Genesis 2:18 24

While there is nothing particularly special about Genesis 2:18-25 as affects language usage and variants that could significantly impact upon its translation, it has become one of the most contentious biblical passages for feminist interpretations of the biblical text. This article investigates Genesis 2:18-25 primarily from the perspective of Jungian individuation theory. It then merges the results of this analysis with the gains made by feminist interpretations of this passage in order further to deconstruct its androcentric application.

The Book of Genesis from a Darwinian Perspective uses the tools of biology to understand the book of Genesis. The field of Biblical Studies as it stands today cannot advance unless it is willing to assume a Darwinian perspective.

The Book of Genesis from a Darwinian Perspective is my most popular paper. What it reveals led me to research and write a handful of papers on Genesis, all from a Darwinian perspective. They are on my main page. 

Here is what Genesis contains:

"At issue is an interpretation, or rather a doctrine which, although known, was taught under the seal of mystery; of a science no less fixed in form than in principles…If we are to believe Maimonides—who, although a stranger to the Kabbalah, could not deny its existence—the first half, entitled ‘The Story of Genesis,’ taught the science of nature…"

Adolphe Franck, The Kabbalah, The Religious Philosophy of the Hebrews
(Bell Publishing, New York 1940) page 16

The "science of nature." See it for yourself.

Genesis 1, though being the most foundational, and, from the everyday human perspective, presumably plain, account of origins, is anything but uncontroversial. It's controversies are due largely to a combination of (a) the text's absence of any explicit qualifications as to the account's over-all or detailed meanings, and (b) the rest of the Bible's absence of any such explanations. Unfortunately, given these absences, the account's author(s), along with those of the rest of the Bible, may be thought not to have been concerned that this foundational account may face controversies. In other words, the author(s) of Genesis 1 may be perceived to lack any concern for interacting with his, her, or their readers, including with the account's original intended. This perception has lead to strong disagreements as to what the text means, whether over-all or in particular details. These disagreements are, by far, the most heated amongst those who prefer to think the account was dictated by God. This is because these groups have widest variance as to what the account teaches: what God did, how long it took, and by what processes He did it. I explain (1) why I think this perception of non-interaction is mistaken, (2) why I think these disagreements really exist, and (3) what, contrary to most who claim to make a plain reading of the text, I think is the basis of the plain reading of the text.

Riguardo la concezione della Bibbia circa il rapporto tra l’uomo e la donna – e, quindi, il matrimonio – si può individuare un arco narrativo dall’inizio della Genesi al Cantico dei Cantici. Il secondo capitolo della Genesi racconta infatti che Dio, dopo aver creato lo ʼādām, l’“essere umano”, decide di “fare” per lui un ʽēzer, “un aiuto” (da un pericolo mortale, nell’attuale contesto la solitudine), che gli stia kenegdô, “come suo di fronte”: che cioè – per la sua alterità irriducibile – costituisca un’occasione di confronto e, quindi, di autentico dialogo. La prima coppia umana, però, ad iniziare dalla reazione dello ʼādām all’apparizione della ʼîššāh, la “donna”, non è in grado di corrispondere al progetto di Dio. Nei racconti successivi la Bibbia mostrerà, così, quanto il vivere la differenza come un dono evitando i due estremi dell’assimilazione dell’altro o della sua negazione sia il risultato di un faticoso ed impegnativo cammino. Il punto di arrivo della relazione di coppia la Bibbia lo mostra, finalmente, nel Cantico dei Cantici: lì, un “Io” e un “Tu” si incontrano in un dialogo continuamente rilanciato, intessuto di separazioni, palpitanti richerche dell’altro, appassionati ritrovi e nuovi allontanamenti. È a questa dialettica della distanza e della vicinanza, dell’alterità e dell’identità, del farsi altro e del tornare se stesso che, ci illumina la Bibbia, dovrebbe – e potrebbe – tendere il rapporto di coppia.

As regard to the biblical conception of the relation between man and woman – and, consequently, of the wedding – it’s possible to identify a narrative arch from the beginning of Genesis until the Songs of the Songs. The second chapter of Genesis tells that God, after having created ʼādām, the “human being”, decides to “make” for him  an ʽēzer, “an help” (from a mortal peril, in the actual context loneliness), which is kenegdô, “as his opposite”: which – for its irreducible otherness – constitutes an occasion of confront and, then, of authentic dialogue. But the first human couple, since the reaction of the human being to the apparition of the ʼîššāh, the “woman”, is not able to correspond to God’s project. In the subsequent tails the Bible shows that living the difference as a gift, avoiding the two extremes of the assimilation of the other or of his negation, is the result of a hard and compelling path. The point of arrival of the relation between the couple is finally shown, in the Bible, in the Songs of the Songs: there, an “I” and a “You” meet themselves in a dialogue continuously raised, woven of separations, throbbing searches of the other, passionate encounters and new estrangements. The relation inside the couple should and could tender – enlights us the Bible – to this dialectic of distance and proximity, of otherness and identity, of become other and come back himself.