an 8-scale, 156-item, psychometric instrument to measure the image of God, developed for clinical and pastoral use in N = 1 cases. For research use with a large N, the God Image Scales (GIS), in a 6-scale, 72-item format, or a 3-scale, 36-item format, are preferred subsets of the GII. The GII and GIS are designed on the basis of Ana-Maria Rizzuto's distinction between the God concept and the God image. They explore issues of belonging (Presence and Challenge scales), goodness (Acceptance and Benevolence scales) and control (Influence and Providence scales). The scales of the GII have demonstrated internal reliability and preliminary validity work has been done. Standards have been developed on an N = 1580 sample of U.S. adults, but are applicable, at least to date, only for Christian subjects. A computerized version is expected shortly. The GIS (text in Appendix) have begun to be used by other researchers, and results to date have supported the validity of the GIS scales.

scholarly journals Connecting the Image of God as Almighty Father, Narcissism, Trump, and Charles Brockden Brown’s Wieland

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 31-45
Author(s):  
Inez Martinez
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
God Image ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
God The Father ◽  
The Image Of God

Given Jung’s understanding of emergence as unconscious materials unattended emerging into lived life, the election of Donald Trump to the presidency of the United States calls for analysis of unconscious collective attitudes. Trump’s enthusiastic supporters embrace his narcissism, including his claims to almighty power, obedience, and adoration, claims characteristic of the God image of the Judeo-Christian Father almighty. This essay proposes that Americans socialized to worship that image of God have not been aware that they are divinizing narcissistic traits. Charles Brockden Brown’s novel Wieland or the Transformation, An American Tale (1798) portrays such a God and a phantom narrative unveiling murderousness in the narcissistic divine Father-son relations. Brown concludes with a call for the development of “juster notions” of divinity. Recognizing the latent murderousness in the narcissistic image of God the Father almighty potentially leads to recalling that projection and collectively accepting responsibility for inner murderousness.

Our Father Which Art in Heaven: Parataxic Distortions in the Image of God

1982 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 120-129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel J. Heinrichs
Keyword(s):  
Image Of God ◽  
Childhood Development ◽  
Object Relations Theory ◽  
God Concept ◽  
Relational Experiences ◽  
Biblical History ◽  
Object Relatedness ◽  
Perceptions Of God ◽  
The Image Of God

One's God-concept, herein referred to as the “image of God,” is a major determinant of the quality of one's personal relationship with God. In addition, the image of God one maintains may be observed to correlate with one's capacity for relational experiences with significant others. In this article object relations theory is applied to perceptions of God. The development of object relatedness in the child is discussed and the concept of parataxic distortions in the image of God is considered within the context of biblical history and childhood development. Parataxic distortions as found in the psychotherapeutic relationship are also briefly addressed, as is the psychotherapeutic resolution of distorted God-percepts.

Man in the Image of God: The Disagreement Between Barth and Brunner Reconsidered

1986 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 433-459 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joan E. O'Donovan
Keyword(s):  
Human Life ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Human Being ◽  
Reproductive Process ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Complex Forms ◽  
The One ◽  
And Control ◽  
The Image Of God

The task of understanding the uniqueness of human being which underlies the obligations obtaining among men in distinction from all other creatures, is a perennial task of Christian theology. The one complete and final revelation of God in Jesus Christ has planted this task firmly and unalterably at the centre of theological reflection rather than at its periphery. In our generation the search for theological clarity on this matter receives heightened urgency from the pervasive assault on dignity of human being coming from recent developments in the modern sciences and technologies. This assault is conducted simultaneously in the theoretical and practical realms, armed by the increasing coalescence of the two realms in advanced scientific method.1 Today the most consequential knowledge of human life is produced by the most exact, intricate, and complex forms of manipulation and control. In the enthralling feats of biochemical technology the coming–into–being of individual human life is now the object of experimental making.2 Whetheror not our mastery of the reproductive process will ever lay bare the mystery of human generation, it certainly throws open to an unprecedented degree the question of what human being is, and by what its uniqueness is constituted.

