Tuesday, August 23, 2022

Abner Chou on Jeremiah 31:28-29 and Ezekiel 18:2-3

Ezek 18:2-4 is often used as a proof-text against the various formulations of Original Sin. Commenting on Jer 31:28-29 and Ezek 18:2-3, Abner Chou noted the following that offers substantiation of this interpretation:

 

quote a popular maxim in Israel, stating “the fathers have eaten the bitter grapes and the children’s teeth received the edge.” In essence, Israel claimed they received the punishment their parents should have received. The looming judgment was not their fault but their parents’ fault. The saying is based upon Exodus 20:5 and Deuteronomy 5:9, where God said the punishment for the sins of the fathers would go onto the children. Israel’s proverb interprets those verses to teach God punishes the children in place of their parents. Hence, he can hold the children guilty for their parents’ sin. God counters these allegations by saying every individual is responsible for their sin from now on (cf. Jer. 31:30; Ezek. 18:4). However, that seems to contradict what he said in Exodus 20:5 and Deuteronomy 5:9. Is this an instance where God changes or contradicts the meaning of previous revelation?

 

In addressing this, the key is to determine what Exodus 20:5 and Deuteronomy 5:9 taught. Do those passages say God will condemn the children instead of their parents? Do those verses imply God does not hold the individual responsible? A careful look at Exodus 20:5 and Deuteronomy 5:9 shows this is not the case. Those two passages reflect how the consequences of punishment (“God visiting the iniquity”) can spill over to other people. For example, a famine would impact subsequent generations. Exile also would certainly affect one’s children. Merrill sums up the verse by saying, “The repercussions are so great as to impact generations yet unborn if they continue to hate God” (Merrill, Deuteronomy, 148). Thus, Exodus 20:5 and Deuteronomy 5:9 warn that one’s sin has long-reaching effects. Nevertheless, all of this is far from saying God held the children guilty instead of their parents. These verses do not say that Israel claimed they said.

 

In fact, the wording specifically states the opposite of what Israel maintained. The text state God will continue the consequences of sin against those who hate him (‎לְשֹׂנְאָֽ֑י, Ex. 20:5; Deut. 5:9). Tigay observes this indicates that God prolongs the effects of his judgment only if future generations prove to be disobedient as well. As such, these verses teach that God holds individual responsible for their own actions.

 

If this is the case, then God was not reinterpreting Exodus 20:5 and Deuteronomy 5:9. Those texts affirm his emphasis on individual responsibility. Rather, the discussion shows that the Israelites thoroughly misinterpreted those passages. They believed God held them guilty for sins they had not done—an idea those texts never intended at all. As scholars agree, the Israelites did not understand the passage correctly (Cooper, Ezekiel, 189; Block, Ezekiel 1-24, 561).

 

Thus, in context, God I not reinterpreting his Word but rather confronting Israel for their misinterpretation. In both Jeremiah and Ezekiel, the Lord rectifies Israel’s error by quoting a form of Deuteronomy 24:16, which states that the one who sins will die (cf. Jer. 31:30; Ezek. 18:4) (Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation, 337-39). God has upheld individual responsibility. Thus, while the punishment against the parents may incidentally harm future generations, Israel cannot appeal to these verses to blame their parents (or even God’s sovereignty) for their problems while absolving themselves from guilt (Ezek. 18:19). As Cooper and Block observe, the original intent of Exodus 20:5 and Deuteronomy 5:9 should have remind them that if they bear God’s judgment it is because they too were “those who hate him” (Cooper, Ezekiel, 189; Block, Ezekiel 1-24, 561). Thus, these passages to not justify blame-shifting. Instead, Israel should realize that God always will heed and response to repentance (Ezek. 18:21). The Lord will make this clear, both in the current age as well as in the new era to come. Israel would then cease to use the proverb (Ezek 18:3) because it grossly misrepresents God’s declaration (Block, Ezekiel 1-24, 561). (Abner Chou, The Hermeneutics of the Biblical Writers: Learning to Interpret Scripture from the Prophet and Apostles [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Kregel Publications, 2018], 63-65, italics in original)

 

In the above, Chou references Jeffrey Tigay’s commentary on Deuteronomy, pp. 436-37. Here is the text in full:

 

Excursus 8

 

Cross-Generational Retribution (5:9–10 and 7:9–10)

 

