ContradictionsReading order 2Bible context 15 min read
Are we punished for the sins of others?
Explicit rules of individual responsibility conflict with divine declarations and narratives that impose suffering on children because of their parents' actions.
- Textual conflict
- Direct contradiction
- The quoted passages make incompatible claims about the same subject under the same conditions. Little additional inference is needed.
- Importance
- Foundational
- A central claim about origins, salvation, divine justice, or religious authority.
Explicit denial that children bear parental iniquity conflicts with statements making parental offenses the reason children are killed.
An editorial assessment of the quoted passages. Importance describes the stakes; it does not increase certainty. Reading order weighs both.
Children and communities suffer for other people's offenses
Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
Romans 5:12
Translation / edition: King James Version (KJV)
Read the full chapter:Romans 5
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
Translation / edition: King James Version (KJV)
Read the full chapter:Exodus 20