Is marriage and getting more children advised or not?
A male devotee (Name hidden) asked like this:
“Is it sinful to not getting married & having child? If so, then what about those Ahoris who never get married & always remain in the devotion of Lord Shiva or Lord Bhairav? What is the limit of having children? Thank you.”
REPLY:
First, about marriage.
Both marrying or not marrying is not sinful, but, only involving in illicit relations outside the marriage is sinful both for grahasthas and brahmacharis.
Who said marriage is sinful? Marrying ONLY FOR SENSE GRATIFICATION is just binding, not sinful. Yes, sense gratification with the spouse is not sinful, but just binding.
There will be no punishments for sense gratification with the spouse, but, you will concentrate in sense gratification more. That’s all.
Marriage life in which you serve Krishna together is called grahastha life. In this kaliyuga, sense inducements are more. So, it is better to marry and keep the senses controlled.
This will help the husband and wife to involve in Krishna conscious sadhanas without any disturbances from senses. Though either the husband or wife is not a devotee, the another one can follow devotion by satisfying the needs of spouse. This is not sinful.
By performing marriage, your activities are regulated within a single person and hence other girls/ boys are safe in a society. You are also helping to maintain the population of this planet. If you see the popular rishis they have lived grahastha life only.
If you had noticed our media from the beginning, you would have found that I have not recommended direct sanyasa in any places unless the devotee is an exceptional person who seriously do not need married life.
Because, I feel that if I encourage a person to take sanyasa directly without marriage, I must ensure that he is not doing any offences after taking sanyasa by fighting with his senses.
In case he commits any offences, I too will be responsible for the fall down of that person. So, I SHOULD ENCOURAGE A PERSON TO TAKE SANYASA ONLY IF I CAN ENSURE THAT HE TRULY NEEDS IT AND IF HE WILL NOT FALL DOWN.
Just recommending sanyasa, but, not following him will be an offense. That is why, Varnashrama dharma encouraged brahmacharya, grahastha, vanaprastha and sanyasa as the sequence.
I am firm in the view that a person should take sanyasa only if he is 100% confident that he will not get disturbed on seeing girls. For that, he must be very strong in his sadhanas. If he dilutes his saadhanas, he may fall into the trap of maya again.
Even if he is attracted by the beauty of any girl, he will fall down from sanyasa. So, if the person is not 100% confident of his sense control, it is better to enter into marriage in young age of around 20-23 and complete all the responsibilities before 50. Then, you can follow whichever ashrama you like to lead.
When a boy gets married, two things happen: (1) A girl gets life and her senses are also regulated by her husband. (2) Other girls are protected as he will not disturb them for his sense gratification.
So, in this kaliyuga, marriage is a safe arrangement that can avoid sinful acts outside marriage. Of course, there are some inconveniences in marriage life. But, there are some inconveniences in sanyasa life also. In case the marriage life is seriously and genuinely difficult to continue and the souse is unable to be corrected, you may consider coming out of it.
So, Quit marriage ONLY IF YOU ARE 100% CONFIDENT THAT YOU WILL NOT LOOK ANY GIRL WITH DESIRE.
Then, about children.
You have no limit to have children. Scriptures have not fixed any limit for that. In older days, every couple had atleast 12-15 children and the wife will be delivering child till her age of 50.
They did because, if not one, another son will take care of them. And, everyone lived in the same big house and hence they did not face any problem of absence of caretakers for elder people and children.
Now a days, the cost of living has gone up. So, the parents find it difficult to bring up even a single child.
So, the beautiful relations like uncle, aunt, cousin, grand ma, grand pa, etc are becoming the things of past.
In fact, if there is more children, there will be more relations for the children and hence, there was a fear for everyone in committing wrong. So, as said by Srila Prabhupada, get as much children you want, but, bring every child as the devotee of Krishna. That is important.
However, the governments discourage getting more children. This is the effect of kali yuga. Scriptures prohibit artificial contraceptives. They recommend self regulation through sense control only.