I’m not nearly as much of a follower of Wiccan culture and news as I was back when I was dating T, but I’m still pleased to learn that the Wiccan pentacle has been added to the list of approved symbols for government-issue tombstones for fallen soldiers. Religious freedom is a founding principle of our nation, and our soldiers who give their lives in defense of that principle deserve to have it recognized when they are laid to rest. (Via BoingBoing.)
[god says abortion isn’t murder]
In the comments on a TPM Café piece on Barack Obama’s efforts to reach out to the Christian right, I ran across this fascinating passage from Exodus 21:22-25 (New International Version):
22 If men who are fighting hit a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely [or she has a miscarriage] but there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined whatever the woman’s husband demands and the court allows. 23 But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, 24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25 burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.
There’s a little ambiguity over what exactly is meant by “gives birth prematurely,” but it seems clear from context — and from the state of medical technology in Biblical times, which would have been insufficient to keep a seriously premature baby alive — that this passage is describing the death of a fetus. (The bracketed interpolation is theirs, not mine.)
A very clear distinction is then made between the killing of a fetus, for which a fine is incurred, and “serious injury,” which can apparently be inflicted only on the living woman, not on the unborn fetus. Fetuses, then, are distinctly in a separate category from actual people. Those who insist that abortion is murder are thus rejecting the legal definitions set forth in the Book of Exodus, which most Fundamentalist and Evangelical Christians recognize as the word of God.
Interestingly, this passage is actually used by pro-lifers to support their position because it penalizes the killing of a fetus. That seems unarguable, but based on the above passage, it would seem more Biblically correct to demand a ban on cars and guns than on abortion, because maiming and death as a result of auto and gun accidents is relatively common and clearly considered more serious by the Biblical God than the death of a fetus.
Of course, no such thing will ever happen (or should). Just as a few verses are plucked from the Bible to justify a culturally based revulsion against homosexuality, the Biblical justifications for banning abortion are ex post facto, chosen to support a preexisting political position. (Indeed, this cherry-picking approach is regularly applied by people who consider themselves Biblical literalists. I would be fascinated to see a serious effort to construct a complete world view starting with the Bible and rejecting any outside sources that contradict the Bible — a modern Karaite movement, as it were — but I suppose the many contradictions within the Bible itself would make such an effort nearly impossible.)
Why abortion is so controversial is not an easy question to answer, but the reasons should be sought in the structure of our society today and in its recent history, not in the Bible.
Note: For those who prefer it, the King James version is less ambiguous:
22 If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman’s husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. 23 And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life, 24 Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25 Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
[sign of hope?]
According to the New York Times, “there is widespread consensus among evangelical leaders that they risk losing their teenagers.”
The article unfortunately goes on to point out that this fear is, like so many aspects of Evangelical culture, largely an article of faith, built around an obscure pronouncement with no particular basis either in science or in Scripture.
Still, I have long held out hope that many of the children of Evangelicals would find their parents’ intolerant, narrow vision of Christianity intolerably narrow. The growth of Evangelical churches in recent decades will not necessarily continue indefinitely.
And please keep in mind that this post is not a paean to the shallow MTV lifestyle the article depicts these kids rejecting. I’m all for a youth culture that has more to offer than hooking up and listening to Chingy. I just hope it is something that also has room for positive approaches to sexuality and homosexuality, respect for science, openness to other cultures and less social pressure to embrace one strain of religious faith unquestioningly.
Like, maybe the government could even start funding schools of some kind that would be open to the public — you know, with art and music and humanities and science programs. It’s so crazy, it just might work!
[a merry and a happy]
We have come around once again to that special time of year: Winter Day Off! However you celebrate it — as Christmas, as the seventh day of Chanukah, as the day that comes four days after Solstice, as Seongtanjeol (which is what Microsoft Outlook thinks Koreans call Christmas, but who knows?), as Kwanzaa Eve, as Eid (there must be one coming up), or as something you just invented — I hope you spend it happy and warm and safe.
Jenny and I will spend our Winter Day Off at home. She’ll cook a figgy pudding, I’ll cook a brisket, and we will both thank goodness we’re not in New Delhi right now, as we were last year. (Highlight of the day: two drunk Scots in search of the new James Bond movie, because “It’s not Chraistmas without a Bond movie!”) We will perhaps make use of our new Scrabble dictionary, perhaps spike ourselves a little egg nog, and almost certainly fail to do that bit of cleaning and organizing that needs to get done in the library.
Best wishes and be well and eat too much!