A CRITICAL ASSESSMENT OF CHRISTOCENTRIC REACTION TO CHILDLESSNESS IN AFRO – TRADO – CULTURAL MARRIAGE
Keywords:
assessment, christocentric, reaction, childlessness, afro-trado-cultural and marriageAbstract
Africans place much premium on marriage and procreation as conditions for the establishment of family. As a result, the preservation and continuation of the family through procreation are of paramount importance to the Africans especially the Igbo race. Childlessness is seen as a terrible situation that goes with a grievous feeling of disappointment. African pre-colonial society condemned a childless marriage. As of then, African culture provided solutions to the unacceptable experience of childlessness. These Afro-cultural solutions included marrying additional women, secretly arranging for another man to impregnate the woman in her marital home with the consent of the sterile husband, levirate marriage and marrying of a ‘female husband’ to a childless widow. A survey of these Afro-cultural solutions reveals that much consideration was given to what could have been the known and unknown causes of the problem. Christianity with its claim of having solutions to all problems has condemned the traditional ways of addressing concretely the problem of childlessness in Igboland and proffered not- up- to -scratch means of dealing with the problem. The tension and pressure generated by this Christian inadequacy of handling the problem lead many childless couples to many detestable things. Thus, this paper critically questioned the Christocentric reaction to childlessness in Afro-trado-cultural marriages and also appraised the lasting values of Afro-cultural solutions to the problem. The paper recommends that Igbo Christians need to apply African solutions to the problem of childlessness with the supporting knowledge of the Bible in order to be authentic Africans and Christians at the same time.
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