Category: Classics

Early Christian Views on the Life of Unborn Children

For Christians today, the conclusion is forgone that life is precious. Regarding most pro-life movements is the emphasis on the lives of the unborn. The struggle to obliterate the barbaric custom of aborting the unborn is as much a reality now as it was in the first century to the earliest Christians. Nevertheless, the battle wages on and Christians continue to advocate that unborn lives be regarded as worthy of the same rights and privileges as those already born.

Political rhetoric attempts to sway the conversation to the side of choice. Attempting to be sympathetic to those who make the decision to abort a life, many hold that the decision is itself agonizing and that women must be in control of their bodies and decisions about their “health.”[1] While the rhetoric often frames the conversation and vilifies those of us who are pro-life, it must be stated that this author is as pro-life for the unborn as he is for the living. I would want to appeal to those who contemplate such a decision to end a life to not do so on the grounds of our religion and the esteem that God our Father has for life.

A Theology for Life

When God created humanity, He created them in His own image (Genesis 1:26–27). Having been made in God’s image, anyone who took life was to lose their own for the reason that they destroyed the image of God: “Whoever sheds man’s blood, by man his blood shall be shed; for in the image of God He made man” (Genesis 9:6). In the ancient East, appearing in God’s image implied a “representation of identity relating to the office/role and the value connected to the image …  The image of god did the god’s work on the earth. The biblical view is similar as people are in the image of God, embodying his qualities and doing his work.”[2] Because each human bears God’s image, this is the source of human worth and personhood.

The language used of those unborn gives us a greater understanding of God’s esteem for those in the womb. These pre-born image bearers of our Father have as much worth and personhood as those outside the womb.

For You formed my inward parts;

You covered me in my mother’s womb.

I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;

Marvelous are Your works,

And that my soul knows very well.

My frame was not hidden from You,

When I was made in secret,

And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.

Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.

And in Your book they all were written,

The days fashioned for me,

When as yet there were none of them.

Psalm 139:13-16

This particular Psalm gives us an idea of the great care with which God acts during the gestation period of the unborn. While science gives us a technical explanation, the Psalm enlightens us with a poetical explanation of God’s workings. Therefore, we read in another Psalm that “the fruit of the womb is a reward” (Psalm 127:3). It was the fruit of Mary’s womb that Elizabeth blessed (Luke 1:42). A child is not a burden, but God’s gift.

God reveals that He knows the unborn even before they form in the womb (Jeremiah 1:4–5). Yet, while in the womb, they are regarded as living beings and the discussion about when life begins is unnecessary (cf. Luke 1:41). In the Mosaic Law, if the unborn were harmed, retribution was necessary (Exodus 21:22–25). We also see this reflected in our own laws when a pregnant woman suffers harm along with her unborn child. The treatment of such matters is as if harm were done to two people, but were the vessel to decide that the unborn were unwanted or a burden, they would need only to “chose” and the treatment of the unborn as a person is neglected for the idol of choice.

Abortion in Greco-Roman Society

Hippocrates (c. 460–375 BC) was a pioneer of medical theory as well as the oath that all physicians swore by upon beginning their practice of medicine, and still do today from my understanding. A part of the Hippocratic Oath states, “I will not give to a woman [an abortifacient].” Abortion was rather common in antiquity, but Greco-Roman society wasn’t entirely careless regarding the unborn. In some cases, abortion appears as wrong as we believe it to be today. For example, in Athens, if a man died while his wife was pregnant and she aborted the pregnancy upon his death, she was charged to have committed a crime against her husband. The legal theory was that her abortion was criminal since the unborn child could have claimed the late father’s estate, so it was more a matter of property rights than a moral statute. Fast-forwarding closer to the advent of Christ, we see that not much had changed in this regard.

Ovid’s work Amores was first published in 16 BC. In this work of poetry, Ovid mentions abortion in the early Roman Empire and the unborn child as a “burden” (Am. 2.13). However, in the next elegy, he refers to the fetus as “tender” and the destruction of it as by a “warlike method.” This particular elegy is against abortion because it robs society of her Caesars and other heroes. Furthermore, were this a common practice, Ovid suggests, there would be no humanity. He asked why women would “thrust and pierce with the instrument and give dire poisons” to unborn children, which explains how abortions were performed then (Am. 2.14). The methods of abortion were sometimes as risky for the mother as they were for the unborn baby and many women died from having attempted to terminate their pregnancy.

The Roman statesman, Cicero mentions a disdain for abortion similar to the Athenian law mentioned above. A mother had been bribed by alternative heirs to terminate her pregnancy, which she did. The mother, in turn, was condemned to death because she cheated the father of his posterity and the Republic of a potential citizen (In Defense of Cluentius 32).

