Last week, we read the story about how Moses, at God's command, sent 12 men into the promised land to explore it. Before Moses sent them, he specifically asked them to bring back a report about the people living there-- are they strong, or weak, are they few, or many? Are their cities fortified, or unwalled? He also wanted to know about the soil, and agriculture. Is it good soil? Does it grow great crops?
When the 12 returned, all 12 were in total agreement about all of those things. The land was a great land, that grew great crops. And there were lots of people, including the Nephilim, who were legitimately viewed as giants, to say the least. And those Nephilim lived in strong, fortified cities.
Where those 12 men disagreed, was on what they should do next. 10 of the men believed that it would be impossible to conquer such a land, because the Nephilim were stronger than them. 2 of the men-- Caleb and Joshua-- were excited about the land, were ready to immediately do battle and take it, and were totally confident that they could conquer it.
So that's the report that the 12 brought back with them, and the advice that they gave.
In Numbers 14, we get to hear the response of the people to this report. Let's read through verse 9, to start:
(1) And the whole assembly/congregation lifted up,
and they gave their voice,
and the people wept that day,
(2) and they grumbled against Moses and against Aaron-- all the sons of Israel--,
and they said to them-- the whole assembly/congregation--
"If only we had died in the land of Egypt!,
or in this wilderness, if only we had died!,
(3) and why [is] Yahweh bringing us to this land to fall by the sword?
Our wives and our little children shall become plunder.
Is it not good/better for us to return to Egypt?,"
(4) and each one said to his brother,
"Let's choose a head/leader,
that we may return to Egypt!,"
(5) and Moses and Aaron fell upon their faces before the whole assembly-- the congregation of the sons of Israel --
(6) and Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Yiphuneh-- from the ones searching out the land-- tore their cloaks,
(7) and they spoke to the whole assembly/congregation of the sons of Israel, saying,
"The land that we passed through in it to explore it-- good, the land [is] (same word as verse 3, "good"; "good"
is focused), exceedingly, exceedingly."
(8) If Yahweh delights in us, He will bring us to this land,
and He will give to us the land that flows with milk and honey.
(9) Only, against Yahweh, may you not rebel,
while you, may you not fear the people of the land,
because our bread, they [are]. [a deliberate contrast to Numbers 13:32]
It has been removed-- their protection-- from over them,
while Yahweh [is] with us.
May you not fear them,"
God's people hear the report, and they have two choices. They can believe the 2, or they can believe the 10. And they believe the 10. The people decide it's hopeless, and that it's time to democratically elect new leadership, and go crawling back to Egypt. They complain about the position that God put them in. And when they do complain, we have a pretty good idea, at this point in Numbers, what will happen next. When people complain about God, God hears that, and He punishes that.
So the response of the congregation is a total disaster in the making. Right?
But before anything bad has happened, starting in verse 6, Joshua and Caleb, the two faithful spies, step up one last time, to encourage the people to take the other option. "Everyone, listen: Yahweh delights in you. He is with you. So all of this is totally going to work out. Taking the land isn't just up to you; God will bring you in, and He will give you the land."
Only, there's a condition to all of that (first word, verse 9). God's promise isn't unconditional. The people need to not rebel. They need to trust God, and not give in to fear. God delights in people who obey him, and stay loyal to him.
So because Joshua and Caleb step in, the people get a second chance. They once again have two choices set before them, and they are given more theological arguments in favor of being brave, and taking the land. At this point, they can still repent, and turn back to God, and Moses, and Aaron, and Joshua, and Caleb.
This is what the people do. Verse 10:
(10) and the whole congregation threatened/proposed to stone them with stones.
The people make their choice. They double down, and threaten to stone Joshua and Caleb.
It's into this, that God very publicly enters the scene. I'll start again at the beginning of verse 10:
(10) and the whole congregation threatened/proposed to stone them with stones.
Now, the glory of Yahweh appeared in the tent of meeting to all the sons of Israel,
(11) and Yahweh said to Moses,
"How long will this people despise me,
and how long will they not be confident (Deut. 28:66)/have faith (Jonah 3:5) in me, with/among all the wonders that I have done in their midst?
(12) May I (jussive) strike them with the plague/pestilence,
that I may disinherit him/them,
that I may make you into a nation greater and mightier than them,"
God is tired of dealing with his people, and so He makes Moses an offer that is basically identical to the one He offered after the golden calf, in Exodus 32. God suggests, politely, that He wipe out his people completely by sending some type of disease, that He disinherit his people, and that He start over by making Moses into a great nation.
So now Moses is the one who has two choices. He can agree to what the God of heaven and earth proposes, or he can push back. God gives him space to push back. God fully invites Moses into the decision-making process about what the future will look like. And what choice does Moses make?
Verse 13:
(13) and Moses said to Yahweh,
"And the Egyptians will hear-- because you brought up with your strength this people from their midst--
(14) and they will speak to the inhabitants of this land.
