I like the end of the book of Jonah (an underrated, very funny and short book of the Bible). Basically Jonah goes to this foreign land to warn them (against his will) of God's wrath to come, and they respond by taking it seriously and dressing both themselves and all of their animals in sackcloth and ashes. At the end, Jonah is like, "Come on, destroy them they suck," and God responds, "You are concerned over the gourd plant [that God used as an object lesson] which cost you no effort and which you did not grow; it came up in one night and in one night it perished. And should I not be concerned over the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who cannot know their right hand from their left, not to mention all the animals?"
Awesome punchline and another clear sign of God's care for animals.
God's covenant after the Flood is also with animals as well as people. (Yes, I know this did not literally occur, but hopefully the story says something real.) "See, I am now establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that was with you: the birds, the tame animals, and all the wild animals that were with you - all that came out of the ark."
Great post! A few things to add (more from a Jewish perspective, but given that these are in the Bible, may be compelling to a Christian too):
1) (Similar to what you said with slight caveats + adding) God only gives Adam “dominion” over the animals AFTER they’ve committed the sin of eating from the tree of knowledge - along with labor and hard child birth. This can very easily be interpreted as a reluctant thing from God’s POV. Ideally, it can be argued, we should not have dominion (famously, Rav Kook believed this and was a vegetarian - minus on Shabbat)!
2) The ritual slaughter (schecheting) required to make meat kosher in judaism is relatively painless compared to the other methods used to kill animals at that time. Maimonidies (among others) argue that this is was designed, at least in part, to minimize animal suffering.
3) Shiluach Hakein is a commandment (mitzvah) in the Torah found in Deuteronomy 22:6-7: It commands that if you find a bird’s nest with a mother bird sitting on her eggs or chicks, you should not take the mother along with her young. Instead, you must first send away the mother bird before taking the eggs or chicks. This is often interpreted (for example, by Maimonidies) as being about compassion for animals!
Although Jesus did arguably engage in gratuitous animal cruelty at various points- for instance miracling fish into existence for people to eat, or driving demons into pigs and getting them to run off a cliff or whatever
About noon the following day as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up on the roof to pray. He became hungry and wanted something to eat, and while the meal was being prepared, he fell into a trance. He saw heaven opened and something like a large sheet being let down to earth by its four corners. It contained all kinds of four-footed animals, as well as reptiles and birds. Then a voice told him, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.”
“Surely not, Lord!” Peter replied. “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.”
The voice spoke to him a second time, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.”
It's hard for me to understand how the Judeo-Christian God could have a particular concern for non-human life if he also intentionally instituted a brutal sacrificial system that resulted in horrendous suffering for (conservatively) hundreds of thousands of bulls, sheep, lambs, doves, etc. And it doesn't even seem like there was any particular point to it beyond God's own glory. So if a being is willing to inflict horrendous suffering on hundreds of thousands of innocent beings purely for their own glory, then it's hard to also argue that being cares about their victims much at all. And I think it's very hard to create a plausible Christian "story" that doesn't have that sacrificial logic at its core. But hopefully some Christians try!
I think Christianity also amplifies a perspective of respect among the reasons why our treatment of animals matters morally. It seems disrespectful (both towards God and the animals ) to be cramming beings created by God into tiny, dirty cages for life just because we want cheaper meat and eggs.
> It seems disrespectful (both towards God and the animals) to be cramming beings created by God into tiny, dirty cages for life just because we want cheaper meat and eggs.
I think the most respectful thing we can do for animals is to not eat them (or take their milk or eggs), whether those animals are crammed into small cages or whether they are living a free-range lifestyle on an idyllic farm (which, in practice, is rare). All those resources that we spend on advocating for small, mostly-meaningless incremental reforms are resources that we could have spent on convincing people to go vegan -- which is something that would actually solve the underlying problem of animal exploitation.
How are we supposed to interpret the 1 penny per animal saved figure? Any reasonable animal welfare certification adds way more than a penny to the price.
The organizations he is talking about use the money to get corporations (particularly retailers and restaurant chains) to adopt cage free commitments (by friendly corporate engagement or antagonistic activism). This then incentivizes their suppliers (the egg producers) to produce more cage free vs caged eggs. Eventually the impact of this will lessen per dollar, but there is still a lot of useful work to do internationally.
I see. But that raises the question, if a charity can induce a corporation to stop caging a chicken for only a penny, why wouldn’t a genuinely cage-free chicken cost only a penny more at the grocery store? It doesn’t make sense.
This is about eggs. Here is a quick and rough example: to build a 100k bird caged house which produces around 30 million eggs per year would be somewhere around $5 million. To do cage free production it is about $2 million more. For that $2 million dollars activist organizations can run campaigns to induce multiple retailers, hotels, or food service to buy only cage free eggs. The 2 million dollars spent on the corporate changes will effect WAY more than 100k birds. McDonalds (which has now made a commitment to go cage free) purchases around 2 billion eggs per year which is the equivalent of ~6.5 million hens so you can see how spending the money on these campaigns can have a magnified impact.
