הכרת הטוב

(35) She conceived again and bore a son, and declared, “This time I will praise ה'.” Therefore she named him Judah. Then she stopped bearing.

(1) 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."

(2) From the roots 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 until the first man (Adam), 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.

(3) 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 240).

(4) 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.