Analysis of the Fifth Commandment . . .

“Honor your Father and your Mother” (5:16).

The word “honor” in the Biblical Hebrew comes from the word “Kabad”, meaning literally “to make heavy.”

We honor our parents not by loving them, but by making them “heavy”, i.e. making them people of substance and not “making light” of them.

The phrase “make light” of someone means a way of belittling or humiliating them.