The basic problem confronting the two sides is a salient explanation and definition of the beginning of life. Does life begin when the seed enters into the egg mixing chromosomes or does life begin at some later date? Some contend that life begins at birth and therefore practice what others consider to be infanticide, God forbid, but each according to their perception justifies the proclamation of their stand.

The nine months of pregnancy can be divided by trimesters, by viability or by points of time distinguished through sudden change; perhaps the most predictable of these changes happens at 40 days after conception when a sudden infusion of energy causes a change in the growth.

Interestingly, 2000 years ago the Rabbis who composed the Mishna, the first writings of the Oral Tradition, were very specific recognizing this 40 day juncture that life begins at 41 days; in addition, the Talmud, the compilation of the Oral Tradition, states: if a woman terminates a pregnancy before 41 days it is "nothing."

Furthermore, it has been later explained by the Rabbis that what transpires during the first forty days of pregnancy produces the placenta, the afterbirth. To understand the strength of the Rabbi's decrees stem from Talmud's admonition that: stricter than the Rabbis is too strict. In other words, to have so much compassion extending even to the afterbirth is too strict.

By determining the precise time that life begins delineates a space in which the woman can exercise her prerogative to have or not to have a baby without incurring a social or spiritual stigma. Only after forty days from conception does the reality of abortion become even relevant. According to Jewish Law the mother's life is more important than the baby's life since the mother has established her life, but the baby has yet to enter into the physical world.

The travesty of abortion is in the rabbi's hands for not making this information, which is corroborated by science, readily available to the general public. By keeping the public in the dark about the metaphoric meaning of sexuality and ancient information about the process by which we come in and leave this world is the biggest crime of all—to place a stumbling block before the blind.
I hope the rabbis will repent their selfish and arrogant ways and free the knowledge of the Torah from the shackles of religion. Until then, I say, abortion the rabbis.