ג׳ כסלו ה׳תשפ״ו | November 22, 2025
The Lie That Turned Children Against Their Parents
“The starting point assumes that parents are the source of harm, and that I, their child, am now noble enough to forgive them. That mindset is completely twisted and false. Forgiveness is something you extend to someone who’s your equal – someone on your level. But a parent is not an equal.”
By Rabbi Dovi Brod – therapist in Kfar Chabad
Three years ago, I stood on stage at Binyanei HaUmah in Yerushalayim. In the audience sat my mother. And I asked her for forgiveness in front of the large crowd.
I spoke about the kind of teenager I was – a boy who challenged his parents in every way possible.
I grew up in a generation caught between two worlds. The older generation believed in absolute parental authority. It wasn’t acceptable for a child to question, criticize, or, r”l, speak disrespectfully to his parents.
A child knew that even if his parents weren’t perfect, they were still his parents, and they were to be honored.
But around that time, new voices began to seep into our world. Modern psychology started to chip away at the old way of thinking, sending parents a very different message: “Your child is delicate and fragile – every small difficulty can scar him. Don’t be strict, don’t set firm boundaries. Just love, just please, just make sure he’s always the center of attention. And if something goes wrong – it’s your fault.”
And me? As the oldest child, I took full advantage of that. If my parents were convinced that everything was always their fault, why should I ruin it for them? I did everything I could to reinforce that narrative and challenge their authority in every possible way.
Later, when I began studying therapy, I heard the same language again: “Most of your struggles come from childhood – specifically from your parents’ failure to meet your emotional needs. They probably didn’t give you what you needed, and that’s why you’re struggling now.”
Only years later, through learning the Rebbe’s sichos and guidance, did I realize how deeply this culture weakens parents, confuses children, and tears families apart – and how completely opposite it is to the Torah, our Torah of Life.
A month before my talk at Binyanei HaUmah, a patient told me that he had flown abroad to visit his father’s grave, to ask forgiveness for the pain he had caused him over the years.
As a teenager, he had gone through therapy. Together with his therapist, he “mapped out” every moment in his life where his father had supposedly “hurt” him. He blamed his father for all of his difficulties and decided to cut off contact. Despite his father’s many attempts to reconnect, he ignored him completely for years.
Only after his father’s sudden passing did he realize what he had done. He understood that he had lost his father while he was still alive. He described to me, through tears, the heartbreaking conversation he had at his father’s graveside – how he broke down, begging forgiveness for the pain and sorrow he had caused. But by then, it was too late.
As I listened to him, I thought to myself: Why wait until after our parents are gone to ask for forgiveness? My parents, baruch Hashem, are alive. I still have the chance to say it to them face-to-face.
And so I did – standing on stage before a massive crowd, I turned to my parents and asked both of them for forgiveness. I never imagined the storm those words would create. I was just sharing my personal story; I had no idea what would come.
Within days, I received hundreds of messages. Parents wrote to me: “We sat through your entire talk in tears.” They said that my story had moved them deeply, shaken them, and reflected their own personal journeys in a way they hadn’t expected.
Parents wrote things like, “You completely changed the way we think,” and “Because of you, I reached out to my mother, I asked forgiveness, and we made peace.”
But there were also therapists who were upset with me. They said, “You’re undermining the whole idea of therapy. Talking about one’s parents is an essential part of the process, and your criticism of that approach could discourage people from seeking help.” Others told me, “Because of you, parents will feel justified to continue their behavior without recognizing the consequences.”
People asked me, “What’s so wrong if a young man or woman goes to therapy and learns to forgive their parents? Isn’t it beautiful when they find the strength to let go and make peace?”
But that, in my view, is exactly the problem. We’ve created a distorted kind of conversation, with statements like, “I’ve forgiven my mother for the damage she caused me,” or “I’ve decided to forgive my father.”
