They Choose Comfort. We Choose Children.
BY RABBI ELIE MISCHEL
Western society is falling apart – and few statistics reflect that cultural collapse more than fertility rates. In America, the current fertility rate per couple is 1.84, well below the replacement level of 2.1. Incredibly, this is better than most developed nations, where birthrates are even lower. As Wilfred Reilly writes, young people in the West “increasingly resemble captive panda bears, who have to be pushed into one another and bribed with delicacies to be persuaded to mate” (Wilfred Reilly, What’s Really Driving the Birth-Rate Crisis, National Review).
Low birthrates are the clearest sign of a society in decline. An aging population means fewer working people, slower economic growth, and unsustainable social programs. But the deeper issue is spiritual: it reflects a culture that no longer believes in itself, a society with no mission and no will to endure.
The Torah describes a strange conversation between Lemech, a descendant of Kayin, and his two wives: “Now Lemech said to his wives, ‘Adah and Tzilah, hearken to my voice; wives of Lemech, incline your ears to my words. For I have slain a man by wounding him and a child by bruising him. If Kayin shall be avenged sevenfold, then for Lemech it shall be seventy-seven fold.’ And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son, and she named him Sheit, for ‘G-d has given me other seed instead of Hevel, for Kayin slew him’” (Bereishit 4:23–25).
At this early stage in human history, there is a crisis. Lemech’s wives won’t listen to him. He seems to have killed both a man and a child. What is going on?
Chazal provide a fascinating backstory. Lemech, who was blind, went hunting with his son Tuval-Kayin. Tuval-Kayin spotted their ancestor Kayin, who was hunched over and appeared to be an animal. He told his father to shoot – and Lemech killed Kayin. When he realized what had happened, Lemech clapped his hands together in anguish, accidentally crushing his son’s head between them and killing him.
After this double tragedy, Lemech’s wives separated from him. Lemech tried to appease them, but they refused. So Lemech came to Adam and complained that his wives had abandoned him. Adam told them: “Return to your husband and fulfill your obligation to be fruitful and multiply.” But Adah and Tzilah responded: “Correct yourself first. Haven’t you separated from your wife for 130 years since death was decreed because of you?” And immediately, Adam reunited with Chavah, and Sheit was born (Rashi, Bereishit 4:23,25).
It’s a strange story – but one that speaks directly to our generation.
Rav Yehuda Leon Ashkenazi explains that after Kayin murdered Hevel, human society spiraled into darkness. They built cities and invented tools and music, but lacked all moral purpose. Like Kayin, they related to G-d in a transactional way: bring a sacrifice, get a reward. Society was marked by violence, egotism, and nihilism. In such a world, human life becomes worthless. Lemech’s senseless killing of Kayin and Tuval-Kayin was the inevitable end result of a hollow, godless society.
Adah and Tzilah saw it clearly. Why bring children into a world like this? If life is about nothing more than self-indulgence and empty pleasure, why continue the human story? Why invest in another generation when there’s nothing worth passing on? (Rabbi Yehuda Leon Ashkenazi, Sod HaIvri, 1:176)
We are witnessing the same phenomenon in Western culture today. As religion fades, children are increasingly seen as a burden – expensive, exhausting, and disruptive to personal fulfillment. Without G-d, Torah, and a higher purpose, there is no compelling reason to raise children at all.
What can be done? The answer lies in the next verse: “And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son, and she named him Sheit, for ‘G-d has given me other seed instead of Hevel, for Kayin slew him’” (Bereishit 4:25).
Adam understood the fundamental problem: the descendants of Kayin were spiritually lost. So he returned to Chavah, and they brought a new soul into the world – Sheit. Sheit was a new kind of man. He was the ancestor of Avraham, Yitzchak, Ya’akov and Am Yisrael. The mission of Sheit and his descendants was to bring humanity back from the brink, to teach the children of Kayin that G-d is real and life has meaning. Sheit is called “a new seed” because he planted the seed of redemption.
This, in the end, is the purpose of Am Yisrael. We are the descendants of Sheit – the counterforce to the spiritual collapse of civilization. Our role is to show the world what a life of meaning looks like. And perhaps more importantly: what a society of meaning looks like.
Even under the threat of war and terror, Israel is growing stronger, not weaker. Our birthrate is the highest in the Western world, our people are returning to G-d, and thousands make Aliyah each year. Step by step, we are fulfilling Sheit’s mission, and becoming the light unto the nations that it is our purpose to be.
They chose comfort. We chose children – and through them, we’ll show the world what it really means to choose life.
Rabbi Elie Mischel is the Editor of HaMizrachi magazine and the author of The War Against the Bible: Ishmael, Esau and Israel at the End Times (2024).