They have heard
that you, Yahweh, [are] in the midst of this people,
that, face to face, you, O Yahweh, have been seen,
while your cloud is standing over them,
while in a pillar of a cloud you are going before them by day,
while in a pillar of fire at night,
(15) and [if] you destroy this people all at once, the nations will say-- [the ones] who have heard the report about you--
(16) "Since Yahweh wasn't able to bring this people to the land that He swore to them, He slaughtered them
in the wilderness,"
Moses' sole concern, in response-- at least what he verbalizes-- is with God's reputation. The Egyptians know that Yahweh, the God of Israel, has a remarkably visible and transparent relationship with his people. Yahweh is a God who doesn't hide. Israel lives by sight. They've seen God. They've got this cloud by day, this fire by night. Everyone knows that Yahweh is Israel's God, and Israel is Yahweh's people.
So if Yahweh destroys his people, everyone is going to draw the wrong conclusion about Yahweh. They'll think that Yahweh was strong enough to free his people from Egypt, but He wasn't strong enough to defeat the Nephilim. Probably, they'll think that the supernatural beings who fight with and for the Nephilim are stronger than the Egyptian gods, and Yahweh just couldn't pull it off. And if Yahweh kills off his people, what everyone will think Yahweh did, out of a sense of shame and embarrassment, was kill off his own people, to hide the truth.
Moses looks into the future, and tells God that this is a real possibility. What God does next will set off a series of dominoes, and that's how it will end. And so Moses encourages God to make a different choice.
Now, before we dive in to the rest of Moses' response, I should say that this is a really tricky little speech, with lots of nuance, and interpretive possibilities. What I'm about to read, should be considered one possible interpretation, or translation, of what Moses says. Almost every word, and phrase, is complicated. I've left my translation ambiguous enough that you can take it home and play with it, and wrestle with it, and see if you think Moses says something a little different than what I think. And if you're not quite sure about parts, I've got a few pages of extra notes on the really hard parts, that I'd be happy to share with you. Fair enough?
Let's start by reading verses 17-19, and then we'll go back over it slowly:
(17) and so then, may the strength of the Lord (Adonai) be great, please,
just as He spoke (Exodus 34:6-7), saying,
(18) 'Yahweh [is] slow of anger, and great in loyalty,
forgiving/removing ("nasa") avon/sin/guilt/punishment (???)
and rebellion (1 Samuel 24:11)/wrongdoing (Genesis 31:36; 50:17; Isaiah 58:1ff.),
and He doesn't leave completely/totally unpunished,
bringing the avon/punishment of the fathers upon the sons, upon the third and upon the fourth
[generation].'
(19) "Suspend, please, the avon/punishment of this people,
in accordance with the greatness of your loyalty,
and in accordance with how you carried ("nasa," but here meaning "carry" not "forgive") this people from
Egypt until now,"
So in verse 16 Moses said that if God wipes out his own people, that all the other peoples will decide that Yahweh is a God who bit off more than He could chew-- that He wasn't strong enough, to give his people the land. Moses knows this isn't true. But it's what the peoples would come to believe.
In verse 17, Moses builds off that, introducing his formal request ("and so then"), by asking God to use his strength. You'd think that's the last thing Moses would want to talk about here. There is a red line that Israel has crossed, and God is right on the edge of using his strength to wipe out his own people in response. But Moses wants God to show his strength in a different way: by showing restraint, by being slow to anger, and by being great in loyalty (the word means "loyalty, not "lovingkindness"). It takes strength, to respond this way.
So in all of this, Moses is quoting, almost word for word, God's own words about what He's like in Exodus 34:6-7. In those verses, Yahweh identifies himself as being a God who is slow to anger, and great in loyalty. And this is the perfect time for Yahweh to be true to his own character, and be incredibly slow to anger, and far more loyal to Israel than they deserve (*Katherine Sakenfeld, "The Problem of Forgiveness in Numbers 14").
Now, this is where it starts to get really complicated. Let's reread the first part of verse 18:
(18) "Yahweh [is] slow of anger, and great in loyalty,
forgiving/removing ("nasa") avon/sin/guilt/punishment (????)
and rebellion (1 Samuel 24:11)/wrongdoing (Genesis 31:36; 50:17; Isaiah
58:1ff.),
Let's ease into this by talking about the meaning of the Hebrew word "avon." "Avon" is by itself a tricky word, that can describe the act of sin ("iniquity"; Isaiah 59:2), the state of guilt that results from that sin (1 Samuel 20:8), and the punishment that comes as a result (Genesis 4:13; 19:15). [And all the standard lexicons agree on this, DBL, DCH, HALOT; verses are pulled from those sources). In English, we want to draw nice lines between all of these things. We want to say that when we sin, we become guilty, and then it (sometimes) leads to God's punishment. But in Hebrew, we'd say that sometimes we "avon," and when we "avon," we enter into a state of being "avon," and that tends to lead to "avon" from God (Numbers 5, the law concerning the jealous husband and possibly adulterous wife, nicely illustrates this).