The starting point assumes that parents are the source of harm, and that I, their child, am now noble enough to forgive them. That mindset is completely twisted and false.
Forgiveness is something you extend to someone who’s your equal, someone on your level. You get angry or reconcile with a friend, or with someone who stands alongside you. But a parent is not your equal. They occupy an entirely different place.
Hashem chose them to be the ones through whom you would enter this world. They are the channel through which your life and blessings flow. They are your link to Hashem Himself.
You and they are not on the same plane. They stand several levels above you, not because they’re necessarily wiser or more skilled, but because they were chosen for this sacred role by the Creator and Ruler of the world.
Hashem knows exactly what He’s doing, and He made them His partners in bringing you here. Your parents were chosen specifically to bring you into this world. There is a divine intention and complete trust placed in them by their Partner: Hashem Himself.
We’ve all heard the story of Rabbi Tarfon: Once, his mother’s sandal tore in the courtyard on Shabbos. He lay down on the ground, placed his hands under her feet, and she walked on him the entire way home, while he dragged himself along the stones. When they reached the house, he got down on his knees so she could climb onto his back and reach her bed.
It’s a strange story at first glance. Why would he do that? Why not simply lift her up? He was a young, strong man. Why go to such extremes, lying on the ground and crawling home?
But, perhaps, Rabbi Tarfon understood that no matter how great he was, everything he had came through his mother. She was the channel of divine blessing in his life, and he refused to let there be even a single moment in which he stood above her – in body or in spirit. If he would lift her up, she would then be below him – he the strong one, she the weak.
He wanted it to be clear who stood above whom: his mother above him. Through her, he was connected to Hashem. And so he lowered himself to the ground, in humility and bittul before her.
That’s why – no matter how smart you are – you can never stand on the same level as your parents. Hashem Himself established that you’re under them. That’s the divine order.
*
We all know about the Rebbe’s extraordinary devotion to honoring his mother, Rebbetzin Chana. The Rebbe would visit her every single day, drink a cup of tea with her, and ask how her day had been. Every minute of the Rebbe’s life was precious; five minutes for him was an eternity. Yet he wouldn’t miss a day.
When he would leave her home, he would back out of the room, just as one does when leaving the presence of a Sefer Torah – walking backward out of respect. The Rebbetzin herself once said that from the time her son became bar mitzvah, she never once saw his back; he always walked a step behind her, so that she would never have to see his.
And when the Rebbe’s brother passed away, he feared that the news would endanger his mother’s health. So for thirteen years, he continued writing letters in his brother’s name – literally adopting his voice – writing exactly what his brother would have written to her, had he still been alive. He arranged for those letters to be mailed from New York to England and then re-mailed back to New York, so that she would not suspect anything – because he knew that the truth could hurt her.
There’s another story the Rebbe’s secretaries would tell: Once, the Rebbe instructed that his mother’s shoes not be placed on the floor, but rather on the table in his room – the very table where the Rebbetzin would rest during Simchas Torah. And so, throughout the entire Yom Tov, his mother’s shoes stood upon that holy table – the same table where the Rebbe had met world leaders and from which he guided the affairs of the entire world. But these weren’t just shoes. They were his mother’s shoes.
From stories like these, we glimpse an unparalleled level of kibbud eim – a son’s reverence for his mother that is almost beyond comprehension.
True, this is a lofty standard, one we can hardly hope to reach. But the question we must ask ourselves is: Do we honor our parents to the fullest of our own ability?
I’ve seen it with my own eyes: Every young person who drew closer to their parents – who began truly respecting and honoring them – not only found greater peace of mind and emotional balance, but also rose spiritually.
Because the moment you accept your parents’ authority with humility and respect, you’re also accepting the authority of your Father in Heaven. You’re taking on ol malchus shamayim – the yoke of Heaven itself.
And sadly, the reverse is also true…
*
Honoring your parents isn’t just about what you do – it’s about where you’re coming from when you do it. It’s about your inner stance, your emotional posture toward them.
