Charles Ellicott Commentary Matthew 23:36

"Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation." — Matthew 23:36 (ASV)

All these things shall come upon this generation—These words carry on the thought of the measure of guilt that is gradually being filled. People make the guilt of past ages their own by reproducing its atrocities and identifying with it. Consequently, what at first seems to be an arbitrary decree—visiting the sins of the fathers on the children—becomes in such cases a righteous judgment.

If they repent, they cut off the terrible inheritance of sin and punishment; but if they harden themselves in their evil, they inherit the delayed punishment of their fathers’ sins as well as their own.