The Seed of the Woman: Chapter 15
This chapter is really in two sections. The first, which comprises the text itself, is a general statement of what is currently known with reasonable certainty about the origin and development, in the maturing individual, of the differences in both form and function between the two sexes. It is important to be aware of these facts because, as will be seen in due course, they have a direct bearing on the taking of Eve out of Adam. The subject also has a direct bearing on the Virgin Birth and the Incarnation. The other section which might have appeared as supporting footnotes were it not as extensive as the text itself (!), will be found in the form of expanded notes which have been relegated to the Reference Section. These scientific excursions are primarily intended for those who by background and training will wish to have a more detailed treatment of the evidence. These notes can be safely disregarded without any harm being done to the thread of the argument by those who do not desire to become involved in technical detail. The continuity of this study will not be seriously disturbed if they are simply ignored. The body of the text itself, however, has a very direct bearing on the creation of Eve out of Adam and is therefore quite essential to what follows later.
When the female ovum is fertilized by the male, there is initiated an incredibly complex chain of events which culminate nine months later in the birth of a child. During the very early stages of this gestation period the development of the embryo is predisposed in certain directions by the possession of the sex chromosomes which are composed of two elements, one contributed by the mother and the other by the father. The mother can contribute only what is termed an X chromosome which predisposes towards the development of female structural, functional and temperamental characteristics, but the father can contribute either an X or a Y chromosome predisposing in the first instance to female, or in the second to male, structural and functional and temperamental characteristics. In short, the sex of the child to be born is initially governed by the chromosomal contribution of the father. All chromosomes are paired, and the Y is dominant over the X chromosome when combined with it. A child conceived will therefore be subject during development thereafter to a predisposition towards femaleness if receiving an X chromosome from the mother and an X chromosome from the father (XX), or towards maleness if receiving an X chromosome from the mother but a Y chromosome from the father (XY).
In the earlier stages of embryological research it was believed that the contribution to the ovum of the X or the Y chromosome from the male parent predetermined the sex of the developing child. It is now recognized however, that the word "predetermine" is too strong and should be replaced by the word predispose. The truth of the matter is that in the very early stages of foetal development certain disturbing factors may neutralize this predisposition and despite the presence of the supposedly determinate sex chromosome contributed by the male, the individual may emerge oppositely sexed. As Professor Dorothy Price put it: (166)
Although its genetic sex has already been determined, depending on whether a Y-carrying or an X-carrying sperm fertilized the egg from which it has grown, the early fetus is structurally equipped to become either a male or a female (emphasis mine).
There are many factors which may disturb or confuse the relationship between the sex chromosome and the emergent femininity or masculinity of the individual, so that it has become useful now to make a distinction between sex and gender, between the physical appearance of the individual and his or her actual temperamental disposition which may belie the physical appearance. (167) It is apparent today that the chain of events during prenatal development may be influenced by factors other than the X or Y chromosome, though these other factors are by no means altogether independent of them.
If and when such disruption occurs the sex of the child as assigned by the attending physician at birth (or later) on the basis of the genitalia or external organs of sex, may either contradict the chromosomal sex or may be indeterminate, appearing in the form of a mixture of both male and female physical characteristics. (168) It then becomes a very serious, and often very difficult, matter for the physician to assign the correct sex so that the developing child may psychologically as well as functionally assume the appropriate role in society to suit the inner drives which he or she will be subjected to as the reproductive organs become mature and begin to produce those hormones that so strongly influence behaviour in adult life. Any conflict between these stimulators of sexual behaviour and the organs of sex which are appropriate to their functional expression can be devastating in terms of the psychological well-being of the afflicted individual.
The truth of the matter is that a significant number of people are indeterminate to a more or less degree in this regard. (169) Indeed, comparatively few of us (some would say virtually none of us) are wholly male or wholly female. We are all a mixture of both in adult life; and in the earliest stages of embryonic development we are actually neither. The body at first seems equally capable of developing into a male or a female, in spite of the predisposing presence of the XY or XX chromosomes which were formerly presumed to be the inescapable triggers of a purely unisexual development.