The Gemara teaches: “There is one who feeds his father the finest delicacies yet inherits Gehinnom, and another who makes his father grind at the millstone yet merits Gan Eden.”
How can that be?
The Gemara explains: In the first case, a wealthy son would serve his father delicious meals of fattened chickens. One day, his father asked him, “My son, where did you get such fine birds?” The son snapped back, “Eat and be quiet – dogs eat and don’t ask questions.”
In the second case, when the king sent soldiers to find strong men to serve as slaves, a son told his father, “Father, tie yourself to the millstone in my place, so they’ll take me and not you.”
The first son fed his father gourmet food and earned Gehinnom; the second put his father through hardship and earned Gan Eden.
Because it’s not what you do that matters – it’s how you do it, and from what place in your heart. What is your attitude – your inner feeling – toward your parents?
There are moments in life when, unfortunately, the practical roles can reverse – when our parents need our help. But that reversal of roles doesn’t cancel the hierarchy between parent and child – it deepens it.
Even when we carry them in our arms, in our hearts we must remain beneath them. Our task is to help without belittling, to accompany without controlling, to speak to them – not about them, and never above them.
We must be a supporting hand, not a replacing one; seek their advice, not issue directives; preserve their independence, not take it away; protect their dignity, not just their comfort.
It isn’t easy, but it’s our sacred duty.
When we’re not in the right place in relation to our parents – no matter our age or stage in life – it creates confusion. And that confusion doesn’t stay contained; it seeps downward, into the next generation.
Only they take it a few steps further.
We’re living in a time when our values are under constant attack. The same ideology that gave us “gender identity,” “Parent 1 and Parent 2,” and slogans like, “You’re the center of the world,” “Do what feels right for you,” “Follow your own truth,” has set off a deep and destructive process:
It dismantled parental authority, confused children’s rights with equality of status, blurred the very definitions of “father” and “mother,” and from there, began unraveling the entire structure of family and identity.
It’s an all-out assault on the healthy, natural hierarchy that the Torah lays down.
And now – at last – we’re beginning to wake up. We’re seeing the damage and the pain it’s caused. And nowhere is that damage felt more sharply than in the area of honoring parents.
The Torah commands us in the Aseres Hadibros: “Honor your father and your mother.” It doesn’t add an asterisk saying, “—as long as they’re young, wise, easygoing, or financially supportive.”
This mitzvah appears in the first column of the Aseres Hadibros, which are bein adam laMakom – between man and Hashem – because honoring your parents isn’t merely about them; it’s about your relationship with Hashem. Your connection to Him passes through them.
It’s an unconditional mitzvah. It doesn’t depend on whether your parents are perfect – or whether you think they could stand to improve in a few areas.
A parent is a parent. Not a friend. Not an equal.
And what happens when that hierarchy breaks down? We get comments like, “My mother meddles in my life,” “She embarrasses me,” “My father gets on my nerves.”
What’s the message behind that? That parent and child are on the same level, and that it’s okay for a child to get angry at a parent as they would at a friend.
And when a father speaks disrespectfully about his parents, or when a mother belittles hers, the children absorb that message. They learn that it’s acceptable.
Because once something sacred stops being sacred, it becomes open to interpretation. And once it’s open to interpretation, there’s no limit to how far it can go.
There was one week when I encountered two remarkable examples.
I met a bochur going through a very difficult time – emotionally and spiritually. But the moment his father walked into the room, he immediately stood up and gave him the more comfortable chair. It was instinctive, natural. To him, it was obvious: A father is above me. The family order was clear.
That same week, I met another bochur – an outstanding boy, a yirei shomayim deeply immersed in Chassidus and well-versed in the fine details of avodah. His father was a baal teshuvah. And the son? He felt superior to him. He would criticize, correct, and even speak down to him. He felt above his father and, worse, was embarrassed by him.
