Selected Reform Responsa 205

bad character, and who fears to bring into the world other moral delinquents:“Ela lemi sheyesh lah tsa-ar leida ke-ein deveitehu deRabbi Chiya; vechol sheken im baneiha ein holechin bederech yeshara, umityare-a shelo tarbeh begidulim ka-elu, shehareshut beyadah.” To these 1 would add the woman who, because of hereditary disease with which she or her husband is afflicted, fears to have children who might be born with these diseases and suffer and be a burden to their family or to society.

From the passage in the Talmud (Yevamot 65b) we learn, however, that there is an objection which the Jewish law might have to a man's using contraceptive means, or having intercourse with his wife in such a manner as to make conception impossible. This objection is based not on the view that such an act is in itself immoral or against the law, but merely on consideration for another religious duty which could not be fulfilled if such a practice would be indulged in all the time. The wife of R. Hiyya— so the Talmud tells us— incapacitated herself only after she had learned that the duty of propagation of the race was not incumbent upon her, since, according to the decision of the Rabbis , women were not included in the commandment,“be fruitful and multiply”(Genesis 1 :28), which was given to men only. Since a man must fulfill the duty of propagation of the race(mitzvat periya ureviya) he cannot be allowed the practice of having intercourse with his wife only in such a manner as to make conception impossible. For in so doing he fails to fulfill the law commanding him to have children. It is accordingly a sin of omission but not of commission; for the practice as such is not immoral or against the law.;

But— and this is peculiar to the Jewish point of view on this question— the man who practices absolute self-restraint or total abstinence is also guilty of the same sin of omission, for he likewise fails to fulfill the duty of propagation of the race. No distinction can be made, according to Jewish law, between the two ways of avoiding the duty of begetting children, whether by total abstention from sexual