Among the factors which can disturb or neutralize this triggering device in prenatal life are the presence of a twin of the opposite sex and, in humans, inadvisable medication during pregnancy. Postnatally among the factors capable of upsetting or even reversing sexual characteristics are operational intervention and so-called parasitic castration in which some parasite destroys part of the function of the sex organ itself, the testes of certain animals. (170)
It is now well recognized that under such influences a genetic or chromosomal male may become a female, both structurally and functionally. The reverse, however, is apparently very rare indeed, (171) although there may be a tendency in this direction with aging due to the failure of the female hormonal system and emergence of some residual male hormonal activity which has hitherto been kept in abeyance by the dominant activity of the female hormone. (172) Thus an older woman may develop some male characteristics such as a deepening and coarsening of the voice, some incipient baldness on the head, beard growth, reduction of the breasts, and, psychologically, the development of a more aggressive disposition. These changes may be enhanced by certain pathological conditions.
It has been found that "maleness" is for some reason not straight-forwardly achieved by the developing male fetus, which does not therefore merely "drift" into the appropriate form simply by possession of the Y chromosome. Maleness is, as it were, actively imposed on the growing organism against a tendency towards femaleness. The tendency to femaleness is in part due to the fact that the whole embryonic development has to take place within the confines of a uterus which is bathed by maternal hormones. (173) The reverse does not appear to be true; a female fetus does not tend towards maleness.
This active imposition is, of course, dependent upon the presence of the Y chromosome which causes the medulla of the gonad * to develop at the expense of the cortex. If this drive is weakened for some reason and the cortex begins to develop at the expense of the medulla, the hitherto neutral organism develops towards a female regardless of the presence of the Y chromosome. The gonad itself is, up to this point, "indifferent," and can therefore develop into a testis or an ovary, although for some unknown reason the gonad more easily develops into an ovary than into a testis. On this account the unborn male is said to have to "struggle" to maintain its integrity as a male. There is apparently no difficulty in the derivation of a female out of a male.
* The gonad is the very first identifiable structure of the reproductive system to be formed in the developing fetus. The medulla is the inner core of the gonad as opposed to its outer layer or cortex.
If the gonad develops into a testis, male hormones are produced which structure the developing organism as a male: if it develops into an ovary, the reverse takes place. It is in this sense that the embryo begins as an entirely neutral organism from the point of view of its sexuality, the X and the Y chromosomes providing the necessary predisposition to decide which way the gonads shall develop, but not providing an infallible predetermination. In the absence of the Y chromosome the gonad has apparently no power to follow a course of development towards maleness, but even in the presence of the Y chromosome, the other influences acting upon the gonad may still override the influence of the Y chromosome. To repeat, therefore, in the present state of our knowledge there are no barriers to the principle of deriving a female out of a male (an Eve out of an Adam), but there are evidently barriers to the derivation of male out of female. At the present moment it appears that the best explanation of such sexual indeterminism is to assume that the sexes were at one time not differentiated at all, that the individual was bi-sexual. With respect to Adam as first created, this could very well mean that he was gynandromorphous in terms of his physical constitution, and androgynous as to his temperament, a man/woman creation, subsequently divided into two: and that the process of separation involved the removing of a female principle out of the male as "woman." The man thus retains both the X and the Y chromosomes whereas the woman carries only the X chromosome.
It must occur to the reader that such bisexuality as we are here attributing to Adam, converted into a monosexual being when Eve was subsequently separated from him, represents a situation that may well have applied equally to some of the other forms of animal life which also testify to a measure of residual bisexuality. I think this is quite likely. The surgical operation which separated Eve from Adam may not therefore have been the only occasion, or even the first occasion, upon which God acted in this way. This should not be a matter of any grave concern in that both man and animals alike also shared a similar experience of creation in the first place, similar at least in so far as both alike return to the dust (Eccl. 3:20). It would surely not be so surprising that God should adopt a single procedure when introducing forms of life which share many things in common as to their overall physiology.
Admittedly, it may seem to lessen the uniqueness of man's position a little but it cannot be denied and, as may be seen from the indexed references (chiefly #175, 176, and 177) animals also share a certain indecisiveness in the matter of sexual dimorphism which parallels that found in man though in a far more pervasive form. We are not really robbing man of his uniqueness; we are only saying, as we have already said in another connection, * that God prepared the natural order before Adam was created in such a way that it would serve (when it came time to create man) as a natural framework for the working out of his redemptive plan, a plan which required that Eve be first of all part of Adam and only later separated from him - for reasons which will become apparent subsequently.
* Custance, A. C., in the Doorway Papers Series, Grand Rapids, Zondervan: see particularly, The Virgin Birth and the Incarnation, Vol. V, Part III, p. 115ff, and Part IV, p. 171ff; and Evolution or Creation, Vol. IV, Part 1, p. 13ff.