Knowledge, Control and Consonance in Sūrat Āl ‘Imrān 3:33–62

2021 ◽  
pp. 14-39
Author(s):  
Leyla Ozgur Alhassen
Keyword(s):  
Image Of God ◽  
Narrative Style ◽  
And Control ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Image Of God

Examining the entire story in verses 3:33–62, this chapter shows that the Qur’ānic narrative style serves to embody the image of God the narrator as being omnipotent and omniscient. In this chapter, the focus is on the literary themes of knowledge, control and consonance, as a means to look at the relationship that the narrator develops between God, the audience and the text. The first section of this chapter focuses on God’s withholding of knowledge, the second section on God’s withholding of control, and finally, God’s creating consonance. All of the parts of the story in Sūrat Āl ‘Imrān work towards putting the readers and even the characters in their place by emphasizing God’s knowledge and control and the readers’ and characters’ deficiency in both. At the same time, the story comforts people by developing consonance between the reader and the characters and even the reader and God, while also providing echoes that signal to the audience that they can understand more of the story if they read more of it in other places in the Qur’ān, thus developing consonance between the reader and the story.

scholarly journals Conceptual Blending, the Second Naïveté, and the Emergence of New Meanings

Open Theology ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-45
Author(s):  
Jason P. Roberts
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Linguistics ◽  
Meaning Making ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Integration Theory ◽  
Conceptual Blending ◽  
Conceptual Integration ◽  
God Concept ◽  
New Meanings ◽  
Conceptual Integration Theory ◽  
The Image Of God

Abstract The field of cognitive linguistics has generated a powerful set of theoretical tools for analyzing the ways in which we understand, communicate, and create concepts. In the conceptual integration theory of Gilles Fauconnier and Mark Turner, the cognitive process known as double-scope blending provides a highdefinition model for the phenomenological hermeneutics of Paul Ricoeur. In particular, Ricoeur’s notion of developing a second naivete through the blending of ancient and contemporary worlds of meanings can be viewed as the double-scope integration of concepts across disparate conceptual frames. This re-modeling of Ricoeur’s hermeneutics gives it a new level of clarity and precision in cognitive scientific terms, which in turn may be utilized in service of theological and other forms of discourse. Conceptual integration theory also sheds light on other Ricoeur-inspired hermeneutical models and makes a case for the revelatory character of scripture through the meaning-making process of interpretation. The interpretation of the image of God concept in an evolutionary worldview serves as a heuristic example of second naivete as double-scope blending.

God Image Inventory

1991 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Thomas Lawrence
Keyword(s):  
God Image ◽  
God Image Inventory

Persons Together

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan L. Mittleman
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Jewish Tradition ◽  
The Political ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Human Flourishing ◽  
Political Dimensions ◽  
Market Relations ◽  
The Image Of God

This chapter moves into the political and economic aspects of human nature. Given scarcity and interdependence, what sense has Judaism made of the material well-being necessary for human flourishing? What are Jewish attitudes toward prosperity, market relations, labor, and leisure? What has Judaism had to say about the political dimensions of human nature? If all humans are made in the image of God, what does that original equality imply for political order, authority, and justice? In what kinds of systems can human beings best flourish? It argues that Jewish tradition shows that we act in conformity with our nature when we elevate, improve, and sanctify it. As co-creators of the world with God, we are not just the sport of our biochemistry. We are persons who can select and choose among the traits that comprise our very own natures, cultivating some and weeding out others.

Gandhian Method of Conflict Resolution: Perception of Educated Youths

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (6) ◽  
pp. 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dr. P. K. Kar
Keyword(s):  
Conflict Resolution ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Integral Approach ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Life Itself ◽  
The Image Of God ◽  
Negative Concept

Gandhiji’s method of conflict resolution was based on truth and non-violence. Truth was for him the image of God. He did not believe in personal God. For Gandhi truth is God and God is truth. Life is a laboratory where experiments are carried on. That is why he named his autobiography “My Experiment with Truth”, without these experiments truth cannot be achieved. According to Gandhi, the sayings of a pure soul which possesses nonviolence, non-stealing, true speech, celibacy and non-possession is truth. The truth of Gandhiji was not confined to any country or community. In other words , his religion had no geographical limits. His patriotism was not different from the service of human beings but was its part and parcel(Mishra:102). Gandhiji developed an integral approach and perspective to the concept of life itself on the basis of experience and experiments. His ideas ,which came to be known to be his philosophy, were a part of his relentless search for truth(Iyer:270). The realization of this truth is possible only with the help of non-violence The negative concept of Ahimsa presupposes the absence of selfishness, jealousy and anger, but the positive conception of ahimsa demands the qualities of love ,liberalism, patience, resistance of injustice, and brutal force.

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