The first marriage took place without courtship, ceremony, or vows. Adam and Eve saw each other, and they knew. I suppose this is the only case of love at first sight that wasn't criticized by an observer.
This first couple undoubtedly realized they had a unique relationship. They knew they were not like the animals; and they also knew they were not exactly like God. They were "man in fellowship" as Paul Jewett so aptly puts it. Sexuality as expressed in an act would be a natural and eventual result, but would not by any means be all or even the main part of that fellowship. They saw each other as "someone like me" and rejoiced in the recognition.
What were their positions in this first human relationship? Was the man the leader? Or the woman? Or were they equals? There is a school of thought that contends that the most ancient human societies were matriarchal in nature. Those who hold this view would probably opt for woman as the leader. Then there are those who think man has always led the woman because of a created order between the sexes existing from the beginning. But I am going to opt for what I believe has the best biblical evidence to support it. I think Adam and Eve were equals and shared whatever decisions they needed to make.
The First Creation Account: Genesis 1:26-28
°ZThen God said, °ZLet us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.°Z So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every creature that moves on the ground.°Z
This first account of human creation is presented as one event, with male and female created together as "man" in God's image. They were given co-regency over all the earth. There was no differentiation of power or position, no order or hierarchy established here. Further, God declared in the verses following this account that all He had created was "good."
The Second Creation Account: Genesis 2:7, 20-24
°ZAnd the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being.
So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field.
But for Adam no suitable helper was found. So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man's ribs and closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. The man said
°ZThis is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called woman,
for she was taken out of man.°Z
For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and
be united with his wife, and they will become one flesh.°Z
According to some, the last part of this passage contains one of the indications of early matriarchy. They claim that if the man had been the dominant partner, the woman would have been expected to leave her father and mother to go with her husband instead of his leaving his parents to go with her. And the first part of this passage is used by those who insist on male dominance to prove that woman is by God's design fitted for an auxiliary relationship with man but not an equal one. They cite the word "helper" or, more usually, the King James Version's "help meet," as proof of woman's subordinate position. I'll still opt for the relationship of equality from the biblical evidence. Let's look more closely at those words "suitable helper" and '"help meet."
Helpmeet or Ezer and Neged?
In modern Christian circles wives are usually referred to as helpmeets (or helpmates) to their husbands. The term combines two King James Version words used to translate the Hebrew words ezer and neged, and we now think of "helpmeet" as modem English usage. To us a helper is someone who is an assistant, lower in status and job description than the one helped. The cumulative impression is that a helpmeet is kind of a glorified gal Friday. But the original language does not carry any such meaning for these words.
Ezer, the word translated "help" or "helper;" occurs repeatedly in the Old Testament. Elsewhere it never refers to a subordinate helper; instead, it is used to identify an equal help or one with superior power. The word is often used in reference to God as our helper as in Psalm 121:1-2:
°ZI lift up my eyes to the hills-
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.°Z
Neged, the word translated as "meet" or "suitable," is a preposition in Hebrew, but to translate it as a preposition in English would obscure its meaning. It is used elsewhere to mean "corresponding to" or "fit for."
The combined sense of the two words ezer and neged is that Eve was an appropriate, fitting partner for Adam. Rather than being proof of a subordinate position for Eve, these words, according to the best use of the original language, support her position as Adam's equal. She was not only his equal, but was his equal in a positive way. She would be a real help! She was like Adam, suitable in every way. He recognized this immediately as he exclaimed, "Ah, at last! Bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh."
Rather than teaching a subordinate-superior hierarchical relationship for man and woman, this passage presents a relationship of mutuality. It may also be God's way of showing that women were to be regarded as fully human by future generations of His people, not disdained and degraded as they have been throughout the world.
Getting the Right One
When Adam and Eve first knew each other, everything was new and untainted. There was none of the misery and trouble that came after the Fall to strain their relationship. They saw each other as equals and as delightful. That was the first marriage.
They probably got along perfectly well without ever a disagreement, stalemate, or difficulty, right? Wrong. Even the most perfect match in the history of the world, the participants chosen by God, deteriorated into the Fall. The woman and man both made excuses for their disobedience, the man even blaming God for "this woman you gave me."