It reached the point where, on Erev Yom Kippur during Birchas HaBanim, he made sure not to be home – just so he wouldn’t have to face the discomfort of refusing his father’s bracha. He would go to a different shul – just so he wouldn’t have to stand beneath his father’s tallis during Birchas Kohanim.
Two different worlds. Light and dark. In one world, it’s obvious: a father is a father no matter what. In the other, the pyramid has been turned upside down.
But there’s also another story – so you don’t think this kind of respect is impossible.
A teenage boy was growing up under difficult circumstances. His mother struggled with mental illness and had been diagnosed with manic depression. He described how life at home came in two distinct periods. There were times when the house was clean and organized, meals were prepared, and his mother was cheerful and caring for her children and home.
And then – suddenly – it would all vanish. His mother would lock herself in her room, sleep for hours on end, bitter and withdrawn, snapping at the smallest things. She could raise her voice, shout, and even say hurtful things – for no real reason.
Yet the way he spoke about her was full of sensitivity and respect. He told me, “My mother isn’t perfect; she has some hard phases. But she does what she can. She’s doing her best. Whatever strength she has – she gives it to me. What she doesn’t, it’s because she doesn’t have the strength to give.”
He was just fifteen, and he honored her completely – whether the house was bright and warm or dark and cold. His respect for her didn’t change. He wasn’t focused on what he lacked, but on what he got from her when she could give.
What a simple, healthy, and beautiful perspective on life.
*
These days, it seems that every day brings a new “rulebook” for parents – how to behave, how to respond, what to say, and what not to say. And with time, the list only gets longer and stricter.
Soon enough, our own children will sit in judgment over us – condemning us for not meeting the impossible standards set by the latest psychology trends. They’ll analyze our “mistakes” in raising them, even though at the time, everything we did seemed natural, normal, and loving.
But how we wish our children would instead say: “My parents did everything they could for me. I’m deeply grateful to them. Whatever they were able to give, they gave fully. And what they didn’t give was simply because they didn’t have it to give.”
It’s important to say this clearly: Yes, a child needs space to express pain, and it’s both right and necessary to acknowledge those feelings. But to justify disrespect, condescension, or judgment toward a parent – that is wrong. And the Torah makes it absolutely clear: it’s not allowed.
Our role is to restore the child to a healthy structure – to the proper, balanced pyramid in which Hashem is at the top, the parents beneath Him, and the child beneath them. A healthy home is one where the hierarchy is clear.
Honoring parents isn’t just a mitzvah – it’s emotional health. It’s stability. It’s the natural order of the world.
If we repair our attitude toward our parents, we’ll also repair our children’s attitude toward us. That’s the sacred cycle of kibbud horim. That’s the healthy pyramid the Torah commands us to live by.
May we all be blessed to bring true nachas to our parents and to merit deep nachas from our children.
COMMENTS
Any human being who experiences pain from another human being will heal from experiencing an expression of regret from the perceived inflictor. Parents are no exception.
Thank you so much for bringing up this point.
It is so true that the modern way of thinking has turned children against their parents, and students against their teachers, and the authors’ points ring very true. I have seen in my own life, the tremendous Kibbud Av Vaeim my grandfather shows to his parents, and i believe in no small way that this is one of the primary reasons all of his many children KA”H are Frum and Chabad Chassidim.
However, we do find many children and teenagers with many challenges and complaints which can be traced to the way their parents have raised them.
What is your alternative idea for how to address that?
Surely the author doesn’t need a lawyer, yet I’d like to point out on his behalf that the above article is about the child’s approach to their parents, not about the other way around.
Maybe iyh one will be written the other way round as well, to give you better understanding and ultimately answer your question.
If the parents respect each other that’s a great free step. Sometimes parents criticize each other harshly, or even justify the other’s conduct in demeaning putdown. Children learn (not good things) from this.
