Eve in Exile and the Restoration of Femininity

by Rebekah Merkle

God created light and it was good. He created the sun and moon and they were good. He created the sea and the land and they were good. He created the trees and the plants and they were good. He created the animals and they were good. He created a man, and suddenly . . . it was not good. It was not good that man should be alone—he needed a helper. And we already know what he needed the help for—he had been given the job of taming an entire planet. So the first thing we should note about the creation of Eve is that she was created specifically to assist Adam in his work, because he was insufficient for the task of conquering a world alone. When God created the first and perfect woman, He made a worker meant to stand by Adam’s side as the two of them, together, took dominion of the earth. When the ’60s feminists were chomping at the bit to get out there and work, they were doing so because that’s what God made us for. God didn’t look at Adam in the garden and say, “It is not good for man to be alone, he needs something pretty to look at.” The ’50s idealized notion of a woman who only exists to look pretty and make the house look pretty is just as much a revolt against the creation order as the radical feminist agenda is—it’s just a revolt against a different part. The Victorian ideal of a tender, swooning, delicate woman who is incapable of getting her lily white hands dirty is a rebellious ideal, forgetting what it was Eve was created for.