Bible Strands
Exodus 20:12
Honor your father and mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — God addresses the assembled Israel at Sinai, placing this command between the Sabbath regulation and the prohibition on murder, making it the first of the Decalogue to govern a human-to-human relationship.
The words — כַּבֵּד (kabed, H3513) literally means "to make heavy," i.e., to give weight or significance to someone; it is not a soft word for affection but a demand for substantive regard.
The thread — Deuteronomy 5:16 restates the command in the second giving of the Law with the same promise; Ephesians 6:1 and Colossians 3:20 carry the obligation into the New Testament, shifting the verb from "honor" to "obey."
Why it lands — It is the only commandment in the Decalogue attached to a specific, temporal promise (long life in the land), and it requires the reader to treat parents with concrete weight rather than mere feeling.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.
Cross-references
- Ephesians 6:1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.
- Colossians 3:20 Children, obey your parents in everything, for this is pleasing to the Lord.
- Deuteronomy 5:16 Honor your father and your mother, as the LORD your God has 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.
- Mark 7:10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’ and ‘Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death.’
- Proverbs 23:22 Listen to your father who gave you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old.
- Leviticus 19:3 Each of you must respect his mother and father, and you must keep My Sabbaths. I am the LORD your God.
- Proverbs 30:17 As for the eye that mocks a father and scorns obedience to a mother, may the ravens of the valley pluck it out and young vultures devour it.
- Proverbs 1:8 Listen, my son, to your father’s instruction, and do not forsake the teaching of your mother.
- Exodus 21:17 Anyone who curses his father or mother must surely be put to death.
- Proverbs 20:20 Whoever curses his father or mother, his lamp will be extinguished in deepest darkness.