The Completion of Man

The the LORD God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him ...So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man." Genesis 2:18, 21-22

It is noteworthy to see that here we have the first time that God says "It is not good..." God says that the state of the man being alone, as a man, is not the "good" state. It will only be good when God completes the task of creating man as mankind. This is what happens when the female is created. God says, in part, that the creation is not truly finished until the woman comes to be. It is true in more ways than we know that 'woman completes man.' The very special creation of the human woman is unique to all of creation. ONLY woman is created from material that at least was living tissue. ONLY woman was not created either from 'the dust' or from nothing that existed previously. Woman was the ONLY female of any other created 'kinds' or 'species' created at a separate time from the male.

A note of explanation: I omitted verses 19 and 20 for two reasons. One was for space saving. A second was to avoid confusion between the naming of the animals and God's creation of woman. Some commentators have wrongly concluded that the purpose of bringing Adam the animals was to show him the possibilities for a "helper" from that animal world. At least one of God's purposes was to show Adam himself that he was indeed 'alone' in the world and impress upon Adam that this was indeed 'not good.' It was to show Adam that he was not yet complete. Thus God prepared Adam for what God was about to do.

Your Joyfully Loquacious Believer,
LEE