That is… a stupefying description of what is written. I had to read the torah in primary school. Half a day, every school day, one book per year, (two for Leviticus), in Hebrew. I was confounded. I thought maybe Rabbi had us skip that part.
The part you are referring to is referred to as “Sota” which describes a magical ceremony where in a man would bring his allegedly unfaithful wife before a Beis Din, and she could drink a magic potion, snickeringly referred to as “sota water,” to prove her innocence. The logic goes that if the woman was unfaithful, “these afflictive waters shall enter your innards, causing your belly to swell and your thigh to rupture” . This could be taken mean an abortion, but in my grade school class, we were very giggly, because we thought it meant she would explode.
Further, the potion is described being water, dust from the tabernacle floor, and an invocation written down and dissolved in the water (Number 5: 17, and 23), and is explicitly stated it won’t hurt an innocent woman. (28). This passage does evoke abortion. But it describes a magical ritual that it claims will only cause abortion in unfaithful women, and the potion provided wont cause anyone to abort (although it is gross). Claiming in instructs an abortion is a massive stretch.
Doesn’t that mean that the bible condones abortion in the case of infidelity? In which case, shouldn’t Republicans want that to be an exception?
It could be interpreted that way… I think? The language it uses refers to seeds.
The situation (infidelity, the graphic imagery of swelling bellies and rupturing thighs) naturally implies abortion, but the ‘Nezre’ah Zerah’ implies the potion will cause barreness.
Fair enough. Of course, this is also from the same half of the Bible Christians conveniently ignore when they want bacon for breakfast, so I guess it’s on the moot side of things.
Yes, I boiled it down to bare bones, but if you ask almost any Rabbi if abortion is allowed, they will do their typical Rabbi thing of trying to dance around the answer so you answer your own question, but if you try to pin them down, they will say that it isn’t forbidden, but should really only be used if the mother in danger of health complications, like death.
As I understand it, The Talmud or Mishrad goes further into how to prepare butter waters, and there is a root that also goes in there that was well known to facilitate an abortion.
