1. Adam was created in the image of God; that is, with the similar mental powers of reason, memory, judgment and will, and the moral qualities of justice, benevolence, love, etc. "Of the earth, earthy," he was an earthly image of a spiritual being, possessing qualities of the same kind, though differing widely in degree, range and scope. To such an extent is man an image of God that God can say even to the fallen man, "Come now, let us reason together", Isa.1:18. A174:2; A20; F37-42.
2. As Jehovah is ruler over all things, so man was made a ruler over all earthly things --after our likeness, let him have dominion over the beasts, fowl, fish, etc. Moses tells us that God recognized the man whom he had made--not merely commenced to make, but completed--and God considered his creature "very good," that is, perfect; for in God's sight nothing short of perfection is very good, in his intelligent creatures. A174:3; Gen. 1:26-31; 21:7-9; 2:18-25.
3. David, in Psalms 8:5, refers to man in his original estate, and prophetically intimates that God has not abondoned his original plan to have man in his own image and the King of earth, and that he will "remember him, redeem him and restore him to the same again. The Apostle Paul (Heb.2:7) call attention to the same fact--that God's original grand and perfect, the King of earth, is to be remembered, and visited and restored. A175:13.
4. The word father has the significance of "life-giver." God, accordingly, was the "Father" or life-giver, while the earth was the mother of Adam, and hence of the human race, Luke 3:38. Adam's form or organism was of and from "Earth" (which therefore served as his mother); but his spark of life which constituted him a man came from God (who thus was his father or life-giver); and in the male of the human species has since resided the power to communicate that spark of life or living seed to progeny. E99:2; Gen.3:1-24.