The Bible and Animal Husbandry

My dog just got back from the vet. The bill for checkup, antibiotics, dental work, and minor surgery will be over $600, bringing my total investment into this little doggy to around $1,200. That’s about $300 per pound. But, he is a member of the family. He’s pretty lucky that he’s my family’s dog and not God’s dog. You see, God doesn’t take very good care of his animals, and he certainly would never go to these lengths to see to their well being.

Let’s consider the Bible’s record when it comes to animal husbandry.

Animals get off to a really bad start. Right off the bat, a snake is possessed by Satan in the Garden of Eden, then cursed by God. Now, this doesn’t seem right. The snake in Eden was an innocent party, used by Satan to trick Eve. Yet, Satan continued to live in heaven for thousands of years, with no seeming punishment. The snake, who really had no idea what was going on, was cursed – made to eat dust, and could no longer walk. Well, no sooner did the snakes get cursed, when they looked around and discovered that the cattle were already there. For some reason, cows had already been cursed. They must have pissed off God right after being created. I suspect that they looked down at their clumsy body right after rolling off the creative assembly line and exclaimed, “Yeah…good one.” Then bam! – cursed.

Well, the human race is just getting into gear, when Cain and Abel decide to give a gift to God. One son offers up some grain. This seems like a pretty good gift, since he had worked hard to get it. The other son, Hanibal Lechter, slices up a sheep and burns the fatty pieces, likely laughing maniacally the whole time. For some reason, God decides that the butcher is the better son, thereby sentencing animals to a long future of being killed for no good reason other than to appease God for something that someone else has done. And, of course, some joker will always take things to an extreme, like King Solomon for example. He killed 142,000 animals during a one week sacrificing spree. He must have been one hell of a sinner to require that much carnage to compensate for it.