This is an arrangement which God did not merely use because it was already in operation, but put into operation because He intended to extend its use in a very special way.
The present tendency among biologists, where evolutionary thinking reigns almost unchallenged, is to assume in the light of what we now know, that sexual reproduction is a somewhat latecomer in the great chain of life. (174) Before it appeared there were no such sexual differences as we now observe widely among living things. Either sexual reproduction was non-existent (i.e., multiplication took place by simple division as in unicellular animals), or both sexes were combined in each individual which was self-fertilized by its own seed. (175) Such a method of reproduction is common among plants and animals, including insects, birds and fish. (176) In such animals it is not at all unusual for their bodies to contain a testis (on one side) and an ovary (on the other side), and not infrequently the individual has the power of self-fertilization - though in some species there is normally cross fertilization with either sex. (177) The problem of the origin of sexual reproduction without which the concept of male and female has virtually no meaning in biology, is one which has baffled evolutionists because it is difficult to see what the intermediate stages could possibly be. It is not without interest that the very word Adam has come to be employed within scientific circles as a kind of code term to identify the whole question of the emergence of sexual dimorphism. (178)
It is clear today that man still shares some of the androgynous character of certain species of animals and one must assume, I think, that the constitution of these animals below man reflects a design which the Creator adopted in anticipation of the creation of Adam who was at first similarly constituted with a bisexual nature in order that a certain further operation which is revealed in Genesis 2:21-23 might be performed to set the stage for man's redemption. As we shall see, the creation of Adam in this form and the subsequent taking of Eve out of him was planned by God for profoundly important physiological reasons in the light of man's foreseen history and foreknown need for redemption. The crucial connection between the Plan of Redemption and the initial form in which Adam was created, according to Scripture, will be explored subsequently. What is important at the present moment is to realize that this initiating surgical operation has left an indelible mark upon man, the evidence of which can still be a subject of fascinating research and the antecedents of which seem to have been witnessed in the prior existence of many other forms of animal life in which the sexes have remained combined in the individual. Such an Adam would have been quite viable. (179)
In man as a consequence of the Fall, the effects of this separation have been disturbed in various ways, to our distress. Certain irregularities in the distribution of the X and Y chromosomes lead to anomalous developments which nevertheless permit us to see something of the specific influences of these specialized chromosomes by their exaggerated effects in such irregular forms. Thus in Turner's Syndrome the Y sex chromosome has somehow been lost so that the normal XY appears as XO. Only one X chromosome is found and this is presumably contributed by the female parent. As might perhaps be expected the virtual disappearance of the male sex component is reflected in a corresponding diminishing of maleness in the female child which results. Such an individual is considered to be a particularly "pure" female. (180)
Meanwhile, in human beings there are vestigial remains in both sexes of the organs of the opposite sex, the nipples in man being an obvious example. However, there is some evidence that these particular organs in the male of the species are not entirely useless. Several reports are now available of men who have suckled children in cases of extreme need. David Livingstone notes a statement from the works of Humboldt who reported an instance of the male breast yielding milk. * Livingstone remarks upon an occasion in Scotland, where a man whose wife had been put to death, in desperation put his child to his breast and found, to the astonishment of himself and his neighbors, that milk flowed. (181) Farley Mowatt gives a translation of a portion of one of the old Viking Sagas setting forth a rather similar situation: (182)
All that night Thorgiol watched over his infant son and he could see that the boy would not survive unless something drastic was done. He did not intend to let him die if he could help it.
Then he shewed his mettle, for he took a knife and cut his own nipple. It began to bleed, and he let the baby tug at it until blood mixed with fluid came out. He did not stop until milk came out; and the boy nursed upon that.
* Livingstone, David, Travels and Researches in South Africa, N.Y., Harper, 1858, p. 141.
Birds may be so completely convertible as to sex, in either direction, that there have been reports since the fifteenth century of roosters becoming hens and laying eggs, and hens becoming roosters with all their cocky characteristics. The Basler Chronick of 1624 reported that in 1474 an egg-laying cockerel was executed! (183) The Edinburgh Evening Courant in July, 1834, mentions a turkey cock in East Lothian which had hatched a brood of chickens. (184) Among animals, therefore, such transformations of sex and such combinations of diverse sexual characters within a single individual are frequent enough; and bisexualism or hermaphroditism is common in plants.
