Rick Lowery, at the Huffington Post, discussing abortion and the Bible:

It’s hard to ask biblical texts the modern question, “when does human life begin?” because the Bible has a very different understanding of human reproduction. Biblical writers don’t talk about sperm fertilizing eggs. They talk about male “seed” planted in fertile female ground. Just as a seed becomes a plant when it emerges from the ground, so too a man’s planted seed becomes another human being when it emerges from the womb.

Lowery does make some good points about reading too far into Biblical passages to promote anti-abortion views. He doesn’t hit on everything, though, as this recent post by Ryan demonstrates. Ryan cites an Old Testament passage where God seems to condone abortion in cases (indeed, even assist it, essentially) where there is question as to the legitimacy of the child. But Lowery makes some good points that the Bible doesn’t say what many think it says regarding abortion, or the mark when a fetus is said to be “alive.” The conclusion: the Bible is not a good source for a Pro-Life viewpoint, as with using Leviticus to justify an anti-gay marriage viewpoint, one ends up just arbitrarily picking what Bible commands one wants to obey. Of course, we at Holey Books would argue it’s not a good source for a variety of other reasons, too.