The pro-life ethic has deep historical roots, including advocacy by the 16th-century Protestant Reformers. Reformation leaders John Calvin and Martin Bucer both condemned willful termination of a pregnancy directly while Martin Luther addressed the dignity of unborn children and the glory of childbearing. Anabaptists likewise dignified unborn life.<\/p>\n
The Reformers\u2019 \u201canthropology — their doctrine of humanity — led them to confess that abortion was the killing of a human being,\u201d said Union University bioethicist and provost C. Ben Mitchell. \u201cSimilarly, for pro-life evangelicals, biblical anthropology leads us to affirm the sanctity of every human life, from womb to tomb, because human beings are made in the image of the living God,\u201d Mitchell told Baptist Press in written comments.<\/p>\n
When Calvin addressed the destruction of unborn life, he didn\u2019t mince words. \u201cThe fetus,\u201d Calvin wrote in a commentary on Exodus 21:22, \u201cthough enclosed in the womb of its mother, is already a human being, and it is almost a monstrous crime to rob it of the life which it has not yet begun to enjoy. If it seems more horrible to kill a man in his own house than in a field, because a man\u2019s house is his place of most secure refuge, it ought surely to be deemed more atrocious to destroy a fetus in the womb before it has come to light.\u201d<\/p>\n
In commenting on Psalm 139:16, Calvin spoke of \u201cGod\u2019s having known\u201d the \u201cembryo\u201d when \u201che was yet a shapeless mass\u201d in the womb.<\/p>\n
That view seems to contrast with a popular medical manual of the day written by German physician Eucharis Rosslin, who taught that \u201chuman life does not begin at conception,\u201d according to Steven Ozment\u2019s account of Reformation family life, \u201cWhen Fathers Ruled.\u201d Rosslin claimed that \u201cduring the first two months the womb contains only formless matter,\u201d Ozment recounted.<\/p>\n
Though abortion was regarded as sinful and illegal in medieval times, according to Wolfgang Muller\u2019s \u201cThe Criminalization of Abortion in the West,\u201d many people believed a baby was not human until 40 or 80 days following conception.<\/p>\n
Calvin \u201csounds about as pro-life as you\u2019re going to get,\u201d Timothy George, Reformation scholar and dean of Samford University\u2019s Beeson Divinity School, told Baptist Press .<\/p>\n
Similarly, Bucer, a German Reformer, regarded abortion as \u201cprofoundly contrary to the divine institution of marriage,\u201d according to H.J. Selderhuis\u2019 \u201cMarriage and Divorce in the Thought of Martin Bucer.\u201d<\/p>\n
Should a wife procure an abortion without her husband\u2019s knowledge or consent, Bucer argued, he would have grounds for divorce.<\/p>\n
Chemical and surgical abortions have been available since ancient times, according to Michael Gorman\u2019s \u201cAbortion and the Early Church.\u201d<\/p>\n
Luther apparently never addressed abortion directly, but he \u201creportedly maintained that a rational soul animated the fetus right from conception,\u201d Muller wrote. That view \u201cenjoyed great popularity among the Lutherans.\u201d<\/p>\n
In his 1522 treatise \u201cThe Estate of Marriage,\u201d Luther said \u201ca woman in the pangs of childbirth\u201d should be encouraged with the admonition \u201cthat this work of God in you is pleasing to Him. Trust joyfully in His will, and let Him have his way with you. Work with all your might to bring forth the child.\u201d<\/p>\n
By giving birth, Luther said, a woman is doing God\u2019s will \u201ceven if her child is born out of wedlock.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fathers who wish they did not have to \u201crock the baby, wash its diapers, make its bed, smell its stench [and] stay up nights with it,\u201d Luther said, are in error. Amid the difficulties of parenthood, fathers and mothers should tell God, \u201cI am certain that it is thus pleasing in thy sight.\u201d<\/p>\n
Anabaptist Janneken Munstdorp gave birth to a daughter while imprisoned for her faith and awaiting execution in 1573, according to George\u2019s \u201cTheology of the Reformers.\u201d Munstdorp\u2019s letter to her newborn seemed to reflect a tender care for preborn and infant life.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow that I have abided the time, and borne you under my heart with great sorrow for nine months,\u201d Munstdorp wrote, \u201cand given birth to you here in prison, in great pain, they have taken you from me. Here I lie, expecting death every morning, and shall now soon follow your dear father,\u201d who was martyred.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I, your dear mother, write you, my dearest child, something for a remembrance, that you will thereby remember your dear father and your dear mother,\u201d Munstdorp wrote.<\/p>\n
Admittedly, George told Baptist Press, explicit treatments of abortion by Reformers are limited. Yet they obviously upheld the sanctity of unborn life. Reformers \u201cdidn\u2019t address [abortion] more directly,\u201d George said, because \u201cit was just assumed\u201d that anti-abortion sentiments were valid. \u201cThey were a part of the ongoing biblical, patristic, medieval, Catholic tradition. \u201cThis was part of the assumed consensus that all life was sacred and came from God, including the life in the womb before it was born,\u201d George said.<\/p>\n
________<\/p>\n
David Roach is chief national correspondent for Baptist Press, the Southern Baptist Convention\u2019s news service.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The pro-life ethic has deep historical roots, including advocacy by the 16th-century Protestant Reformers. Reformation leaders John Calvin and Martin Bucer both condemned willful termination of a pregnancy directly while Martin Luther addressed the dignity of unborn children and the glory of childbearing. Anabaptists likewise dignified unborn life. The Reformers\u2019 \u201canthropology — their doctrine of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[450,2818,2545,452,2544,451],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7530"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7530"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7530\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}