Our Responsibilities to Our Children
By Rabbi Rami Pavolotzky
This week we read parashat Tazria. Among others mitzvot, we find in this Torah section the commandment of Brit Milah, the ritual circumcision. Although this mitzvah had already been conveyed to Abraham in the Book of Genesis, the sages explain that it is repeated here in order to teach that a Brit Milah should be performed even on Shabbat, if the eighth day after birth falls on Shabbat (Shabbat 132).
According to traditional halacha, the father is responsible for the ritual circumcision of his son/s. As we learn in the Talmud (Kidushin 29:a), “A father is obligated with regard to his son to circumcise him, and to redeem him (if he is a firstborn son who must be redeemed by payment to a priest), and to teach him Torah, and to marry him to a woman, and to teach him a trade. And some say: “A father is also obligated to teach his son to swim.”
This source establishes the obligations of a father to his son. I can easily recognize in this text some statements many of you may disagree with. For example: Why only the father? What about the daughters? Why does the father need to marry his son? I am sure you can find more. However, I still like this teaching by the rabbis as an example of the obligations that parents have for their children.
Some of these obligations are ritual, like the circumcision, or the redemption of the first born. The rest of them are related to the necessary skills a child had to develop to have a successful life in the society the rabbis lived thousands of years ago. At that time, if you wanted to thrive (and survive, first!) you needed to learn Torah, which includes the basic rules of the society and the basic values you needed to master, apart from education/schooling itself. Marrying and forming a family were considered mandatory. You were not able to earn a living and feed your family without knowing a trade. And swimming, well, that is still considered a life saver.
According to the Talmud, then, parents need to teach or provide their children the basic skills they need to be able to survive as adults and have a dignified life. I find this concept still very relevant. We love our children so much that we would like to be there for them forever, helping, guiding and, eventually, “saving” them from any problem they may have. However, we all know that it is not possible. We give them life, their life, and they need to move their wings and develop their own journeys. Therefore, as parents, the best we can do, apart from love them and be there for them when possible, is to provide them with the skills and tools they will need to develop their lives. The rest is on them! Even with our best intentions and possibilities, we will not be able to be there for them forever. The skills and values we are able to transmit to them, however, will stay with them for the rest of their lives.