“…Multiply, Subdue The Earth, and Have Dominion”

…MULTIPLY… AND SUBDUE THE EARTH…and HAVE DOMINION

– Mary A. LaClair                                                    

The History Channel, I love the History Channel.  The other day they had a program dealing with large landowners in England. Did you know that they are required by law to do population control on rabbits as a part of managing their estates?

Here in America we are required to meet some rigid building codes, so, I was all right with pest control in England; it was interesting watching the ferrets at work helping to keep a balance in nature.

We should always remember that the Bubonic Plague, which killed literally thousands upon thousands of humans in Eastern Europe, was due to overpopulation of rats which carried infected fleas, which in turn gave the bite of death to thousands of people.

Population control in rodents and animals is necessary. This is why God has told us to have dominion over the animals of the earth:

Gen 1:28 “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.”   KJV  (emphasis mine)

Using ferrets, farmers are able to save much of man’s food supply and vegetable crops from being totally destroyed through an over population of rabbits. This is the meaning of the old term ‘to ferret out’.

While we might not ferret out rabbits, population control of pests is still necessary, especially of those kinds that invade our homes and gardens. It is said that for every one rat or mouse that we see, there are ten that we don’t see. I think everyone should be concerned with this. I do not feel transporting them elsewhere fulfills the “subdue the earth” mandate but instead permits them to multiply and then return in unseen dangerous hordes to man’s territory because of dwindling natural food supply for their large numbers, or even to move in on vacant buildings and city slums to spread disease.

Rodents had been getting into our attic, and spending the winter there, damaging storage items through gnawing and chewing; even removing insulation to make nests. Dangerous side effects are that feces and corpses turn into airborne dust; and, if they chew insulation from wires it creates a fire hazard. Even in the basement, plants wintering there were rootless in the spring, having become food for wandering rodents too lazy to dig winter burrows outside as they should, eating the roots of wild plants and weeds.

Animals do have instinct which could be described as the voice of God to animals. Birds hear it and know when to fly south in winter, and when to fly back north for breeding season. Bears and turtles hear it and know just when to hibernate. I think that they listen to God better than man does sometimes. Wild animals have a natural fear of man, I’m sure they are told not to go near man’s habitation; but, just like mankind, there are animals that disobey. A peaceful Utopia will come in its time; but not in this age!

Genesis 9:2 “The fear of you (speaking of mankind) and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every bird of the air, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea; into your hand they are delivered.” 

Until then, squirrels, chipmunks and mice that disobey, by forfeiting their natural habitat for that of man’s, will not have dominion over me and my household. To let errant rodents live with me destroying my goods and my house is to give them dominion over man. That’s not going to happen at my house.

Some women prefer to use poison bait; they don’t have to look at dead bodies that way, and I wonder, who are they fooling but themselves? Creatures feeding on carrion then risk becoming ill from residual poison, and it could affect the chain of nature.  I think it is selfish and self deceptive that people would rather something suffer days from the effects of poison rather than have them not know what hit them just because they may wish to deny killing something and having to bury it. When a corpse is not buried, it remains to smell up a house for weeks, or to putrefy outside further creating and spread air-borne disease.  Dead things need to be buried for health reasons. That is why I believe that a body trap is best.

I was setting a mousetrap when one of the grandchildren popped in. “What’cha doin’ G-Ma?” they ask.

“Well, I’m setting a trap for naughty rodents scurrying around in the attic.”

“You’re killing some of God’s creatures?”                                          

“Yes, but just the disobedient ones.”

“The death penalty for one act of disobedience?”

Could she be getting worried about some of her own single acts of disobedience?

“They carry disease and are a pest when they interfere with man’s place on earth, and it’s not just one act of disobedience, it’s a lifestyle when they stay in my house and start destroying things inside, and crops outside.”

” Take a lesson, don’t get used to a lifestyle of sin, children. Take a lesson from the animals. Hear and obey God. Stay on the straight and narrow, and if you wander, get back quickly to the right path where you belong.”

They probably thought they were getting a lecture; I thought they got an educated, unabridged answer to their question.  I continue:

“In the meantime, I will obey and have dominion over my little corner of the earth and subdue it; even if it means trapping naughty mice, squirrels and wayward chippys; they are not really human, regardless of what popular movies and cartoons may lead children, and some adults, to think. I will not let wayward creatures subdue me, for that is not the way. God tells us to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and have dominion over the creature. Right now, I only take dominion over aggressive ones who invade my territory. Animals do the same thing.”                                                                          

“Umm, my Daddy uses peanut butter.”

(clip art courtesy of ClassRoomClipArt)

P.S.  Attending a gathering where a Bee-Keeper gave a presentation on his hobby, I learned that a bee may sting another insect and live; but if a honey bee stings a mammal even once, the bee dies.

I guess God believes in the death penalty, too; well, He instituted it after all if we stop to think about it.  See article ANIMALS WILL BE JUDGED BY GOD.

Genesis 9:5 “For your lifeblood I will surely require a reckoning; of every beast I will require it and of man; of every man’s brother I will require the life of man. Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for God made man in his own image.”