Help-Meet

In the history of English Bibles, John Wycliffe's version (1380's) describes Eve as Adam's "helpere" (helper); but moving forward through history, the 1560 Geneva Bible says that "The man therefore gaue names vnto all cattel, and to the foule of the heauen, and to euerie beaft of the field: but for Adam founde he not an helpe meete for him" (Gen. 2.20). "Helpe" means "aid" and "meete" clearly means "suitable" or "fit." This describes the woman in relation to man as God designed them.

The phrase "help-meet" is one that Christians sometimes use today to describe a wife -- the terminology of "help meet" (two words, lacking the following "for him") is common in Puritan literature, for example -- and came into common parlance in the 19th century (Wordsworth and Tennyson employed "helpmeet"). However, as a single hypenated word, "help-meet" has its origins in a play published by poet and playwright John Dryden in 1673: Marriage a la Mode. In Act 4, Scene 1, the character Rhodophil has this to say of his wife Doralice: "[W]ell, if ever woman was a help-meet for man, my Spouse is so...". The phrase took another turn in 1715 when Myles Davies (Athenae Britannicae) referred to "Helpmates". Soon after (1722), Daniel Defoe helped to define "helpmate" as a term equally applicable to husband or wife: "A woman is to be a helpmate, and a man is to be the same" (Religious Courtship). These words elicit scorn from some, but are memorable for succinctly encapsulating the nature of marriage. Dryden's turn of the phrase made for a special word in the English language. But Milton, a few years before (Paradise Lost, VIII, 449-451, 1667), said it so well too, as only a brilliant poet can:

What next I bring shall please thee, be assured,
Thy likeness, thy fit help, thy other self,
Thy wish exactly to thy heart's desire.