Exodus 20:5

American Standard Version with Strong's Numbers

thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them; for I Jehovah thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me,

📖 Grammatical Analysis

Original Text

לֹֽא־תִשְׁתַּחְוֶ֥֣ה לָהֶ֖ם֮ וְלֹ֣א תָעָבְדֵ֑ם֒ כִּ֣י אֽ͏ָנֹכִ֞י יְהוָ֤ה אֱלֹהֶ֙יךָ֙ אֵ֣ל קַנָּ֔א פֹּ֠קֵד עֲוֺ֨ן אָבֹ֧ת עַל־בָּנִ֛ים עַל־שִׁלֵּשִׁ֥ים וְעַל־רִבֵּעִ֖ים לְשֹׂנְאָֽ֑י׃

Transliteration

lōʾ-ṯishtaḥăweh lāhem wə-lōʾ ṯāʿāḇəḏēm kî ʾānōḵî YHWH ʾĕlōheḵā ʾēl qannāʾ pōqēḏ ʿăwōn ʾāḇōṯ ʿal-bānîm ʿal-shillēshîm wə-ʿal-ribēʿîm lə-śōnəʾāy

Grammar Details

• *lōʾ-ṯishtaḥăweh*: negative particle + hishtaphel imperfect, 2nd masculine singular - you shall not bow down
• *lāhem*: preposition with 3rd masculine plural suffix - to them
• *wə-lōʾ ṯāʿāḇəḏēm*: conjunction + negative particle + qal imperfect, 2nd masculine singular with 3rd masculine plural suffix - and you shall not serve them
• *kî*: conjunction - for/because
• *ʾānōḵî*: 1st person singular pronoun - I
• *YHWH*: proper name - LORD/YHWH
• *ʾĕlōheḵā*: masculine plural noun construct with 2nd masculine singular suffix - your God
• *ʾēl qannāʾ*: masculine singular noun + adjective - jealous God
• *pōqēḏ*: qal participle, masculine singular - visiting/punishing
• *ʿăwōn*: masculine singular construct - iniquity of
• *ʾāḇōṯ*: masculine plural noun - fathers
• *ʿal-bānîm*: preposition + masculine plural noun - upon children
• *ʿal-shillēshîm*: preposition + masculine plural ordinal - upon third [generation]
• *wə-ʿal-ribēʿîm*: conjunction + preposition + masculine plural ordinal - and upon fourth [generation]
• *lə-śōnəʾāy*: preposition + qal participle plural construct with 1st singular suffix - to those hating me

Word Meanings

• *ṯishtaḥăweh*: bow down/prostrate yourself/worship
• *ṯāʿāḇəḏēm*: serve them/worship them/be enslaved to them
• *ʾēl qannāʾ*: jealous God/zealous God/passionate God
• *pōqēḏ*: visiting/punishing/attending to
• *ʿăwōn*: iniquity/guilt/punishment
• *lə-śōnəʾāy*: to those who hate me/to my enemies

