Our fathers sinned, and are no more. We have borne their iniquities.
Parallel Translations
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Our fathers sinned, and are no more. We have borne their iniquities.
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Our fathers have sinned, and are not; and we have borne their iniquities.
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Our fathers have sinned, and are not; and we have borne their iniquities.
Cross-references (12)
Passages linked to Lamentations 5:7 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Jeremiah 16:12 You have done evil more than your fathers, for behold, you each walk after the stubbornness of his evil heart, so that you don’t listen to me.
- Jeremiah 31:29 “In those days they will say no more, “ ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.’
- Ezekiel 18:2 “What do you mean, that you use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge’?
- Jeremiah 14:20 We acknowledge, Yahweh, our wickedness, and the iniquity of our fathers; for we have sinned against you.
- Exodus 20:5 you shall not bow yourself down to them, nor serve them, for I, Yahweh your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and on the fourth generation of those who hate me,
- Genesis 42:36 Jacob, their father, said to them, “You have bereaved me of my children! Joseph is no more, Simeon is no more, and you want to take Benjamin away. All these things are against me.”
- Jeremiah 31:15 Yahweh says: “A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping, Rachel weeping for her children. She refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.”
- Matthew 23:32-36 Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you offspring of vipers, how will you escape the judgment of Gehenna? Therefore behold, I send to you prophets, wise men, and scribes. Some of them you will kill and crucify; and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city; that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zachariah son of Barachiah, whom you killed between the sanctuary and the altar. Most certainly I tell you, all these things will come upon this generation.
- Job 7:21 Why do you not pardon my disobedience, and take away my iniquity? For now will I lie down in the dust. You will seek me diligently, but I will not be.”
- Genesis 42:13 They said, “We, your servants, are twelve brothers, the sons of one man in the land of Canaan; and behold, the youngest is today with our father, and one is no more.”
- Job 7:8 The eye of him who sees me will see me no more. Your eyes will be on me, but I will not be.
- Zechariah 1:5 Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever?
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (16 sources)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain The Prophet seems here to contend with God, and…
The Prophet seems here to contend with God, and to utter that blasphemy mentioned by Ezekiel. For when God severely chastised the people, that proverb was commonly used by them,
“Our fathers did eat a sour grape, and our teeth are blunted.” (Ezekiel 18:2.)
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Thus they intimated that they were unjustly and cruelly treated, because they suffered the punishment of others, when they themselves were innocent. So the Prophet seems to quarrel with God when he says that the fathers who sinned were no more; but as we shall presently see, the Prophet confesses also the sins of those who were yet alive. As, then, an ingenuous confession is made by the Prophet, he no doubt abstained here from that blasphemy which is so severely reproved by Ezekiel. Jeremiah had nothing farther from his purpose than to free the people from all blame, as though God had dealt cruelly with them, according to what is said by a heathen poet, —
“For the sins of the fathers thou undeservedly sufferest, O Roman!”
Another says, —
“Enough already by our blood Have we suffered for the perjuries of Laomedonian Troy.”
They mean that the people of their age were wholly innocent, and seek in Asia and beyond the sea the cause of evils, as though they never had a sin at Rome. But the meaning of Jeremiah was not this, but he simply intended to say that the people who had been long rebellious against God were already dead, and that it was therefore a suitable time for God to regard the miseries of their posterity. The faithful, then, do not allege here their own innocency before God, as though they were blameless; but only mention that their fathers underwent a just punishment, for that whole generation had perished. Daniel speaks more fully when he says,
“We have sinned, and our fathers, and our kings.” (Daniel 9:8.)
He involved in the same condemnation both the fathers and their children.
But our Prophet’s object was different, even to turn God to mercy, as it has been stated; and to attain this object he says, “O Lord, thou indeed hast hitherto executed just punishment, because our fathers had very long abused thy goodness and forbearance; but now the time is come for thee to try and prove whether we are like our fathers: as, then, they have perished as they deserved, receive us now into favor.” We hence see that thus no quarrel or contention is carried on with God, but only that the miserable exiles ask God to look on them, since their fathers who had provoked God and had experienced his dreadful vengeance, were already dead.
And when he says that the sons bore the iniquity of the fathers, though it be a strong expression, yet its meaning is not as though God had without reason punished their children and not their fathers; for unalterable is that declaration,
“The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, nor the father the iniquity of the son; but the soul that sinneth it shall die.” (Ezekiel 18:20.)
It may yet be said that children are loaded with the sins of their fathers, because God, as he declares by Moses, extends his vengeance to the third and fourth generation. (Exodus 20:5.) And he says also in another place,
“I will return into the bosom of children the iniquity of their fathers.” (Jeremiah 32:18.)
