Rib or side, right or left and the traits of women: Midrashic dilemmas about the creation of Eve in medieval Islamic tradition and literature

The creation of Eve from Adam's body is a theme that has been extensively discussed in scholarship, as part of research into ancient Jewish and Christian sources, within the framework of studies on Islam and Arabic, or in other contexts (see various references throughout this paper below). Here we would like to examine this subject from a slightly different perspective, in the hope of making a modest contribution concerning early non-Muslim reflections and ideas on this narrative which may have provided the background for the emergence of some Muslim traditions on the subject, some of which have as yet, in our opinion, not received the scholarly attention they deserve.