The easiest way to tell when it's the Hebrew word "avon," is when you see the word "iniquity" in an older translation of the Bible. But, again, that word "iniquity" can mean sin, or guilt, or punishment, or some combination of all three, in any given verse. It's complicated.
And the memory trick for remembering "avon," if you're interested, is to think about the poor men who are married to "avon ladies." [It sounds different, with the stress on the second syllable, but it looks the same]. The avon husbands have to help get their house cleaned up for the avon parties, they have to help host, and they have to help clean up. Avon husbands feel like the whole thing is avon-- they wonder what sin they committed, that they ended up in this situation, what guilt they have, and why they are being punished this way.
The other tricky word in here is "nasa." Depending on who the subject of the verb is-- on who is doing the verb-- it means something like, "to carry, or bear, or forgive, or remove." When God does the verb (or God's agents), it means something like "to forgive or to remove."
So what would it mean, to say that God forgives, or removes, avon? What's being removed?
Does God remove sin? Guilt? Punishment? There's an ambiguity here in Hebrew (and the reason I think all of this is so complicated, in Hebrew, is because of how much work has to go into explaining what God is and isn't doing here, relative to the word "avon").
If we add in the next line, which talks about rebellion, I think that partially answers our question. Rebellion is an act, as "sin" is an act. So I think for sure what "avon" means, is that God forgives acts of sin. Is God also saying that He removes guilt, and that He removes punishment?
At this point, we are best served by putting a giant question mark in the text. God forgives something, removes something, but what exactly?
Let's restart verse 18 for the last time, and go through the whole verse:
(18) "Yahweh [is] slow of anger, and great in loyalty,
forgiving/removing ("nasa") avon/sin/guilt/punishment (here: sin? guilt?)
and rebellion (1 Samuel 24:11)/wrongdoing (Genesis 31:36; 50:17; Isaiah 58:1ff.),
and He doesn't leave completely/totally unpunished,
bringing the avon/punishment of the fathers upon the sons, upon the third and upon the fourth
[generation].'
So God removes "avon." But, at the same time, God "doesn't completely leave unpunished, but instead, He brings the avon of the fathers upon the sons."
Here, I think, we have our answer. What God "removes" completely (I think), when He "nasa"s, is sin, and guilt. He also partially removes punishment. He doesn't completely leave unpunished; there is still some punishment.
God then goes on, and elaborates on how this punishment works. When God punishes, He punishes across multiple generations. What's in view here isn't generational curses. There's nothing in here about curses; there's no curse language. God isn't talking about generational curses; He's talking about generational punishment. When the fathers sin, God punishes them. But God doesn't stop there. He also brings the punishment upon the fathers' kids, and grandkids, and great grandkids. [And I should say again, that what God is clarifying here, or unpacking, is the complicated meaning of "avon."]
God says this, and we wonder why He would do that. And we wonder what that looks like. When we keep reading, we'll get our answer. So I think we're best served by putting another giant question mark in the margin, and waiting at this point.
So Moses, in verses 17-18, reminds God of God's own words about who He is, and how He acts toward his people. Yahweh has said that He is a loyal, slow-to-anger God. Now, Moses makes his straightforward request. But understanding the Hebrew, is again a tricky thing. Things don't get any easier:
(19) "Suspend, please, the avon/punishment of this people,
in accordance with the greatness of your loyalty,
and in accordance with how you carried this people from Egypt until now,"
English Bibles here don't translate the first verb as "suspend." They'll translate it as Moses asking God to either "forgive," or "pardon." This is a different word. It's not "nasa," it's "salah."
But what Moses is seeking, isn't God's forgiveness, as we'd normally understand forgiveness. Moses isn't asking that the people's guilt be removed, or covered/atoned, or that they be cleansed from sin, or that their sin would be separated from them, as far as the east is from the west. What Moses wants here, is for God to not do what He threatened to do in the first place in verse 12. Moses doesn't want God to strike his people with the plague, kill them all, and then start over with Moses (*Katherine Sakenfeld, "The Problem of Forgiveness in Numbers 14", and on this point, Sakenfeld has won widespread consensus). So I think the verb here doesn't really mean forgive, at least here. I think it means "suspend."
The cleanest, shortest example of this verb "salah" meaning "suspend," and not forgive, is in Amos 7 (NRSV updated no reason). Basically, God threatens a terrible punishment on Israel. Amos uses the verb, "salah," asking God not to do it. And God relents:
7 This is what the Lord GOD showed me: he was forming locusts at the time the latter growth began to sprout (it was the latter growth after the king’s mowings). 2 When they had finished eating the grass of the land, I said,
“O Lord GOD, FORGIVE, I beg you!
How can Jacob stand?
He is so small!”
