Aggada -- Translations into English; Bible. Old Testament -- Legends; Jewish legends; Midrash -- Translations into English
The woman destined to become the true companion of man was taken from
Adam's body, for "only when like is joined unto like the union is
indissoluble."[41] The creation of woman from man was possible because
Adam originally had two faces, which were separated at the birth of
Eve.[42]
When God was on the point of making Eve, He said: "I will not make her
from the head of man, lest she carry her head high in arrogant pride;
not from the eye, lest she be wanton-eyed; not from the ear, lest she
be an eavesdropper; not from the neck, lest she be insolent; not from
the mouth, lest she be a tattler; not from the heart, lest she be
inclined to envy; not from the hand, lest she be a meddler; not from
the foot, lest she be a gadabout. I will form her from a chaste portion
of the body," and to every limb and organ as He formed it, God said,
"Be chaste! Be chaste!" Nevertheless, in spite of the great caution
used, woman has all the faults God tried to obviate. The daughters of
Zion were haughty and walked with stretched forth necks and wanton
eyes; Sarah was an eavesdropper in her own tent, when the angel spoke
with Abraham; Miriam was a talebearer, accusing Moses; Rachel was
envious of her sister Leah; Eve put out her hand to take the forbidden
fruit, and Dinah was a gadabout.[43]
The physical formation of woman is far more complicated than that of
man, as it must be for the function of child-bearing, and likewise the
intelligence of woman matures more quickly than the intelligence of
man.[44] Many of the physical and psychical differences between the two
sexes must be attributed to the fact that man was formed from the
ground and woman from bone. Women need perfumes, while men do not; dust
of the ground remains the same no matter how long it is kept; flesh,
however, requires salt to keep it in good condition. The voice of women
is shrill, not so the voice of men; when soft viands are cooked, no
sound is heard, but let a bone be put in a pot, and at once it
crackles. A man is easily placated, not so a woman; a few drops of
water suffice to soften a clod of earth; a bone stays hard, and if it
were to soak in water for days. The man must ask the woman to be his
wife, and not the woman the man to be her husband, because it is man
who has sustained the loss of his rib, and he sallies forth to make
good his loss again. The very differences between the sexes in garb and
social forms go back to the origin of man and woman for their reasons.
Woman covers her hair in token of Eve's having brought sin into the
world; she tries to hide her shame; and women precede men in a funeral
cortege, because it was woman who brought death into the world. And the
religious commands addressed to women alone are connected with the
history of Eve. Adam was the heave offering of the world, and Eve
defiled it. As expiation, all women are commanded to separate a heave
offering from the dough. And because woman extinguished the light of
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