The placenta is made by the human body, but it's not really a body part... like milk, semen, dead skin cells, saliva, boogers, etc. Those all consist of human cells at least in part, but not something that's supposed to remain a part of you. If you considered placentophagy to be cannibalism, why wouldn't you consider your baby a cannibal if you breastfeed him?
oh good point about the breastmilk.
I've mentioned encapsulating my placenta to multiple people at my church (some who are ordained) and no one said anything about it being sinful.. weird, yes, but sinful? no.
I don't think it would be sinful, and can't think of a verse that you could use to convince me otherwise.
The things listed in Acts 15 were forbidden because they were all associated with the way the new Christian Gentiles used to worship their gods and Paul wanted them to set themselves apart by abstaining from those things.
Getting super legalistic about this kind of thing just doesn't fit into my theology though. :)
The placenta is made by the human body, but it's not really a body part... like milk, semen, dead skin cells, saliva, boogers, etc. Those all consist of human cells at least in part, but not something that's supposed to remain a part of you. If you considered placentophagy to be cannibalism, why wouldn't you consider your baby a cannibal if you breastfeed him?
This is why I thought eating placenta as cannibalism was borderline and arguable. It is a fully functioning human organ, but one which is intended to eventually be discarded.
I would certainly not place it in the same category as milk or dead skin, though. The placenta is a part of the fetal body which grows along with the fetus, keeps it alive throughout pregnancy, and functions in a complex way. It is not really the same as a secretion.
Well, technically, the placenta is both. It arises from both foetal and maternal cells.
Regarding the consumption of human flesh, I thought the New Testament didn't mention it. I could certainly be wrong though. Could you point me in the direction of some verses, I'd like to read more.
From what I learned of the early stages of pregnancy, the fetus and placenta develop together during the very earliest stages of embryonic development, beginning even before implantation. I may not remember the details correctly, but I thought the placenta was derived entirely from fetal cells.
I am not aware of anything in the NT specifically on cannibalism. There are quite a few references from first and second century Christian writings that mention Christians considering the eating of human flesh or blood sinful. The subject came up a lot, because non-Christian sources sometimes accused Christians of practicing ritual cannibalism, due to a misunderstanding about the nature of Communion. Early authors mentioned that they not only didn't practice cannibalism in their services, but they despised the practice and avoided it. There seems to be no disagreement anywhere in early Church history. As far as Scriptural sources denouncing cannibalism, though, there may not be any.
The placenta does start to develop with the embryo before implantation. But, once implantation occurs, cells in the uterine wall begin to contribute to it's development and it becomes a joint project, as it were.
NOT MAKING A "RULING" just was looking more into the question.
I was thinking about this question. I did a little "digging" in the bible and did come across Deuteronomy 28: 57 It is talking about eating the afterbirth because the woman is SO hungry! It is really the only think that I could find about what the "law" said about eat humans or the placenta.
I was going to w/my 1st and just never did. BUT maybe I will do it with this little surprise!
CONGRATULATIONS NAZS MOM!
I think you've gotten your answer.. it's very funny to me, it never really even crossed my mind as a Christian.. I just figure it was another one of God's gifts for healing ourselves ;)
Getting super legalistic about this kind of thing just doesn't fit into my theology though. :)
and too, so take from my experience what you will, but because I didn't think twice about it, I have been consuming bits of mine frozen in smoothies since my little one was born 5/31/11. God has been pretty consistently blunt with me too, so I know what you mean. :) I had a history of both ppd and fairly severe depression not related to ppd. I did NOT want to go down that path again, and was determined to do whatever it took to avoid that this time around. I can tell you that I never once felt any sort of conviction for doing it - my conscience couldn't be more clear. I don't know about anyone else, but I've never been able to do anything questionable without some level of guilt. Nothing I read in any of my or my hubby's Biblical research led us to feel it was sinful or something we shouldn't be doing, as we read the passages. I *have* gotten a lot of "Hooookaaaay.... that's ONE way to go!" type comments from the few in my circle who know I'm doing it, but no talk of sin or offense to God - though honestly I have kept it fairly quiet. Why flip people out unnecessarily? But I wouldn't deny it if asked either. I think my mom was a little taken aback, but hey, she's the Seventies Hippie Christian Earth Mother (I know many would feel that's some kind of oxymoron, haha!) that raised me as a crunchy Christian! I just keep taking it farther than she did.
