Our fathers have sinned, and are not; and we have borne their iniquities.
The lament belongs to Judah's reproach after Jerusalem fell and its people were carried captive into Babylon, when the survivors lived in exile and oppression. It is a confession that the fathers sinned and are no more, while the living generation bears the punishment of their iniquities. That bearing of iniquity meant being left as orphans and fatherless with mothers as widows, and having inheritance and houses turned over to strangers and aliens. It meant being ruled over by servants with no one to deliver them, and suffering faint hearts and dim eyes. The same pattern shows a broader principle that people may suffer the consequences of earlier generations' sins, so that when a nation is punished the innocent suffer alongside the guilty, as faithful people in apostate Israel endured troubles caused by the nation's unfaithfulness.
The lament belongs to Judah's reproach after Jerusalem fell and its people were carried captive into Babylon, when the survivors lived in exile and oppression. It is a confession that the fathers sinned and are no more, while the living generation bears the punishment of their iniquities. That bearing of iniquity meant being left as orphans and fatherless with mothers as widows, and having inheritance and houses turned over to strangers and aliens. It meant being ruled over by servants with no one to deliver them, and suffering faint hearts and dim eyes. The same pattern shows a broader principle that people may suffer the consequences of earlier generations' sins, so that when a nation is punished the innocent suffer alongside the guilty, as faithful people in apostate Israel endured troubles caused by the nation's unfaithfulness.