Abortion and Adam, Genesis and First Breath

There is a rather new argument that is being tossed around pro-choice circles that the Bible states that personhood begins at birth (and not at conception). The argument looks like this: Genesis states that Adam was not living until he took his first breath, therefore, until a newly born baby takes its first breath, it's not living either. Thus, aborting a fetus isn't the same thing as killing a tiny human person.

"It's not human until it takes its first breath--that's what the Bible says!"

Prolife response?

Firstly, what the Bible really says is that Adam wasn't living until God breathed into his nostrils:

then the LORD God formed the man out of the dust of the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being--Genesis 2:7

....which is NOT the same thing as Adam (or a newborn baby) taking his first breath. The first requires Adam to be passive and receive the breath of life from God; however, when a newborn takes its first breath, that is an action.

Incidentally, if the pro-choicer is correct that no one is a person until first breath, this means that this sweet little baby, just being delivered and not yet taking her first breath (or having God's spirit breathed into her cute little nostrils), could be killed--because she's not a person yet--for the first few seconds of her life outside the womb.

In fact, since none of us can prove that God breathed into our nostrils when we were newly born... by the pro-choicer's argument, none of us is living. And that means the pro-choicer is arguing that any of us walking around today can be killed...since none of us are really persons yet.

Also, prolifers can respond that what the Bible says is that if you're a man made out of dirt, you don't become living until God breathes into your nostrils....

So for the rest of us who are definitely NOT made of dirt, we become human beings the moment we begin to exist, which science tells us is at the moment of fertilization.

In fact, embryology textbooks assert that at the moment of fertilization an entirely new human organism is made.

“Human life begins at fertilization, the process during which a male gamete or sperm (spermatozoon) unites with a female gamete or oocyte (ovum) to form a single cell called a zygote. This highly specialized, totipotent cell marked the beginning of each of us as a unique individual.” “A zygote is the beginning of a new human being (i.e., an embryo).”
Keith L. Moore, The Developing Human: Clinically Oriented Embryology, 7th edition. Philadelphia, PA: Saunders, 2003. pp. 16, 2.


“It is the penetration of the ovum by a sperm and the resulting mingling of nuclear material each brings to the union that constitutes the initiation of the life of a new individual.”
Clark Edward and  Corliss Patten’s Human Embryology, McGraw – Hill Inc., 30


“[The Zygote] results from the union of an oocyte and a sperm. A zygote is the beginning of a new human being. Human development begins at fertilization, the process during which a male gamete or sperm … unites with a female gamete or oocyte … to form a single cell called a zygote. This highly specialized, totipotent cell marks the beginning of each of us as a unique individual.”
The Developing Human: Clinically Oriented Embryology, 6th ed. Keith L. Moore, Ph.D. & T.V.N. Persaud, Md., (Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders Company, 1998), 2-18

Out of all the arguments pro-choicers give, IMHO, this particular argument is the most eye-roll inducing.

The implications of saying that no one is a human being until he takes his first breath are absurd.