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The Great Debate Continues

WHEN does life begin? At birth or at conception? This is the basic question that legislators of several countries are pondering. Recently the United States Senate held an “abortion hearing” in which scientists testified concerning the beginning of life. One witness, Dr. J. Lejeune, a French geneticist, argued that “from its very beginning the ‘thing’ we started with is a member of our kin . . . the same human being from fecundation [fertilization] to death.” In his contention that life begins at conception, he stated: “The very fact that we have to develop ourselves during nine months inside the bodily protection of our mother does not change anything.”

At this same hearing another scientist arguing in favor of abortion reasoned that the question “is essentially a religious and moral” one. In reflecting on his point, how does the greatest of religious books refer to the unborn? As simply tissue? The Bible at Jeremiah 1:5 says: “Before you proceeded to come forth from the womb I sanctified you.” God viewed Jeremiah as having life prior to his birth. Likewise the inspired psalmist David says: “You kept me screened off in the belly of my mother. . . . Your eyes saw even the embryo of me, and in your book all its parts were down in writing.”​—Ps. 139:13-16.

Thus, while the debate continues among scientists and legislators, for those who look to the Bible the answer has already been given by the greatest Scientist, the Source of life himself.​—Ps. 36:9.