This piece was written by Dr Peter Orr – a lecturer at Moore College. We will be looking at it in two parts.
Have you ever thought about one of the underlying assumptions behind almost every Hollywood thriller?
It is the value of human life.
Basically, because we value human life, the hero will bend over backwards to ensure that the nerve gas isn’t released into the city’s gas supply or stop the nuclear warhead from being detonated.
These movies would be pretty short if the hero simply did a cost-benefit analysis and concluded that it would be simply too expensive to save the city. No, the underlying assumption is that human life is precious.
But when we try and analyse why human life is valuable things get a bit more tricky. As Christians we know that human beings are created in the image of God and animals are not. But when we are pressed we often find it hard to say more than that.
Increasingly, though, it will be important that we are clear on the value of humanity since, as Western society turns its back on its Christian heritage, voices are being raised that question the assumption that there is anything special about humanity. For example, the Australian philosopher Peter Singer argued some years ago in the journal Metaphilosophy that to favour human life over animal life is actually a form of “speciesism”.
The Bible gives us a different perspective, and perhaps the clearest example of its perspective is in Psalm 8. David asks the question in verse 4: “what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?” And the psalm gives us three parts to the answer.
1. Human life is valuable because even in its weakness it brings glory to God (v.2)
The first point David makes is that God’s glory – his strength and his majesty – is shown in the weakest member of humanity: “Through the praise of children and infants you have established a stronghold against your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger”.
Even young children praise God – their mouths can testify to God’s strength and that silences those who oppose him. That is how Jesus uses this psalm in Matthew 21:16 as he enters Jerusalem and people complain about the children heralding his entry.
The idea is also that God proves his strength in that he can sustain even the weakest member of the human race. If anything shows humanity in its frailty it is a baby. What chance of survival does a baby have if left on its own? But even more, what chance does a baby have when it is surrounded by the type of people described in this verse: foes, the enemy and the avenger? A baby wouldn’t stand a chance. But God declares his greatness in saying that he can and does sustain infants and nursing babies in this situation.
Children give God glory – whether by specifically praising him, or implicitly through the fact that he sustains them. Thus the value of the weakest, frailest human life is that it testifies to God.
This perspective is by no means universally held. Peter Singer has denied that all human life is equally valuable in a series of distressing statements: “Human babies are not born self-aware, or capable of grasping that they exist over time. They are not persons… Killing them, therefore, cannot be equated with killing normal human beings”. Further, he argues, “It does not seem wise to add to the burden on limited resources by increasing the number of severely disabled children”
The message of this psalm couldn’t be more different. Humanity, even in its weakest form, is purposeful and valuable because it gives God glory.
Part 2 next week.