image is a representation of the original. It’s not equal to the original. For example, an idol, in the ancient Near Eastern understanding, imaged the deity. It was held to carry some of its essence, though it was not necessarily the deity itself. That is, when you had an idol in front of you, that was not the god. It would have some of the aspects of the god associated with it. So, there’s correlation between the idol and the deity, but they’re not equal to each other. John Walton has said that