According to 5:9–10, God “visits the guilt of the parents upon the children” and rewards descendants for their ancestors’ loyalty and obedience. This idea, also expressed elsewhere in the Bible, is found in Greek and Hittite literature as well. As noted in the Comment to 5:9, the idea corresponds to the concept of family solidarity in ancient societies, especially those with a tribal background. The basic unit of society was the family, not the individual. Individuals were not viewed as separate entities but as inextricably bound up with their kin, including past and future generations. Members of a family expected to share a common fortune, whether good or bad. An adoption contract from Mari states that the adoptive son shall share his adoptive parents’ good fortune and their bad fortune. In the light of this concept, it was natural that Saul promised to reward both Goliath’s killer and the killer’s family, and that grants given to reward loyal servants were to pass on to their descendants in perpetuity. Given the feelings of a person for his family and later descendants, it was recognized that their suffering was indeed painful to him and hence an effective punishment, just as one might reward a person with a benefaction to his family or his descendants. The very threat of harm or promise of benefit to one’s family could serve to deter or encourage certain behavior.

 

Effective as this approach may have been, Deuteronomy 24:16 forbids its application by judicial authorities: “Parents shall not be put to death for children, nor children be put to death for parents: a person shall be put to death only for his own crime.” But experience showed that people often do suffer or benefit because of the actions of their ancestors; one modern commentator termed this the “most firmly established of all the lessons of history” (Wellhausen). Accordingly, the cross-generational retribution that was denied to human authorities was recognized as an aspect of divine governance: loyalty to God is rewarded, and rebellion against Him punished, across the generations. Tradition recorded that Noah’s entire family was saved along with him, that Abraham’s descendants were given the promised land because of his loyalty to God, and that the descendants of Phinehas and David inherited, respectively, the priesthood and the monarchy because of their forebears’ loyalty to God. On the other hand, the entire households of Dathan and Abiram perished along with them, while punishments due to David, Jeroboam, and Ahab were carried out on their descendants. Indeed, the generation of the fall of Jerusalem believed that it was being punished for the sins of Manasseh’s generation, though not all denied that their own generation, too, had sinned. A popular saying circulated complaining that “fathers have eaten sour grapes and children’s teeth are blunted.”

 

Jeremiah and Ezekiel both felt compelled to refer to this attitude when urging their contemporaries to have confidence in a restoration. They apparently found it a hindrance to confidence. Jeremiah asserted that in the future even God would no longer punish descendants for their ancestors’ sins; He would punish individuals solely for their own actions, as He requires of human authorities in Deuteronomy 24:16. Ezekiel denied that God operated that way even in the present and was punishing Judah for ancestral guilt: even now, according to Ezekiel, God rewards and punishes people only for their own deeds. In talmudic times Rabbi Yosi bar Ḥaninah recognized that Ezekiel in effect abrogated the principle of cross-generational punishment expressed in the Decalogue. In his words, “Moses said ‘Visiting the guilt of the parents upon the children,’ but Ezekiel came and annulled it: ‘The person who sins, only he shall die.’ ”

 

Jeremiah and Ezekiel were not the only ones to mitigate the doctrine of cross-generational punishment by God. It is partially mitigated in the Torah itself. In the Torah, only Exodus 34:7 and Numbers 14:18 state without qualification that God visits the sins of fathers upon children. In both versions of the Decalogue, the list of generations to be punished and rewarded is qualified by the phrases “of those who hate Me,” and “of those who love Me and keep My commandments” (Deut. 5:9–10; Exod. 20:5–6). The phrases most likely refer to the descendants, meaning that cross-generational retribution applies only to descendants who act as their ancestors did; in other words: God “visits the guilt of the fathers on future generations that reject Him and rewards the loyalty of ancestors to the thousandth generation of descendants who are also loyal to Him” In other words, God punishes or rewards descendants for ancestral sins and virtues along with their own if they—the descendants—“continue the deeds of their ancestors.”

 

This idea of compound punishment befalling sinful descendants, attested in Leviticus 26:39 and elsewhere, occupies the middle ground between cross-generational retribution and the principle that individuals should be rewarded and punished only for their own deeds. It recognizes the reality of the former but holds that cross-generational rewards and punishments only come to those who merit similar retribution on their own. This qualification avoids the demoralizing effect that the principle of cross-generational retribution had in its unconditional form (“Why obey if our fate has already been determined by our ancestors’ conduct?”).

 

Deuteronomy 7:9–10 goes one step further. According to that passage, God “keeps His covenant faithfully to the thousandth generation of those who love Him and keep His commandments, but instantly requites with destruction those who reject Him—never slow with those who reject Him, but requiting them instantly.” Here, only divine rewards are extended down through the generations. God punishes sinners personally and instantly, and not a word is said of His extending the punishment to sinners’ descendants. According to this version, God Himself acts in accordance with the principle He established in 24:16. (Jeffrey H. Tigay, Deuteronomy [The JPS Torah Commentary; Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1996], 436-37)

 

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