Cruelty to animals is very real. It is something that has existed all through history. Some come from other animals and some come from people who don’t care about animals. Petty people look at animals as being beneath them, rather than appreciating them for what they are. In doing so, they make it easy for themselves to mistreat those animals, seeing them as unworthy of their consideration. Some of those people do the same to other people as well.
People see these animals being mistreated and are concerned. “How could God allow that?” is the cry that goes up. Yet, is it fair to blame God for what people do? Is God supposed to stop that cruelty? If so, where does it say that He is?
On the other hand, is it fair to say that all cruelty and suffering is created by man? The Bible teaches us that “The wages of sin is death,” (Romans 6:23). Some have taken this to mean that before the first sin, which is recorded in Genesis, chapter 3, there was no death. Animals which are now carnivores didn’t eat other animals back then, but only ate plants; a viewpoint that science doesn’t support. Just where did suffering start and how much of it is mankind responsible for?
Pain and Suffering in Nature
We share this world with an incredible variety of life. The creation account in the first two chapters of Genesis, tells us that God created plants on the third day, birds and fish on the fifth day, and animals on the sixth day. Yet the biblical account does nothing to show the true diversity of God’s creation. Insects alone account for about 40% of all living species, with somewhere between 10 and 30 million different species of insects. Each of these has a purpose in God’s plan for how the natural world works.
Insects actually provide a number of useful services, benefiting nature, as well as mankind. At one end of the scale, they are a large part of the world’s recycling system, working to break down biological matter so that it can become part of the soil, nourishing new plant life. They are also pretty close to the bottom of the food chain, being eaten by birds, rodents and reptiles. Perhaps one of their most important functions is to pollinate plants, so that they can grow, reproduce and produce fruit.
It is that food chain that allows the vast diversity of animal life here on planet Earth. Smaller animals are killed and eaten by larger animals, which are then eaten by still larger predators, all the way up the food chain, to the apex predators, of which mankind is the greatest. Although I will have to say that there are other predators which would be glad to eat the occasional person, should they get the chance.
Pain Versus Suffering
All this requires that animals die. But does that mean that those animals suffer? We know that higher life forms can feel pain; but is that the same as suffering?
While pain might be considered a part of suffering, there is a distinct difference between the two. Pain is a physical reaction, where the nervous system reports damage to the body. It is intended to be a safety mechanism, preventing the person or animal from continuing an action that is causing damage. But when that creature cannot stop the action, such as when they are being attacked by a natural predator, all they can do is feel the pain.
Suffering is our emotional reaction to pain, whether that physical pain or emotional pain. As a reaction, it is something of the mind, rather than something physical. It is also something we have control over. While we cannot stop the pain that is causing the suffering, we can choose not to suffer.
It is interesting to note that animals, even animals which we believe have souls, such as dogs, will react, showing that they feel pain, but not do the same for suffering in any way. A dog might whimper from pain, but can still be happy to see you, licking your hand. They don’t allow the pain to affect their emotions, even while it might affect their bodies.
Do Animals Suffer When They Die?
This brings up the question as to whether animals suffer when they die? Do those animals which are being killed as food by other animals suffer or do they just feel pain? That’s something that we can’t really know, as we cannot read their thoughts.
Interestingly enough, the manner that animals kill other animals can be seen as being humane or merciful in its brevity. Most predators kill quickly, rather than causing their prey prolonged pain. Some, like wolves and mountain lions, go for the neck, either breaking the spinal column or crushing the larynx, while simultaneously ripping open the jugular vein, causing their prey to bleed our rapidly.
While those animals do feel pain when they die, I contend that they do not suffer. None of them have regret about dying, thinking about the things they didn’t do, the people they didn’t spend enough time with or the family members they never told they love. Those sorts of thoughts aren’t in animals’ minds, at least not outside the comic strips. They just die and stop thinking about the things that occupy their time; eating, sleeping, and mating.
Is Death Cruel?
This brings us to another tricky question; is death itself cruel? I’m sure there are many who would say that it is; but I will have to differ with them; death, by its very nature, is impartial. It comes to all, human, animal and plant life at some point in time. When each living thing’s time is up, it dies; regardless of how that death comes. Some deaths cause more pain than others, some are faster than others; but their finality is equal.
However, death can be made to be cruel, when the mechanism that is creating that death takes its time to kill its victim. This can happen naturally through a variety of means, such as dehydration, starvation or illness. But it can also happen at the hands of cruel humans, when they take pleasure in mistreating some other form of life to make it die slowly.
