Parents Speaking in One Voice? - Something Spiritual on Parshat Ki-Teitzei

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Parents Speaking in One Voice?: Something Spiritual on Parshat Ki-Teitzei

Topics:

Ben Sorer U'Moreh, Parenting; Parenthood, Ki Teitzei

Rabbi Yehuda Stern lives in Johannesburg, South Africa, with his wife Estee and their children. He is Rabbi at the Sydenham Shul, and director of Young Jewish Joburg, catering to Jewish students and young professionals.

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1 Comment

Andy February 11, 2017

so shalt thou put harah away from among you This has always been one of my favourite passages in the Torah with the wonder of how the world would be if all the recalcitrant youth were being stoned to death (rather than stoned!)
But rather than a fast interpretation we have a fast and loose one here. The teen-ager is not simply "punished" but killed - to purge the evil from the community. So vs 21 is very clear as to who the wrong-doer is.
If one wishes to provide a reason for the parents being referred to separately (although they must act together in vs 19), a more contextually sensible interpretation would be that the parents have different roles in instructing the son, or, with the mother being more intimately involved in the life of the son, an implicit "even" before "the voice of his em" (vs 18).
Whilst Yehuda's purpose is for the good - ensuring that couples work together - the world is filled with the hatred and suffering created by evil out-of-context interpretations. Reply