Deuteronomy 6:20-21 And when your son asks you in time to come, saying, What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments… Children often break upon their parents with very tough questions, and questions that wear a considerable looking towards infidelity. It requires, in fact, but a simple child to ask questions that no philosopher can answer. Parents are not to be hurried or flurried in such cases, and make up extempore answers that are only meant to confuse the child, and consciously have no real verity. It is equally bad if the child is scolded for his freedom; for what respect can he have for the truth when he may not so much as question where it is? Still worse, if the child's question is taken for an evidence of his superlative smartness, and repeated with evident pride in his hearing. In all such cases a quiet answer should be given to the child's question where it can be easily done, and where it cannot, some delay should be taken, wherein it will be confessed that not even his parents know everything. Or, sometimes, if the question is one that plainly cannot be answered by anybody, occasion should be taken to show the child how little we know, and how many things God knows which are too deep for us — how reverently, therefore, we are to submit our mind to His, and let Him teach us when He will what is true. It is a very great thing for a child to have had the busy infidel lurking in his questions, early instructed in regard to the necessary limits of knowledge, and accustomed to a simple faith in God's requirement, where his knowledge fails. (H. Bushnell.) Parallel Verses KJV: And when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the LORD our God hath commanded you? |
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