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What mean ye, that ye use this proverb, etc.? Another and entirely different section opens, and we see at once from what it started. Ezekiel had heard from the lips of his countrymen, and had seen its working in their hearts, the proverb with which they blunted their sense of personal responsibility. They had to bear the punishment of sins which they had not committed. The sins of the fathers were visited, as in Exo_20:5; Exo_34:7; Le 26:39, 40; Num_14:18; Deu_5:9, upon the third and fourth generations. Manasseh and his people had sinned, and Josiah and his descendants and their contemporaries had to suffer for it. The thought was familiar enough, and the general law of the passages above referred to was afterwards applied, as with authority, to what was then passing (2Ki_23:26; 2Ki_24:3). Even Jeremiah recognized it in Lam_5:7 and Jer_15:4, and was content to look, for a reversal of the proverb, to the distant Messianic time of the new covenant (Jer_31:29-31). The plea with which Ezekiel had to deal was therefore one which seemed to rest on the basis of a Divine authority. And that authority was confirmed by the induction of a wide experience. Every preacher of righteousness in every age has to warn the evil doer that he is working evil for generations yet unborn, to whom he transmits his own tendencies, the evil of his own influence and example. It is well that he can balance that thought with the belief that good also may work in the future with a yet wider range and mightier power (Exo_20:5). Authority and experience alike might seem to favour the plea that the fathers had eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth were set on edge. Ezekiel was led, however, to feel that there was a latent falsehood in the plea. In the depth of his consciousness there was the witness that every man was personally responsible for the things that he did, that the eternal righteousness of God would not ultimately punish the innocent for the guilty, he had to work out, according to the light given him, his vindication of the ways of God to man, to sketch at least the outlines of a theodicy. Did he, in doing this, come forward as a prophet, correcting and setting aside the teaching of the Law? At first, and on a surface view, he might seem to do so. But it was with him as it was afterwards with St. Paul He "established the Law" in the very teaching which seemed to contradict it. He does not deny (it would have been idle to do so) that the sins of the fathers are visited upon the children, i.e. affect those children for evil. What he does is to define the limits of that law. And he may have found his starting point in that very book which, for him and his generation, was the great embodiment of the Law as a whole. If men were forbidden, as in Deu_24:16, to put the children to death for the sins of the fathers; if that was to be the rule of human justice,—the justice of God could not be less equitable than the rule which he prescribed for his creatures. It is not without interest to note the parallelism between Ezekiel and the Greek poet who was likest to him, as in his genius, so also in the courage with which he faced the problems of the universe. AEschylus also recognizes that there is a righteous order in the seeming anomalies of history. Men might say, in their proverbs, that prosperity as such provoked the wrath of the gods, and brought on the downfall of a "woe insatiable;" and then he adds—
"But I, apart from all,
Hold this my creed alone."
And that creed is that punishment comes only when the children reproduce the impious recklessness of their fathers. "Justice shines brightly in the dwellings of those who love the right, and rule their life by law." Into the deeper problem raised by the modern thought of inherited tendencies developed by the environment, which itself originates in the past, it was not given to Ezekiel or AEschylus to enter.
Eze_18:3
Stress is laid on the fact that the proverb which implied unrighteousness in God is no longer to be used in Israel. There, among the, people in whom he was manifesting his righteousness for the education of mankind, it should be seen to have no force whatever. The thought was an essentially heathen thought—a half-truth distorted into a falsehood.
Eze_18:4
Behold, all souls are mine, etc. The words imply, not only creation, ownership, absolute authority, on the part of God, but, as even Calvin could recognize (in loc.), "a paternal affection towards the whole human race which he created and formed." Ezekiel anticipates here, and yet more fully in verse 32. the teaching of St. Paul, that "God willeth that all men should be saved" (1Ti_2:4). The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The sentence, though taken from the Law, which ordered capital punishment for the offences named, cannot be limited to that punishment. "Death" and "life" are both used in their highest and widest meaning—"life" as including all that makes it worth living, "death" for the loss of that only true life which is found in knowing God (Joh_17:3).
Eze_18:5-9
The verses that follow are noticeable as forming one of the most complete pictures of a righteous life presented in the Old Testament. It ads characteristic of Ezekiel that he starts from the avoidance of sins against the first table of the commandments. To eat upon the mountains was to take part in the sacrificial feasts on the places, of which he had already spoken (Eze_16:16; comp. Eze_22:9; Deu_12:2). The words, lifted up his eyes, as in Deu_4:19 and Psa_121:1, implied every form of idolatrous adoration. The two sins that follow seem to us, as compared with each other, to stand on a very different footing. To Ezekiel, however, they both appeared as mala prohibita, to each of which the Law assigned the punishment of death (Le Eze_18:19; Eze_20:10, Eze_20:18; Deu_22:22), each involving the dominance of animal passions, in the one case, over the sacred rights of others; in the other, over a law of self-restraint which rested partly on physical grounds, the act condemned frustrating the final cause of the union of the sexes; partly, also, on its ethical significance. The prominence given to it implies that the sin was common, and that it brought with it an infinite degradation of the holiest ties.