3 The LORD relented concerning this;
“It shall not be,” said the LORD.
In Amos 7, God isn't forgiving the people, as we think of forgiveness. He goes on to propose other judgments; nothing is settled, or finished. What God is agreeing to, is to not bring the punishment He threatened.
"Salah," at least at times (it's messy; see supplementary notes), means to suspend punishment.
When we return back to Numbers, we see that God agrees to Moses' request:
(20) and Yahweh said,
"I will suspend
in accordance with your word.
What God is saying, in verse 20, isn't that He's forgiving his people. He's saying, the sin-- the avon-- that his people committed, won't end his relationship with them. God will prove that He is great in loyalty, and slow to anger. He won't kill everyone. He will keep his covenant with Israel. God and his people will still have a future together.
So at this point, we probably feel a little confused about how to put it all together. How do think about God being loyal, and forgiving, and at the same time still bringing punishment on both the fathers and the later generations?
What we get, in the rest of this chapter, unpacks this. I'll just read all the way through, to verse 38:
(21) However, as I live, the glory of Yahweh will fill all the earth.
(22) Although ("ki") all the people [have been] seeing my glory and my signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, they have tested me these ten times,
and they haven't heeded my voice.
(23) Surely they shall never see the land that I swore to their fathers,
while all the ones despising me, may they never see it!,
(24) while my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit with him, and [because] he wholly follows after me, I shall bring him to the land which he entered into there,
and his seed will inherit/possess it.
(25) Now, the Amalekites and the Canaanites [are] dwelling in the valley.
Tomorrow, turn,
and set out for the desert/wilderness [by] the way/road of the Sea of Reeds,"
(26) and Yahweh spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying,
"How long [will it be] for this evil congregation
that they are complaining against me?
The complaining of the sons of Israel that they [are] complaining against me, I have heard.
(28) Say to them,
"As I live-- utterance of Yahweh-- surely, just as you spoke in my ears, thus I will do to you (Numbers 14:2: "If only we'd died in this wilderness").
(29) In this wilderness your carcasses will fall,
with all the ones counted from among your number from 20 years and up
who complained against me.
(30) Surely, you won't enter into the land, which I lifted up my hand to make you dwell in it,
but only Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun,
while your little children-- whom you said, "Plunder, they will be"-- I will bring them,
and they will know the land which you rejected,
(32) while your carcasses will fall in this desert/wilderness,
(33) while your children will be shepherds in the desert/wilderness forty years,
and/that they will bear/carry your unfaithfulness/prostitution until all your carcasses are in the desert.
(34) In accordance with the number of days that you explored the land-- 40 days-- for every day, a year-- you will bear/carry your avon/sin/guilt/punishment-- 40 years,
and you will know/acknowledge my opposition (DCH).
(35) I, Yahweh, have spoken.
Surely, this I will do to all this evil congregation/community-- the ones banding together against me:
In this desert they will be finished,
while there they will die,
(36) and the men-- who Moses sent to explore the land, and they returned, and they complained against him [to] the whole community, by spreading a negative report concerning the evil land-- the men spreading the negative report of the land died through the plague before Yahweh,
(38) while Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh lived-- from among those ones who went to explore the land.
The verses I want to focus on here are v. 33 and 34. These are the two verses that help us put it all together:
(33) while your children will be shepherds in the desert/wilderness forty years,
and/that they will bear/carry your unfaithfulness/prostitution until all your carcasses are in the desert.
(34) In accordance with the number of days that you explored the land-- 40 days-- for every day, a year-- you will bear/carry your avon/sin/guilt/punishment-- 40 years,
What's the end result of the fathers' sin?
Let's look first at verse 34, and what God does to the fathers. God doesn't immediately kill them. But He also doesn't leave their sin completely unpunished, by any means. For every day that the spies were in the promised land, the fathers will "bear"-- they will "nasa"-- their punishment for a year. The entire time in the wilderness will be punishment. Yahweh will still be their God; He will still provide for them, and protect them. But at the same time, it'll be punishment. That generation has forever missed out on what God swore, on oath, He would give to them (because as Caleb rightly noted, the oath and the delighting is conditional).
What about the kids?
They will also "nasa." They will bear their father's unfaithfulness. They will be stuck in the wilderness, roaming it like shepherds, until their fathers all die. They will share, with their fathers, God's punishment.
So when we take a step back, and look at generational punishment in this passage, what do we see, and what do we not see?
What we don't see:
(1) I don't think the passages teaches that the children suffer "in place of" the fathers, or that there is any "transfer" of sin, or guilt, or punishment. The fathers bear their own punishment. Children suffer "with" their fathers. They suffer "because of" their fathers. They don't suffer "in place of" their fathers.
(2) I don't think the passage teaches that the fathers suffer less, because their children innocently suffer (as I think Jacob Milgrom maybe argues). The children don't lighten their father's punishment. The passage doesn't quite make that link, and I don't want to push it that direction. The fathers suffer less than they should, because God chooses to be great in loyalty, and slow to anger, and because God to some extent removes punishment (avon).
