Honor Your Father and Your Mother

Respect and care for parents and caregivers — Who is my mother and who are my brothers? — Family ties in body and spirit — Instructions from the Spirits about education, ingratitude, and family reunions.

The chapter also distinguishes biological bonds from emotional and spiritual bonds and addresses the responsibility of parents and children within the reincarnationist view.

1. Among the commandments recalled by Jesus is: honor your father and your mother. The same set includes not killing, stealing, betraying, lying, or committing fraud. (Mark 10:19; Luke 18:20; Matthew 19:18-19)

2. The Decalogue says: “Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God will give you.” (Exodus 20:12)

Respect and care for parents

3. Kardec connects the commandment to honor father and mother with the general law of love and charity. Beyond respect, he understands that there is a special responsibility to care for those who raised and supported us.

This care can also extend to grandparents, guardians, adoptive parents, and other people who truly fulfilled a parenting role. Respect does not mean blind obedience to every order or accepting abuse; it means recognizing bonds and responsibilities without abandoning one's own safety and dignity.

When parents grow old or lack resources, honoring them can mean taking part in their care, helping them as far as possible, and not abandoning them after a life in which they also cared for their children.

Kardec criticizes children who live comfortably while leaving elderly parents in undignified conditions or treating them like servants. Care needs to preserve respect, autonomy, and dignity, not merely ensure minimum survival.

Parents who offered presence, protection, and effort during childhood deserve, when they need it, more than cold and bureaucratic assistance. Attention, companionship, affection, and small comforts are also part of care.

The message considers ingratitude especially painful when someone completely forgets those who supported and educated them. In the Spiritist view, choices of abandonment would also have learning consequences throughout the Spirit's journey.

Not all parents fulfill their duties. Some abandon, humiliate, neglect, or assault. The Gospel invites forgiveness and absence of revenge, but this does not oblige anyone to remain close to someone who continues to cause harm. Boundaries, distance, and protection may be necessary.

Thus, the principles of respect, charity, and forgiveness can also guide the relationship with parents, but they need to be applied consciously. Charity does not mean allowing violence or remaining silent in situations that require help and protection.

4. The ancient commandment connects respect for parents with a long life in the “land God will give.” Kardec recalls that this language was linked to the context of the Hebrew people and the idea of the Promised Land.

To understand the text, we need to consider the religious horizon of that period. Expectations were closely connected with the concrete life of the people and possession of a land where they could live safely.

Therefore, the promise is presented in material language: living a long time in the desired land. Later, according to Kardec, Jesus broadens the perspective by speaking of a kingdom that is not of this world and of spiritual life beyond earthly experience.

In the Christian reading presented by the work, the reward for good ceases to be understood only as material prosperity and becomes related mainly to spiritual progress.

Who is my mother and who are my brothers?

5. When Jesus was told that his mother and brothers were outside calling for him, Jesus looked at the people listening to his teachings and asked: “Who is my mother and who are my brothers?” He then said that whoever does God's will also forms a spiritual family with him. (Mark 3:20-21,31-35; Matthew 12:46-50)

Matthew 12:46-50

6. At first sight, these words may seem incompatible with the teaching of love and the commandment to honor parents. Kardec proposes that they be understood within their symbolic meaning and context, not as contempt by Jesus for his own family.

7. The accounts show that not all of Jesus' relatives understood his mission at that time. His brothers appear in some passages showing doubt or distance from what he taught.

The Gospel of John also records that, at a certain period, his brothers did not believe in him. This helps us understand that biological kinship did not automatically mean sharing a mission or spiritual outlook.

Nothing in Jesus' teachings allows us to conclude that he despised his mother. The doctrine itself values family care and respect. For this reason, Kardec seeks another meaning for the passage.

Jesus uses the situation to broaden the concept of family: beyond blood relationships, there are also relationships built by values, affection, commitment, and spiritual affinity.

Family ties in body and spirit

8. In the Spiritist Doctrine, parents do not create the child's Spirit; they participate in the formation of the body and assume responsibility for helping the child develop intelligence, character, and values. The Spirit would already exist before that family relationship.

Spirits who incarnate in the same family, especially close relatives, would often be kindred Spirits united by earlier relationships, reflected in their affection during earthly life. It could also happen that Spirits previously divided by antipathies live together, with their earthly opposition serving as a trial and an opportunity for learning.

True family ties would therefore not be only ties of blood, but bonds of sympathy and shared thought that unite Spirits before, during, and after incarnation. Thus, two people born to different parents could be more like siblings in Spirit than biological siblings. They may be drawn to one another and become friends, while biological siblings may sometimes grow apart.

