How would the world be different if women didn’t exist? It’s an interesting thing to think about. According to MensMagDaily.com, everything men do, every decision they make, every item they buy is directly related to how women will react to it. Everything revolves around women, how to get ‘em, how to keep ‘em, how to please ‘em, it’s all about them. If any man in the work place was told to sit down and think about why he did something, it would all come down to a woman.
Christianity also looks at the importance of women, especially in marital relationships. St Thomas Aquinas used the idea of equality in marital friendship to argue against polygamy and in favor of an unconditional love between husband and wife:
“The greater the friendship is, the more solid and long lasting it will be. Now there seems to be the greatest friendship between husband and wife, for they are united not only in the act of fleshly union, which produces a certain gentle association even among beasts, but also in the partnership of the whole range of domestic activity. Consequently, as an indication of this, man must even “leave his father and mother” for the sake of his wife as it is said in Genesis (2:24).
Furthermore, Aquinas believed that the fact that Eve was made from Adam’s rib indicates that she was not above him (as she might be had she been created from Adam’s head) nor below him, like a slave (as she might be had she arisen from his feet). She comes from his side, indicating that she is a partner and companion. These statements of the equality of man and women – not the statement of male superiority – were new and radical. The specifically Christian attitude toward women – not the pre-existing pagan attitude – was new and radical. It has taken some time, though, for the wheat to be separated from the chaff.
According to Church Father Gregory of Nazianzus, throughout history Jesus has protected women:
The majority of men are ill-disposed to chastity and their laws are unequal and irregular. For what was the reason they restrained the woman but indulged the man, and that a woman who practices evil against her husband’s bed is an adulteress and the penalties of the law severe, but if the husband commits fornication against his wife, he has no account to give? I do not accept this legislation. I do not approve this custom.” (Oration 37:6)
By establishing one moral code obligatory on men and women alike, Christianity fostered a lasting commitment of unconditional covenantal love, protecting the family structure and putting the sexes on an equal footing.
So when God made woman, he literally rocked the world of man.
Translating a World on the Edge 