What we see:
(1) When God punishes the fathers' generation, that punishment doesn't stop neatly at their own generational line (Joshua 7:11).
(2) When God "brings punishment" to the third and fourth generation, that extends up to the maximum number of generations that can be alive at the same time. A great-great grandparent can see a great-great grandchild. [Best here would be if there's three generations of one family in church]. Imagine God standing up front of this church, and threatening to bring judgment on this church body as a whole, because of something that the grandparents and elders did. The group that God looks out on, the congregation, extends up to the third and fourth generation. God says, I will bring punishment on those wicked grandparents, and on the parents, and on the kids, and on the grandkids. God deals with, interacts, with, the congregation as a whole.
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What should we take home today?
What we see in this passage, is something that we often see in life. Life often presents itself as a series of choices, for both God, and people. Our God wants to have a relationship with us, where we are loyal, and faithful, and brave, and obedient. He wants us to live out of a starting point that recognizes that God is with us, that God be trusted, and that God will keep his promises. God wants this for each one of us individually, for each his little congregations, and for his congregation as a whole.
But what God wants, God doesn't always get. Not yet, anyway.
And so we, and God, find ourselves wrestling with what comes next, when God's people sin.
What we see in this passage, is a clear example of corporate sin. Of God's people, as a group, being unfaithful, and fearful, and rejecting God, and wanting to go back to their old way of life. We see them listening to the wrong voices, and then doubling down, and wanting to permanently silence the voices of the faithful, who tell them what they don't want to hear.
In this passage, the sin starts with just 10 people. 10 people didn't trust in God's loyalty, or in his power. 10 people worked from an earthly, human, Godless perspective. 10 people believed that what God wanted, and expected, wasn't possible. And the sin of those 10 people rippled out through an entire generation of God's people, so that almost everyone turned from God.
So we see that the consequences of sin extend far beyond the first sinner. Sin within God's people is like a cancer, or a rot, that tends to spread, and turn everything else into something equally rotten.
We also see something else in this story that spreads out-- God's judgment, his punishment.
In this story, we see, first of all, that it's the fathers' generation that God holds responsible. They are the ones, as heads of their families, and clans, and tribes, who have a particular responsibility to do what's right, and wholly follow after God. They are the ones whose voice carries the most weight. These fathers are also responsible for leading their children-- the next generation-- to make the same decisions-- to walk in loyalty toward God, keeping covenant with Him, loving Him with the entirety of their being. As long as children are under their father's roof, the father's expectation should be, that they will serve the Lord. But in the meantime, while the kids are kids (and until sons turn into fathers), it's the fathers who carry the first and primary responsibility to make sure that they, and their families, stay faithful to God.
In this story, we see the fathers fail at all of this. From God's perspective, in God's words, they prostituted themselves.
We also see that when God punishes in response, that this punishment extends beyond those who are most responsible. God's punishment doesn't always stop neatly, precisely, surgically, at generational lines. The whole congregation will be stuck in the wilderness until the fathers' generation completely dies off. In verse 33, we read that the children will "bear the unfaithfulness of their fathers." This doesn't mean that the children carry guilt. It means they suffer under the same punishment of the fathers, at least for a time.
Does this strike us as unfair? Is it right for children to carry the unfaithfulness of their fathers? Is it right for children to have to wander the wilderness for decades because of what their fathers did?
That's something we will probably wrestle with more next week. But this passage assumes that God has relationships with groups, at least as much as He does with individuals. God made a covenant through Moses with the people-- the nation-- as a whole. God interacts with the nation as a whole. When the whole congregation complains, and rejects God's salvation, and wants to return like a dog to its vomit back to Egypt and its old way of life, God (for good reason) takes that as a personal rejection of him, and his salvation. And God punishes the entire nation as a result, up to three and four generations.
And the idea of three and four generations, is that it includes every Israelite possibly living at that time. Especially in a day when people married young, and started having kids young, it'd be possible to have four generations living at the same time. So the idea isn't that curses, or punishments, have a life of their own, and that they operate independently of God, and that people living 80 years later are suffering because of something their great-great grandpa did. It's not like someone like me, in my 40s, needs to be worried about something my great grandpa did a long time ago, even though he's been in the grave for decades. The idea is that there's a 2 year old in the Israelite camp, and he falls under God's judgment in the wilderness because of his great-great grandpa's complaining about God. God "brings punishment on 2 year olds" because Israel as a whole has sinned against God, and 2 year olds bear corporate responsibility for what their living great-great grandpas did.
Are you with me?
