Is Abortion Murder?

The month isn't what I have been arguing about it is the time that a fetus can survive by breathing with our without a ventilator. If medicine wants to require that they try to help a fetus breath at 4 months during an abortion then I see no problems with that and we can move it back to 4 months.

 

Post-it, I didn't realize my question was such a stumblingblock. I have directly asked a question twice and you dance around it. Are you so unsure about your position?

You asked if Jesus would still be the Christ if He had broken bones. Um, can we stay on the subject please?

I want to know if you think Christ was a person while in Mary or if He became a person only when He took His first breath?

I didn't think it was a difficult question.

 

You analysis of some of the prior arguments is in line with the rest of your ability to reason.

My argument from the start has not been what it is, but rather what does scripture say about abortion and when does life really begin? In an attempt to get away from scripture, many of you have brought up secular reasoning. As I have said before, if you wish to decide what is right and wrong outside scripture and in direct opposition to scripture, why don't you do the same with the homosexual issue.

Otherwise, let's find out what scripture says, if you find it supports your side then continue using it to support prolife, if however, it doesn't, I saying to STOP using it to support prolife and create a murder situation with women.

 

post-it said:

You analysis of some of the prior arguments is in line with the rest of your ability to reason.

Thank you, I take that as a compliment.

Otherwise, let's find out what scripture says

The Scripture says, "You shall not murder" (Exod. 20:13).

If a fetus is an unborn human person, an abortionist is a murderer.
If a fetus is not an unborn human person, an abortionist is a plastic surgeon.

Either way, the moral justification for abortion hinges on one, simple question: What is the unborn?

Why won't you just answer that one, simple question?

 

Mary had free choice as God has given us all free choice, she could have aborted Jesus up to the age that he could have taken his first breath and still have been following scripture's acceptable time frame for an abortion. Would God have put Jesus in a mother he knew would abort? I don't think so, but what if he had already? What if some other girl which followed David's line did abort Jesus. That doesn't and wouldn't stop the will of God to have something done.

God could have also made it impossible for Mary to abort. There is just too many possibilities and that is why it is not relevant to this topic. Her's was a special case. It doesn't help or hurt the argument for other women and their choice on the matter.

[ August 26, 2002, 03:39 PM: Message edited by: post-it ]

 

Again, that too, was in line with your ability to reason. Not understanding is an art with some. You've painted a masterpiece.

 

Post-it, can you answer a simple question? I did not ask if Mary had free will or anything like that. I want to know if you believe that God was in her womb? Put another way, did the child become God and a person only when he was outside the womb? So, if Mary had had an abortion, would it have killed Christ or something else? If it was something else, when did that something else become Christ.

These questions are totally relevant. I only see you doing a Mexican hat dance around the questions becuase your position would be shown to be false. You don't want to answer the questions.

BTW, that tidbit about Christ having possibly been aborted before Mary is evident you are lost. You cannot reconcile what you believe with Scripture. You are like the rest of the libs on this board. No logic skills and the silly practice of picking verses from something you don't believe to prove that something is okay to either believe in or do.

Answer the question about Mary if your position is so solid.

 

post-it said:

Not understanding is an art with some.

So, apparently, is not recognizing sarcasm.

I will agree as soon as you provide scripture like the last statement you gave.

Sorry, I have provided my Scripture: Exod. 20:13. This request from you is yet another smokescreen, attempting to divert the issue from the identity of the unborn. What is it?

It doesn't matter what I think it is, it matters what the Bible say is allowed and not allowed in regards to aborting a baby or making sure it lives.

There is no point in determining what "the Bible says allowed and not allowed" to be done to a fetus until you have determined what it is.

If the fetus is an unborn human person, then abortion is forbidden according Exod. 20:13.

If the fetus is not an unborn human person, then abortion is not forbidden.

You just keep wanting humanistic reasons instead of Biblical ones.