So in sum the funds are used for activism to make mcdonalds commit to buy only cage free eggs, then their suppliers have to produce cage free instead of caged for all 6.5 million birds, and the consumer pays a decent amount more money per egg.
> Both moral intuition and the Bible are clear: animals matter.
Yeah, but Christians (and also a lot of non-Christians) get it wrong. They assume that it's perfectly OK for humans to exploit animals for our own purposes, as long as we're nice to those animals. I agree with philosopher Gary Francione that welfare reforms are ineffective and are actually counter-productive. Efforts to build larger cages or use "humane" slaughtering methods are severely misguided. Such measures don't actually improve animal's lives as much as most people think (have you seen photos of a cage-free poultry facility?). Consumers who buy "happy meat" falsely believe that they've solved the problem of animal cruelty and so there is no reason for them to stop using animals or animal products. Thus, the property status of animals is reinforced, and real change becomes that much more difficult.
When I talk to people about animals, I really de-emphasize the suffering on factory farms (though this is real). Instead, I tell them that sentience - an animal's capacity for subjective experiences and consciousness - should be the foundation for moral consideration rather than just the ability to suffer. Focusing on suffering misses the broader reality that animals are subjects of their own lives with desires and emotional experiences.
Francione is off the rails there. While cage-free is still very bad, it's better than cages. Billions fewer animals suffer intensely in cages. Additionally, there's no significant abolitionist movement, and historically, reforms tend to spur other reforms. Major reforms to farming expose people to the cruel horrors of farming and make them more supportive of widespread abolition.
I've been following Francione's work since I first became vegan about 20 years ago. The arguments you present are the standard ones that people always raise against abolitionism, but I find them unconvincing. We didn't get rid of human chattel slavery by encouraging plantation owners to use smaller sticks when beating their slaves.
I don't have any firm views on this debate but it is worth pointing out that, historically, reformist measures did significantly weaken the slave system and contributed in many important ways to its eventual abolition. The common assumption that reforms "only perpetuate a system" or whatever just isn't supported by the evidence.
I like the end of the book of Jonah (an underrated, very funny and short book of the Bible). Basically Jonah goes to this foreign land to warn them (against his will) of God's wrath to come, and they respond by taking it seriously and dressing both themselves and all of their animals in sackcloth and ashes. At the end, Jonah is like, "Come on, destroy them they suck," and God responds, "You are concerned over the gourd plant [that God used as an object lesson] which cost you no effort and which you did not grow; it came up in one night and in one night it perished. And should I not be concerned over the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who cannot know their right hand from their left, not to mention all the animals?"
Awesome punchline and another clear sign of God's care for animals.
God's covenant after the Flood is also with animals as well as people. (Yes, I know this did not literally occur, but hopefully the story says something real.) "See, I am now establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that was with you: the birds, the tame animals, and all the wild animals that were with you - all that came out of the ark."
Great post! A few things to add (more from a Jewish perspective, but given that these are in the Bible, may be compelling to a Christian too):
1) (Similar to what you said with slight caveats + adding) God only gives Adam “dominion” over the animals AFTER they’ve committed the sin of eating from the tree of knowledge - along with labor and hard child birth. This can very easily be interpreted as a reluctant thing from God’s POV. Ideally, it can be argued, we should not have dominion (famously, Rav Kook believed this and was a vegetarian - minus on Shabbat)!
2) The ritual slaughter (schecheting) required to make meat kosher in judaism is relatively painless compared to the other methods used to kill animals at that time. Maimonidies (among others) argue that this is was designed, at least in part, to minimize animal suffering.
3) Shiluach Hakein is a commandment (mitzvah) in the Torah found in Deuteronomy 22:6-7: It commands that if you find a bird’s nest with a mother bird sitting on her eggs or chicks, you should not take the mother along with her young. Instead, you must first send away the mother bird before taking the eggs or chicks. This is often interpreted (for example, by Maimonidies) as being about compassion for animals!
As a Christian, thank you for writing this.
Thank you!
Although Jesus did arguably engage in gratuitous animal cruelty at various points- for instance miracling fish into existence for people to eat, or driving demons into pigs and getting them to run off a cliff or whatever
Lol I think the fish Jesus miracled into existence were served cooked
At least the fish were dead.
Yes, and see also Acts 10:9 - 15:
About noon the following day as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up on the roof to pray. He became hungry and wanted something to eat, and while the meal was being prepared, he fell into a trance. He saw heaven opened and something like a large sheet being let down to earth by its four corners. It contained all kinds of four-footed animals, as well as reptiles and birds. Then a voice told him, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.”
“Surely not, Lord!” Peter replied. “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.”
The voice spoke to him a second time, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.”