And we maybe find ourselves assuming this is just an OT thing (and we maybe wonder how Ezekiel 18 plays in at this point, as well, but that's a topic possibly for next week). But in the book of Revelation, we see that Jesus comes in judgment, for good or bad, on churches as a whole. And in Corinth, the church's failure to celebrate the Lord's supper the right way, by waiting for everyone to get there, and eat the potluck as a whole body, led God to bringing judgment on the church as a whole (1 Corinthians 11:30). So we should be cautious in assuming that this is simply an OT thing. God deals with his people as a whole, at least as much as individuals.
Now, we don't see it in this passage, but God deals with family units as well, at least as much as individuals. When a father sins, the kids are often punished with the father. Family units are viewed as a whole, and treated as a whole, by God. This also works positively, the other way. When a father acts loyally toward God, God brings blessings on that whole house. And this is something that probably continues into the New Testament. When Paul encourages people to stay married to their unbelieving spouses, he says that their spouse is considered "holy" to God (1 Corinthians 7:14). God views that spouse, and those kids, as being consecrated, committed, to Him. And God treats your spouse and your kids better, because of their connection to you. God delights in them, because of you. And because of that connection, God will show them grace, and favor, and give them earthly blessings that He otherwise wouldn't.
So when we look at the passage as a whole, we see that God deals with the nation as a whole. There is corporate responsibility. Corporate sin. Corporate guilt. Corporate punishment.
At the same time, we also see in this passage that Israel isn't treated as one homogenous unit. In our passage, God's people look more like raw milk, than store milk. There are layers. There's some separation.
God blesses Caleb and Joshua for their confidence in God, and for their attempt to persuade the nation to choose faith, and courage, over doubt and fear. Caleb and Joshua are the cream of the milk, who get to enter the good land. And the 10 spies who swayed the nation, and caused God's little ones to stumble? At the end of the passage, verses 36-38, we see that God showed them much more severe judgment. They didn't get to live out their lives in the wilderness; God killed them much faster.
So in this one passage, we can see a pretty filled out picture of how God interacts with individuals, and with groups. We can see how those pieces fit together. There's individual responsibility, and corporate responsibility. And it's not just that everyone is responsible for themselves, and we are supposed to mind our own business, and worry about ourselves. God doesn't just want his people to be faithful; He wants them to be like Caleb, and Joshua, and try to turn his people away from sin (James 5:20).
Let me leave you today with one sobering thought. Those of you who have the biggest voice in church, who are in positions of leadership, and authority, who are pastors, and elders, and teachers-- or maybe you're simply respected voices, who everyone tends to listens to-- have a weighty responsibility. You are the generation who help the church make a choice, about which voice it will listen to. You are the ones who decide which sins are tolerated, and which sins are allowed to spread like a cancer through the whole church body. Which sins are called sin? Which sins are ignored, and won't be talked about? And you are the ones who make the choice, whether you will steer the whole congregation toward God's blessings, or God's judgment. You can be like the 10, or like the 2.
I was at a church once, led by a cessationist pastor, which somehow ended up with a young married couple in it, who were radically committed to God. They had great confidence in God-- they were the kind of people who'd look at Nephilim in fortified cities, and grab a ladder and a sword. And they had all of what we'd consider to be the typical charismatic characteristics-- they worshipped exuberantly, with swaying, and dancing. They spoke in tongues. They'd stop random people on the street who suffered physically, and ask if they could pray for those people, laying hands on them in Jesus' name.
The leadership of this church was panicky over this couple, and didn't know what to do with them. The couple was asked to worship in the back, so that worship was "orderly," meaning hands at one's sides, standing like statues. They were carefully limited in what they were allowed to do in the church. Great care was quietly made, behind the scenes, to put safer people in positions of responsibility and authority, and keep that couple on the margins.
Looking back on that this week, I would say now what I never would've said then-- because I was one who was freaked out by that couple, and didn't know what to make of them. This couple was a gift from Jesus (Ephesians 4:7, 11-12), sent to build up this body, and transform it into something much more biblical. But this couple was an unwanted gift. Their voices, like that of Caleb and Joshua, weren't listened to. And eventually they moved on-- God called them somewhere else, to take an incredible risk, hundreds of miles away. This is a church that died fairly quickly, a short time later. And maybe, this was part of why that happened (cheap grace, also). Maybe, this is part of why God brought that church to an end. I'm not at all sure. All I can do is wonder. But that church certainly missed out on God's best for them. There was a much better path set before them, and the church chose not to take it.
In every church, there are critical moments where the congregation has to decide which voice it will listen to, and which it will reject. And it's easy to make the wrong decision about whose voice we will listen to. The easiest voices to listen to, are the ones who expect nothing of God, who think God can't be trusted in everyday life, and who are quick to complain about God when things get scary and tough. It's hard to listen to the voices who have great faith, who suggest something that feels big and risky. We'd like to think that we are a church who would listen to Calebs and Joshuas, but that's easier said than done.
One last thought: We see in this passage that it's easy to not simply fall into sin ourselves, but to steer everyone else around us into the same sin.