Eze_18:7
Hath restored to the debtor his pledge. The law, found in Exo_22:1-31.25 and Deu_24:6, Deu_24:13, was a striking instance of the considerateness of the Mosaic Law. The garment which the debtor had pledged as a security was to be restored to him at night. Such a law implied, of course, the return of the pledge in the morning. It was probably often used by the debtor for his own fraudulent advantage, and it was a natural consequence that the creditor should be tempted to evade compliance with it. The excellence of the man whom Ezekiel describes was that he resisted the temptation. Hath spoiled none by violence. Comp. Le Eze_6:1-5, which Ezekiel probably had specially in view. The sin, common enough at all times (1Sa_12:3), would seem to have been specially characteristic of the time in which Ezekiel lived, from the king downwards (Jer_22:13). As contrasted with the sin, there was the virtue of generous almsgiving (Isa_58:5-7).
Eze_18:8
He that hath not given forth his money upon usury. The word "usury," we must remember, is used, not, as with us, for exorbitant interest above the market rate, but for interest of any kind. This was allowed in commercial dealings with foreigners (Deu_23:20), but was altogether forbidden in the ease of loans to Israelites (Exo_22:25; Le Exo_25:35, Exo_25:37; Deu_23:19 : Isa_24:2). The principle implied in this distinction was that, although it was, on strict principles of justice, allowable to charge for the use of money, as for the use of lands or the hire of cattle, Israel, as a people, was under the higher law of brotherhood. If money was to be lent at all, it was to be lent as to a brother in went (Mat_5:42; Luk_6:35), for the relief of his necessities, and not to make profit. A brother who would not help a brother by a loan without interest was thought unworthy of the name. The ideal of the social polity of Israel was that it was to consist of a population of small freeholders, bound together by ties of mutual help—a national friendly society, rather than of traders and manufacturers; and hence the whole drift of its legislation tended to repress the money making spirit which afterwards became specially characteristic of its people, and ate like a canker into its life. The distinction between the two words seems to be that "usury" represents any interest on money; and "increase," any profit on the sale of goods beyond the cost of production, as measured by the maintenance of the worker and his family. To buy in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest was not to be the rule in a nation of brothers, and it was wiser to forbid it altogether rather than to sanction what we call a "reasonable rate" of interest or profit. Hath executed true judgment. The last special feature in the description of the righteous man is that he is free from the judicial corruption which has always been the ineradicable evil of Eastern social life (1Sa_8:3; 1Sa_12:3; Amo_5:12; Isa_33:15).
Eze_18:10
A robber. The Hebrew implies robbery with violence, perhaps, as in the Authorized Version margin, the offence of the housebreaker. That doeth the like to any of these things. The margin of the Revised Version, following the Chaldee paraphrase, gives, who doeth to a brother any of these things. Others (Keil and Furst) render, "who doeth only one of these things," as if recognizing the principle of Jas_2:10. On the whole, there seems sufficient reason for keeping to the text.
Eze_18:11
The word "duties" is not in the Hebrew, but is legitimately introduced as expressing Ezekiel's meaning, where the mere pronoun by itself would have been ambiguous. In English we might say, "He does these things: he does not do those;" but this does not fall in with the Hebrew idiom.
Eze_18:12
The word abomination probably covers the specific sin named in Eze_18:6, but not here.
Eze_18:13
One holes the special emphasis, first of the question, and then of the direct negative, as though that, in the judgment alike of God and man, was the only answer that could be given to it in the very words of the Law (Le Eze_20:9, Eze_20:11, Eze_20:13).
Eze_18:14-17
Now, lo! etc. The law of personal responsibility had been pressed on its darker side. It is now asserted in its brighter, and that with the special emphasis indicated in its opening words. The proverb of the "sour grapes" receives a direct contradiction. The son of the evil doer way take warning by his father's example, and repent, as Ezekiel exhorted those among whom he lived to do. In that case he need fear no inherited or transmitted curse. He shall surely live; Hebrew, living he shall live. That truth came to Ezekiel as with the force of a new apocalypse, and it is obviously "exceeding broad," with far-reaching consequences both in ethics and theology.
Eze_18:18
The reappearance of the father, with the same emphatic "lo!" seems to imply that Ezekiel thought of the two phenomena as possibly contemporaneous. Men might see before them, at the same time, the father dying in his sins, and the son turning from them and gaining the true life.
Eze_18:19
Why? doth not the son, etc.? The words are better taken, with the LXX; Vulgate, Revised Version, and most critics, as a single question, Why doth not the son bear, etc.? What is the explanation of a fact which seemingly contradicts the teaching of the Law? The answer to the question seems at first only an iteration of what had been stated before. The son repents, and therefore does not bear his father's iniquity. A man is responsible for his own sins, and for those only. To think otherwise is to think of God as less righteous than man.
Eze_18:21, Eze_18:22
But if the wicked will turn, etc. Here, however, there is a distinct advance. The question is carried further into the relations between the past and the present of the same man, between his old and his new self. And in answering that question also Ezekiel becomes the preacher of a gospel. The judgment of God deals with each man according to his present state, not his past. Repentance and conversion and obedience shall cancel, as it were, the very memory of his former sins (Ezekiel's language is necessarily that of a hold anthropopathy), and his transgressions shall not be mentioned unto him (comp. Eze_33:16; Isa_43:25; Isa_64:9; Jer_31:34). Assuming the later date of Isaiah 40-66, the last three utterances have the interest of being those of nearly contemporary prophets to whom the same truth had been revealed.
