Communion of Persons

In the beginning of the Book of Genesis, we have the biblical accounts of the creation of the world and of man and woman. Recent biblical studies have disclosed to us that in the Book of Genesis, there are actually two creation stories, not one: what we call the Priestly account and the Yahwist account of creation.

If we focus on the Yahwist account (the second creation story that we now find in our Bibles), then we see that after creating Adam (the man), God said: "It is not good for man to be alone." Alone, man is somehow incomplete. There is something lacking in his creation. As a result, God put him to sleep and as he was sleeping, God took one of his ribs and from it created Eve (the woman). This is the Bible's way of expressing, in an archaic, metaphorical and figurative manner, a fundamental truth: namely, that man and woman share the same common humanity. They both come from the same stock, made up of the same stuff. They belong to the same species. Both are human persons created in the image and likeness of God.

At the sight of the woman's body, Adam (the man) exclaimed in words of pure joy: "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh!" It is as if Adam was saying: "This at last is a person like myself. I am no longer alone in the midst of creation. Here at last is a someone with whom I can establish a relationship of love!" And man realized that the woman is God's gift to him, and he is God's gift to the woman. Given and accepted in love, masculinity finds itself affirmed in femininity, and vice versa, for they have been given by God to each other and they somehow complete each other. Writes John Paul II: "femininity finds itself, in a sense, in the presence of maculinity and masculinity is confirmed through femininity."

This is what John Paul II refers to as the "original experience of unity" of man and woman.