We have in our Bibles a few Bible verses which clearly indicate that children ought not be put to death for the sins of their parents.
What then are we to make of verses described divinely ordained genocide in the Hexateuch, wherein the soldiers are ordered to completely destroy "the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites" leaving "alive nothing that breathes" as they find themselves stabbing eastward into the Promised Land, wiping out city after city along the way.
Moreover, we have the following from Isaiah 14:21-22 (YLT):
Prepare ye for his sons slaughter; Because of the iniquity of their fathers, They rise not, nor have possessed the land, Nor filled the face of the world [with] cities. And I have risen up against them, (The affirmation of Jehovah of Hosts,) And have cut off, in reference to Babylon, Name and remnant, and continuator and successor, The affirmation of Jehovah.Isaiah 14 is basically one long fuckyoulogy to the late king of Babylon, which seems like a harmless bunch of invective until we get to the part at the end praising YHWH for wiping out all the sons of Babylon.
I would suppose the apologetical approach to this problem is to carve out an exception for divinely ordained genocide, so the rule should be taken to read "Do not kill the children for the sins of their fathers, unless that sin happens to be the sin of being born into the wrong tribe."
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