Eze_18:23
Have I any pleasure, etc.? Ezekiel's anticipations of the gospel of Christ take a yet wider range, and we come at last to what had been throughout the suppressed premise of the argument. To him, as afterwards to St. Paul (1Ti_2:4) and St. Peter (2Pe_3:9), the mind of God was presented as being at once absolutely righteous and absolutely loving. The death of the wicked, the loss, i.e; of true life, for a time, or even forever, might be the necessary consequence of laws that were righteous in themselves, and were working out the well being of the universe; but that death was not to be thought of as the result of a Divine decree, or contemplated by the Divine mind with any satisfaction. If it were not given to Ezekiel to see, as clearly as Isaiah seems to have seen it, how the Divine philanthropy was to manifest itself, he at least gauged that philanthropy itself, and found it fathomless.
Eze_18:24
In the previous argument (Eze_18:21) the truth that the individual character may change had been stated as a ground of hope. Here it appears as a ground, for fear and watchfulness. The "grey-haired saint may fail at last," the apostle may become a castaway (1Co_9:27), and the righteousness of a life may be cancelled by the sins of a year or of a day. Whether there was an opening for repentance, even after that fall, the prophet does not say, but the law that a man is in spiritual life or death according to what he is at any given moment of his course, seems to require the extension of the hope, unless we assume that the nature of the fall in the case supposed fetters the freedom of the will, and makes repentance impossible (Heb_6:4-7; 2Pe_2:20).
Eze_18:25
Are not my ways equal? The. primary meaning of the Hebrew adjective is that of something ordered, symmetrically arranged. Men would find in the ways of God precisely that in which their own ways were wanting, and which they denied to him—the workings of a considerate equity, adjusting all things according to their true weight and measure.
Eze_18:26-29
The equity of the Divine judgments is asserted, as before, by fresh iteration rather than by new arguments. In a discourse delivered, as this probably was, orally, it was necessary, so to speak, to hammer in the truth upon men's minds so that it might be driven home and do its work.
Eze_18:30, Eze_18:31
That work was to produce repentance, hope, and fear. The goodness and severity of God alike led up to that. For a man to remain in his sin will be fatal, but it is not the will of God that he should so remain. What he needs is the new heart and the new spirit, which are primarily, as in Eze_11:19, God's gift to men, but which men must make their own by seeking and receiving them. So iniquity shall not be your ruin; better, with the margin of the Revised Version, so shall they not be a stumbling block (same word as in Eze_3:20; Eze_7:19; Eze_14:3) of iniquity unto you. Repented sins shall be no more an occasion of offence. Men may rise on them to "higher things," as on "steppingstones of their dead selves."
Eze_18:32
Turn yourselves, etc. As in Eze_14:6, but there is no ground for the rendering of "turn others," suggested in the margin of the Authorized Version.
So we close what we may rightly speak of as among the noblest of Ezekiel's utterances, that which makes him take his place side by side with the greatest of the prophets as a preacher of repentance and forgiveness. In the next chapter he returns to his parables of history after the fashion of those of Eze_17:1-24.
I. THE TRUTHS BEHIND THE PROVERB. This saying and the doctrine which it embodied were based upon dark, mysterious, but still true, facts of experience.
1. Children share in the sufferings produced by the sins of their parents. Sins of the fathers are visited on the children. This dread fact was recognized in the ten commandments (Exo_20:5). We see it confirmed by our daily observation of the world. The vices of the father and mother bring poverty, disgrace, and disease on the children. When the thief is sent to prison his children are left without bread. Fearful diseases appear in the constitution of innocent children following their parents' profligacy.
2. Children inherit the appetites and habits of their parents. The child of the drunkard is predisposed to inebriety. This physical inheritance in brain and nerve is confirmed by the ceaseless, powerful, unanswerable lessons of example. Where the head of the family leads a loose life the children are brought up under evil influences.
II. THE FALSITY OF THE PROVERB.
1. God does not inflict real punishment on innocent children. They suffer, but they are not punished; for there is no element of Divine anger towards them in what they endure. God permits the suffering, and he uses it, as he uses other troubles of his children, for discipline. But he cannot look upon the poor victims of the vices of others with any disfavour. It is a piece of hypocritical Pharisaism on the part of society to treat the children who come of sinful parentage as though they were disgraced by their birth. The effect of sour grapes is purely physical. When we transfer the physical fact to the moral world we fall into a mistake.
2. Actual sin is not hereditary. If it were, men would be doomed to sin apart from their own choice. But the essence of sin is a self-willed rebellion against God. When freedom of choice is taken out of it the evil thing ceases to be sin; it becomes a moral disease. So long as we have individuality and personal wills we can choose for ourselves. No one is utterly the slave of moral disease, or, if such a person exists, be is a moral lunatic, and not responsible for his action. Therefore he should be put under lock and key. Moreover, responsibility is measured by opportunity, and moral conduct is seen in the amount of resistance offered to the terrible slavery of an inherited tendency to evil habits. The proverb of the sour grapes was not only a discouragement to children; it was an excuse for impenitence among grownup men.
III. THE EXPOSURE AND REJECTION OF THE PROVERB.
1. A familiar saying may be false. It may be a venerable lie, or, if true in its first utterance, it may have been exaggerated and so presented as to be false in its present application.
2. It is the duty of the teacher of religion to correct popular notions. This is the second occasion on which Ezekiel has exposed and repudiated a popular fallacy enshrined in the form of a proverb (Eze_12:22). Christ fought prevalent delusions (e.g. Luk_13:1-5); so did St. Paul (Rom_2:25).
