2:13 first formed. The intended leadership role for men in the basic institutions of the home and church dates from the creation itself. That is, Eve was formed from Adam’s side, to be “an help meet for him” (Genesis 2:18). This is not an invention of the supposedly anti-feminist apostle, as some have alleged, but the stipulation of God Himself, even before the entrance of sin and the curse into the world. This in no way means that man is superior to woman in God’s sight, for both were created “in the image of God” (Genesis 1:27), and both are “one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). Each, however, was created for a distinctive role and purpose, and neither is truly fulfilled apart from that.

2:13 then Eve. There is no conceivable way in which some process of evolution could first form men, and then women. According to theistic evolution, both male and female human beings evolved simultaneously from a population of hominids, and this verse, as well as many others, flatly contradicts this notion. Note also I Corinthians 11:8-9. “Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.”