God then continued his vengeance to their posterity. But yet there is no doubt but that the children who had been so severely punished, bore also the punishment of their own iniquity, for they deserved a hundred deaths. But these two things well agree together, that God returns the iniquity of the fathers into the bosom of their children, and yet that the children are chastised for their own sins.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain As our fathers have been punished for their sins:…
As our fathers have been punished for their sins: so we that are culpable of the same sins, are punished.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Lam 5:7 Our fathers have sinned, [and are] not;…
Lam 5:7 Our fathers have sinned, [and are] not; and we have borne their iniquities.
Ver. 7. Our fathers have sinned, and are not.] They had their payment, but not comparable to ours, who have outsinned them, and do therefore justly bear the punishment of both their sins and our own too. Nobis foret iucundias semel emori, quam vitara invitara vivere.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain We must not understand this in the same sense…
We must not understand this in the same sense as Eze 18:2, where God reflecteth upon them for using a proverb to this sense. It is the prophet who here speaketh, and in the name of the godly Jews, who would not excuse themselves as if they suffered merely for their forefathers’ sins. But the prophet confesseth and bewaileth that God had punished their iniquities and the iniquities of their forefathers together; and it was better with their forefathers who had sinned, and were dead and gone, than with them, upon whom the punishment of their iniquity did abide, and was like so to do a long time.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Our fathers have sinned, and are not,.... In the…
Our fathers have sinned, and are not,.... In the world, as the Targum adds; they were in being, but not on earth; they were departed from hence, and gone into another world; and so were free from the miseries and calamities their children were attended with, and therefore more happy:
and we have borne their iniquities; the punishment of them, or chastisement for them: this is not said by way of complaint, much less as charging God with injustice, in punishing them for their fathers' sins, or to excuse theirs; for they were ready to own that they had consented to them, and were guilty of the same; but to obtain mercy and pity at the hands of God.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Their iniquities - The punishment of them.
Their iniquities - The punishment of them.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 7. Our fathers have sinned, and are not]…
Verse 7. Our fathers have sinned, and are not] Nations, as such, cannot be punished in the other world; therefore national judgments are to be looked for only in this life. The punishment which the Jewish nation had been meriting for a series of years came now upon them, because they copied and increased the sins of their fathers, and the cup of their iniquity was full. Thus the children might be said to bear the sins of the fathers, that is, in temporal punishment, for in no other way does God visit these upon the children. See Eze 18:1, &c.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Lam 5:7-10. Our fathers have sinned, and are not…
Lam 5:7-10. Our fathers have sinned, and are not — Death hath secured our fathers from these evils, though they had sinned; but the punishment they escaped, we suffer in the most grievous degree: see note on Jer 31:29. The expression, is not, or, are not, is often used of those who are departed out of this world, Gen 42:13. Servants have ruled over us — Servants to the great men among the Chaldeans, and other strangers, are become our masters, Neh 5:15. We gat our bread with the peril of our lives, &c. — It was at the hazard of our lives that we brought in the grain out of the fields, on account of the robbers who infested the country. Blaney thinks that the prophet refers here to the incursions of the Arabian free-booters, who, he supposes, might not be improperly styled, the sword of the wilderness, to whose depredations the people, on account of their weak and helpless state, were continually exposed, while they followed their necessary business. Our skin was black like an oven — Famine and other hardships changed the very colour of our countenances.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain And are not; and we ... - Or, they…
And are not; and we ... - Or, they are not; “we have borne their iniquities.” Our fathers who began this national apostasy died before the hour of punishment.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Iniquities. This was the usual complaint of the Jews,…
Iniquities. This was the usual complaint of the Jews, (chap. xxxi. 29.) as if they had committed no offence themselves. If any virtuous people were involved in common ruin, they bore it with resignation, and acknowledged that they had deserved it, 1 Esdras ix. 6., and 2 Esdras i. 6., and Esther xiv. 6., and Daniel iii. 29.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain (Jer 31:29).
(Jer 31:29).
borne their iniquities--that is, the punishment of them. The accumulated sins of our fathers from age to age, as well as our own, are visited on us. They say this as a plea why God should pity them (compare Eze 18:2, &c.).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 7. Our fathers… we have borne their iniquities —…
7. Our fathers… we have borne their iniquities — They sinned, but died before the times were ripe for the punishment of the nation, hence we suffer for their sins. Not that they themselves were innocent, but they suffer not only for their own sins but also for those of their progenitors.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 7. we have borne their iniquities] See on Jer_31:29.…
7. we have borne their iniquities] See on Jer_31:29. The children, who, however, it must be acknowledged (see Lam_5:16) shared the guilt of preceding generations, have to bear the penalty escaped by their forbears.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (7) We have borne their iniquities.—The words seem at…
(7) We have borne their iniquities.—The words seem at first parallel to the proverb of the “sour grapes” in Jer_31:29; Eze_18:2. Here, however, it is followed in Lam_5:16 by a confession of personal guilt, and the complaint is simply that the former generation of offenders had passed away without the punishment which now fell upon their descendants, who thus had to bear, as it were, a double penalty.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain We have borne their iniquities. The fathers died before…
We have borne their iniquities. The fathers died before the iniquity was fully ripe for punishment, and their descendants have the feeling that the accumulated sins of the nation are visited upon them. This view of national troubles is very clearly endorsed by one important class of passages. (Exo_20:5 Exo_34:7 Num_14:18 Jer_32:18) The objection to it is forcibly expressed by Job, (Job_21:19) "God it is said layeth up his iniquity for his children: but let him requite it to himself, that he may feel it!" Hence Jeremiah (Jer_31:30) and Ezekiel (Eze_18:1, etc.) insist on the truth that every man is punished for his own sins. Of course the two views of punishment are reconcilable. The Jews were not only punished, according to Jer_16:11, Jer_16:12, for their fathers" sins, but for their own still more flagrant offences.