If we do this, the risk is that we'll bring judgment not only on ourselves, but on the church as a whole. And what this passage shows, is that this judgment may not just be for our generation of fathers, but the young one that follows.
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Note #1. What does it mean to "visit upon"?
I didn't actually check the KJV, but my guess is that this is an example of where the KJV's very wooden/formal translation as "visiting iniquity upon" has just passed through the different newer translations of Bible, but it was never very clear what that meant.
When I temporarily left out the word "iniquity" (avon), and just searched the phrase "visit upon," I found that it very clearly means "bring upon/against." In many examples, God "brings judgment upon sinners." In other examples, He brings judgment upon" the third and fourth generation. In a few places, it has a separate meaning of "assigning/appointing over":
Exodus 32:34: "On the day of my "visiting," I will visit upon them their sin, and (35) Yahweh afflicted the people."
Leviticus 26:16: "I will visit upon you horror-- the wasting disease and the fever, etc."
Leviticus 26:29: "If like the death of every human, these ones die, and the visitation/("fate") of every human is visited upon them, Yahweh hasn't sent me."
2 Samuel 3:8: "You have visited upon me the avon/sin/guilt/punishment of the woman today."
-a false accusation against a man, saying he slept with Saul's concubine. He is trying to put guilt on him ("assign upon him"; see next verse?), and the guy just isn't having it.
1 Kings 14:27: "He assigned/visited upon the hand of the commanders of the runners keeping/guarding the doorway of the king's house.
2 Kings 25:22: "Nebuchadnezzar "assigned/appointed/visited over them" certain people to govern them.
Isaiah 10:12: "I will visit upon/against the fruit of arrogance of the king of Assyria"
Isaiah 13:11: "I will visit upon the world [van der Mere: "for its"] evil (???), and upon the wicked ones ["for?"] their avon.
-My guess is the word order is unusual. "I will visit upon the world disaster (raah can have this sense, referring not just to the evil deed but also to the consequences God brings because of that deed; it functions like avon, Exodus 32:14), and I will visit upon the wicked people their 'avon' (which here again refers to either the guilt, or the consequences of that avon).
Isaiah 27:3: I, Yahweh, will guard her, again and again I will provide water for her, lest he/someone "visits upon her."
Jeremiah 9:24: "I will visit upon all the circumcised in foreskin" =I will punish all the circumcised...
same in Jeremiah 11:22
Jeremiah 13:21, "appointing over you."
Jeremiah 15:3: "I will visit/appoint/summon over them four calamities."
Jeremiah 23:34 (concerning false prophets): "I will visit upon that man and upon his house." =I will bring judgment/punishment upon...
Jeremiah 25:12: "I will visit upon the king of Babylon and upon that nation-- utterance of Yahweh-- their avon, and upon the land of the Chaldeans... then used in parallel with "bringing upon that land all the words I spoke against it."
Jeremiah 27:8: God "visits a plague upon that nation." ="brings a plague upon"
To me, at least, it's quite clear that to "visit iniquity upon the third and fourth generation" means "to bring judgment/punishment upon the third and fourth generation."
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Note #2: The meaning of "salah," to suspend/forgive.
The expression I'm most interested here, is where "salah" occurs with the preposition "l," introducing/marking the object "suspended." Dictionary of Classical Hebrew lists the following examples:
(1) With "katat," sin/punishment ("katat" can mean "punishment for sin," cf. Zechariah 14:19, and the following are other examples where "punishment" perhaps makes sense): Exodus 34:9; 1 Kings 8:34; 2 Chronicles 6:25; 1 Kings 8:36; 2 Chronicles 6:27; Jeremiah 36:3; 2 Chronicles 7:14.
(2) With "avon," punishment: Exodus 34:9; Numbers 14:19; Jeremiah 31:34; 33:8; 36:3; Psalm 25:11; 103:3.
(3) With "pesha," rebellion: 1 Kings 8:50.
To "salah," means to suspend judgment (Amos 7:2).
Here's Jeremiah 36:3 (NIV no reason):
3 Perhaps when the people of Judah hear about every disaster I plan to inflict on them, they will each turn from their wicked ways; then I will forgive their wickedness and their sin.”
I think I'd want to translate it, "then I will suspend their punishment and their sin/punishment."
Psalm 25:11 (NIV translates "ki" concessively, as "although"):
11 For the sake of your name, LORD,
forgive my iniquity, though it is great.
"Suspend my punishment, because it is great" works nicely actually. Life is tough for the psalmist in 25, and he at some point earlier was rebellious and sinful (v. 7), and the psalmist wants God to ease up.
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Translation:
(1) And the whole assembly/congregation lifted up,
and they gave their voice,
and the people wept that day,
(2) and they grumbled against Moses and against Aaron-- all the sons of Israel--,
and they said to them -- the whole assembly/congregation--
"If only we had died in the land of Egypt!,
or in this wilderness, if only we had died!,
(3) and why [is] Yahweh bringing us to this land to fall by the sword?
