The Iniquity of the Fathers on the Children

In the ten commandments the Lord told Moses, “Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me” (Exodus 20:5).  This language has been somewhat perplexing to me—is the Lord saying that He will punish the children because of the iniquity of their fathers?  Other passages use similar language; for example, Abinadi used this same language when quoted the ten commandments to the priests of Noah in Mosiah 13:13.  Elsewhere in the law of Moses we also read, “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 to the fourth generation” (Exodus 34:7).  This was emphasized again later in these words: “The Lord is longsuffering, and of great mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression, and by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation” (Numbers 14:18).  So are the children to suffer for three or four generations for the iniquity of their parents?

             We know from other scriptures that one person is not to be punished for the sins of someone else.  For example, the law of Moses states, “The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his own sin” (Deuteronomy 16:16).  Adam similarly learned that “the sins of the parents cannot be answered upon the heads of the children, for they are whole from the foundation of the world” (Moses 6:54).  So perhaps one way to understand this passage from the law of Moses that the children will be visited because of the iniquity of their fathers is that children will inevitably be negatively affected because of the wickedness of their parents.  This isn’t to say that they are being punished for the sins of their parents, but naturally they will have difficulties—and often a loss of faith—that come to them because their parents weren’t righteous.  They will be punished in the sense that they don’t receive as readily the blessings of the gospel they could have had if their parents and grandparents had kept the commandments of God.  Elder Richard L. Evans spoke of this: “Some parents … seem to feel that they can ease up a little on the fundamentals without affecting their family or their family’s future. But if a parent goes a little off course, the children are likely to exceed the parent’s example.”  Elder Holland quoted this when he spoke of “a fine young man who came in contact with us after he had been roaming around through the occult and sorting through a variety of Eastern religions, all in an attempt to find religious faith. His father, he admitted, believed in nothing whatsoever. But his grandfather, he said, was actually a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. ‘But he didn’t do much with it,’ the young man said. ‘He was always pretty cynical about the Church.’ From a grandfather who is cynical to a son who is agnostic to a grandson who is now looking desperately for what God had already once given his family!”  Later generations suffered in ignorance of God’s light because of choices of progenitors. 

             I think there is also another way to understand Exodus 20:5.  The passage states that the Lord will visit “the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate [Him].”  Who is the them in the passage?  If it is referring to the children of the third and fourth generations, then the Lord may simply be saying that if those children still hate the Lord (i.e. they are wicked like their fathers)  then they too will be punished for their wickedness.  The next verse reads, “And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.”  Perhaps the “them” of this verse is again the children, those of the third and fourth generations.  If that’s the case, then the Lord is saying that He will show them mercy if they will but love the Lord and keep His commandments.  There is not loss of agency or punishment for another’s sins—those who love the Lord, no matter what their fathers did, will be blessed.