There’s a
lot of talk today — and maybe this is the case in every generation —
about the evils of generations past and how they affect the present, conferring
“privilege” on some and disadvantaging others.
Much of this talk is nonsense, nothing but hunger for political
power masquerading as a quest for justice. Moreover, the outrage directed at the
alleged beneficiaries of multi-generational injustices is very selective. For
example, we are not allowed to excoriate the practitioners of modern-day Islam for
9/11, but it is perfectly fine to blame the economic and social disadvantages of
today’s American black community on the current generation of whites, including
many whose ancestors did not even cross the Atlantic until years after the abolition
of slavery. Equal weights and measures, and all that.
Nevertheless,
notwithstanding the abuses of the concept in the present day, there remains
some biblical validity to the idea of cumulative multi-generational sin that brings
the judgment of God to bear on a single, unfortunate generation.