Maybe one day there will be an article about how to honor your spouse (things that each engaged couple used to hear about, idk if they pay enough these days to be able to hear that), but this one is about honoring parents.
See ibid.
You have a good point, and for people with healthy parents and generally normal childhoods, this is most likely the case.
Yet, do we ever know what really goes on behind the scenes?
Your lack of acknowledgement for situations where real abuse has taken place (often by parents who are particularly adept at covering up well and presenting a “caring” image to anyone other than their victim) undermines your otherwise good article and allows these unhealthy parents to simply hide behind the banner of kibud av v’em and keep their abuse going.
I personally know of a case where a particularly horrifically abusive mother and now grandmother was aided by respected rabbonim and family members who she managed to convince of her innocence by simply being a smooth manipulator. She then turned around and wrote public articles about how “worried” and “concerned” she was about her child and grandchildren, how dangerous therapists can be, and how sad it is that nowadays kibud av v”em is out the window.
Don’t let yourself be used by people like her to cover up abuse that is very real even if they make sure you don’t see it.
For a child to have to endure growing up with such a parent and then on top of it be told that they are too new-age sensitive, or are being convinced by therapists to make misread things, are a selfish, bad person for “putting space” between themselves and their parent – is beyond hurtful and can lead to devastating consequences.
These situations are hopefully rare, but to not acknowledge them allows these unhealthy parents to continue to abuse and smear their children and grandchildren and point to articles like yours as coverage.
When writing an article about dealing with a cough or fever it would be quite odd to comment “but what about chemo for cancer”
When Torah talks about walking to shul shulchan aruch doesn’t add “unless the person doesn’t have feet”
Articles, books, and Torah are generally written in the form of the general rule obviously there are exceptions but your comment takes the exception and tries to incorporate it into the rule.
When there are parents who piggy-back ride on the general rule, hide behind it, and use it to be able to continue their abusive exception, then yes it is not only important, but the responsible thing (particularly coming from a therapist), to bring it up.
It may be out of context for you but it’s real for many people. Abuse inside and ‘tzadik’ appearances outside does happen. What to do then with the abuse and kibud Av or em
It’s interesting how your so obsessed with the “Tzadik” that’s abusive… Yet it doesn’t bother you the more common issue of parents that stick out their feet like pigs making as if so kind and caring for their kids but when no one’s looking they abuse their kids besides for never giving them the time of day.
I find it much more common that modern parents are much less connected to their children and sometimes even abusive towards them, than the chasidishe ones. That of course is unless you believe having Jewish and Halachik standards are abusive in which case the article is talking to you.
Maybe those who respect their parents end up being better parents themselves compared to those who do not..
For those of us who are lucky enough to be parents BH, this may resonate
So, so true and so, so painful!
If I can look into my mother’s eyes, and candidly ask her forgiveness, I’d be such a happy and complete person. Yet, it’s unbearably gut-wrenching.
God, it’s so hard…
👏🏻👏🏻💪🏻
Thank you for putting your words and thoughts into writing for others to enjoy!
1st. I’d like to point out the famous letter of the Frierdike Rebbe where the Fr. Rebbe says how the children will demand why the parents didn’t give them the full truth. (I won’t put quotation marks as the letter isn’t currently before me and I fear to misquote cv the Holy words of the Rebbe. It’s a pretty accessible letter). Which seemingly adds to your points how the parents not only should, but must demand their respect, (obviously not in an outlandish manner, there should be no yelling, nor hitting cv, but stern and in a peaceful manner [not to one up the child “I’ll show you who’s boss”]) cause if they don’t, eventually the child themself will come to regret it and ask why the parent didn’t say anything earlier, as you’ve mentioned and so finely brought out in great length.
2nd. Children, and humanity at large, need to finally face the reality, that there are times and circumstances and people that we are unapologetic about!
HaShem, Rebbe (as chassidim) and parents! (All in the order of comfort to each individual person as they will receive it!).
