But lo, if he have begotten a son that seeth all his father's sins which he hath done, and considereth, and doeth not such like
The exiles kept repeating a proverb: children suffer for their parents' sins. Verse 14 answers with a test case — a wicked man's son who sees his father's life and refuses to copy it.
The chapter works through cases: a righteous man, then his violent son, and now the son of the wicked man. This third son knows his father's evil well, and still chooses differently.
Next comes the question of the son of the wicked man. He "sees all the sins that his father has done; he sees, and does not do likewise." This should always be the result for someone who has had such an object lesson in front of him. Suppose he reads it rightly and turns from his father's iniquity to walk in the divine statutes. Should he die for his father's iniquity? No, he should surely live. Father and son are judged according to their own personal character.
The people had complained that they were paying for their ancestors' wrongdoing. God answers by holding them to their own complaint.
At the captivity God acts on the murmuring of His people. He no longer deals with them on the ground of Exodus 34:6-7. From now on He would take them on their own terms. They complained of the hardship of suffering for their fathers' failures, so He would now give them what they themselves deserved. It is clear that a sinner must suffer for sin. If he challenges the justice of paying the penalty for a parent's evil, he cannot deny that he deserves punishment for his own.
The people leaned on a commandment that seemed to back their complaint. They were reading only half of it.
Many commentators say otherwise, but the second commandment of the law is clearly in question here... For God had declared that He was "a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, to the third and fourth generation of those who hate Me, and showing mercy to thousands of those who love Me and keep My commandments."... But the commandment says something quite different. Those who love God and keep His commandments have in it the definite assurance that He will show them mercy. So they could not come under the contradictory rule of inheriting their father's sins.
The son does more than notice his father's sins. Older translations read "and considers" — he weighs what he sees. A father's sin set in front of a son is either a warning heeded or a warning ignored.
If I keep on in my father's sin, I am more guilty than he is, because his sin was a warning to me. My sin is double, morally increased by all the effect his sin ought to have had in holding me back... it is clear that in this case my father's sin has hardened my heart. I have seen my father, or ought to have seen him, in the light of God given to me.
If a bad father cannot condemn a good son, a good father cannot save a bad one. The exiles were leaning on their descent from Abraham.
This was an important question for the Jew, and above all for the Jew of the captivity. The nation was under God's dealings and cut off from their land and temple, so they fell back more and more on the merits of Abraham... The question is turned back on them. Here was a father who had not eaten sour grapes; did that stop his children's teeth being set on edge? God was dealing with them for their own sins. They forfeited every privilege they had through Abraham if in their own character they were not the true seed of Abraham.
The chapter is often pulled into debates about eternal destiny. Commentators here read the language as God's dealing with people in this life.
Each one was guilty, and God would judge each one as such. Yet where repentance was clear, God would pardon, for He had no pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezek. 18:23). Keep in mind that what is spoken of here is temporal judgment — physical death, because of sin now. It gives us no teaching about the eternal judgment of sin, which is taught elsewhere.
- Proverb — Israel blamed their fathers for their suffering. God closed that argument and dealt with each person for his own sin.
- Principle — God took the people on their own terms: each sinner answers for his own sin, and He judges father and son by their own personal character.
- Sight — The son sees all his father's evil. That sight is meant to work as an object lesson.
- Choice — Weighing his father's sin turns it into a warning. Copying it makes the son's sin heavier than his father's, because he ignored the warning.
- Life — Neither a wicked father's guilt nor a righteous father's merit passes down. The son who walks in God's statutes shall surely live.
-- he hath not eaten upon the mountains, nor lifted up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel; he hath not defiled his neighbour's wife,
Israel in exile blamed its troubles on the sins of its parents, so God answered with three test cases. Verse 15 belongs to the third: a son who watches his father sin and refuses to copy him.
The chapter answers that complaint.
At the captivity God acts on the murmuring of His people and ends any further governmental dealings on the ground of Exodus 34:6-7. From now on He would take them on their own terms. They complained of the hardship of suffering for the failures of their fathers, so He would now give them what they themselves deserved. It is clear that a sinner must suffer for sin. A man may question whether it is just to pay the penalty for a parent's evil. He still cannot deny that he deserves punishment for his own.
Verse 15 belongs to the third case in the chapter.
Suppose a third case — a son warned by the wicked ways of his father. "Now, look, if he has a son who sees all his father's sins ... he shall not die for the iniquity of his father, he shall surely live."
Eating on the mountains and lifting the eyes to idols are not new here. They were the opening marks of the righteous man in verse 6. One measure runs through the chapter, and God applies it to each man on his own.
First the Lord speaks of His way with a righteous man — not absolutely righteous, but distinctively so: "If a man is righteous, and does judgment and justice, he has not eaten on the mountains, nor lifted up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel ... he shall surely live, says the Lord Jehovah." That completely undermined the proverb Israel was using. There is no question about their ancestry. Each one was responsible for himself, and this is the basic principle of all that follows.
The turn in this man's life begins before the list of things he avoids. He looks at his father's life and thinks about it.
Next comes the son of the wicked man, who "sees all his father's sins which he has done, and considers, and does not do the same." This should always be the result for someone with such an object lesson in front of him. Suppose he reads it rightly, turns from his father's iniquity, and walks in the divine statutes. Should he die for the iniquity of his father? No, he should surely live. God judges father and son by their own personal character.
