R i g h t a r d i a: Chuck Norris: Obamacare would have killed Baby Jesus

Friday, December 18, 2009

Chuck Norris: Obamacare would have killed Baby Jesus

In a column published at the conservative Human Events blog earlier this week, Chuck Norris suggested that if a government-run health care plan had existed in Bethlehem at the time of Jesus' birth, the shame of Mary's "out-of-wedlock" pregnancy would have pushed her into aborting her child.

Norris wrote:

Lastly, as we near the eve of another Christmas, I wonder: What would have happened if Mother Mary had been covered by Obamacare?

What if that young, poor and uninsured teenage woman had been provided the federal funds (via Obamacare) and facilities (via Planned Parenthood, etc.) to avoid the ridicule, ostracizing, persecution and possible stoning because of her out-of-wedlock pregnancy?

Imagine all the great souls who could have been erased from history and the influence of mankind if their parents had been as progressive as Washington's wise men and women!

Rightardia: Norris' comments are ludicrous and historians would scoff at him for being 'present minded.' The ancient world was very different than today and infant mortality in Rome at the time of Christ was about 28 per cent. There are also some phrases in the Bible that suggest a that cultic infanticide was practiced in ancient Israel.

The strongest evidence (omitted above) lies in Ex 22:28-29. I reproduce the two verse below:

מלאתך ודמעך לא תאחר
בכור בניך תתן־לי
כן תעשה לשרך לצאנך
שבעת ימים יהיה עם־אמו ביום השמיני תתנו־לי

This clause is probably a metaphorical allusion to the following:

“You shall give me your first-born son;
Such shall you do with your ox(en), (and) with your flocks:
Seven days will he be with his mother, (but) on the eighth day you shall give (him) to me.”

Did Herod actually kill babies and children in Bethlehem around the time of Jesus' birth? There is no evidence that the 'Massacre of the Innocents' really happened. Herod was an unpopular king and was capable of this.

Wikipedia suggests the story in Gospel of Matthew 2:16-18 may really be about Herod's the murder of his two sons. The story is not mentioned by the contemporary Jewish historian Josephus, nor in the other gospels, nor in the early apocrypha.

Read more at Suite101: Did Herod Kill Children? Massacre of the Innocents