The Talmudic sages described the different physiological contributions of the parents to their children as follows: “The sages taught: There are three partners in [the formation of] a person, the Holy One, blessed be He, the father, and the mother. The father contributes the ‘white seed,’ from which develops the skeleton, the sinews, the nails, the brain, and the white of the eye. The mother contributes the ‘red seed,’ from which develops the skin, the flesh, the hair, and the pupil of the eye. The Holy One, blessed be He, contributes the spirit and the soul” (Nidah 31a).
From this statement it follows that whatever is connected to what is white in the body originates in the father, while whatever is connected to what is red originates from the mother. We have here a blending of what is contributed by each parent, white with red. This is, of course, a type of physical imagery, but it has psychological implications. As mentioned previously, chochmah is referred to as the “father” and binah as the “mother.” The father is similar to chochmah in that he contributes the seminal drop (the “white”), whereas the mother is similar to binah since in her womb all the embryo’s latent bodily parts (the “red”) are developed. Chochmah is by nature a point, the idea in general. Binah is the ability to meditate: to analyze and expand the seminal point of chochmah, applying the abstract idea to concrete reality. It focuses on the details of reality and takes them into account. In the scheme of the sefirot, chochmah is removed and distant from the emotions, in contrast to binah, which is in contact with the emotions due to their proximity to it.
Also in regard to the type of psychological influence of the parents on their children, the psychological nature of chochmah and binah correspond to those of a father and a mother. Each has a different type of effect on the emotions “born” of them. The “white” that the child receives from his father is his inner strength and stability, corresponding to the skeleton, nails, sinews, etc. In the soul, this is the location of the independent self, that part of us that believes in ourselves regardless of our relationship with our environment. In contrast, the “red” received from the mother is the soft, pliable flesh, which corresponds psychologically to the ability to adapt to one’s surroundings.
In greater detail, the father—similar to chochmah in that it is independent and separate, exhibiting the properties of rigidity and stability characteristic of the whiteness of bone—imparts to his child his message of stability and his guiding principles. As the sages put it, “the father teaches him the Torah,” thereby planting in him a strong self-image and inner strength. This gift enables the child to be connected to himself, to express his essence to the world, to establish goals that express himself and to cling to them, to overcome obstacles presented by the environment—“not to be intimidated by scoffers”—to preserve the attitude of meriting to be who he is, believing in himself, possessing a “backbone.”
In contrast to the (relatively) removed state of the father, the mother is closer to the child. She carries him in her womb, he is flesh of her flesh, she nurses him, and is close to him physically, emotionally, and practically. This is similar to how binah is closer to the emotions and relates to them. The mother’s closeness and warmth toward her children helps develop in them their softer and more pliable side, similar to the physical skin and flesh of the body that is derived from the mother. This side is their healthy connection to their environment, their sensitivity to their environment, their need for an environment, and their ability to navigate it. It develops in the children the feeling that they require intimacy, relationships, and the warmth that an environment can provide, and thus also the ability to give and give back to the environment and the ability to be flexible toward it.
Just as a healthy body requires both bones and flesh, and a healthy soul requires both determination and flexibility, so does a child require the influence of both parents. Of course, both parents possess both bones and flesh, backbone and flexibility, the ability to overcome the influences of the environment and the ability to connect to the environment. The connection between whiteness and chochmah, the father, and that between redness and binah, the mother, is relative. It can happen that the father is the softer and the mother the more removed and solid. These cases have their own idiosyncratic effects on the development of the child’s self-consciousness, but there is no room to discuss such cases in this context.