On Animal Death

Rev. Benjamin Glaser

I don’t really like being the center of attention and I certainly hope not to court unwanted notoriety upon myself. Benjamin Glaser is not a controversialist, nor do I ever want to seek that out. The positions I hold personally on a number of issues native to the Reformed faith have, for whatever reason, gone from humdrum no biggies to being now either out-of-favor, or just passe, or even worse “violating the spirit of Deuteronomy 29:29”. Some like to say I would just be more comfortable in 1643 or 1822 or whenever. In my opinion I’m just fine in 2024. Holding these ideas in my own head and soul are born not out of nostalgia or a hope to re-create some bygone era of confessional perfection. First, such a thing is nonsensical because it has never existed. The only time the Reformed doctrine has been perfectly held was by Adam in the Garden, and even there you had one who disagreed with him. Second, it’s a lazy critique.

I say all that to get us into a topic which was riled up, again admittedly by me, at a recent Presbytery meeting and I am not going to rehash the particulars, partly because I don’t kiss and tell and also, the question at hand is not really tied into anything or anyone. It is a matter which is bigger than my personal foibles and weaknesses. The question as to death, who dies, how and when, and whether Adam had anything to do with it is something that’s been a matter of debate even before the advent of Scientism in the nineteenth century, and even before the rise of Schleiermachian skepticism in the eighteenth. A weird thing people do sometimes when discussing matters is to dismiss older sources because they didn’t experience the world as we do today. There were weirdoes and weird ideas in the time of Noah as much as John Calvin. They may not have had to deal with the specific, but they certainly met their grandfather.

We (men who subscribe to the WCF) are all comfortable with and can confiram the statement of Romans 5:12, “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned.”. The issue before us has to do with those living things that aren’t human. What about Old Yeller? Why did he have to pass over the rainbow bridge? Is it just as sad when a plankton gets swallowed by a blue whale as when an elephant meets his or her demise? It may seem a silly thing to get into. “There are more important things happening!” I can hear the nattering nabobs of negativity grumbling. Well, sorry to disappoint, but this matter is veryserious. The question concerning the effect of the Fall on creation is at the very center of the gospel of grace. What has Christ come to do but to reconcile the fallen to the perfect? It is my argument here that Jesus answers the cry of Eve as much as Balaam’s donkey. That when Paul writes in Romans 8 that the creation groans under the weight of sin he means that the creation groans under the weight of sin. 

It should be beyond any doubt that death is bad. It is evil and has no place in God’s good world.

I hunt, and I slit the throats of my own chickens who I have raised from the egg. Monitoring the entire lifecycle of a creature that God has made, and in His wisdom has provided the meat thereof for me and my families benefit has a certain humility attached to it. Watching the blood pour into the bucket is a somber and solemn event. I have chastised my own children for an uncouth reaction to such because this should not be, but it is. I have been known to react quite negatively to deer hunters who mock and waste the gift of the life of the animal taken. This is not a joke nor is it a game. It is serious business. Yet, it is in the Lord’s order, due to the hardness of man’s heart, that we partake of the flesh and blood of animals made before us on the fourth and fifth day. While God may have been saving the apple of His eye for the final day of labor we who were made on the sixth day have a special relationship, one of stewardship over them.

This matters very much because it was us who brought pain and the grave into the existence of the cow, the eagle, and the polecat. We, in Adam, have caused animals to die. We are responsible.

God gave Adam a duty to care for the creation. He, and we, failed. So, yes this is a gospel issue primarily because it is Christ who has come to put to death, death, not just for us, though we are redeemed in a unique way separate from the animals due to our being made in God’s image. But it is no less true that as we noted before from Romans 8:22, “For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now.” What’s that? Until now. Praise be to the cross-bearing savior! Those which died, shall die no longer, including those creatures who were made in God’s gracious love to be a friend to Adam and His posterity and have been subject to futility previously, and now granted peace without fear. Those who were once enemies have been made neighbors in Christ Jesus our Lord. I can’t imagine anything more important than this truth, that no animal died before Adam sinned, and because of the mighty and awesome work of the Second Adam, no animal will need to die anymore in the days to come when He shall come again in power and in His effervescent glory.

Isaiah 11:6 shall be as true as it once was in the land Eden.

Before we close I want to deal with one particular argument against everything I have said.

What about those big pointy teeth the apex monsters have? Let me be frank and bold.

The very statement, “If the lion was not meant to rip flesh with its teeth, then why does it have canines?“ evinces a heart and mind which is already given over to the teaching of Darwin. In other words, by making that argument you are assuming that the king of the jungle came by his fangs through a process of change and adaptation. God also made man with a brain capable of naming all the animals and subduing the earth with the wisdom of access to the power of grey matter. The fact we use that intellect to destroy thousands in the flash of a second does not mean we were designed to do that when the world was still without sin. The animal kingdom has been subject to the vanity of the Fall as much as the human world. We got them fangs as well. We would never say that man died before the sin of Adam, why do we say the same of Fozzy Bear?

Blessings in Christ,

Rev. Benjamin Glaser

Pastor, Bethany ARP Church