Here in the U.S., today is Father’s Day. Some texts from the Bible:
Honor your father and your mother – Exodus 20:12
Hear, my son, the instruction of your father, and do not forsake the teaching of your mother; For they shall be a chaplet of grace upon your head, and chains about your neck. – Proverbs 1:8-9
He who fears Adonai has a secure fortress, and for his children it will be a refuge. – Proverbs 14:26
As a father has compassion on his children, so Adonai has compassion on those who fear him. – Psalm 103:13
And from the Talmud:
Our Rabbis taught: A father has the following obligations towards his son: to circumcise him, to redeem him, if he is a firstborn, to teach him Torah, to find him a wife, and to teach him a craft or a trade. And there are some who say that he must also teach him how to swim.– Kiddushin 29a
Our Rabbis taught: What is reverence and what is honor? Reverence means that the child must neither stand nor sit in the parent’s place, may not contradict a parent’s words, nor do anything that harms a parent’s interests. Honor means that a child must give a parent food, drink, and clothing, and provide transport. – Kiddushin 31b
The folk saying goes: What the child says out in the street comes either from his father or his mother. – Sukkah 56b
Do you have a favorite text about fathering or parenthood?
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“Come mothers and fathers throughout the land and don’t criticize what you can’t understand.”
From the song, ‘The Times They Are A Changin.’ Written by Robert Allen Zimmerman and made popular by Bob Dylan.
Good one!