A Partner For The Man!”

“A Partner For The Man!”(Gen.2:18-25).
One female theologian argues with passion that if a man claims to be superior to woman because he was created first, then man himself is inferior to animals since they were created before man.
All other creation was God’s free decision, but woman was created out of a need. There was a vacuum that needed to be filled for the man to be complete. One of the early Church fathers said a man is complete without a woman, whereas without a man a woman is incomplete.
Meaning makes sense within context.
Why was woman made? “The LORD God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.'”
So a woman was made as a helper suitable for the man. Perhaps that is why the woman was made out of the man.
At the first sight of the woman the man knew that she was part of him. Yes, “blood is thicker than water!” As soon as he saw her he said, “This is now the bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh…”
This was the beginning of marriage whereby husband and wife form their own new family.
The other day I listened to a tiktok message of Pst. Chris in which he said a husband is master, contrary to the feminist understanding that husband is the male in the marriage relationship. I got curious and checked up the etymology of husband and got this: Origin of husband: “Old English husbonda (in the senses ‘male head of a household’ and ‘manager, steward’), from Old Norse húsbóndi ‘master of a house’, from hús ‘house’ + bóndi ‘occupier and tiller of the soil’. The original sense of the verb was ‘till, cultivate’.”
Husband therefore is not only master, he is “tiller of the soil” – breadwinner, so to say. This does not in any way make the man superior to the woman as helper does not mean unequal in the relationship between husband and wife.
The rib theory confirms this, that God decided a bone, not from top of the man in which case the woman becomes superior to the man. He did not decide a bone from below so that the woman should be trampled upon. Rather he took a rib by the side so that they should walk hand in hand, and side by side as helpmates to each other.
This pericope also introduces us to the beginning of cultures as “the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all beasts of the field.”
We note also that this passage does not only introduce to us the sanctity of marriage as between a man and a woman. It also implies a taboo on homosexuality and bestiality. Gay marriages and marriage between a human and another creature or object is not in God’s arrangement for humanity. LGBTQ+ is unscriptural and must be rejected in strong terms. Africans shouldn’t allow this as a leverage to secure loans when the continent is wealthy enough to loan to others too.
Male chauvinism and patriarchy should be discouraged, but this does not mean that feminism should be a quest for dominance!
Husband/wife relationship is summed up in this wise saying: “The fact that the hen does not crow doesn’t mean it does not know that it is daybreak.” An orderly God expects orderliness as we accept and function within the limits of our assigned roles.
Weekend prayer: Holy Spirit help us to be gender sensitive and function within the limits of our God assigned perimeters. Amen!
Have a blessed weekend! Peace be with you!
Rev Babila Fochang.