Jews are almost as diverse as Baptists. “That different Jews have disparate views is not news. What is news is when most Jews agree on a particular idea or approach. And so it is with the curious consensus of Jews on abortion.” (Jewish Journal, February 1, 2013) The Jewish belief that a fetus becomes a human being only after birth is based on Exodus 21:22. If two men are fighting and one accidentally causes a woman to have an abortion the Torah requires a monetary payment for a loss of property not eye for eye, life for life.
There are other references in the Hebrew Bible. When God established the value of persons, pregnant women had no greater value than sterile women. Infants had no value until they were a month old. (Lev. 27:1-7) When God commanded a census of the Levites, only males at least a month old or older were to be counted. (Num. 3:14, 15) Babies less than a month old didn’t have personhood.
The Bible requires abortion for some sins. (Num. Chapt.5; Lev. 20: 20, 21) The prophet Hosea prayed for God to punish wayward Israelites with abortion. (Hosea 9:14) When God wanted to punish the Midianites all the women were killed; neither pregnant women nor their fetuses were spared. (Num. Chapter 31)
Jews came to America for the same reasons as others, religious freedom being foremost. In 1655, Jews formed a community in New Amsterdam. In 1730 the community built its first synagogue in what had become New York. The British Plantation Act gave Jews a limited citizenship in 1740. In 1788, the U.S. Constitution gave Jews full rights, but the states did not.
Two years later, 1791, the Bill of Rights guaranteed freedom of religion to all, including Jews and those who came for economic reasons. Jews are united in the belief that family planning is best done by the family. The most vulnerable in a new birth is the family. An unwanted pregnancy can destroy a family. Failure to provide a male heir can destroy a family.
The most vulnerable in the family is the mother. She can be divorced. She can be abandoned. Every baby wounds its mother and sometimes gives her lifelong injury and sometimes is the cause of her death. But men, often religious men, believe reproduction and the pleasure and profit it gives men is the sole purpose of women. And childbirth is not a medical condition.
Western Catholic immigrants came with a story not familiar in America, a tradition that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was immaculately conceived. She was conceived the way all mammals are conceived but at the moment of conception her body and her soul were forgiven of “original” sin. Not all Christians believe in the duality of body and soul, a concept that comes from Greek philosophy. Neither do all Christians believe in “original” sin.
When the “Immaculate Conception” became doctrine in the Catholic Church, 1854, a fetus that did not have a human form could not receive religious rites. When the pope became infallible in 1870, the Immaculate Conception became dogma. You can debate doctrine; you cannot debate dogma. Dogma must be accepted. Because of the duality of “body and soul”, Mary’s body and soul both had to be cleansed of original sin; therefore ensoulment began at the moment of conception and so did life.
Neither the Eastern Catholic Church nor Protestants accept the immaculate conception because there is no biblical base for it; neither is there any need for it. God can forive anyone of original sin whenever the Deity wishes.
It is also not scientific. There is no big bang, no “moment” in conception. There are a half dozen processes that must occur before an egg is fertilized and the processes take about 24 hours. More than half of those will never become a live birth because they are not implanted in the womb. At its earliest life begins at implantation.
And how are those zygotes, those fertilized eggs that are more sacred than a pregnant woman treated? They are flushed from the body like human waste. Neither religion nor government make any effort to give them rights or rites. No effort is made to save them or give them dignity. There are no pickets, no protests, no parades, no threats of violence, no homicides.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the Jews were the first to lose the religious liberty of planning their family as was best for the family. Church and state—male dominated institutions—would determine family planning.
In contrast, despite fears that Israeli Arabs may out-populate Israeli Jews, Israel passed a law subsidizing elective abortions, as well as abortions in medical emergencies or cases of rape, incest or adultery, for women between the ages of 20 and 33. The religious liberty of American Jews has been trumped for generations by Western Catholic religious law.
Baptists and some other Protestants are not far behind.