Thinking Out Loud with Alan Shlemon - Is Abortion before Implantation Biblically Permissible?

Episode Date: January 27, 2020

While speaking on embryonic stem cell research at a church recently, Alan was challenged by an attendee. She made an argument that, based on Leviticus 17:11, killing a developing human being before implantation could be morally permissible. Alan responds to this question in today’s episode. Download the mp3...

I recently spoke at a church on the topic of embryonic stem cell research. And there was a person in the audience who challenged me and gave me a biblical defense for killing the early human embryo. Okay, this is during the Q&A. And this particular attendee cited Leviticus 17.11, which she said, says this, quote, for the life of the creature is in the blood, end quote. And so what she did was she argued that shortly after conception, the developing human embryo is still traveling down the fallopian tube and has not yet implanted in the uterus inside the woman's womb. And so prior to implantation, she said, there's no blood,

right? And without blood, there's no life as Leviticus 17, 11 suggests. Therefore, she was arguing that killing the human embryo before implantation should not be described as killing a human life. So therefore, of course, abortion, she would argue, would be or taking the life of the human embryo at that point would be morally permissible. Now, since January 22nd is the 47th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, which was the landmark Supreme Court decision that made abortion the law of the land of the United States, I thought it'd be appropriate to address this particular claim that challenges a component of the pro-life position. Now, there are several ways to respond to this particular challenge. First, you could challenge the facts of the claim, or another approach would be to accept the claim and then follow it to its logical and possibly absurd conclusion. And so let me first begin by the first way to address this challenge is by challenging the

facts. So first of all, scientifically speaking, an individual human life begins at conception. It does not begin at implantation. And this is a biological maxim. In fact, it's even the opinion of most scientists. There was a recent survey of biology professors at over 1,000 institutions around the world. And it revealed the following result. 5,337 biologists, which accounted for, by the way, 96% of all biologists that were surveyed. So 5,337 biologists affirmed that human life begins at conception. Only 4% rejected that view. And so therefore, the claim that the pre-implanted human embryo is not a living human being goes against common scientific understanding. Second of all, the human embryo before it implants is identical to the

human embryo after it implants. And so there different DNA than the post-implanted embryo. Rather, both of them are the same kind of organism with the same DNA. means if it's permissible to kill the human embryo before implantation, then there'd be no morally significant reason why we shouldn't be able to kill it after implantation. And so those are two scientific considerations. And as I mentioned, what they do is they are challenging the facts of the claim. But as it turns out, as I mentioned before, you can also respond to this particular challenge by employing a tactic that we teach at Stand to Reason. And that tactic is called taking the roof off. In Latin, it's known as reductio ad absurdum, or not just in Latin, but if you were to take a logic or a philosophy class, they'd refer to it as reductio ad absurdum. reductio ad absurdum. Now, this particular approach begins by accepting the claim as true,

and then asking, okay, what logically follows from that claim? And if their claim leads to a ridiculous outcome, then we can reject the rationale. And as you'll see, there are at least three absurd consequences to their view. In other words, there's three absurd things that result if you accept their claim as legitimate. So let's begin with the first one. First of all, it assumes it's true that Leviticus teaches that humans are alive only when they have blood in them. And it turns out that there's no blood in the human embryo even immediately after implantation. In other words, according to the rationale that a human is alive only when he or she has blood inside them, that would mean even the implanted embryo isn't alive. You see, it isn't until day 21 or two weeks after fertilization that red blood cells form and a heart begins to pump blood.

And so, in this view, not only would killing the pre-implanted human embryo be permissible, but it would also be also killing the human embryo after implantation because, again, there's no blood at that point. And indeed, killing the human embryo during the first three weeks of gestation would also be permissible because, again, there's no blood even in the human for three weeks or so of gestation. So that's one absurdity. Here's a second one. If life is in the blood, then some animals that don't contain blood are not alive. For example, jellyfish.

They lack a brain, they lack lungs, they lack a heart, and they lack blood. But jellyfish are clearly alive. Insects, amoebas, and many other animals that don't have blood are also living. Well, how does this understanding of Leviticus 17.11 make sense of living creatures that don't have blood? Well, it can't, because again, something's wrong with this presumption that that's what Leviticus 17 is teaching. Now, a third absurdity is that if life is in the blood, then anything with blood should be living. For example, a fresh human corpse would technically still be alive, right? After all, immediately after death, a dead body still contains living red blood cells. Granted, they'll only be alive for a limited time, of course. But surely we wouldn't say it's possible to kill a human corpse simply because it has blood in it. That would be, of course, absurd. And so those are three absurdities that when you accept the claims as true result. And so again, this is a way to show that this kind

of understanding, this kind of argument is mistaken. And so now at this point, it becomes reasonable to wonder, well, then what does the Leviticus passage actually mean if it doesn't mean what was suggested by the attendee of the event? And that's a fair question. But let me first offer a thought. Even if we don't know the correct interpretation of Leviticus 17.11, that doesn't mean we can't be confident of the incorrect interpretation. Surely the passage can't mean that only humans with blood are living human beings who deserve protection because of the absurdities that arise given that understanding of Leviticus 17. Now, reading the passage in context, which would be at least Leviticus 17 verses 10 through 12, if you read it in context, this gives us a clue as to the meaning of the words in verse 11.

You see, God tells Moses, meaning of the words in verse 11. You see, God tells Moses, I will set my face against any Israelite or any foreigner residing among them who eats blood, end quote. And so the principle here is don't eat blood. Why? Well, God explains his rationale in the very next verse. He says, quote, for the life of a creature is in the blood and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar. It is the blood that makes atonement for one's life. So God forbids eating blood because it gives the animal life, and during animal sacrifice, it's the blood that is spilt to atone for your sins that gives you life. And so, of course, this is really just a picture of the atoning work of Christ,

whose spilt blood washes our sin away and gives us life. And so, therefore, since we now have life, we are called to protect the life of every human being, no matter their stage of development.