The “You’re a Man” Fallacy

In abortion argumentation, a common attack against critics who are male is, “You’re a man, you can’t get pregnant, so you don’t have a right to talk about it.” Let’s take a moment just to review why this argument simply doesn’t work.

1) It’s an ad hominem, plain and simple.

An ad hominem is often believed to just be an insult (like “You’re stupid!”), but actually the Latin phrase itself means against the man. It refers to an argument that attacks a personal trait of someone giving the argument, rather than the argument itself. In this case, the response is not to the argument the man is making, merely the fact he is a man. It is therefore, at its very nature, a fallacious argument.

Let me put it this way: suppose I had a physical, and the female doctor inspecting me told me that it seemed I had testicular cancer, and that I should get treated or I might lose them. Would it make any sense to tell her, “Don’t tell me what to do! You’re a woman, you don’t know what it’s like to have testicles!” Of course not. I’m not responding to her arguments or any of her points – I’m just stating that she’s a woman, as if that ends all discussion or completely negates what she just said.

2) It’s inconsistent with other argumentation.

If a white person said, “I think the Jim Crow laws were wrong,” would anyone stand up and say, “You can’t comment! You’re white!” Probably not. Likewise, one has to wonder if in a scenario a man supported abortion, how many pro-abortion people would jump up and say, “You can’t say you support abortion! You’re a man!” Probably none. Yet if you’re going to make a kind of argumentation about one subject, you have to be consistent across the board.

The presents a good reason why this form of ad hominem is so fallacious: a moral or ethical question is not bound by the personal traits of the person giving it. A person does not have to be Jewish to say the Holocaust was wrong. A person does not have to be black to say the Jim Crow laws were wrong. A person does not have to have to be a kid to know child abuse is wrong. A person does not have to have lived under a dictator to know tyranny is wrong. Likewise, a person does not have to be a woman to say abortion is wrong.

3) It’s not carried to its logical conclusion.

Let’s say, for the sake of argumentation, that a man can’t comment on abortion because he’s a man and can never be pregnant. Who, then, can? If we say those who can get pregnant (ie., women), let’s take that a step further. A woman who has never been pregnant could not comment, because she has not shared in all the emotional and physical experiences that come with that, therefore women who have never been pregnant cannot comment. Furthermore, a woman who was pregnant and had an abortion did not experience childbirth and all the positives and negatives that went with it, therefore she cannot give a valid opinion based on experiences. Even then, one would have to go through child rearing, raising a child through infancy, the teenage years, and through college to see if any one can go through that. Therefore, the only people who can ever comment on abortion are women who have had actual pregnancies, given birth to children and then raised those children through adulthood. That would not only take out a good chunk of pro-life advocates, but a good number of pro-abortion advocates as well. Sadly, I don’t think many pro-abortion advocates would follow this logic quite this far.

Every woman talks about post partum depression. But

nobody talks about Post Abortion Depression (PAD). There are

many articles by women and even books on the problem. The

women who write relate they are left to solve the issue on their

own. This article is a desire to help each and every woman with

this issue.

I am a father. Obviously I have children so I might have a

little personal experience. Our first birth resulted in my wife

having severe post partum depression. It lasted about five

months. At the second birth she knew we could handle the

problems of marriage and children. This goes along with the

study and logic I have found in order to write this article. We

were paying our mortgage, utilities, and eating enough

nutritious foods. We had a constructive future. The percent

of women in an ethnic group who have PPD are in lower

Post Abortion Depression 2 of 7

socio-economic straits, have little family support, possibly

no spouse, and are already responsible for other children.

There have been some studies on the hormone changes.

But the responses to therapy have not proven successful. They

do not explain PPD of the husbands involved. True, husbands

have lesser and shorter problems, but they can and do have

PPD. They don’t have hormonal changes.

There is another issue called the baby blues. It is shorter

term and seems to be more related to the fact of the increased

work load, interrupted sleep patterns, colicky baby, change in

diet needs and house hold tasks. The organizational ability of

the woman and advice from friends solves most of the blues.

