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What About an "age of accountability"?
When it comes to the question of "when" or at what age a person becomes accountable for their sins/misdeeds and for seeking God and His truth, we do not have a clear answer in the Bible. However, there are some pieces of information that can get us pointed in the right direction.
Some preliminary thoughts. God knows what will happen before it happens (Isaiah 43:10) and He knows each one of us very intimately (Matthew 9:4; John 2:24,25; Hebrews 4:12,13). We are accountable to God for all that we individually do (Ezekiel 18:4), but He is a loving Father who is not anxious to punish or destroy His "image-creatures" (Ezekiel 18:32). He knows our inner strengths, weaknesses, knowledge & ignorance, etc. and can render a more accurate and fair judgment of us than any human being ever could. He is not to be "mocked" or played for a fool by those who think they can manipulate or abuse His mercy ("I'll sin it up now and have fun and then repent in my old age before I die"), but He is kind and patient with those who are sincerely trying to please Him, do what is right, and obey Him, just as a wise, kind, and patient human parent nurtures and bears with a child that is still in the process of maturing. Sincere ignorance and foolishness from which we learn lessons is to be patiently nurtured, while willful and knowledgeable rebellion and sneaking is worthy of punishment. With that said, let's move on. There are some hints about "accountability" and personal maturity in the Old Testament. While they certainly did not have any previous examples to observe and learn from, Adam and Eve were accountable and suffered the punishment of broken law after the first offense. How old/physically mature they were is unknown, but God considered them personally accountable and the text does indicate that Adam and Eve became guilty before God on the basis that they consciously crossed the “knowing good and evil” line (Genesis 2:16,17; 3:22) in a knowledgeable, self-willed manner. Eve was "deceived" (Genesis 3:13; 2Corinthians 11:3; 1Timothy 2:14), but Adam did what he did knowingly. No age distinctions were noted in the judgment following the "golden calf" incident (Exodus 32), except that a personal unwillingness to come back to the Lord's/Moses' side, when offered the opportunity, was what caused 3,000 to be killed. However, one of the most helpful incidents in the Old Testament in considering an "age of accountability" is that of Israel's refusal to enter Canaan when it was first opened to them (Numbers 13-14). The determination was that those who were 20 years old and up were guilty and their entrance into the Promised Land was denied. All of those 19 years old and younger were not "held accountable." This age break, between 19-20 years of age is associated with the "knowledge of good and evil" in the Deuteronomy 1:39 comment reflecting back on that event. Thus, Israel's "little ones" and sons, up to the age of 19, seem to have been viewed by God as innocent, at least in this incident. This probably corresponds to our Western tradition of granting full legal responsibility to young people between 18-21 years of age. Jewish tradition would eventually assign personal "spiritual" accountability to an individual at the age of 12-13 years and this is when the Bar Mitzvah[1] took place (Luke 2:41-51). Perhaps we can assume that a Jew became spiritually responsible for himself at 12-13 years of age and legally responsible for his/her own actions at the age 20. However, adulthood and leadership/full participation in adult society required further maturity and was granted at the age of 30 years. While all Levitical male children were counted in the census after a month of life (Numbers 3:15), the age at which men began to render service in the community was 30 (Numbers 4:30,35,39,43,47) and the length of service was 20 years, with retirement at 50. Later, we find that King David became a political leader at the age of 30 (2Samuel 5:4) and Jesus began his ministry at the age of 30 (Luke 3:23). When Israel was re-organizing after the Babylonian exile, the covenant that Israelites pledged themselves to, concerning obeying the Law and paying an annual Temple support fee (Nehemiah 10), involved "wives, sons and daughters, all those who had knowledge and understanding" (v. 29).
In summary, we could use the ages of 12-13/20/30 as the Jews did and probably benefit from such a viewpoint. The selection of the age of 12-13 for spiritual accountability developed from uninspired human tradition and does not, so far as I know, have a "thus saith the Lord" Scriptural origin. Human development and learning studies have demonstrated that awareness in the young can come earlier than we used to think, although it also indicates that every individual is different and matures at different rates and times. Thus, we probably should refrain from applying a hard and fast "age of accountability" to everyone, while remembering that the likelihood of a person's accountability before God certainly increases as their age and capacity for willful, spiritual rebellion increases. Jesus made two comments in which He put forward children as examples of "kingdom citizenship" for adults (Matthew 18:1-3; 19:19:13,14). Are children pure, innocent, and "safe" until they are 20 years old? No, but children "learn" most of the tricks and deceptions that adults use by watching and listening to others - they don't start out with a full arsenal of lies and games, but tend to be pretty straightforward and trusting until taught otherwise. Other Biblical information should caution us against the doctrine of "original sin" - that every infant is guilty of Adam's sin. However, children do vary in perception and certainly begin to make bad choices and follow bad examples before they reach the age of 20. Thus, our teaching and example is very important. When do little children become "responsible" for their rebellion/sin before God? Only God knows for sure, but what has been presented here may offer some help in sorting this out. --------------------------------------------------------- Charles E. McCoy January 18, 1999 updated: 01/19/2005 [1] A humanly/culturally devised ceremony in which Jewish young men took the "burden of the commandments" upon themselves and became a "son of the commandments." A similar ceremony was available for girls.
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