Genesis 2:22

And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he woman,.... It is commonly observed, and pertinently enough, that the woman was not made from the superior part of man, that she might not

And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman.

From some place at a little distance, whither he first carried her, that for the decency of the action he might bring her thence; a bride to a bridegroom to be married to him: the great God being pleased to act the part of a father to give his daughter and workmanship to him, thereby both teaching parents their duty of providing marriages for their children, and children their duty of expecting their parents’ consent in marriage.

Genesis 2:22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.Ver. 22. And the rib which the Lord God had taken.] Matter, in the beginning of time, was taken from man to make a woman. And matter, in the fulness of time, was taken from a woman to make a man, even "the man Christ Jesus". And as out of the side of sleeping Adam Eve was formed; so, from the blood issuing out of the side and flesh of dying Christ, came his spouse the Church. His chief care therein was to "sanctify and cleanse" his Church, and therefore he "came by water and blood". So should it be every husband’ s; then would not the devil so oft break his head with his own rib; or, as St Gregory hath it, climb so oft by his rib to his heart, as by a ladder. A good wife doth him good, and not evil, all her days. But this is not every man’ s happiness. Lucky Sulla, if he should not have had a wife. So Job and Moses, for whom marriage caused problems. There is in most a propension to the nuptial conjunction. The man misseth his rib, say the Rabbins; the woman would be in her old place again, under the man’ s arm or wing. "Then Naomi her mother-in-law said unto her, My daughter, shall I not seek rest for thee, that it may be well with thee?" Made he a woman.] Heb., builded, that is, created with special care, art, and fit proportion, in the manner of a house. A body hath God given the woman more capacious and roomy, both for the conceiving and containing of her young babe, which dwells in her womb, as in its house, and hath all its household stuff, as it were, about it, till time produce it into the light of life. Adam was formed, Eve built; her frame consists of rarer rooms, of a more exact composition than his doth. And if place be any privilege, we find, saith one, hers built in Paradise, when his was made out of it. And brought her unto the man.] Marriage, then, is of Divine institution. The Saturnalian heretics sinfully said, that it was of the devil. And the blemish will never be wiped off from some of the ancients, who, to establish their own idol, of, I know not what virginity, have written most wickedly and basely against marriage. Three things we have here out of Moses to say for it against whatsoever opposite - viz., God’ s (1.) Spoke; (2.) Led; (3.) Blessed. God the Father ordained it; God the Son honoured it with His first miracle; God the Holy Ghost did the like, by overshadowing the betrothed Virgin.

(22) Made he a woman.—Heb., he built up into a woman. Her formation is described as requiring both time and care on the heavenly artificer’s part. Thus woman is no casual or hasty production of nature, but is the finished result of labour and skill. Finally, she is brought with special honour to the man as the Creator’s last and most perfect work. Every step and stage in this description is intended for the ennoblement of marriage. Woman is not made from the adâmâh, but from the adam. She is something that he once had, but has lost; and while for Adam there is simply the closing of the cavity caused by her withdrawal, she is moulded and re-fashioned, and built up into man’s counterpart. She brings back more than the man parted with, and the Creator Himself leads her by the hand to her husband. The anthropomorphic language of these early chapters is part of that condescension to human weakness which makes it the rule everywhere for inspiration to use popular language. He who made heaven and earth by the fiat of His will must not be understood as having literally moulded the side taken from Adam as a sculptor would the plastic clay; nor did He assume human form that He might place her at man’s side. Much of this may indeed have been represented to Adam’s mind in the trance into which he had fallen; but the whole narrative has a nobler meaning, and the practical result of its teaching was that neither woman nor marriage ever sank into that utter degradation among the Jews which elsewhere aided so greatly in corrupting morals and men.

22. made he] Heb. “builded He,” so LXX ᾠκοδόμησεν, Lat. aedificavit: a different word from that in Genesis 2:7-19.

22. Made he a woman — Hebrews, Built… the rib which he had taken from the man into a woman. This is a simple statement of fact, and skeptical speculation and jest respecting it are idle and absurd.