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THE MUSEUM OF MENSTRUATION AND WOMEN'S
HEALTH
Contraception
and religion
A
short history
by Kathleen O'Grady
(in Spanish translation here by
Maria Garcia)
Kathleen
O'Grady, who has contributed
many items to
this Web site, most notably the
bulk of the bibliography
and a large part of the
discussion on religion
and menstruation, generously
sent to this site her article,
below, from
The Encyclopedia of Women and
World Religion (Serinity Young
et al. (eds).
Macmillan, 1999).
Contraception has been known to
humankind from the earliest times.
Ancient
Jewish sources, early Islamic
medical texts, and Hindu sacred
scriptures
all indicate that herbal
contraceptives could induce
temporary sterility.
Today, however, there exists no
uniform position on contraception
within
each of the major religious
traditions; rather, the issue is
marked by a
plurality of views from followers,
religious leaders and scholars.
All of
the traditions discussed below are
founded on notions of fertility
and procreation
within the family and thus, while
the views on contraception vary
widely,
no religion advocates the goal of
a childless marriage or the use of
contraception
outside of the marriage contract.
The Hebrew Bible promotes
prolific childbirth - "be fruitful
and
multiply" (Gen 1:28) has been
taken by both Jews and Christians
as
God's "first commandment" - yet
there is only one explicit
reference
to birth control; Genesis 38:9-10,
states that during intercourse
Onan "spilled
his seed on the ground" (coitus
interruptus). This was "evil
in the sight of the Lord" and was
punished by Onan's death. Jewish
Talmudic literature builds on this
passage and prohibits the use of
any
contraceptive device for use by
men which would waste the "male
seed";
female contraceptives may be
permitted for health reasons
(danger to the
mother or to the potential child).
This remains the Orthodox position
on
contraception, which accepts
abstinence as the only permissible
birth control
method except where health reasons
apply. Conservative and Reform
views,
which note that sexual pleasure
between married couples is
permissible and
sanctioned by the rabbinical
literature, authorize social,
environmental
and economic reasons for the use
of birth control in addition to
the health
factors accepted by Orthodox
practice, and leave the decision
to individual
choice (declared formally at the
Central Conference of American
Rabbis,
1930; and the Rabbinical Assembly
of America, 1935).
Prior to the 1930s all Christian
denominations were united in their
firm rejection of contraceptives.
The Lambeth Conference of the
Church of
England (1930) marks the first
departure from this unanimous
prohibition,
by advocating the use of
artificial contraception when
abstinence was deemed
impracticable. The Federal Council
of Churches (1931) equally adopted
a
policy of conservative advocation
for artificial birth control
methods.
Most major Protestant traditions
followed suit, and by 1961, the
National
Council of Churches declared a
liberal policy on contraceptive
use, subject
to mutual consent between couples.
The total prohibition of
artificial birth control methods
by the Roman
Catholic church, declared by Pope
Pius XI in his 1930 encyclical, Casi
Connubii, was maintained by
the 1968 Humanae vitae
(the encyclical
of Pope Paul VI), and constitutes
the present day policy of the
church.
The Catholic position on
contraception is highly influenced
by the natural
law theory of Aristotle, Augustine
and Aquinas, which deems that
sexuality
has as its end purpose,
procreation; to interfere in this
end would be a
violation of the natural law, and
thus, a sin. This view is
maintained by
some Anglicans, Evangelicals, and
Christian fundamentalist
denominations
as well. The Catholic Church
sanctions only abstinence and the
Natural Family
Planning method (NFP) as suitable
techniques for birth control.
Unlike the Catholic tradition,
the Eastern Orthodox Church does
not
discern a moral difference between
artificial or natural birth
control methods.
They note that many Church
Fathers, as well as the Pauline
texts in the
New Testament, do not strictly
limit sexual intercourse to
procreation;
the Orthodox position is that
sexual intercourse also
constitutes an expression
of love within the marriage
contract. No official statement
has been made
on prohibitions for artificial
contraceptives, while abortion,
infanticide
and permanent sterilization have
been condemned. The Orthodox
Church allows
a married couple to make their own
decisions on contraceptive use.
There is a wide-spread variation
on attitudes to contraception in
the
Islamic faith. The Quaran states:
"You should not kill your children
for fear of want" (17:31; and
6:151). Critics of birth control
argue
that this can be extended to
include a ban on all family
planning methods,
while advocates of birth control
indicate that this passage
explicitly refers
to infanticide, and note that
there is no prohibition against
birth control
in the Quaran. Further, the Hadith
and Sunna literature clearly
permits
the practice of coitus
interruptus ('azl),
and sources indicate
that 'azl was practiced
by the prophet Muhammed himself
(Sunna related
by Jabir). Those in favour of
contraception argue that
artificial birth
control is morally the same as 'azl
and therefore to be accepted.
Most Muslim traditions permit the
use of birth control where health
reasons
are an issue or where the
well-being of the family is
concerned; this affords
great flexibility and latitude in
interpretation and is reflected by
the
vast differences in policies on
family planning by distinct Muslim
groups
and countries. Despite varying
viewpoints, the emphasis remains
on procreation
within the family as a religious
duty. There is unanimous rejection
of sterilization
and abortion.
Hinduism actively encourages a
prolific procreation within
marriage
but there is no prohibition
against birth control in the Hindu
religion.
