Posted on 04/05/2010 3:13:26 PM PDT by wagglebee
Nope. I understand that. I'm doing what P-Marlowe challenged: Attempting to find a biblical basis for "life" beginning prior to blood forming.
I've never worked on it before.
Yet, I've no doubt it is the the truth based on the Jeremiah verse in which God says that He knew Jeremiah before Jeremiah was formed in the womb.
Also, Christ left His estate with God and took the form of a human through the mechanism of the Holy Spirit overshadowing Mary. Her "seed" was to bruise the head of the serpent, therefore, Mary did contribute her seed in the equation. That seed was at one point pre-blood, but it was also the incarnated, second person of the Trinity.
Are we saying it lacked "life" EVEN THOUGH it was the eternal second person of the blessed Trinity?
I think the case can also be made that because Christ was fully human that ANY human characteristics He had would also be shared by us.
Excellent point. It is a necessary addition to the case of His own birth to extend that same logic to ourselves.
Yet you keep pinging me. I saw something you apparently overlooked so I made you aware of it. Does that equate to joining in the discussion? I haven't replied to any of your other pings, have I?
Are you counting this one?
What part of "other" don't you understand?
Arguments in regard to that issue are clearly esoteric and subject to varied interpretations, However, the "life is in the blood" argument is concrete. If the life is in the blood, then it is clear that the presence of a heartbeat signifies "life" as defined by the Bible. Any interpretation of life beginning before that point must necessarily rely on some esoteric interpretation of some obscure passage that may or may not relate to the issue.
Ultimately there must be a concrete basis for imposing laws upon people to protect the "life" of the unborn. If the issue is all cloudy and subject to diverse interpretations, then we will never be able to draft legislation to protect the unborn. I therefore believe that the presence of a heartbeat is sufficient evidence (both biblically and biologically) of "life" to require the state to institute measures to protect that "life".
I do not believe we will ever reach a legal consensus that life begins at conception or that contraception should be outlawed to protect the life of the unconceived.
I'm being a realist here.
I don't know, maybe I'm just dense.
Are we friends yet?
There’s nothing you should take personally or feel bad about. I’m simply tired of the back-and-forth with people who would rather quibble and obfuscate than debate.
I didn’t consider my pointing out that a statement you made had already been covered as ‘participating’. Perhaps I was wrong. I apologize.
Please point out a single post I have ever made on this forum where I was "quibbling and obfuscating" rather than debating.
If you had bothered to read my posts before losing your cool, you would have been able to see that I was making some serious points and not "quibbling and obfuscating" as you have accused me of doing.
I didn’t consider my pointing out that a statement you made had already been covered as ‘participating’. Perhaps I was wrong. I apologize.
You are still participating. I bet you even respond to this post.
I wasn't speaking of you. Sorry if you took it that way. I was referring to the tack the thread took yesterday before you arrived. So, yes, I did respond to this post to clear the air between you and I. I do NOT see how that is continuing a participation in the overall discussion on abortion.
So, to make you happy, I will not post to you again. For whatever reason, on whatever thread. Now you should be elated.
At this point, I’m not focused on legal interpretations and what the state does or doesn’t do.
I’m focused on the challenge of biblical interpretation for life beginning at conception.
I believe that I just proved it to a BIBLICAL CHRISTIAN, and that it wasn’t esoteric.
One must ask at which point the “in utero, incarnate, second person of the trinity” was NOT life.
Are you saying that it is your intention never to post or debate the issue of abortion again?
Or is it that you just don't want to participate in any discussion that I am involved in on the subject (which is just about every pro-life thread on this forum).
So, to make you happy, I will not post to you again. For whatever reason, on whatever thread. Now you should be elated.
Actually it makes me sad. :-(
Feel free to post to me anytime. I never shirk from a debate. I understood you to say that you were basically done posting to me. Then you posted to me again. And then another time. And now this time.
Are we friends now?
But that is the point of the thread. The issue is what do we do in cases of rape or incest? Do we outlaw any procedure which would stop the embryo from attaching itself to the uterus because that would be murder?
The legal question then becomes, when and why would we call that murder and under what circumstances, if any should we conclude that anything less than a viable fetus is a "life" that must be protected at the expense of the liberty of the mother?
Now you can make a theological argument that life begins at the moment of conception, but then that argument is not concrete. You have to have a "secular" definintion in order to restrict the liberty of the mother. It also has to be a definition that will appeal to the vast majority of the citizens of this country.
Since we measure the end of life by the last heartbeat, it is not unreasonable to measure the beginning of life by the first heartbeat. This would solve the issue of what to do in cases of rape as there are means of keeping the egg from attaching to the uterus even before the first heartbeat.
But to deny a rape victim the opportunity to prevent a pregnancy that has not yet occurred is not going to go over too well with the majority of citizens in this nation.
So then the question becomes are we willing to continue to allow indiscriminate abortion on demand because we must insist that we need to protect the life of an embryo that has not yet even attached itself to it's mother's womb?
My personal opinion is that I can think of no legitimate precedent among civilized people where a child is executed for the crime of his or her father.
As a realist, I know that it will be IMPOSSIBLE to tell rape victims that they must carry a baby to term.
That being said, rape victims have ample access to the morning after pill and, while I am opposed to this, I think it might make the most sense for rape victims.
hmm. It says that we are formed in the womb. Conception takes place outside of the womb. I think you had better pick another passage.
"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations."
There are no words in ancient Hebrew for vagina, uterus, fallopian tubes or ovaries. In the Bible, the term womb encompasses the entire female reproductive system.
I agree with you, P-Marlowe. But then, I'm a realist, too.
It seems to me there cannot really be a "legal consensus" without an underlying social/moral consensus. Which evidently we do lack.
Under the circumstances, it seems to me the best the law can do is to mitigate the damage to Life occasioned by a society increasingly callous on life issues, from cradle to grave.
Thank you so much, P-Marlowe, for your insightful essay/post!
That's an understatement! The culture of death's new push is to be allowed to systematically kill those who are most certainly alive.
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