Grapes and the New Year Celebration

Ezekiel was a prophet on exile. He was among those deported to Babylon and he did his ministry in the foreign land.

Ezekiel was questioned by the Lord God, "What is the meaning of this proverb you recite in the land of Israel: Parents eat sour grapes, but the children’s teeth are set on edge?" (18/2). It was an expression indicating that the faults of parents pass on to the next generations. A parent eats grapes, the kids face the consequences, so to speak. People following the traditional thinking believed that their exile was a consequence of what their parents did. Ezekiel went against this tradition. No transmission is involved, he said. For him whoever was at fault must be the one to face the consequences. Remember that Ezekiel was a prophet on exile, so he had to assure the exiled people that their situation was not a consequence of the acts of their previous generations. Ezekiel had to bring the light of hope and not despair to the exiled population. It was a tough job because it involved re-forming a tradition.

So the prophet said, "As I live—oracle of the Lord GOD: I swear that none of you will ever repeat this proverb in Israel. Only the one who sins shall die. The son shall not be charged with the guilt of his father...." (18/3 & 20).

Jeremiah shared the same view. He too was doing his ministry around the exile period. He stated, "In those days they shall no longer say, “The parents ate unripe grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge, but all shall die because of their own iniquity: the teeth of anyone who eats unripe grapes shall be set on edge" (31/30). The verse has complicated twist and turns that biblists will like to decipher. For us the whole point is that Jeremiah was concerned with the restoration of the people of Judah with the hope of a new covenant, so he wanted to drop all that crap about making future generations answer the faults of their past generations. Start everything anew!

This New Year season may be an occasion to re-think things over and accept that there is hope. The past may be so crushing and exasperating...but can we start anew?