The Bible says nothing specific about abortion, the “sanctity” of human life, or when life begins. The Ten Commandments does say “you shall not kill” (Exodus 20:13; Deuteronomy 5:17), which Bible scholars interpret as “you shall not kill unjustifiably.” Exceptions to this command are: to punish a murderer, participation in holy war or general war, and self-defense. Thus killing is permitted if the community finds it “justifiable.” With respect to the “sanctity” of human life, the situation depicted in Hebrew Bible/Old Testament is surprising. God authorizes the killing of Job’s entire family to satisfy a back room bargain with Satan (Job 1:12). God himself kills the two brothers Er and Onan for different reasons (Genesis 38:7-10). God was responsible for the deaths of Moses’ opposition, Korah, Dathan, Abiram, and their entire households (Numbers 16:1-35). The prophet Samuel told Saul that God had authorized the slaughter of the entire nation of the Amalekites—including even infants and nursing babies (1 Sam 15:2-3). The prophet Elijah slaughtered 400 prophets of Baal on Mt Carmel (1 Kings 18:40-41). So much for the Bible’s position on the sanctity of life!

       Anti-Abortionists cite certain texts from the Bible to argue against abortion, but none are specifically on the topic of abortion. For example, they make inferences from texts tangentially related to the issue and argue that the Bible’s use of the term child, son, or daughter for an unborn fetus means that the fetus has the same standing as a child living independently of the mother’s womb. A text that says the opposite, however, regards harm to a living person as greater than harm to a fetus. In Exodus 21:22-25 a pregnant woman is caused to miscarry. The man causing the miscarriage must pay a fine, but if the woman subsequently dies the killer must pay “life for life” (Exodus 21:23). A fine is paid for the death of the miscarried fetus to compensate the father for the potential economic worth of the child, but the mother’s death requires the killer’s death! Another argument asserts that when God is described as “knowing an individual before birth” it means that the Bible regards the fetus as a person. Such language, however, is a poetic way of affirming the omniscience of God. For example, Jeremiah 1:4-5 asserts that God knew Jeremiah’s future before he was in the womb. The writer could equally well have said God knew me “when I was but a gleam in my father’s eye,” as is suggested by the Psalmist’s statement “The Lord knows the thoughts of man” (94:11; see also 1 Chronicles 28:9; Psalm 44:21). Prohibitions against committing murder exist in the New Testament (Matt 19:18; 1 Pet 4:15; Rev 21:8, 22:15), and one text even asserts that murderers are denied eternal life (1 John 3:15), but nothing on abortion or describing abortionists as murderers.

       On the other hand, the Didache, an early non-biblical Christian writing dating anywhere from 50 to 150 C. E., reads “you shall not kill a child by abortion/miscarriage; you shall not kill an infant” (2:2). The same writer also argues for a clearly immoral idea: “slaves be subject to your master, as to God’s representative, in reverence and fear” (4:11). The trick in using an ancient text to support modern ethical arguments is to quote briefly and hope no one will discover how generally inappropriate the text is for a modern situation.

       In our world moral decisions are often complex—not clearly black and white, but a murky shade of gray. Actions often seeming immoral may still be the “better” choice. For example, a German Lutheran minister, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, participated in a plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler. Although he believed murder was immoral, the horrible situation in Germany under the Nazi regime overrode his commitment to pacifism and non violence, and brought him finally to the murder plot. He reasoned that the guilt accruing to him for murder would be less than his guilt for doing nothing. As he saw it, he had to choose between the “better” of two evils. It wasn’t the right choice, but it wasn’t the wrong choice either. Decisions about unplanned pregnancies are not infrequently like Bonhoeffer’s choice, a very dirty shade of gray—however much anti-abortionists try to convince us that the choice is always black and white. For people of conscience, however, legal actions are not always moral, nor are illegal actions always immoral. It depends on the situation.

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

Posted by Charles Hedrick at 3:06pm
 

Charlie: Thanks for initiating a stimulating discussion.

I suggest that the passages you mention in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament should be seen in the context of a theology that places life at the center. In Genesis, starting with the creation account, God is shown creating the heavens and the earth for the purpose of bringing life into existence, culminating in human life. And that account concludes by underlining the specialness of animate life when it states that vegetation (not the flesh of animals) is given for food, for both humans and animals (1.1-30). Later, that is modified, and humans are given permission to eat other animals. But even then, they are forbidden to eat the blood, because that is what carries life (Genesis 9.3-4). At the same time they are told not to kill other humans (on pain of death—Genesis 9.5-6), except to punish a killer. And in Exodus, the Hebrews are told that the ancient practice of sacrificing every first-born should no longer be followed in the case of their children—they must be redeemed, presumably by the substitution of a sheep (Exodus 13.11-16; 34.19-20; see also Genesis 22.1-19). Does this add up to “the sanctity of life”? I’m not sure about the language. But it does say that life is very important to God, in the view of the writers/editors of the Genesis and Exodus, and that God’s concern about life extends to newborn children.

But what about before birth? There, the account you mention from Exodus, about the woman who miscarries because of an inadvertent injury by another person, helps (21.22). The death of the fetus is not treated like a crime against God. The fetus is treated as something that is potential life, but not full life. It could have become a child, but was not allowed to. And the penalty, therefore, is not a divinely prescribed one for the death of a person, but monetary—presumably because fetal death deprives the family of a future child (whether the economic value of the child was the issue, as Victor Matthews argues, is not clear from the text). This suggests that it is only when a fetus emerges fully formed from the womb that it would be considered a human being and therefore a person, whose killing could be thought of as murder or manslaughter (since it was done accidentally, as in the Exodus case —see Exodus 21.13).

But the Exodus example doesn’t say anything about intentional abortion, any more than the rest of the Bible does. The central importance of life would seem to stand in the way of casual or unconsidered abortion. But beyond that is the large gray area you mention where there are competing life issues to be wrestled with, as when a woman’s life is in danger from a continued pregnancy.

Doug Parrott, Professor Emeriitus,
Department of Religious Studies
University of California, Riverside
Posted by Douglas Parrott on 11/12/2008 at 4:34pm