I mention this here because when we are disgusted with our husband or wife we are all prone to think that maybe, just maybe we got the wrong one, that some other man or woman would have been easier to live with. I know I have thought that. And one day when I was thinking just that, my mind fastened on a startling bit of information: If getting the exactly right marriage partner is the key to success, then Adam and Eve had the ideal potential for a perfect marriage. But they disobeyed God together, blamed each other for their disobedience, and even denounced each other. Then the marriage of Rebekah and Isaac came to mind. If ever there was care taken in trying to get a guaranteed good match with God's direction, this was it. Abraham sent his chief servant all the way back to Mesopotamia to find a wife for his son. The servant prayed for divine guidance, and the girl was found. High hopes for the marriage abounded. But if we look at this marriage years later, we see deception, favoritism in both parents for 'their" child, and tragedy as a result.
Adam and Eve had perfect potential. But together they lost their home in Eden and produced a son who killed his brother. Their own daily choices determined what their lives were like, not the perfection of the original match. Isaac and Rebekah let their relationship deteriorate, dragging their sons down also. God doesn't seem to hand out perfect marriage partners or guarantees of harmony based upon the choice of a mate.
Someone once said that being the best marriage partner was more important than finding one. I thought at the time, that sounds nice but rather unrealistic. What if you marry someone who is really terrible? And I will concede that there are unions that are so unworkable and miserable it seems they cannot be mended even though one of the partners is doing his or her absolute best to be the right kind of marriage partner. It takes more than one to make a successful partnership. But the principle is still sound. it is what you do with what you have that counts, rather than wishing you had found Prince or Princess Charming before you married a frog by mistake.
Effects of the Fall
°ZYour desire will be for your husband
and he will rule over you.°Z (Gen. 3:16)
Over the centuries these words have been used to support the imposing of the medieval Order of Things on the marriage relationship. This verse is an important link in the chain-of--command philosophy and has long been interpreted as God's decree that woman, whatever her relationship to man previous to the Fall, is thereafter to be in subjection to man. Some have said it means that all women are to be in subjection to all men. Others say this only applies to the marriage relationship°Zthat to maintain an orderly and peaceful home, someone must be in authority, and this verse gives that authority to man in perpetuity.
But do these interpretations hold up under the scrutiny of good interpretive principles? Or do these interpretations reflect Bible study methods that are more like the medieval Bible study methods than the methods now accepted as more accurate and revealing of the real meaning of the Scriptures?
To interpret this verse as restricting the woman's participation in marriage to being follower and submitter, forcing the man to be leader and authoritarian, one must tear it away from its surroundings. To maintain the hierarchical interpretation one must ignore the context.
When looking at the passage as a whole within its context, the issue becomes: is this information a decree from God or is it a prediction? Is God telling this human couple that from now on this is the way it must be? Or is He telling our first parents that this is the way the world will go now that sin has entered into it? Is it a curse decreed upon them or a natural result of their actions? For if it is a decreed curse, there is no escape from it. It must be. But if it is a prediction, then there is an alternative. There is room for grace to change the results of sin.
It is ironic that we have no difficulty at all seeing that the references to the man and the soil and death are predictions. Those effects are not seen as unchangeable decrees representative of what God wants for us. In fact, we work to ameliorate and modify them. We try to make toil less burdensome for man, and we work to help the ground bring forth things other than thorns and thistles. Even much of what we do as service to God serves to frustrate the sentence of death; we prolong life and assuage pain whenever we can. But somehow woman is exempted from our interpretation of the rest of this passage. We are told that she must be under man's dominion "because Genesis 3:16 says so." Women even write such things about themselves: "I know it is God's will for me because the Bible says my nature has been changed so that I need a man to rule over me."
But the language here is predictive; the Hebrew construction is a form generally used in a predictive sense. And there is no indication from the context that it should be used in any other way. Thus, it is reasonable to interpret the passage as predictive, as prophecy not penalty--as God saying, in effect, this is the way the world will go.
If we interpret this section as an unfailing decree, then we cannot single woman out, for that is poor interpretive practice. We must give the same weight to the decree about thorns and thistles and not try to thwart them. And we must certainly insist that man work by the sweat of his brow till he die. That means no more retirement, fellows, and toss out your. Antiperspirants too.