We consider human death to ourselves cruel, in a different way than animal death, because of the regrets that we associate with our own deaths. We all seem to die with those regrets, mostly of things not done or left unsaid. But that is an emotional reaction, which causes us to suffer, not the mechanism of death itself.
What About Human Cruelty to Animals?
There have probably always been those who were cruel to animals. Enough so, that God felt it necessary to deal with the subject in the Bible, including in the Mosaic Law. When God established a day of rest for man, He included the animals that those men owned as well:
Six days you shall do your work, and on the seventh day you shall rest, that your ox and your donkey may rest, and the son of your female servant and the stranger may be refreshed. – Exodus 23:12
In that time, oxen and donkeys were the main motive power of industry, specifically agriculture. People recognized their value for the strength these animals had and the work they were able to perform. Even so, God apparently saw that it was necessary to insist that people allow their animals a chance to rest. He even went so far as to repeat that commandment later on in Deuteronomy.
But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your ox, nor your donkey, nor any of your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. – Deuteronomy 5:14
Apparently, there were people who were passive-aggressive back then, just as today, as God felt it necessary to be so specific. Had He not been, there would have likely been those who would have said “I’m not working on the Sabbath,” while ensuring that they still turned a profit by making their servants and animals work.
It is interesting that God gives the same consideration to animals here, that He does to people. That shouldn’t be taken as God making animals the equivalent of humans, as only we are made in His image. Rather, it shows us the level of importance that God places on our treatment of those who are under our care and charge.
In making this a commandment, it becomes sin when it is not obeyed, even though God doesn’t call it one. Anything that we do, which is in opposition to what God says is sin, whether our disobedience is intentional or accidental, direct or indirect.
Not everything in the Bible is a commandment. When reading scripture, things which we are directed to do are commandments, they can be seen as being prescriptive, much like a prescription from a doctor tells us what to do. Other things are descriptive, providing us with information and advice. One of the greatest descriptive statements about taking care of those animals we own is in the greatest book of wisdom of all times, the book of Proverbs.
A righteous man regards the life of his animal, but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel. – Proverbs 12:10
This is clearly not a commandment, but rather shows us the wisdom of those who are righteous. Why would a righteous man “regard the life of his animal?” Because in that time period, those animals were an important part of his livelihood. Whether they were beasts of burden, such as oxen and donkeys or they were animals being raised for slaughter, his livelihood came from the lives of those animals. Taking the time to care for the animals is a way of ensuring his own good fortune. Not taking care of those animals can be seen as a recipe for his own destruction.
God goes so far as to instruct farmers to allow their oxen to eat off the grain they are separating by walking on it, a practice which seems very unsanitary to us today. Even so, there are still places in the world where it is practiced:
You shall not nuzzle an ox while it treads out the grain. – Deuteronomy 25:4
The interesting thing, which most people don’t think about when reading this verse, is that those oxen wouldn’t be eating much grain, but rather, eating the stalks. Grain is heavier than the dried stalks, so when the oxen tread upon it, separating the two, the grain falls down through the stalks. Were the oxen to pick up something to eat, it would likely be the stalks, not the grain.
These commandments don’t stop with caring for one’s own animals, as God also instructed people to help care for the animals of others, even to the point of caring for animals belonging to their enemies. There are commandments which forbade them passing by an animal in distress, wandering astray, or one which has fallen down under its load (Exodus 23:4-5).
Yet things are considerably different today, at least for most of us; we no longer have beasts of burden, nor do most of us raise animals agriculturally.
This is true; but it doesn’t change God’s Word. Both cats and dogs, the most common pets in our households, have uses beyond eating food and giving us something soft to pet. Dogs are one of the greatest burglar alarms there are, often being so successful that they scare off miscreants, without any intervention on our part. Some will also attack those invaders, physically protecting our families. While cats won’t do that, we all know how useful cats can be in keeping rodent populations at bay, so that they don’t get into our food.
What About Other Animals?
God’s concern with animals extends beyond domesticated ones. There are a large number of verses in the Bible, especially the Old Testament, which talk about God’s solicitude towards animals. He is the one who is there for the wild animals, when they give birth; not any human veterinarian. He is the one who makes sure they have food to eat.
Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? – Matthew 6:26
Or, how about:
You open Your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing. – Psalms 145:16
God was even concerned about the cattle in Nineveh, not wanting to destroy those living in that great city, even though it was a city known for its cruelty towards the peoples that it conquered. He specifically mentioned the livestock (some translations say “cattle”), along with the people in that statement to the prophet Jonah.
