SURROGACY
What does the Bible say?
What is surrogacy? Surrogacy simply means someone taking the place of another. It is the practice where a couple agrees to use another woman’s womb to carry their own pregnancy to full term and until the birth of the child. The eggs of the married woman could be fertilized using her husband’s spermatozoa by artificial insemination; (external processes); or by implantation after the eggs have been fertilized in the woman (internally). This fertilized egg is thence “planted” into another woman’s womb.
Couples often resort into this method if the woman’s womb is incapable of carrying fetus to maturity. In order words, she might have experienced so many miscarriages and the medical doctor now recommends surrogacy. Some married women may even have phobia of the child delivery process; and thus, they opt for somebody else to help carry and deliver their unborn child. Women with good eggs but womb-less often resort to this method. The woman who accepts to carry the pregnancy for the couple is called surrogate mother. The surrogate mother could be a relation or a non-relation. These days, there are professional surrogate mothers who even use middlemen to canvass or advertise their work. In such cases, they charge a fee for the work.
There are many ethical and legal controversies on surrogacy. For instance, who is the actual mother of the surrogate baby when born? Is it the woman whose egg was fertilized or the woman who carries the baby in her womb for nine months and went through the pains of delivery? How will the surrogate child adjust when grown and become an adult to discover that he/she has “two mothers?” How will such child cope with societal stigmatization?
And then, the other side: if the surrogate mother had not come to “help” how would the couple ever have a child? If surrogacy is so much despised, what about fetus that developed in a test-tube; and in this case the incubator acting as “womb?”
Much more, surrogacy does not only apply to women – there could be surrogate fathers as well. In this case, a man who takes care of a child when one or both parents are not available or a man who acts as a father figure to a child when the biological father is not there is a surrogate father.
What is the biblical stand on surrogacy? Can a Christian be a professional surrogate mother? Is it biblical for a couple to go the way of surrogacy in order to have children? These are tough questions as there’s no place in the Bible where the word “surrogacy” is mentioned except that there are suppositios here and there.
Firstly, let’s examine some inferences in the Bible concerning surrogacy. In Genesis 16, Sarah offered her maid, Hagar, to her husband, Abraham as surrogate. Going by the customs and traditions of those days, Hagar’s children were to be Sarah’s. But the deal didn’t go down well with Hagar. When she discovered she was pregnant, she became proud and detested giving her child up to be Sarah’s.
The ripple effect of this was colossal. Sarah ensured that Hagar and her baby were expelled from their house. Abraham was not happy at this; yet, God commanded him to get rid of Hagar and her child, Ishmael in Genesis 21:12. As a matter of fact, as a result of this, God had to reprimand Abraham to “walk before Me, and be thou perfect” in Genesis 17:1. In order words, this act of Abraham can best be said to be in the permissive will of God. It wasn’t in His perfect will. The Bible later referred to Ishmael in Galatians 4:13-21 as the son of the bond woman who would never be an heir with the son of the free woman, Isaac.
History reveals that Ishmael became the great progenitor of Mohammed, the founder of Islamic religion; while Isaac, the son of Sarah, was the great progenitor of Jesus Christ the founder of Christian religion. The salient lesson here is that if Abraham and Sarah had not attempted to use Hagar as surrogate, Ishmael would never had been born and in corollary, Islamic religion would perhaps never have been known to the world as it is today. It was long prophesied of Ishmael in Genesis 16:11-12, that he would be a wild man, and that his hands would be against every man and every man’s hand against him.
“And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael; because the LORD hath heard thy affliction. And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”
Furthermore, in Deut. 25:5-6, a brother of or the next-of-kin to a man who died childless is expected to raise at least a child in the name of his deceased brother through his widow.
“If brethren dwell together, and one of them die, and have no child, the wife of the dead shall not marry without unto a stranger: her husband’s brother shall go in unto her, and take her to him to wife, and perform the duty of an husband’s brother unto her. And it shall be, that the firstborn which she beareth shall succeed in the name of his brother which is dead, that his name be not put out of Israel”
This practice was such a serious matter in the Old Testament such that God Himself killed Onan in Genesis 38:8-10 for his refusal to perform this duty.
In addition, there were some other instances where slave girls were used as surrogate mothers. In Genesis 30:3-13, Leah’s maid, Zilpah bore Gad and Asher on Leah’s behalf; and Rachel’s maid bore Dan and Naphtali on Rachel’s behalf. Ruth, too, was a surrogate mother for Naomi in Ruth 4:13-17. The child that Ruth bore was recorded as “a son born to Naomi.”
As for surrogate fatherhood, in Matthew 1:16, Joseph was referred to as the surrogate father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Also, another Biblical resemblance is Mordecai who took Hadassah that is Esther, his uncle’s daughter for his own daughter, Esther 2:5-7.
It must be established here that children are gifts from God, Psalm 127:3-5. And according to John 3:27, no man can receive anything except he’s given from Heaven. While discussing the issue of child-bearing, it must be noted that, nobody can “help” God. Abraham attempted it in the case of Ishmael mentioned earlier and messed up the future of generations of the children of the free woman. Therefore, generally, surrogacy should never be used to substitute the work of God.
Some people may however argue that it is not spiritually proper for a Christian not to take advantage of breakthroughs in medical technologies. In this respect, much as there seems to be no Biblical reservation for a married woman getting pregnant with her own husband’s sperm whether through natural or artificial insemination; so it seems there can be no Biblical inhibition for a woman whose womb merely acts as an incubator or whose womb is used to carry the fetus to maturity. But in such cases, it must be stressed that the sperm of another man must not have any contact with the surrogate mother’s egg. Otherwise, it becomes adulterous.
There is nothing wrong scripturally, for instance, if a grandmother or any woman, who is medically fit, offers her womb as surrogate for her married daughter or anyone else, who is capable of conception but incapable of carrying the fetus to maturity and onwards to delivery. Here, there is no doubt about the paternity and the maternity of the new baby, which is the couple whose egg and sperm got fertilized. The third woman is regarded as a “carrier.” The “seed” of a third parent does not mix with the couple’s “seed.” Even, at this, a Christian couple should prayerfully seek the will, leading and guidance of God before taking any step towards surrogacy because according to 1Cor. 10:31, all things must be done for the glory of God.
But surrogacy becomes adulterous where a married woman gets impregnated through implantation or artificial insemination with the sperm of another man other than her husband’s. That is, surrogacy becomes sinful when the egg of the married woman gets fertilized by another man’s semen. In this case, the baby has a “third” parent. The unbiblical aspect of surrogacy has to do with using the egg or sperm of “another man or another woman” other than that of the married couple. This is adultery. Adultery is having an intercourse with an opposite sex who is not your spouse. As a matter of fact our Lord Jesus Christ teaches in Matthew 5:28 that mere lusting after the opposite sex is equally classified as adultery.
For Christian couples interested in carrying out surrogacy, it must also be mentioned here that the processes of surrogacy is not all that cheap. Many factors must be considered. Foremost of all is the fact that life begins the moment an egg is fertilized. It may be a herculean task to fertilize only those eggs that will be implanted. Therefore, on no account must any of the fertilized egg, the embryos, be aborted, eliminated, destroyed or used as laboratory experiments as these would mean manslaughter, murder and killing of innocent human beings. Every conceived embryo must be given its chance to live and “surplus” embryos must not be disposed off.
