What Does the Bible Say About…Abortion?

“For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there were none of them.” (Psalm 139:13-16; ESV)

No topic has divided America as deeply as the topic of abortion.  Advocates on both sides of the issue use this as a “litmus test” for advancing their own political agenda.  Abortion clinics are routinely picketed by pro-life advocates who demonstrate against the issue of abortion.  I personally have witnessed pro-choice activists in action.  Several years ago I was privileged to attend a Promise Keepers event in Indianapolis, Indiana.  When we arrived at the arena, we witnessed all sorts of protesters; including pro-choice advocates who claimed we wanted to take away a woman’s right to choose.  It was kind of surreal for me.

Before we see what the Bible has to say on this controversial subject, let’s attempt to frame the debate as it currently stands.  In 1973 the Supreme Court of the United States decided (in a 7-2 decision) that women had the right to choose whether or not to have an abortion.  That decision (Roe v. Wade) stands as a landmark case in Supreme Court history.  Women no longer had to endure illegal procedures performed in unsanitary conditions to deal with unwanted pregnancies.  The decision was based on a right to privacy that was derived from the 14th amendment of the United States Constitution.  Many attempts in the past 30+ years have been made to appeal or limit the reach of Roe v. Wade, but most all of those attempts have failed.  On the surface it seems like a huge victory in women’s rights.

For the most part the debate hinged on the emotional aspect of abortion.  Those who support a women’s right to choose often employ extreme examples of why abortion should be kept legal and try to make those extremes seem like the norm.  For example, they will often cite the scared teenage girl who gets pregnant and is afraid to confront her parents.  They will also argue that this pregnant teenage girl’s life will be drastically altered.  Instead of being able to pursue all that life has to offer, she will be forced to raise a child, probably alone, with little or no support.  Her life, which seemed so full of potential, is now irrevocably changed.  Other examples often cited are victims of incest or rape.  Why should a woman be forced to raise a child she didn’t plan and never wanted?  The final example they trot out is the case where the mother’s life is in danger should she continue to deliver her child.

On the face of it, these arguments are very strong.  It’s very difficult to argue against extreme emotion—it’s like swimming against the current.  Yet emotional arguments, when examined more closely, often don’t have an objective view of the situation.  The first thing to consider is whether the examples pro-abortion advocates advance are extremes or the norm.  Over the past 30+ years that abortion has been legal it has been estimated that almost 50 million abortions have been performed; an average of almost 1½ million a year.  That’s an astounding number, and I find it very difficult to believe that each year there are over a million girls who are pregnant because of rape or incest.  In fact according to a 2004 survey only 7% of women cited these “hard cases” as the reason they were seeking an abortion (according to the National Right to Life website).  Here’s another astounding statistic:  Nearly half of all abortions are obtained by women who have had at least one abortion already.  What you have in reality is abortion as another form of birth control.  It’s yet another way to have sex outside of marriage without the consequences of unwanted children.  Women now have the freedom to have sex whenever and with whomever they want and damn the consequences.  If all other forms of birth control fail, they can always have an abortion.

Recently the debate has moved away from the emotional into the logical.  The argument now is based on when life truly begins.  Pro-abortion advocates typically argue that before a certain time (usually before the second trimester of pregnancy, though some will argue before the third trimester) the fetus is not a human being, and therefore not protected by our laws.  Up until that moment of time, aborting a fetus is no different than removing a tumor—the fetus is just an unviable mass of tissue.  Another argument they advance is that abortions are OK up until the point the fetus is viable (able to survive outside the mother’s womb).  They say as long as the fetus is inside the womb and dependent on the mother for survival, it is OK to abort it.  This has led to the ghastly procedure called partial-birth abortion (or late term abortion).  In this procedure the fetus is partially delivered except for the head.  Then a needle is inserted into the base of the fetus’ skull and its brain is sucked out, thereby rendering it dead.

The pro-life side argues that life begins at the moment of conception.  At the moment of fertilization, the fetus has all of the genetic material that is needed for a human life to develop—all it needs is a safe environment to gestate for approximately nine months.  All of the arguments regarding what determine the beginning of a human life is irrelevant because the pro-life side doesn’t argue for a discreet point in time where one nanosecond prior the fetus is a blob and one nanosecond after the fetus is human.  The moment a fetus comes into existence (i.e., when an ovum is fertilized by a sperm cell) it is a living developing human being.

