And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up its place with flesh;
All Commentaries on Genesis 2:21 Go To Genesis 2
Augustine of Hippo
AD 430
Hence we are justified in concluding that the ecstasy in which Adam was caught up when God cast him into a sleep was given to him so that his mind in that state might participate with the host of angels and, entering into the sanctuary of God, understand what was finally to come. When he awoke, he was like one filled with the spirit of prophecy, and seeing his wife brought before him, he immediately opened his mouth and proclaimed the great mystery that St. Paul teaches: “This now is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she has been taken out of man. And for this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall be the two in one flesh.” These were the words of the first man according to the testimony of Scripture, but in the Gospel our Lord declared that God spoke them. For he says, “Have you not read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh’ ”? From this we should understand, therefore, that because of the ecstasy that Adam had just experienced he was able to say this as a prophet under divine guidance. .
