Genesis 2:18, 22-24: Then the Lord God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him." And the Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man...And the man said, "This is now bone of my bones, And flesh of my flesh; She shall be called Woman, Because she was taken out of Man." For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh." NASB
Woman was made from man for man because he needed her. Because he was alone. Even among the splendid animals, he was alone. He had no one to help him in a way that matched him.
alone, adj.: without anyone or anything else, lacking companionship
Most of us are probably aware that we don't always understand our needs. We know our wants pretty well, but perhaps not our deepest needs. But certainly we know we need help (provision) for the meeting of both our needs and our wants. The first man, Adam, was in need. Enter woman.
help v. tr.:
1. To give assistance or support; aid
2. To contribute to the furtherance of; promote
3. To ease; relieve
4. To change for the better; improve
5. To wait on
Much of the complementarian material I've read seems to imply that woman needs man more than he needs her: without him, she has no leader. Without him, she has no purpose. In many ways this is true. Even nuns in a convent serve God in Christ, Who is represented in male terms. But then, so do monks in a monastery.
But such rhetoric seems to place emphasis on woman's relation to man in terms of #s 1, 2, and 5 above (except when it comes to sex; then perhaps it's #3) to the neglect of #4. Certainly both men and women need all five types of help from persons of both genders; this is the function of the Body of Christ. But the point is, woman was made for man not because she needed him, but because he needed her. (I think she does need him, but that's not why she was made.)
Both man and woman were made that they might look to one another, but first to God. If man depends upon woman to the exclusion of God, then trouble results. If woman depends upon man to the exclusion of God, then trouble results. But some seem to think that for a woman, to look to God is to look to a man. These persons, however, are really suggesting that for a man, to look to God is to look to woman, for justification. And this is one of the problems with certain complementarian doctrine.
