EXOD435 The Two Basic Filial Duties: Honor and Respect. Two of the Torah’s commandments establish the foundation for the Jewish concept of parent-child relationships--the duties to honor one's parents and to fear or respect them: “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you. (Exodus 20:12). “You shall fear every man his mother and his father, and you shall keep My Sabbaths: I am the Lord your God (Leviticus 19:3). In typical rabbinic fashion, the Rabbis immediately try to define what each of these commandments entails and how they differ from each other. As a boy, I always thought that the commandment to honor my parents applied to me and my young friends and that it commanded us to obey our parents. That, however, is not how the Rabbis define it. Instead, they determine that it applies to adult children who have positive duties (that is, things they must do) to care for their elderly parents when they cannot care for themselves. As long as the parents have financial resources, the children may use them to carry out this obligation, but once the parents’ money runs out, the children must use their own resources to finance the services required by this commandment. The duty to respect (or fear) one's parents, on the other hand, involves negative duties to refrain from actions that would reduce the parents psychologically and socially to the level of their children. They may therefore not sit in either parent’s chair (assuming that the parent has a special one ) or contradict the parent in public. The latter duty, however, does not mean that the child must always agree with their parent or may not challenge the parent in private; this is rather a matter of preserving the honor of the parent in public forums.