What does the Bible say about
dealing with animals?
Animals are living beings and, like us hu-mans, creatures of God. According to bibli-cal tradition, God also made them out of the dust of the earth, just like us humans. But unlike humans, animals are not created in the image of God. This means that the life of a human being is, in principle, of greater value to God than that of an animal.
Nevertheless, God gave us humans responsi-bility for the earth and thus also for the animals that God created so that we can care for them, enjoy companionship with them and also use them for work to a reasonable extent can.
Although God originally gave people in pa-radise plants - namely the fruits of trees - for food, after death came to God's crea-tion due to man's sin, God allowed them to also eat the flesh of animals and use them for the Lord -position of clothing and other everyday objects. However, God does not approve in any way when people wan-tonly torture or cause animals to suffer or intentionally neglect them. Likewise, a person is not allowed to exploit animals for financial gain or kill them for no rea-son. Rather, it is God's will that we humans value the earth as his gift to us and con-scientiously fulfill our responsibility for the animals as part of God's creation.
After the Fall, God commanded people to sacrifice animals for a limited time as an expression of their will to have fellowship with God. In addition, the death of an ani-mal made atonement for the sins of people. So by having an animal die in place of man, man could stay alive. This should make the person who has sinned aware that death is the punishment for sin.
All of these sacrificial rites were a picture of Jesus Christ, the Savior of humanity an-nounced by God, who offered the perfect sacrifice for the sins of all people through his righteous life and his death on the cross. Anyone who believes in Jesus and follows him will be absolved of their guilt and receive eternal life. Since then, there is no longer any need for us humans to sa-crifice animals. Rather, our entire life should be a sign of our love and devotion for God and our fellow human beings.