Friday the 13th

So, um, I hate to ask, but with Evangelical Christians on the verge of realizing their decades-long goal of finally overturning Roe v. Wade, what does the Bible actually say about abortion?

Well, it turns out not very much.  It's a delicate and sensitive matter, and generally the Bible concerns itself with other things.  But in the Book of Numbers, abortion is not only allowed but required by law to be performed by a priest when a woman has been unfaithful to her husband. To quote Numbers 5:27:

If a woman has made herself impure and been unfaithful to her husband, this will be the result: When she is made to drink bitter water that brings a curse and causes suffering, it will enter her, her abdomen will swell and her womb will miscarry, and she will become a curse.

Chapter 5 has details of how to prepare bitter water and describes the ceremony to be performed in the administration of bitter water.  It's a trial by ordeal - if she hasn't been unfaithful, the bitter water won't affect her, but if she has, it will cause her to miscarry and abort the pregnancy.

How does this reconcile with the Commandment not to kill?  Well, according to the Bible, an abortion isn't killing because life had not yet started.  The Bible does not claim that life starts at conception or at a heartbeat.  According to the Bible, life begins at first breath.  As explained in Genesis 2:7:

And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.

Man did not become a living being until he received the breath of life.  Likewise, a fetus is not a "living being" until it draws its first breath.

To be sure, I don't recognize the Bible as having any divine or other authority and it does not guide any aspect of my moral or spiritual life.  But Evangelical Christians sure put a lot of stock in it, and yet it seems to contradict their hardline position on abortion - that life begins at conception and abortion should be forbidden in all cases, even incest, rape, and to save the life of the mother.  

This position is not only not found in the Bible, it is flat out contradicted by their holy scripture.  The life-begins-at-conception argument is just a fiction created by anti-abortion zealots taking a no-holds-barred, extreme position to support their goal.  It is the position of those church ladies with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces and of hypocrites, bigots, and bastards.