Is a Fetus Just a Thing?

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Hi A____,

Thank you for your question about medical abortions.
Before I deal with your question concerning abortion, I want to make it clear that by standing on the Word of God, I am in no way condemning women and mothers who have had abortions while being told that the child they were aborting was not a living being. Every abortion ever performed was the taking of a life, but giving back that life is no problem at all for God, and He will do just that in His own time.

1Co 15:22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

My intent in all of my answers to all who write to me is to simply remain faithful to God’s Word. It is not intended to judge or to condemn anyone. So when I use the word ‘you’ below I am not referring to you but to the words which you have sent to me to answer. Please keep that in mind as we begin answering the questions which are raised here.
You reference the story of Judah and Tamar, and you use Judah’s judgment to burn Tamar alive with her unborn child, who was an ancestor of Christ, as proof that the unborn are not children at all.
You ask:

There is no specific condemnation of Judah for selling his brother Joseph into slavery in the previous chapter of Genesis.
Here is Judah’s own assessment of himself in this whole story:

Gen 38:24 And it came to pass about three months after, that it was told Judah, saying, Tamar thy daughter in law hath played the harlot; and also, behold, she is with child by whoredom. And Judah said, Bring her forth, and let her be burnt.
Gen 38:25 When she was brought forth, she sent to her father in law, saying, By the man, whose these are, am I with child: and she said, Discern, I pray thee, whose are these, the signet, and bracelets, and staff.
Gen 38:26 And Judah acknowledged them, and said, She hath been more righteous than I; because that I gave her not to Shelah my son. And he knew her again no more.

So using lying, conniving, and self- righteous Judah’s totally unbiblical decision to burn Tamar alive at the stake for her supposed harlotry, in which he himself had played the part of the whoremonger, is hardly any indication of what is the mind of God concerning the subject of medical abortions, which actually are not specifically mentioned in scripture.
But the value of a fetus IS specifically dealt with in scripture, and it is not considered a mere ‘thing’, as you emphasize in quoting the words that refer to our Lord in His mother’s womb.
Here is proof that God considers a fetus to be a ‘thing’ of great value:

Exo 21:22 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.

He will surely be punished, according as the woman’s husband will lay upon him”. That is quite a statement. I doubt any husband ever demanded a mere penny for the loss of his child.
You make reference to Luk 1:35. “That holy thing which shall be born of you shall be called the son of God”. That ‘thing’ could never become the son of God without first being a living fetus which is breathing the oxygen of life through His mother’s lungs. If that fetus and the oxygen in its blood is not to be considered as being alive, then neither is the life- giving oxygen of the blood of the mother.
Emphasizing the word ‘thing’ while totally ignoring that this ‘thing’ is “the Son of God” is nothing less than a demonstration of a bias which is determined to justify the murder of defenseless children who are no more “viable” outside the womb than they are inside the womb.
Ignoring the children in the wombs of the mothers who were “ripped up” by the Ammonites, and placing emphasis only on the mothers is nothing short of total blindness to what is being said. God is specifically condemning the ripping up of women “with child”. It is God Himself who has already made the decision that these women are “with child“.

Amo 1:13 I will not revoke the punishment because they have ripped up women with child in Gilead, that they might enlarge their borders.

The holy spirit could have inspired the writer to simply refer to women being murdered. That would have been a terrible sin on the part of the Ammonites in itself, but they compounded their sin by ‘ripping up women with child“. If those warring Ammonites will not be held guiltless by God, how much less will a doctor to does the same thing for filthy lucre be judged by God for his murders of helpless and innocent children? Yes, as I will show below, God calls the unborn “children”, as well as “the thing… the Son of God”.
Every pregnant mother, and the husband of that pregnant mother, have to contend with that unborn child moving, rolling over, and kicking while it is in its mother’s womb. Having five children of my own, I know whereof I speak. So an unborn child is very much alive and is living on the oxygen of its mother’s lungs. That unborn child is considered by God to be just as alive as its mother. Here are a couple of fetuses in particular on which our Lord placed very great value. He is no respecter of persons and places the same value on all other fetuses:

Gen 25:21 And Isaac intreated the LORD for his wife, because she was barren: and the LORD was intreated of him, and Rebekah his wife conceived.
Gen 25:22 And the children struggled together within her; and she said, If it be so, why am I thus? And she went to enquire of the LORD.
Gen 25:23 And the LORD said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger.

