Large Emden Catechism (1551):
Q. 81. How should I understand this?
R. Indisputably, the image and likeness of God, in which man was created in the beginning, along with all inclinations for good, was lost in him.
Q. 82. How should I understand this?
R. This image of God was in Adam in the beginning, by virtue of which he was immortal, holy, wise, and lord of the entire world, and thus was endowed with the freedom and ability to either completely execute or disregard the commandment of God. However, the image of God in himself and in all of us he so destroyed by his sin, that henceforth, all offerings intended for goodness were utterly destroyed both in himself and in all of us (Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation [Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2008], vol. 1, p. 607).
Scottish Confession (1560):
3. By which transgression, commonly called original sin, was the image of God utterly defaced in man; and he and his posterity of nature, became enemies of God, slaves to Satan, and servants to sin.
Confession of the Spanish Congregation of London (1560/61):
4:1. We confess that, man, at his creation, having received from the hand of God the powers of wisdom and the ability and will to know, love, and serve his Creator, persisting in his obedience (which is commonly called free will), received also a law (Gen. 2), in the obedience of which he exercised these admirable gifts; which, breaking by his own free will (Gen. [3]), at the same time was marred from the image of God, and all the benefits that make him like God. And from the state of being wise, good, just, truthful, merciful, and holy he was rendered ignorant, evil, impious, a liar, and cruel, clothed in the image and likeness of the devil toward whom he moved as he departed from God, with the loss of that holy liberty with which he was created (Eccl. 7; 2 Peter 2), and thus was made a slave and servant of sin and of the devil (Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation [Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2010], vol. 2, p. 376).
Belgic Confession (1561):
14. We believe that God created man out of the dust of the earth, and made and formed him after his own image and likeness, good, righteous, and holy, capable in all things to will, agreeably to the will of God. But being in honour, he understood it not, neither knew his excellency, but willfully subjected himself to sin, and consequently to death, and the curse, giving ear to the words of the devil. For the commandment of life, which he had received, he transgressed; and by sin separated himself from God, who was his true life, having corrupted his whole nature; whereby he made himself liable to corporal and spiritual death. And being thus become wicked, perverse, and corrupt in all his ways, he hath lost all his excellent gifts, which he had received from God, and only retained a few remains thereof, which, however, are sufficient to leave man without excuse; for all the light which is in us is changed into darkness, as the Scriptures teach us, saying: The light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not: where St. John calleth men darkness …
Larger Catechism of Zacharias Ursinus (c. 1562):
1. Q. What firm comfort do you have in life and in death?
A. That I was created by God in his image for eternal life; and after I willfully lost this in Adam, God, out of infinite and free mercy, took me into his covenant of grace that he might give me by faith, righteousness and eternal life because of the obedience and death of his Son who was sent in the flesh. And that he sealed his covenant in my heart by his Spirit, who renews me in the image of God and cries out in me, “Abba,” Father, by his Word and the visible signs of this covenant.
12. Q. What is this image?
A. A true knowledge of God and the divine will and the inclination and desire of the whole man to live according to God’s will alone.
19. Q. Why are we unable to fulfill it?
A. Because we lost the image of God.
107. Q. Why is he called “Spirit”?
A. Not only because he is God, but especially because he is the person through whom the Father and the Son make us alive and move our hearts.
108. Q. Why “Holy”?
A. Because he is God and makes us like God.
Heidelberg Catechism (1563):
Q. 6. Did God then create man so wicked and perverse?
A. By no means; but God created man good, and after his own image, in true righteousness and holiness, that he might rightly know God his Creator, heartily love him and live with him in eternal happiness to glorify and praise him.
Q. 86. Since then we are delivered from our misery merely of grace, through Christ, without any merit of ours, why must we still do good works?
A. Because Christ, having redeemed and delivered us by His blood, also renews us by His Holy Spirit after His own image; that so we may testify by the whole of our conduct our gratitude to God for His blessings, and that He may be praised by us; also, that every one may be assured in himself of his faith by the fruits thereof; and that by our godly conversation others may be gained to Christ.
Q. 115. Why will God then have the ten commandments so strictly preached, since no man in this life can keep them?
A. First, that all our lifetime we may learn more and more to know our sinful nature, and thus become the more earnest in seeking the remission of sin and righteousness in Christ; likewise, that we constantly endeavor, and pray to God for the grace of the Holy Spirit, that we may become more and more conformable to the image of God, till we arrive at the perfection proposed to us in a life to come.
Documents of the Debrecen Synod (1567):
First, since the image of God was lost by Adam, it was restored through the image of the infinite God, consubstantial and equal with the Father, i.e., Christ was made to us righteousness, life, truth, and sanctification; that is, He restored our lost virtues (1 Cor. 1; Col. 1-2; Eph. 1, 3; 1 Cor. 15). “Day by day, we are renewed more and more to His image through the Spirit of God” (cf. 2 Cor. 3:18). “Put on the new man, who has been created in accordance with God” (Eph. 4:24) … Therefore Christ, by the power of His deity, has restored the image of God, the lost virtues (Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation [Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2012], vol. 3, pp. 17-18).