Children suffering for the sins of their parents.
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I IT IS A FACT THAT CHILDREN DO SUFFER FOR THE SINS OF THEIR PARENTS. It was apparent in the times of the Captivity; for owing to Josiah"s reformation the moral condition of the nation then was better than it had been a generation or so before; yet the blow, which was caused by the greater guilt of the fathers, fell upon the children. It may often be observed in history that the greatest catastrophes do not fall on the most guilty, but on their successors, who are often better mere Thus James II was a better man than Charles II, though the Stuart dynasty ended in the younger brother; and Louis XVI was comparatively innocent, and yet he had to suffer for the vices of Louis XIV and Louis XV In private life, poverty, disease, and disgrace are inherited by children from their parents. Now, it is a sign of the robust truthfulness of the Bible that this dark fact is distinctly recognized. There is no attempt to shun it because it is mysterious. We have in the Bible an honest, brave confronting of the evils of life, and not a system which is only beautiful to contemplate in idea and which cannot be squared with facts.
II THIS FACT IS A WARNING TO PARENTS. The selfishness that incurs disastrous consequences on a man"s family is too often ignored if those consequences are not immediately apparent. But it should be exposed and reprobated. Thus the intemperate man is sometimes regarded as a kind and good natured man because he displays no malice of temper. Surely his cruelty in impoverishing his household and risking the health of his children should be considered a gross sin. If a man will not hold his hand for his own soul"s sake, let him consider how he will wreck his family and ruin innocent sons and daughters before he yields to temptation.
III THIS FACT SHOULD NOT SHAKE OUR FAITH IN GOD.
1. Men in all ages have faced it clearly and yet have retained their trust in Providence, e.g. the writers of the Bible.
2. The very idea of faith implies that we must confide and wait in the darkness where we cannot understand.
3. The necessary greatness of the scheme of the government of a world should lead us to expect mysteries in it.
IV THIS FACT SHOULD HELP US TO UNDERSTAND PART OF THE DIVINE IDEA OF LIFE. It is a sorrowful sight innocent little children plunged into poverty and distress through no fault of their own, solely on account of the sins of those who should be their greatest benefactors! But it shows us that God does not treat us as isolated units. He takes notice of families as such. There is a "solidarity" of mankind. Everywhere we see the innocent suffering with the guilty. Social and domestic life are under providential care. And it may be best for the world as a whole that the several societies and collective bodies of which it consists should be governed with Messing and discipline than that each individual should receive only his own private grace and judgment. Moreover, if this is the case, inasmuch as the individuals profit by the corporate life and prosperity, this treatment by. families and cities and nations may turn out in the long run to be the best for the separate persons.
The moral continuity of nations.
Man is naturally not merely gregarious, but social. The powers that be, an apostle teaches us, are ordained by God from which we learn that political and social life have a Divine sanction. Accordingly, the Judge of all deals with men, not only as individuals, but as communities. This fact was present to the mind of the prophet when he wrote these words.
I THE FACT OF NATIONAL ACCOUNTABILITY TO THE MORAL GOVERNOR. The history of the Jews is the history of a theocracy; but it embodied lessons which are adapted to all mankind. Nations have national privileges, national responsibilities, national probations, national rewards and punishments.
II NATIONAL RETRIBUTION IS SOMETIMES DEFERRED FOR A SEASON. The prophets appear to have had a clear view of this law. Wrong doing in one generation was seen to be followed by punishment in a succeeding age. Jeremiah is the author of the well known proverb, "The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children"s teeth are set on edge." The seed (to change the figure) is sown by one generation; a following generation reaps the harvest.