3. There is an advance in revelation. The proverb of the sour grapes was never given with the authority of a Divine truth. But in the earlier stages of revelation there was not enough light to liberate men from the illusion on which it was founded. As revelation advances it dissolves moral difficulties and clarifies our vision of Divine righteousness.
Eze_18:4
II. THE DEATH PENALTY OF SIN FALLS ONLY ON THE SINNER. Other consequences of sin reach the innocent; but not this. Herein lies the solution of the terrible enigma presented by the spectacle of children suffering for the sins of their fathers—or rather, a partial solution of it. The real punishment of the sin does not fall upon them When the guilty father is drowned in his own wickedness, he sprinkles some of the foul spray on his children, and it burns them like spots of fire; but he does not drag them down with him to his dismal doom unless they freely choose to follow his bad example. Now, for the guilty man there is this dark prospect—he cannot shirk his responsibility and cast his punishment upon another. There is an awful loneliness in guilt. Every one must bear the load of his own sin.
III. THIS JUST ARRANGEMENT IS SECURED BY GOD'S OWNERSHIP OF SOULS. All belong to God; therefore he will not permit final injustice. The discarded proverb (verse 2) rested on a sense of fatalism. The idea it contained was not just, but it seemed to be inevitable. The tragedies of AEschylus and Sophocles exhibit the operation of a Nemesis pursuing the descendants of a guilty man until the original crime of their ancestor is expiated. Physically, something of the kind does often occur; but in the higher moral and spiritual realm it is impossible, so long as a personal God takes personal interest in individual souls. The modern Nemesis is physical law. We can only escape from some form of unjust fatalism by a belief in a personal God and his direct dealings with souls.
IV. CHRIST DIES FOR THE SINS OF OTHERS.
1. Here is a grand exception to the order of punishment. The soul that does not sin dies for the souls that do sin. But with this fact we are in a new order. Christ's death is not a consequence of moral law.
(1) He comes in grace.
(2) His act is voluntary.
2. Here is the hope of our deliverance from death. We have all sinned. Therefore we all deserve death, for there is no exception to the law, "The soul that sinneth, it shall die." But not only has Christ died for us; he dies in us, we are crucified in him, and dying to sin through his grace we are spared the fearful dying for sin.
Eze_18:14
I. A FATHER'S SIN IS A SHAMEFUL SIGHT FOR HIS SON. The verse before us presents a distressing picture, though one with bright features in it. The father should be an example to his children, and they should be able to look up to him with reverence. Indeed, very little children naturally regard those who have charge of them as good. When first a child discovers that one who has directed his conduct is doing wrong, the revelation comes upon him with a painful shock of surprise. How sad that this should become a familiar sight! The very centre of authority in the home is then degraded. The child may still obey from a sense of fear, from a feeling of duty, or from mere force of habit. But all reverence is gone, and contempt is beginning to take its place. There must be something sadly wrong when a right-minded child is forced to despise his father or his mother. Surely such a prospect should be a warning to parents when personal considerations fail to influence them.
II. A SON MAY BE SAVED FROM SHARING HIS FATHER'S SIN BY ITS VERY SHAMEFULNESS. There is an influence which is just the contrary of heredity in sin. Unconsciously, by force of physical constitution, and by the influence of example no doubt, a child is drawn towards his father's sin. But when he reflects upon it and exercises his own judgment, he has miserable opportunities for witnessing its shamefulness which are not accorded to the happily guarded children of purer homes. The child of the drunkard knows the evil of strong drink only toe well. Thus if he "considereth" he has an ever present warning. Do we not see children who have turned with loathing from the habits of disgraceful parents, shunning the first approaches to the evil which has wrought such havoc in their homes, when other children who have not been to so painful a school toy with it in the confidence of ignorance?
III. IT IS THE DUTY OF CHRISTIANS TO RESCUE THE CHILDREN OF WICKED PARENTS. The problem furnished by the wreck of broken down character among the degraded creatures who haunt the slums of great cities is well nigh insoluble, because so many of those hopeless beings refuse to be reclaimed. If they are removed to decent dwellings and supplied with the means of conducting respectable lives, they sink back to their old stats of degradation. Emigration alone will not cure this disease of dissoluteness. We could only burden America and our colonies with useless paupers by sending its victims across the sea. They have neither the moral nor the physical strength to begin s new life. It would seem that the best thing we could do for them would be to shut them up in a hospital for incurables, where at least they might be prevented from spreading moral contagion. They have reached moral imbecility. But we can save their children. It is with the children that the hope of recovery is most encouraging. Good work already done in rescuing the little waifs of the streets points to a much more extensive effort in that direction. For the price of an ironclad we might save the children of the slums of a whole city! It is here that the solution of our great social problem will begin.
Eze_18:23
1. It might appear that he had.
(1) Men transferred to God their own low notions of vengeance. "Revenge is sweet" among men; therefore it was supposed that God must take some pleasure in avenging himself on those who have offended him.
(2) The rigour of the Law of God appeared to favour this notion. If God had no pleasure in the death of the wicked, why did God let him die? Such a question goes on the assumption that the only motive of action is the personal pleasure of the agent.
2. But on the other hand, it is certain that the fate of the sinner is no pleasure to God.
(1) God is righteous. The pleasures of vengeance are sinful. It cannot be good to feel anything but distress at the ruin of a soul. There might be a certain pleasure in the infliction of useful chastisement, because of its happy end; but the death of a soul is wholly dark.