The Synod at Szikszó (1568):
XII. They err exceedingly who speak the nonsense that the image of God in which man was made was the future humanity of Christ, since it is the virtues that are communicated to men: righteousness, holiness, wisdom (Eph. 4:24; Col. 3:10). And the first man is said to be the form of the future, not the image of man (Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation [Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2012], vol. 3, p. 151).
Craig’s Catechism (1581):
Q. In whose image made He them? (Gen. 1:26)
A. In His own image.
Q. What is the image of God? (Eph. 4:24)
A. Perfect uprightness in body and soul.
…
Q. What was the craft of Satan here?
A. He persuaded them that good was evil and evil was good.
Q. How could they be persuaded, having the image of God?
A. They had the image, but not the gift of constancy.
Q. What things did they lose through their fall? (Gen. 3:17)
A. The favor and image of God, with the use of the creatures.
Q. What succeeded the loss of the favor and image of God? (Gen. 3:14)
A. The wrath of God and original sin.
Q. What is original sin? (Rom. 5:19; 7)
A. The corruption of our whole nature
…
Q. In what did their salvation stand?
A. In the remission of their sin and repairing of God’s image.
Q. What followed upon the repairing of God’s image? (Rom. 7:5)
A. A continual battle both within and without.
Q. From whence does this battle proceed?
A. From the two contrary images in mankind.
Q. What are these images?
A. The image of God and the image of the serpent (Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation [Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2012], vol. 3, pp. 545, 546, 549).
Canons of Dordt (1618-1619):
III/IV:1. Man was originally formed after the image of God. His understanding was adorned with a true and saving knowledge of his Creator, and of spiritual things; his heart and will were upright; all his affections pure; and the whole man was holy; but revolting from God by the instigation of the devil, and abusing the freedom of his own will, he forfeited these excellent gifts; and on the contrary entailed on himself blindness of mind, horrible darkness, vanity and perverseness of judgment, became wicked, rebellious, and obdurate in heart and will, and impure in his affections.
III/IV:2. Man after the fall begat children in his own likeness. A corrupt stock produced a corrupt offspring. Hence all the posterity of Adam, Christ only excepted, have derived corruption from their original parent, not by imitation, as the Pelagians of old asserted, but by the propagation of a vicious nature.
III/IV:3. Therefore all men are conceived in sin, and by nature children of wrath, incapable of saving good, prone to evil, dead in sin, and in bondage thereto, and without the regenerating grace of the Holy Spirit they are neither able nor willing to return to God, to reform the depravity of their nature, nor to dispose themselves to reformation.
III/IV:R:2. [The Synod rejects the errors of those] Who teach that the spiritual gifts, or the good qualities and virtues, such as goodness, holiness, righteousness, could not belong to the will of man when he was first created, and that these, therefore, could not have been separated therefrom in the fall.
Westminster Confession (1646):
4:2. After God had made all other creatures, he created man, male and female, with reasonable and immortal souls, endued with knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness, after his own image; having the law of God written in their hearts, and power to fulfil it: and yet under a possibility of transgressing, being left to the liberty of their own will, which was subject unto change. Beside this law written in their hearts, they received a command, not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; which while they kept, they were happy in their communion with God, and had dominion over the creatures.
Westminster Larger Catechism (1647):
Q. 17. How did God create man?
A. After God had made all other creatures, he created man male and female; formed the body of the man out of the dust of the ground, and the woman of the rib of the man, endued them with living, reasonable and immortal souls; made them after his own image, in knowledge, righteousness and holiness.
Q. 75. What is sanctification?
A. Sanctification is a work of God’s grace, whereby they whom God hath, before the foundation of the world, chosen to be holy, are in time, through the powerful operation of his Spirit applying the death and resurrection of Christ unto them, renewed in their whole man after the image of God; having the seeds of repentance unto life, and all other saving graces, put into their hearts, and those graces so stirred up, increased, and strengthened, as that they more and more die unto sin, and rise unto newness of life.
Westminster Shorter Catechism (1647):
Q. 10. How did God create man?
A. God created man male and female, after his own image, in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, with dominion over the creatures.
Q. 35. What is sanctification?
A. Sanctification is the work of God’s free grace, whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God, and are enabled more and more to die unto sin, and live unto righteousness.
Waldensian Confession (1662):
VIII. That man, who was created pure and holy in God’s image, by his own fault deprived himself of that blessed estate, having believed the lying words of the devil.
Proofs: Eccl. 7:29; Gen. 1:26-27; Eph. 4:24; Col. 3:10; 2 Cor. 11:3; 1 Tim. 2:14; Rom. 5:12.
IX. That in his transgression man lost the righteousness and holiness he received, incurring the wrath of God, death, and captivity under the power of the one who has the power of death, namely the devil; so that his free will became a slave of sin and by nature all men, Jews and Gentiles, are children of wrath, dead in trespasses and sins; and are consequently incapable of anything good towards salvation and indeed of any good thought without grace; for all his thoughts are only evil at all times.
Proofs: Rom. 3:9; 5:12; John 8:34; Rom. 6:17; Eph. 2:1; Rom. 8:7; 1 Cor. 2:14; Gen. 6:5; 8:21; Jer. 17:9; Matt. 7:18; John 6:44; 15:5; 3:5, 27; 1 Cor. 2:11, 14; 12:3; 2 Cor. 3:5 (Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation [Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2014], vol. 4, pp. 502-503).
