Did God Create a Woman from a Rib?

By Dr. Eli Lizorkin-Eyzenberg

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Immediately after commanding the man to eat freely from every tree in the garden and forbidding him to eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (Gen 2:16–17), the Lord made His assessment of man:

And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone (לֹא-טוֹב הֱיוֹת הָאָדָם לְבַדּוֹ); I will make him a helping partner that will match him (אֶעֱשֶׂה-לּוֹ עֵזֶר, כְּנֶגְדּוֹ). (Gen 2:18)

One by one, animals were brought to the man, and he gave each one a name, exercising God-given authority over creation. Yet, God’s initial assessment proved true:

…for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him (וּלְאָדָם, לֹא-מָצָא עֵזֶר כְּנֶגְדּוֹ). (Gen 2:20)

Who is Ezer KeNegdo?

Among modern translations, NASB/NIV Bible translations render עֵזֶר כְּנֶגְדּוֹ (ezer kenegdo) as “a helper suitable for him.” The NET Bible strikes a similar but slightly different tone: “a companion for him who corresponds to him,” while the KJV simply calls her “an help meet for him.” Let’s highlight a few nuances that can only be seen in Hebrew.

First, עֵזֶר (ezer) appears twenty-one times in the Hebrew Bible, overwhelmingly for God Himself as Israel’s help in contexts of deliverance (Exod 18:4; Deut 33:7; Ps 33:20; 70:5). Even though there is no question that in a marriage relationship a man is a covenant head, the woman’s designation as ezer does not imply subordination. Instead, the term connotes strength, commitment, and willingness to intervene and save her partner at any cost.

Second, כְּנֶגְדּוֹ (kenegdo) derives from the root נֶגֶד (neged), meaning “against, in front of, corresponding to, over against.” The preposition כְּ (ke-, “like, as”) indicates similarity, while the noun form implies confrontation or correspondence. Thus the phrase is dynamic: the woman is “a helper like his opposite” or “a strength corresponding to him.” She matches him in essence (both אָדָם adam, human) yet stands over against him in personhood. The tension is deliberate: she is equal yet distinct, the same yet other. English “suitable” flattens this dialectic into mere compatibility, whereas the Hebrew evokes a mirror that both reflects and also opposes—or, better put, challenges.

Rib or Side?

We cannot possibly know whether the original audience imagined a literal divine surgery or understood the story as poetic truth (remember, scientific approaches belong to our time, not theirs). In Genesis, the creation of הָאָדָם (the human, adam) is from the אֲדָמָה (ground, adama) and the אִשָּׁה (woman, isha) from the אִישׁ (ish). We can easily see that they are connected.

Then we read:

So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place (וַיִּקַּח, אַחַת מִצַּלְעֹתָיו, וַיִּסְגֹּר בָּשָׂר, תַּחְתֶּנָּה). (Gen 2:21)

The noun usually translated as “rib” is צֵלָע (tzela); it occurs some forty-one times in the Hebrew Bible, but only here (Gen 2:21–22) for a human body part. In 30 out of 41 cases it means “side” (of the ark, e.g., Exod 25:12; Exod 25:14; Exod 37:3; Exod 37:5; of the tabernacle, e.g., Exod 26:20; Exod 26:26–27; Exod 36:25; Exod 36:31–32; of a hill, 2 Sam 16:13), in 5 cases it means plank/beam (of wood or architecture, 1 Kgs 6:15–16; 1 Kgs 7:3), and in 3 cases it means side chamber/side room (1 Kgs 6:5–6; Ezek 41:5–9).

A fourth-century Latin Church Father, Jerome, in the Latin Vulgate (ca. 405 CE), translated πλευρά as costa, which in Latin primarily means “rib” or “side” (with “side” being a less common usage). In other words, in the Judeo-Greek Septuagint, “side” was primary and “rib” secondary, but in Jerome’s Latin Vulgate, inadvertently, “rib” became primary and “side” secondary. Through the Vulgate, “rib” entered the King James Version and inspired the unchallenged following of other translations until a fairly recent time. While most Bible translations follow KJV’s “rib,” a number of other translations restore the dominant Biblical Hebrew use as “side” or “one of his sides,” including the Common English Bible (CEB), International Standard Version (ISV), Lexham English Bible (LEB), and Jubilee Bible (JUB).

