In this week’s Torah portion, we are commanded to send away a mother bird before taking her young from the nest. The reward for this mitzvah is long life in the land which God has given us. There is one other mitzvah with this same reward, honoring one’s parents. Both are about parenthood and the parent-child connection. It seems that honoring that particular familial connection brings life to the Land of Israel. 

The Ramban (Devarim 22:6) gives two reasons for the commandment of sending away the mother bird. The first is that we must cultivate a heart which is merciful and not cruel. The second is so that we take care to guard against the eradication of any species. 

These two commandments result in long life because they cultivate a sensitivity to life—to animal life and, hopefully, by extension, to human life—in those who observe them. Israel is a land deeply attuned to those who live in it. Murder, sexual immorality, and dishonesty cause the land to vomit out its inhabitants. The long life granted by these commandments is “in the land which God has given you.” Specifically in Israel, due to its sensitivity, when we act in ways that encourage life, we establish a chain reaction which brings more life. 

Rashi seems to hint at this underlying idea as well. The Torah here juxtaposes shooing away the mother bird and the commandment to put a parapet on one’s roof so that no one falls off. Rashi says that if we send away the mother bird then we will merit to build a home. This chain of life-affirming reactions sparks a cascade of fecundity and intergenerational family life in the Land of Israel.

The Kli Yakar explains that these mitzvot are to teach us that there is a sense of nurturing, birthing, and cultivating that is ingrained in the universe. If we see the world as always having been here, randomly, then it lacks this fundamental foundation. Judaism believes in creation not because the idea of creation itself is so important but because of what it means philosophically and fundamentally. The world must be cultivated; it cannot be taken for granted: “We learn from these mitzvot that…everything has a cause and is born from something else. Going all the way back to the first one who gave birth.”

The number of births per person is dropping in most countries today. The Torah teaches us not only to value our own lives and accomplishments, success or wealth, but to understand that we are part of a larger important project: the continuity of the universe and the value of human and animal life, which traces back to the first one who gave birth, God.