I was most certainly a daddy’s girl. One of my favorite pictures is me at five years old with my parents. Of course it was meant to be a standard family portrait, but during one of our poses the photographer captured me staring up with my sweet little girl eyes directly at my daddy. If there was ever any question that I was a daddy’s girl, this photo says it all. And what am I doing now? Apparently I’m also raising a daddy’s girl. While Shiri certainly loves me, especially when she’s hungry, nothing compares to the smile that lights up her face when her daddy walks into the room. It is clear that she associates Daddy with rough-and-tumble silly time and mommy with eating, nose wiping, and diaper changing. To be clear, in our house we do engage in these activities equally, but Shiri knows who to go to when she wants to be goofy, and Daddy has me beat in that category.

It is certainly natural for children to identify with one parent or the other for different reasons. My father and I were alike in our love of Judaism and our passion for teaching, and my mom and my sister still have their own unique bond. Throughout history we also have assigned societal roles and responsibilities either to a mother or father, and these have evolved over the centuries. Many people grew up in a time when it was expected that fathers would be disciplinarians and mothers would be nurturers. Interestingly, this perhaps was never the view – or at least the only view – of Judaism.

This week we read a double parshah, Acharei Mot-Kedoshim. Parshat Acharei Mot deals with what happens after Aaron’s sons have offered up “strange fire” to God and with certain forbidden relationships between human beings. The structure of this section of text pushes us to look at our relationships with both God and others and see the boundaries and intimacies of each relationship. Parshat Kedoshim deals with what is known as the “Holiness Code” that helps us to understand how we can walk in God’s ways and create a community of relationship and understanding.

It is in this section where the Torah teaches, “You shall each revere his mother and his father, and keep my Shabbat, I the Lord am your God.” This mitzvah is similar to the commandment in the 10 Commandments, “You shall honor your father and your mother,” but with one small change. In the 10 Commandments, the mother is mentioned second in regard to honor, and in the Holiness Code, the mother comes first in regard to reverence.

Rashi, the great medieval commentator on text, suggests that our natural instinct is to revere (fear) one’s father and to honor (love) one’s mother. The Torah’s ordering of these would have us regard each of our parents equally with reverence and love and would have each parent represent both discipline and forgiveness in the child’s mind. According to Rashi, the scripture recognizes that there is an innate way in which we approach our parents, and thus we are encouraged to stretch beyond what is unmindful and automatic in order to give true meaning to respecting our parents.

Do you (or did you) feel a particular bond with one parent? A common sense of humor or love of a certain food? Please share.