which is more important?

SpiceItUp

life......or blood?

If it takes blood to save life then is that putting blood over life?

but if you put life over blood wouldn't that make a transfusion ok?

any thoughts?

funkyderek

In the real world, blood is absolutely worthless except for it's ability to sustain life. Putting blood as a symbol of life above life itself is absolutely disgusting and grossly immoral.

If trying to convince those who put some old men's interpretation of the millenia-old laws of a barbarian tribe above common sense and human compassion, you'll have a hard job but the example of Jesus breaking the Sabbath law (far more important to the Jews than the dietary restriction on blood) in order to heal people is probably a good starting point.

JH

Life is the most important thing, and that's why you need blood to sustain life.

Do everything to stay alive and healthy, even if that means blood transfusions.

One day the watchtower will back off on this issue, but after how many innocent lives are taken...

Angharad

Exactly

I heard someone make the analogy once that, its like saying I value my actual wedding ring which is the symbol of my marriage, more than my marriage itself - doesnt make any sense

I cant see then dropping it completely and openly, as it will leave them open to so many lawsuits.

onacruse

Ahh, Spice, you provoke me, you really do! LOL I'm not sure if the silence on the other recent threads about blood indicates that this issue has been temporarily "beaten to death" (pardon the pun), and I've no desire to belabor the point. Let me just offer one thought:

You are comparing disparates. "Life" is a concept, a definition, typically associate with "sentience" (e.g. witness the social conflict about whether fetuses are "alive," or the debate about whether plants are "alive," or the differing opinions about what truly constitutes death), whereas "blood" is a demonstrably material thing.

Thus, insofar as we consider "sentience" to have greater value than "material things," then life is more important. But, that being said, a common factor in defining life (as in the examples I used above) is the ability for self-determination. Therefore, if a being self-determines that blood transfusion is OK, then's it's OK, for that being. If a being self-determines that transfusion is not OK, then it's not OK, for that being. That's what morality is all about: "what's OK for me."

Please excuse me if I'm departing from the point of your thread.

Craig

BluesBrother

I guess that here we are simply using the word "life" in an everyday sense , to mean the continued existance of a loved one. To continue to see a baby's smile, feel a wife's warm touch , hear a child's laughter etc . Should you trade that for blind obedience to a principle that is derived from Scripture? . By that I mean that transfusions could not have been discussed an ancient book and the stand is taken from laws on diet

As Angherad well put it , a symbolism of life cannot be more value than the thing itself. This board has often carried references to scriptures that show that the Hebrew laws on blood and other religious rules were occasionally waived when life itself depended on it .... the argument against the WT stand on blood can go on and on