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Jones, David Albert, the Soul of the Embryo J The Soul of the Embryo: An enquiry into the status of the human embryo in the Christian tradition DAVID ALBERT JONES • , continuum A LONDON • NEW YORK Continuum The Tower Building 15 East 26th Street 11 York Road New York London, SE1 7NX NY 10010 www.continuumbooks.com C) David Jones 2004 Contents All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data Abbreviations A catalogue record for this book is available from The British Library. Foreword ISBN 0 8264 6296 0 Introduction 1 Moulded in the Earth The embryo in the Hebrew Scriptures: creation, Typeset by BookEns Ltd, Royston, Herts. providence, calling Printed and hound in Great Britain by Antony Rowe Ltd, Chippenham, Wilts. 2 Curdled Like Cheese Ancient embryology: Hippocrates and Aristotle 3 Discarded Children • Exposure, infanticide and abortion in ancient Greece and Rome 4 Grieving in Ramah Jewish attitudes to infanticide and abortion 5 Medicinal Penalties Early Christianity and abortion: Celtic/Anglo-Saxon penances, Greek/Latin canons 6 Soul Talk Soul as the principle of life, body and soul, the I would like to thank Fr Michael Hayes, Head of the School of Theology, spiritual soul Philosophy and History at St Mary's College for supporting an ethos of research 7 Whence the Soul? and scholarship within the School; Robin Baird-Smith of Continuum books for The Church Fathers on the origin of the soul: his great patience; and the Linacre Centre for Healthcare Ethics for the use of pre-existence, traducianism, creationism their excellent library. Also thanks to Professor John Keown, Dr Wendy Hiscox, Dr Agneta Sutton and Mr Anthony McCarthy for suggestions and corrections 8 The Timing of Ensoulment which have helped sharpen the text in many ways. They bear no responsibility Immediate and delayed animation from the Fathers for those weaknesses that remain. to Thomas Aquinas 111 iv CONTENTS 9 The Embryonic Christ 125 The conception of Jesus, Chalcedon, Maximus the Confessor on the embryo 10 Imputed Dignity 141 Luther, Calvin and Barth: from essential to relational categories 11 Embryology through the Looking-glass 156 Abbreviations Ovists and animalculists, preformation, epigenesis, embryology and ensoulment 12 Probable Sins and Indirect Exceptions 175 Casuistry, therapeutic abortion, probabilism, application to the embryo 13 The Justice of Miscarriage 194 AMA American Medical Association Abortion law from the Middle Ages to the twentieth century GA Aristotle, On the Generation of Animals 14 The Embryo in Isolation 214 In vitro fertilization, personhood, identical twins, HA Aristotle, On the History of Animals stem cell research 15 The Least of these Little Ones 236 IVF in vitro fertilization The theological status of the embryo MAL Middle Assyrian Laws Bibliography 252 .• Indexes 262 I NC Hippocrates, The Nature of the Child NIV New International Version [Bible] OAP Offence against the Person [Act] SCDF Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith ST Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae To my parents who gave me life and inspired in me a love of learning. Introduction Foreword Begin at the beginning, go on till you come to the end; then stop. (Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland) There was a time when you did not exist. This is a strange thought truly to get your head around. It provokes a certain dizziness. We A recurring theme in contemporary bioethics is the way in which seem to be a necessary part of our world, of the world seen from advances in scientific and medical technology have provoked here and now, and yet we know that we have not always existed.' renewed interest in age-old debates of philosophers and theolo- Reflecting in this way on our previous nonexistence gives a sense of gians. Nowhere is this clearer than at the beginning of life. depth to what it means for each of us to be, to be alive, to exist in In vitro fertilisation, pre-implantation diagnosis, therapeutic & our own right. Thinking of someone very close to us can bring a reproductive cloning, germ-line genetic therapy, embryo selection similar realization. We might be telling someone of a memory or and stem cell technology - the application of these spectacular event and then realize that, at that time, the person in front of us modern techniques are all profoundly influenced by our under- did not even exist! Someone 'who is real and significant in our lives, standing of the status and significance of the human embryo. At the who is the centre of his or her own story, his or her own world, same time, confronted by new insights in the nature and once did not exist. If we seriously consider the existence and the development of the embryo, Christian philosophers and theolo- beginning of any one particular human