Then the man said: Then marks a transition to the man’s reaction, which is one of joyful enthusiasm. The man named the animals, but he has never entered into conversation with God. In languages in which it is necessary to say who the man speaks to, we may say “The man said to God.” When he finally speaks he bursts forth in poetic style.
This at last is …: this refers to the time and not to the woman. The sense is “This time,” “Now,” “Finally,” after having examined and named all the animals and birds. The context shows the man is delighted that he has at last found his companion. Accordingly Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch translates the words introducing the quotation as “He was happy and shouted….” Bible en français courant has “Ah, this time…!” Good News Translation is somewhat less emotive with “At last….” Because the idiom bone of my bones follows immediately, Good News Translation has introduced “here is one of my own kind,” so that it is clear that the woman is the one referred to in the idiom.
Bone of my bones is often taken as an idiomatic expression, as is flesh of my flesh. In this understanding the two expressions form a poetic parallelism in which each says very much the same thing, but the two make the saying emphatic. The two expressions together are equivalent to English “my own flesh and blood,” said of someone related to another by sharing the same ancestors. The expression is “bone and flesh” in Gen 29.14; Judges 9.2; 2 Sam 5.1. However, in this context it is also possible to make good sense of the two expressions by taking them in a literal sense; according to the story the woman was in fact made from the man’s bone and taken out of his flesh. So New English Bible and Revised English Bible have “bone from my bones, flesh from my flesh.”
Translators may take these expressions in either the idiomatic or the literal sense. If they are idiomatic, the sense is something like “She is my very own kind,” “my close relative,” or “just like I am.” Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch says “At last, someone like myself,” and Bible en français courant “Ah, this time here is another me [like] myself….” If the sense is literal it may be expressed as in a translation that says “Her bones were taken out of my bones, and her flesh was taken out of my flesh.”
When the man named the animals, the reader did not learn any of the names. Now, however, the man gives out the name: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. The Revised Standard Version footnote shows that in Hebrew Woman is ʾishshah and man is ʾish. This is a clear play on words, but translators should not think that their similarity in sound and letters means that the word for “woman” is historically derived from the word for “man.” The Good News Translation footnote is correct in calling attention to the similarity in sound in the two words. Something similar exists in the English words “woman” and “man,” which leads Moffatt to translate “This shall be called Wo-man, for from man was she taken.” Taken out translates the same verb root as used in verse 21.
Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. and Fry, Euan McG. A Handbook on Genesis. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1997. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .