000 Allen FMT (i-xxii) - The Presbyterian Leader

192 Proper 23 [28]/Year B
dust (from which God made the nonhuman creatures) but from the actual
human being. They are of the same stuff, thus suggesting primeval equality.
Verse 23b contains the first direct indication of gender difference, even
as it reiterates the theme of similarity-and-connection-with-difference
expressed in the designations Woman (ishshah) and Male (ish).
Scholars almost universally see God bringing the couple together in
verse 22 as indicating that marriage is instituted by God. In the world of
biblical Israel, marriage involved the female leaving her home to join the
male and his family. However, some interpreters think that verse 24 preserves
the memory of an earlier time when the male left his home and
joined that of the woman.
In its present form, the key affirmation of the latter part of the text is
that male and female “become one flesh.” This statement does not mean
that difference between the two is eradicated. The phrase has a sexual
overtone: in the sexual relationship, male and female can become so
responsive to one another that they function as one. The phrase thus signals
that the two human beings work together in singularity of purpose
(making use of their differences) to fulfill together the role of exercising
dominion (Gen. 1:26–28).
The text concludes by noting that in this pristine period of existence,
they did not know shame. Shame results only from the fall.
This text is ideally paired today with Mark 10:2–11, for Mark asserts its
viewpoint to explain why divorce is not possible in the community of those
awaiting the final apocalyptic manifestation of the realm of God. This passage
is also directly or indirectly cited in 1 Corinthians 6:16 and 11:8–9,
in Ephesians 5:3, and in 1 Timothy 2:13.
Proper 23 [28]/Year B
Job 23:1–9, 16–17+ (Semicontinuous)
Intending to give Job pastoral care, friends visit Job on the ash heap of life
and offer what they take to be appropriate theological interpretations of
his situation. By oversimplifying, we can summarize Eliphaz (Job
4:1–5:27), voicing the popular idea still heard today that obedient people
succeed while the disobedient suffer (e.g., 4:6–7) and that circumstances
such as Job’s are divine discipline (5:17). Bildad (8:1–22) thinks that God
is just and punishes sin. The suffering of Job must, therefore, reveal that
Job has sinned and should prompt Job to repent. Zophar (11:1–20)
reprises the notion that God is fair and points out that God knows more