Doesn't Lev. 27:6 show that God places no value on the lives of unborn children?

From Theonomy Wiki
This page contains changes which are not marked for translation.

Answered Questions

This is a foolish argument that people who want to justify abortion will try to use. It merely shows that they are ignorant of God's law.

Here is the full context of the law in question: 2 “Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them, ‘When a man consecrates a person to YHWH in a vow, according to your valuation, 3 your valuation of a male from twenty years old to sixty years old shall be fifty shekels of silver, according to the shekel of the sanctuary. 4 If she is a female, then your valuation shall be thirty shekels. 5 If the person is from five years old to twenty years old, then your valuation shall be for a male twenty shekels, and for a female ten shekels. 6 If the person is from a month old to five years old, then your valuation shall be for a male five shekels of silver, and for a female your valuation shall be three shekels of silver. 7 If the person is from sixty years old and upward; if he is a male, then your valuation shall be fifteen shekels, and for a female ten shekels. Leviticus 27:2-7WEB

The ancient Israelites had a custom of showing their love for God by making vows. Sometimes these vows involved dedicating either themselves or their children to work for God's sanctuary/temple (e.g. 1 Sam. 1:22). Vows were not required by God's law (cf. Deut.23:21-23), but they were allowed, and regulated. One might even conclude that God's law discouraged the careless use of vows, by the regulations that surrounded them.

People could even dedicate themselves or their children to the service of the sanctuary. But if they changed their mind about the vow later, they could not break their word to God (see Eccl.5:4-5). The law above, mercifully, allowed a person to fulfill their vow of dedication (without having to literally serve the sanctuary) by paying a certain amount of money, based upon the age of the person at the time.

The differing vow-redemption amounts generally follow the expected value of a person's labor for an extended period of time. An average wage for a laborer at that time would be a shekel per month. Women and the elderly were physically weaker, thus their labor value was correspondingly less. This obviously has nothing to do with the personal value of the human beings themselves. This would be like someone in today's culture saying that professional basketball players have more value as human beings than mothers, because they are paid more for their work. If you recognize the foolishness of that statement, then you can understand the foolishness of the pro-abortionist's argument.

The fact that the unborn (and up to one month-old) are not assigned a vow-redemption value probably means that no one was expected to change their mind about the vow this early in the child's life. Interpreted at face value, this law means that if someone did change their mind about the vow this early, they would not have to pay anything to discharge the vow without sinning, which is a pretty merciful way of dealing with rash vows.