on teenage rebellion

I firmly believe teenagers do not have to rebel when they hit that age. If they HAD to rebel, if it was an inevitable milestone toward maturity, then the command found in Torah, to stone a son or daughter who is rebellious and refuses to listen to his parents, would be unjust. And God is not unjust.

But there are other proofs that teenagers do not have to rebel. Teens in non- Western societies or in primitive societies do not always rebel. And teens who lived in other eras, not our modern era, did not always rebel. If teens had to rebel in order to reach adulthood, these things would not be the case. So I believe there is something about our modern Western society that encourages teenage rebellion. In fact, I think there are several somethings that encourage rebellion, and it may be that several factors are at work at once in any particular case.

There is a popularly- held belief that homeschooled children do not rebel as teens while public schooled children do. It is a myth. It is a generalization and oversimplification. Some public- schooled children do not rebel, while some homeschooled children do. If it were simply a matter of education, then we would not see the exception to the rule, but in fact, we do. While many public- schooled children may be fed more factors that cause rebellion, while many homeschooled children may have those factors short circuited because of their family’s healthy choices (of which homeschooling tends to be one), the education itself is not a factor.

So what is the cause of teenage rebellion? There are several causes, in fact, and as usual, the Scriptures hold the key.

on teenage rebellion, part two
on teenage rebellion, part three
on teenage rebellion, part four
on teenage rebellion, part five