The philosophical school of Stoicism held that life began once a child was born. The breathing of a person outside the womb was the moment life began. This thinking allowed abortion to be acceptable, and Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BC–AD 65), a Roman statesman and philosopher, was able to use this belief in the legal system. Seneca wrote that “unnatural progeny” were destroyed, which was likely a reference to an incestuous conception. He also wrote about drowning children that were born abnormal and weak (On Anger 1.15.2–3), but I’ll talk more about infanticide in the next chapter. The Stoic idea that unborn babies were not humans came to influence Roman law and only further justified the practice of abortion.[3]

Not all Stoics, however, consented to abortion being a good thing. Musonius Rufus (c. AD 30?–102) saw abortion as inhuman. He saw its purpose as solely of enhancing the firstborn’s inheritance more than anything, which amounted to greedy motives. The lawgivers, he contended, functioned to discern what was lawful and good for the state, as well as what was bad and detrimental to it. The lawgivers, he recalled, urged the increase of the homes as something fortunate. So fortunate was the increase of the homes “that they forbade women to suffer abortions and imposed a penalty upon those who disobeyed” (Discourse 15). His discourse on this matter is likely a referendum against the common practice of abortions in the first century.[4]

Juvenal wrote that wealthy women would not endure labor, but would dull the pain with drugs or obtain an abortion (Satire 6.593–96). He also wrote how Emperor Domitian (c. AD 81–96) impregnated his niece and then gave her abortive drugs. The niece in question, Julia, died in AD 91 as a result of the abortion (Satire 2.20–24). Here we see another example of why abortions were performed (incest). Wealthy people may not have just wanted to deal with it, so they selfishly terminated the pregnancy. However, there was another reason for terminating a pregnancy. Slave women might terminate a pregnancy to avoid bring up a child in slavery.[5] The slave women would have had to have done this in secrecy because a slave’s child was the property of her master and not her own.   

In the second century, the Greek gynecologist, obstetrician, and pediatrician, Soranus of Ephesus, wrote his work Gynecology which explains how medical knowledge at the time treated various related matters. In this work, he distinguished between an involuntary abortion—what we’d call “miscarriage”—and the willful termination of pregnancy. He also distinguished between a contraceptive and abortive. The former was to prevent conception from taking place while the latter was intended to expel the unborn from the woman’s body (Gyn. 1.59–60).

In discussing when an abortive was given, he noted that some would not give an abortive if a woman wanted to terminate the pregnancy due to adultery or because she wanted to preserve her youthful beauty—again, two reasons why abortions took place then. An abortive would be given if it were discovered that the woman’s body, according to the science then, were determined to be unable of birthing a child and thus risk the mother’s wellbeing. However, Soranus preferred contraceptives to an abortive as a preventative risk, because “it is safer to prevent conception from taking place than to destroy the fetus” (Gyn. 1.60). He then went on to list various concoctions that could be used as a contraceptive or abortifacient, but if used to terminate a pregnancy, serious side effects followed that posed significant risks (Gyn. 1.61–63). Yet, this didn’t prevent him from explicitly naming how one might terminate a pregnancy (Gyn. 1.64–65).

While more citations could be supplied to the ends of showing how common abortion was, we also noted a couple of pagans who were against it, but not for the same moral reasons early Christians stood opposed to the practice. Additionally, there were others who opposed abortion in antiquity, but Christians gave a clearer understanding of why it was wrong that distinguished them from others. It’s now to this focus that we turn.

Early Christians as Pro-Life

What we must admit is that there are no clearly stated prohibitions against abortion in the New Testament. However, early Christianity borrowed their moral understanding of various issues from Judaism, so we, first, look the Jewish historian, Josephus (c. AD 37–100). He wrote about the Jewish prohibition against abortion on the basis that it was a matter of Jewish law.

The law, moreover enjoins us to bring up all our offspring, and forbids women to cause abortion of what is begotten, or to destroy it afterward; and if any woman appears to have so done, she will be a murderer of her child, by destroying a living creature, and diminishing humankind: if anyone, therefore, proceeds to such fornication or murder, he cannot be clean.

(Against Apion 2.202)

The Ten Commandments were used by early Christians just as they were by Jews—as teachings that pertained to moral living. Notably, the sixth commandment, “You shall not murder,” was given a greater exposition in Christian thinking. When in the late first, early second century, a document known as Didache was written, attention turned to the sixth commandment and stated, “You shall not murder … you shall not engage in sorcery; you shall not abort a child or commit infanticide” (2.2). This document understood the sixth commandment as extending to the unborn. The reason I included “sorcery” as a part of this understanding is that the Greek term translated “sorcery” is the word from which we get “pharmacy.” Therefore, “sorcery” here likely included taking abortifacients—drugs that induced abortion. Our modern understanding of the sixth commandment was clearly understood as extending to the life of the unborn.

Also in keeping with the Mosaic Law, the paths of life and death (Deuteronomy 27–28) are recast as darkness and light in another early Christian writing.

But the path of darkness is crooked and full of cursing, for it is the path of eternal death and punishment, in which way are the things that destroy the soul …  Here are they who are persecutors of the good, haters of truth, lovers of lies; they who know not the reward of righteousness, who cleave not to what is good nor unto just judgment … murderers of children.

(Barnabas 20.1–2)

Christian writers believed that life began at conception. Clement of Alexandria (c. AD 160–215) inferred from Luke 1:41 when John leaped in Elizabeth’s womb that very belief (Instructor 2.10.96). Athenagoras, in the late-second-century, pointed to Christianity’s rejection of abortion as proof that Christians were moral when he wrote that the Christians “say that those women who use drugs to bring on abortion commit murder, and will have to give an account to God for the abortion” (Leg. 35).

Later church councils forbade abortion and actually levied punishments against any who murdered their unborn. The Council of Elvira (c. 4th century) reflects such beliefs.

If a woman conceives in adultery and then has an abortion, she may not commune again, even as death approaches, because she has sinned twice. (Canon 63)

A catechumen who conceives in adultery and then suffocates the child may be baptized only when death approaches. (Canon 68)

Even some of the most notable early church theologians supported this stance. Both Augustine (c. AD 354–430) and John Chrysostom (c. AD 347–407) viewed abortion as murder.