And finally, HaShem should bench you to continue to go from strength to strength and be able to be respectfully unapologetic about the truth, and may the truth prevail- Toras Emes- horaa baChaim etc with MOSHIACH now to put an end to all the pain and suffering worldwide (olam katan zeh adam)
“ It’s important to say this clearly: Yes, a child needs space to express pain, and it’s both right and necessary to acknowledge those feelings. But to justify disrespect, condescension, or judgment toward a parent – that is wrong. “ there should be the first paragraph not at the end.
I have internalized self hatred because I respected my father so much that I internalized his verbal abuse.
I kept abusing myself in his stead.
You need to break that self image in order to get out that. To do that you need to fully accept that that way of treating you is completely wrong and unjustified.
I tried to deny it to protect them and it was only when I realized how wrong and unjustified their treatment of a child was could I start looking at myself in a healthy way.
I’m not saying Chas vesholom to disrespect parents. But parents are people with flaws. Honoring them doesn’t mean denying that they hurt you. It’s respecting them regardless for giving you life. They are imperfect people like anyone else and did what they could based on what made sense at the time.
But that doesn’t mean we need to self flaggelate to protect them.
I’ve seen adults who are still currently in unhealthy family dynamics and are stifling their potential in the name of kibud av.
I know the balance swung to far to the opposite but there is a reason therapy sometimes tries to protect a person at the expense of his relationship with their parents. I don’t know if its right but I don’t think denying the issue of abuse is either.
If you know a way to get back your dignity and self esteem while still holding internally the reverence for your parents (that was used as leverage to abuse you). Please tell.
This article was written for the majority of families, which are BH healthy. Of course in special cases of real abuse it’s different. This article is talking about the regular majority who end up dealing in a terrible way with normal regular parents who sometimes can make mistakes. I recently heard about a rov saying that in the history of yidden it was unheard of the amount of estranged children from parents that there are today. And most could have been prevented. Strong family was always a major strength of the frum communities, and we are losing that. We can’t have our strength fall apart because of a few special cases. You say about a case you know personally. I personally know of quite a few beautiful healthy families who were ripped apart by well meaning (?) therapists. This includes estrangement from children to parents or parents from children, estrangement between siblings and divorce – and I’m not talking about abusive situations.
No parent is perfect. This imperfection will always come at some expense to the children and obviously there is a very wide range to these imperfections.
The author is making an extremely valid point for the overwhelming majority of cases. parents deserve and it’s a moral responsibility of the children to respect their parents.
Bringing up some extreme cases is an excuse for many people to piggy back in order to justify their disrespect to their parents.
And even in the most extreme cases which bring the most extreme pain to the children the Torah still demands and expects of the children never to disrespect the parents and more so to show them respect.
Many of the times the way parents behave to their children is the result of the way they were dealt with and they just didn’t know better it was never malicious and perhaps more therapists should teach children that they’re response to their parents should be one of compassion rather than today’s misdirected advice of modern-day therapist and psychologists.
When you choose to have a child, you accept the responsibility to do your utmost to raise them with as little damage as possible. You also accept the responsibility that when they come to you with injuries, you help reverse the damage. Perhaps there’s room to argue that the parents’ failure to parent effectively, and the injuries they thereby caused, are forgivable. However, the refusal to be a part of the healing process by owning up to those mistakes and apologizing; that is NOT forgivable.
Additionally, I don’t know what makes this author a “therapist“ and the author is free to share his religious views wherever and however, he pleases. But to present it as a Medical model for healing in the name of whatever credential he is carrying is dishonest, disingenuous, and misrepresenting himself and his field.
We have seen the value of “credentials” in helping people who are struggling. Many lives have been ruined by bad advice in therapy. Many therapists who can’t take care of their own personal life are dispensing advice to others. It’s a business like any other and as long as they get paid, they’re fine, no matter the long term fallout.
