The Dominion of Love: Animal Rights According to the Bible

Front Cover
Lantern Books, 2002 - Nature - 208 pages
Many commentators and users of the Bible have, over the centuries and up to the present day, used the Bible to argue that animals have no rights, that they were put on this earth for our use, and that we have no obligations to them.

In his cogent, honest, and fully researched and referenced work, The Dominion of Love, Norm Phelps attempts to encourage all who revere the Bible as holy scripture to open their hearts to the suffering that we inflict upon our nonhuman neighbors. He shows that the right of animals not to be imprisoned, harmed, and killed for our benefit flows naturally from the Bible's message of love and compassion and argues that this is the message of the Bible's most important passages dealing with our relationship to animals. He further responds to the defenses of animal exploitation that are often made based on the Bible.

Beautifully written, The Dominion of Love is an essential addition to a growing body of literature that argues for a compassionate and non-exploitative reading of Holy Scripture.

 

Contents

An Eternal Treblinka
2
Kill All the Women and Children
2
Cruelty is Atheism
24
The Prime Directives
33
The Image and Likeness of God
45
All Gods Children Go to Heaven
57
The Suffering of the Living
67
Your Hands Are Covered with Blood
74
What Did Jesus Eat?
125
The Sparrow and the Lamb
137
The Gospel of Mercy
149
Does God Care about Oxen?
155
Eat Anything You Want
169
The Dominion of Love
176
Biblical Verses Relating to Human Treatment of Animals
180
Suggestions for Further Reading
193

They Shall Be Yours for Food
91
Fish Stories
108
Bibliography
200
Copyright

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About the author (2002)

Norm Phelps (d. 2014) was an American animal rights activist, vegetarian and writer. He was a founding member of the Society of Ethical and Religious Vegetarians (SERV), and a former outreach director of the Fund for Animals.

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