Israel had a text in mind. In the second commandment God warns that He visits the sins of the fathers on the children. The exiles felt that warning had landed on them.
Despite many commentators, the second commandment of the law is clearly in question here. It was that which gave a seeming excuse for the proverb itself... The resentful thought of those caught in the nation's present disasters seems clear. They held that the third and fourth generations were suffering for faults that were in no way their own. They admit the wickedness of former generations, which is not so hard to confess as one's own. They grant that their fathers ate the sour grapes, but say that they themselves did not. But the commandment says something quite different. Those who love God and keep His commandments find in it a definite promise of mercy.
A bad family line is real, but it is never a defence.
Man's nature is actively evil, and what that nature does is our own individual responsibility. If a wicked father has a wicked son, the son's wickedness is his own responsibility, not his parent's. The law of the land would not excuse a thief because his father and grandfather had been thieves before him. In the same way, God's law does not excuse each of us for the sinful nature we inherited from the parent of our race.
Commentators warn against a common misuse of the word "die" in this chapter.
An important thing to notice here is the misuse of the word "die." ... But dying in its positive sense never applies to the soul. Good people with good intentions constantly quote Ezekiel 18 for this. But it speaks only of death in this world — present judgment here, not for a father's sins but for our own.
- Sees — the chain breaks at the eyes. This son looks straight at his father's sins instead of copying them blindly.
- Considers — a bad example becomes an object lesson. The son turns from his father's iniquity and walks in God's statutes.
- Refuses — the verse names what he will not do: the idol feast, the lifted eye, the neighbour's wife. Verse 6 tested the righteous man the same way.
- Stands alone — God ends the sour-grapes excuse and takes each person on his own terms. No court excuses a thief because his father was a thief, and God's law does not excuse us either.
- Lives — he does not die for his father's iniquity. The life promised here is escape from judgment in this world, not a word about eternity.
and hath not oppressed any, nor withholden the pledge, neither hath exercised robbery; he hath given his bread to the hungry, and covered the naked with a garment;
Ezekiel 18 works through test cases, and this verse belongs to the third: a son who sees his father's life and refuses to copy it. His record raises the chapter's two questions: can a son inherit his father's guilt, and what is the "life" promised here?
Israel in exile had a saying: the fathers ate sour grapes, and the children's teeth were set on edge. God answers by taking them at their word.
This deserves careful thought. At the captivity God acts on the murmuring of His people and ends any further governmental dealings on the basis of Exodus 34:6-7. From now on He would take them on their own terms. They complained about the hardship of suffering for their fathers' failures, so He would now give them what they themselves deserved.
This son does not differ from his father by accident.
Next comes the question of the son of the wicked man, who "sees all his father's sins which he has done, and considers, and does not do the same." This should always be the result when someone has such an object lesson in front of him. Suppose he reads it rightly, turning from his father's iniquity and walking in the divine statutes. Should he die for his father's iniquity? No, he should surely live. Father and son are judged according to their own personal character.
The same list of deeds appears earlier in the chapter, describing the just man. It measures him toward God and toward his neighbour at once.
The first case is a man who is himself just and does judgment and justice, both toward God and toward his neighbour. He refuses impurity and unrighteousness. He also shows loving care for the distressed, refuses selfish advantage, keeps clear of iniquity, and maintains fairness between man and man, all while walking in the divine statutes. Such a man shall surely live.
A pledge was something handed over as security for a loan. The law behind this verse limited what a lender could take and keep.
A lender was not to charge interest to the poor who borrowed money (Ex. 22:25), and he was not to keep a neighbour's pledged garment overnight (Ex. 22:26-27). To this last God adds this beautiful expression, "for I am gracious."
Feeding the hungry and covering the naked close the list. The Lord names the same two acts when He judges the nations.
And indeed what service could be more blessed than to clothe the naked and feed the hungry? The Lord Himself will sit on the throne of His glory to judge the living nations. There He names these as services rendered to Himself in the person of His "brothers." He says, "I was hungry and you gave me food… I was naked and you clothed me." (Matt. 25:35-36.)
This promise of life can sound like a way of earning eternal life. The chapter has something else in view.
Sinful man cannot fulfil the conditions for having life and being just. "Eternal life" is not in view in these verses. These are not conditions for securing eternal life, but for escaping physical death in the announced judgment.
Having settled that no one dies for another's sin, the chapter turns to the man whose record is his own and bad.
But if the wicked will turn from all his sins that he has committed, and keep all my statutes, and do what is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. All his transgressions that he has committed shall not be mentioned to him: in his righteousness that he has done he shall live.
- Own account. God judges each person by his own character, not his father's. The son who refuses to repeat his father's sins does not die for them.
- Own eyes. The turning point is that he sees and considers; a bad example, read rightly, becomes an object lesson.
- Own hands. The proof is practical. He takes nothing from the weak and feeds and clothes those in need — fairness and loving care of the distressed.
- Own reward. The "life" promised here is escape from physical death in the announced judgment. It is not a formula for earning eternal life, which sinful man cannot fulfil.
- Own choice. The principle cuts both ways: a wicked man may turn from his sins, and a righteous man may turn from his righteousness — each bears his own burden.
he hath withdrawn his hand from the poor, hath not received usury nor increase, hath executed my judgments, [and] walked in my statutes he shall not die for the iniquity of his father, he shall certainly live.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.