John Calvin on Deuteronomy 24:16-18

Here also God manifests how great is His regard for human life, so that blood should not be shed indiscriminately, when he forbids that children should be involved in the punishment of their parents. Nor was this Law by any means supererogatory, because on account of one man’s crime his whole race was often severely dealt with. It is not without cause, therefore, that God interposes for the protection of the innocent, and does not allow the punishment to travel further than where the crime exists. And surely our natural common sense dictates that it is an act of barbarous madness to put children to death out of hatred to their father. If any should object, what we have already seen, that God avenges “unto the third and fourth generation,” the reply is easy, that He is a law unto Himself, and that He does not rush by a blind impulse to the exercise of vengeance, so as to confound the innocent with the reprobate, but that He so visits the iniquity of the fathers upon their children, as to temper extreme severity with the greatest equity. Moreover, He has not so bound Himself by an inflexible rule as not to be free, if it so pleases Him, to depart from the Law; as, for example, He commanded the whole race of Canaan to be rooted out, because the land would not be purged except by the extermination of their defilements; and, since they were all reprobate, the children, no less than their fathers, were doomed to just destruction. Nay, we read that, after Saul’s death, his guilt was expiated by the death of his children, (2 Samuel 21;) still, by this special exception, the Supreme Lawgiver did not abrogate what He had commanded; but would have His own admirable wisdom acquiesced in, which is the fountain from whence all laws proceed.

Deuteronomy 20

Deuteronomy 20:10-18

10. When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it.

10. Quum accesseris ad urbem ut expugnes illam, clamabis ad eam pacem.

11. And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee.

11. Et erit, si pacem responderit tibi, et aperuit tibi, universus populus qui fuerit repertus in ea, erunt tibi tributarii, servientque tibi.

12. And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it:

12. Si vero pacem non fecerit tecum, sed faciet tecum praelium, obsederisque eam;

13. And when the Lord thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword:

13. Et dederit eam Jehova Deus tuus in manu tua: tunc percuties omnem masculum ejus acie gladii.

14. But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself: and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the Lord thy God hath given thee.

14. Tantum mulieres, et parvulos, et animalia, et quicquid fuerit in urbe, omnia spolia ejus praedaberis tibi: comedesque spolia inimicorum tuorum, quos dederit tibi Jehova Deus tuus.

15. Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations.

15. Sic facies omnibus urbibus longinquis a te valde, quae non sunt de urbibus gentium istarum.

16. But of the cities of these people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee. for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth.

16. Tantum de urbibus populorum istorum quos Jehova Deus tuus dat tibi in haereditatem, non vivificabis ullam animam:

17. But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee:

17. Sed perdendo perdes eos, Hitthaeum, Amorrhaeum, Chananaeum et Perisaeum, Hivaeum, et Jebusaeum, quemadmodum praecepit tibi Jehova Deus tuus:

18. That they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their gods; so should ye sin against the Lord your God.

18. Ne doceant vos facere secundum abominationes suas quas faciunt diis suis: et peccetis in Jehovam Deum vestrum.