And Jehovah Elohim said, It is not good that Man should be alone; I will make him a helpmate, his like.
In this chapter God plants a garden, gives man work, and sets one rule. Then the first thing He calls "not good" is Adam by himself. That raises the questions this verse turns on. Why is being alone a fault in a world with nothing yet wrong? What sort of "helper" does God intend? And why does He announce the plan before He carries it out?
Up to this point in the chapter God has issued commands. Here He gives a considered judgment about what is best for the man He made.
Here in Genesis 2 the LORD God is both moral Governor and Creator. He enters with kind care into the daily life and comfort of man on earth. He has a kind and wise mind about man's well-being. He also speaks it out, so that man may know it as His. This is not a command, as in verses 16 and 17. It is the kind judgment of One who knew everything and overflowed with favour toward man. "Then the LORD God said, 'It is not good that the man should be alone.'" Exchange of affection and interest is good for man. No wonder that solitude is the harshest punishment short of death.
Adam had lost nothing and done nothing wrong. What follows is added goodness on top of an already generous provision.
The love that had blessed with so much had further good in store, and that in the form of one who should be worthy of the object of such love and goodness.
The gift met more than Adam's need for a working partner.
For Adam, where everything was still right, here was a spiritual being he could share thought and feeling with — the exchange our whole being craves. She was also an object for his heart. She was a pledge of his Creator's love. In her, love served him where he could see it, and drew out his own love. She rescued him from isolation, and from being wrapped up in himself.
God states the need in verse 18, then parades the animals before Adam in the verses that follow. The order is deliberate.
God did not create man to be self-sufficient. He needed more than company. He needed a "helper fit for him," a counterpart. We see the goodness of God as well as His wisdom in the way the counterpart came into being. God's aim was Adam's own good. So He brought the whole range of beasts and birds before Adam. That way Adam saw for himself that no such counterpart existed among them.
Every marriage since traces back to the word spoken here. It also traces back to something in man that mirrors God Himself.
"A marriage" carries us back at once to Eden, and to the word by which God set it up: "It is not good that the man should be alone." God made man for communion. The gift of language shows it — man can speak, and can be spoken to. In this he shows not only a creature's need. He also shows the likeness of his Creator. In the very preface to his creation the words "Let us make man" speak of communion.
God supplied the need in one particular way. That makes this verse the measure of every later departure from it. The first on record is Lamech, who took two wives.
It was "not good that the man should be alone." But His provision was not two or more. It was one woman, "a helper fit for him," his counterpart. Self-will kept growing. In the end it did not hesitate to cross God's mind, which His act had shown plainly to those who fear Him: "And Lamech took two wives." From the beginning it was not so.
God's answer to Adam's aloneness was not simply another human being. One writer asks why.
The man was created first, and it was not good for him that he should be alone. The woman was created in view of this need. Why a woman for that reason, and not another man? Because another man would not have given the help she gave.
One writer reads the same words as God's thought about Christ, answered in the church.
In eternity past God looked forward and saw the risen, glorified Son. He was saying, It is not good for Him to be alone. I will build a helper suitable for Him. God thought it; God said it; and God has done it. All of it is of God. Think of the predestined glory of the church. Whatever Adam was, that was every particle of Eve. Whatever Christ is, as the risen man from among the dead, such shall be, such is, His bride.
- Not good — In a world God had called good, the one fault He names is Adam being alone. He says it as kind judgment about man's comfort, not as a command.
- Gift — The remedy is added goodness, not repair. God gives a counterpart who draws out Adam's heart and rescues him from himself.
- Discovery — God announces the need, then lets Adam name the animals and find no match, so the gift lands on a felt lack.
- Institution — Marriage rests on this word. One woman for one man is the shape of God's provision. Lamech's two wives are the first break with it.
- Fulfilment — Read forward, the same sentence is God's thought about His Son. The answer is a bride who shares everything He is.
And out of the ground Jehovah Elohim had formed every animal of the field and all fowl of the heavens, and brought [them] to Man, to see what he would call them; and whatever Man called each living soul, that was its name.
Genesis 2:19 puts the newly made man at the centre of the animal world, with God Himself bringing every beast and bird to him for a name. Two questions follow: does this place the animals after man, against chapter 1, and why does God stage the parade at all?
Some claim that chapters 1 and 2 come from two writers who contradict each other. This verse says God "had formed" the beasts and birds. One commentator finds the key in the purpose of chapter 2:
This moral meaning, and the picture it carries, is the true key to the record in Genesis 2:4-25. It fully accounts for the differences from chapter 1 to 2:3 — differences that ignorance and unbelief twist into the contradictions of two separate writers. It is not true that Genesis 2:7, 19 presents man as created first of all living creatures, before the birds and beasts. Nor does man's creation in God's image (Gen. 1:27) contradict Genesis 2:7, which says that God formed him from the dust of the ground.
This verse says God formed the birds, like the beasts, out of the ground. Some read that as a clash with the fifth day. The answer lies in the older English version this writer corrects:
Chapter 2 shows that God made birds out of the earth. But Genesis 1:20, they say, shows that He made them out of the waters. Superficial objectors! Genesis 1 says nothing of the sort. It agrees perfectly with Genesis 2:19… This verse does not teach that the waters were to bring forth birds, as it appears to do in our English version. It says, "Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature, and let birds fly about the earth in the open expanse of heaven."
Adam did not summon the animals. God brought them to him, and gave him the wisdom to name them:
God made Adam lord of the lower creation here on earth. In His goodness He gave him the wisdom and intelligence to give the proper names to all cattle, to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, for He had put them all under him. This matters all the more, because it is the fitting sign of the dominion given him… Adam claimed nothing here in pride. It was the Lord God who brought the animals to him to see what he would call them, and whatever Adam called every living creature had His approval.
