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 Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.  Proverbs 22:6  KJV

Train [Or Start ] a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it. Proverbs 22:6 NIV

It has come to my attention that many Christian parents have interpreted the above verse to mean that they must train infants and young children in the way one might train an animal.  I believe that this interpretation is not correct.  I base this conclusion on the following study:

The Hebrew word which is translated as "Train" in Proverbs 22:6 is kha-nokh. When I cut and paste the real Hebrew into the Hebrew-English Dictionary, it shows these words "to guide, to tutor, to educate ; (biblical) to teach" as well as "to inaugurate, to dedicate, to consecrate" as the NIV translation mentions.  You can try it for yourself using the links I provided.

In the same verse, "Child" is Na-ar, which translates as "youth, youngster, adolescent ; (law) minor; (biblical) servant, armsbearer."  This word does not appear to be used for infants, nor very young children.  Everything I have found in the Bible which refers to discipline refers to youth, adolescents and adults.  

My husband says that even if The Old Testament does say to hit children, it also says to sacrifice animals and to stone rebellious teenagers (and other sinners).  So, anyone who spanks (or strikes) their children is living under the Law and therefore, not under Grace.  If we are living by Grace, we must apply grace to our children.   There is more information about Grace Based Discipline in Crystal's Articles  .

I am also deeply concerned about the concept that we have a right to control a child's heart.  Insisting that they always obey with a "happy heart" only teaches them to hide their true feelings.  Michael Pearl says, "If a child shows the least displeasure in response to a command or duty, it should be addressed as disobedience."  Since he teaches to correct all disobedience with the rod, it is obvious that he is saying to switch the child until they are showing nothing but happiness.  He promises that switching the child will produce a happy child and demonstrates it with countless anecdotes.  It seems obvious to many readers of these stories that the child has no choice but to act happy, as any other show of emotion only means more switching. 

Here are some thoughts from my  husband:

•  God does not have a rod in His hand to hit us with it every time we don't obey.  He punishes us by our own consequences.  God says, "Don't go to your right or to your left, stay on the straight and narrow path which are my commandments and if you don't, you will suffer the consequences." Here are some examples. Let's talk about Adam, in Eden, remember? God told him do not eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. God told him the consequences they would suffer if they disobeyed. And when Adam ate the fruit, God didn't scold him, nor did He hit him with anything. Adam suffered his own consequences for his disobedience. And what were the consequences? He took away the privileges of being able to live forever, so he had to die. He also was no longer allowed to stay in Eden and live a life of leisure. Now, let's look at Moses' consequences. When God told Moses to speak to the rock and instead he hit the rock, God told him that the consequences of what he did were that he would not enter the Promised Land, he would not enjoy the land, nor be the one to distribute the land to 10 of the 12 tribes of Israel. (Numbers 20:10-12) No amount of begging on the part of Moses could change His mind, he finally refused to discuss it further with him. (Deut 3:23-26) He did not hit Moses, he simply took away those privileges and Moses was remorseful. So what we see here is the discipline of the Lord. And these are only 2 of many examples of God disciplining His children. Also, notice that Adam and Moses were adults. The Bible does not show instances of God punishing little children.

If our children do not obey, we have to explain to them what we require and why.  We take away privileges when they don't obey, as God does to us.  He takes privileges away from us when we are disobedient.  He only does this with His children.  Here are some examples. The ungodly may prosper, but when God's children disobey, they suffer the consequences. That is the way that God scourges us. (Hebrews 12:6-8)  Who are God's children?  The ones who have The Holy Spirit. (Romans 8:14) And who has the Holy Spirit?  Those who have accepted Jesus Christ as their savior. (Acts 2:38)

Let me remind you of what Jesus said when the disciples stopped the children from coming to Jesus.  He said, "Let the little children come unto me and forbid them not, for such is the kingdom of  God."  What happened after?  He blessed the little children.  What we learn from this is that Jesus rebuked the disciples for scolding the children.  Jesus teaches us by this verse that we have to listen to our own children, not scold them, nor spank them, nor mistreat them in any way.  We must communicate with them, not just say, "Do this because I say so."  We must bless our children as well as discipline.  Discipline does not mean spanking or hitting.  It means to make someone our disciples by teaching them.  How do we get disciplined?  By repetition.  We must be patient with our children as God is patient with us.  He gives us our own free will to decide how we will respond, he does not want robots.  Nor should we train our children to be like robots, obeying without thinking.

