Daily Lesson for March 12, 2020

Today’s Daily Lesson comes from Deuteronomy chapter 5 verse 6:

“Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God commanded you, so that your days may be long and that it may go well with you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.”

“Honor your father and your mother . . .” This is a Biblical command often quoted by parents of unruly teenagers in the most vexing of parental moments. Sometimes it is used manipulatively by even older parents. Almost always it is intended to saddle a burden of conscience upon the next generation.

But in a time like this, with a disease like COVID-19 (Coronavirus) rampaging it’s way around the world and striking hard especially against the aged, perhaps we have a more clear look at the intent and meaning of the verse.

“Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God commanded you, SO THAT YOUR DAYS MAY BE LONG AND THAT IT MAY GO WELL WITH YOU IN THE LAND THAT THE LORD YOUR GOD IS GIVING YOU.”

Wow; to read such words in such a time as this is eye opening. Who even remembered that second part of the verse about longevity and wellness?  And why is that? Because the context of the Scripture has been so lost to us, but now comes nearer in a time of global pandemic.

The original context for the Biblical injunction was the giving of the Law after the Israelites fled Egypt. In Egypt the aged — fathers and mothers — were of low value and easily discarded. Pharaoh literally worked people to death; and in times of anxiety, or scarcity, or pestilence (there is much about the pestilences of Egypt in chapter 7 of Deuteronomy) the elderly were simply abandoned — forced by Pharaoh in fact to be abandoned for the sake of His greater economic holding, the whole edifice of a slave labor system.

But not so in the new land that the Lord their God was giving the Israelites. In the new land the aged would not be discarded or abandoned or simply left behind. They would honored, meaning cared for, always and to the end, so then it would indeed be possible for everyone’s days to be long and decent even into very old age.

So then, the prophet Isaiah said, in the vision of the new community there would be no person who would live not into the ripest of age; and a person who died at 100 years would still be like a youth.

Now is a time for caring for our mothers and fathers and the rest of their generation. Coronavirus is striking the elderly and other vulnerable people at an especially alarming rate. It is the duty of the young to honor our parents by practicing good hygiene, appropriate social distancing, and by continuing to look after their needs when they need our help and when they need first access to our medical resources.

It is in the face of disease that we read and learn again the import of the command to honor our fathers and mothers. Their lives matter. And we honor their lives by our conscientiousness and care.  We honor their lives so that we can be a community different from Pharaoh’s Egypt, where everyone was made to look after only themselves and no one looked after the aged and most vulnerable. We honor their lives so that in the promised land of mutual aid and communal care we all can live long and well lives together — even in such a time as this.