The ever-inventive animalists at PETA are out with a new beef, er, gripe: The Bible.

It seems in this 400^th anniversary year of the venerable King James Version, PETA wants to jump on the bandwagon for some free publicity. Here’s the news item:

Animal activists say the Bible needs to be more considerate of God’s furry friends. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, has asked the Committee on Bible Translation to update the New International Version Bible to include more animal-friendly language, according to CNN. In a letter to translators, the group called the Bible’s current text “speciesist” and requested that pronouns like “he” and “she” be used instead of “it” when referring to animals…“Language matters,” Friedrich told CNN. “Calling an animal ‘it’ denies them something. They are beloved by God. They glorify God.”

Actually, PETA folks get this one wrong, too, as they get most things wrong. The Bible is most considerate of God’s creatures. The Bible tells us that all Creation groans, awaiting its savior. As C.S. Lewis helpfully informs us, Nature is not our mother, she’s our sister. Nature, like us, is in need of redemption. That’s why, when Jesus was born, Heaven and Nature sang.

As it happens, my men’s Bible study just this week delved into the remarkable story of Balaam’s ass. It’s in the book of Numbers 22:21-38. In brief, Balaam is a pagan priest on his way to curse Israel. Apparently, Balaam is considered a champion curser. He mounts his she-ass and heads off to do evil. But the Angel of the Lord appears and blocks the path. Balaam’s poor donkey sees the angel and balks at going to the left or the right. Despite Balaam’s beating her, she refuses to aid him in his wickedness. She lies down before the Angel. She even talks to Balaam. She asks him how he can be so cruel to her. Never before had I encountered talking animals in Scripture. No wonder C.S. Lewis “peoples” his books with talking creatures, two- and four-legged. Balaam’s ass is a touching story. Even the donkey acknowledges the God of Israel.

I was once taught a lesson in the differences between men and beasts. Boarding a Soviet trawler in the Bering Sea, my party of ten Coast Guardsmen quickly finished our inspection of their catch of fish. I was serving as the Russian language interpreter for the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Boutwell.

As I was about to go back over the side, I offered this last word to the Soviet skipper. “Naoborot, spaceetyay kitov.” (By the way, save the whales.) Whales, like all marine mammals are a protected species. My Greenpeace friends ashore had given me that Russian line to use.

The Soviet skipper laughed: “We know whut you mean,” he said, “but you can’t say eet zat way,” he said in heavily accented English. He smiled through stainless steel teeth.

“Spaceets means to save as in save one’s soul. Whales dun’t haff souls, only people haff souls.”

I looked up at the trawler’s smokestack. It had a yellow profile of Lenin, the top Communist revolutionary. Lenin had said any religious sentiment, however slight, was “unspeakably vile.” Yet here was one of his own Communists—wearing a furry shapka on his head that bore the red star, hammer and sickle device—and telling me that only people had souls. I half expected that smokestack to tumble into the sea!

If Balaam’s ass can acknowledge the God of Israel, and if this official representative of the atheist USSR knows that only people have souls, there may be hope for PETA yet.

Tags: PETA

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