When the Bible says, "And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord." (Eph. 6:4) this means to respect your children so that they will learn to respect you.  Because if you don't respect them first, they will not respect you.  And the training here does not mean that kind of training you would do to animals because it's the training of the Lord and the Lord does not train us like animals.   Training here means to teach. And admonition means mild, kind, yet earnest reproof, cautionary advice or warning.

And don't forget, when your time is up to go face God, you have to give an account for how  you treated your children.  I believe that according to the Bible, hitting them for any reason and with any thing is abusing them.  And if anyone is abusing their children in this way, they are violating The Word Of God in Eph 6:4. We are called to love our children, not to abuse them. The Love of which I speak here is Agape, as displayed in 1 Corintians 13:4-7.

-Irbin  email Irbin at IRBIN@KJSL.COM

Here are some more quotes about the training methods in the Pearls' books:

• "The Pearls believe that training is a separate thing from teaching and discipline. They start very early using a switch to inflict pain...to train babies to avoid things the parent wants the baby to avoid...just like a behavioral psychologist might use electric shocks and rewards to train rats to navigate a maze. 

In my opinion it is repugnant and unbiblical because babies are human beings, made in the image of God, endowed by Him with far more mental and spiritual and emotional equipment and innate worth than animals have been given. In recognition of that, we glorify and respect God's creation by dealing with human beings in accordance with these higher abilities--and that includes all human beings. Babies. The elderly. Prisoners. Slaves. The handicapped. 

I don't think the Bible is referring to behavioristic animal-style training when the word "train" is used (as in "train up a child in the way he should go"). The Pearls don't make much of a biblical argument for their methods (unlike the Ezzos), but that one is certainly implied by the title of their book, and as I say, I just don't think it's supported by the Bible." -Kathy Thile

• "You know, this is my very basic beef with Pearl and Ezzo, et al. This very basic concept that THEY (the parent) control the hearts of their children. Wow, how incredibly god-like. I was pretty sure that the Bible says only GOD can rule the hearts of his children. Controlling the hearts of our children is the most ungodly principle in all of these methods. To obey God, we MUST turn their hearts over to God. We cannot control their hearts. We can control their outward actions. But, we cannot even know their hearts, much less control them.
  
  Trust me, I learned how to make my parents think I was happy inside simply by how I acted on the outside. They never knew that instead of breeding the love and godly repentance and obedience they were demanding, they instead breed anger, hatred and bitterness (from all 3 of the children they raised this way). Why didn't they know? Simply because they could not know our hearts. Had their nurtured our hearts, guided us with love and respect and instead been living models of the God they so desperately wanted us to love and follow, they would have breed the love and commitment that God intended parents to give their children. Two of us were fortunate that we didn't close our hearts to the God our parents showed us and learned to see he was not the God our parents emulated. But, we became Godly adults in spite of our parents and not because of (but by the greater power of our Savior). The third has been lost for a long time, I don't know if that sibling will ever accept the God of our parents who tried to play God instead of follow him.
  
  Didn't mean to go off. But, this is what is at the very heart of these programs that is so fundamentally against the call of our Saviour. And, I cannot fathom Christ doing anything but crying when his youngest children are treated by misguided parents who feel they must be gods versus follow God." - Jo

• "What is "wrong", IMO, about going strictly from a training point-of-view is that children are *NOT* dogs, mules, mice, etc. (Some could pointedly argue you don't even need to train dogs with all this "pain".) There is a future. We do not just need our children to be manageable *today*, we hopefully want them to be emotionally healthy adults. Training children to be hopelessly submissive, no matter what, also trains them to be hopelessly submissive, no matter what, as adults. (I speak from experience; this is a very difficult "training" to rectify.)
  
  Training children not to touch anything, for example, trains them to be apathetic about their surroundings and/or to believe they have no personal rights to enjoy their surroundings.
  
  Training children to drop everything the instant they are called trains them to be people-pleasers who, as adults, will be constantly taken advantage of by more domineering people.
  
  Training children that you love and smile at them while you inflict pain on them trains them that people who profess to "love" you also injure you, disrespect you and care nothing for your opinion or feelings. Children who grow up like this become adults who allow themselves to be abused - physically, emotionally, verbally.
  
  Children trained never to "talk back" become adults who cannot express their opinion. Again, they "have" to please others to be loved." - Danielle

• The philosophical underpinnings of these kinds of "Christian" behaviour "training" models do not sit well with biblical theology.
  
