Individualism in the Bible

Ezekiel 18 has recently come up in discussions here. I'm going to post some of my private notes on this matter. I wrote it about 4 years ago, in the process of writing rebuttals to credobaptist arguments, and that's why you'll see reference to credobaptism. I don't post this to debate that subject, but just to post some of my thoughts on Ezekiel 18 (and Jer. 31) and its use in arguing against principles of corporate solidarity or federal representative headship. Again, this are notes I wrote up to myself and I have not taken the time to proof read or otherwise spruce them up. The letter 'L' you see represents where in my set of notes this answer is found. I have also deleted portions of this section in my notes from this post as they were more specifically geared toward credo/paedo debates.

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L. The Individualistic Nature of the New Covenant:

The argument based off this text from Jeremiah 31,

27 "Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man and the seed of beast. 28 And it shall come to pass that as I have watched over them to pluck up and break down, to overthrow, destroy, and bring harm, so I will watch over them to build and to plant, declares the LORD. 29 In those days they shall no longer say: "'The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.' 30 But everyone shall die for his own sin. Each man who eats sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge.

Malone takes from this,

“When the New Covenant administration is examined by Baptists, they see ample evidence that the New Covenant does not include the organic idea in covenant membership in the same way the Abrahamic covenant did. Rather, they see a new individualistic element in the New Covenant administration that was not as patent in the Old Testament ‘covenants of promise.’

[…]

The promise was that, in the days of the New Covenant, God would cease bringing generational covenantal curses upon men for the sins of their fathers as he did upon the members of Old Testament organic Israel. The link would be changed. Each would die for his own sin, not the sins of the father. According to O. Palmer Robertson, every heart in the New Covenant Israel will be individually changed and directly responsible to God.

[…]

In other words, although the Israel of God in the Old Testament included all naturally born children under the blessings and curses, the New Covenant ‘Israel of God’ only includes regenerate individuals in the covenant, not the organic seed. There is a heightened individualism in the New Covenant.”

My problems with the above argument are numerous:

1) Daniel Block has written what Tremper Longman has referred to the best book on the Old Testament; his commentary on Ezekiel. Block notes about Malone’s type of argument,

“For more than a century this chapter has provided the primary basis for the widely held notion that one - perhaps the most - important contribution made by Ezekiel to Israelite theology was his doctrine of individual responsibility. Prior to this time sin and judgment were supposed to have been dealt with by Yahweh on a corporate basis.”

So we can see that Malone’s interpretation is simply keeping in step with some standard views on the claim by Jehovah made in both Jeremiah and Ezekiel. It is not disputed that they are referring to the exact same proverb. Therefore, any answer applicable to Ezekiel is likewise applicable to Jeremiah as well. Block goes on to note that,

“In recent years, however, scholars have largely abandoned this view. Not only is the individualism reflected in this chapter [Ezekiel 18] evident in texts much earlier than Ezekiel; the corporate emphasis of earlier writings is never abandoned in favor of strict individualism. Furthermore, individual responsibility is much more muted here than has previously been supposed. Indeed, the aim of this dispute in the transformation of the corporate body, specifically the exilic community. These are the children whose ‘teeth are set on edge’ (v. 2). This corporate focus is highlighted by early references to Israel (vv. 2, 3) and repetitious later identification of the addresses as ‘the house of Israel’ (vv. 25, 29-31; cf. also vv. 6, 15). The call to repentance is issued to the community as a whole. To identify a new doctrine of individualism as the principle agenda of the chapter is to confuse subject with theme.”

Block notes that this was a “pithy saying” that operated in both the ancient Near East as well as Israel. Malone’s interpretation suffers from a few problems. First, this saying was a secular proverb. Block says that Ezekiel quotes the proverb correctly (Jeremiah was trying to highlight the anteriority of the father’s actions, hence his use of the perfect verb, akelu). The non-perfect use of the verb represents “true proverbial style” (Block, 560). It also “expresses belief in an inevitable and uncontrollable determinism. This is how things are; one can do nothing to change it” (Block, 560).

Second, in ch. 16 Ezekiel does quote cause-effect relationship between generations, but this is just to establish that personality traits are passed on from one generation to the next.

Third, why, if this challenge by the people is intended to mock previous ways God has dealt with his people, why was the point made so “obliquely?” (Block, 560). Indeed, Ezekiel’s audience makes direct charges against God in this very chapter (v. 25).

And, fourth, since the Israelites ask why God should not punish people for the sins of their fathers in v. 19, then the traditional interpretation has a built in contradiction to it. Supposedly, in v. 2 the people reject the traditional theology, and then in v. 19 they ask for it to be implemented!

So, Block concludes that “the problem the proverb poses for Ezekiel is not with punishment that children are bearing for the sins of the fathers, or even the issue of theodicy. On the contrary, it reflects a materialistic fatalism, a resignation of immutable cosmic rules of cause and effect. … To the extent that the charge concerns God at all, it accuses Him of disinterest or impotence in the face of the exiles’ current crisis” (Block, 561).

The response to the Israelites is an extended theology on the involvement and immanency of God. Jehovah responds by claiming that he is Lord over all life. Jewish as well as Gentile. Theocentrism is taught and fatalism repudiated. Their fate, as is the fate of every man, is in the hands of a personal God.

2) The credo Baptist who makes the argument that all people are now held responsible for their own sins (as the universal claim says, “the soul who sins shall die") and there is no more principle of children being punished for the sins of their fathers has a contradiction in his system if he holds to a covenant of works. All men still suffer, and are born with the guilt of, Adam’s sin. Even as Christians our bodies still break down. We still sin. In fact, why would we accept Christ’s righteousness? Jehovah also states the if a man sins but his father (his own federal head) is righteous, the sinful son will still be punished (Eze. 18:5-13). Thus a total and complete abandonment of the traditional principle of federal headship theology cannot be accepted. It was also argued that corporate responsibility, correctly considered, was not the subject up for debate.

3) In 1 Corinthians 5 we note that the sin of one individual is counted as the entire congregation’s sin. If they do not take care of it, they will also be punished! In Titus 1:10 we note that entire families are destroyed because the heads of those families have accepted Judaizing teaching. And, in Matthew 10, we read that entire households and towns are destroyed because of the decision of at least one representative of that town.