What are we to make of this information? Life is precious and worthy of being protected. Moreover, even without the testament of church history, the Scriptures give sufficient enough evidence for us to believe this once one examines the passages that speak about the life of the unborn. However, for those who desire greater proof, early Christian history is without apology in holding that life begins at conception, so the unborn ought not to be aborted. These two beliefs led to another moral issue. The problem that arose as a result of unwanted children led to the abandonment of children throughout the Roman Empire, so what did Christianity do? They practiced pure and undefiled religion and cared for the orphans.

[1] Perhaps the best source that I’ve read about pro-life principles from a philosophical and practical standpoint is by an obstetrician and former politician, Ron Paul, Abortion and Liberty (Lake Jackson, Texas: The Foundation for Rational Economics and Education, 1983). For a complete classical evaluation of abortion, I’d urge a reading of Michael J. Gorman, Abortion and the Early Church (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1982). 

[2] John H. Walton, ed., Genesis, in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, Vol. 1 (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2009), 21.

[3] Cf. Justinian, Digest 35.2.9.1.

[4] Caesar Augustus issued edicts in 18 BC and AD 9 promoting childbearing, but he did not explicitly outlaw abortion (Gorman, Abortion and the Early Church, 27). 

[5] Dio Chrysostom (c. AD 40/50–110/120), Discourses 15.8.

Understanding Romans 13 in the First Century

In June 2015, my uncle Jim ascended the lectern at my grandfather’s funeral services and read from Romans 13:1–7. Granddaddy had been an Air Force veteran and retired as a Captain with the Metro Police Department in Nashville, TN. He was one of the Department’s K-9 division founding members, and his late K-9, Bam-Bam, was Nashville’s first-ever. Having grown up on over sixty acres north of Nashville, our family was accustomed to a life different from most families. When my daddy (step) and uncles grew up in the seventies, granddaddy was a K-9 officer and later a special tactics officer, even working in the vice squad—riding undercover with Hell’s Angels for some time. Because of this, everyone knew how to wield a firearm, more so from hunting, and gram would carry the wash to hang on the clothesline with a shotgun atop the basket that she’d lay aside while she hung laundry. There was always a fear that granddaddy’s cover would be blown and that any enemies he’d made would target his family. If that were to happen, his family would be prepared.

The passage here under consideration is read through the lenses of the esteem and honor of those who serve governing authorities as servants of God. You’ll notice that this authority is from God and appointed by God (13:1). To resist governing authorities is to resist God Himself because of their work, which brings judgment (13:2). Twice is the same term used of them: officers in the church—diakonos—“minister” (13:4). Because these officials exist by the will of God and through the apparatus of civil government, they are tasked with keeping the peace and executing judgment on evildoers. Despite societal narratives today, these servants of God “do not bear the sword in vain” (13:4)—the same one, the short-sword, used in the execution of James (Acts 12:1–2). It is used both for good and in unjust ways, unfortunately, but is meant for good. This sense of service to God and our fellow man is how we were brought up, and it’s why we still have officers and military members in the family. As one author put it, “This is not a capitulation to pagan power but a fervent affirmation of divine authority over civil powers.”[1]

The First Century Understanding of this Passage

We need to understand the zeitgeist of first-century Rome to better understand the climate into which Paul wrote. The second-century BCE historian, Polybius noted that Rome had in fifty-three years subdued the inhabited world (Hist. 1.1). This feat obviously spoke about something impressive regarding the Empire, but what was it? The divine purpose of Rome, so it was believed, was to create a united language and bring civilization to all of humanity[2] while bringing the whole world under the rule of law (Aen. 4.231). Cicero held that Rome was the home of virtue and imperial power and that the Empire’s borders weren’t fixed by the earth but by the sky.[3] All indications pointed to the belief that Rome’s manifest destiny to subdue the entire world and make it, for the lack of a better term, Roman. This was accomplished more so by conquest than conversion. When you put up these beliefs about the Empire against the gospel’s universal call, you can see that the two might find themselves at the opposite ends of one another.

Shades of this tension appear as early as the New Testament. The disciples of Jesus were accused of having turned the world upside down. How? By allegedly defying Caesar’s decrees and calling Jesus King (Acts 17:6–7). In the first century, the Romans feared that a conquest upon themselves by Jews. A couple of texts point to this end.

The majority firmly believed that their ancient priestly writings contained the prophecy that this was the very time when the East should grow strong and that men starting from Judea should possess the world. (Tacitus, Hist. 5.13)

There had spread over all the Orient an old and established belief, that it was fated at that time for men coming from Judaea to rule the world. (Seut. Vesp. 4.5)

The belief that Christians a threat to the Empire appears in the first century and also the second. Pliny the Younger, who was governor of Pontus and Bithynia from 111–113 CE, exchanged letters with the emperor Trajan over the matter. Pliny was himself unclear as to the offense that Christians had committed, but he knew his orders were to round them up and either get them to recant and curse the name of Jesus, or they would be executed.