On the other hand, there are many capable and caring individuals – without the alphabet soup after their name – who are helping people in the community without fanfare. They care about you and your longterm success, not about a payment.
We need to stop this blind faith in therapists as the magic healers of emotional issues. Challenges are real, and you need to find someone with a good family life (shalom bayis, happy chassidishe children – the real credentials) who cares about you and your growth.
The fact that people with credentials gave bad advice doesn’t mean therapists are not good with what they’re doing.
And this couldn’t be further from the truth to take your emotional issues to a well caring person who’s not trained in this area.
So much of our youth end up the way they do precisely for the lack of having dealt with their issues professionally.
And there’s nothing wrong with getting paid for doing your job. You wouldn’t expect a mechanic or any other professional to work for free, and therapists are no different.
Don’t follow someone just because they speak in the name of science. Find out their track record. Start with their personal life: How is their marriage? How well did they raise their child(ren)? If they can’t manage their own life, why would you want to get advice that they heard or read somewhere?
We have BH a Torah and living community. Find the people with real credentials and listen to them.
Evolution has primed humans to identify and lynch the wicked. By explaining how our hurtful experiences are attributed to “bad name” (*itler, S*talin, M*mdani), we feel a sense of relief. Then, by communal punishment to the “rasha”, we convince ourselves that we are “fixing” the problem. This is why pitchforks and stoning were features of nearly all ancient civilizations.
That is why we seek to blame and name a parent for their sins. “If not for them”, we say, “life would have been good”.
The truth however is that these parents were not “evil”. The reason they did or didn’t do was simply because they were socially conditioned to be sick. They come from a simpler generation and many of them are survivors of war, poverty, or even Yeshiva.
Nursing students who lack a medical aptitude display their ineptitude early after having been exposed to victims in a psych ward. “Oh my Gosh” “Did you see what bed number 9 said to me” “that patient needs an injection!” “that is NOT forgivable”
But those students who show understanding are ultimately selected. The ones who display compassion toward a patient who hurls at them their slurs or socks or whatever turn out to by the best and the brightest physicians.
When an abused child is brought into your office, and you teach her or him to trash his parents / siblings, you are transferring your own personal primitive wrath, as evolution has done to you, for whatever issues you have. You are not a physician. You are a caveman.
A physician who makes the effort to treat the whole family as a unit, a broken unit in which the parents are simply sick, very sick, and treats the unit with respect, and builds dignity – even for the “bad” parent – is a noble human worthy of representing medicine of the future.
A physician
Yes. Well said. Estrangement is not the answer. But denying abuse isn’t either — if there certainly was. (One way of ascertaining that is if you get the same reaction from multiple therapists, who are all shocked and dismayed to hear your stories, and tell you that you were (severely) abused — whether physically, or emotionally and verbally, or both.
When people who grew up in such homes think they weren’t abused, and such behavior is normal, they destroy their own families as well, by continuing the chain of abuse…)
The Rebbe Rasha’b applogised to the previous Rebbe.
Did the Frierdiker Rebbe demand an apology?…
That’s what happens when you conflate responsibilities with rights. Parents have their job, but children’s job is to honor their parents. That’s the problem with modern thinking – someone else’s responsibility becomes your “right” causing a breakdown in relationships.
Apologized to the Frierdiker Rebbe about what?
Therapy is not about your parents. It’s about you. It’s not about blaming your parents. Understanding how your childhood experiences shape who you are as an adult is necessary if you want to understand your own behavior, which enables you to then take achrayus for your own behavior and improve yourself.
As I read and reread your article, I can’t keep myself back from reciting the blessing, ”Blessed are You Hashem our G-D King of the universe who has apportioned of His knowledge to those who fear him.”