But I think the problem of Post Abortion Depression is

moral problem. My logic is based on my acceptance of the

Christian moral position of a righteous God and sinful humans.

I personally accept the Old and New Testament as the writing

of the same God and of equal authority.
Post Abortion Depression 3 of 7

Everybody in the world lives in a country with a law against

murder, stopping a human life. God included it in His Ten

Commandments. Murder in the Bible includes more than just

stopping a life. We can kill a fly. We can kill a cow and eat the

meat. That is stopping a life. But the death of a human includes

the separation of a body and its soul per biblical information.

Well, what about self defense and capital punishment you

That is a proper question. The Old Testament (OT) records

two instances of a killing. Self defense is illustrated in the

story of an individual entering through a window at night. The

owner of the house is allowed to assume the intruder is entering

with malicious intent. In the defense of the home, if the intruder

dies, the home owner is not to be accused of a murder.

The second is in Ex. 21:22-25 and it is included in the

account of an abused pregnant woman. God seems to give

two principles we should live with in this account. One

Post Abortion Depression 4of 7

principle prescribes equal punishment for comparable crimes, a

‘soul for a soul, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”. But

secondly, the separation of the soul of one of the victims must

result in God also receiving the soul of the person who caused a

death. That would reinforce the command of Gen. 9:6 where God

commands the shedding of a man’s blood be followed by the

shedding of the killer’s blood. Other places indicate there must

also be a public court case to prove guilt for such human action.

So now that we indicated an authorized separation of a body

from its soul, killing, there must be an unauthorized instance,

murder. The explanation is more involved and starts at the

creation.

The Bible takes the existence of Jehovah as a given. Then at

creation He gives Adam a “living soul” which makes him special

and different from the other living creatures. An important concept

is the adjective and the noun. The soul is a real thing. God gives a

few rules to the new couple. The critical one being, “rebel and I
Post Abortion Depression 5 of 7

will take back my “living soul” (My paraphrase). They rebelled

and God kept His promise, continuing death to each of us. It is His

promise so God doesn’t allow sinful humans to usurp His deity or

when He decides to carry out His promise. He calls that a murder,

a short word for an ‘unauthorized separation of a body and its

soul’. The soul of each individual was given at the same time as

the sperm joined with the egg according to Psalm 51. It is a new,

special creature, a human being.

Now we are getting into the cause of PAD. Most people

believe there is a god. I didn’t capitalize the word because many

have a vague definition with no specific god in mind. However, the

Bible claims He has a name, Jehovah, and has written a book they

are to read, understand, and follow. That book claims everybody

has inner knowledge of the God mentioned in it.

Reading between the lines of articles written by women with

PAD, a Christian has a perspective of befuddled individuals

Post Abortion Depression 6 of 7

hunting for salvation from God’s justice. They sense they have

murdered their own flesh and blood. They are afraid of the coming

Judgment and the Hell God has promised. It is a lifelong turmoil.

Unfortunately, I know of no Christian Church or its adherents

who are publicly advertising they know the solution for PAD.

They are proving a poignant and common complaint of these

suffering women who are left to suffer alone in silence.

Personally I am available to help. I will explain in as simple

terms as I know of the fall into sin. The picture of the unblemished

lamb which shed its blood to pay for sin was written in the OT.

The final shedding of blood by the unblemished Lamb of God,

Jesus Christ, paid for all sins. The result is a future life with God

after repentance and acceptance of Jesus’ blood as payment for the

sin of murder and subsequent forgiveness. The life time

commitment is the personal part, and sharing with others is

reassurance and joy.

My email is coehling@sbcglobal.net and the website is
Post Abortion Depression 7 of 7

www.michigandersforlife.com, my telephone is 1-269-

468-7110, 6314f, and I can be contacted at 330 E. Center St.,

Coloma MI 49038. I will provide Luther’s Small Catechism. It

contains the doctrinal basics in Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

form focusing on Bible passage answers. Acceptance and belief is

up to the individual’s personal commitment to Jehovah. I can try to

connect individuals to other Christian women. You are not alone.