In Kardec's view, this is a moral problem for which the plurality of existences offers an explanation. (Chapter IV, no. 13.)

There would therefore be two kinds of families: those formed by spiritual bonds and those formed by bodily bonds. Spiritual families would be lasting, strengthened by progress, and continue in the spirit world through the soul's different journeys; bodily families, being tied to matter, may change with time and can sometimes become morally distant even during the present life.

Kardec understands that this is what Jesus meant by saying, “Here are my mother and my brothers” — that is, his spiritual family, since “whoever does the will of my Father in Heaven is my brother, my sister, and my mother.” The tension with some of his brothers is reflected in Mark's account, where they intended to restrain him because they believed he had lost his reason.

When their arrival was announced, and considering their attitude toward him, Kardec finds it natural that Jesus, speaking of his disciples from the perspective of spiritual life, would say: “Here are my true brothers.” His mother was with them, and Jesus generalizes the teaching. This does not mean that his mother by blood meant nothing to him spiritually or that he was indifferent to her; his conduct in other situations shows the opposite.

Instructions from the Spirits

The ingratitude of children and family ties

Saint Augustine - Paris, 1862

9. The message considers ingratitude an expression of selfishness and examines especially conflicts between children and parents within the reincarnationist view.

According to the Spiritist Doctrine, the Spirit keeps its moral tendencies after death. It may remain attached to resentment and desires for revenge or, over time, recognize the harm caused by these feelings and decide to change.

Forgiving someone who caused serious harm can be very difficult. The message does not describe this process as simple. A first step would be recognizing that holding on to hatred forever also imprisons the person who hates.

In the Spiritist view, a Spirit that wishes to overcome an old conflict could choose to be born near people with whom it had difficulties, creating an opportunity for coexistence and transformation.

Meeting again would not guarantee automatic harmony. Living together can reactivate old tendencies, and each person would remain free to choose reconciliation, responsible distance, or repetition of the conflict.

Kardec uses this hypothesis to explain some family antipathies without an apparent cause. It is important to remember that this is a religious interpretation and should not be used to blame children, parents, or victims of family violence.

The educational responsibility of parents and caregivers is great. Love, limits, example, access to education, and protection help children develop resources to make better choices.

Ancient language assigns severe punishment to parents who fail. In current terms, we can preserve the idea of responsibility without turning every problem of the child into the parents' fault. Children and adults have individuality, their own factors, and increasing freedom of choice.

When there is a difficult relationship with a child, the guidance should not be to reject the child because of it. Seek to understand their needs, establish appropriate limits, and offer support. The hypothesis of previous lives belongs to Spiritist faith and does not replace assessment of present causes.

Educating is not only feeding and physically protecting. It also involves teaching respect, responsibility, empathy, and limits. Excessive permissiveness and neglect can hinder development, just as authoritarianism and violence can also cause harm.

Great formal education is not required to offer morally careful parenting. Presence, consistency, affection, and willingness to learn can make a major difference in a child's development.

When signs of selfishness, aggression, or disrespect appear, the proposal is to address these attitudes early with guidance and limits, without labeling the child as bad or waiting for the problem to grow.

Even deeply devoted parents do not control all their children's choices. When they responsibly did what was within their reach, they do not need to turn every difficulty of the child into a personal condemnation. In the Spiritist view, relationships and opportunities for help continue beyond a single life.

The message insists that there is always a possibility of repentance and change. A present difficulty would not mean permanent condemnation for either side of the relationship.

Difficult trials can become opportunities for transformation when faced with support, responsibility, and a desire to learn. This does not mean being grateful for violence or remaining in dangerous environments.

Family conflicts can hurt more than material difficulties because they affect deep emotional bonds. The message recognizes the intensity of this pain and offers the idea of continuity and the possibility of repair as a source of hope.

In the Spiritist view, suffering would not be eternal. The Spirit could change its own path through better choices, gradually reducing the moral causes of its conflicts.

Reincarnation broadens the horizon of the family relationship: a problem that seems unsolvable in a single life could find new opportunities for understanding in future stages.

For the work, spiritual families are formed mainly through affinity, affection, and moral development. These bonds could continue across different existences, even when the roles of father, mother, child, or sibling change.

Living together would not occur only among similar Spirits. People at different stages could also meet in the same family to learn, provide examples, and develop patience, responsibility, and solidarity.

The conclusion is to welcome and help those who come into the family without abandoning necessary protection and limits. In the Spiritist view, helping someone grow may also prepare that person to help others in the future.