Kids

Poor Eli. He was such a man of God and tried to instill that in his children, I would assume. Yet, his children were awful. 1 Samuel 2:12 says "Now the sons of Eli were scoundrels; they had no regard for the Lord". God replaces these sons with Samuel as the heir to the religious throne, if you will. God tells Eli that his sons are not faithful and will not be the next in his line, but will instead be killed and God will raise up a replacement who is more suitable. Eli seems to simply accept this and move on. In fact, when his sons do die, he is more shocked and appalled by the loss of the ark than the loss of his family.
This made me think of how often parents are blamed for the actions of their children, even well into the adulthood of that child. I think that is a much more delicate balance there than can be determined by judgmental outsiders. Today I overheard a conversation about a man of power over young adult men (18+) who would refuse to meet the parents of men he didn't like. He made the assumption that because the child was ill mannered, the parents would be awful as well. How much of this mindset is actually based on a deep-set Freudian mindset we have without even realizing or acknowledging it?
God doesn't seem to do this very often thus far. We all know some of the proverbs that get quoted in support of this idea- "spare the rod, spoil the child", etc. But God does not seem to hold Eli responsible for his children's transgressions, just as Adam and Eve are not held responsible for the sins of their children. Sometimes parents get a bad rap for children that they loved and punished properly but who continued to act out and misbehave. This just seems like us judging situations we don't understand completely and misappropriating behavior onto an older generation.