The Emotion of Motherhood
The Emotion of Motherhood
The emotion or instinct of motherhood is strong in most women, to the extent that some weep bitterly if they have no children, desiring offspring with all their hearts. Our mother Sarah gave her maidservant Hagar to our father Abraham so that she might bear him a child who would be counted as hers.
How astonishing was the struggle between the two sisters, Leah and Rachel, competing to bear sons! Rachel said about it: “With mighty wrestlings I have wrestled with my sister, and I have prevailed” (Genesis 30:8).
Indeed, Rachel’s longing for children made her say to her husband Jacob: “Give me children, or else I die!” And Jacob’s anger was kindled against Rachel, and he said, “Am I in the place of God, who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?” (Genesis 30:1–2).
Because of this longing for children, the barren woman, upon giving birth, would say: “God has taken away my reproach” (Genesis 30:23). She regarded childbirth as a kind of deliverance (1 Samuel 2:1; Luke 1:71).
Out of her desire for children, Hannah wept in the temple before the Lord, prayed fervently with a sorrowful spirit, and made a vow to dedicate her child to the Lord (1 Samuel 1).
The joy of childbirth was so great that even elderly women rejoiced in bearing sons, such as Sarah and Elizabeth.
The Holy Scripture compares the woman who bears children to a fruitful vine, saying in the Psalm: “Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children like olive shoots around your table” (Psalm 128:3).
The emotion of motherhood reaches its height toward an only child—especially when the mother is a widow.
It becomes even stronger toward an infant who depends entirely on his mother. The Lord said: “Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Surely they may forget, yet I will not forget you” (Isaiah 49:15).
The emotion of motherhood is very strong—even among animals. Scripture gives the example of a hen gathering her chicks under her wings, and with this image, the love of God was compared.
Tags: Motherhood, Love
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