Oral Law- Iris Hirsch

"You shall each revere his mother and his father, and keep My sabbaths: I the Lord am your God."-  Leviticus 19.3

I choose this verse because each part is an important part of my life today. To me this mitzvah is very clear and one everyone should follow, you shall love your mother and father, keep the sabbath and only realize that we only worship one god. I follow this mitzvah in many ways, first I always love and respect my parents. This is a very important value for me because I recognize how much my parents love and care for me and they deserve nothing but love and respect in return. Also, keeping the sabbath I learned is a very important part of daily life. Since I have been in Israel I have learned to love and enjoy the sabbath. Since being here, we have had services every Friday night and Saturday mornings, even though I do not always want to go, I always have a great time and really realize how great Judaism is and how is brings an entire community together. Another important part of the sabbath is resting, we have such busy weeks here that having those twenty four hours to just relax, unwind and spent time with friends is really amazing and I wish life was more similar back in the US. This mitzvah should be a guide for me in the modern world because as teenagers we are always so busy being social and doing so much for school that we forget how important just winding down is and we should really do it more often. In addition we should always love our parents, never be rude or hurtful to them and spend more time with them because if it was not for them we would not have the life we have today and they should really be thanked for all that they do.

This picture above is my parents, sister and me at the airport when I was on my way to Israel. This picture I feel picture captures Leviticus 19.3 very well. This follows the theme of "revere his mother and his father" because even though at the time this picture was taken, I was leaving my family, they were so loving and supportive of this opportunity to go study in Israel and I cannot thank them enough. Furthermore, this picture follows "and keep My sabbaths" because of my parents I have learned to love Judaism and to follow the holidays and observe the sabbath, but without coming here I would not have learned to love the sabbath like I do now and be able to really appreciate its meaning.