Ezekiel 18:20

The context

Ezekiel 18 addresses exiles who were quoting a proverb about fathers eating sour grapes and children's teeth being set on edge. The chapter answers with a series of cases, a righteous man, his violent son, and a righteous grandson, and it ends with a plea to turn and live. Verse 20 states the principle the cases illustrate.

What it establishes

The verse establishes individual responsibility within the covenant: the one who sins dies, and the son does not carry the father's guilt. It is addressed to a community that felt trapped by inherited consequences, and it opens a door to repentance rather than closing one.

What it does not establish

It does not deny corporate consequences. The verse concerns liability in judgment, and it says nothing about the way one generation's sin damages the next in practice. Nor does it settle the later comparison of Adam and Christ, which works with a different question about representation.

Short note, first pass, October 2026. Corrections welcome.

Cited in these answers

• If God is all-powerful, all-knowing and all-loving, why does he permit starvation, child molestation, rape, torture and genocide? And don't tell me these victims are suffering for Adam's sin.

Part of Scripture, Opened — the exegetical layer behind every citation on this site. Scripture quotations are from the ESV.