Q&A: Childless Couples Having Marital Relations in a Year of Famine
Childless Couples Having Marital Relations in a Year of Famine
Question
Hello, honorable Rabbi.
The Talmud in tractate Ta’anit 11a says that those who are “without children engage in marital relations in a year of famine,” and according to some halakhic decisors they are obligated to have relations in order to bring children into the world.
Isn’t that, forgive me, irresponsible and perhaps even cruel—to bring children into the world in such a situation? In their time, after all, if there was no rain people died of hunger! So why bring children into the world then? It not only endangers the lives of the children, but also the lives of the parents themselves…
Answer
Of course, if someone fears for the very life of the additional child or for his own life, he should not bring the child into the world. That is obvious and really need not even be said.
In general, refraining from bringing children into the world in years of famine (for someone who has already fulfilled the commandment to be fruitful and multiply) also does not stem from the concern that we will not be able to feed them, but from participating in the suffering of the world. See the context in which this Jewish law is brought in Maimonides, Laws of Fasts 3:8. Therefore, if a person has not fulfilled the commandment to be fruitful and multiply, that value overrides the value of participating in the suffering of the world, and therefore he does have marital relations.
That is indeed the straightforward meaning, but see the Ritva there, and also Nimukei Yosef in the name of “Others.” And so too in the responsa Ma’il Tzedakah, sec. 252—that the reason is so that they should not be “weak of constitution.” (By the way, it’s interesting what the Ritva and Nimukei Yosef wrote there—that one can read it as “chashukhei” with a right-hand shin!)