Sheikh el Bahr el Khouli (1953) points out, that Islam regards prevention of pregnancy as a necessity under certain conditions: if pregnancy injures the woman’s health and if a man desires to lighten the burden of the responsibilities of life by limiting the number of his offspring.
However Sheikh Moh. el Khadr, (1953) rector of the El Azhar university of Kairo stated, that birth control violated Islamic principles.
In Pakistan, the Muslim-state, the President Field Marshal Moh. Ayub Khan spoke via radio-addresses to the population about the great importance and the great necessity of responsible parenthood with small families in Pakistan. And so the government has, in the present five year-plan, voted considerable sums of money for the propagation of this idea and its application. Also the Minister for Health and social Welfare, Lieut-Gen. W.A. Burki (1960), directed the local authorities to set up a family planning centre in Hyderabad without delay.
In Indonesia few pronouncements of Muslim authorities are known. In the meeting of 1952 at Jogjakarta it was completely rejected by the local authorities. Some Muslim authors in Indonesia did express their opinion on this subject, namely:
Ramaly: (1951) He cautiously indicates that familyplanning is not something forbidden, if it has been decided on with mutual consent by the married couple and with attention to all circumstances concerned. Ali Akbar: (1959) wrote that the prevention of pregnancy may be considered only as a measure in case of necessity and may only be practised at urgent, mainly medical indication (heart-disease, tuberculosis). A general propaganda would endanger the people’s morals, through which the number of marriages would decrease and prostitution would increase in extent. The present situation in Indonesia does not make birth control necessary in the coming decennia, according to All Akbar.
In addition to the great resistances, offered by the existing and already agelong conceptions of marriage to a carried out propaganda, to the starting of discussions and to other ways in which the confrontation of the population problem and responsible parenthood will be brought to the people, there are many other circumstances, which will obstruct the acceptance and propagation of this way out of a too full and starving Java on to a possibly more prosperous and happier Java.
The social and spiritual suppositions, necessary for a similar action for the development and propagation of responsible parenthood with small families are wanting almost entirely.
The asset of the privilege of a certain welbeing in a Javanese family is no inducement for limiting the number of children. This became also evident from an investigation made in 1953 among the students at the University of Djakarta. It appeared that in poor as well as in rich families a high number of children was found. In the three welfare-groups, distinguished in the investigation, and in which the students’ distinguished in the investigation, and in which the students’ fathers were classed, no difference in the average number of children was apparent.
- In group I : professors, higher officials, free traders;
- In group II : highschool teachers; medium officials, merchants;
- In group III : primary school teachers, lower officials, farmers, soldiers
the average number of children appeared to be the same, viz. 6.2 .
The Javanese community is organized around the undivided family. The enjoyed income does not exclusively benefit the worker’s own family, but must support a much greater number of relatives. A small family is therefore often morally indebted to support a number of nephews and nieces. A limitation of the number of children does not as a matter of course benefit the man’s own family. For the favour to be allowed to count on the support of one’s relatives in times of need, one pays in times of “plenty”. The “surplus”. The savings, may be regarded as being at the disposal of the enlarged family as a whole, and not for the man’s own wife and children only.
With the possession of children and especially of sons the “life-insurance aspect” is connected. During the old age of the parents the moral obligation to support them falls to the sons, who are therefore a much wanted possession in this period of life. The possession of a son is therefore a vital concern in this hard and poor society and for that reason also for the continuance of the marriage. A great number of children gives the possibility to enter into relations with a number of other families via the marriages of the children. This is of great importance for the consolidation of the parent’s social position.
Marriage is in Java also a prerequisite to obtain a dignified place in society. A bachelor or unmarried woman is not as a matter of course accepted as a full member of society. According to the social code in Java it is not necessary for the man to be able to support a family out of his own income, when he marries. For young families the relatives stand by, if this is necessary. These circumstances promote marriages at a young age. The rise of the marriage age would have a perceptible influence on the birth-rate figure.
The poor conditions of life in Java are the cause, that for the greater part of the population there are very few joys in this life. An idea and an advice which may give rise to the misunderstanding that the joy of marriage too is threatened, will meet with resistance from all who in this poor and troublous life would not like to see this joy dwindle too.
The victims of chronic starvation or of a limited moderate famine fall in the age-groups of pre-school children and among the older people aged 40 and over.
It is exactly the age-group most active with regard to procreation, who are least menaced, and who are called upon for cooperation to responsible parenthood with small families.
The lack of a fit contraceptive, which would be useful in the propaganda campaign in the matter of responsible parenthood, is an obstructive circumstance. A contra conceptive, which might deserve recommendation in Java, even under a partly analphabetic population will have to answer to a number of requirements, as: being effective, non-toxical by protracted use on a large scale, not at all or only little interfering with the coïtus, very cheap so that it is with reach of the poor people in Java, to be manufactured or at least prepared in the country itself, well tenable at a tropical temperature, to be applied preferably by the woman and simple in use so that the directions for use can easily be explained without many words also to simple women. Up till now this medicine is not available and that is the cause that the propaganda campaign has to resort to a more intricate and more expensive method.
Summing up I would conclude that in the near future in Java one may expect, that the existing population problems will seriously increase, Reaching a political stability could evidently not be realized, so that an economic development has little chance. Will the solution of the ever growing population-problem, which is the largest problem of the Republic of Indonesia, be realized under democratic or under totalitary conditions?
The many measures taken by the government before 1942 evidently asked great efforts and were hardly able to maintain the standard of life for the rapidly growing population of Java on the same level. When after the war the initiative came more from the Indonesian population and ever less from outside the Indonesian community, the standard of living of the continually growing population could evidently no longer be maintained by the measures taken. An increasing tension between the means of subsistence and the numerical strength of the Javanese population, expressing itself in high infant- and toddler-mortality and local famines, renders the problem greater and more urgent. The Javanese population is unsufficiently aware of the existing population problems, so that the initiative for the search of a possible solution and full coöperation in the execution of a government plan are not forthcoming. Will the further dynamizing of Javanese society have a sufficiently rapid progress to realize the people’s in sight into their own problems, the drawing up of an adequate welfare plan and the bringing into practice of many and various measures in the attempt to bring this problem to a solution? Will the necessary help come from abroad?
But both along the many wrong tracks and along the presumably right way out of these difficulties a great many children’s graves will inevitably be found.