These two fetuses are referred to by our Creator as “the children… within her”. They are definitely not referred to as “never having been” or as ‘those things”.
I just this moment went to my e- sword to check the Greek meaning of the word translated ‘thing’ in Luk 1:35, and lo and behold, that word is not even there. That word ‘thing’ is added to the Greek word ‘hagios’ which means ‘holy’. So the ‘holy’ in Mary’s Womb shall be called “the son of God”. That is what Adam himself is called.
Here is that verse with all the Strong’s numbers by each word:

Luk 1:35 AndG2532 theG3588 angelG32 answeredG611 and saidG2036 unto her, G846 The HolyG40 GhostG4151 shall comeG1904 uponG1909 thee, G4571 andG2532 the powerG1411 of the HighestG5310 shall overshadowG1982 thee: G4671 thereforeG1352 alsoG2532 that holy thingG40 which shall be bornG1080 ofG1537 theeG4675 shall be calledG2564 the SonG5207 of God. G2316

Here is the Strong’s entry for G40:
G40
αγιος
hagios
hag’- ee- os
From αγος hagos (an awful thing) compare G53, [ H2282]; sacred (physically pure, morally blameless or religious, ceremonially consecrated): – (most) holy (one, thing), saint.

This is the Greek word translated ‘holy’ every time we read the words ‘holy spirit’. So it is nothing less than deliberate deceit to make this statement:

… as if the word under discussion was the word ‘thing’, when in fact there is no such word. “That holy thingG40” It is all translated from the one Greek word ‘hagios’, which is assigned Strong’s number G40.
Now Adam himself is also called “the son of God” in Luke’s genealogy:

Luk 3:38 Which was the son of Enos, which was the son of Seth, which was the son of Adam, which was the son of God.

Since all men are “in Adam” and since “Adam… was the son of God” we can safely conclude that we are all Christ’s brothers “in Adam” and that as such we are all “sons of God” and that in the final analysis, all life is holy to God, and that “as you have done it unto one of the least of these… ye have done it unto me”.

Joh 10:34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?

So what was in Mary was simply ‘hagios’ or ‘holy’, as is all life. The fact that Christ did not have a physical father, does not make “the first man Adam” any less a “son of God”.
There is much more that can be said on this subject, and a brother named John McDowell has done a rather thorough job of dealing with this issue in the second of the URLs listed below.
I pray that this e- mail helps to give you a Biblical understanding of Luk 1:35, and the fact that the word ‘thing’ is really ‘holy’, that the Ammonites of Amo 1:13 will not be held guiltless because the ripped up women with child, and that Gen 38:24 is a commentary on Judah’s corruption rather than a commentary on the worthlessness of a fetus.
I pray that our Lord will grant you to think as He thinks on this and on all matters.

Joh 17:3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

Your brother in Christ,
Mike
1. Are Medical Abortions Murder?
Friendly Page Are Medical Abortions Murder? Posted May 17, 2009 Updated March 3, 2010 Mike, In one of your posts you say this. “Personally performing an abortion is to personally murder a baby human being and brother, but to fill out a prescription is nowhere near personally deciding upon the death of another human being, even if the person you are serving
www. iswasandwillbe. com/ Abortion. php
2. Is Abortion Ever Permissible?
Here are a few good links: Are Medical Abortions Murder? Why Died I Not From the Womb? How Does God Make Us Do Evil? Can a Christian Be a Pharmacist? Verses on unborn children — are they living beings or not? The Word of God makes it very clear in more than one place that a child in the mother’s womb is known by God from the moment of conception — or
www. iswasandwillbe. com/ Is_ abortion_ permissible. php
3. Job 3:11-18 Why did I not die?
as infant which never saw light” has been taken by itself to justify the millions of medical abortions as children which really “had not been”. All who have done this can only be … then why is this man being punished for an accidental abortion? It is true that medical abortions are never even considered in scripture, but the fact that the unborn are said to
www. iswasandwillbe. com/ StudyNotes/ Book_ of_ Job/Job_3_11__18_ Why_ not_ die. ph…

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