How much more Biblical can I get than one of the Ten Commandments? "You shall not murder" (Exod. 20:13).

Stop asking me what I think

I'm not asking you what you think. I am asking you to tell me what the unborn is, so we can determine whether it is OK to kill it or not.

 

Jesus is God, and if you don't believe it, you're going to hell. Abortion is murder, and if you don't believe it, you're going to hell. Homosexuality is sin, if you don't believe it, you're going to hell. Pretty blunt! But, if you don't show the fruits of salvation, you're lost.

 

Whoops you blinked. Your reasoning is now at checkmate because you didn't see the grin I posted. Yes, I saw plainly, I guess you didn't. Checkmate. Lighten up will ya'?

[ August 26, 2002, 04:24 PM: Message edited by: post-it ]

 

I see what you mean about showing your fruits, thanks for showing us...

If you take 5 minutes and open the Bible to the topic at hand you will be taken seriously.

 

post-it said:

Checkmate.

You seem to have missed the substance of my post and decided to make me the issue.

 

Thank You, You finally got it. You have been making this about what "I" think and feel instead of what Scripture says. Your attacks on me through sarcastic summations were about "me" and not what scripture says. Now will you stop with ridiculing me and open your Bible?

 

I would be most interested to hear from some of our clergy on what Numbers 5 is all about and what the different understandings are as held by Theologians. Please help us understand these passages more clearly.

 

post-it said:

You have been making this about what "I" think and feel instead of what Scripture says.

No, I have been making this about the identity of the fetus - about which you have either been totally wrong, or totally silent.

If the fetus is an unborn human person, abortion is murder and forbidden by Exod. 20:13.

If the fetus is not an unborn human person, abortion is not murder and not forbidden by anything.

Your attacks on me through sarcastic summations were about "me" and not what scripture says. Now will you stop with ridiculing me and open your Bible?

I have opened my Bible.

"You shall not murder" (Exod. 20:13).

So - is the fetus a human person - something that can be "murdered" - or isn't it?

Stop filibustering and answer this plain question.

[ August 26, 2002, 04:53 PM: Message edited by: Ransom ]

 

Numbers 5

19 'The priest shall have her take an oath and shall say to the woman, "If no man has lain with you and if you have not gone astray into uncleanness, being under the authority of your husband, be immune to this water of bitterness that brings a curse;
20 if you, however, have gone astray, being under the authority of your husband, and if you have defiled yourself and a man other than your husband has had intercourse with you"
21 (then the priest shall have the woman swear with the oath of the curse, and the priest shall say to the woman), "the LORD make you a curse and an oath among your people by the LORD'S making your thigh waste away and your abdomen swell;
22 and this water that brings a curse shall go into your stomach, and make your abdomen swell and your thigh waste away." And the woman shall say, "Amen. Amen."
23 'The priest shall then write these curses on a scroll, and he shall wash them off into the water of bitterness.
24 'Then he shall make the woman drink the water of bitterness that brings a curse, so that the water which brings a curse will go into her and cause bitterness.
25 'The priest shall take the grain offering of jealousy from the woman's hand, and he shall wave the grain offering before the LORD and bring it to the altar;
26 and the priest shall take a handful of the grain offering as its memorial offering and offer it up in smoke on the altar, and afterward he shall make the woman drink the water.
27 'When he has made her drink the water, then it shall come about, if she has defiled herself and has been unfaithful to her husband, that the water which brings a curse will go into her and cause bitterness, and her abdomen will swell and her thigh will waste away, and the woman will become a curse among her people.
28 'But if the woman has not defiled herself and is clean, she will then be free and conceive children.

Post-it, No where in this passage does it say anything regarding a pregnancy or the loss of a child. This is just an example of my earlier charge. You ignore direct interpretations and applications of scripture in favor of twisting the text to your own liking... or in this case, re-writing scripture to say something it simply does not say.