The Upanishads describe a birth
control method (Brihadaranyaka
Upanishad)
and temporary abstinence is
advocated in the Shastras, while
abortion is
condemned. Still there is a wide
variance of views on contraception
by Hindu
scholars: Gandhi advocated birth
control based on abstinence and
not through
artificial means, while
Radhakrishnan and Tagore, on the
other hand, promoted
the use of artificial methods.
India was the first nation to
establish a
governmental population strategy
based on birth control measures.
Common concerns unite all major
religious traditions on the issue
of
birth control. The critics of
family planning in each tradition
fear that
contraceptive use will encourage
immorality and illicit sex, while
further,
many non-Western faiths fear that
liberal contraceptive policies
encourage
a Western model of living that
would destroy the family and
family values.
Feminist commentators have viewed
prohibitions on birth control as a
means
to control female sexuality and
independence.
Bibliography
Most of the literature on
contraception and religion is
contained in
sociological, health or
environmental studies on
population control. Very
little work has been completed
specifically on the relation
between birth
control and religious
institutions, but references to
contraception (particularly
with a feminist analysis) can be
found in more general texts on
women and
religion or in articles dealing
with religious views of abortion.
Catholic and Islamic opinions of
birth control are the most
comprehensively
covered in the secondary
literature. Janet E. Smith's Humanae
Vitae:
A Generation Later (1991)
offers a systematic examination of
the moral
and theological implications of
the arguments against the present
Catholic
prohibition on artificial birth
control methods, and argues that
the Church
ruling on birth control is a
logical extension of its
traditional teachings
on morality and the family; while
this is a conservative text that
supports
the ban on contraception it
nevertheless offers the most
detailed historical
information on the arguments
against birth control in the
Catholic church
to date. Similarly, Abortion,
Birth Control & Surrogate
Parenting: An
Islamic Perspective by Abul Fadl
Mohsin Ebrahim supports a
conservative
Muslim position on contraception,
yet offers a clear and concise
listing
of the primary text references and
religious commentaries on the
subject.
Feminist analysis of contraception
in the Islamic tradition include
Islam,
Gender and Social Change edited by
Yvonne Yazbeck Haddad and John L.
Esposito
(1998) and Theodora Foster
Carroll's "Islam and Population"
in
her Women, Religion, and
Development in the Third World
(1983). The most
recent information on religious
views of contraception can be
found in the
proceedings of the September 1994
United Nations conference on
Population
and Development held in Cairo
(Document A/Conf.171/13). See
specifically
Chapter VII: "Reproductive Rights
and Reproductive Health" and
the reservations to this chapter
made by various Islamic countries
and the
Holy See. Proceedings of the
International Islamic Conference
in Rabat,
1971, are also available in
printed form as Islam and Family
Planning (Isam
R. Nazer et al. eds,
International Planned Parenthood
Federation,
1974).
In "Hindu Ethics for Modern
Life" (pp. 5-35, in World
Religions
and Global Ethics, S. Cromwell
Crawford , ed., 1989) S. Cromwell
Crawford
includes an extensive section on
birth control in a Hindu context.
Bardwell
Smith offers an account of
Japanese Buddhist views on
contraception in "Buddhism
and Abortion in Contemporary
Japan" (pp. 65-90 in Buddhism,
Sexuality,
and Gender, José Ignacio
Cabezón, ed., 1992). Susan
Power
Bratton's Six Billion and More:
Human Population Regulation and
Christian
Ethics (1992) links a Christian
moral theology with issues of
contraception
and population control. "The
Morality of Contraception: An
Eastern
Orthodox Opinion" (Journal of
Ecumenical Studies, Vol. XI, No.
4, 1974,
pp. 677-690) by Chrysostom
Zaphiris, an Orthodox theologian
himself, contrasts
the views of the Roman Catholic
church with those of the Eastern
Orthodoxy
on the concept of family planning
generally. Similarly, Harmon L.
Smith
contrasts Anglican views of
contraception with Catholic
natural law theory
in "Contraception and Natural Law:
A Half-Century of Anglican Moral
Reflection" (pp. 181-200 in The
Anglican Moral Choice, Paul Elmen
ed.,
1983).
Kathleen O'Grady
Kathleen
O'Grady is Bank of Montreal
Visiting
Scholar at the Institute of
Women's Studies, University of
Ottawa (kogrady@uottawa.ca).
She has written extensively on
feminist philosophy. Her book, Sweet
Secrets:
Stories of Menstruation,
with Paula Wansbrough (Toronto:
Second Story
Press, 1997) contains a
cross-cultural study of menarche
as a rite of passage
for teenage girls.
See Egyptian
hieroglyphics
from about 1550 B.C.E. describing a
tampon
used for contraception.
See
Australian
douche
ads in the
"Wife's
Guide and Friend": The
Australian government
prosecuted this publication for
being obscene because it
advertised contraceptives
and contained birth control
information.
See Fresca
douche powder (early 20th
century, U.S.A.);
the label contains language
possibly hinting at contraceptive
use.
Read selections from Married Love
(first published
1918), Dr.
Marie Stopes' book that
was banned
until 1931 in America. Dr. Stopes
founded the first birth-control
clinic
in the British Empire, in 1921,
and it's still running.
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Copyright 1999 Kathleen O'Grady
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