Charles Ellicott Commentary Deuteronomy 5:9

"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;" — Deuteronomy 5:9 (ASV)

Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children. —There are no sins which so surely entail penal consequences upon succeeding generations as the abominations of idolatry. All idolatry means the degradation of the Divine image in man. But it is not meant here that the soul of the son shall die for the father. The penalty extends only to them that hate me.