Post by stephen on May 12, 2022 12:01:59 GMT -5
THE BIBLE CASE ON ABORTION
“Then God said ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness’.”
I’ve always thought that “in our image” meant having a similar kind of consciousness, having a conscious will.
“And let them have dominion… over all the earth” (Genesis ch1 v26)
This is the reason why the “likeness” of God has been given to men. It fits them for the task of being God’s deputies in the governing of the world.
“And God blessed them, and God said to them ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion…” (v28).
That is, he blessed them by telling them to be fruitful and multiply.
God’s blessing is always about the generation of life. When it seems to refer to wealth, that is only because wealth is being measured in living things, like flocks and crops.
As this verse makes clear, multiplying and filling the earth is a necessary condition for dominion over the earth as God’s deputy in the world. That is why it follows on from the original intention.
“Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh” (Genesis ch2 v24).
Obviously there cannot be children unless man and woman come together, and men cannot fill the earth without having children, and they cannot have dominion over the earth without filling it. That is why marriage is part of God’s plan.
“Lo, sons are a heritage from the Lord… Happy [i.e. “blessed”] is the man who has his quiver full of them” (Psalm 127 v5).
Confirming two lessons;
a ) Children come from God, are a gift from God
b ) Men receive this gift as a blessing.
“When men strive together and hurt a woman with child, so that there is a miscarriage, and yet no harm [to the woman] follows, the one who hurt her shall be fined, according as the woman’s husband shall lay upon him, and he shall pay as the judges determine” (Exodus ch21 v22).
Inasmuch as children are a blessing, the loss of a child, even in the womb, is an injury.
“[Why does not the Lord accept our offerings?] Because the Lord was witness to the covenant between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Has not the one God made and sustained for us the spirit of life? And what does he desire? Godly offspring” (Malachi ch2 vv14-15).
Underlining the point that the purpose of marriage is to give children to God.
To be exact, “godly children”. Almost any act of sexual union between men and women may create children of some kind, but their chances of becoming “godly” are best in the context of a stable marriage. That is the root of Malachi’s objection to divorce.
Over the Old Testament as a whole, God objects to many kinds of sexual behaviour- adultery, divorce, incest, fornication, prostitution, bestiality, lying with another man as with a woman. The common factor, I think you will find, is that all of them get in the way of having godly children. Some of them get in the way of having children at all. And “godly offspring” is what God wants from human life on earth. He gave us the spirit of life for that purpose.
“And you took your sons and daughters whom you had borne to me, and these you sacrificed to [the idols] to be devoured. Were your harlotries so small a matter that you slaughtered my children and delivered them up as a sacrifice by fire to them?” (Ezekiel ch16 vv30-31)
Inasmuch as children come from God in the first place, they remain his children. Therefore the very worst kind of idolatry is the idolatry that lives on the slaughter of children. It makes God very angry.
There is enough evidence here to give a sense of his probable reaction to abortion as a social phenomenon.
And why did the laws have nothing more specific? For exactly the same reason that the Pentateuch contains no legislation about driving articulated lorries at high speed in a residential area. In both cases, nobody was doing it at the time, so the subject did not come up
“Then God said ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness’.”
I’ve always thought that “in our image” meant having a similar kind of consciousness, having a conscious will.
“And let them have dominion… over all the earth” (Genesis ch1 v26)
This is the reason why the “likeness” of God has been given to men. It fits them for the task of being God’s deputies in the governing of the world.
“And God blessed them, and God said to them ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion…” (v28).
That is, he blessed them by telling them to be fruitful and multiply.
God’s blessing is always about the generation of life. When it seems to refer to wealth, that is only because wealth is being measured in living things, like flocks and crops.
As this verse makes clear, multiplying and filling the earth is a necessary condition for dominion over the earth as God’s deputy in the world. That is why it follows on from the original intention.
“Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh” (Genesis ch2 v24).
Obviously there cannot be children unless man and woman come together, and men cannot fill the earth without having children, and they cannot have dominion over the earth without filling it. That is why marriage is part of God’s plan.
“Lo, sons are a heritage from the Lord… Happy [i.e. “blessed”] is the man who has his quiver full of them” (Psalm 127 v5).
Confirming two lessons;
a ) Children come from God, are a gift from God
b ) Men receive this gift as a blessing.
“When men strive together and hurt a woman with child, so that there is a miscarriage, and yet no harm [to the woman] follows, the one who hurt her shall be fined, according as the woman’s husband shall lay upon him, and he shall pay as the judges determine” (Exodus ch21 v22).
Inasmuch as children are a blessing, the loss of a child, even in the womb, is an injury.
“[Why does not the Lord accept our offerings?] Because the Lord was witness to the covenant between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Has not the one God made and sustained for us the spirit of life? And what does he desire? Godly offspring” (Malachi ch2 vv14-15).
Underlining the point that the purpose of marriage is to give children to God.
To be exact, “godly children”. Almost any act of sexual union between men and women may create children of some kind, but their chances of becoming “godly” are best in the context of a stable marriage. That is the root of Malachi’s objection to divorce.
Over the Old Testament as a whole, God objects to many kinds of sexual behaviour- adultery, divorce, incest, fornication, prostitution, bestiality, lying with another man as with a woman. The common factor, I think you will find, is that all of them get in the way of having godly children. Some of them get in the way of having children at all. And “godly offspring” is what God wants from human life on earth. He gave us the spirit of life for that purpose.
“And you took your sons and daughters whom you had borne to me, and these you sacrificed to [the idols] to be devoured. Were your harlotries so small a matter that you slaughtered my children and delivered them up as a sacrifice by fire to them?” (Ezekiel ch16 vv30-31)
Inasmuch as children come from God in the first place, they remain his children. Therefore the very worst kind of idolatry is the idolatry that lives on the slaughter of children. It makes God very angry.
There is enough evidence here to give a sense of his probable reaction to abortion as a social phenomenon.
And why did the laws have nothing more specific? For exactly the same reason that the Pentateuch contains no legislation about driving articulated lorries at high speed in a residential area. In both cases, nobody was doing it at the time, so the subject did not come up