Furthermore, the argument regarding location—inside the womb or outside the womb—is equally irrelevant.  Why does it matter where the fetus is?  What is the difference between a fetus hours before delivery and a baby hours after delivery?  The answer to these questions are “it doesn’t” and “none.”  A mother who aborts her child in the final trimester is acting on her constitutionally protecting rights to do so, but a mother who kills her newborn infant is guilty of murder.  Does anybody sense an inconsistency here?

Let’s move on to what the Bible has to say on this subject.  Some pro-choice advocates will jump on the fact that the Bible doesn’t explicitly say anything about abortion.  But then the Bible doesn’t say anything explicitly on the topic of internet pornography either.  That doesn’t mean we can’t glean some Biblical principles regarding abortion.  First of all, the Bible is clear that human beings are created in the “image of God” (Genesis 1:26).  What that means is we’re all created with a rational component that the rest of creation lacks.  Human beings have mind, emotion and will.  We’re self-aware and able to communicate rationally.  We’re able to override our baser instincts and act volitionally—i.e., we’re not mindless animals who act purely out of instinct.  What it also means it that we’re created with purpose.  Contrary to the popular (and false) opinion that human beings are the latest in the endless chain of chance evolution, we are created by God in his image and with purpose; and that purpose is to glorify him (1 Corinthians 10:31).

Secondly, the Bible has strict prohibitions against murder precisely because we’re all created in the image of God.  The prohibition for murder was first expressed to Noah after the flood (Genesis 9:6) and later codified in the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:13).  Whenever a person takes it upon themselves to extinguish the life of another, what they have done in essence is to extinguish the image of God in that person.  The only just punishment in that case is life for life.  That’s how seriously God values life that the ultimate penalty is paid for the taking of a life.

Thirdly, the Bible indicates that life begins the moment of conception.  There are many places in Scripture to go for this, but the best place is Psalm 139.  In this psalm, David is describing God’s intimate knowledge of him.  In vv. 13-18, we see that God was intimately involved in David’s development in the womb.  This isn’t something that God only did for David, but something he does for all of us.  We are God’s handiwork, and he took care of every detail from the moment of conception.  The question becomes would God show that much concern over an unviable mass of tissue?  The point of Psalm 139 is to show that the image of God in all of us isn’t something that is conferred to us at birth, but something imbued from the moment of conception.

Finally, let’s consider how the Jewish law treated unborn babies.  In Exodus 21:22-24 we find this passage:  “When men strive together and hit a pregnant woman, so that her children come out, but there is no harm, the one who hit her shall surely be fined, as the woman’s husband shall impose on him, and he shall pay as the judges determine. But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.”  Here we see that the death penalty was imposed on someone who injured a pregnant woman to the point that she had a miscarriage.  To call for the death penalty in the case of a death of an unborn child implies that the unborn child has the same worth as any other person.  That is why the pro-abortion crowd was in an uproar when congress passed the Unborn Victims of Violence Act of 2004.  The wording of this law is very similar to the wording of this passage.

Bottom Line: What we see in the world now is the current dominance of the evolutionary worldview.  That worldview says we’re all the result of random chance forces.  We’re all cosmic accidents, and as such we have no inherent worth or value.  If that is true, then what does it really matter if we kill one another?  We try to derive meaning in a world that is ultimately meaningless.  Only in this current cultural climate can we tolerate the wholesale murder of millions of unborn babies each year—all for the cause of granting woman their sexual freedom.

Against this cultural current is the Bible.  The Bible says we are created by God in his image.  The Bible says that we have inherent worth and value.  The Bible places the ultimate penalty on the taking of a human life because of this inherent worth and value.  And the Bible applies this inherent worth and value to unborn children in the womb.  Though the Bible doesn’t explicitly say “Thou shalt not abort an unborn child,” it is clear that the Bible views the aborting of a fetus as the taking of a human life; which is a sin.

Norma McCorvey, the woman who was “Jane Roe” in the Roe v. Wade abortion case, became a Christian a few years back.  The woman who was the poster child for the pro-abortion movement now has a great burden in her heart for women who are going through “crisis” pregnancies.  She has now dedicated her life to fight against the very thing that made her famous.  Ironically, she never had an abortion.