What Does the Bible Really Say about Abortion?
Religious guilt-tripping notwithstanding, nowhere does the Bible condemn abortion, even though this practice was known in biblical times.
The religious right's "moral" arguments about abortion are their standard practice: first they decide what their prejudices are, and then they go searching through the Bible for passages to take out of context and misinterpret as "proof" of their prejudices. Legitimate theologians call this "proof-texting."
In biblical times, half of all live births died before the first birthday. Today, 40 percent of premature births die. Spontaneous abortion (miscarriage) occurs if far greater number than medical abortions. By conservative estimate, the miscarriage rate is at least 15 percent. Others estimate 40 percent. One medical study found a spontaneous abortion rate of almost 90 percent in very early pregnancy. Thus, God is the great abortionist of all!
It is clear that in the minds of the writers of the Bible, the soul doesn't enter the body until after birth. In the Bible, the concepts of breath and soul are inextricably intertwined. God "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul" (Genesis 2:7).
The biblical Greek word pneuma means "air, breath, wind, and spirit." The Latin spiritus means "breath" and "spirit." In biblical times, "killing" a fetus was not wrong, because a fetus was not regarded as a living soul with breath and consciousness. Breath enters the body at birth, and consciousness may not enter the body until several months after birth. Whether the soul enters with breath or consciousness, in either case it is not present in the womb, and abortion is not wrong. For this reason, many major Christian denominations support the right to abortion, in spite of the religious right's attempt to pretend that they alone own God and that they alone represent morality.
See "The Bible Says" link above for more information about breath and soul, and also see
www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-bibleforbids.htm
www.elroy.net/ehr/abortion.html
www.elroy.net/ehr/abortionanswers.html