The word hermaphrodite is formed from the names of two pagan deities Hermes and Aphrodite, who are said to have loved so dearly that they begot a child combining both their natures in one. It is obvious that the ancients were well acquainted with sexual aberrations and sought to explain some of them in supernatural terms. Because hermaphroditism is by no means limited to man, I think one must assume that, like physical immortality, it was built into the Natural Order by the Creator in anticipation of the making of man whose history was to require a similar potential.
It therefore appears, in the light of present knowledge, that in living forms below man a clear distinction between male and female is not always to be observed. In plants, bisexuality is exceedingly common, in insects frequent, in birds it is not rare, and in higher animals the distinctions are often blurred. (185) Moreover, we know now that in animals conversion can be in either direction, maleness is easily converted into femaleness, and vice versa: whereas in man conversion from femaleness to maleness seldom occurs in spite of attempts by human intervention. We also know that a surprising number of people are almost equally male and female in some aspects of their constitution and character.
Let me try to sum up, therefore, for the non-specialist reader the substance of what we have been considering thus far. Not many of us, with the possible exception of those who "suffer" from the Turner Syndrome, are entirely male or entirely female: we are all a little of both and some are so much so that their sex and gender are contradictory and life may become a very confusing experience.
Present evidence shows that by so constituting Adam, woman could quite conceivably be derived out of man: but it is difficult to conceive how man could have been taken out of woman. To my mind, the creation of Eve was pure miracle: but the Christian who has once settled this fact in his own mind should surely not be surprised to find that research now provides him with a little better understanding of the background of what he has long since believed. There is no longer any excuse for denying the possibility that our first parents could very well have been united in one individual named Adam (Gen. 5:2).
Neither can be wholly complete without the other and yet such have been the disruptive effects of sin through the centuries that constitutionally it is a rare thing when two are joined in marriage with entire success, for the true maleness or femaleness of both has been disordered. Consequently we are no longer two perfect halves which would make one complete whole even on a physiological plane: we are only two fragments and these fragments rarely match perfectly in more than a few areas of interaction.
Experience shows, moreover, that those whose sexuality is least clearly differentiated towards one pole or the other are often the most highly gifted but also the least fitted for marriage. (186)
I suspect that the original "wholeness" that was in Adam at first was not merely the sum of two halves, but a compound with qualities and characteristics of which we can have little knowledge. *
* According to Berdyaev, "man is really a bisexual being combining both the masculine and feminine principle in different proportions. A man in whom the female principle is completely absent would be an abstract being, and a woman in whom the masculine principle is completely absent would not be a personality. The masculine principle is essentially personal and anthropological, while the feminine principle is essentially communal and cosmic. It is only in the union of these two principles that we have complete humanity. This union is realized in every man and woman within their androgynous natures, but in the fallen world the two principles not only seek union but also wage war against each other." Man is a sick, wounded, disharmonious creature, in the thinking of Berdyaev, primarily because he is sexual, that is, a bisexual being who has lost his wholeness arid original integrity. [Nicholas Berdyaev, The Destiny of Man, London, Geoffrey Bles, 1954, chap III, Sect. 3, titled, "Sex: the Masculine and the Feminine."]
As the compound of two chemicals is usually quite different in its nature to the elements * themselves, so the first Adam, as created, was such a creature as to be as full of mystery and glory as the last Adam was.
* As an example, salt is a compound of two elements that have very different characteristics. And even more remarkable is water with its incompressibility and other extraordinary qualities, composed as it is of two compressible gases.
So it is not at all necessary for the child of God any longer to speak apologetically about his faith in the creation of Eve out of Adam. This is sober history, and if we do not believe it, it is not because we know too much but because we know too little. Eve was taken out of Adam by a surgical operation, divinely performed while Adam was in a deep coma. And this mode of creation for her was essential, as we shall see, for the later appearing of the virgin born Saviour who was truly to represent the original Adam as God created him. This is miracle - but miracle performed with a rational end in view and by a means that was essential to the service of that end. Every year sees further advances in our understanding of why and how this could be so, and leaves us with increasing wonderment at the ways of the Lord in creating man, and the extraordinary insight of the Genesis story.
We conclude, therefore, that the record of the formation of Eve out of Adam is not only entirely reasonable but may in fact give us a clue which we would not, except for revelation, have had regarding the origin of certain aspects of man's form and function and temperament as he is now constituted. And by extrapolation, we may judge something of his original constitution when God created him.
Corrections, May 17, 1997.
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