Opponents and supporters of the right to abortion often assemble their position in terms of two basic values: “life” or “choice.”
However, many defenders of “life” are happy to kill humans in situations such as war and the death penalty. Many on the “choice” side advocate government regulation of guns or mandatory masking and vaccines.
As I see, “life” and “choice” are not really a problem in their own right. The central question is what, or who constitutes a person.
This question has long been engrossed in anthropologists, especially anthropologists like me who specialize in the study of non-European religions. Some ideas that are usually taken for granted in the United States and Europe about what it means to be a person are, very simply, not shared with believers in other religious traditions or cultures.
The idea of personality in American culture is primarily a product of Christianity, and personality is inextricably linked to the concept of the soul. Only beings with a soul are humans, and personality is treated as a matter of black and white: beings either have or do not have a soul.
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As an African religious expert, I have noticed a religious tradition that treats personality in a very different and more subtle way. Although the vast majority of people in Africa recognize that they are Muslims or Christians, indigenous religions are still widespread and many consider personality to be a process rather than a one-off phenomenon.
Gradual humanity
This is well illustrated by the belief in babies in the Ben culture of Côte d’Ivoire. This is explained in detail by anthropologist Alma Gottlieb in the 2004 notable ethnography “The World After Death is Our Hometown”.
For Ben, every baby is a reincarnation of those who have recently died. They emerge from a place called “wrugbe”, which is a kind of premortal life as well as the afterlife.
The idea that babies are especially reincarnated in their ancestors is not unique to Ben, or African religion. Indeed, newborns do not actually leave “wrinkles” until the amputated umbilical cord dries and falls off. Only then can the baby be considered a person in some way. If she dies in advance, she will not undergo any kind of funeral. Even then, until the children are a few years old, people believe they are ready between the “wrugbe” and the ordinary human world.
For Ben and many others, rituals show the development of humanity. Some cultures believe that children do not have full gender until they are stamped. The process of imprinting itself is a symbolic death and rebirth, as if the imprinter became a new person. In some societies, such as the Tallensi in northern Ghana, when an individual achieves full humanity, it becomes an ancestor after death and is fully involved in the lives of its offspring.
Not just humans
A “person” does not necessarily have to be human. In West African Mande culture, such as the Dyula community I surveyed, all clans are associated with “ntana”, large and dangerous wildlife species such as lions, leopards, elephants, crocodiles and snakes. Species members are considered humans, but only for individuals of the relevant clan.
Each has a story about the origin of their relationship with ntana-typically about how species ancestors saved clan ancestors, such as by pulling him out of a hole in which he fell. .. Clan members must not kill or eat their ntana, and contact with dead animal debris and even visibility is considered dangerous.
When comparing how the paradigms differ from culture to culture, two aspects of personality stand out in particular.
First, personality is sometimes considered a process rather than a steady state and is not automatically owned by each individual. Second, personality is not a purely personal phenomenon, but is inherently involved in the social relationships, especially between parents, siblings and children. Between spouse and relatives; and between living and dead. Christianity, on the other hand, emphasizes the salvation of the soul and the individual. Being either has or does not have a soul, and the salvation and punishment of this soul is the responsibility of the individual.
In the majority of Christian societies, it is not always clear to what extent our recognized notions of humanity derive from the foundations of Christianity, until compared to other religious traditions. not. In my view, incorporating these ideas into the law is to incorporate theology into the principles of law, especially by banning or permitting abortion.
This article has been republished from Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Please read the original article.
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