Are children punished for the sins of their parents?

The second commandment is related to the first, forbidding the making of images of any created thing, whether in heaven or earth or in the waters (v.8). Bowing down to such things or worshiping them is an insult to God. Israel did this in the case of the golden calf (Ex.32:1-8), but God is rightly jealous of His own glory, and if the fathers are guilty of such iniquity, God will visit the results of this upon the children to the third and fourth generation (v.9). It is always true that our children will suffer because of our disobedience to God. This does not affect the question of eternal salvation, for any one of the children may still call on the Lord and be saved, but their lives on earth will be affected by their parents' wrongdoing. If a man is a robber, his children will suffer on earth because of this, but they can still be saved eternally by receiving Christ as Savior.

Ezekiel 18 contains the important principle that the soul that sins, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him" (Ezek. 18:20). The individual would be dealt with by God according to his own conduct. It is not a question of what their fathers had been. Their own iniquities demanded and would entail God's judgment. Long before, God had threatened to visit "the iniquities of the fathers upon the children" (see Ex. 34:7). This principle is departed from. Individually they were guilty, and as such would be judged; nevertheless, where repentance was manifest, God would pardon, for He had no pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezek. 18:23). It must be borne in mind that what is spoken of here is temporal judgment, physical death, because of sin now. It gives us no teaching as to the eternal judgment of sin, which is taught elsewhere.

These are then briefly discussed and compared in verses 18-20. "As for his father, because he cruelly oppressed, spoiled his brother by violence, and did that which is not good among his people, lo, even he shall die in his iniquity. Yet say ye, Why? doth not the son bear the iniquity of the father? when the son has done that which is lawful and right, and has kept all my statutes, and has done them, he shall surely live. The soul that sins, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him." The wicked father must perish; the son warned by it shall live. There is thus the way clear for the maxim — "the soul that sins, it shall die;" neither the son suffering for his father's wrong nor the father for his son's, but each reaping as he had sown.

He has Himself assured us that He "visits the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation," but then it is added as most necessary guarding of what would be otherwise misconstrued, "of them that hate Me"; and elsewhere the proverb which Israel had taken up from just such misconstruction is reprobated most emphatically by the Lord: "the fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge." (Ezek. 18.) He not only says, but swears, that they shall have no occasion to use such a proverb; that the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, nor the father bear the iniquity of the son; that the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him; while the repentance of any shall avert his doom.

On the other hand, it is familiar to us all that the character of the father may have much to do with the temporal condition of the children; and that thus the warp and woof of human history proclaim the far-reaching consequences of sin. And all this is a witness from God as to it that could not be silenced without the worst results upon men at large. If we take, then; these guides and guards on either hand, we shall avoid serious mistake as to the moral character of what we have in this psalm, with all its solemn imprecations of judgment on the transgressor. So far as this affects his children it is overruled for blessing to them; as surely as they heed the lesson; nor can sin be bound upon Any, apart from the consent of their own character. And this the 14th verse here definitely shows: for the very prayer that the iniquity of his fathers may be remembered before Jehovah is grounded upon his own character in this way (ver. 16).

This is much to be weighed. 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. Henceforth He would take them on their own terms; and as they complained of the hardship of suffering for the delinquencies of their fathers, He would now give them their own deserts. It is evident that a sinner must suffer for sin; and if he challenge the justice of paying the penalty of a parent's evil, he cannot deny that he ought to be punished for his own. All were God's, alike the souls of fathers and of sons; and the sinner must die. There was no relief or escape on any such pretext.

But they raise the objection: "Why? Doth not the son bear the iniquity of his father?" Spite of many commentators, the second commandment of the law is evidently in question here. It was that which gave a seeming excuse for the proverb itself. For God had declared that He was "a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Me, and showing mercy unto thousands of them, that love Me and keep my commandments." It seems evident that the resentful thought that is in the mind of those overtaken by the present calamities of the nation, is that the third and fourth generations were suffering for faults that were in no wise their own. Allowing the wickedness of former generations — which is not so hard to confess as one's own — they admit that their fathers indeed ate the sour grapes, but not themselves. But the commandment speaks quite otherwise than this; for those who love God and keep His commandments have in it the definite assurance of mercy to be shown them, and could not come, therefore, under the contradictory law of inheriting their father's sins.

