Do Not Kill Thy Children

These verses from the Qur'an demolish the economic basis on which birth control movements have arisen in different periods of human history, starting from ancient times until the present. In the past, fear of poverty drove people to infanticide and abortion. Today it drives people towards a third alternative – prevention of conception. However, according to this provision of the Islamic manifesto, man is required not to waste his energies on the destructive task of reducing the number of mouths that have to be fed. Instead, man should devote his energies to constructive tasks which, under God’s Law, lead to increases in the production of wealth.

One of man’s major blunders is that he often decides to put a brake on procreation for fear of paucity in economic resources. The verse warns man that in no way does he control the process of providing sustenance for God’s creatures. That control rests with God alone Who has created and placed mankind on earth. Now in the same manner that God has provided men with their sustenance in the past, He will also do so in the future. Human history also bears witness to the fact that economic resources in different parts of the world have increased in proportion to the growth of human population; and at times, these resources have increased at an even higher pace than growth in population. Hence, man’s amateurish interference in the providential arrangements of God amounts to nothing short of folly.