What Does Ezekiel 18:20 Mean in the King James?
The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The Hebrew verb for “bear” makes guilt a carried load, and the verse refuses to assign that load through parentage.
THE MEANING
The living person who misses the mark dies; that person’s own course is not transferred from a parent or child. Alignment and wickedness rest with the person who embodies them.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A parent’s wrongdoing determines a child’s standing, or a parent’s alignment can substitute for the child’s own.
THE ROOT
יִשָּׂא
yissa
GROWS FROM
נשׂא
nasa, lift, carry, bear
The Hebrew verb יִשָּׂא (yissa, “he will bear”) opens “bearing” as carrying or lifting. The same root can describe someone raised up, but here the verse assigns the burden to the person whose own course carries it, rather than transferring it through a family line.
ALSO GROWS
nasi: A leader, traditionally understood as one lifted up.
נָשִׂיא
This branch retains the root’s upward motion, showing that נשׂא can describe both carrying and being raised.
hinnase: To be raised or exalted.
הִנָּשֵׂא
This form makes the root’s lifting sense explicit beside the verse’s image of bearing a burden.
THE PATTERN
A person’s own course carries its own accountability; kinship does not transfer another’s standing.
The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his own sin.For every man shall bear his own burden.So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God.THE THREAD
Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.Isaiah uses נשׂא (nasa, lift, carry, bear) in “he bare the sin of many.” The shared verb distinguishes inheritance from an enacted bearing: Ezekiel rejects guilt passed down by descent, while Isaiah describes the servant carrying the missing of many.
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