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Mar 11, 2010 - 9:20:54 PM |
According to the Bible it is wise and right to feed, shelter and not overwork animals that are valuable to us and in our care.
"A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast..." (Proverbs 12:10)
But should the comfort and well-being of animals be regarded as highly as the comfort and well-being of people? The answer is no.
Human beings are intrinsically more valuable than animals, pets or any "endangered species," and here is why. People are made in God’s image; animals are not. People continue to exist after their spirits leave their bodies; animals do not continue to exist after death.
People must give an account to God for their actions on Judgment Day; animals have no such day awaiting them. Man has a conscience and a moral will that is free, able and obligated to do right; animals have no such conscience and are not obligated by God to do right.
Let us now consider more fully how humans, and not animals, are able and required to do right. Doing right consists in loving or promoting the good of God and mankind in general.
Man is able and therefore morally obligated to love God supremely and to love his neighbor as himself, whereas animals have no such ability or obligation. Dogs, cats and horses are not capable of making moral choices or of showing the kind of goodwill that humans are able and required to show.
The choices of animals are governed by instinct, self-preservation, self-gratification or habit formed in them through human training. Unlike humans, they are unable to act from higher motives.
Animals act on the basis of their appetites, cravings and feelings without regard to the pleasure of God or the pleasure of other creatures. Animals are concerned only about their own interests and personal satisfaction.
But people are different. We are not designed or hard-wired to make the gratifying of our appetites, craving and feelings our supreme aim. We are obligated and able to act on the basis of God’s laws in spite of our innate or natural appetites, cravings and feelings.
Our natural appetites, desires and propensities are not sinful in themselves. They are all inherently legitimate and proper. But the problem lies when the fulfilling of these appetites and desires becomes the ultimate goal toward which we act. If the gratifying of our appetites and feelings becomes the ultimate thing at which we aim, then we are living like the animals and not the way we were designed to live.
All people are capable, through the influence and help of God’s Spirit, to honestly intend to promote the highest good of God and mankind. But pets have no such ability to act in this way or to express goodwill; therefore, they have no such obligation to do so. For this reason all pets and animals are of less inherent worth than people.
Animals cannot and are not morally obligated to love as people can. True love, the kind that we humans are commanded and able to express, is this; to please God and to intend the highest well-being of mankind. Pets can express feelings and emotions. They can sometimes display what appears to us as great acts of courage, loyalty or goodwill.
But they are not acting from the principle of true love or goodwill, that is, they are not acting out of an aim to please God or to bring about anyone’s well-being other than their own. They are simply acting out of instinct, self-interest or human training.
Many people act selfishly (and therefore wickedly) but all animals invariably act selfishly (though not wickedly because they are unable to act otherwise.) When your dog licks you when you come home it is not seeking to promote your highest well-being. It is just doing what it instinctively does, or what it has been trained to do, or what it thinks will lead to a treat or to some attention that will benefit him.
Self-interest is the end in all the actions of animals. Their end (the object intended to be reached in all their actions) is to survive, to gratify their own impulses and cravings, or to please their senses.
But humans are morally bound to choose a different end in life. We are not to live as animals do. The purpose intended in our actions should always be to promote the highest possible good to God and to mankind in general (which includes ourselves).
Yes, it is good and right to promote our own interests and to ratify our own appetites and cravings, but only as it is consistent with the moral law, which is revealed in our consciences and in the Bible.
Acting to promote our own interests or to satisfy our own natural desires is proper and right so long as other interests and higher interests are not trampled upon and so long as the gratifying of our desires is not our supreme aim.
The Bible is not against the fulfilling of our appetites for food, drink, comfort, companionship or sexual intimacy, but it surely has many laws and principles regulating the fulfilling of these innate appetites.
One reason why many grow attached to animals nowadays is to compensate for the lack of good relationships with God and others. Christ Jesus foretold,
"And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold." (Matt. 24:12)
Because sin and vice thrive in our culture, good relationships with God, spouses, children and neighbors suffer as a result. And so the love of pets and animals are often turned to as substitutes for broken or non-existing relationships.
From the August 4, 2007 edition of the
Waldo Independent.
Note: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is reproduced for non-profit educational purposes only. For more information go
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