1164 words

Today, 13 April 2011, the Health Committee of the Alabama House of Representatives held a hearing on the Alabama Personhood Amendment, a proposed amendment to the Alabama Constitution that would recognize the personhood of the unborn child from the moment of fertilization and at all times thereafter until death.

A rabbi spoke in opposition to the amendment, arguing that the Mosaic Law does not recognize an unborn child as a person. To prove his point he cited Exodus 21:22-25, in which a man who causes a pregnant mother to deliver a child prematurely is liable only for damages, not murder or manslaughter for causing the death of the child.

I respectfully disagree. I make no claim to be a Hebrew scholar, although I did study Hebrew in seminary. But my study of this passage convinces me that the rabbi’s interpretation of this passage is mistaken.

The passage reads,

If men fight, and hurt a woman with child, so that she gives birth prematurely, yet no lasting harm follows, he shall surely be punished accordingly as the woman’s husband imposes on him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. But if any lasting harm follows, then you shall give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe (NKJV).

The passage presupposes that the pregnant woman’s husband is in the right and that the other man is the aggressor. As the men fight, the pregnant wife is struck (possibly she had entered the fray to help her husband, or they rolled in her direction), and “she gives birth prematurely,” or as the King James says, “her fruit depart from her.” Some have interpreted this passage to mean that the woman has a miscarriage, but I’m convinced that is not what the text says or means.

The term that the KJV translates “depart from her” and that the NKJV and other translations render “gives birth prematurely” is yatsah. In every other Old Testament passage in which yatsah is used in connection with childbirth, it refers to a normal and healthy childbirth with the possible exception of Numbers 12:12 which may refer to a stillbirth but not a miscarriage. If the author of the Book of Exodus (whom I believe to have been Moses) had wanted to speak of a miscarriage, there are at least two distinctive words for miscarriage that he could have used: shakol, which he used two chapters later in Exodus 23:26, and nephel, which is found Job 3:16, Psalm 58:8, and Ecclesiastes 6:3. But Moses did not use shakol or nephel in Exodus 21:22. He used the normal word for childbirth, yatsah. I believe Moses, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, said exactly what he meant and meant exactly what he said.

Some confusion over this passage resulted from an early version of the New American Standard translation which rendered the passage “miscarriage.” But the 1995 edition of the New American Standard corrects that mistake and renders the passage “so that she gives birth prematurely.” Thus the New American Standard is now in harmony with most other translations. Brown, Driver & Briggs, the most authoritative Hebrew lexicon, lists the passage as “untimely birth.”

The term the KJV translates “fruit” and that other versions render “child” or “children” is yehled. This word is found 89 times in the Old Testament, and in every other passage in which it is used in relation to humans, it is translated as a child, children, a boy, or a young man.
The picture this passage presents, then, is that of a pregnant woman who is struck by an aggressor and who as a result gives birth to a child prematurely. Now let’s look at the result.

If “no lasting harm follows” (the word ahsohn translated harm is a broad term meaning harm in general), meaning there is no injury to the mother or to the child, then “he shall surely be punished accordingly as the woman’s husband imposes on him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.” Again, the text presupposes that the other man is the aggressor and at fault. He is to be punished for starting the fight, and he is to pay restitution for any damage he has caused to the husband.

The text continues, “But if any lasting harm follows, then you shall give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.” If there is harm – and nothing in the passage limits the harm to injury to the mother only – then the offender is to be punished according to the lex talionis or law of like punishment: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, etc. If the offender causes the death of the unborn child, the crime is to be treated as murder, “life for life.”

Correctly translated and interpreted, the passage cited by the rabbi strongly supports the personhood position by providing legal protection for the life of the unborn child.
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2 Responses to “Does Exodus 21 Provide Legal Protection for the Unborn Child?”

