The Grief of Being Childless
Dr. Geikie. Luke 1:7 And they had no child, because that Elisabeth was barren, and they both were now well stricken in years. But, notwithstanding all the satisfaction and inward peace of innocent and godly lives, in spite of the natural pride they, doubtless, felt in the consideration that must have been shown them, as born of a priestly ancestry, stretching back through fifteen hundred years, and though they must have had round them the comforts of a modest competency, there was a secret grief in the heart of both. Elisabeth had no child, and what this meant to a Hebrew wife it is hard for us to fancy. Rachel's words, "Give me children, or else I die," were the burden of every childless woman's heart in Israel. The birth of a child was the removal of a reproach. Hannah's prayer for a son was that of all Jewish wives in the same position. To have no child was regarded as a heavy punishment from the hand of God. How bitter the thought that his name should perish was for a Jew to bear, was seen in the law which required that a childless widow should be, forthwith, married by a dead husband's brother, that children might be raised up to preserve the memory of the childless man, by being accounted his. Nor was it enough that one brother of a number acted thus: in the imaginary instance given by the Sadducees to our Lord, seven brothers, in succession, took a dead brother's wife, for this object. The birth of a child was therefore a special blessing, as a security that the name of his father "should not be cut off from among his brethren, and from the gate of his place," and that it should not be "put out of Israel." Ancient nations, generally, seem to have had this feeling, and it is still so strong among Orientals, that after the birth of a first-born son, a father and a mother are no longer known by their own names, but as the father and mother of the child. There was, besides, a higher thought of possible relations, however distant, to the great-expected Messiah, by the birth of children; but Zacharias and Elisabeth had reason enough to sorrow at their childless home, even on the humbler ground of natural sentiments. They had grieved over their misfortune, and had made it the burden of many prayers, but years passed, and they had both grown elderly, and yet no child had been vouchsafed them. (Dr. Geikie.) Parallel Verses KJV: And they had no child, because that Elisabeth was barren, and they both were now well stricken in years. WEB: But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and they both were well advanced in years.