Fifth Commandment: Honor Your Parents

Honor your father: With this it completes everything that we are due directly to the Creater, God's self, and turns toward commanding us about matters of human beings, beginning with the father, who is toward his descendants like a partial creator, participating in their formation, for God is our first parent and the one who sired us is our last. That is why Deuteromony says, "...as I commanded you..." - that is, I commanded you already about My own honor, and now I similarly command you about My partner in your formation. But the Torah isn't explicit about the honor, so that we should learn by derivation from the honor due to the Blessed First Parent: one should acknowledge that is one's father and not obscure the relationshiop by refering to any ohter person as his father; he should not serve him as one who is just hoping for an inheritance or something else he hopes to gain from him; he should not use his father's name or swear falsely by his father's life. And other things also come into the category of honor because we are commanded about everything that honors him, and many of them are spelled out in the Talmud (kiddushin 31), which also spells out that the parent's honor is compared to God's honor. And just as this mitzvah is on earth, so it's reward is in length of days in the land that God gives you, and our sages hold (Kiddushin 39) that the Torah intends "so that your days shall be long on the land," promising that ALL your days shall be long -- including your 'days' in the world to come, where we will dwell eternal on the Good Land that will be given to us...

The Sages taught: it is stated: “Honor your father and your mother” (Exodus 20:11), and it is stated: “Honor the Lord with your wealth” (Proverbs 3:9): the verses equates the honor of one’s father and mother to the honor of the Omnipresent. It is stated: “A man shall fear his mother and his father” (Lev 19:3), and it is stated: “You shall fear the Lord your God and Him you shall serve” (Deut 6:13): the verse equates the fear of one’s father and mother to the fear of the Omnipresent. It is stated: “He who curses his father or his mother shall be put to death” (Ex 21:17), and it is stated: “Whoever curses his God shall bear his sin” (Lev 24:15): the verse equates "blessing" one’s father and mother to blessing the Omnipresent. --But as to striking it is certainly not possible--- Thus it is logical as the three of them are partners in his creation, as the Sages taught: There are three partners in a person: The Holy One, Blessed be He, and his father and his mother. When a person honors his father and mother, the Holy One, Blessed be He, says: I ascribe credit to them as if I dwelt between them and they honor Me as well.

Our Rabbis taught: What is ‘fear’ and what is ‘honour’?‘Fear’ means that he must neither stand in his place nor sit in his place, nor contradict his words, nor tip the scales against him. ‘Honour" means that he must give him food and drink, clothe and cover him, lead him in and out.

The commandment to honor father and mother: To honor father and mother, as it is stated (Exodus 20:12), "You shall honor your father and your mother." And the explanation (Kiddushin 31b) comes to [define it], "What does it mean to 'honor'? To feed, give drink, dress, bring in, and take out."

The philosophical root of this commandment is that it is fitting for a person to acknowledge and return kindness to people who were good to him, and not to be an ungrateful scoundrel, because that is a bad and repulsive attribute before God and people. And he should take to heart that the father and the mother are the cause of his being in the world; and hence it is truly fitting to honor them in every way and give every benefit he can to them, because they brought him to the world, and worked hard for him when he was little. And once he fixes this idea in his soul, he will move up from it to recognize the good of God, Blessed be He, who is his Cause and the Cause of all his ancestors back to the first human being, and that He took him out into the world's air, and fulfilled his needs every day, and made his body strong and able to stand, and gave him a mind that knows and learns - for without the mind that God granted him, he would be 'like a horse or a mule who does not understand.' And he should think at length about how very fitting it is to be careful in his worship of the Blessed be He.

The laws of this commandment - for example, whose property should be spent on this honor, the child's or the parent's, and the ruling (Kiddushin 32a) is that it is out of the parent's if the parent has assets, but if not, the child must even beg door to door (see Talmud Yerushalmi Kiddushin 1:7) in order to feed their parent; which takes priority, honoring the father or the mother; if [the parent] waives that honor [if it is effective]; if the child sees the parent violating the Torah's words, with what words should they stop them; if his father commands him to violate the Torah's words, that he should not believe him about it; that the child is obligated to honor [the parent] in life and in death, and how is the honor in death; and the rest of its details - are [all] elucidated in Tractate Kiddushin and in a few other places in the Gemara (See Tur, Yoreh Deah 260). And [it] is practiced in every place and at all times by males; and by females (Kiddushin 31a) any time it is possible for them - meaning to say when their husbands do not prevent them. And one who transgressed it violated a positive commandment, and his punishment is very great; for they are like one who ignores their Heavenly Father. And if the court has the power, they coerce him; as we wrote above (in Sefer HaChinukh 6) that the court coerces with regards to the negation of a positive commandment.

(2) (Devarim, Ibid.) "and by this thing (Torah study) you shall prolong days.": This is one of the things, which, by doing them, one eats their fruits in this world and "prolongs days" in the world to come, viz. "for it is your life, and by this thing you shall prolong days." Whence do we derive (the same for) honoring father and mother? From (Devarim 5:16) "Honor your father and mother so that your days be prolonged and so that it be good for you, etc." Whence do we derive (the same for) lovingkindness? From (Proverbs 21:21) "He who pursues righteousness and lovingkindness will find life, righteousness, and honor." Whence do we derive (the same for) the conferring of peace (upon man and his neighbor)? From (Psalms 34:15) "Seek peace and pursue it," and (Isaiah 54:13) "and all of your children learned of the L-rd, and an abundance of peace (will be the lot of) your children."