Those who denied that they were or had been Christians, when they invoked the gods in words dictated by me, offered prayer with incense and wine to your image, which I had ordered to be brought for this purpose together with statues of the gods, and moreover cursed Christ–none of which those who are really Christians, it is said, can be forced to do–these I thought should be discharged. (Epistles 10.96–97)

By the third century, the crime was “treason, chiefly against the Roman religion.”[4] Rome believed that the gods had so blessed them not because of faith because the notion was foreign to the ancient Romans. You didn’t have to believe. You just had to participate in cultic acts, such as prayer, incense, and libation, among other such things. That’s all you had to do, and there was always enough room reserved for another god to add. Because Christians attributed “Lord” to Jesus and refused to do so to “Caesar,” they were traitors. Because they refused to perform the specific cultic acts to the gods that shone favor on Rome, they were traitors.

The Roman letter bears out that these believers had struggled because they professed Jesus as Lord. They encountered tribulations (Rom. 5:3–5); they suffered (Rom. 8:18, 31–35); they were persecuted (Rom. 12:14). How might they respond? The natural inclination is to raise an army, take up arms, and fight, but this wasn’t the way Christ taught. Why depose one despot for another that is subject to being replaced himself? No, King Jesus will always reign, and the kingdom is in His hands, so earthly rulers will come and go, but Christ is still on His throne. The way Christians behave is to act with the self-sacrificial love of Jesus, even toward the civil government. Paul begins this in Romans 12:9–21. This is how Christians live when the government is hostile towards them, and their duty towards government is entailed in Romans 13:1–7. After Paul acknowledged the responsibility of civil government, he once more reminds Christians of the value of loving their neighbor in Romans 13:8–10, and by 13:11–14, he explains that regardless of what government does, we are respectful and submissive because they exist by God’s will.

[1] As quoted in Scot McKnight and Joseph B. Modica, eds., Jesus is Lord Caesar is Not: Evaluating Empire in New Testament Studies (Kindle ed., Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2013), loc. 2995.

[2] Ibid., loc. 337.

[3] De Oratore 1.196; In Catilinam 3.26.

[4] Tert. Apol. 24.1.

Early Christianity on Abortion & Exposure of Children

What we must admit is that there are no clearly stated prohibitions against abortion in the New Testament. However, early Christianity—having itself consisted of Jewish adherents to the Way in the first decade after Christ’s ascension— continued to adopt their moral understanding of various issues from Judaism. We, first, look the Jewish historian, Josephus (c. 37–100 CE) and what he wrote about the Jewish prohibition against abortion. It was a prohibition according to Jewish law.

The law, moreover enjoins us to bring up all our offspring, and forbids women to cause abortion of what is begotten, or to destroy it afterward; and if any woman appears to have so done, she will be a murderer of her child, by destroying a living creature, and diminishing humankind: if anyone, therefore, proceeds to such fornication or murder, he cannot be clean.

(Against Apion 2.202)

The Ten Commandments were used by early Christians just as they were by Jews—as teachings that pertained to moral living. Notably, the sixth commandment, “You shall not murder,” was given a greater exposition in Christian thinking and applied specifically to the termination of a pregnancy. When in the late first, early second century, a document known as Didache was written, attention turned to the sixth commandment and stated, “You shall not murder … you shall not engage in sorcery; you shall not abort a child or commit infanticide” (2.2). This document understood the sixth commandment as extending to the unborn. The reason I included “sorcery” as a part of this understanding is that the Greek term translated “sorcery” is the word from which we get “pharmacy.” Therefore, “sorcery” here likely included taking abortifacients—drugs that induced miscarriage. Our modern understanding of the sixth commandment was clearly understood as extending to the life of the unborn.

Also in keeping with the Mosaic Law, the paths of life and death (Deuteronomy 27–28) are recast as darkness and light in another early Christian writing.

But the path of darkness is crooked and full of cursing, for it is the path of eternal death and punishment, in which way are the things that destroy the soul …  Here are they who are persecutors of the good, haters of truth, lovers of lies; they who know not the reward of righteousness, who cleave not to what is good nor unto just judgment … murderers of children.

(Epistle of Barnabas 20.1–2)

Christian writers believed that life in the womb was no different than life outside it. Clement of Alexandria (c. 160–215 CE) inferred from Luke 1:41 when John leaped in Elizabeth’s womb that very belief (Instructor 2.10.96). Athenagoras, in the late-second-century, pointed to Christianity’s rejection of abortion as proof that Christians were moral when he wrote that the Christians “say that those women who use drugs to bring on abortion commit murder, and will have to give an account to God for the abortion” (Leg. 35).

Later church councils forbade abortion and actually levied punishments against any who murdered their unborn. The Council of Elvira (c. 4th century) reflects such beliefs.

If a woman conceives in adultery and then has an abortion, she may not commune again, even as death approaches, because she has sinned twice. (Canon 63)

A catechumen who conceives in adultery and then suffocates the child may be baptized only when death approaches. (Canon 68)

Even some of the most notable early church theologians supported this stance. Both Augustine (c. 354–430) and John Chrysostom (c. 347–407) viewed abortion as murder, and exposure—abortion’s ugly cousin—was no less an evil.

Moses’ Law encouraged caring for orphans (Exodus 22:22–24; Deuteronomy 14:29).[1] God administered justice for orphans, so Israel was not to pervert justice towards them (Deuteronomy 10:18; cf. 24:17; 27:19). The Essenes—a Jewish sect that lived around the Dead Sea in the first century CE—were known for taking them in and caring for them. Their community resembled a modern idea of a monastery in that everything was common property. Josephus records that they would take in children not their own because they did not wed, and they would care for those children and teach them their ways (Wars 2.8.2).

