[Ethics of medical management of inability to give birth. Johannes Stahelin and his plea for embryotomy].
Confronted with the inability to give birth to a child, delivery could be achieved by embryotomy--that was only permitted, when the foetus was dead--or by Caesarean section--where the chance to save mother and child as well was merely theoretical until the end of the 19th century. In two statements of the Theological Faculty of the Sorbonne in Paris embryotomy was absolutely rejected (1648), in nearly all cases of impossible delivery the Caesarean section was required (1733). In 1749 Johannes Stähelin starts a daring attempt to justify embryotomy by application of natural law to the situation of critical childbirth. Keywords of the theological statements are confronted with categories of the natural law in a sophisticated way, nevertheless the basis of Christian confession is maintained. This argumentation in order to justify embryotomy as a lawful method to deliver a woman seemed to be more adequate to the medical sphere than claiming the Caesarean section. The ethical debate continued until the problem was solved by mastering Caesarean section.