Deffinbaugh comments on the creation of the woman from man in Genesis chapter two and says, “An illustration of biblical ‘wholeness’ can be seen in marriage, specifically in the marriage of Adam and Eve. When God made Adam, he was initially alone. When Adam named the animals, they all passed before him—in pairs! There was Mr. and Mrs. Sheep, Mr. and Mrs. Ox, and so on. Adam began to feel incomplete, and rightly so. God said that Adam’s aloneness was not good, and so he made a mate for him—Eve. When the two were joined together, they became one flesh. Adam became ‘whole’ when he became one with Eve.”[1] The late “Back to the Bible” preacher, J. Vernon McGee wrote, “Eve was created to be a helpmeet—a help that fit—for Adam. The language is tremendous. She was taken from his side, not molded from the ground as were the animals, but taken from a part of him so that he actually was incomplete until they were together. God fashioned her the loveliest thing in His creation, and He brought her to Adam. She was a helpmeet; she compensated for what he lacked, for he was not complete in himself. She was made for him, and they became one.”[2] This is exactly what Adam said when God walked Eve down the aisle and presented her to Adam in Genesis 2:23: “Then the man said, ‘This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.’”

I’ve heard people say of couples, “they were made for each other.” Exactly! Adam professed his love for his bride with God as his witness. “In a very real sense, then, marriage is not a mere social convenience, or even just a religious ceremony. Rather it is to be seen as a reuniting of the man and the women at the deepest level of their creation, as real as if the bone and flesh were joined together to make one new person again!”[3]

Jerome, the man who translated the Hebrew and Greek Bible into the Latin Vulgate said that the creation of Eve from the rib of a man, is symbolic of Christ and the church. The word that God used for “fashioning” or “Forming” Eve from Adam’s rib, is the same verb that Jesus used when telling his followers that he would “build, fashion, form” his church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. Jerome says, “We have heard about the first Adam; let us come now to the second Adam and see how the church is made (fashioned or formed) from his side. The side of the Lord Savior as he hung on the cross is pierced with a lance, and from it there comes forth blood and water.”[4] From the blood and water that gushed forth from Jesus ribs, we have forgiveness of sin and reconciliation with God. Those coming to God through faith in the shed blood of Jesus are joined once and for all to the body of Christ’s bride, the church.

[1] Bob Deffinbaugh. n.d. Leviticus Commentary.

[2] McGee, J. Vernon. 1991. Thru the Bible Commentary: The Prophets (Malachi). Electronic ed. Vol. 33. Nashville: Thomas Nelson.

[3] Vibert, Simon. 2005. The Diamond Marriage: Have Ultimate Purpose in Your Marriage. Fearn, UK: Christian Focus Publications.

[4] Louth, Andrew, and Marco Conti, eds. 2001. Genesis 1–11. Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.