I don’t wish to enter into a discussion about the legitimacy of orphanages or children’s homes, but the order of widows cared for orphans as a part of their ecclesial duties.[2] Theologically, caring for orphans is missional in its practice. Even Jesus was adopted by Joseph, and Christ identified Himself with the “least of these my brothers” (Matthew 25:40). To care for orphans is to see Christ in the orphan as one of the least of those in society. As Christians, we have been adopted into God’s family. We are orphans made children by adoption through Christ (Romans 8:15, 23).[3]

A testimony of early church history also demonstrates that such were cared for by Christians. The late first-century bishop, Clement of Rome wrote, “Let the [elders] be compassionate and merciful to everyone—bringing back those who wander, visiting all the sick, and not neglecting the widow, the orphan, or the poor.” The second-century Greek apologist, Aristides, wrote that Christians “do not turn away their care from widows, and they deliver the orphan from anyone who treats him harshly.” The second-century Christian work, Shepherd of Hermas, noted, “Therefore, instead of lands, buy afflicted souls, according as each one is able. And visit widows and orphans.”[4]

Christianity’s stances on exposure led to a shift in Roman law in later years.[5] By 374 CE, one could incur a penalty for exposing a child. Obviously, by this time, Constantine had reigned and obliterated the persecution of Christians with Christianity later becoming the state religion in the Roman Empire. This elevation of the faith was good in some respects but bad in others. The good that came from the legalization of Christianity and its adoption as the state religion was that Christian theology began to have a say in legal matters.

The Cappadocian Fathers of the fourth century, as well as Latin theologians, helped shape the thinking of the Empire with some of them even having strong connections in government, For example, the Cappadocian Father, Basil the Great was familiar with Julian the Apostate since the two had been educated together. These two figures began competing, Basil through Christianity and Julian through the pagan rites, to win the hearts of people to their respective faiths. By this time, however, paganism had little influence but Christianity flourished.

With abortion as with exposure, while a rather defined orthodoxy was to not abort or expose children, not all Christians were blameless in these areas. Christians both participated in aborting unborn and exposing newly born infants.[6] One may wonder why these unique features taught in Christianity were violated by adherents to the faith. After all, wouldn’t that make these unique features unworthy of the world? Would it not nullify the faith of Christ itself and might we be justified in labeling those who did such “hypocrites?” The frustration is inevitable. However, there is no excuse for why Christians did such things.

I might remind the reader that many of the writings that comprise the New Testament were written as reactionary letters to communities of faith who were skating perilously close to an edge of heresy or infidelity to God. Christians are no different from any other person or group of people. We have our trials and temptations. We try rather hard to weather the storms, but despite our profession of faith, we still sin. It may be with a purpose that Christians sin, and sometimes it may be accidental. We still sin. However, the lives we are supposed to live are to be mirrored after that of Christ Himself. Yet, we often fall short. The early Christians did, and we still do today. If we can but recapture the uniqueness of our faith once again, perhaps we’ll be able to make the kind of changes that those believers did in their own time

[1] The Hebrew term often translated as “fatherless child” in the NKJV is elsewhere translated as “orphan” (cf. Lamentations 5:3; Malachi 3:5), so when I mention orphan and you reference the passage to find the translation as “fatherless child,” I’ve referenced from the Hebrew and not the English. Interestingly enough, many passages where “orphan” appears also has “widow” in the same verse or immediate context. At other places, “stranger” appears alongside them both. The point being that God cares for those most vulnerable to abuse in society. It must be mentioned that the Thebans outlawed exposure, but allowed the sale of children. This is the only recorded government, alongside the practice of Jews and Christians, to have taken a rather different approach for the newborn when compared to the rest of the ancient world.

[2] See Michael J. Gorman, Abortion and the Early Church: Christian, Jewish and Pagan Attitudes in the Greco-Roman World (Eugene: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 1982).

[3] Russell D. Moore, “Abba Changes Everything: Why Every Christian Is Called to Rescue Orphans,” Christianity Today 54, no. 7 (July 2010): 18–22.

[4] David W. Bercot, ed., A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs, s.v. “Orphans and Widows,” 1998.

[5] See Joshua C. Tate, “Christianity and the Legal Status of Abandoned Children in the Later Roman Empire,” Journal of Law and Religion 24, no. 1 (2008/09): 123–41.

[6] Everett Ferguson, Thinking-Living-Dying: Early Apologists Speak to the 21st Century (Vienna: Warren Christian Apologetics Center, 2011), 27, 29.

Abortion in Greco-Roman Society

The intention of this post is to record history, and not opine so much on why and how things were done. In the next post, historical sources from early Christianity will be provided on the same matter to show how Christianity, in this regard, distinguished itself from Greco-Roman society at-large.

Hippocrates (c. 460–375 BCE) was a pioneer of medical theory as well as the oath that all physicians swore by upon beginning their practice of medicine, and still do today from my understanding. A part of the Hippocratic Oath states, “I will not give to a woman [an abortifacient].” Abortion was rather common in antiquity, but Greco-Roman society wasn’t entirely careless regarding the unborn. In some cases, abortion appears as wrong as some believe it to be today. For example, in Athens, if a man died while his wife was pregnant and she aborted the pregnancy upon his death, she was charged to have committed a crime against her husband. The legal theory was that her abortion was criminal since the unborn child could have claimed the late father’s estate, so it was more a matter of property rights than a moral statute. Fast-forwarding closer to the advent of Christ, we see that not much had changed in this regard.