Our wives and our little children shall become plunder.
Is it not good/better for us to return to Egypt?,"
(4) and each one said to his brother,
"Let's choose a head/leader,
that we may return to Egypt!,"
(5) and Moses and Aaron fell upon their faces before the whole assembly-- the congregation of the sons of Israel--
(6) and Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Yiphuneh-- from the ones searching out the land-- tore their cloaks,
(7) and they spoke to the whole assembly/congregation of the sons of Israel, saying,
"The land that we passed through in it to explore it-- good, the land [is] (same word as verse 3, "good"; "good" is focused), exceedingly, exceedingly."
(8) If Yahweh delights in us, He will bring us to this land,
and He will give to us the land that flows with milk and honey.
(9) Only, against Yahweh, may you not rebel,
while you, may you not fear the people of the land,
because our bread, they [are].
It has been removed-- their protection-- from over them,
while Yahweh [is] with us.
May you not fear them,"
(10) and the whole congregation threatened/proposed to stone them with stones.
Now, the glory of Yahweh appeared in the tent of meeting to all the sons of Israel,
(11) and Yahweh said to Moses,
"How long will this people despise me,
and how long will they not be confident (Deut. 28:66)/have faith (Jonah 3:5) in me, with/among all the wonders that I have done in their midst?
May I (jussive) strike them with the plague/pestilence,
that I may disinherit him/them,
that I may make you into a nation greater and mightier than them,"
(13) and Moses said to Yahweh,
"And the Egyptians will hear-- because you brought up with your strength this people from their midst--
(14) and they will speak to the inhabitants of this land.
They have heard
that you, Yahweh, [are] in the midst of this people,
that, face to face, you, O Yahweh, have been seen,
while your cloud is standing over them,
while in a pillar of a cloud you are going before them by day,
while in a pillar of fire at night,
(15) and [if] you destroy this people all at once, the nations will say-- [the ones] who have heard the report about you--
(16) "Since Yahweh wasn't able to bring this people to the land that He swore to them, He slaughtered them in the wilderness,"
(17) and so then, may the strength of the Lord (Adonai) be great, please,
just as He spoke, saying,
(18) "Yahweh [is] slow of anger, and great in loyalty,
forgiving/removing avon/sin/guilt/punishment
and rebellion (1 Samuel 24:11)/wrongdoing (Genesis 31:36;
50:17; Isaiah 58:1ff.),
and He doesn't completely/totally leave unpunished,
bringing the avon/punishment of the fathers upon the sons, upon the third and upon the fourth
[generation].'
(19) "Suspend, please, the avon/punishment of this people,
in accordance with the greatness of your loyalty,
and in accordance with how you carried this people from Egypt until now,"
(20) and Yahweh said,
"I will suspend
in accordance with your word.
(21) However, as I live, the glory of Yahweh will fill all the earth.
(22) Although ("ki") all the people [have been] seeing my glory and my signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, they have tested me these ten times,
and they haven't heeded my voice.
(23) Surely they shall never see the land that I swore to their fathers,
while all the ones despising me, may they never see it!,
(24) while my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit with him, and [because] he wholly follows after me, I shall bring him to the land which he entered into there,
and his seed will inherit/possess it.
(25) Now, the Amalekites and the Canaanites [are] dwelling in the valley.
Tomorrow, turn,
and set out for the desert/wilderness [by] the way/road of the Sea of Reeds,"
(26) and Yahweh spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying,
"How long [will it be] for this evil congregation
that they are complaining against me?
The complaining of the sons of Israel that they [are] complaining against me, I have heard.
(28) Say to them,
"As I live-- utterance of Yahweh-- surely, just as you spoke in my ears, thus I will do to you.
(29) In this wilderness your carcasses will fall,
with all the ones counted from among your number from 20 years and up
who complained against me.
(30) Surely, you won't enter into the land, which I lifted up my hand to make you dwell in it,
but only Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun,
while your little children-- whom you said, "Plunder, they will be"-- I will bring them,
and they will know the land which you rejected,
(32) while your carcasses will fall in this desert/wilderness,
(33) while your children will be shepherds in the desert/wilderness forty years,
and/that they will bear/carry your unfaithfulness/prostitution until all your carcasses are in the desert.
(34) In accordance with the number of days that you explored the land-- 40 days-- for every day, a year-- you will bear/carry your avon/sin/guilt/punishment-- 40 years,
and you will know/acknowledge my opposition (DCH).
(35) I, Yahweh, have spoken.
Surely, this I will do to all this evil congregation/community-- the ones banding together against me:
In this desert they will be finished,
while there they will die,
(36) and the men-- who Moses sent to explore the land, and they returned, and they complained against him [to] the whole community, by spreading a negative report concerning the evil land-- the men spreading the negative report of the land died through the plague before Yahweh,
(38) while Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh lived-- from among those ones who went to explore the land.