(2) God is merciful. God does not hate his enemies. "He hateth nothing that he hath made." God loves the souls that perish. His long suffering and delay of punishment, his readiness to forgive the penitent, and, above all, the gift of his Son to redeem the world from death, are proofs that he has no pleasure in the death of the wicked.
II. STILL GOD PERMITS IT.
1. God has given freedom to his children. It can scarcely be said that God kills a wicked man. The sinner is his own executioner; his sin is its own sword of vengeance. Sin itself slays. The sinner is practically a suicide. God has no pleasure in the ruin which the foolish man brings on his own head. But there would be no moral nature left for him, and therefore no possibility of goodness, if God did not leave him the use of that freedom which he abuses in slaying his own soul.
2. God is just, though justice may be painful. It may be said that we cannot throw the whole burden of his death on the sinner, because God has made him and has made the laws which connect death with sin. No doubt, therefore, there is a certain Divine retribution in the punishment of sin. But then God is just, and does not regard his own pleasure. It is only an epicurean deity who would refuse to punish sin because he took no pleasure in the death of the sinner.
3. There can be no escape for the impenitent. If it were merely a question of God's pleasure, we might appeal from that to his mercy. But he already denies himself to permit the punishment. It is therefore the more sure.
III. GOD PREFERS THE LIFE OF HIS CHILDREN. If he has no pleasure in their death, he will welcome any avenue of escape. Nay, he will provide all possible means of deliverance. Hence the gospel of Christ.
1. There is a possibility of escape through amendment. It can come no other way, or justice would be outraged; for it is better that the soul should die than that it should continue forever in sin. The life of sin is a curse to the sinner and a blight on God's world. But a return to the better way is open to all of us through Christ (2Co_5:20).
2. This escape gives life. God loves life, or he would not have created a world teeming with living beings. He loves to gives us a new life in Christ (1Jn_5:12). Let no one despair. God does not desire our death; God wills our life.
Eze_18:25
I. GOD IS ACCUSED OF INJUSTICE. "Ye say, The way of the Lord is not equal." It is felt that the rule of the supreme God should be very different from that of earthly judges, some of whom take bribes, and all of whom are fallible. "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" exclaims Abraham, when venturing to expostulate with God on what appears to him a threatened injustice (Gen_18:25). Yet the facts of life are often discouraging, and suggest to doubting, impatient souls a notion that God is not acting justly. The wicked prosper, and the good meet with misfortune. Children suffer from the misdeeds of their parents. Persons equal in character are unequal in fortune. To one the way of life is far more smooth than to another, although we can detect no good reason for the distinction. At one time a wild and mindless Chance seems to play with the world, at another a blind, stern Fate appears to hold it in an iron grip. We cannot discover the hand of justice behind the drifting cloud of circumstances. But:
1. Justice does not involve equality, but treatment according to desert.
2. We only see a small part of God's ways, and therefore cannot judge of the whole. The fly on the wheel cannot understand the machine. He might think the action of the "eccentric" deranged because it was unequal, and yet it is essential to the right working of the whole engine.
3. We are too limited in nature to judge, even if we saw all the facts.
II. THIS ACCUSATION RESULTS FROM MAN'S INJUSTICE. We impute to God what is in ourselves. We judge him by our own hearts and conduct. We know what would be our motives if we did certain things which we discover in the Divine action, and therefore we ascribe those same motives to God. We colour what we see with the hues that are in our own eyes. To the railway traveller the hedgerows and trees appear to be turning about invisible pivots, now flying to him and then swiftly whirling away; yet the motion is with the observer.
1. We are unjust in attempting to judge God. Here on the threshold the fault is seen to be ours. Even if God were unjust, since we are not capable of understanding his actions, we should be unjust also in venturing to give a verdict on his deeds.
2. We are unjust in our general conduct. There is a lack of integrity of heart in us even when our external behaviour is straight. We walk in crooked paths, and our conscience itself is perverted, so that the very rule by which we measure is warped. It is not surprising that God seems to be unjust when our standard of measurement does not agree with his action; but then the fault is with the standard. Until our own hearts and lives are right, it is not possible for us to form right views of God.
3. We are unjust in ascribing our own injustice to God. The inequalities of society are charged against God. They come from "man's inhumanity to man."
Eze_18:26-28
I. GOD JUDGES ACCORDING TO PRESENT CHARACTER. Human judgment is stiff and blunt. Having formed our estimate of a man, we hold it after all justification for it has vanished. We are blind to those traits in his character which do not agree with our theory; or, if we are forced to recognize them, our first impulse is to twist them into harmony with the theory. Thus men's characters in the world outlive the facts on which they are founded. They are not all equal in this respect. A good character is more easily lost than a bad character. If a man has once earned an evil name, it is almost impossible for him to divest himself of it. People will not believe in his thorough conversion. This suspicion is partly due to ignorance of the hearts of men, and to a consequent danger of being imposed upon by hypocrisy. But God knows hearts. He is not bound by names and reputations. He sees present facts, and he judges men as they are. Then he judges according to present condition. He does not spare the fallen man on account of past goodness, and he does not rake up old charges against the penitent. We must not suppose, however, that God judges by a man's latest act. This would throw in an element of chance. A man is not condemned because he happens to be doing wrong at the moment of death, or saved because death finds him on his knees in prayer. But when the whole life is turned round, God judges by its present character, and not by its former state.
