Help Meet

Genes 2:18 http://www.womeninthescriptures.com/2010/11/real-meaning-of-term-help-meet.html

One of the most frequently misunderstood terms in the bible is the term "help meet" in the book of Genesis. In Genesis 2:18 it says, "And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him."
The common way in which the term "help meet" is interpreted is to mean that Eve, unlike the other beasts of the earth, was "appropriate for" or "worthy" of Adam and was to be his helper or companion on the earth. While there are some really good things about this interpretation it doesn't do full justice to what the term "help meet" really means. The term, in it's original Hebrew, means something much more profound and powerful than just a "helper" and when we understand what God was saying to Adam we come to see Eve's role and the role of women on this earth in a much different light. In Hebrew the two words that "help meet" are derived from are the words "ezer" and the word 'kenegdo". Ezer which is commonly translated as "help" is really a rich word with a much deeper meaning. In her book Eve and the Choice Made in Eden, Beverly Campbell explains,

According to biblical scholar David Freedman, the Hebrew word translated thee into English as help is ezer. This word is a combination of two roots, one meaning to rescue, to save, and the other meaning to be strong. Just as the roots merged into one word, so did their meanings. At first ezer meant either to save or to be strong, but in time, said Freedman, ezer  was always interpreted as to help a mixture of both nuances. Diana Webb in her book Forgotten Women of God also clarifies this word by explaining, "The noun ezer occurs 21 times in the Hebrew Bible. In eight of these instances the word means savior. These examples are easy to identify because they are associated with other expressions of deliverance or saving. Elsewhere in the Bible, the root ezer means strength.... the word is most frequently used to describe how God is an ezer to man. "
For example, the word "ebenezer" in 1 Samuel 7:12 is used to describe the power of God's deliverance. "Eben" means rock and "ezer" means "help" or "salvation". Ebenezer therefore means "rock of help" or "rock of salvation". The root "ezer" is the same word that God used to describe to Adam who Eve was. She was not intended to be just his helper or his companion, rather she was intended to be his savior, his deliverer.
The other part of the term "help meet" which is commonly translated as "meet for" or "fit for" is the word "kenegdo". It is hard to know exactly what the word kenegdo means because it only appears once in the entire Bible. Yet Diana Webb explained that,
"Neged, a related word which means against, was one of the first words I learned in Hebrew. I thought it was very strange that God would create a companion for Adam that was against him! Later, I learned that kenegdo could also mean in front of or opposite. This still didn’t help much. Finally I heard it explained as being exactly corresponding to, like when you look at yourself in a mirror."
Eve was not designed to be exactly like Adam. She was designed to be his mirror opposite, possessing the other half of the qualities, responsibilities, and attributes which he lacked. Just like Adam and Eve's sexual organs were physically mirror opposites (one being internal and the other external) so were their divine stewardship designed to be opposite but fit together perfectly to create life. Eve was Adam's complete spiritual equal, endowed with an essential saving power that was opposite from his.
I've pondered a lot about this clarification of Eve's role and how it is that she has been given a saving power equal but opposite to Adam's saving power. As I've thought about it I realized that while women do much to help and assist men in their stewardship they have been given a stewardship that is uniquely theirs and which is every bit as important as men's stewardship.
Women are "saviors" to men by the fact that they give them life and nurture them towards the light of Christ. By conceiving, creating and bearing mortal bodies women make it possible for God's children to start on their mortal journey and have the opportunity to become perfected. Without women there would be no gateway into this world and no opportunity for progress or exaltation. In addition, by being willing to sacrifice (their very lives if necessary) to bring children into this world women demonstrate the true meaning of charity. From the very first breath a child takes he or she has been the recipient of charity and unconditional love. This is a powerful gift that a mother gives her child and it is her love which first reminds the child of God and points them towards Christ. Each woman, regardless of her ability to give birth, is a savior to mankind when she loves men and nurtures a child closer to Christ.
Even Adam, whose physical body was not created by a daughter of Eve, was saved and delivered by a woman. For it was through a woman, Mary, that Jesus Christ came to conquer the bonds of death and sin and atoned for Adam's transgression. Without a woman to bear the body of Christ mankind would have been lost and fallen forever and Adam's work and purpose on the earth would have been meaningless. Mary was the gateway that made Christ's work possible and her nurturing the catalyst for his success. Even though Eve didn't give physical life to Adam she literally saved him from spiritual death by opening the way for the Savior and Redeemer to come into the world. Salvation, in the form of Christ, literally came to the earth through a woman.
This perspective on Eve is so powerful for me. It is so different from what we normally hear about her and about women's roles in the world. I love how Beverly Campbell concluded her remarks about the term "help meet", she said,
"Thus, it seems that through imprecise translation, our understanding of the powerful words used originally to describe Eve’s role have been diminished. As a result, our understanding or Mother Eve has also been diminished. Suppose we had all, male and female alike, been taught to understand Genesis 2:18 as something like the following, “It is not good that man should be alone. I will make him a companion of strength and power who has a saving power and is equal with him. "I know that understanding the real meaning of the term "help meet" earlier in my life would have made a huge difference in how I understood my role and mission as a woman. I think that if I had caught the vision of who we are as women and what a marvelous stewardship the Lord has given us I wouldn't have wasted so many years and so much energy being angry that I couldn't have a man's stewardship. I realize now that true power come when men and women understand that they have been blessed with different gifts, abilities and stewardship's and truly work together as equal partners to help each other be successful. Men and women need each other and it is only when they are united, body, soul and mind, that God's work moves forth. We are nothing without each other and nothing without Christ.
It is not good that man should be alone. I will make him a companion of strength and power who has a saving power and is equal with him.

Genesis 2:18 be translated as "I will make a power [or strength] corresponding to man." Freedman even suggests on the basis of later Hebrew that the second word in the Hebrew expression found in this verse should be rendered equal to him. If so, then God makes for the man a woman fully his equal and fully his match. In this way, the man's loneliness will be assuaged. Genesis 2:23 where Adam says of Eve, "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,' for she was taken out of man." The idiomatic sense of this phrase "bone of my bones" is a "very close relative" to "one of us" or in effect "our equal.

In Gen 1:26-28 God gave both male and female dominion over creation:
they are the King and the Queen.  God has not changed His mind.
 How different our world would be if men and women really understood that!