Rebecca YeHyung Lee says:
April 14, 2011 at 10:51 am

Dear Professor Eidsmoe

Thank you for pointing out that. I was at the hearing with the Bible with me, but could not think about the points. Blessings, Rebecca
Carl G. Oehling says:
April 15, 2011 at 9:27 am

Dr. Eidsmoe, I read of the examples of men of God like Nathan, Elijah, Jonas, John, etc. who spoke God’s words with the meaning (Neh. 8:8) so the people could understand. They spoke against the sins of the day. John spoke of repentance of the sins of the day and little of the coming payment for those sins. What is wrong with “Go and do thou likewise”?

SANCTITY OF LIFE AND POST ABORTION DEPRESSION

Life is introduced in the first two chapters of the Hebrew Bible and we have a lot of information. God has as an innate part of Himself the attribute of life. Since He has always been and always will be, so life has no beginning or end. In the course of events, God created the universe, formed Adam from the earth and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. Adam became a living soul. Next God took a living rib from Adam and formed Eve from it. Thus life was continued in her. There was no spontaneous generation. A new life was not started. The two produced live, haploid cells in their bodies. The two cells joined in Eve’s falopian tube to form a live diploid cell with its human DNA. It developed onto a live, adult human being, Cain. God’s life has continued in that manner ever since because God decreed man continue their kind. The difference between human life and other organisms is the soul God gives humans at conception.

The sin of murder is because of God’s covenant with Adam, ‘you eat, I take back my soul”! (My paraphrase). Since we are in Adam’s image, we die. It happened 930 years later for Adam. Nobody has authority to interfere with God’s covenant with each individual. We cannot give a living soul. God does that at conception. But we can separate the body from its soul. God calls the usurped authority a murder. That action irritates God to the extent He commands society to immediately send the murderer to Him for eternal Judgment upon conviction of the crime. We call that capitol punishment, but it is merely the door of God’s Judgment Hall.

That is the origin for my position on murder. I think society has determined the same idea and in Michigan we have MCL 750.316, the law against premeditated murder. For those two reasons I am anti-murder.

Please note well I am not pro-life. I have nothing to do with making life. I think that is Jehovah’s sole domain.

I am not anti-abortion, either. An abortion is: “the premature removal of the fetus from the maternal organ of reproduction”. It is done to bitches, cats, rats and many others. It is accomplished by God Himself in a spontaneous abortion. I don’t have the authority to disagree with God. There are many other justifiable reasons that abortions occur as a quick check with a medical dictionary will confirm. Since those terms are written in Hospital records and used in court cases they also have court precedence.

I think it is proper to illustrate how far the definitions of murder and abortion are separated in meaning. One method of murder is done when a human being removes some of the amniotic fluid from the sac and replaces it with a chemical which causes the death of the baby in about 2 hours. Often about 2 days later the mother goes into labor and gives birth to the dead child. That is a normal reaction. The abortion has nothing to do with the murder. But it has a lot to do with the mother removing the rotting baby from her body. It is common in an infection of Brucelle Abortus in cows also.

Some times we desire a quicker solution to a pregnancy so we devise other methods. In partial-birth-abortion, we define when a fetus is still in the womb and when the baby is considered born. The critical moment is when the belly button passes outside the labia major. Thus, when the Medical doctor blows the brains out of the skull before the belly button passes outside, the death occurs before birth. The doctor then aborts a corpse before it rots.

The Justices of the U. S. supreme court have decided a fetus is not defined as a person and has no Constitutional rights. I beg to differ. The “right to life” is a clear statement in the way I read those words. The distinctions of color of skin, sex, ethnic group, age and other qualifications are not included. I do not read where the Justices have the authority to add words or ideas to the Constitution.

I bring up another legal problem now. What if a man dies and one of his children is in the womb. His will give his estate to his wife and children per stirpe. The estate will be divided as if the child is born even if he is still a fetus and not a ‘person’, and I imagine that has court precedence.

