Cheryl Schatz

Gazza,

You said:

. I don’t see how God in making Eve a woman detracts from the significance of Adam naming her. Surely the fact that in the text it is Adam and not God who actually names Eve that Mark is saying is significant.

Actually the issue that we have been discussing is not the name “Eve” but the issue of Adam calling her “woman”. What we have been arguing is that God identifies her by identifying what He made and by the way that He made her which identifies exactly what she is. The issue of Adam calling her “Eve” is outside the issue of the original sinless creation so it wouldn’t identify whether God gave Adam authority over the woman in the beginning which is a major issue.

No one would argue that Adam in anyway created Eve or her nature but rather that in naming Eve Adam is asserting his understanding that he is in a position of leadership over her (according to our understanding of the signficance of naming in Hebrew culture).

Gengwall brought up a great point that no husband named his wife so there is no historical significance in a husband naming his wife.

Plus if it was truly a significance of naming in the Hebrew culture, then what about the Scripture that says that Hagar named God?

Genesis 16:13 (NASB)
13 Then she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, “You are a God who sees”; for she said, “Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?”

It certainly was the same author that had Adam name Eve, so is Hagar now taking authority over God since the author recorded the naming? If we really are going to identify naming as taking authority over a person, then we need to understand the serious problems with this view even in Genesis.

Gods silence in not naming the woman could be seen as an assertion of this role.

God wasn’t silent. In chapter 1 He called both of them “Adam” and in chapter 2 He identified her as the woman. Apparently God didn’t see any need to give her another name as He didn’t see any need to give Adam another name.

This would be true despite Pinklights observations that God made Eve according to Gods own design for woman would it not?

We are talking about the term “woman”. And if we were to deal with the idea of the mother of the living, God Himself identified that she would be the mother of the Messiah who we know as The Life so mother of the living would be God’s idea before it became man’s idea.

could this not be that the animals are plural – many different types where as Eve was a singular entity. Adam no more made the animals or their nature than he did Eve.

She wasn’t called Eve when God brought her to the man and she was not in the class of the animals. She was not just another animal brought to Adam. It is interesting that those who believe in evolution describe humans as a type of animal. This is not God’s plan as only humans are made in God’s image.