Human Dignity and Human Justice: Thinking with Calvin About the Imago Dei

Abstract

This article explores Calvin’s theological treatment of the Biblical doctrine of humankind’s creation in and restoration to ‘the image of God’, and draws out the critical implications of his treatment for the contemporary elaboration of an ‘inherent human dignity’ in terms of ‘human (subjective) rights’ as the moral foundation of a public justice of secular, egalitarian rights. The argument is that Calvin locates the created and restored ‘image’ in active Trinitarian and Christological relations of divine and human knowing and loving, and not in any immanent or self-standing human structure, quality, or capacity, and in so doing renders theologically problematic an elaboration of ‘inherent human dignity’ in terms of subjective rights. Moreover, his account of public justice, being rooted in, ordered to, and limited by these divine-human relationships, is incompatible with a secular rights polity.