The choice of צֵלָע (tzela) in the original Hebrew, most likely, evokes a side of a bilaterally symmetrical structure, suggesting that Adam in the Genesis story should be seen as being split into two parts instead. (This will become very significant just a little later.)

Moreover, we read:

And the Lord God fashioned (בָּנָה) into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man and brought her to the man. (Gen 2:22)

The verb בָּנָה (bana, “fashioned,” v. 22) is typically used for building houses or altars (Gen 8:20; 1 Kgs 6:1), not biological creation (which uses a different word, יָצַר yatzar, as in v. 19 for animals). The choice of language here suggests that God builds the woman as an edifice of strength and beauty.

One Flesh

In response to God’s creation of woman, man responds with joy now that ezer kenegdo is found. We read:

“At last (הַפַּעַם), this is bone of my bones (זֹאת עֶצֶם מֵעֲצָמַי),
And flesh of my flesh (וּבָשָׂר מִבְּשָׂרִי);
She shall be called ‘woman.’ (לְזֹאת יִקָּרֵא אִשָּׁה)
Because she was taken out of man.” (כִּי מֵאִישׁ לֻקֳחָה־זֹּאת) (Gen 2:23)

Bible translations capture the basic meaning but miss the sonic brilliance. אִישׁ (ish) and אִשָּׁה (isha) share the same consonants (אש) with differentiated vowels and the feminine ending. In Hebrew, the names declare origin and affinity: she is “man-ess,” taken from “man.”

The phrase זֹאת הַפַּעַם (zot hapa’am, “this at last” or “this time”) conveys long-awaited fulfillment after the parade of animals yielded no כְּנֶגְדּוֹ (kenegdo). We read:

For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife (עַל־כֵּן יַעֲזָב־אִישׁ אֶת־אָבִיו וְאֶת־אִמּוֹ וְדָבַק בְּאִשְׁתּוֹ), and they shall become one flesh. (וְהָיוּ לְבָשָׂר אֶחָד) (Gen 2:24)

“Leave” (יַעֲזָב, ya‘azov) demands a radical severance from parental ties, inverting ancient family norms in which a husband often swore greater allegiance to his parents than to his wife. “Joined” (דָבַק, davaq)—employed for the utmost level of covenant commitment (Deut 10:20)—elevates marriage to a sacred adhesion. “One flesh” (בָשָׂר אֶחָד, basar eḥad) signifies not merely sexuality but an ontological reunion, reversing the division of the male human wrought by the creation of woman (Gen 2:21). Adam, bereft of his half, is but half of his former, original self; he requires her—the woman formed from his half—to be made whole (one flesh) once more. In Ephesians we read:

So husbands also ought to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are parts of His body. For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. (Eph 5:28-31)

Translating צֵלָע (tzela) as “side” instead of “rib” does not make it easier to explain the Genesis 2 account to those outside of the believing community, but it certainly makes it far more beautiful, consistent, and meaningful.

Conclusion

In the dawn of creation, God inscribed an eternal truth upon the human soul: we are not formed for solitude. From the man’s own side, He fashioned the woman as a mighty ezer kenegdo—His decisive answer to aloneness. She is no afterthought, but a divine masterpiece of strength and perfect correspondence: a partner who mirrors yet confronts, an ally who completes.

Yet Eden’s whisper extends beyond marriage. Every ish and ishah—widowed, divorced, or single—remains half of a greater whole, longing for reunion within the covenant community. Like mirrors poised in divine hands, we stand kenegdo: opposite yet kindred, severed from original creation oneness only to be drawn back into the sacred bond of belonging.