"And Rivkah took the precious [lit: covetable] garments of her older son Esau..." (Gen 27:15). Those that he coveted from Nimrod and killed him and took them -- and this is what the verse refers to (Prov 12:12): An evil person covets the gear of the wicked.

"...which were with her at home..." in which he used to serve his father. R. Shimon ben Gamliel said: All the days of my life I used to serve Father, and I didn't serve him even one percent of Esau's service to his father. I, when I served Father, used to serve him in dirty clothing and then when I left to travel I changed into clean clothes. But Esau, in the hour when he served his father did so only in royal garments! saying, It is not fitting to the honor of my father to serve him other than in royal garments." And that's why it says, "which [Rivkah] kept in her house": though he had many wives, he also knew about their [idolatrous] worship...

And the son's commandment toward the father is to honor him and revere him. And if sometimes his father will be angry at him, and insult him and curse him for no reason, because of some sorrow that he has in his heart or because of what has happened over time, and he will pour out his anger onto him; or because of his father's personal qualities or his mental lack, then the son will need understanding, to tolerate (suffer) all that for the honor of his Creater's commandment. He won't speak contempuously to him, nor respond harshly to him, nor insult him, God forbid. But he will bend his head down like a reed, and not suffer or grieve. For didn't we read in the Talmud about Dama? Even though he was a gentile, and his mother was demented and hit him in front of all the dignitaries of Rome, adn took his purse and threw it into the sea, he didn't insult her. And certainly if one's parents have their mental capacities intact, so that the son should consider that they are probably correct in whatever they do to him; and if it seems to him that they have really deviated from right behavior it's because of his own lack of understanding, for it's the way of sons always to justify themselves as if their conduct were correct, and it seems to them that their father and mother judge them whenever they correct them! But the son who is truly understanding for whom the fear of God is his treasure, it will not seem that way to him and his heart will not judge this way, but will believe that in every detail they are acting rightly, and he himself is not. And his will make his ear a receiver to accept correction, and he will not deviate from what they tell him neither to the right nor to the left, even if they tell him that "Right" is really "Left."

R. Tarfon's mother went down to stroll in her courtyard on shabbat. R. Tarfon went and laid his two hands under her footsteps so that she walked on them until she reached her bed. One day he became ill and the sages went to visit him. She said to them, "Pray for my son Tarfon, who behaves toward me with extreme honor!" They asked her, "What did he do?" and she told them this case. They told her, "Even if he had done a thousand thousand times that much, he would only have reached half of the honor that the Torah says."

R. Ishmael's mother came and complained about him to the Rabbis, saying to them, "Speak ill of my son Ishmael, who does not behave with honor to me!" ...

R. Shimon bar Yochai said: "Honoring your father and mother is such a great mitzvah that God privileged it even more than God's own honor. Compare "Honor your father and mother" (Ex 20) to "Honor God from your possessions" (Prov 3). With what do you honor God? With what God gave you. You separate and take out leket, shikhekhah, peah, terumah, first tithe, second tithe, poverty tithe, and the hallah; you acquire, make, and use a sukkah, lulav, shofar, tefillin, and tzitzit; you feed the poor and hungry and give drink to the thirsty: If you have, you are obligated in all them, but if you lack, you are free of every single one! But when it comes to honoring your parents, whether you have wealth or you have nothing, honor your parents -- even if you are going door to door begging.

...

R. Abba bar Kahanah said: Scripture makes a parallel between the lightest and easiest of all mitzvot, and the hardest and harshest of all mitzvot. The lightest mitzvah is sending the mother bird away from the nest, and the hardest is honoring your mother and father. In both cases the Torah says, "that you may have long days." R. Abun said, "Well, if in a case where you are paying a debt you owe it says 'so that it will be good for you and you will have long days," then surely in a case where you have both monetary loss and danger to life, shouldn't the reward be at least the same?"

"And Timnah was the concubine of Esau's son Eliphaz." (Gen 36:12). R. Shimon b. Yohai taught: Why does it bother to tell us that Timnah was Eliphaz's concubine? To let us know the greatness of Abraham our father's household. How eager where other royal families to align with them?.... She said, Since I do not rank high enough to marry him as his wife, I will become his servant. And needless to say, if Esau, who only ever accomplished one single mitzvah in that he honored his father, was a desirable match for kings and princes, so much more so would Jacob our righteous father be, who observed every bit of the Torah!

All descendants of Noah are commanded with seven commandments: On laws, and on worshipping the stars, and on sexual immorality, and on spilling blood, and on stealing, and on eating parts of a still-living creature....

And if you would say, "indeed, that is so"?! But doesn’t Rav Yehuda say that Shmuel says: The Sages asked Rabbi Eliezer: To what extent, honoring one’s father and mother? He said to them: Go and see what a certain star-worshipper did for his father in Ashkelon, and his name is Dama ben Netina. Once, they sought [to buy] stones from him for the [High Priest's] ephod for six hundred thousand profit, -- Rav Kahana teaches that it was eight hundred thousand! The keys were placed under his father’s head, and he would not disturb him. ... And furthermore, the latter clause teaches: In a subsequent year, a red heifer was born in his herd and the Sages of Israel approached him. He said to them: I know about you, that if I ask you for all the money in the world, you would give it to me. Now I am requesting from you only that money that I lost because of my father. There, it was through the agency of Jewish merchants that they purchased the heifer. And is Rabbi Eliezer not concerned about the possibility that a person has engaged in bestiality with the animal? ...