And there is NO question as to it's effectiveness for me. Two days post-partum I could feel myself getting a little "bluesy". By the fourth day, I was a MESS, just a pile of snot and tears. I got my poor hubby to make me a smoothie and within two hours I was right back on my feet again. And that's what I've done, just used one (ice cube sized) chunk whenever I had a day where I felt my grip slipping. Nearly instant relief every time. It's been absolutely worth it.
THOUGH... I just got home and the part I had frozen but not cut up that I envisioned encapsulating seems to be a bit defrosted bc my dd1 failed to close the freezer door all the way before I left! Not sure what I'll do with it now, thinking of going ahead and drying or cooking it and then refreezing it. My hubby had a hard time with prepping it for me, so I did most of it. He said the smell overwhelmed him, but oddly enough I couldn't smell it at all! So I cleaned and prepped the rest of it myself after that first smoothie and it took a *really* really long time to rinse all the blood away. But it did finally rinse clean enough for me. I wasn't terribly concerned about the blood as far as consumption goes, it just seemed like the thing to do.. And .... it was cool. It made me wish I had prepped it ALL myself, and I kind of regretted not really examining it (just for the "far out" factor) before we did any cutting. I had thought about doing a print, and I didn't... now I wish I had.
So just my $1.50! Hope it helps. :)
CONGRATULATIONS NAZS MOM!
Thanks!
What's this "cannibalism is forbidden" thing? I can't think of it being mentioned at all in the Bible (beyond that Deuteronomy reference, where it's mentioned in the context of murder plus cannibalism). As a Christian I'd have no MORAL problem even with eating the flesh of another person (a la the plane crash in the Andes). A very strong squeamishness/health problem with it, sure; I'm not sure I could bring myself to do it. But "God wouldn't want me to eat human flesh" just would not register as an objection. It's not forbidden. It's not mentioned. And I'm Protestant, so the objections of early Christians to the practice don't hold weight in and of themselves (although if their arguments were sound, the arguments would).
I capsulised the placenta with both pregnancies. I think it helped more the first time, but DH burnt it the second time! :p It wasn't particularly bloody; no more so than meat. I'm not convinced the bit about abstaining from blood is relevant to all Christians in any case; it seems like it was in the context of idol worship, as PPs have said. But all commercial meat is bled to some extent anyway, so unless you're into black pudding, surely it's not an issue?
We are not under the law anymore but under grace.
"'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind'; and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'"
Eating placenta doesn`t seem like it would be contrary to these greatest commandments. I am going to eat mine guilt-free :)
What's this "cannibalism is forbidden" thing? I can't think of it being mentioned at all in the Bible (beyond that Deuteronomy reference, where it's mentioned in the context of murder plus cannibalism). As a Christian I'd have no MORAL problem even with eating the flesh of another person (a la the plane crash in the Andes). A very strong squeamishness/health problem with it, sure; I'm not sure I could bring myself to do it. But "God wouldn't want me to eat human flesh" just would not register as an objection. It's not forbidden. It's not mentioned. And I'm Protestant, so the objections of early Christians to the practice don't hold weight in and of themselves (although if their arguments were sound, the arguments would).
Your arguments put into focus the two approaches the OP (or others) could take in deciding the matter.
From a strict Scripture-only perspective, you are right, cannibalism is apparently permitted since it is not specifically proscribed in the New Testament canon.
(For a non-Scripture-only person, this is an example of why Scripture-only doesn't work, but I am looking at things from a different direction, I suppose.)
My take would be that since early Christians from the first generation onward, including those taught by the Apostles, maintained and openly preached that cannibalism was forbidden within Christianity, only the most compelling and overwhelming evidence could begin to refute that belief. It would require the same kind of evidence as, for example, arguing that Christians could marry their own siblings because brother-sister incest was not specifically forbidden in the New Testament; the force of longstanding tradition and Church-wide understanding would outweigh almost anything on the other side.
Your arguments put into focus the two approaches the OP (or others) could take in deciding the matter.
From a strict Scripture-only perspective, you are right, cannibalism is apparently permitted since it is not specifically proscribed in the New Testament canon.
(For a non-Scripture-only person, this is an example of why Scripture-only doesn't work, but I am looking at things from a different direction, I suppose.)
My take would be that since early Christians from the first generation onward, including those taught by the Apostles, maintained and openly preached that cannibalism was forbidden within Christianity, only the most compelling and overwhelming evidence could begin to refute that belief. It would require the same kind of evidence as, for example, arguing that Christians could marry their own siblings because brother-sister incest was not specifically forbidden in the New Testament; the force of longstanding tradition and Church-wide understanding would outweigh almost anything on the other side.