Ovid’s work Amores was first published in 16 BCE. In this work of poetry, Ovid mentions abortion in the early Roman Empire and the unborn child as a “burden” (Am. 2.13). However, in the next elegy, he refers to the fetus as “tender” and the destruction of it as by a “warlike method.” This particular elegy is against abortion because it robs society of her Caesars and other heroes. Furthermore, were this a common practice, Ovid suggests, there would be no humanity. He asked why women would “thrust and pierce with the instrument and give dire poisons” to unborn children, which explains how abortions were performed then (Am. 2.14). The methods of abortion were sometimes as risky for the mother as they were for the unborn baby and many women died from having attempted to terminate their pregnancy.

The Roman statesman, Cicero mentions a disdain for abortion similar to the Athenian law mentioned above. A mother had been bribed by alternative heirs to terminate her pregnancy, which she did. The mother, in turn, was condemned to death because she cheated the father of his posterity and the Republic of a potential citizen (In Defense of Cluentius 32). The philosophical school of Stoicism held that life began once a child was born. The breathing of a person outside the womb was the moment life began. This thinking allowed abortion to be acceptable, and Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BCE–65 CE), a Roman statesman and philosopher, was able to use this belief in the legal system. Seneca wrote that “unnatural progeny” were destroyed, which was likely a reference to an incestuous conception. He also wrote about drowning children that were born abnormal and weak (On Anger 1.15.2–3). The Stoic idea that unborn babies were not humans came to influence Roman law and only further justified the practice of abortion.[1]

Not all Stoics, however, consented to abortion being a good thing. Musonius Rufus (c. 30?–102 CE) saw abortion as inhuman. He saw its purpose as solely of enhancing the firstborn’s inheritance more than anything, which amounted to greedy motives. The lawgivers, he contended, functioned to discern what was lawful and good for the state, as well as what was bad and detrimental to it. The lawgivers, he recalled, urged the increase of the homes as something fortunate. So fortunate was the increase of the homes “that they forbade women to suffer abortions and imposed a penalty upon those who disobeyed” (Discourse 15). His discourse on this matter is likely a referendum against the common practice of abortions in the first century.[2]

Juvenal wrote that wealthy women would not endure labor, but would dull the pain with drugs or obtain an abortion (Satire 6.593–96). He also wrote how Emperor Domitian (c. 81–96 CE) impregnated his niece and then gave her abortive drugs. The niece in question, Julia, died in 91 CE as a result of the abortion (Satire 2.20–24). Here we see another example of why abortions were performed (incest). Wealthy people may not have just wanted to deal with it, so they terminated the pregnancy. However, there was another reason for terminating a pregnancy. Slave women might terminate a pregnancy to avoid bringing up a child in slavery.[3] The slave women would have had to have done this in secrecy because a slave’s child was the property of her master and not her own.   

In the second century, the Greek gynecologist, obstetrician, and pediatrician, Soranus of Ephesus, wrote his work Gynecology which explains how medical knowledge at the time treated various related matters. In this work, he distinguished between an involuntary abortion—what we’d call “miscarriage”—and the willful termination of pregnancy. He also distinguished between a contraceptive and abortive. The former was to prevent conception from taking place while the latter was intended to expel the unborn from the woman’s body (Gyn. 1.59–60). In discussing when an abortive was given, he noted that some would not give an abortive if a woman wanted to terminate the pregnancy due to adultery or because she wanted to preserve her youthful beauty—again, two reasons why abortions took place then. An abortive would be given if it were discovered that the woman’s body, according to the science then, were determined to be unable of birthing a child and thus risk the mother’s wellbeing. However, Soranus preferred contraceptives to an abortive as a preventative risk, because “it is safer to prevent conception from taking place than to destroy the fetus” (Gyn. 1.60). He then went on to list various concoctions that could be used as a contraceptive or abortifacient, but if used to terminate a pregnancy, serious side effects followed that posed significant risks (Gyn. 1.61–63). Yet, this didn’t prevent him from explicitly naming how one might terminate a pregnancy (Gyn. 1.64–65).

While more citations could be supplied to the ends of showing how common abortion was, we also noted a couple of pagans who were against it, but not for the same moral reasons early Christians stood opposed to the practice. Additionally, there were others who opposed abortion in antiquity, but Christians gave a clearer understanding of why it was wrong that distinguished them from others. In the next post, I’ll list early Christian sources on the matter itself.

[1] Cf. Justinian, Digest 35.2.9.1.

[2] Caesar Augustus issued edicts in 18 BCE and 9 CE promoting childbearing, but he did not explicitly outlaw abortion (Gorman, Abortion and the Early Church, 27).

[3] Dio Chrysostom (c. 40/50–110/120 CE), Discourses 15.8.

How Sophocles Can Help Us In the Age of BLM

One thing the humanities instilled in me was the ability to listen. I’m invited into a conversation, even if I happen to disagree with what’s written. The earliest engagement came from my first semester in my doctoral studies when I read Sophocles’ Theban Cycle, specifically, Antigone. What does a fifth century BCE Greek playwright have to say that could help me be a better listener? That’s a great question.   

