RESPONSA

GOLINKIN, DAVID

RESPONSA DAVID GOLINKIN Home care or institutional care for elderly parents. Even Jewish law has no clear answer. QAs life expectancy grows, many people are faced with the difficulties of...

...I want a husband as handsome as you...
...5 Mamrim 6:10...
...9 Kiddushin 31a and Yerushalmi ibid., Chapter 1, fol...
...In this resolution of the conflicting demands, the parent feels wanted and loved by his or her child (a feeling frequendy lacking in an institutional setting), the parent functions better at home than in a strange environment and the child fulfills the commandment to "honor your father and your mother" in a direct and personal way...
...I want a husband...
...The halachic authorities interpreted this story in two conflicting directions...
...And again: "You shall each revere his mother and his father" (Leviticus 19:3...
...AThe Torah commands us to "Honor your father and your mother" (Exodus 20:12, Deuteronomy 5:16...
...But, we are told, he did nothing to shame her...
...3 Kiddushin 32a...
...According to Jewish law, is it permissible to institutionalize such a parent...
...When he heard that she was following him to Israel, he asked Rabbi Yohanan for permission to leave Israel in order to meet his mother...
...Or is he saying that not only did he act properly by leaving her, but he was not even required to meet her coffin...
...Another Talmudic passage reads: They asked Rabbi Eliezer: "To what extent must one honor one's father and mother...
...What about the emotional strains on the child—and the family...
...10 (1990), pp...
...care of parents, as advocated by the Rabad and his followers, and thereby fulfill the command of Ben Sira not to "leave [them] all the days of your life...
...Subsequent halachic authorities align themselves on either side of the debate.6 Some authorities argue that an outsider can do a better job of caring for a senile parent than a child can: An outsider can raise his voice or physically restrain the parent if necessary, a child would never be able to do these things...
...8 'A post-Talmudic midrash, Seder Eliyahu, Chapter (27) 25 (Friedman ed., p. 136...
...Halachic authorities frequently rely on nonlegal passages in the Talmud when there is a dearth of halachic sources...
...This and the previous passage were codified by Maimonides (Mamrim 6:7) and Rabbi Joseph Karo (Shulchan Aruch, Yoreh De'ah 240.3, 8...
...Levi Meier, "Filial Responsibility to the 'Senile' Parent" in Levi Meier, ed., Jewish Values in Bio-ethics (New York: Human Sciences, 1986), pp...
...Rabbi David Golinkin is senior lecturer in Talmud and dean of academic affairs at the Seminary of Judaic Studies of the Masorti (Conservative) Movement in Jerusalem, where he chairs the Va'ad Halachah (law committee) of the Rabbinical Assembly of Israel...
...7 The growing phenomenon of adult day care centers enables many children to keep their senile parents at home—see Newsweek, July 2, 1990, pp...
...4 This story is difficult to understand and interpret...
...Another source teaches much the same thing: Even if your father's spittle is running down his beard, obey him immediately...
...He said: "Had I known, I would not have left Babylon...
...There thus seem to be three legitimate halachic options: • A child with sufficient stamina and emotional fortitude can personally take Submit questions or problems for Responsa to MOMENT, 3000 Connecticut Avenue, N.W., Suite 300, Washington, D.C...
...I believe the preferred halachic solution is one implied by a number of the rabbis who follow Maimonides: Keep the parent at home'' but pay an outsider to attend to the functions it is painful or inappropriate for the child to perform...
...Was Rav Assi's mother mentally disturbed (she seems to be interested in marrying her own son) or merely crotchety...
...According to this view, a child is not personally obligated to care for the parent if the child must sacrifice his or her own emotional health in the process...
...1 The Talmud records an incident in which the mother of the gentile "mayor" of Ashkelon interrupted a meeting of the city council...
...6Rabbis Shem Tov ibn Gaon (14th century), Nissim Gerondi (1300-1380), David ibn Zimra (1479-1573), Joseph Karo (1488-1575), Solomon of Chelm (18th century), Yehiel Mikhal Epstein (1829-1908) and Eliezer Waldenberg (b...
...The Talmudic passage most frequently cited in later halachic discussions, however, seems to look in the other direction: Rav Assi [who lived in Babylon] had an aged mother...
...This view is buttressed by the argument that an outsider can do things the child cannot do and that the parent would not want the child to do...
...Or: "Had I known, I would not have bothered asking permission to leave Israel...
...Maimonides used it to legitimate custodial care: If one's father or mother should become mentally disordered, he should try to treat them as their mental state demands until God has pity on them...
...Rabbis Solomon Luria (1510-1574),Joshua Falk (1555-1614), Joel Sirkes (1561-1640), David Halevi (1586-1667) and Samuel Strashun (1794-1872) follow the Rabad...
...75-83...
...He replied: "To the extent that if he takes your wallet and throws it in the sea, you should not shame him...
...This is not unusual...
...Did Rav Assi regret abandoning his mother...
...She proceeded to tear off her son's expensive cloak, hit him on the head and spit in his face...
...Two of the three Talmudic passages cited here are aggadic or nonlegal in nature...
...This sounds like a new dilemma but, in fact, the problem of senile parents is mentioned in Jewish sources as early as the second century B.C.E., and the specific question raised above has been hotly debated by halachic authorities for the past 800 years...
...The apocryphal book of Ben Sira (3:12-13), dating to the second century B.C.E., tells us: My son, be strong in the honor of your father, and do not leave him all the days of your life...
...On the other hand, following Maimonides, the child protects the parent's honor and the child's own emotional health by ensuring that a professional is on hand who can perform functions not in keeping with the honor owed a parent by a child...
...Others may place the parent in a nursing home, following the example of Rav Assi, as interpreted by Maimonides and his followers...
...In this resolution of the issue, the command to "honor your father and your mother" is an absolute value...
...Barry Freundel, "Halakhah and the ¦Nursing Home Dilemma," in Paul Bindler, ed., Proceedings of the Association of Orthodox Jewish Scientists, Vol...
...But, then, we are told: In the meantime he heard that her coffin was coming...
...Or is it greater honor for an outsider to do so...
...If, however, the parent has deteriorated to such an extent that he or she requires a slap or being ded to the bed or being drugged or having a diaper changed, is it honor and reverence for a child to do this...
...Can a child run away when he can no longer tolerate a parent's erratic behavior...
...He replied: "I'll look for one for you...
...1917) follow Maimonides...
...Moreover, the parent will be embarrassed to misbehave in front of an outsider...
...She said to him: "I want jewelry...
...How much must the child bear...
...If he goes and leaves him, who shall he command to watch him...
...116-119...
...85-106...
...Even if he loses sense, let him do [all that he wishes] and do not shame him all the days of his life...
...He made some for her...
...20008...
...QAs life expectancy grows, many people are faced with the difficulties of caring for a senile parent...
...He left her and went to Israel...
...See Gerald Blidstein, Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother (New York: KTAV, 1975), pp...
...And what does the final ambiguous sentence mean...
...56-58...
...4 Kiddushin 31b...
...But if he finds he cannot endure the situation because of their extreme madness, let him leave them and go away, commanding others to care for them as befits them.5 Rabad of Posquieres (1120-1198), Maimonides' classic critic, disagrees: "This is not a correct ruling...
...On the other hand, other authorities argue that a child will have a better understanding of the parent's desires and idiosyncracies and will therefore be a better custodian...

Vol. 16 • April 1991 • No. 2


 
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