LIFE TOGETHER Parents and Children: Fathers instruct and admonish their children

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. EPH 6:4

Interestingly, Paul singled out fathers and their relationships with their children. He tells them to lead, train, and relate with their sons and daughters in God’s ways. Fathers are to discipline their children without exasperating them, and direct them without discouraging them. In practical ways, how should a father instruct his children? What can future fathers do today in preparation for this?

Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children’s children . . . DEU 4:9

Berakhot 22a:4

As it was taught in a baraita: It is written: “Make them known to your children and your children’s children” (Deu 4:9), and it is written thereafter: “The day that you stood before the Lord your God at Horeb” (Deu 4:10). Just as below, the Revelation at Sinai was in reverence, fear, quaking, and trembling, so too here, in every generation, the law must be studied with a sense of reverence, fear, quaking, and trembling.

John Gill

Only take care—To walk according to this law, and not swerve from it:

And keep your soul diligently—From the transgressions and breaches of it:

Lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen—Either the statutes and judgments set before them, and the circumstances of the delivery of them; or the punishment inflicted on the breakers of them; or the favours bestowed on those that observed them:

And lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life—Out of your mind and memory, and have no place in your affections, through a neglect and disuse of them:

Make them known to your children and your children’s children—their children and grandchildren, that they may be trained up in them in their youth, and so not depart from them when grown up, and in years; see Deu 6:7.

Kiddushin 30a:5

The Gemara asks: But is one’s father’s father obligated to teach him the law? But isn’t it taught in a baraita, that the verse: “You shall teach them to your children” (Deu 11:19), indicates: But not your children’s children? And how do I realize, i.e., understand, the meaning of the verse: “Make them known to your children and your children’s children” (Deu 4:9)? This serves to say to you that whoever teaches his son the law, the verse ascribes him credit as though he taught him, and his son, and his son’s son, until the end of all generations.

19 You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.

Bava Batra 21a:2

What was this ordinance? As Rav Yehuda says that Rav says: Truly, that man is remembered for the good, and his name is Yehoshua ben Gamla. If not for him the law would have been forgotten from the Jewish people. Initially, whoever had a father would have his father teach him the law, and whoever did not have a father would not learn the law at all. The Gemara explains: What verse did they interpret homiletically that allowed them to conduct themselves in this manner? They interpreted the verse that states: “You shall teach them [otam] to your children” (Deu 11:19), to mean: You yourselves [atem] shall teach, i.e., you fathers shall teach your sons.

Kiddushin 29b:8

The baraita teaches that a father is obligated to teach his son the law. The Gemara asks: From where do we derivethis requirement? As it is written: “You shall teach them [velimadtem] to your children” (Deu 11:19). And in a case where his father did not teach him he is obligated to teach himself, as it is written, i.e., the verse can be read with a different vocalization: You shall study [ulmadtem].

Rashi

You shall teach them to your children, talking of them—From the moment when your son knows how to speak, teach him (Deu 33:4) “Moses commanded us a law”—so that this should be the means of teaching him to speak (Sukkah 42a). From this they (the Rabbis) derived their teaching: When the babe begins to speak, his father should speak with him in the holy tongue, and should instruct him in the law. If he does not do this, it is as though he buries him, as it is said here, “You shall teach them to your children, talking of them . . .” that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied.

20 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates,

21 that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give them, as long as the heavens are above the earth. DEU 11:19-21

John Gill

That your days . . . may be multiplied—Long life being a very desirable blessing, and which is promised to those that obey and keep the law; see Deu 30:19-20; Psa 91:16

And the days of your children—Which are dear to parents, and the continuance of whose lives, next to their own, is most desirable, yea, as desirable as their own; and especially it is desirable that they might have a posterity descending from them, to enjoy for ever their estates and possessions; as it was to the people of Israel, that they might have a seed always to dwell

In the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give them—The land of Canaan, so often spoken of as the promise, oath, and gift of God:

As long as the heavens are above the earth—That is, as long as the heavens and the earth shall be, and the one shall be over the other, as they will be to the end of time.

Rashi

That your days and the days of your children may be multiplied—If you do so, they will increase, but if not, they will not increase, for the statements of the law may be expounded so as to derive from the negative the positive, and from the positive, the negative (Sifrei Devarim 46).

The land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give them—It is not written here “to give you,” but “to give them.” From this we are able to derive that the tenet of the resurrection of the dead has its basis from the law (Sifrei Devarim 47:2).

