The first impulse of a person unacquainted with this controversy would be to ask in astonishment what this has to do with the immortality of man; nor would his astonishment be in any wise diminished when he heard the reply that as God is immortal, man, made in his image, must be immortal also. Has God, then, no other attribute but immortality, that we must confine it to this? Is not God omnipotent? Yes. Is man? No. Is not God omnipresent? Yes. Is man? No. Is not God omniscient? Yes. Is man? No. Is not God independent and self-existent? Yes. Is man? No. Is not God infallible? Yes. Is man? No. Then why single out the one attribute of immortality, and make the likeness of man to God consist wholly in this? In the form of a syllogism the popular argument stands thus:-- _Major Premise_: God is immortal. 1 Tim. 1:17. _Minor Premise_: Man is created in the image of God. Gen. 1:27. _Conclusion_: Therefore man is immortal. This is easily quashed by another equally good, thus:-- 1. God is omnipotent. 2. Man is made in the image of God. 3. Therefore man is omnipotent. This conclusion, by being brought within the cognizance of our senses, becomes more obviously, though it is not more essentially, absurd. It shows either that the argument for immortality drawn from the image of God, is unqualified assumption, or that puny and finite man is clothed with all the attributes of the deity. In what respect, then, is man in the image of his Maker? A universal rule of interpretation, applying to Bible language as well as any other, is to allow every word its most obvious and literal import, unless some plain reason exists for giving it a mystical or figurative meaning. The plain and literal definition of image is, as given by Webster, “An imitation, representation or similitude of any person or thing, sculptured, drawn, painted, or otherwise made _perceptible to the sight_; a _visible_ presentation; a copy; a likeness; an effigy.” We have italicized a portion of this definition as containing an essential idea. An image must be something that is visible to the eye. How can we conceive of an image of anything that is not perceptible to the sight, and which we cannot take cognizance of by any of the senses? Even an image formed in the mind must be conceived of as having some sort of outward shape or form. In this sense, of having outward form, the word is used in each of the thirty-one times of its occurrence elsewhere in the Old Testament.