  The more I read about Ezzo and Pearl's behaviour modification techniques the more I am reminded of Behaviouristic psychology (the works of Skinner, Watson, Pavlov etc)
  
  Fundamentally, behavioural psychology advocates the use operant/classical conditioning for behaviour modification (neg or pos reinforcement and the pleasure/avoidance stimulus responses they entail).
  
  From a purely pragmatic standpoint these often demonstratably work - they get results...for example,
  
  I see the needle + it causes me pain
  I avoid needles
  
  I eat chocolate = I feel good
  In order to feel good, I eat chocolate, lol
  
  ...but the understanding of human nature behind it is disturbing from a Christian standpoint.
  
  At the roots of Behaviourism are a worldview that totally denies that people have
  
  (a) real emotions (such as love, grief, hatred etc.) our internal states are just a sum of the internal processing of our external behaviour, conditioned according to stimulus response
  
  (b) personality preferences (unless they've been 'shaped' through outside behavioural control)
  
  (c) a moral conscience - people simply learn to "react" and "behave" [so much for God's laws being written on our hearts and minds...]
  
  (d) original thoughts/ideas - including the 'big ideas' like truth and beauty AND God
  
  (e) self determination or internal self control [just behaviour patterns that have conformed to external reward/punishment patterns]
  
  (f) a soul (this is 'superstition' which we have been conditioned to believe for purposes of social control or it gratifies some conditioned response)
  
  OK, so I've said that in practise operant/classical conditioning works - we all use it whenever we praise our children for doing something good...but to RELY on punishment/reward for behaviour modification or use it as a sole means of teaching/training a child?
  
  What a naive and Godless conception of what it is to be a human! Methinks of that song lyric - 'Despite all my rage, I am still but a rat in a cage!" - Amy in Australia

• Tulipgirl has some good arguments On The Pearls and Parenting in her blog
• Read about a death attributed to Pearl's training advice and the autopsy in the News Observer.

I have come across some very good articles which express my beliefs better than I can.  

Is Spanking Biblical? By Carol

Avoiding Millstones (An Open Letter to Those Who Advocate Spanking) by Rebecca Prewett

Spare The Rod, Spoil The Child? by Aurelia Ann

Biblical Discipline: Conclusions by Laura Moody who was a “Contact Mom” for GFI from January 1999 to August of 2000.

And the Bible Sayeth, Train up a Child in the Way He Should Go  by Dr. William Sears

Ask Dr. Sears: Spanking 10 Reasons Not To Hit Your Child by Dr. William Sears

The Bible Does NOT Teach Spanking By Judie C. Rall and The Center for Unhindered Living

10 reasons not to spank ( see especially #6) by Dr. William Sears 

Following Your Instincts by Mary Eakin

New Testiment Parenting by Sheryl Tribble

Crystal's Arms Of Love website.  You will find many good articles here.  Crystal is the author of Biblical Parenting, a book well worth reading.  

Boot Camp for Babies by Rebecca Prewett

Unprepared for Parenting from the Gentle Christian Mothers site.  

“To Train Up A Child” chapter by chapter review     by Wendy

“To Train Up A Child” Book Review From Allthings2all by Catez

From the Gentle Christian Mothers Forums

Parenting In Jesus' Footsteps

Positive Discipline Resource Center

Christians For Nonviolent Parenting 

Chris's Anti-Spanking Web Site

The Rod By The Wigleys

Authoritarianism And Isolationism Among Us by the C.R.I.

Michael and Debi Pearl's No Greater Joy Ministries: A Look at the Basics From Allthings2all by Catez

Michael Pearl on Original Sin: An Analysis From Allthings2all by Catez

Concerns about the Pearls By MarynMunchkins

Salon's arcicle about The Pearls

No greater joy than abusing your kids?! From From Leaving Münster an experiment in Anabaptist spirituality...

Fundamental Baptists warning about No Greater Joy Ministries Caveat: I do not agree with everything in this article.

If you are interested in reading "To Train Up A Child" and don't want to buy the book, you can read it here.

Parenting in Jesus' Footsteps petition

Stop The Rod Petition

Responses to Created To Be His Helpmeet

Spunky's Blog entry about Created To Be His Helpmeet

A Dangerous Book, Created To Be His Helpmeet by Glenys

A Time To Search My Heart About CTBHH by Glenys

Do you have anything which belongs on this site?  Please send any links or anything you have written to LindaV@kjsl.com.  I will not post anything without the author's permission.  Please also feel free to send me any advice or comments.

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