being, of ourselves or gians have been forced to re-explore their ancient ethical traditions. someone we know well, we realize that it is something strange and Dr Jones combines the skills and insights of a historically profound. Many philosophers have recognized that the existence of informed theologian and philosopher with that of the contempor- the world is something mysterious: 'Not how the world is, but that ary bioethicist. Not only does he provide a unique distillation of the world is is the mystery' (Wittgenstein 2001; see also McCabe legal, scientific, philosophical, ethical and theological sources over 2002; Munitz 1965). However, if we truly grasp the existence of any continuing history of more than two thousand years, he also draws one person we see that this too is mysterious (Crosby 1996). The out the multifaceted implications in the ethical and legal fields. His beginning of each human life thus shows itself to be a matter of work provides a carefully researched and authoritative response to religious and philosophical concern, not only something to be mplistic and widely publicized assertions about the historical si thought of in terms of biology or medicine. origins of Christian teaching on the embryo. The task of 'beginning at the beginning' is nowhere more significant and nowhere more bewildering than in our own case. John Wyatt is Professor of Neonatal Paediatrics We are led to ask, when and how does a new human individual at University College London come to be? Or, to put it another way: when did I begin? Someone 2 THE SOUL OF THE EMBRYO I INTRODUCTION 3 might say to us, 'I knew your parents before they met one another, embryos was extended to cover a wider range of medical research when you were just a twinkle in your mother's eye.' But, of course, including stem cell research. This move was approved, after the a twinkle in the eye is not a human being, and when the twinkle fact, by the House of Lords Select Committee on Stem Cell was, we were not Research chaired by the Anglican Bishop of Oxford, The Rt Revd The question of how to understand the beginning of human Richard Harries. In the USA experimentation on human embryos existence shapes the attitudes we have, or should have, towards the is governed by state law and has varied from state to state. South human embryo. It affects not only the question of whether, and if Dakota has a human embryo research statute banning 'non- so in what circumstances, termination of pregnancy could be therapeutic research that destroys a human embryo', while others ethically justified. It also provokes the question of what should count (such as Louisiana and Michigan) have laws that ban experimenta- as pregnancy. The line between abortion and contraception has tion on live foetuses. These laws could apply to experimentation on been obscured by fbrms of 'contraception' which actually work by human embryos. In 2002, after a great deal of debate, President preventing the human embryo from implanting. In the UK, the Bush banned the destruction of embryos to produce stem cells, but courts have thought it necessary to rule on whether the morning- allowed research to continue on stem cell lines that had already after pill 'causes a miscarriage' and thus falls within the terms of the been generated. Offences against the Person Act (1861). They ruled that it did not Given the difficulty of understanding what it means for a human In the USA in 2001, District Judge Herman Weber ruled that the being to come to exist, and given the profound significance of this conscience clause in an Ohio law, designed to protect people who question for law and ethics, any approach which offers to shed refused to perform or participate in abortion, also applied to some light on the issue should be allowed a fair hearing. In this pharmacists asked to provide 'emergency contraception'. Other book, the issue of the beginning of the human life will be pursued such cases are expected. by critical engagement with the history of Christian thought on the Understanding how and when each of us begins to exist also has human embryo. Many people should be interested in discovering implications for the treatment of the embryo outside the womb. In how the Christian tradition has understood the human embryo. A 1978 Louise Brown became the first child to be delivered significant proportion of the world population (around 30 per cent successfully after having been conceived in vitro: the first 'test-tube or two billion people) declare themselves to be Christians. baby'. Subsequently very many couples have accepted in vitro Christianity has also exerted a great influence on Western ethical fertilization (IVF) and many have gone on to give birth to healthy thinking and on the understanding of the human person and has children.
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