The crux of the issue in Antigone revolves around the treatment of the corpse of Polyneices, Antigone’s brother. Contrasted with Polyneices was his brother Eteocles, who fought for the city of Thebes while the former fought against the city, thus garnering a traitor’s status by King Creon. According to law, the burial custom gave honor to the dead and rest for their ghost. What the context of this tragedy reveals is the equal respect for a Grecian citizen regardless of fidelity to the state.

The rebellion of Polyneices against the city of Thebes was undoubtedly a treacherous act. During the rule of Creon, Thebes was defending itself, and during this defense, Polyneices perished. Although, Creon thought Polyneices’ status as a traitor removed from him the honor of a proper burial. Tiresias was careful to point out to Creon that “a dead man’s body left unburied [and] defiled” was a dishonor regardless of the status of patriot or traitor.

The reader can readily sympathize with Creon’s feelings of not wanting to treat a traitor with the same respect as they would a patriot. Creon stated, “Those who are loyal to the city deserve respect when they are alive and every honor when they die.” Regarding Polyneices, Creon pronounced, “His corpse shall be left for carrion birds and dogs to foul and feed on.” His sentiment sounds reasonable. Creon had the authority to “make the laws that apply to both the living and the dead,” a higher law abounded, that of the gods.

Creon reasoned according to what he thought the gods would approve. He said the burial of a traitor was “offensive to heaven” while Antigone maintained that she would suffer “for having shown the laws of heaven reverence.” Creon observed that if the traitor prevailed, he would have likely burned the temples of the gods and their sacred altars. Creon went as far as to swear by Zeus to put to death the one who buried the traitor’s corpse. Therefore, Creon believed he was doing the will of the gods by exposing the traitor’s body.

In religion, the will of the gods always reigns supreme to that of human intellect (cf. Isaiah 55:8-9). Moreover, at times human intuition based upon a perceived grasp of their god’s holiness and will fails because what they understood to be the will of their god was the complete opposite (cf. Lev. 10:1-3; 1 Chron. 13:9-10; et. al.). Had Creon indeed sought to please the gods, should he not have inquired about the disposal of Polyneices’ body? What is strikingly apparent is that Creon acted based on emotion in declaring his judgment while Antigone acted within the will of the gods. What further vindicated Antigone’s actions were those corroborating interpretations of the gods’ will.

Haemon described Antigone’s deed as a “pious action” thus indicating her adherence to the god, Hades. Even Creon acknowledged her reverence for Hades and his laws in his anger. Creon said she should place her trust in Hades or else learn “that all her piety is useless.” What solidified Antigone’s actions was Tiresias’s words to Creon: “You do not rule over life and death. You cannot keep here what belongs to the gods below, a corpse, unburied, obscene … Therefore, will Furies attend you, relentless avengers dispatched from Hades.”

Perhaps the overarching principle that eluded Creon was that once dead, a person belonged to Hades. To reject Hades’ will by refusing to bury the dead was to reject the collective will of the gods in respect to their realms of dominion. Tiresias seemed to accost Creon’s actions in refusing the gods of the dead by leaving Polyneices’ body open to scavengers. While a man is mighty and influential on earth, he does not rule “Hades’ relentlessness,” but “when he honors the gods’ laws, his city stands proud, but when he ignores them, what of his city?”

In summation, the body of the dead traitor still deserved its due honor to please the gods, specifically Hades, since this was his realm. No clear stipulations appear to justify Creon’s actions and prohibit Antigone’s other than Creon’s mandate, which did not supersede the gods’ laws. Therefore, the dead, patriot or traitor, was to receive equal honor in burial rites.

This tragedy allows the reader to be the proverbial fly on the wall. We hear Creon’s frustration and plan for a traitor, which most of us might agree with, and Antigone’s reverence for the will of the gods. We’re privy to a back-and-forth over the merits of each position only to wonder who is right. Is there an absolute truth? Yes, but it depended on the zeitgeist of ancient Greece. Chief above all to the ancient Greeks was the intertwining of the state and its religion. Unlike our modern separation of church and state, ancient city-states in Greece would have thought such peculiar. The gods were responsible for the city-state’s success, and everyone, even the king, was indebted to them. In their time, the will of the gods reigned supreme. 

For us in the era of Black Lives Matter, we’d do well to listen. As for myself, the will of God, the Father of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, His will is chief among all. Sadly, not everyone agrees on the validity of the complaints from the black community. It’s because they’re either fueled by bigotry, a political party, or a separate ideology that permits dismissing those griefs. Nevertheless, we can all listen, and we should. 

A COVID-19 Leadership Lesson from an Ancient Roman

The year is 19 BCE, and the poet, Virgil is traveling with the Emperor Augustus. For the last ten years, Virgil has been working on an epic poem akin to Homer’s two infamous works, Iliad and Odyssey. The only difference being that Virgil is writing one not for Greece, but for the Roman Empire and its current leader, Augustus. While on this trip to Greece with the Emperor, Virgil has a heat stroke and is unwell. Not seeming to recover, he tells his companions to destroy his manuscript because he isn’t pleased with it in the least. Do they heed his words? No. After the statesman passes away, they present the unfinished work to the Emperor, who then orders it to be published throughout the Empire. Such is done, and even to this day, Virgil’s work remains with us. It is studied in the humanities by those in various disciplines. Luckily for us, they didn’t destroy it as the poet wanted, because we’d be bereft of a marvelous tome that gives us tremendous insight into the first centuries BCE and CE.