The names were not noises. Each one described what the creature actually was:
One of man's first lessons was a lesson in zoology. Giving names to all the creatures implies that he understood them, and the names stood for qualities in them that could be recognised, and were. Adam had no language but his own. He could not hide the emptiness of a meaningless name behind grand-sounding Greek, as our zoologists do now.
The same scene answers a question about where language came from:
The Lord God brings these creatures before Adam, and Adam gives names to them all. This shows not only his title as lord, but the power of fitting language, given by God from the first. The idea that clear speech is only a growth from the slow putting together of elements is a dream of clever speculation… On the very first day of his life, even before Eve was formed, Adam gave the animals their names, and God Himself endorsed what their head said.
The parade had a second effect. Among all those creatures, none matched Adam, and God let him find that out for himself:
God did not create man to be an entirely self-sufficient being. He needed not only companionship but a "helpmeet," a counterpart. We see the goodness of God as well as His wisdom in the way that counterpart came into being. God's aim was Adam's good and profit, so He brought the whole range of beasts and birds before him and let him see for himself that no such counterpart existed among the animals.
The order of events is deliberate — rule first, then a bride. One writer describes the sequence as two ceremonies:
To complete his condition, the Lord God holds for him a coronation day and a wedding day. But this action has an order in it… He brings the creatures of the field and of the air to Adam, to see what he would call them. This was investing him with dominion, setting the royal crown on his head. Then He prepares the helper suited to him, and presents Eve to him, following his coronation with his marriage.
- Formed — birds and beasts alike came out of the ground. The clash with chapter 1 comes from an old translation, not from the text.
- Brought — Adam did not round up the animals. God led them to him, so the naming confirmed a rule already given.
- Named — the names described real qualities. Naming them showed understanding, and speech was God's gift on day one, not a slow invention.
- Crowned — one writer reads the scene as a coronation. The crown went on Adam's head before a bride was presented to him.
- Alone — the parade that proved his rule also proved his solitude. No creature matched him, and God let him see it for himself.
And Man gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the heavens, and to every beast of the field; but as for Adam, he found no helpmate, his like.
God brings every creature He has formed to the man, and the man names each one. Two things happen at once: he shows his authority over the animals, and he finds that none of them matches him.
God Himself brings the animals to Adam, and whatever he calls them stands. Writers point to naming as Scripture's mark of who rules whom.
Giving names is a ruler's right. Scripture recognises this everywhere — not only in Genesis but right through the Bible, even when Gentile nations held the upper hand. It belongs to man by nature, and he still uses it today over everything and everyone under him. But the weightiest and most striking use of this right was in man before he sinned, fresh from his Creator's hand. The Creator, Himself Sovereign Ruler, took pleasure in the rule of His representative on earth.
The same sign appears later with people, not animals.
Giving names is a mark of lordship, or ownership. So Adam at the beginning gave names to the animals. Pharaoh gave a name to Joseph, and Nebuchadnezzar gave one to Daniel (Gen. 2:20; Gen. 41:45; Dan. 1:7).
The names were not random sounds. What Adam called each creature showed what he knew.
He gives them each a name. These are not made-up names. In Scripture a name states the mark that sets a thing apart. So in naming the animals we see that Adam knew them perfectly. But with all this knowledge he fails to find one "his like."
Adam's naming assumes he could already talk. Commentators see here a gift from God, not a slow human invention.
Jehovah-Elohim brings these creatures before Adam, and he gives names to them all. This shows not only his title as lord, but also his power of fitting speech, which God gave him from the first. Some say that speech grew piece by piece, out of smaller elements. That idea is a clever dream. It may exercise men's wits, but it has no foundation at all. On the very first day of his life, before God formed Eve, Adam gave the animals their names. And God Himself approved what their head said.
God did not hand Eve over at once. The parade of creatures came first.
God did not create man to be completely self-sufficient. He needed more than company. He needed a "helpmeet," or counterpart. The way God brought that counterpart into being shows His goodness as well as His wisdom. God's aim was Adam's own good. So He brought the whole range of beasts and birds before him, and let Adam see for himself that no such counterpart existed among the animals.
The creatures he named made his own loneliness plain.
Every creature under Adam's rule had its mate to share the joy of its new life. The eagle in mid air, the singing birds in the trees, the roaring lion, the lamb feeding in peace beside him, down to the silent creatures of the waters — each had its own. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him. Man was alone in the middle of a paradise, and therefore it was no paradise to him. There was a void in his heart, with all the abundance of that beautiful garden around him.
Adam names the creation before the woman exists. Writers see a picture here of Christ and the church.
The beautiful picture is kept intact: creation belongs to Christ. It does not belong to the church in the first place at all; her place is one of grace alone. The Heir of all things is the Second man, not the bride. If she has everything along with Him, that is because she is joined to Him, not because it is hers in herself.
What Adam could not find, God supplied. Where the ESV reads "a helper fit for him," older translations read "a helpmate, his like."
When God created man, no other creature of God's hand was found to be "a helpmate, his like" (Gen. 2:20) — none that could enter into the thoughts and feelings of man, or respond to his love. Ephesians 5 teaches us that Christ went into death, as Adam went into his deep sleep, so that one could be produced who would be "His like."
- Authority. Naming is Scripture's sign of lordship. Adam names the animals because God set him over them.
- Intelligence. A name states what a thing is. Adam's naming shows he knew each creature, and could speak from his first day.
- Exposure. The same parade that showed his rule showed his lack. God let him find for himself that nothing there matched him.
- Absence. Every creature had its mate. The man had none, so a perfect garden was no paradise to him.
- Supply. He named the creatures before the woman existed, so headship stayed his alone. In this he pictures Christ, Heir of creation, who went into death so that a companion "His like" could come out of it.