This is quite plain as to the law. But it may be argued, Is there not a testimony of fact, however, which we cannot help taking as an interpretation of the commandment? Is there not a law of heredity entailing the most serious consequences? What do we all inherit from Adam? There is but one answer to this. We certainly inherit both a sinful nature and its consequences; but the nature is not in question here. It is the penalty, of which the popular proverb here is speaking. A fallen nature we all have, truly — though we must remember that man is not as a beast to be bound by his nature, nor to be excused by it. Let a man argue as he will about what he has inherited from Adam, he knows in his own soul, as to every sin that he has committed, that he is responsible, and why he is responsible for it. He cannot put his sins to Adam's account. They are his own. Theology may complicate matters for him, indeed, but we are not concerned with that now — it is looked at elsewhere. (See Rom. 5:12-21, Notes.)

There are two great principles in God's dealings, in connection with man on the earth, which are developed in the church of God, as such, and in the government of God. And these two things are very distinct the one from the other. In the church the riches of God's grace are manifested; but in His governmental dealings, righteousness, and the display of His attributes, as justice, mercy, and goodness. We have an example of God's governmental power in Exodus 34:6-7, "And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, unto the third and fourth generation." Here it is in connection with the Jews, and not only among the Jews, but it shews also that which is outside in the world in God's dealings. What we get in Exodus 34 is not sovereign grace bringing a soul to eternal life, but governmental power; the exercise of which we may now mark every day around us. For if a man wastes his fortune, or ruins his health by intemperance of any kind, his children suffer for it. This is an invariable principle. We see also the exercise of righteous government in God's not clearing the guilty.

As some find difficulty in the latter part of verse 7 it may be well to remark that God is here indicating how He deals with men on earth in His holy government. When it is a question of His judgment for eternity, the dead will be dealt with "according to their works" (Rev. 20:12-13) and there is no thought of a child bearing the sin of his father. In speaking to Moses, God was not dealing with the issues of eternity, but with His government of Israel under the law in the light of His mercy that had just been declared. In the working out of God's government in this world, the way in which the iniquity of a father adversely affects his children is a fact too obvious for any of us to overlook. The laws of heredity, which God has ordained, are very real.

In the government of God, children have to suffer for the sins of their parents, and nations for the sins of their rulers. Men may murmur against this, and characterize it as injustice, but the fact remains, that should a man squander his inheritance and abuse his body, his children will have to suffer for it in want and weakness. But this does not extend beyond this present life, and the sorrows here on earth are but short lived. No man will be made to undergo the judgment of Gehenna for the sins of others, but only for those he himself has committed. And as a way of salvation has been opened up for all, and entrance into a sinless, sorrowless world of unspeakable happiness, what else can be done with the man who refuses to avail himself of a place and portion there, but cast him out? Any observant soul can see the fact verified in numberless instances, that the iniquities of the fathers are visited upon the children, and that mercy is shown to the descendants of them that love God and keep His commandments.

Job asks, "How often is the lamp of the wicked put out?" It is certainly not always the case in this life, in fact it is not often the case (v.17). Sometimes, in an aggravated case, destruction might overtake them, but not often. They may be like straw or chaff before the wind, and therefore carried away eventually by death, but present judgment does not seem to be often carried out (v.18). It may be rightly said, however, that "God lays up one's iniquity for his children," that is, that the children may afterward suffer for their fathers' sins, as Exodus 34:7 indicates, speaking of God "visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation." This is certainly a warning to parents that their children will suffer the consequences of their parents' wickedness. God knows how to mete out recompense in an appropriate way (v.19).