POST ABORTION DEPRESSION (PAD) is a terrible result of many abortions. The problem is many people think there is a God who will judge them after they die. The Judeo-christian Bible claims everybody knows it in their heart. It is therefore a foregone conclusion that the woman who allows another person to destroy the life in her womb is guilty of murder. That is the recipe for life long depression. It is universally ignored by most people because they were not the mother. But if a person reads the pathos of women in PAD, one cannot help but cry. My solution is to highlight the murder and ignore the abortion. Then tell her of humans personality to sin and God’s solution of shedding Christ’s blood on the cross in lieu of their own in Hell. I intend calling it what it is, premeditated murder, by including in MCL 750.316 the definition of a human by its DNA. LET’S STOP PAD!

I think one of the reasons there is no final social observance of the law against murder is because the Christians and Jews don’t tell people the unauthorized separation of the body and soul is a murder. Jehovah authorizes that separation in the case of self defense. He commands that separation after conviction of a capital crime against society’s laws which are patterned after His primary Law.

We intend having on hand bumper stickers, t-shirts, tri-folds and stuff to inform society. A bumper sticker might say: ROE vs. WADE EXPLOITS WOMAN; or Roe Vs. Wade 1973 to 2010: 50,000,000 murdered: Vengeance is Mine, God.

I was running for the Michigan 79th District House of Representatives. I will work to change MCL 750.316 to include the definition of a human being by DNA. My web site is www.carloehling.com or www.michigandersforlife.com.

coehling@sbcglobal.net; 1-269-468-7110

The whole reason we are still murdering babies in the womb is very few are
calling it by Jeh_vah’s Word, namely MURDER. In Ex 21:22-25 God doesn’t even
mention the abortion since it is not a sin against any of His Ten Commandments.
He does mention the command to send Him the MURDERER. Murder is mentioned as a
sin in the Ten Commandments. Neither of the men mentioned or Operation Rescue
promote God’s Word. I frankly wonder what they or any Christian or Jew uses as
the foundation for their position in Roe vs. Wade.
I have two URLs establishing my position, www.michigandersforlife.com and
www.carloehling.com. If you three don’t first establish we get a SOUL at
conception from God, then your life is no different from the cow we eat at
MacDonald’s. If you three don’t mention the SOUL leaves the body at death, even
as Rebecca’s SOUL left her body after death at childbirth, you have no Biblical
foundation. If you three don’t then remind everybody, God will have an
accounting on Judgment Day with each individual about how they voted, they have
no personal reason to vote God’s will.
What do all Christians mean, and especially the Pastors when they lead the
congregation, and they say in the LORD”S Prayer: “Thy will be done on earth as
it is done in Heaven”? Do you think the Angels were a nano-second late in
announcing the birth of Christ? Who do they think God expects to do it on earth.

Society is now 39 years late in sending the MURDERERS to God for His ultimate judgment
as He has commanded us. Either we do it God’s way or He will not listen to our
prayers or help us.

Carl G. Oehling, <’))><

TWICE BLESSED

The child of my child I now hold in my arms;

Defenses all down – I’ve succumbed to her charms;

Her toes how enchanting; Her hands sheer delight!

Oh baby! Oh baby—it’s love at first sight!!

To see the perfection of God in your eyes!

I knew you were coming—so why the surprise?

To witness this miracle – child come to be;

Oh child of my child – you’re life’s sweet mystery!!

You look like your mother and now I recall

A day wrought in fear like a tottering wall

About to envelope my heart and my soul:

To kill my own baby was my desperate goal.

And then as I walked in the cold winter air,

I heard a small voice like an angel in prayer:

“Please don’t kill your baby!” she pleaded with me

“My Jesus will help you and set your heart free!”

And now as I think of the deed almost done,

I’m TWICE BLESSED –oh, thank God for this little one!

Oh, child of my child what a wonder you are!

You shine on my life like a bright morning star!!

www.voicefortheunborn.com