II. REVERSALS OF CHARACTER ARE POSSIBLE. We are not arguing on hypothetical cases. The ways of God to men are to be justified in part by the knowledge that such cases exist.
1. The good man may fall away into sin. When this happens, the world lifts up its hands in horror at what it supposes to be a revelation of monstrous and long continued hypocrisy; but there may be no hypocrisy in the case. The fallen man may have been sincere in his earlier life of goodness. But he has turned aside from it. Here is a terrible warning. No character is crystalline; all characters are more or less mobile. The best man may fall. Then all his former goodness will not save him. We have reason for watchfulness, diffidence, and prayer for God's protection.
2. The bad man may be recovered. The stern and changeless judgment of the world dooms one who has fallen to lifelong ignominy. This is cruel and murderous. If we lend a helping hand, the fallen may be lifted up. By the grace of Christ the most hardened sinner may be softened to penitence and turned into the ways of goodness. Then his former sin will not hang like a millstone about his neck to keep him forever down. God forgives it, and never mentions it again. It is the elder son, not the father, who refers to the former sins of the returned prodigal (Luk_15:30).
Eze_18:30
1. It is to be by God. "I will judge you." The all-searching and almighty Lord will be the Judge. None can elude his inquiry; none can resist his sentence.
2. It is a matter of the future. Therefore we cannot wisely make light of it by comparison with present experience. The future will be different from the present in this respect. Now is the time of probation; evil has therefore a liberty which will not continue. There will be a change of dispensations, that of judgment superseding the dispensation of grace.
3. It will certainly come. It is not conditional on possible circumstances. There is nothing hypothetical in the prophet's words. God does not say, "If I judge," but "I will judge you."
4. It will come home to God's own people. God will judge the "house of Israel." Israel delighted in the prospect of the day of the Lord, when her oppressors, the neighbouring heathen nations, should be judged. But she herself will also be judged. God will judge Christendom; he will judge his Church. The Master calls his own servants to account (Mat_25:14).
5. It will be individual. God will not judge the house of Israel as a whole, but "every one of you." Each will be judged separately. None will be overlooked.
6. It will be according to the conduct of life. "According to his ways."
(1) According to conduct—not according to creed, feelings, aspirations, but deeds.
(2) According to normal conduct. His ways, i.e. his habits, his general course of conduct, not exceptional acts of virtue, nor occasional lapses below the usual manner of living. God judges on the conduct of the whole life.
II. THE ALTERNATIVES.
1. Amendment. This involves two changes, an internal and an external.
(1) The internal change. Repentance. The first step towards amendment is that turn of mind which consists in grief and loathing for the past, together with a hearty desire for a better future.
(2) The external change. "Turn yourselves from all your transgressions." It is useless to weep over the deeds which we do not forsake. Repentance of heart must be proved and confirmed by change of conduct. The drunkard must not only weep over his last night's debauch; he must give up the drink. The thief must cease to steal, the liar to lie, the blasphemer to swear. This is not to be fully accomplished without a change of heart (Eze_18:31). But while God only can truly regenerate us, we must voluntarily turn from the evil way and seek the new life.
2. Ruin. Ezekiel urges his readers to repent with the mingled warning and encouragement. "So iniquity shall not be your ruin."
(1) The consequences of condemnation are ruin. When God sits in judgment over an evil life, terrible issues are at stake. No mere temporary suffering will satisfy the just demands of law. The broad road leads to "destruction" (Mat_7:13). The end of sin is an utter undoing, a shipwreck of life, a confounding of the soul, death!
(2) This ruin flows directly from sin. God does not send an angel of judgment to punish the sinner. His own iniquity will be his ruin. Sin works directly on the soul as a deadly poison. Therefore all that the judgment of God can be required to do is to make it apparent that the ruin is justly earned, and to show that nothing can be justly done to avert it.
Eze_18:31
II. THE DEATH OF SINNERS IS IN THEIR OWN HANDS. "Why will ye die?" It is not written by God. It is not fated by destiny. It does not fall out by chance. It is not a consequence of circumstances. Secondary and external events may appear to be traceable to one or other of these causes. but utter soul-ruin depends on the soul itself. If the soul dies it is because it will die. The reasons for this position are two.
1. We have free will. If we sin, therefore, we do it of our own accord. We cannot lay the blame on our tempters. There is always a way of escape from temptation (1Co_10:13). The deed that is done under compulsion is no longer a sin. Every sin is the soul's free act.
2. The death of the soul comes directly from sin. It is not an extraneous event; it is just the natural fruit of the soul's own evil doing. Therefore we cannot accuse God, or Satan, or nature, or circumstances. The blame rests with ourselves.
III. THE REASONS WHICH LEAD SINNERS TO COURT DEATH SHOULD BE CONSIDERED. "Why will ye die?"
1. Because of indifference. Many are heedless. They do not will to die, but they will the way to death. But he who chooses the path chooses its end.
2. Because of obstinacy. The appeal of the text is made against a stubborn spirit of self-will. God brings up the battering rams of grace against the thick walls of the town of Man-soul. Pride makes men hold to their own ways. But pride will be humbled in the day of ruin. There is no pride in death.
3. Because of the love of sin. This love blinds men. They see the attractive wickedness; they should learn to see also the snake that lurks among the flowers.
4. Because of unbelief. This is not merely a wrong intellectual conclusion. There is a dangerous unbelief that comes from closing the eyes to unpleasant facts. Yet they are not the less true.
