Inerrancy of scripture and evolution

People keep bringing it up for the same reason that the vast majority of Bible translations use “formed” rather than “had formed”. The whole arc of the Genesis 2:18-25 passage is one of unfolding consecutive action:

  1. God announces his plan to make a suitable helper for the man.
  2. God forms the animals.
  3. God brings them before the man.
  4. The man names them, but when all is said and done, no suitable helper is yet found.
  5. So as the dramatic climax to all this, God creates the woman.
  6. And man exults.

If step 2 was “had formed” the whole flow is interrupted for little point or purpose; the singular mounting drama of creative action, first announced in step 1, is suddenly interrupted with a non-creative, barely-related sideshow from steps 2 - 4, and not really resumed until step 5. There is no reason to translate the narrative this way except over-concern with the preceding chapter - a chapter that in many other stylistic markers diverges from this chapter, so that there already are many other warning flags that the two chapters are not to be read as a fluid union.

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