What the Christian Bible actually has to say about abortion...

[Bob Michaels]

There isn't one word in the bible pertaining to the sinfulness of abortion...including the word "abortion."

But rather than equating the practice with murder or mortal sin..."Numbers 5:11-22" appear to condone inducing a miscarriage in the case of an "unfaithful" wife"...and while these scriptural passages don't universally endorse the practice...they certainly don't help the Pro-Life assertion that it is against the law of god...

Numbers 5:11-22 NIV - The Test for an Unfaithful Wife - Then - Bible Gateway

In fact, the Bible places no value on fetuses at all...or even infants...less than one month old...

"And if it be from a month old even unto five years old, then thy estimation shall be of the male five shekels of silver, and for the female, thy estimation shall be three shekels of silver." -- Leviticus 27:6

BTW...one can't help but notice the glaring misogyny contained in the above scriptural passage...

In addition, fetuses...and infants less than one month old are not considered persons.

"Number the children of Levi after the house of their fathers, by their families: every male from a month old and upward shalt thou number them. And Moses numbered them according to the word of the LORD." -- Numbers 3:15-16

But the Bible does actually state when a human being's life begins. Genesis 2:7 is clearest.

The first human became a “living being” (nefesh hayah, “a living breath”) when God blew into its nostrils and it started to breathe.

Human life begins at birth, according to the authors of the Bible themselves... 

[Bonaventura]

Think twice:

"im mutterleib" | English Standard Version :: BibleServer

[wildcat1000]

No, it does not deal with the issue of abortion directly. However, indirectly it certainly does deal with it.

"For behold, when the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby leaped in my womb for joy. (Lk. 1:44 NAS)

Please notice that it is referred to as a "baby" and it speaks of it being able to experience joy. Only human beings can experience joy. No, you can't ascribe joy to other animals that behave in a way that we "interpret" as being the result of joy. To claim that they experience the same sensations we do when we experience joy is simply a claim of being able to read animal minds. That kind of claim is plain delusional.

So, the bible does not call a baby in the womb anything other than a baby. Oddly enough...so do expecting mothers that actually want their baby. That's why they say such things as "My baby kicked". We all know that the baby has full humanity and is worthy of our protection and we have to work very hard to destroy the truth in our own minds and support abortion.

[good4usoul@gmail.com]

It's dealt with, euphemistically, in Exodus 21:22.  Ideally, now we don't have to go to the trouble of claiming "Oh...  We were fighting and we accidentally hit this pregnant woman in the stomach, and the baby ended up stillborn."  

[Bonaventura]

Very interesting. And it seems that there are also situations discribed of mothers in distress as very young women or very old women getting a baby. Although they face poor circumstances they faithful accept their babies as a gift by God. If I am not completely wrong that is the reason why we also give presents on Christmas. And the Bible does not reflect the situation of a women in distress only but also the point of view of a father in a difficult situation.

[LL LL]

On Nov 26, 2021, at 7:01 AM, Bonaventura <christoph...@gmail.com> wrote:

Very interesting. And it seems that there are also situations discribed of mothers in distress as very young women or very old women getting a baby. Although they face poor circumstances they faithful accept their babies as a gift by God. If I am not completely wrong that is the reason why we also give presents on Christmas. And the Bible does not reflect the situation of a women in distress only but also the point of view of a father in a difficult situation.

I read a good line lately. People who are against abortion should just ignore it, the same way they ignore kids in foster care. (And, I would add,  the 3.1 million kids under 5  who die of malnutrition every year worldwide and the countless ones trafficked for sex and the ones  abused by their parents and caretakers.)

wildcat1000 schrieb am Donnerstag, 23. September 2021 um 03:06:59 UTC+2:

No, it does not deal with the issue of abortion directly. However, indirectly it certainly does deal with it.

"For behold, when the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby leaped in my womb for joy. (Lk. 1:44 NAS)

Please notice that it is referred to as a "baby" and it speaks of it being able to experience joy. Only human beings can experience joy. No, you can't ascribe joy to other animals that behave in a way that we "interpret" as being the result of joy. To claim that they experience the same sensations we do when we experience joy is simply a claim of being able to read animal minds. That kind of claim is plain delusional.

So, the bible does not call a baby in the womb anything other than a baby. Oddly enough...so do expecting mothers that actually want their baby. That's why they say such things as "My baby kicked". We all know that the baby has full humanity and is worthy of our protection and we have to work very hard to destroy the truth in our own minds and support abortion.

On Saturday, April 24, 2021 at 2:49:17 AM UTC-4 Bob Michaels wrote:

There isn't one word in the bible pertaining to the sinfulness of abortion...including the word "abortion."

But rather than equating the practice with murder or mortal sin..."Numbers 5:11-22" appear to condone inducing a miscarriage in the case of an "unfaithful" wife"...and while these scriptural passages don't universally endorse the practice...they certainly don't help the Pro-Life assertion that it is against the law of god...

Numbers 5:11-22 NIV - The Test for an Unfaithful Wife - Then - Bible Gateway

In fact, the Bible places no value on fetuses at all...or even infants...less than one month old...

"And if it be from a month old even unto five years old, then thy estimation shall be of the male five shekels of silver, and for the female, thy estimation shall be three shekels of silver." -- Leviticus 27:6

BTW...one can't help but notice the glaring misogyny contained in the above scriptural passage...

In addition, fetuses...and infants less than one month old are not considered persons.

"Number the children of Levi after the house of their fathers, by their families: every male from a month old and upward shalt thou number them. And Moses numbered them according to the word of the LORD." -- Numbers 3:15-16

But the Bible does actually state when a human being's life begins. Genesis 2:7 is clearest.

The first human became a “living being” (nefesh hayah, “a living breath”) when God blew into its nostrils and it started to breathe.

Human life begins at birth, according to the authors of the Bible themselves... 

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[good4usoul@gmail.com]

Wow, I caught the euphamistic reference in in Exodus 21:22, but somehow had missed the gigantic literal full chapter of Numbers 5, devoted explicitly to the topic of abortion. 

That helps me with another question I'd been wondering:  I think Isaiah 8:1 and Luke 1:63  might be examples of husbands who opted in to Numbers 5:23, but opted out of Numbers 5:24.

[thea]

I see a lot of bones here, and would like to add some 70 years of knowledge to them, by adding flesh.   You see the man gives the soul to a child, because the sperm moves of it's own volition according to St Thomas Aquinas in The Summa Theological  And then when this lump of flesh is born, after being a parasite in a woman's body for nine months (women died in child birth because of feeding a child when they did not have the nutrition that they needed to survive), God gives it a breath of life, when the doctor holds the child up by its heals and slaps its behind.  Then this child becomes a Living Soul.  Totally free to be alive in the name of Jesus.  John 3:17 says that there is no condemnation, just that Jesus came to save and take us to His abode for eternity.   The reason a child is not counted for a month, is because with natural child birth which in 1st century was the normal.  A woman was considered unclean because she had an issue of blood for 3 to 4 weeks after natural child birth.  When she was finished with this, she could go to the Temple and register her child, and have a sacrifice of a turtle dove for herself. In other words there were reasons which we do not celebrate today because we do not have blood sacrifices on an altar for the remission of our sins.