What Does The Bible Say About Elective Abortion?

[Miles]

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I ask because I can't find a darn thing. And if it isn't addressed in the Bible how important can it be?

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[Tcg]

[Replying to Miles in post #1]

After a bit of cursory research I found that Assyrian law addressed it in 1075 BCE. An Egyptian papyrus mentioned it as early as 1550 BCE. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_abortion

Before I read this I was going to state that the Bible doesn't mention it because humans hadn't yet developed the technology to perform abortions. Obviously I was wrong and I too have found no mention of it in the Bible.


Tcg

[Difflugia]

I ask because I can't find a darn thing.

Depending on how one reads Numbers 5:11-31, Yahweh is potentially fine with aborting the children of adulterous unions. In a combination of divination and trial by ordeal, a man that thinks his wife might be cheating on him can make his wife drink water mixed with dirt from the tabernacle (remember that the altar on which animals are slaughtered, bled, and burnt is just on the other side of the tent flap and this would be the equivalent of dirt from a barn floor). If the "curse goes into her bowels" and her "thigh falls away," then that's the sign from Yahweh that she was unfaithful as well as her punishment for having been so. Since this is TD&D and the way the text is worded leaves no room for either false positives or negatives in Yahweh's divine judgement, we can be assured that her "thigh" would "fall away" even if she were pregnant of the liason. I can't imagine a scenario in which that would occur, but the innocent, unborn child would survive to be born.

[1213]

I ask because I can't find a darn thing. And if it isn't addressed in the Bible how important can it be?

Bible tells that we should love others and do good, what we would want to be done to us. By that, if you don’t want to be aborted against your will, don’t abort anyone else against their will.

[PinSeeker]

Commandment number six (Exodus 20:13, Deuteronomy 5:17) covers any and all types of murder of people of any age. Just four short words are sufficient: "You shall not murder."

Grace and peace to all.

[Miles]

I ask because I can't find a darn thing. And if it isn't addressed in the Bible how important can it be?

Bible tells that we should love others and do good, what we would want to be done to us. By that, if you don’t want to be aborted against your will, don’t abort anyone else against their will.

"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" is obviously a poor maxim when on considers some of the wants of others. Should I whip others because I'm a masochist who likes to be whipped? Of course not. So a far more reasonable maxim would be "Do unto others as they would have you do unto them."

The Golden Rule is nothing but a fools-golden rule. Jesus (Matthew 7:12), among other folk, simply got it wrong.


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[Miles]

Commandment number seven (Exodus 20:13, Deuteronomy 5:17) covers any and all types of murder of people of any age.

That's alright because in the USA, at least, abortion is not considered murder. And who determined that an embryo or fetus is people (a person)? The word certainly doesn't fit the definition.

"Person
A person (plural people or persons) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of property, or legal responsibility."
Source: Wikipedia

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[2timothy316]

“If men should struggle with each other and they hurt a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely but no fatality results, the offender must pay the damages imposed on him by the husband of the woman; and he must pay it through the judges. But if a fatality does occur, then you must give life for life.”—Exodus 21:22, 23.

If the penalty is for death for a careless person that accidentally kills an unborn child, I don't see why a person that intentionally kills an unborn child would get a pass.

[Difflugia]

Commandment number six (Exodus 20:13, Deuteronomy 5:17) covers any and all types of murder of people of any age. Just four short words are sufficient: "You shall not murder."

Grace and peace to all.

Since there are many circumstances under which homicide is sanctioned in the Bible, citing a generic commandment against murder (prohibited homicide) to claim that an abortion is a murder is an invalid argument. It also just looks like you're trying to sidestep what the OP was asking.

[nobspeople]

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I ask because I can't find a darn thing. And if it isn't addressed in the Bible how important can it be?

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Personally, I don't much care what it does or doesn't say. People need to listen to science and themselves, not long dead men, from a time when people thought people were made from mud and important dead ones rose from the dead.