Having never read the book myself I can only say this.
Yes it did only in that the parents did not understand what they were reading or did not have the ability to translate the knowledge they received. This does not mean the book is totally at fault but it is the catalyst.
In other words it would have been best they had never read it.
This is an old line Amish book, quite different than Catholic, Evangelical and mainline Protestant approaches.
Some folks take an idea and carry it to wacky extremes or become overly literal about it and lose metaphorical meanings. It is difficult to believe the authors of the book wanted this.
What a stupid article. The book’s authors should sue the article’s author for totally misrepresenting the book.
I actually read the book and applied the very commonsense principles. Very sound advice about scheduling children for eating and sleeping. My household had happy and well rested children who were a joy to be around My kids are now teens but I still see how the simple principle of consistency still bears fruit
Christianity is not about sadism.
It is about love. That poor 13 year old, starved by controlling parents. That poor 7 year old beaten to death out of “love” and the poor 4 year old killed by those who are supposed to protect him. These parents are stupid and depraved.
This is NOT an assault on Christianity, this is something a “Christian” author did.
How many times do people have to emphasize tough “love” is not love at all, it is hateful.
I read this comment at the NYT when they covered this story and it sort of stuck with me so I went and looked it up:
“If there have been 3 deaths for 670,000 copies. . . that’d be 4.4 per million. In the US, the overall rate of child death by parental abuse was 23.3 per million in 2008, roughly 8 times greater. So, households containing the Pearl book are far LESS likely to experience a child death by abuse that households not containing the book.
If the statistics are to be believed, we could lower the child abuse rate significantly by distributing a copy of the Pearl book to new mothers leaving the hospital.”
Most children’s deaths are caused by selfishness(abortion), drugs, drunk drivers, anger and violence. I can’t think of any that died in a true Christian church service.
The articles says “And 4-year-old Sean Paddock suffocated after his mother wrapped him in a blanket too tightly in an effort to keep him from getting out of bed.”
The Pearls don’t teach that. They teach blanket training, where you train your baby to play on a blanket with toys while the mother is nearby.
The wrapping tightly in blankets thing is some sort of wacky teaching that originated in the adoption movement as some way of simulating a “re-birth” into the new family (for kids who would not bond with their adoptive families) and several others deaths have been reported. But that is not a Pearl teaching at all.
All that having been said, I think some of the things in the book are good. It’s mostly just a bunch of common sense. But I would say that I disagree with them that you can train your child to some kind of completely obedient and always perfect kid.
Kids are still kids, and just like adults, they are going to make mistakes.
But the mistake being made here is blaming a well meaning husband and wife who wrote the book for the crimes of 3 unbalanced adoptive parents who never should have been approved for adoption anyway.
“To Train up a Child” is a very fine book that should be read by all parents and especially those with large families. The author is a modern Evangelical who passes along parenting lessons he learned rearing his children while living within an Amish community. It is like reading reports from a time traveler who went back to examine the family life of our great-great-great-grandparents.
Notably, the book suggests strategies for implementing the biblical injunctions to correct childhood misbehavior by spanking. Parents are warned to avoid punishing in anger. In my opinion and having raised children to adulthood, corporal punishment is indispensable in a household of rambunctious boys. Administering the correction with businesslike impartiality is essential for maintaining those all-important parent-child bonds of affection.
A book that recommends moderate spanking cannot be blamed for parents killing their children.
Could not stand this legalistic, behaviorism, training children as if they were worse than animals, with classical conditioning.
However - read Sears books and immediately liked them, knew it was the right way- Highly recommend!
This isn’t actually a smear job. Browse the Pearls’ website, read where they advocate whipping three month olds, staying with a husband who is molesting your children and tempting children and then punishing them. (Contrary to the Lord’s Prayer) They also found the deaths of these children funny, see his facebook page.
But they aren’t truly Christians. They are paleagians with strong gnostic tendencies. Reading their work indicates a flawedn if not heretical, understanding of Jesus Christ as both God and man.
I’ve read the book and nothing in it would lead to this kind of thing unless the parents already had serious problems.
I have not read this book, but as a school nurse, I have sat in with parents, especially parents advised by clergy to follow the advice of Christian books. However, when the parents are not true believers, or dingy to begin with, these attempts usually do not bring favorable results. They cling to certain things in these books religiously and rigidly. It’s too bad, too, because for the average Christian parent, there is probably some very good advice to be gotten, but not for those who mistreat their kids to begin with, or are not attempting to follow after Christ. I’ve had to report abuse.
I have read this book. I don’t agree with some of its attitude.
It does NOT, however, recommend you do ANY of the abuse listed in the article. It is unfair to say that it does.
Heard about this on the radio recently. Talk about a smear job! The attack on christianity continues....
So...if you consider yourself a christian - this is the book you were supposed to read first?
I never got the memo!
Anyone here know anyone with this book on their shelf?