Abstract
In Classical Greece and following centuries, the uncertainty of when a soul entered the body of a fetus, termed ensoulment, was closely connected to abortion. The Greeks created no laws concerning abortion, so the personal opinion of philosophers and physicians outlined the social acceptability of abortion based on ensoulment. This discussion of social acceptability references Pythagorean, Aristotelian, and Platonic beliefs as well as medical texts to establish the disjointed nature of the Greek perspective. In a culture contemporary with the Greeks, Judaism, abortion was agreed upon as wrong and punishable by law. Ensoulment dictated the severity of Jewish law and gave the fetus rights that the Greeks did not. Using ensoulment as a link for comparing the unified Jewish legal perspective of abortion with the varying Greek cultural opinions, the Greek inability to define the personhood of a fetus can be established. Founded on the comparison of contemporary Greek and Jewish cultures, this paper will argue that the Greeks perceived the fetus as a living thing, but not as a human being.
How to Cite
Horrocks, A., (2014) “The Soul and Abortion in Ancient Greek Culture and Jewish Law”, Capstone, The UNC Asheville Journal of Undergraduate Scholarship 27(1).
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