III THE CERTAINTY THAT PENALTIES WILE, BE INFLICTED UPON THE IMPENITENT. There is indeed a sense in which even the repenting and reformed suffer for the sins of those who have gone before them. But for the impenitent and unreformed there is no exception, no escape. We, says the prophet, speaking of himself and of his rebellious and ungodly contemporaries have borne the iniquities of our fathers." The apostasy and rebellion of the former generations were visited upon those who endured the horrors of the siege and the degradation of the Captivity. There is mystery in the providential appointment that, not only shall every man bear his own burden, but that some shall bear the burden of those also who have gone before them. But the fact remains, and it gives solemnity to the life of families and of nations.
IV THE LESSON IS THUS IMPRESSED UPON ALL MEN HOW SERIOUS AND REAL A THING IS NATIONAL PROBATION!
The teaching which was profitable for Israel is equally adapted to England, and indeed to all the nations of mankind. The Lord is King, and from his government and authority none of the earth"s inhabitants is free. T.
The sin of the fathers and the suffering of the children.
This chapter is the complaint of those who suffer. "We," "us," "our, these are the prominent words. The complainers are those who have lost inheritance and houses, become fatherless, and entered into a galling servitude. And now what do they give as the reason of all this terrible experience? This that "our fathers have sinned.
I THE MEASURE OF TRUTH IN THIS. The fathers had sinned. That was a historical fact. The utterances of former prophets, recorded, perhaps, in far greater abundance than we have any idea of, attested the iniquities of past generations. No generation of which there was any record had been without its disobedience. And had it not also been said that the sins of the fathers should be visited on the children? Hence there is plain logic in these words, "Our fathers have sinned... and we have borne their iniquities." Great is the suffering in bodily pain, in privation, and in emotion, of every generation; and each generation has a right to say that some, at all events, of this suffering would have been escaped if only preceding generations had lived according to the full law of righteousness. Hence the appeal to us, when self-indulgence presses with all its energies, to consider others. Indulging self, we have to make ready for after pains; but those pains cannot be kept within the limit of our own lives.
II True as this statement is, there is A MEASURE OF DEFECT IN IT. Note exactly how the point is put: "Our fathers have sinned, and are not;" that is, "they cannot suffer any more, and now the suffering comes on to us." In such an aspect of the situation there is great pathos, but we need to travel round to the other aspects also. There is a difference between retribution and suffering. Some kinds of pain and injury may be inherited to the third and fourth generation, but a guilty conscience belongs to the individual. The worst pains, the worst consequences, and those on which the Saviour looks with the most pity, are surely those coming out of our own wrong doing; and searching into the connection between the sins of past generations and the suffering of the present one will do harm rather than good, if such a searching tends to obscure our own lawlessness, our own want of attention to the requirements of God, There is, indeed, a great difference in kind between the suffering coming on us from the wickedness of others and that which comes from our own. Y.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain Our fathers have sinned, and are not, and we…
Lam_5:7
Our fathers have sinned, and are not, and we have borne their iniquities.
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Zions sufferings
The terms unfolded, When in the depths of our distress the iniquities of our forefathers come to our remembrance, at once they aggravate our sins and augment our sorrows (2Ki_22:13; Dan_9:16; Jer_14:19-20). When God comes to find sin successive in generations, the last shall be sure to drink deep of the cup of Divine vengeance (Neh_9:34-35; Neh_9:38; Jer_4:24-25). When ancestors sins are not our cautions (Eze_18:14), it deeply aggravates the guilt of our souls (Neh_13:18; Ezr_9:7; Jer_16:11-13; Zec_1:4-6). The longer heavens patience is abused, the greater and more dreadful is the wrath of God that is deserved (Rom_2:4-5; Rom_1:18; Jer_49:9-11). If we promote sin by indulgence, or by example in our posterities, we shall be sure to entail judgment upon our issue (1Sa_2:29; 1Sa_2:34; 1Sa_2:36). Children are many times executors, they enter upon their fathers sins, and you know that in justice the executor may be sued, the debtor being dead. God may punish the sins of the parents upon the children, and yet the cause of the punishment may be in themselves (Hos_4:12-13). As if any being sick of the plague infect others, every one that dies, is said to die, not of others, but of his own plague. Had their parents been good, had they been pious and zealous for God, there would have been no ground, no cause for this complaint; they could not then have said, Our fathers iniquity is laid as a burden upon our shoulders. It is good to be good parents, parental holiness is advantageous to posterity (Psa_102:28; Psa_112:1-2; Pro_14:26; Jer_32:39).
1. Exemplary piety in the fathers makes an impression upon the childrens hearts (Zec_10:7).
2. Heavens benediction descends from the parents to the children (Act_2:39).
3. Wicked fathers infelicitate their posterity (Job_5:3-4). The Jews were very unhappy parents (Mat_27:25). Children, plead if you can your ancestors integrity before the Lord. The fathers piety is the childs privilege (Psa_116:16; Psa_86:16; 1Ki_8:23-25). Let us labour to be good ourselves, and to plant holiness in our families, that so we may have Gods blessings estated upon our children (Gen_18:19). (D. Swift.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.