Why Child marriages in the past ?

It is a fact that the child marriage was a custom in the ancient Hindu society and in many other cultures too around the world. The famous Dharma Sastra compiled by the great sage Manu says – asta varshath bhaveth kanya, it implies that the girl child should be married at her age of eight [8]. To the peripheral look it might seem uncivilized and idiotic to the modern thinkers but, it is not without reason. In fact it is out of deeper and holistic understanding of the human body, psyche, spirit and the society. So, many things are interconnected in the custom of child marriage but, it is not mindless and baseless.

The ancients had a different purpose for the life and lived accordingly and no doubt it was all spiritual. This is because they knew the life and world far better than the modern thinkers and scientists.

The purpose of their life or life in reality – is nothing but to evolve into perfection, to bloom within [Charles Darwin says this as – evolution of life]. Whether the modern individuals agree with this or not this is true, as it a universal truth. By knowing this they lived and formulated their society accordingly and so was the custom of child marriage.

As are the air, water, food and sleep – the sex is also a basic necessity of any animal in general and the human being too – the Hindu sastras [scriptures] claim.

The purpose of a seed is nothing but to grow into a plant and to reproduce some more seeds. This is a very general law in the universe, a universal law. This is true to all life forms, birds, animals, human beings, etc., as well.

So, by the law of the Universe, the body of a man or a woman therefore is meant to reproduce but, the self or soul inhabiting the body has a different purpose, quite opposite to this – to emancipate from life and deaths, this Hindu scriptures are saying this ‘moksha’ or janmaraahityam.

So, the purpose of the body is to reproduce and the purpose of the soul is emancipation [janmaraahityam]. But, as the ‘soul’ is dwelling in the body it has to help the body to reproduce – it is called as dharma, righteousness.

Speaking from the point of the human body, the modern biology says – the human body becomes sexually active from the teens and it is active before body enters its late thirties. During this time [13 – 35: approx] the sexual attraction is intense according to all the modern theories, both from biological and psychological as well. The body should reproduce as early as possible - this is from the evolution itself because, the animals have to reproduce soon as the death is chasing in the wild and so, this concept is inbuilt in the genes. So, sex is a must for the body along with - air, food and sleep in the very teens. If you deny sex, if you suppress sex - it creates many psychological problems. For this child marriage was made a culture in the ancient societies as the sex outside marriages was considered [it is a sin in fact – for more on this read the article – Why not to cheat wife / husband ? on this site] a sin, the child marriage is a must, there is exception.

From the spiritual angle, the ‘marriage’ is the easiest possible spiritual practice possible. If a boy and a girl are in deep need of each other [of course sexually], this sexual longing will mature into love later on, thus the person can grow internally. But, if they are involved with extramarital relationship then the maturity is crippled or is not possible. So, naturally, this is a kind of – spiritual practice, the simplest and the easiest one possible.

The modern psychology says that – it is better for a person to maintain deep relation with another person than to have peripheral relations with thousand persons, as it makes the personality of the person strong and deep. This is known in modern psychology as the ‘closed circuit relationship’. Out of the deep bond between the lad and his lass – their personality will grow deeply, easily too but, this deep bond could only occur only when the boy and girl are married in their childhood.

It is a practical observation that – as the marriage age is growing the divorce rate is also growing too. The modern statistical results on divorce are also in agreement with this. This implies that the child marriage will not give rise to divorce cases easily. So, child marriage was made a custom in the olden days.

Finally [to my knowledge] - sex is like food to the body. So as all you know – the body needs sex from the start of the teens. On the other hand the government laws permit marriages at the age of 18/21 or so. So, this implies that the - boys and girls are kept starving for so many years when they are in need of food [sex]. Is it not a sin to keep your kids starving for years? Naturally, this spoils their personality and the psychological problems are created in the persons if they are not having sex for so long, due to sexual suppression, they might turn violent too.

This forced sexual starving will make them look for unnatural means to fulfill their sexual desires. This might lead to homosexuality, masturbation, watching porn movies, and even it increases aggression and criminality too in the youth due to unfulfilled sexual desires.

This implies that due to lack of child marriages – the youth are spoiled morally or their health is spoiled psychologically, they might turn into criminals too. These are what we observe directly, but the indirect effects are much more and diverse too.

Honestly, I agree that these are the few reasons I know and there will be many more reasons behind the custom of ‘child marriages’ but, it is not baseless or mindless.

If a scientist says [or invents] something, always ‘it’ will be wrong or bad to people or environment but, if the sages are saying something they [sages/scriptures] will never go wrong. The sages will only say for your [our] good as they are selfless people wishing good for all the creatures and they are not half-knowledged like the scientists to go wrong. But, the only problem is that we fail to understand them [the sages and scriptures] due to our own immature minds.

If the sages or scriptures are saying something – there will be some valid logic and thought in that but, often we fail to get their logic as our intellects are not broad and deep like theirs. Read the related article: Why do we misunderstand our ancients ?