The hardening of Pharaoh’s heart

Whenever I mention that I am a specialist in Old Testament, I encounter questions of what people find difficult there. High on the list, along with the issue of violence, is the topic of Pharaoh’s hardening by God. As I am writing notes on Exodus 4 at the moment, I have decided to tackle Pharaoh’s hardening where it is first mentioned (Exod 4:21). The image that many have in their minds is that God blocks Pharaoh from repenting and then holds him responsible for not doing so and punishes him to boot. This, however, is a caricature of the real dynamics.

First, as many will know, the heart in Hebrew symbolises the will and cognition of a person, not the centre of the emotions. In fact, there are three different verbs used for what English translations render ‘to harden’ (to make/be strong; to make heavy and to make hard) though there is no noticeable pattern regarding their distribution here. Overall, it would be better to interpret the concept of hardening the heart as strengthening one’s resolve or being stubborn and determined about something or deliberately closing one’s mind to an option. The table below provides an overview. I give a wooden translation on the left and reflect the small variations in the Hebrew by like variations in the English (e.g. his heart was strong, he made his heart strong, etc.). The right-hand column is my attempt at rendering the sense rather than just the words of the Hebrew.

* For those interested in looking up the Hebrew, the references in ch.8 are 8:10, 15, 28 (the chapter division falls at a different place in Hebrew, so the verse numbers shift too, but the content is the same).

The table above shows a clear distribution of agency. God warns Moses in advance that He will (in the future) harden Pharaoh’s heart (Exod 4:21; Exod 7:3). What follows, however, is Pharaoh repeatedly hardening his own heart and it is not until Exod 9:12 that we first read that God did so. Apart from a couple of mentions afterwards with Pharaoh as the agent, from this point on God is described as doing the hardening. Thus, Pharaoh is not a puppet who is forced to act in certain ways against his own will from the start. Rather, God confirms or strengthens what is already there from the beginning: a clear rejection of God’s miracles, His power and the truth of His words as presented by Moses over and over again. Long before God overtly gets involved in the action, the previous Pharaoh plans the systematic decimation of God’s people and enslaves them into hard labour. The new Pharaoh Moses will face during the ten plagues does not in any way alleviate conditions either. When Moses comes in God’s name, Pharaoh’s defiant response is ‘Who is the LORD that I should obey Him?’ (Exod 5:2). He accuses Israel of laziness and toughens the rules for brickmaking (Exod 5:7-8). Seven of the ten plagues are announced in advance giving Pharaoh a chance to repent and change the course of events as in the case of the Ninevites who will repent at Jonah’s message of judgement (Jonah 3:4-10). At one point, even Pharaoh’s magicians come to realise the hand of Israel’s God in the plagues (Exod 8:19), yet Pharaoh declines to do so. Thus, God has every right to draw the line somewhere. It is a sober warning for all of us that the opportunities for repentance are not limitless. If we resist long and hard enough, God may stop to ‘bother’ us.

It has also been observed that, psychologically speaking, the more we repeat certain actions, the more we ‘harden’ into them. It is particularly true when we recurrently go against the truth, until our consciences become so seared that we no longer feel that something is wrong. I have heard of Christians who left their spouse for another and yet maintained that they felt at peace with the Lord. It made me wonder if they were deliberately lying or if they genuinely believed what they said. I suspect that if they explained away their pangs of conscience long enough, they would eventually lose their sensitivity to the Spirit’s prompting and no longer be troubled by a sense of sin. I wonder if Pharaoh’s resistance and rejection of the true God likewise hardened him and God simply confirmed what he had decided all along.

As an overall point, it is also worth noting that the OT writers are primarily concerned about showing God’s sovereignty and authority in the events of history. They want to communicate that God is in full charge, is not surprised or taken unawares by particular incidents. Therefore, they most often highlight God’s involvement and only rarely distinguish between direct and indirect agency. The difficulty is, of course, that the more we emphasise God’s sovereignty, the more we diminish human responsibility and vice versa.

One instance that helpfully juxtaposes the two perspectives is in Isa 10:5-7. God says that He sent Assyria against His own people (to punish or discipline them), which would make us think that she had no choice in the matter (and therefore no responsibility). However, the next verse clarifies that Assyria is unaware of God’s plans, is simply arrogant and wants to destroy other nations (Isa 10:5-7). In fact, God is going to punish her for her arrogance (Isa 10:12), holding her to account. Today we would probably say that God allowed Assyria to attack God’s own people or used her attack for His own purposes.

Combining these last two insights about the biblical emphasis on sovereignty and the psychological aspects of hardening, we might say that God built into human functioning certain characteristics such that if we resist the truth repeatedly, there is a point where we become incapable of seeing or accepting that truth and insensitive to the Holy Spirit’s promptings. If God created us this way, then it could be said that, ultimately, He hardens us even as we harden ourselves.

I have to admit that this explanation appeals to me, but I also recognise the truth of the argument that such a view may overly stress human responsibility and thereby diminish God’s sovereignty too much. He is the potter and we are the clay and He has every right to act as He will even if we are not able to explain satisfactorily the what and the why. After all, God is God and who are we to judge? This is a point that Paul makes in Rom 9:14-24, as he wrestles with the partial hardening of Israel as a nation in the face of the gospel. Interestingly, while Romans 9 focuses on God’s sovereignty, Romans 10 directs the spotlight on Israel’s refusal to turn to Jesus as Messiah. Paul’s resolution is not through finding a balance point between God’s sovereignty and human responsibility, but in swinging between the two extremes of a pendulum, emphasising fully first the one, then the other side.

It is clear both from the exodus account, as well as from Paul’s reflections in Romans 9-11, that God’s hardening action is always in line with human intention. Both Pharaoh and Israel (as a nation, not as individuals) showed a refusal to accept God’s authority consistently, forcefully and over a lengthy period of time when they repeatedly had opportunities to repent and submit to His ways. God perhaps intensified or firmed up their intention, but He never overruled their will in the opposite direction to where they were going. In other words, at no time did God force them to be hard when, really, they wanted to repent.

What then is the purpose behind God hardening Pharaoh? It is repeatedly asserted that such hardening allows God to show the full measure of His power through His miracles, so that the Egyptians (Exod 7:3-5) and Israel (Exod 10:1-2) might know that the Lord is truly God. Ridley Scott’s 2014 epic movie, Exodus: Gods and Kings, sadly misrepresents God as a spoilt child who is more concerned about His vanity in showing off His ‘fireworks’ than in the suffering this might cause to those affected. Nothing could be further from the truth. God is not ministering to His own vanity in wanting to display signs and wonders, but His aim is to reveal Himself, so that people might submit to Him. Those of us who have submitted ourselves to God know the difference it makes to our whole lives for the better. Such an act then is meant for the benefit of the world. The hardening of one allows for a greater revelation of God’s character and leads to the potential benefit of many. Interestingly, this is a point Paul also makes in connection to Israel’s partial hardening, which allowed the Gentiles to enter into God’s salvation (Rom 11:11-16).

Ultimately, we need to admit that we cannot entirely explain how God’s sovereignty and human responsibility fit together and the best we can do is to submit to His wisdom and trust that He is both just and merciful. So, with Paul, we can only repeat the remarks he concludes his discussion on the subject in Romans.

11 ³³ Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! ³⁴ For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor? ³⁵ Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to him again? ³⁶ For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen. (NASB)