He is the very/ the splitting image of sophistication

I am wondering whether or not those mean the same thing, if so, are they interchangeable?

Would you please throw a light on this confusion in a simple way?

I have just updated this issue, waiting for your invaluable explanations.

UPDATED:

h=Having taken into account the following linke, I am wondering which one I should use, and eventually which one of the following bold ones you use?

metaphor: “it’s like he was spat out of his father’s mouth” (1689).

metonymy: “he’s the very spit of his father” (1825) — when the metaphor is commonplace enough, it no longer gets spelled out in full.

idiom/cliché: “the spit and image of his father” (1859) — a particularly effective wording of the metonymy solidifies into a widely re-used phrase.

corruption: “the spitten image” (1878) — the original analysis of the phrase is lost.

reanalysis: “the spitting image” (1901) — this strange new word “spitten” gets replaced by something which is at least syntactically more comprehensible.

further reanalysis/eggcorning: “the splitting image” (1880(!?), 1939) — the phrase changes to something which is more semantically plausible — it’s easier to imagine ways that “splitting image” could have arisen than “spitting image”.

spitting image”

splitting image

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Thanks in advance