5. Because of the rejection of grace. If we will not to have Christ, we do in fact will to die.
IV. THE WAY OF ESCAPE FROM DEATH IS OPEN TO ALL.
1. By casting out sin. Sin is the viper in the bosom, whose bite is mortal. Any cherished sin brings death. The first step must be not merely to grieve over sin, but to tear it away and fling it off.
2. By receiving a new heart. We need to have a better nature. Nothing less than a new heart will suffice. Only God can give that (Psa_51:10). Only the Holy Spirit can regenerate (Joh_3:5). But the change depends on our seeking and accepting it.
I. THE INFLUENCE OF HEREDITY UPON CHARACTER. Physically, the power of heredity is vast. Every individual, we are told by men of science, is the product of parents, with the addition of such peculiarity as they attribute to the other principle, viz. variation. A man's birth, breeding, and training count for very much; they determine the locality of his early days, the climate, the political and social circumstances, the religions education, the associations, of childhood and of youth. The bodily constitution, including the nervous organization, the temperament and the inclinations springing from it, are to a very large extent hereditary. The environment is largely the effect of birth, and the early influences involved in it. Those who adopt the "naturalistic" system of morals, to whom man appears the effect of definite causes—the "determinists," as they are cabled in philosophy—consider that circumstances, and such character as is itself the product of circumstances, determine what the man will be and must be. Whilst even those who advocate spiritual ethics, and who believe in human liberty, are quite willing to admit that all men owe to hereditary causes and influences very much which makes them what they are.
II. THE LIMITS TO THIS INFLUENCE.
1. Heredity does not interfere with man's moral nature. The will, the freedom, of man are as real as the motives upon which he acts, with which he identifies himself. There is a distinction absolute and ineffaceable between the material and animal on the one side, and the spiritual upon the other.
2. Nor with man's responsibility. If man were not free, he would not be responsible. We do not speak of the sun as responsible for shining, or a bird as responsible for flying. But we cannot avoid speaking and thinking of men as responsible for all their purposes, endeavours, and habits. The wicked are blamable because, when good and evil were before them, and they were free to choose the good, they chose the evil.
3. Nor with God's justice and grace. Ezekiel makes a great point of vindicating the ways of God with men, of showing that every individual will certainly be dealt with, not upon capricious or unjust principles, hut with omniscient wisdom, inflexible righteousness, and considerate mercy. Thus, in the sight of God, all circumstances are apparent, and in the judgment of God all circumstances are taken into account, which justly affect an individual's guilt. Heredity may be among such circumstances, and allowance is doubtless made for tendencies inherited, for early neglect, for unfavourable influences of whatever kind. Where little is given, little is required. but all this does not affect the great fact that every individual is held responsible for his own moral position and conduct. None can escape judgment and censure by pleading the iniquities of his progenitors, as if those iniquities were an excuse for yielding to temptation. Every one shall bear his own burden. All souls are God's, to rule, to weigh, to recompense. From whomsoever sprung, the just shall live, and the soul that sinneth, it shall die.—T.
Eze_18:5-18
I. THE DESCRIPTION OF THE GOOD AND OF THE BAD MAN. As the classes are exclusive, each negativing the other, it is sufficient to name the characteristics of the good man, with the understanding that the bad man is he in whom these characteristics are wanting.
1. The good man is characterized by justice in dealing with his fellow men.
2. He refrains from idolatry of every kind.
3. He avoids adultery and every form of impurity.
4. He refrains from oppressing those who, for any reason, are within his power.
5. He abstains from violence in the treatment of others.
6. He is charitable to the poor and needy.
7. He forbears taking advantage of those who, by misfortune and poverty, are within his power.
8. He scrupulously and cheerfully obeys the Divine laws.
II. THE RECOMPENSE OF THE GOOD AND OF THE BAD MAN.
1. To the good is promised life, which is to be understood, not in the narrow and physical signification of the word, but in its large and scriptural sense.
2. Against the wicked is threatened death, which is to be interpreted as including the effects of God's righteous anger—a doom the most awful which can be pronounced and executed.
APPLICATION. The minister of religion may from this solemn passage learn the imperative duty of teaching morality. There must indeed be a foundation laid for such preaching in spiritual and evangelical doctrine; but the superstructure must not be neglected. The wise teacher, before entering into detail as to human character and conduct, will consider his audience, and the time and occasion; for all subjects are not to be treated before persons of every class, of every age, of both sexes. But he will find opportunities for stating and enforcing the precepts of the Law in the spirit and with the motives of the gospel. And the faithful minister will not shrink from depicting, though for the most part in careful and scriptural language, the penalties following upon disobedience to God's laws, as well as the rewards assured to the loyal and the good. It is true that those who are saved are saved by grace; but it is also true that all men, without exception, are judged by their works, and that God will bring every work into judgment, and every secret thing, whether it be good or bad.—T.
Eze_18:19-22
I. THE VAIN AND DECEPTIVE CONTENTION THAT THE MORAL QUALITY OF ONE GENERATION IS IMPUTED TO ANOTHER. This contention may take either of two forms.
1. The son of a good father is apt to rely upon his father's goodness. There is no doubt that such a one may inherit much that is advantageous, e.g. a good constitution, a happy temperament, a good introduction to life, the favourable regard of many helpful friends. And it is sometimes forgotten that all this does not interfere with responsibility; in fact, he who is so highly favoured is thereby raised to a higher level of accountability. Much is given, and much will be required.