And should I not pity Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred and twenty thousands persons who cannot discern between their right hand and their left – and much livestock? – Jonah 4:11
There are other verses referring to animals, both domestic and wild, showing God’s compassion towards them; but there is not one single verse which shows indifference or God condoning cruelty towards animals.
Then Why Does God Sit Idly By, When People are Cruel to Animals?
With it being so clear that God isn’t cruel to animals and that He doesn’t want us to be cruel to animals, why then, dose He allow it? Why does it seem that he sits idly by allowing such cruelty?
First of all, saying that God sits idly by is an assumption. We don’t know what God is doing, because we cannot see it. God does countless things outside of our sight, even things we ask Him to. There are many stories in the Bible of people asking God to do something and nothing seems to happen for some time, even years; then suddenly God moves. Was that really God moving suddenly or was it actually God moving all the time and it comes to light, where we can see it, suddenly? Most likely the latter.
Yet God has created mankind with free will. Had He not done so, we would not have the capacity for love. As beings created in His image, love is an inseparable part of who we are. God intended it that way, so that we could receive His love and return out love to Him.
In doing so, God realized that we would misuse our will and some would choose to hate, rather than to love. This doesn’t just mean that they would choose to hate God, but that they would choose to hate other people, their computer, a bump in the road and yes, animals too. Even without hating those animals, they may have little regard towards them.
This is where the stem of cruelty to animals comes from; the hatred and indifference in people’s hearts. Since they don’t care, it is easy to see those animals as nothing more than something placed there for their convenience or even an inconvenience. In either case, that can result in cruelty.
God is never in favor of people being cruel to animals. In addition to the verses that I’ve already mentioned in this study, there are many others included in the Bible, where God talks about how we should care for animals. If we all lived according to His will and His desire, no animal would ever be mistreated.
Some of the greatest cruelties towards animals come in the use of the animals’ own nature against them, when people have dogs, roosters and other animals fight each other, as a means of entertainment and of gaining money. Those people have no compassion for their animals, merely seeing their pain as dollar signs.
Does That Mean We Can’t Kill Animals?
Some say that killing animals, even for food, is cruel. By and large, these are people who are vegetarians of one sort or another; but this can also include people who are meat-eaters, but are opposed to hunting. Is killing animals for food cruel? Is hunting cruel?
We’ve already discussed how animals killing other animals for food is not cruel. As the apex predator of all apex predators, it would follow suit that it is not cruel for humans to kill animals, so that we might use them for food. As long as that fits in with God’s intended plan for us, then we are operating within the proper constraints to avoid cruelty.
Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as the green herbs. 4 But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. – Genesis 9:3-4
In this verse, God is speaking to Noah, after the flood. Later, God limits the animals that His people are allowed to eat, in the Mosaic Law. Still later, He gives us permission to eat all animals in the New Testament. In all of this, there is no mention of cruelty, nor limitation on how we kill animals for food.
It should be noted that animals who are slaughtered commercially for food are generally slaughtered in the most humane manner possible. Even in ancient times, when they didn’t have the methods we have available to us today, people would strive to find the most humane manner to kill animals, reducing their pain. There is both a moral and a practical reason for this, as the body can release chemicals during death that can alter the taste and toughness of the meat, especially if the animal is tense or fearful in the moments before death.
Nevertheless, allow me to add something to what God says in His Word. Although it is not cruel to kill animals for food, it is possible to kill animals in a cruel manner. Any killing where the pain associated with death is allowed to be prolonged can be considered cruelty. This is why responsible hunters say that if you wound an animal, you are to track that animal and finish it off, keeping it from suffering.
We get into a gray area here, when it comes to killing animals as a sport, only for the trophies. There have been cases of people going to Africa or such places on “big game safaris,” hunting elephants, zebras, lions and just about any other animal you can think of. If all those hunters are after is a trophy, I cannot find any biblical justification for their actions. On the other hand, if the native people eat the meat of the animal, even if the hunters don’t, then it can be said that the animal has been killed for food, regardless of the motive of the hunter. Perhaps that abolishes them from culpability and perhaps it doesn’t, I’m not one to judge.
Even in such cases, hunters should take care to ensure that they kill their game as humanly as possible, avoiding creating a situation where the animal goes through a prolonged death. The weapons used to kill the animals must be of a sufficient size so as to guarantee a quick death.