Not to take out responsibility but this kosher article is interesting.
[1]
Researchers now believe that about 60% of addiction is epigenetic.
That is. We may be born with a unique fixed DNA, but how we read the DNA changes depending on our lifestyle and environment.
I guess Hashem decides when and how to change the DNA, but we do have a lot to say about how we tap into our DNA.
If we interact badly with ourselves, that means we have procedures that activate DNA for the bad in our cells. This also gives rise to diseases, bad tendencies, inclinations.
If we have a good way of live, all our cells multiply with the good way of reading the DNA.
We have free will and can fix and redirect behaviours, that in turn changes the cells and the way it reads the same DNA.
How then does it get transmitted?
Excerpt from Transgenerational Epigenetics
[2]
During
mitotic cell divisions the
epigenetic states are inherited from one cell to another, but much of the epigenetic message of the genome is reset during reproduction of an organism. However, the epigenetic erasure process is not complete and
meiotic epigenetic transfer of information may allow phenotypic traits to appear in subsequent generations, a process referred to as transgenerational epigenetics. The epigenetic information, often established by mechanisms such as
DNA methylation,
histone modifications, and
non-coding RNA, may not only influence gene expression in the first generation of offspring, but may persist for multiple generations.
In short. Though there is a general reset in our children DNA, our behaviour and lifestyle, can affect a few next generations.
The Lord, the Lord, compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in loving-kindness and truth … Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.” (Ex. 34: 7)
So I guess, we do get this hereditary pathologies, but can change it for good, and fix it for generations to come.
"But for those who love Me and keep My commandments, I show love for thousands of generations" (Exodus 20:6)
I guess you go back to read the DNA as is supposed to.
And this is why our tasks is so important. We must be clean.
This is the porpoise of our struggle, to fix. To be participants in who Hashem wants us to be.
The "bread of shame" is one reason we must build ourselves. We do not want to be robots and be entities that all is given to us done, easy, free.
This concept, "nahama d'kisufa", is deeper. Hashem gives. We receive. Hashem created us to be more like Him.
So then, how can we give to Hashem? Does He need anything from us?
Well. This is this world - An opportunity to give Him; an opportunity to give others; an opportunity to be more like Him; an opportunity to be givers.
An angel can not do that, nor any other being. Only human beings can decide to give back to Hashem.
And if it were easy, how then would that make us participants?
Let's be that generation, the generation that gives the final tikun not only to ourselves, but to our descendants, to creation, and the core reason, to our connection with Hashem.
