[Avodah] punishing children for the sins of fathers

[Eli Turkel via Avodah]

http://www.torahmusings.com/2015/11/rav-kook-on-nidui-and-cherem/?utm_source=Weekly+Digest&utm_campaign=9e311bfd0f-Weekly_Digest_Correction&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_bfc0f3f090-9e311bfd0f-267646509



If *Taz*? idea applies even when the purpose is to foster better Torah

observance, punishing someone who did not sin would be an example, since

the Torah says ?? ????? ???? ?? ????, fathers should not be killed for the

sins of sons, and vice verse. If so, rabbis cannot do it even as an

extraordinary measure to foster Torah observance.



That seems to R. Kook the implication of *Sanhedrin* 44a?s questioning how

Yehoshua could have killed the children of Achan. The answer was that they

weren?t killed (which is not the simple reading of the verse), they were

forced to watch, to learn a lesson. If Yehoshua was allowed to kill the

children as an object lesson to others, the Gemara?s question makes no

sense. It seems clear, he says, that the verse prohibits killing (or

punishing) sons for the sins of the father, even if it would help make an

important point.

-- 
Eli Turkel
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