It hadn’t been much longer before Virgil began working on his poem that Augustus ended the civil war that ravaged the Empire. Augustus’ great-uncle, Julius Caesar, had crossed the Rubicon—an illegal act to bring an army beyond that point into the holy city—and consolidated power. Rome ceased to be a Republic and became an Empire. Caesar would eventually be assassinated in the Senate by many of his peers. This was only a continuation of the civil war that he’d began with Pompey. Now, various factions were vying for control of Rome. Caesar, himself having fathered no sons, had only his great-nephew, Augustus, to name as his heir, which he had done in his will. Augustus rode the popularity of his uncle and eventually quelled the rivals and, in a triumph, marched their corpses through the streets of Rome and was universally recognized as Emperor. Virgil’s work was to honor not only Augustus but the history of the Roman people.

Virgil picked up where Homer left off, but he picked up with the losers of the Trojan War, the Trojans themselves. He chose Aeneas, a high-ranking soldier, to be his hero and that of Rome. Aeneas and those with him who fled Troy did so in the shadow of a once-thought impregnable city burning in ashes. Flames and smoke filled the sky. Cries could be heard. Aeneas was the surviving officer to lead what Trojans he could to safety, and ultimately to fulfill the gods’ will of sailing to Latium (Italy) where they would establish themselves. Aeneas would be the father of the Roman people. Thrust into this position of sole leadership of the Trojans, Aeneas is portrayed as very much human, but a stalwart chap.

Virgil’s very much concerned with portraying him as human but as dutiful to the will of the gods. The word used in the text of him and his mission is pietas. This is a term we would translate as “duty.” If you’ve ever watched Downton Abbey and The Crown, you will understand a bit about duty. Particularly the latter, Queen Elizabeth is both a person and a monarch, and the crown must always win, as her grandmother tells her in the show. What does this entail? It entails subjugating one’s personal feelings, ties, and desires for the sake of their duty. Aeneas does this, and he is particularly shown to do so when he forsakes the Carthaginian Queen, Dido, to fulfill his mission.

So, you might now be asking, what has all this to do with COVID-19 and leadership? Now I will begin to answer this question, but only after you have an understanding of the context in which this occurred. In the first lines of this epic, Aeneid, the hero, is nearly shipwrecked as he and his compatriots flee the burning city of Troy. In that instance, Aeneas cries aloud to the heavens and gods about his miseries. However, not too much later in the first book of this work, Aeneas addresses those with him thus:

Companions mine, we have not failed to feel
calamity till now. O, ye have borne
far heavier sorrow: Jove will make an end
also of this. Ye sailed a course hard by
infuriate Scylla’s howling cliffs and caves.
Ye knew the Cyclops’ crags. Lift up your hearts!
No more complaint and fear! It well may be
some happier hour will find this memory fair.
Through chance and change and hazard without end,
our goal is Latium; where our destinies
beckon to blest abodes, and have ordained
that Troy shall rise new-born! Have patience all!
And bide expectantly that golden day. (Aeneid, 1.198–207)

He begins by acknowledging not only their loss in battle but the tumultuous journey in fleeing Troy and all the travails that have befallen them since. He, then, instructs them to no longer be afraid and, thus, complain. He points to the future and how they may even look back on this occasion with somewhat of a fondness. That sounds improbable, but he’s leading terrified, demoralized people. He invokes the gods’ will of them reaching Latium (Italy) and rising again. In the meantime, he urges them to be patient and to look forward to their bright future, for it is the will of the gods. After this, we read the following.

Such was his word, but vexed with grief and care,
feigned hopes upon his forehead firm he wore,
and locked within his heart a hero’s pain. (Aeneid, 1.208–210)

Virgil, next, informs us that while saying what he had said, the hero himself was terrified.

Leaders often must portray confidence even in the face of fear and uncertainty. No matter where we find ourselves, we’re all leaders in one way or another. As entrepreneurs, we’ve made tough decisions over the past month. People have had to be furloughed or laid off. Maybe even our inventory has had to be discarded or drastically reduced in price to keep afloat. As elected officials, we want to consider so many points that making the right decision seems like a no-win scenario. No matter what we decided, it won’t be popular with everyone, but we will make the decision based on the best available data. As parents, we want our children to be healthy and well, and we don’t want them to fear. We may grapple with our own fears, but we know if we let them know that we’re afraid, it could bring about the anxiety we aren’t equipped to manage. 

In my own position as a minister, I have found that the balancing act of doing what’s in the best interest of the congregation I serve and love as well as expressing my personal views is a tough road to travel. I’ve found it necessary to halt voicing my own opinions only because it garners more animosity than it’s worth. Though I’m no economist or epidemiologist, as a man of letters, I can read, research, decipher, and form what I believe to be an intelligent opinion. However, when people are afraid, no amount of reason is well-received and often subject to misinterpretation. I care for people: their health, their economy, and their rights. I’ve subjected my personal feelings to the backburner on all that is taking place for the sake of a greater good—bringing peace and calm in an unprecedented time. Virgil has been my instructor in this venture as of late. If I had it to do over again, I would have withheld my own views for fear that it may alienate someone from Christ by my role as a minister. The Gospel is exceedingly more important than being right. My opinion isn’t that important if it would create a chasm between myself and a potential convert to Jesus. Virgil taught me this through his own leadership of people, and he can show us all how to best lead during this period.

Vergil. Aeneid. Theodore C. Williams. trans. Boston. Houghton Mifflin Co. 1910.

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