After being in Chinuch for many decades, and struggling personally with children that turned against their parents, and listening to many lectures, and reading many articles on this issue, trying to find clarity, I finally found it in your article. I hope you don’t mind if I reprint it, and pass it on to anyone who is interested in Daas- Torah on this subject. I wouldn’t add a word or remove a word, except the preface, which reads ‘opinion’. I would replace it with the words DAAS-TORAH.
In the story from the Gemara, the paragraph which begins ‘In the second case’, might have a typo, and probably should read as follows; ‘In the second case, of a son who tied himself to a millstone to provide for his family. When the king sent soldiers to find men to serve as slaves, and they picked his father, he said ”Father, tie yourself to the millstone in my place, and I will go instead of you.”
There is a reason why this mitzvah is part of aseres hadibros, and was said near the commandment of “Anochi HaShem..” and during command a reward is immediately promised (how many mitzvos have that?)
The Torah does not say “your parents are perfect and automatically right”, this mitzva applies even to imperfect parents. Lucky for us because last time I checked, we might also fit into that criteria..
There is a story in Talmud of a mother who was making unreasonable demands from her son and he had to distance himself and let others take care of her. If a parent damages their child’s property they may demand payment. The mitzva still applies however.
If someone is in a sticky situation I recommend they discuss with a Rov. This will also help them not to have guilt conscience and doubts.
Yes. Finally, a breath of fresh air. Thank you!!
The Gemorah in kiddushin 31a shares an edifying story to emulate: about Dama ben Nesina who while sitting among the Roman nobles was approach by his senile mother that slapped him cold, spit in his face and tore his golden garment. He nevertheless bravely didn’t yell at her or respond at all. He rather remained quiet and kept his cool realizing that his mother was simply getting older and losing her mind unfortunately. This is a true model of kibbud av ve’em.
Thank you very much for writing this article. Bezras Hashem all children should be zoche to read it and internalize it deeply to obtain a true Torah perspective on respecting parents properly!
The author makes many valid and thought-provoking points, and he weakens them by unnecessarily using straw-man arguments and assertions.
The core message is powerful: parents occupy a unique, non-reciprocal role–they’re the divine channel through which we entered existence. Honoring them isn’t about rating their performance; it’s about recognizing the role itself. This framework genuinely helps contextualize hurt: “what they didn’t give was because they didn’t have it to give.”
His strongest example proves this. The 15-year-old with the mentally ill mother sees reality clearly–the manic depression, the instability–yet maintains complete respect. He’s not in denial, but he’s also not positioning himself as her judge. That’s the balanced model.
But by conflating harmful practices (encouraging estrangement) with legitimate therapeutic work (understanding how upbringing shapes you), the author actually makes it harder to distinguish between them. When you lump together practices that genuinely damage families with work that helps people grow, you weaken your own message.
To be helpful–and to avoid just preaching to the choir or making defiant statements against those you feel threatened by–simply keep the message pure and focused on the values you’re promoting. That allows each person to evaluate and apply these values according to the nuances of their own situation.
The wisdom is real. The delivery undermines it.
I don’t know if the author consulted a Rav, but I recommend he read the final chapter of the Sefer הרופא לשבורי לב by Reb Yitzchok Schechter which is based on the Psakim of Rav David Cohen Shlita who is one of the most recognized authorities when it comes to the Halachos of mental health. That chapter provides clear guidance on the appropriate compromise of כיבוד אב ואם as it benefits the healing of the child.
See here for what the Torah says (as opposed to somebody’s personal opinion) https://drsorotzkin.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/eng-honoring-abusive-parents.pdf
Just as in other areas of halacha, a person cannot just decide on his own that his parents are halachically considered “abusive.” Not every person who upsets you is “abusive.”
This is the classic workaround where people find some exception to the halacha and then claim that every case is the exception. You need to consult a knowledgeable and Torah-minded rov who can decide.
True. However, the author of your article paints a picture of parents as being beyond reproach and that calling them out for their misbehaviors is inappropriate from a Torah perspective. This is simply not true as the article in the previous comment demonstrates.