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Isaiah 14:20 "You will not be joined with them in burial, because you have destroyed your land, you have slain your people. May the descendants of evildoers never more be named!"

 

Isaiah is prophesying coming judgment on the Babylonian king and his descendants. The line "may the descendants of evildoers nevermore be named” strikes me. It gets me thinking again of the punishment of future generations for the sins of their ancestors. I have written about this before in several posts, like Inherited Dysfunction, Justice Has Already Been Satisfied, and Suffering for the Sins of Our Fathers (and Mothers). 

 

Lately, I've been pondering questions about the nature of “being human” and what happens if humanity in general no longer wants a relationship with God. If humans go far enough away from God, will they become (or revert to) something almost unrecognizable as being in His image? Can we deny our part in the Divinity so much and for so long that we become significantly less God-like?  I'm thinking this is one way that generations can pass real suffering on to their descendants.

 

Some time ago I saw this Thomistic Institute video on Adam and Eve. Part of it suggests the possibility that the first sin, original sin, could have been procreation with other hominid beings from whom God had set Adam and Eve apart. Thinking this through, God had breathed souls into Adam and Eve making them His images. Since they were the sole recipients of this gift and would begin God's people as He intended, they were not to have relations with others not like them. Of course, this is just supposition, but I think it makes sense as a possibility, especially in light of the fact that Jesus revealed in the Precious Blood Prayer Against Sins of the Flesh (and I think elsewhere, I just can't remember where) that carnal sin is the main thing the devil would use to get us away from God. This theory also makes clear the importance of having a soul in God's image, and the unfathomable difference between Adam and Eve and the rest of Creation, including any species not having souls like theirs.

 

I thought of that video when I recently read a lengthy post on how the author thinks many people are becoming LLMS (large language models) without a basis in reality (truth) on which to assess things. This is a plausible explanation for the otherwise inexplicable, to me at least, behavior of so many. So many people seem to have lost their reason, their critical thinking ability, even, sometimes, their souls. It makes me think a portion of humanity has gone so far from God (and into the arms of strange gods like technology) that they have lost what it means to be human, and are unable to pass humanity itself on to their children. So we have been left with a generation+ of almost soulless people, descendants who, unless they have a conversion experience, will nevermore be named.

 

Of course, everyone can be saved, and Jesus wants precisely that, but I think the LLM people have a much harder road to conversion, as they have fostered or inherited a lack of ability to think and pursue truth. I don't think this is something we can fix, only God. I think it is evidence of the fact that we are living in a unique time in salvation history. The flood happened because mankind had just one redeemable family, Noah’s. I know there are more redeemable people than that in the world today, and I know that God has promised not to destroy the world again by flood, but Revelation makes clear that there are great chastisements coming, and many will wish the mountains would fall on them. I used to think about this suffering of humanity and wonder how God could allow it, but now I wonder if humanity at that point simply won't be very human anymore.