It's hard for me to understand how the Judeo-Christian God could have a particular concern for non-human life if he also intentionally instituted a brutal sacrificial system that resulted in horrendous suffering for (conservatively) hundreds of thousands of bulls, sheep, lambs, doves, etc. And it doesn't even seem like there was any particular point to it beyond God's own glory. So if a being is willing to inflict horrendous suffering on hundreds of thousands of innocent beings purely for their own glory, then it's hard to also argue that being cares about their victims much at all. And I think it's very hard to create a plausible Christian "story" that doesn't have that sacrificial logic at its core. But hopefully some Christians try!
Thanks for writing this!
For some Christian takes on why animal welfare should matter to Christians, see Dustin Crummett's animal cruelty cause area report for Christians for Impact here https://www.christiansforimpact.org/full-reports/animal-cruelty#case and my overview series on the Bible and animals here: https://christandcounterfactuals.substack.com/p/should-christians-be-concerned-about-animal-welfare-part-1.
I think Christianity also amplifies a perspective of respect among the reasons why our treatment of animals matters morally. It seems disrespectful (both towards God and the animals ) to be cramming beings created by God into tiny, dirty cages for life just because we want cheaper meat and eggs.
> It seems disrespectful (both towards God and the animals) to be cramming beings created by God into tiny, dirty cages for life just because we want cheaper meat and eggs.
I think the most respectful thing we can do for animals is to not eat them (or take their milk or eggs), whether those animals are crammed into small cages or whether they are living a free-range lifestyle on an idyllic farm (which, in practice, is rare). All those resources that we spend on advocating for small, mostly-meaningless incremental reforms are resources that we could have spent on convincing people to go vegan -- which is something that would actually solve the underlying problem of animal exploitation.
How are we supposed to interpret the 1 penny per animal saved figure? Any reasonable animal welfare certification adds way more than a penny to the price.
The organizations he is talking about use the money to get corporations (particularly retailers and restaurant chains) to adopt cage free commitments (by friendly corporate engagement or antagonistic activism). This then incentivizes their suppliers (the egg producers) to produce more cage free vs caged eggs. Eventually the impact of this will lessen per dollar, but there is still a lot of useful work to do internationally.
I see. But that raises the question, if a charity can induce a corporation to stop caging a chicken for only a penny, why wouldn’t a genuinely cage-free chicken cost only a penny more at the grocery store? It doesn’t make sense.
This is about eggs. Here is a quick and rough example: to build a 100k bird caged house which produces around 30 million eggs per year would be somewhere around $5 million. To do cage free production it is about $2 million more. For that $2 million dollars activist organizations can run campaigns to induce multiple retailers, hotels, or food service to buy only cage free eggs. The 2 million dollars spent on the corporate changes will effect WAY more than 100k birds. McDonalds (which has now made a commitment to go cage free) purchases around 2 billion eggs per year which is the equivalent of ~6.5 million hens so you can see how spending the money on these campaigns can have a magnified impact.
So in sum the funds are used for activism to make mcdonalds commit to buy only cage free eggs, then their suppliers have to produce cage free instead of caged for all 6.5 million birds, and the consumer pays a decent amount more money per egg.
> Both moral intuition and the Bible are clear: animals matter.
Yeah, but Christians (and also a lot of non-Christians) get it wrong. They assume that it's perfectly OK for humans to exploit animals for our own purposes, as long as we're nice to those animals. I agree with philosopher Gary Francione that welfare reforms are ineffective and are actually counter-productive. Efforts to build larger cages or use "humane" slaughtering methods are severely misguided. Such measures don't actually improve animal's lives as much as most people think (have you seen photos of a cage-free poultry facility?). Consumers who buy "happy meat" falsely believe that they've solved the problem of animal cruelty and so there is no reason for them to stop using animals or animal products. Thus, the property status of animals is reinforced, and real change becomes that much more difficult.
When I talk to people about animals, I really de-emphasize the suffering on factory farms (though this is real). Instead, I tell them that sentience - an animal's capacity for subjective experiences and consciousness - should be the foundation for moral consideration rather than just the ability to suffer. Focusing on suffering misses the broader reality that animals are subjects of their own lives with desires and emotional experiences.
Francione is off the rails there. While cage-free is still very bad, it's better than cages. Billions fewer animals suffer intensely in cages. Additionally, there's no significant abolitionist movement, and historically, reforms tend to spur other reforms. Major reforms to farming expose people to the cruel horrors of farming and make them more supportive of widespread abolition.
I've been following Francione's work since I first became vegan about 20 years ago. The arguments you present are the standard ones that people always raise against abolitionism, but I find them unconvincing. We didn't get rid of human chattel slavery by encouraging plantation owners to use smaller sticks when beating their slaves.
I don't have any firm views on this debate but it is worth pointing out that, historically, reformist measures did significantly weaken the slave system and contributed in many important ways to its eventual abolition. The common assumption that reforms "only perpetuate a system" or whatever just isn't supported by the evidence.