This text says nothing more than if a guilty woman undergoes this ceremony and is found guilty, she will be marked and left barren. Exodus 21 specifically deals with the child. If an abortion were the intended outcome of Numbers 5, it is reasonable to expect like language to be used.

Your request for someone to "help us understand these passages more clearly" is ridiculous. These verses are not written in code. They say what they say. You demand scripture that explicitly rather than implicitly disproves your position... then you allow yourself to write between the lines.

[ August 26, 2002, 05:32 PM: Message edited by: Scott J ]

 

You have not been reading my posts, I have said that it is murder in some cases and isn't murder in other cases according to scripture.

It doesn't seem you have been reading the scriptures I have quoted, otherwise you would be telling me why they mean something else. Would you please do that for me and tell me what you think they mean? You don't need me to tell you what I think about biology do you? This isn't about humanistic, secular arguments, and what biology or I feels or thinks, it’s about what scripture says.

 

I've answered this before. What else are they going to call it? The question is when does it become a person,</font>[/QUOTE] A child is a person! Have you reached such an extreme that you even dispute the definitions of words?!!! A child is, by definition, a person. I challenge you to find a definition anywhere that says that a child isn't a person in this context whether it is moments after conception or moments before death. If it is said she is "with child" then it follows that the "child" is in fact a person.

Wonderful admission on your part. And since it can be shown that Mary was "with child" at the moment she conceived. It logically follows that she was pregnant with a "person."

Why? Because if you don't dismiss these facts, they destroy your predetermined conclusion?
Since the Bible does not have a verse saying "Thou shalt not have an abortion", two things come into play. One is the biblical definition of murder and the other is the biblical recognition and definition of the unborn. I think we agree on the definition for murder. The Bible does not make a distinction between women at various stages of pregnancy. They are all said to be "with child." The same word, "child", defines all unborn as "persons."

Nowhere does scripture say that God accepts or commands anyone to perform abortion. This argument is meaningless.

Trouble is... you are not defending the Bible but your point of view... the Bible is not pro-abortion in its stand- to the contrary, you have been shown this error and persist in believing it... the Bible NEVER sanctions the murder of children- for you to put these words in the mouth of God is the worst form of blasphemy.

See my other response.

 

OK. Let's see how each of these verses helps define a living human being.

Adam was unique in all of creation. He was formed out of dead materials into a full grown man then brought to life by God. His creation has nothing to say of conception, birth, or death.

Can be read as two different things "life" vs. "breath".

In addition and of more certain relevance, this passage deals with his potential death- not his conception nor even his birth. In other words, just because the lack of breath will extinguish his life it does not necessarily follow that breath gave him life.

It cannot be used to prove anything about an unborn child since it is neither directly nor indirectly related to an unborn child.

This not only has nothing to do with an unborn child- it has nothing to do with physical life.

Again, you are ripping scripture from its context. This passage deals with death not conception or birth.

You are really stretching this aren't you? This isn't saying that a man's life is literally a breath but is the length (figuratively) of a breath... a short period of time.

Dealing with death again- not relevant by any stretch of reasoning to defining when life begins. We can agree that life ends when breathing stops but that still doesn't define the beginning.

This has nothing at all to do with life, death, unborns, birth, etc. It is simply irrelevant to the topic of when life begins.

Deals with man's vulnerability. Has nothing to do with abortion or the beginning of life.

Another unique situation. Resurrection is an entirely different process from conception and birth. These will be fully grown men that were dead (life systems not functioning) who will be brought back to life. In this sense, it indirectly disproves your position since a functioning body is equivalent to life and personhood.

Deals with death again. Does not apply to abortion or birth.

Symbolic for the length of life again. Contributes nothing to your argument.

Death, once again.

To meet your own bar for proof, you need to come up with a proof text that says "In your mother's womb, I knew you not; for you were no person but when you took the breath of life, I knew you."

However the really devastating thing for your position is that there is no text that denies personhood to the newly conceived unborn and numerous that imply it.