To take the statements connected with the Fall (in Genesis 3) as other than predictions would result in actions that are everything from heartless to absurd. Unfortunately, the church has at times insisted on interpreting them in just such a way. Painkillers have been denied to those needing them, especially for the pain of difficult childbirth because of a misinterpretation of the first half of Genesis 3:16. And many still cling to the medieval interpretation concerning husband and wife relationships.
"Worldliness" Begins
But what does this passage mean? °ZYour desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.°Z
I believe it means the woman will more and more tend to rely upon her husband, be dependent upon him because of her many pregnancies and small children to care for, and as a result of her dependency, he will take advantage of her need and dominate her. I think it predicts the beginning of the true essence of worldliness: Those who are vulnerable look to the
powerful for help, and the powerful exploit their power and rule over and mistreat the vulnerable. The process becomes complex and intertwined, extending itself geometricaIIy until it has permeated all relationships and affected all people. While the weak turn to the strong, they resent their own vulnerability and the oppression it will bring them; thus, the weak maneuver and manipulate and misuse the strong when they discover the weaknesses they have. On the one side there is the groveling slave who works only when the master is watching and wastes his goods; on the other, there is the rich landowner who keeps his tenants in poverty while he lives in splendor. There is the husband who denies his wife what she wants just because he can, while the wife humiliates him and gossips about him in return. It is a never-ending circle of exploitation and retaliation.
Fortunately, this circle of worldliness caused by the Fall can be broken by Christ's provision. Salvation restores our fellowship with God. The Holy Spirit not only gives us back the lost access to God, but also enables us to know how to reunite ourselves with each other again as equals, mending that interpersonal break as well. And it is this banner of freedom in Christ and the equality of believers that carries us on toward reversing the principles of worldliness which teach us to exploit and manipulate; we can go on to relationships of non-exploitation and non-manipulation in which each person is of equal value with equal opportunity to experience and express his or her full personhood.
In the past, we have taken this prediction of sin's result and have tried to institutionalize it and enforce it as God's will for us. Instead, we should be working to reverse it (as we have the other results of the Fall) and reinstate that lost relationship of mutual responsibility and respect that was present before the Fall. God provided a Savior to mend the broken relationship between His human creation and Himself. Now He wants to work through us, His creation, to reverse the bad effects of the Fall. It is time we worked with Him to reinstate the original relationship between man and woman in marriage.
Advantages in the First Marriage
Even though Adam and Eve had to experience the anguish of remembering their lost paradise after the Fall, they had some advantages over us in their marriage.
There were only two of them, and they were the first people to be married. There was no one else around to tell them how the should relate to each other or what roles they should try to mold themselves into. There weren't even any in-laws. Of course that meant no baby-sitters either, so 1 guess it wasn't all gravy. But then, where did they have to go?
The point is, Adam and Eve could make this marriage any way they wanted it to be. They could be themselves, work out their differences without interference or preconceived ideas about which one should take out the garbage. They could decide on each issue as it arose.
Suppose you and your mate could go to the proverbial desert island. And suppose that you would not need anyone for medical help or any other reason, so you could safely stay as long as you liked. Couldn't you two get along pretty well there? You would have to work things out or be very lonely.
Why not live as if. Why not live as if you can, between the two of you, decide how you want to live, what you want to do, how you wan to divide work and responsibilities? Why not live as if there were no other people to interfere, no preconceived ideas about what you should do? Why not?
It is your marriage. You aren't married to your parents, so you don't have to live like them. You aren't married to your neighbors, or your teachers, or your friends. You are married to each other. Why not act like it?
We cannot go back to the Garden of Eden to reclaim that original privacy, but we can create a privacy and codetermination of our own to a degree far greater than most of us have imagined. We can stop trying to dominate each other or to live by formula. We can, bit by bit, rebuild our marriage relationship into one that is really ours, not leftovers from everybody else's marriages. The principle of mutual submission can help and we will look at that in the next chapter.
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Heirs Together, by Patricia Gundry, Published by Suitcase Books http://www.suitcasebooks.com Copyright Patricia Gundry