My mom’s adorable bundle of playful energy, Zippy!
Zippy ©Photos by Terri

Do you have a pet? The picture above is my mom’s dog Zippy, and she loves that little guy. Do you have an animal you love? I wonder about what God thinks of our pets. Do dogs go to heaven? Will my mom get to enjoy the company of Zippy in the big upstairs? What about the animals we eat and use for clothing and such, does God care about them and how we treat them?

In an audio book I was listening to, Myth in Human History (The Great Courses), the instructor Professor Grant L. Voth was discussing the Christian creation myth told in Genesis chapters 1-3. He differentiated this myth from others by pointing out that it makes humans “lords of creation,” and further expands on this by stating that it leaves no room for animal rights. This is what he said:

“This story gives us pretty much carte blanche to do what we want with nature since God isn’t in it, outside it, it exists for our use and he gave it to us to use however we wanted. The ecological consequences of this are obvious now. We can sometimes wish that we had been heir to a tradition that required us at least to apologize to a buffalo when we had to kill it or to a mountain when we had to level it, and do as little of this as we possibly could get by with. There was an 18th century clergyman whose sermon I read once who argued in the sermon that the only reason that animals were given life at all was to keep their meat fresh until we killed it. This is the days before refrigeration. There is no sense of animal rights here. There are no rights except ours, and that is inherent in this Genesis account.” (Part I at 2:33, or 26 minutes into lecture 5, “Hebrew Creation Myths”)

There are a number of inconsistencies with his analysis of Christian “myth,” but I want to focus on the animal rights issue. The Bible does not, in any way, promote cruelty toward animals, nor is it condoned, nor is the Bible apathetic on this topic. The professor quoted a number of verses throughout the Bible during the course, so he had to have read it, and I assume a professor would read it through more than once. He seems to have focused more on the verses that supported his view of it as myth and the paradigms he was using to analyze myths.

First, I would like to cite the verse in the Bible that explicitly states God gave animals to humans for food. This did not occur in the creation part of the story, chapters 1-3 which the professor was discussing, but after the flood that only Noah, his family and his animals survived, which is in chapter 9 of Genesis.

Genesis 9:3, “Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.”

The Bible says we can eat meat. Or animals, rather. But does it say we can treat them negligently or even cruelly? Let’s start with Deuteronomy and the Ten Commandments, the fourth one in particular.

Deuteronomy 5:14, “but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your ox, your donkey or any of your animals, nor the alien within your gates, so that your manservant and maidservant may rest, as you do.”

Notice animals are required to get the same day of rest as humans. That seems rather…humane. Another regulation found in the same part of the Bible is about the agricultural process.

Deuteronomy 25:4, “Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain.”

Animals should be able to eat the grain as they work. There is a very similar regulation prohibiting Israelites from reaping to the edge of their field, or gathering the gleanings of the harvest, or what falls to the ground. Rather they are to leave these leftovers behind for the poor and the foreigners (Lev 19:9-10). God cares for the poor, he cares for the estranged, and in much the same way, he cares for the laboring animals.

Does the Bible ever state explicitly that we are to treat animals decently? To provide for and protect them? To not torture them? Yup.

Proverbs 12:10, “A righteous man cares for the needs of his animal, but the kindest acts of the wicked are cruel.”

The contrast within this proverb not only points to the righteousness of caring for an animal, but also to the wickedness of cruelty toward animals. Also, from the prophets:

Habakkuk 2:17, “The violence you have done to Lebanon will overwhelm you, and your destruction of animals will terrify you. For you have shed man’s blood; you have destroyed lands and cities and everyone in them.”

For me, knowing that God’s justice extends to those who “destroy” animals warms my heart. Once, while working on an overseas military base, I saw a soldier and a fellow contractor murder the puppies of a stray dog living in the gate of the base. In my questioning of the contractor on this, I called him a “puppy-killer.” This title disturbed him, and he quickly became uneasy about what he had done. Too bad he did not think of that before he murdered them.

How does God feel about these animals he has created? Does he care for them like he cares for humans? Or are they simply food he provided for us, carriers of meat? Let us take a look at Jonah’s story. The following verse is God speaking to Jonah, who is very depressed that the city of Nineveh was spared from God’s wrath after repenting of their evil ways.

Jonah 4:11, “But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about that great city?”

This verse is the end of a story of a man who was sent to preach to a people he did not want to see saved. Jonah wanted the people of Nineveh to burn in hell for what they had done. The details of their violation against Jonah are not mentioned in the story, but apparently Nineveh at this point in history was known for their violence and lust.

God felt differently than Jonah. Despite the terrible reputation of this city, God calls it “great” in the verse above. What made it great? I do not believe God was referring to their ability in war or trade. Their greatness was due to there being 120,000 of his creations living in it! Their abilities and accomplishments did not matter. This is an amazing point, and deserves its own blog post, but I want to point out the mention of cattle in there. Yes, what made the city of Nineveh great in God’s eyes was not only the 120,000 people, but also the cattle! God did not want to destroy the people or the cattle, but to save the cattle as well. This, I believe, expresses how God feels about animals.

A couple other verses:

Psalm 36:6, “Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, your justice like the great deep. O Lord, you preserve both man and beast.”

Psalm 145:16-17, “You open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing. The Lord is righteous in all his ways and loving toward all he has made.”

God’s righteousness, justice, provision, and his love are all directed toward the animals of the earth as well as the humans. It seems to me that the Bible makes it clear that we are not to be cruel to animals. Rather, we are to care for them, provide for them, protect them, and love them! Since being a Christian is to be Christ-like, my mom loving her Zippy is a very Christian thing to do.

Do dogs go to heaven? I do not know. But, clearly God wants us to care for them because he cares for them, and if he cares for them, do you think maybe we will get to enjoy our pets in heaven like we did on earth? I believe so. I think my mom will get to enjoy Zippy’s crazy playful energy in heaven. God created animals for his pleasure, and for ours, and it makes sense to me that they would continue giving us pleasure in heaven. This is only my opinion, though.

In Matthew 6:26, Jesus said, “Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.”

God provides for the birds of the air, because he cares for them. But Jesus continued, “Are you not much more valuable than they?”

Jesus did not die on the cross for animals, not even the cattle in Nineveh that Jonah apparently preached to. Jesus died for people, and that is the real message of the Bible.

God loves animals, but he REALLY loves us! So much so that he humbled himself and lived as a common man, then let us beat him up, insult him, and kill him. Receiving Jesus as God and believing in his life and death and resurrection (John 1:12) opens the door to a relationship with the most loving, kind, understanding, and compassionate person, Jesus Christ. I encourage you all to be kind to animals, and to get to know this man Jesus.

Blessings – Shamar Covenant

(All Bible quotations are from the NIV84 translation.)