Ties that Bind

Human Life Review, Summer 2006 by Fielding, Ellen Wilson

One of the things that might most astonish a pre-ancient man or woman who visited our era-something at least as shocking as the automobile, antibiotics, or bikinis-is our attitude toward family life, particularly large families. Most of us, like every other generation since the dawn of time, want to marry at some point and have children. (Though that "most" is getting smaller-the most recent Census Bureau statistics show about 20% of American women in their early 40s are childless, up from 10% in 1976.) But unlike human populations in pre-modern times, most couples now think (and plan) in terms of a couple of kids. We are told that high infant and child mortality rates in pre-modern societies made the production of numerous progeny a good hedge against disease, and this is true. We are told that children were an asset in the labor-intensive world of the family farm (or cottage industry or shop), and that children constituted their parents' security in old age, and these things are also true. We also know that, aside from completely abstaining from sexual intercourse, people seeking to restrict family size before the 20th century had only crude and often unreliable means, like coitus interruptus, primitive models of condoms and spermicides, etc. We are further told that, for poverty-stricken families, especially in nonrural conditions where children needed at least several years' worth of expensive nonproductivity before they could be put to work, parents of large families would willingly have forgone many of their children.

The introductory plot of "Hansel and Gretel" gives us a glimpse of this darker, less family-friendly aspect of the past, as the children's father reluctantly agrees to abandon Hansel and Gretel in the forest, because he cannot provide for them. The hygienic version we read blames the stepmother for this unfatherly act, but another version has their own mother arguing for their abandonment. And the leftover lore of the pro-abortion movement, as well as historical research, informs us that abortion, infanticide, and the sale and abuse of children have piled up corpses in other eras beside our own.

Still, it is hard to get around the fact that, both in pre-modern times and in those few remaining pockets of the globe where people live essentially "pre-modern" lives, as long as starvation and abject poverty are not threatening, children are welcomed as a good, and busy, crowded, intensely non-private family living is even enjoyed.

Consider how children-in large numbers-are regarded in the Old Testament, for example. Jacob's beloved wife Rachel wishes to die because she has borne him no children (and this is not a dynastic problem, because her sister Leah has already produced several male heirs for Jacob by then). When her prayers are answered, she delights in the birth of first Joseph and then Benjamin. We know that sterility represented to the Jews (and many other peoples) a sign of divine disfavor, but perhaps we don't consider the implications of the reverse-that being blessed with many children was a sign of being, well, blessed. It was a gift, a God-given favor, an enrichening as indicative of the goodness of Creation and the Creator as abundant harvests or nets teeming with a catch of fish. "Happy the man who has his quiver full" of sons, says the psalm, and "your children [are] like olive plants around your table" says another. Consider that, in all other contexts except that of human reproduction, "fertility" and fruitfulness have only positive connotations. In contrast to sterility and barrenness, it is a sign of life, health, growth, promise. (Interestingly, it is only about a century and a half ago that we began developing a parallel positive definition of sterility, with the discovery of germs.)

Well, in the culture of the Old Testament (and almost all other cultures the world has seen), even reproductive fertility was a blessing. The sign of the Messianic age was that "the barren wife will bear seven sons." One of the indicators of Job's prosperity both before he is visited with misfortune and after the restoration of his riches is a very large family. When we consider the amount of sheer hard labor exacted by even a small family before the machine age-weaving, sewing, hand-washing, drawing water, cooking, baking, preserving, and on and on and on, it is incredible to realize that, even so, additions to the family were welcomed as blessings, except when plague or famine or extreme poverty threatened the lives of all.

Why? Which is the same as asking, "Why isn't this the case today, outside of small pockets of countercultural traditionalists?" In a world of plenty and convenience beyond the dreams of ancient populations, what makes the idea of plentiful children so unappealing to prosperous populations?

We have heard lots of the proposed answers, and once again, it is hard to argue against their accuracy as far as they go. For example, money. Nowadays children commonly don't contribute financially to the family; on the contrary, they are enormous money pits compared to earlier generations and simpler societies, because of the extension of their education and the postponement of adulthood. Once they are adults, children (ideally) find employment, but instead of pooling their resources with other family members, they move out on their own. This means no more major child-related expenses for the parents (except in cases of illness, unemployment, or incapacitation), but also no influx of money-and often limited emotional support or physical assistance. Far from being seen as an act of desertion, however, this distancing is often welcomed by both parties, since independence and self-reliance (on the part of both the maturing children and the aging parents) are the goals and in fact the standard for evaluating a healthy adult human life.