Meaning of father and children

Question

What does it mean by " turning the children to their fathers and turning the fathers to their children"in Malachi 4:6

Answer 1

The reference is unexplained. So we may interpret the prophecy primarily as an appeal to conscience. A filial child learns God's ways from their parent, and a true parent's conscience is turned to God by their children. The returning Elijah must lead a movement of conscience in which parents and children mutually stimulate one another to Godly conduct or repentance.

We may have been given a more specific clue in Mal. 2, where the prophet portrays divorce as a root problem.

The Lord no longer takes note of your offering or accepts it favorably from your hand. And you say, “Why?” — Because the LORD is witness between you and the wife of your youth With whom you have broken faith, though she is your companion, your covenanted wife. Did he not make them one, with flesh and spirit? And what does the One require? Godly offspring! You should be on guard, then, for your life, and do not break faith with the wife of your youth. For I hate divorce, says the LORD, the God of Israel.

Here the prophet emphasizes the importance of Godly offspring as a central point in his warning against divorce. Divorce breaks the parent-child covenant and endangers the covenant between God and his people. So Malachi may have had this warning in mind when he spoke of the need to turn the children to the parents and vice versa.

In this context we may also think of the message of John the Baptist who, according to Jesus, was the fulfillment of Malachi's prophecy concerning Elijah. John was arrested and ultimately beheaded for criticizing the illegal remarriage (according to Jewish law) of Herod Antipas (Luke 3:19). It could be that John saw himself as acting in accord with Malachi's prophecy, emphasizing the need not to betray "the wife of one's youth" and thereby turn parents and children against one another? Certainly John must have believed that Antipas' action set a bad example for the entire country. He may have hoped that by speaking out against it, he was turning the nation's father-figure toward his children and vice versa. In the end, unfortunately, Antipas' daughter Salome did not respond positively to the message. Instead, she took it as in insult and demanded John's head in punishment.

Conclusion: Mal. 4:6 refers to the beneficial mutual effect of parents on children and vice versa in God's plan of moral instruction. Parents keep God's ways for the sake of the children, and children learn God's ways from their parents. The prophecy may also relate to Malachi's teaching on divorce in his chapter 2, and also to John the Baptist's ministry, as a latter-day Elijah, in relation the divorce and re-marriage of Herod Antipas.

Answer 2

It is not a great difference, but the Masoretic Text actually reads (KJV translation):

Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet. Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children [לֵב־אָבוֹת עַל־בָּנִים], And the heart of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.

The Septuagint reading is slightly different (Brenton):

And, behold, I will send to you Elias the Thesbite, before the great and glorious day of the Lord comes; who shall turn again the heart of the father to the son [καρδία πατρὸς πρὸς υἱόν], and the heart of a man to his neighbour, lest I come and smite the earth grievously.

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We know that the overall passage was seen by Christians as referring to John the Baptist.

Jerome believed that fathers and children referred literally to familial relations. Commenting on the phrase heart of the fathers ... in the Hebrew text, he wrote:

By the hearts of the fathers and children he means that the sons should not despise their fathers, nor the fathers vex their sons, but that the hearts of the one and the other should be turned mutually to each other, and that they should love each other, and that in the domestic circle at least concord should reign. (Commentary on Malachi, Book 3, Chapter 4)

But Cyril of Alexandria and others (e.g. Origen) saw the phrase as relating rather to the relationship of humanity with God:

For since the disobedience of our first parent Adam, all of humanity had become estranged from God, having turned the affection of their hearts away from him. But when the Son of God came, he reconciled us to the Father and turned our hearts back to him. He enabled us to call God our Father, which we could not do before, and he taught us to love one another as brothers and sisters. This is the meaning of the phrase, the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers. For it was through the disobedience of the first parent that the hearts of fathers and children were divided, but through the obedience of Christ, they were reunited and made one (Commentary on the Twelve Prophets).

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There are various Jewish explanations in the Talmud, where the phrase is seen as referring to the Patriarchs (Rashi, Sukkah 52b), the Jewish people's leaders and teachers (Sanhedrin 98b), as well as the Jewish people turning toward God (Sotah 48a; cf. Cyril et al.).