The Africa Review in Five highlights African current affairs from a Christian perspective. Listen and subscribe through Youtube, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.
Today is Friday, July 28th, A.D. 2023. This is The Africa Review in Five, written by Paul Schlehlein and presented by Yamikani Katunga.
On Spanking Your Child in Africa
Last month in June, South Africa’s highest court upheld a ruling that the corporal punishment of children at home violates a child’s rights and is therefore unconstitutional. This ruling was in agreement with the 2017 Constitutional Court decision that sentenced a father for severely spanking his 13-year-old son for watching a pornographic film on an iPad. The father argued that he as the parent has the right to discipline his son. The court disagreed.
Moreover, the South African courts left no room for ambiguity, as all nine constitutional judges decided that spanking is illegal. Chief Justice Mogoeng declared: “The vulnerability of children, their rights to dignity and to have the paramountcy of their best interests upheld, as well as the availability of less restrictive means to achieve discipline, render moderate and reasonable chastisement unconstitutional.”
The Apple dictionary defines spanking as “an act of slapping, especially on the buttocks as a punishment for children.” There is no hint in this definition of inherent abuse within the act of spanking. But notice how clear the South African courts ruled against spanking. It isn’t only against severe mistreatment. The court opposes all forms of corporal punishment, including “moderate and reasonable chastisement.”
South Africa is not the only country in Africa that opposes corporal punishment in the home. According to a CNN article in 2018, sixty countries, states and territories around the world have adopted legislation that fully prohibits using corporal punishment against children at home. Some of the African countries include Benin, Congo, South Sudan and Togo. Sweden became the first country in the world to ban physical punishment of children by law, the formal ruling coming in 1979. Interestingly, the United States still allows corporal punishment in the home in all 50 states.
Religious freedom groups in South Africa have challenged the ruling of South Africa’s high court on spanking, arguing that while parents should not harm or abuse their children, God has still given them the right and authority as parents to raise their children as they see fit.
In Scripture, the mandate, the model and the method of disciplining children is clear. Parents find a strong mandate to discipline in Proverbs 29:17: “Discipline your son, and he will give you rest; he will give delight to your heart.” It is not the government’s role to feed, clothe and shelter children. It is the parent’s role. Therefore, government mustn’t interfere with parents by forbidding them to discipline.
Parents can learn how to parent their children by following the example of the Perfect Parent—God Almighty. Hebrews 12:10 says, “For [earthly parents] disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but [God] disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness.”
Is spanking a proper method for parents to use when disciplining their children? Scripture answers with an emphatic ‘yes’. We mustn’t think the Bible is old fashioned or that today’s enlightened elites know better than God. Consider the following verses. Proverbs 23:13-14, “Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you strike him with a rod, he will not die. If you strike him with the rod, you will save his soul from Sheol.”
Proverbs 22:15 denies that children are naturally good, saying: “Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him.” Then again, Proverbs 29:15, “The rod and reproof give wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother.”
Of course, parents should always accompany discipline with patient love, grace and faithful teaching. Scripture urges parents to teach their children (Pr. 22:6) in the word (Dt. 6:7; Eph. 6:4) and always through love—which is often most clearly seen through corporal punishment.
In fact, Solomon says that if you follow countries that forbid spanking your children, you actually hate your child. As Proverbs 13:24 says, “Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.”
And that’s it for The Africa Review in Five on this Friday, July 28th in the year of our Lord 2023. Subscribe to the Missionary Minds podcast on Spotify or Apple podcasts. I’m Yamikani Katunga. Be not weary in well-doing.