Charis

Humans also are one of the only ones who appear to mate even when there is no possibility of conception. Only in humans is the “one flesh union” a huge part of our inner souls. Animals are just not in the same category.

Are you claiming that “one flesh union”= sex?
and that humans are in a different category because humans do it even when there is no possibility of conception?

I say “one flesh union” is far deeper than just sex. Just sex does not make a “one flesh union” or animals would have a “one flesh union”. I think in the Garden they knew about the other aspects very deeply, in a very heavenly kind of way and that sex was just not as important as fallen man has made it.

And though I agree that a woman’s desire for her husband is much more than physical, just think how it would be if she never ever had any sexual desire except during fertility (like animals). I think it would take away a lot of the sexualization of media, the exploitation of women, and it would make women much less dependent upon male opinion. And I think men would adjust. Monogomous men who followed the Law lived close to such a pattern (sex only in fertile periods). Two week abstinence every month was part of the Law (Lev 15:19ff; Lev 20:18)

If it was this way, I wouldn’t see it as a bad thing either, but it would give an idea that in the garden before sin, that the woman and man were quite mismatched sexually. I also don’t see this as a redemptive thing. I would need you to explain this because I don’t see this as anything to do with salvation.

I don’t see them as sexually mismatched before the Fall. They had much deep intense intimacy of other kinds. We have no comprehension of how good it was for them. We think sex is “ultimate”. Like a child might think chocolate is ultimate and say “what you want to take time for sex when you could be eating chocolate instead?”. Well they had intimacy which was so far beyond sex- face to face intimacy with God so that they would say “what you want to spend time on sex when you could be doing this instead?” They were not sex obsessed like modern mankind, nor did they feel a lack. Think of two children together. They never think about sex (hopefully). That’s how I see them in the Garden. They were God’s children.
Young children remain “naked and unashamed” to this day (unless violated)
Animals are “naked and unashamed”
Neither children nor animals are sex obsessed

I think that before the Fall the man and woman were not sex obsessed. We impose that on there. And I think “desire” of Genesis 3:16 has a libido component. I think the frequency of sexual activity increased after the Fall. Interesting that God never even mentioned Adam KNOWING his wife pre-Fall. If it was such a central part of what marriage is all about then its odd that it is really unclear that they ever even had sex before the Fall.