2. The son of a bad father is apt to excuse his faults by casting the blame for them upon the transmission of evil influences by heredity, or upon circumstances traceable to family relationships. It is the case that such a person starts heavily weighted upon the race of life; his temptations to error and sin are many and urgent, and restraining influences are weakened. Allowances are made by men, and no doubt by God also, for such disadvantages; but they do not destroy the moral responsibility of the free agent.
II. THE WITNESS OF THE CONSCIENCE TO INDIVIDUAL AND INALIENABLE RESPONSIBILITY. Reference has been made to the attempts too often made by shiners to cast their responsibility upon others. But it may unhesitatingly be asserted that those who put forward such excuses are never themselves convinced by them. In their hearts they are well aware that there is no sincerity in such excuses, that they are mere subterfuges. The conscience within, which accuses and excuses, gives no uncertain sound. The religious teacher, the Christian preacher, who seeks to convince men of sin has the assurance that the inner monitor of his hearers supports his endeavour, that he neither upbraids nor pleads alone. When the Lord God exclaims by the voice of his prophet, "Hear now, O house of Israel; Is not my way equal? are not your ways unequal?" every man, convicted by his conscience, is reduced to silence; for there is no reply to be made. When conscience is awakened, its witness is plain and unmistakable.
III. THE EXPRESS AND AUTHORITATIVE STATEMENT OF GOD'S OWN WORD AS TO MAN'S INDIVIDUAL ACCOUNTABILITY. The language of this chapter is peculiarly explicit upon this matter. "The soul that sinneth, it shall die;… the righteous shall surely live, he shall not die." And these statements are in harmony with the whole tenor of Scripture teaching. The Bible magnifies man's personality, and never represents man as a machine, an organism. Each living soul stands in its own relation to the Father of spirits, before whom every moral and free nature must appear to render an account for itself, and not for another. The teaching of our Lord and of his apostles is as definite and decided upon this point as the teaching of the Lawgiver and the prophets of the earlier dispensation. We are throughout Scripture consistently taught that there is no evading the great account.—T.
Eze_18:23
I. MEN HAVE CHERISHED SUSPICION OF THE DIVINE MALEVOLENCE. No one who is acquainted with the religions which have obtained among the nations of mankind will question this. The deities of the Gentiles have reflected the moral qualities of the human race, and accordingly attributes morally reprehensible as well as attributes morally commendable have been assigned to the deities whom men have worshipped. Indeed, worship has to no small extent consisted in methods supposed efficacious to appease the wrath of the cruel and malicious powers from whose ill will humanity, it has been thought, had much to dread. And it is not to be questioned that even Jewish and Christian worship have not been free from some measure of this same error. It has been customary to refer the governmental and judicial infliction of punishment to a disposition to take pleasure in human sufferings and torture. The student of Scripture is aware that there is no authority, no justification for such a view; but the student of human nature is not surprised that such a view should have been taken.
II. GOD'S REPUDIATION OF MALEVOLENCE IN PLAIN AUTHORITATIVE WORDS. "Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked? saith the Lord God." It is indeed condescension in the Supreme Ruler thus to remove the misunderstandings and difficulties which men create for themselves by their own ignorance and sin. Again and again he represents himself as merciful and delighting in mercy, but nowhere does he give the least ground for a suspicion that he delights in, or even is indifferent to, the sufferings of the children of men. Since all his words are faithful and true, we can but rest and rejoice in such an assurance as that of the text.
III. GOD'S PROOF IN HIS DEEDS OF THE BENEVOLENCE OF HIS NATURE. Israel, as a nation, had abundant evidence of the loving kindness and long suffering of him who chose the people as his own, trained them for his service, instructed them in his Law, bore with their frequent disobedience and rebellion, and ever addressed to them promises of compassion and of help. But all proofs of the Divine benevolence pale before that glorious exhibition of God's love and kindness which we Christians have received in him who is the unspeakable Gift of Heaven. Had the Almighty felt any pleasure in the death of the wicked, he would not have given his own Son, while we were yet sinners, to die for us. He took pleasure, not in the condemnation and death, but in the salvation of men. In Christ his love and kindness appeared; for Christ came, not to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.
IV. THE ENCOURAGEMENT THUS AFFORDED TO PENITENT SINNERS TO HOPE FOR ACCEPTANCE AND LIFE. The pleasure of God is that the wicked "should return from his way, and should live." Thus there is coincidence between the good pleasure of the Omnipotent upon the one hand, and the best desires and truest interests of penitent sinners on the other. He wire repents of his evil deed, who looks upwards for forgiveness, and who resolves upon. a new and better life, has not to encounter Divine displeasure or ill will; on the contrary, he is assured of a gracious reception, of immediate pardon, of kindest consideration, and of help and guidance in the carrying out of holler purpose and endeavour. The demeanour and the language of God are those of the compassionate Father, who welcomes the returning prodigal, accords him a benign reception, and proffers him all those blessings, now and hereafter, which alone can answer to the glorious and comprehensive gift of Divine love—eternal life!—T.
Eze_18:31
I. WHY WILL YE DIE, WHEN DEATH IS THE WORST OF DOOMS? If the death of the body is in itself and in its circumstances and consequences of a repulsive nature, all the more fitly may it serve to set forth and to suggest the evils denoted in Scripture as spiri