{Recent conversations with people have lead me to consider the value of human life.}
What value does a single life hold? It has been said that if you add up the monetary value found in one human body the total would be about $4.50. This doesn't really make you worth very much. At that rate you are certainly replaceable. (http://www.coolquiz.com/trivia/explain/docs/worth.asp)
Beliefs about the value of human life boil down to two systems: contingent value and inherent value. Contingent value makes the value of a human life dependant upon variables. Therefore the value is conditional. On the side of inherent value, life's value is a quality that cannot be removed. The value of human life is permanent and consistent; it cannot be separated or changed. Inherent value simply is.
Contingent value has a long history and finds many supporters in various philosophies. One characteristic that these groups share is the desire to impose their own pursuits upon others (to elevate themselves or their group to some advantage). These form their own variables upon which they measure the value of a life. The ancient Greek Stoics found value through virtues. Those who did not poses these "virtues" were not considered worth as much. Those who were ill, maned, disabled, orphaned, etc were considered unable to posses these "virtues" and were thus not valuable.
The Stoics, however, were not alone in their philosophy. Many ancient peoples placed similar conditional value on life. The ancient philosophers valued "virtuous men." These men of virtue were mostly comprised of the educated, or those connected by specific kinship or state citizenship. Confucianism taught the suppression of individual differences for the greater common good. Value was here placed upon the group good, leaving the individual little or no value. Hitler taught that value could be based upon a person's European blood line.
Fundamentally, contingent value leads to oppression. Slavery, caste systems, the Holocaust, and mistreatment of the disabled, ill, or orphaned all arise from the belief that the value of human life is dependant upon a set of variables.
Taken even further, to the ultimate result, contingent value does not allow society to react to ones personal choices which may effect the quality or status of life. This means that anti-drug or self mutilation laws have no basis. What one chooses to do to or with ones life is based upon their own set of variables. Variables by their very nature can change. Thus we can also not speak against murder or genocide when they are based upon dependant variables. "Without inherent value in human life, at most these acts would be socially impolite or culturally distasteful, but never objectively wrong." (http://talk.thinkingmatters.org.nz/2008/the-inherent-value-of-human-life/)
Inherent value also has a long historical tradition. The Hebrews, and their forefathers, were the first to assign unconditional value on human life. While the Hebrews believed in just punishment of the guilty, the Talmud taught that innocent life should be guarded, even at the cost of other lives. The Torah also held that all life should be valued while the quality of life should never be a factor in its preservation. Jewish tradition mandates the preservation of all life (Jewish legal sources call this pikuach nefesh). One source puts it this way "When one destroys a single individual, it is as if that person destroyed the whole world. (Sanhedrin 4:5)" (http://judaism.about.com/library/3_intro/level2/bl_war.htm)
This belief is illustrated by the story of David and his punishment of the messenger who brought news of the death of King Saul. The messenger claimed to have happened upon Saul while he lay wounded on the battle field. Saul called out to the man and asked him to end his life that he might no longer suffer. The messenger hoped that by claiming to have taken the life of Saul himself he would secured for himself favor with David who's life had been relentlessly sought after by Saul. David, however, valued the life of Saul and was greatly distressed by the news of Saul's death. "And David said unto him, How wast thou not afraid to stretch forth thine hand to destroy the Lord's anointed?" (II Samuel 1:14, KJV) It was obvious that King Saul would have eventually died of his wounds or by the hand of the enemy army which was in hot pursuit of the Hebrews. Yet David was horrified by the messengers boldness to judge the King's life worthy of being cut short. The messenger himself died for his confession to the crime of murder.
Beliefs of inherent value where later shared with Judeo-Christian believers. These beliefs that all are of an equal inherent value were developed and expressed in a variety of ways. One example of the expression of this belief can be found in the United States Declaration of Independence. "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness." (http://www.earlyamerica.com/earlyamerica/freedom/doi/text.html) They believed that this value could not be taken away and should be preserved.
These two schools of human value are connected to the believers notion of God. Contingent value is connected to a lack of belief in God. The ancient Greeks and other philosophers, while they often believed in some form of deity, did not hold great personal connection with these deities. Their gods where not personal creators who loved and cared for their creation. Some cultures held that they themselves were smaller gods working their way to divinity. Many of the more modern embracers of contingent value do not believe that there is any divine being or purpose for humans. They hold that humans sprang from eons of evolution and have only accidentally achieved their modern state. By this humans cannot have inherent value because one is only an accident, survival of the fittest. So by these standards life's value can change based on the conditional variables one chooses to place upon it.
In inherent value ones life is locked with a creator God. The Hebrews and their forefathers, as well as those of Judeo-Christian thought, hold to a personal God. Genesis chapters one and two describe the creation of man in the image of God. Again, in Genesis 9:6 this connection is referred to when condemning murder. "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man." (Genesis 9:6, KJV)
