What does the Bible say about Abortion?

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Question: Does the Bible say anything specifically about abortion?

Answer: What the Bible says about this subject has deeper spiritual consequences than society realizes. We know that the sixth of the Ten Commandments states we should not murder another person (Deuteronomy 5:17). One contentious issue that needs to be resolved regarding abortion is: What is a human being? More specifically, how does God define what constitutes a human?

Apart from those who justify abortion on the grounds that what is removed from a woman is not a person, God's word speaks of knowing someone in the womb. God knew the prophet Jeremiah very early in his human development: "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations." (Jeremiah 1:5, NKJV througout). How could someone be known by God in the womb if they had not been given a mind and spirit - some of the essential ingredients that make all of us human?

Jesus was given the Holy Spirit, without measure, from conception. It certainly made him a special human who had the mind of God (and not man) within him. Having the Holy Spirit without measure right from the very beginning of his human life is one reason why he is called Immanuel ('god with us,' Matthew 1:23).

God considers humans whole and viable from conception. Each pregnancy is a miracle, the means by which he is reproducing himself. Abortion attempts to stop this miracle. Not only does he know a human in the womb, he even knows what KIND of people they will be - as he told Rebekah, the wife of Issac:

"And the Lord said to her: 'Two nations are in your womb, two peoples shall be separated from your body; One people shall be stronger than the other, and the older shall serve the younger.'" (Genesis. 25:23-24)

God considers all men to be human at the time of conception - not at the time of birth. The consequences of abortion can be profound. If, for example, Rebekah's children would have been aborted, the whole fabric of history would have been changed.

"As you do not know what is the way of the wind, or how the bones grow in the womb of her who is with child, so you do not know the works of God who makes everything." (Ecclesiates 11:5)

This passage shows God considers what is growing inside a pregnant woman to be a child - a child with a purpose in his great plan for all man. One has to wonder what things in the world could have been different if killing unborn babies was not an option - if millions of innocent humans were not killed while they grew in the womb.

God's will in the Bible is that all humans repent so that they can become his spiritual sons and daughters. Abortion is man's attempt to deny God a family through murder. Clearly, it is not part of the will of an all-powerful, loving God.