Referenced Verses

• Num 14:18 : 18 Jehovah is slow to anger, and abundant in lovingkindness, forgiving iniquity and transgression; and that will by no means clear [the guilty], visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation.
• Exod 34:14 : 14 (for thou shalt worship no other god: for Jehovah, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God);
• Nah 1:2 : 2 Jehovah is a jealous God and avengeth; Jehovah avengeth and is full of wrath; Jehovah taketh vengeance on his adversaries, and he reserveth [wrath] for his enemies.
• Jer 32:18 : 18 who showest lovingkindness unto thousands, and recompensest the iniquity of the fathers into the bosom of their children after them; the great, the mighty God, Jehovah of hosts is his name;
• Deut 4:24 : 24 For Jehovah thy God is a devouring fire, a jealous God.
• Deut 5:9 : 9 thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them; for I, Jehovah, thy God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me;
• Deut 6:15 : 15 for Jehovah thy God in the midst of thee is a jealous God; lest the anger of Jehovah thy God be kindled against thee, and he destroy thee from off the face of the earth.
• Josh 23:7 : 7 that ye come not among these nations, these that remain among you; neither make mention of the name of their gods, nor cause to swear [by them], neither serve them, nor bow down yourselves unto them;
• Exod 23:24 : 24 Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works; but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and break in pieces their pillars.
• Num 14:33 : 33 And your children shall be wanderers in the wilderness forty years, and shall bear your whoredoms, until your dead bodies be consumed in the wilderness.
• Josh 24:19 : 19 And Joshua said unto the people, Ye cannot serve Jehovah; for he is a holy God; he is a jealous God; he will not forgive your transgression nor your sins.
• Ps 79:8 : 8 Remember not against us the iniquities of our forefathers: Let thy tender mercies speedily meet us; For we are brought very low.
• Ps 109:14 : 14 Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with Jehovah; And let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.
• Isa 65:6-7 : 6 Behold, it is written before me: I will not keep silence, but will recompense, yea, I will recompense into their bosom, 7 your own iniquities, and the iniquities of your fathers together, saith Jehovah, that have burned incense upon the mountains, and blasphemed me upon the hills; therefore will I first measure their work into their bosom.
• Jer 2:9 : 9 Wherefore I will yet contend with you, saith Jehovah, and with your children's children will I contend.
• John 7:7 : 7 The world cannot hate you; but me it hateth, because I testify of it, that its works are evil.
• John 15:18 : 18 If the world hateth you, ye know that it hath hated me before [it hated] you.
• John 15:23-24 : 23 He that hateth me hateth my Father also. 24 If I had not done among them the works which none other did, they had not had sin: but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father.
• Rom 1:30 : 30 backbiters, hateful to God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
• Lev 26:39-40 : 39 And they that are left of you shall pine away in their iniquity in your enemies' lands; and also in the iniquities of their fathers shall they pine away with them. 40 And they shall confess their iniquity, and the iniquity of their fathers, in their trespass which they trespassed against me, and also that, because they walked contrary unto me,
• Jas 4:4 : 4 Ye {G3432} {G2532} adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? Whosoever {G302} therefore would be a friend of the world maketh himself an enemy of God.
• Isa 14:20-21 : 20 Thou shalt not be joined with them in burial, because thou hast destroyed thy land, thou hast slain thy people; the seed of evil-doers shall not be named for ever. 21 Prepare ye slaughter for his children for the iniquity of their fathers, that they rise not up, and possess the earth, and fill the face of the world with cities.
• Isa 44:15 : 15 Then shall it be for a man to burn; and he taketh thereof, and warmeth himself; yea, he kindleth it, and baketh bread: yea, he maketh a god, and worshippeth it; he maketh it a graven image, and falleth down thereto.
• Isa 44:19 : 19 And none calleth to mind, neither is there knowledge nor understanding to say, I have burned part of it in the fire; yea, also I have baked bread upon the coals thereof; I have roasted flesh and eaten it: and shall I make the residue thereof an abomination? shall I fall down to the stock of a tree?
• Ps 81:15 : 15 The haters of Jehovah should submit themselves unto him: But their time should endure for ever.
• Job 5:4 : 4 His children are far from safety, And they are crushed in the gate, Neither is there any to deliver them:
• 2 Kgs 23:26 : 26 Notwithstanding, Jehovah turned not from the fierceness of his great wrath, wherewith his anger was kindled against Judah, because of all the provocations wherewith Manasseh had provoked him.
• 2 Sam 21:1 : 1 And there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David sought the face of Jehovah. And Jehovah said, It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he put to death the Gibeonites.
• 2 Sam 21:6 : 6 let seven men of his sons be delivered unto us, and we will hang them up unto Jehovah in Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of Jehovah. And the king said, I will give them.
• 1 Kgs 21:29 : 29 Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me? because he humbleth himself before me, I will not bring the evil in his days; but in his son's days will I bring the evil upon his house.
• 2 Kgs 17:35 : 35 with whom Jehovah had made a covenant, and charged them, saying, Ye shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them:
• Lev 26:1 : 1 Ye shall make you no idols, neither shall ye rear you up a graven image, or a pillar, neither shall ye place any figured stone in your land, to bow down unto it: for I am Jehovah your God.
• Deut 32:21 : 21 They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; They have provoked me to anger with their vanities: And I will move them to jealousy with those that are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.
• Deut 32:41 : 41 If I whet my glittering sword, And my hand take hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to mine adversaries, And will recompense them that hate me.
• Josh 23:16 : 16 When ye transgress the covenant of Jehovah your God, which he commanded you, and go and serve other gods, and bow down yourselves to them; then will the anger of Jehovah be kindled against you, and ye shall perish quickly from off the good land which he hath given unto you.
• Deut 7:10 : 10 and repayeth them that hate him to their face, to destroy them: he will not be slack to him that hateth him, he will repay him to his face.
• Lev 26:29 : 29 And ye shall eat the flesh of your sons, and the flesh of your daughters shall ye eat.
• Exod 34:6-7 : 6 And Jehovah passed by before him, and proclaimed, Jehovah, Jehovah, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abundant in lovingkindness and truth; 7 keeping lovingkindness for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin; and that will by no means clear [the guilty], visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation.
• Lev 20:5 : 5 then I will set my face against that man, and against his family, and will cut him off, and all that play the harlot after him, to play the harlot with Molech, from among their people.
• 2 Kgs 17:41 : 41 So these nations feared Jehovah, and served their graven images; their children likewise, and their children's children, as did their fathers, so do they unto this day.
• 2 Chr 25:14 : 14 Now it came to pass, after that Amaziah was come from the slaughter of the Edomites, that he brought the gods of the children of Seir, and set them up to be his gods, and bowed down himself before them, and burned incense unto them.
• Judg 2:19 : 19 But it came to pass, when the judge was dead, that they turned back, and dealt more corruptly than their fathers, in following other gods to serve them, and to bow down unto them; they ceased not from their doings, nor from their stubborn way.
• 1 Sam 15:2-3 : 2 Thus saith Jehovah of hosts, I have marked that which Amalek did to Israel, how he set himself against him in the way, when he came up out of Egypt. 3 Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.
• Job 21:19 : 19 [Ye say], God layeth up his iniquity for his children. Let him recompense it unto himself, that he may know it:
• Ps 78:58 : 58 For they provoked him to anger with their high places, And moved him to jealousy with their graven images.
• Prov 6:34-35 : 34 For jealousy is the rage of a man; And he will not spare in the day of vengeance. 35 He will not regard any ransom; Neither will he rest content, though thou givest many gifts.
• Prov 8:36 : 36 But he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul: All they that hate me love death.
• Matt 4:9 : 9 and he said unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.
• Matt 23:34-36 : 34 Therefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: some of them shall ye kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city: 35 that upon you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of Abel the righteous unto the blood of Zachariah son of Barachiah, whom ye slew between the sanctuary and the altar. 36 Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation.
• Rom 8:7 : 7 because the mind of the flesh is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be:
• 1 Cor 10:22 : 22 Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? are we stronger than he?
• Ezek 8:3 : 3 And he put forth the form of a hand, and took me by a lock of my head; and the Spirit lifted me up between earth and heaven, and brought me in the visions of God to Jerusalem, to the door of the gate of the inner [court] that looketh toward the north; where was the seat of the image of jealousy, which provoketh to jealousy.
• Dan 1:2 : 2 And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, with part of the vessels of the house of God; and he carried them into the land of Shinar to the house of his god: and he brought the vessels into the treasure - house of his god.