I think this is a good point. It is really tricky (although interesting) to discuss things on this forum because you don't always know what perspective the other person is coming from.
I am scripture first person. I mentioned this to my parents and they told me about the recent bible study program they'd just participated in on guidance. It had three heading I guess - scripture, good judgment and trivial. Your first point-of-call is the Bible. If it doesn't say one way or the other then the next question is, is this good judgement? To use your example, I would say that a brother/sister marriage would be poor judgement because of the implications for children of the union.
I personally think that the placenta question could be either judgment or trivia. One could argue that it showed a good use of the available resources to prevent or treat PPD anaemia or one could argue that it really didn't matter either way and that God didn't mind whether you ate your placenta or took a course of commercial iron tablets.
I didn't really understand what you meant by this being an example of why scripture only doesn't work but only expand if you feel like it 
From a strict Scripture-only perspective, you are right, cannibalism is apparently permitted since it is not specifically proscribed in the New Testament canon.
(For a non-Scripture-only person, this is an example of why Scripture-only doesn't work, but I am looking at things from a different direction, I suppose.)
I'm not "Scripture-only" - as far as I know, that position doesn't exist. I'm sola Scriptura, which is not at all the same thing.
It's not as simple as "whatever is not specifically proscribed is permitted" - putting bombs in mailboxes isn't specifically proscribed either. The point is, there are Scriptural principles that can be used to determine that putting bombs in mailboxes is not something God would approve of - verses about not committing murder, for instance. (I suppose you could argue for exceptions along the assassinating-Hitler line, but again, Scriptural principles would come into play there.)
There are, to my knowledge, no Scriptural principles that would prohibit cannibalism. The Bible doesn't require us to treat our dead in a particular way - it's not important, because God can raise the dead regardless of the condition of their bodies. Dietary laws went out with the New Covenant (with the possible exception of the "eating blood" thing the OP mentioned, but I've covered that). One could argue that the Golden Rule would apply for casual cannibalism - most of us wouldn't want our dead relatives eaten, so we shouldn't eat other people's relatives - but in a life-or-death situation, I'm not sure that applies (any more than it'd be wrong to take a dead hiker's thermal blanket on Everest, even though most people wouldn't want their dead despoiled... you know?). And in the case of placentaphagy, it doesn't really apply anyway.
So how does sola Scriptura "not work" in this scenario? Unless you're starting from the perspective that cannibalism is absolutely wrong, and therefore SS must be flawed in that it cannot reach that conclusion. But that's contentious: why would you think cannibalism was wrong? The early Christians, taught by the Apostles, taught a lot of weird stuff; the question is, were their arguments sound? So what were they? Were they based on moral principles, and if so, whence derived? Or a squeamishness-based "Ew, no, we don't do that" response to the Roman contention that the Lord's Supper was cannibalism?
Also, "incest is forbidden for Chrristians" can be derived from the Bible. It comes under "Follow the laws of your country as long as they do not conflict with the laws of God".
sosurreal09- Did you ever come to a decision? I was talking about this today and remembered this thead...
I just came across this, and I wanted to throw in my opinion along with the rest 
I ate a piece of my placenta right after DD's birth, blended up in a fruit smoothie. For a few weeks afterward, I would do the same thing if I ever felt moody. Guess what? No PPD! I cannot be sure if this was because of the placenta, or the fact that I was in a Much better frame of mind than when my son was a baby. Did the placenta help? I like to think so.
Now, I'll tell you my personal opinion of the placenta. It is similar to a chicken's egg yolk. The yolk is NOT the chick, as most people believe; it is the nourishment FOR the chick. The chick grows on the outside of the yolk, and yes, chicks have bellybuttons! The yolk nourishes the chick, and right before hatching, the yolk is absorbed into the chick, to provide a few days of nourishment after the hatch.
The placenta is not part of the baby--it nourishes the baby (much like the egg yolk). If you eat the placenta, as many animals do, you are consuming a substance that will ultimately show up in your milk, which will nourish the baby. So, the placenta nourishes the baby while in the womb, and then once again when you eat it and it appears in the milk. (This is oversimplifying, I know, but that's how I like to think of it!) Think about it--you are what you eat, and your milk is too, so in a round about way, whatever you eat helps to make milk!
In my opinion, it should be alright to consume the placenta, because it was meant to nourish the baby, both in and out of the womb.
Also, I pray that you will have a wonderful labor and delivery, and that you and the baby will be happy and healthy!
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