The claim that an English translation of the Bible was changed to accommodate the Christian Right to support its anti-abortion stance is biblically and historically bogus. I made note of these points in the previous article on this subject. But there is even more exegetical and historical evidence that the best translation of the text should read in English “so that her children come out” long before there was a Christian political movement that began in the late 1970s.
Umberto Cassuto, also known as Moshe David Cassuto (1883–1951), was a Jewish rabbi and biblical scholar born in Florence, Italy. In his commentary on Exodus, he presents an accurate translation of the passage based on the nuances of the Hebrew:
When men strive together and they hurt unintentionally a woman with child, and her children come forth but no mischief happens—that is, the woman and the children do not die—the one who hurts her shall surely be punished by a fine. But if any mischief happens, that is, if the woman dies or the children, then you shall give life for life.
Cassuto’s commentary was first published in Hebrew in 1951. Before Roe v. Wade and before the rise of the so-called Christian Right. Cassuto was a Jew and not a Christian who knew Hebrew better than Ruttenberg and Zeh.