9 And you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father and serve him with a whole heart and with a willing mind, for the Lord searches all hearts and understands every plan and thought. If you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will cast you off forever.

John Gill

And you, Solomon my son—Who was present in this assembly, and presented to them by David as his successor, and their future king: and having addressed them, he turns himself to him, and exhorts him, saying,

Know the God of your father—Who was his Father and covenant God, and whom he served and worshiped, and who had bestowed upon him many favours, both temporal and spiritual; and having had such an experience of his goodness, he exhorts his son to seek to know more and more of him, and to own and acknowledge him as his God, and to love and fear him:

Serve him with a whole heart and with a willing mind—Cordially and sincerely, cheerfully and freely, neither in an hypocritical manner, nor through force and constraint, nor with loathing and weariness:

For the Lord searches all hearts—The hearts of all men, even of kings, and knows from what principles and with what views and in what manor they serve him:

And understands every plan and thought—Not only the thoughts of the heart, when regularly formed and ranged in order, hut even the very beginning of them, the first motions of the mind, and before they are well formed, see Gen 6:5; Psa 139:2

If you seek him—By prayer and supplication in his house and ordinances:

He will be found by you—Grant his presence and bestow his favours, see Isa 4:6

But if you forsake him—His word, his ways, his worship:

He will cast you off forever—From being king, or enjoying that peace, prosperity, and happiness, which otherwise would be enjoyed.

Rashi

And serve him with a whole heart—Heb. בְּלֵב שָׁלֵם. It is not stated בְּלֵבָב שָׁלֵם, which would mean two hearts, but בְּלֵב שָׁלֵם, that you shall have but one heart for our Father who is in heaven. And so did the liturgical poet set down (in the Kedushah of Musaph of the first day of the Feast of Trumpets): “You have two hearts like one for the One.” Similar to this, we find in 1KI 8:61: “Let your heart therefore be wholly true (שָׁלֵם) to the Lord our God.” It is not written שְׁלֵמִים but שָׁלֵם: your two hearts will be one whole heart. And so it is explained (Gen 18:5): “. . . and refresh your heart (לִבְּכֶם), and after that you may pass on.” This teaches us that the angels have only one heart, and also in the future it will be so, as it is written: (Psa 48:14): “Consider well (לִבְּכֶם lit., your heart) her ramparts.”

For the Lord searches all hearts—Here it is appropriate to say לְבָבוֹת; the Lord searches all hearts, whether good or bad.

And understands every plan and thought—In Bereishit Rabbah 9:3, we learned: “Before a creature is created, the Holy One, blessed be he, understands what the person is destined to think.”

If you seek him, he will be found by you—Therefore, I say, (v. 8): “and seek out all the commandments of the Lord.”

He will cast you off forever—Heb. יַזְנִיחֲךָ. It is not written here: He will forsake you (יַעַזָבְךָ), but he will cast you off (יַזְנִיחֲך), which is a harsher term like Isa 19:6: “And they will abandon (הֶאֶזְנִיחוּ) its canals”; (Lam 2:7): “The Lord abandoned (זָנַח) his altar.”

10 Be careful now, for the Lord has chosen you to build a house for the sanctuary; be strong and do it.

Rashi

For the Lord has chosen you to build a house for the sanctuary not to build it for him to dwell therein, for the heavens and the heavens of the heavens cannot contain him, but for the sanctuary, for the requirement of the ark, which is called מִקְדָּשׁ, as it is written (Num 10:21): “And the Kohathites, the bearers of the מִקְדָּשׁ traveled,” and that is the ark. He did not choose you because you are more praiseworthy than other men, but for his sake and for the sake of his mercies; therefore be strong and do it.

20 Then David said to Solomon his son, “Be strong and courageous and do it. Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed, for the Lord God, even my God, is with you. He will not leave you or forsake you, until all the work for the service of the house of the Lord is finished.” 1CH 28:9-10, 20

Rashi

Be strong and courageous in order that your kingdom endure as the Holy One, blessed be he, has promised you, (verse 7): “. . . I will prepare his kingdom to eternity if he continues strong in keeping my commandments, etc.”

Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. COL 3:21

John Gill

Fathers, do not provoke your children—(See Gill on Eph 6:4).

Lest they become discouraged—Or disheartened and dispirited; their spirits be broke through grief and trouble, and they become indolent, sluggish, and unfit for business; or, despairing of having any share in the affections of their parents, disregard their commands, instructions, and corrections, and grow obdurate, stubborn, and rebellious.

. . . and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 2TI 3:15