Who hardened Pharaoh's heart? Red head inspired! Red head approved?

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1still_waters

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This topic was brought up in another thread by Jullianna. Figured I'd make another thread about it.

So who hardened Pharaoh's heart? Did he harden it himself through his own rebellion? Did God outright do it? Was it a mix between constant rebellion and God basically saying enough is enough?
 
I don't think it's necessarily an either/or, but I would say that Pharaoh's hardening his heart was a result of God's work. For one thing, God predicted that He would harden Pharaoh's heart before Moses even went to Egypt:

Exodus 4:21 And the LORD said to Moses, “When you go back to Egypt, see that you do before Pharaoh all the miracles that I have put in your power. But I will harden his heart, so that he will not let the people go.​

When Moses gets to Egypt, God again tells Moses that he is going to harden the heart of Pharaoh:


Exodus 7:3–4 But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and though I multiply my signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, Pharaoh will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and bring my hosts, my people the children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by great acts of judgment.​

So then, the first time we read of Pharaoh's heart *actually being hardened* this is the explanation the narrator gives to it:

Exodus 7:13 Still Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he would not listen to them, as the LORD had said.​

So the entire narrative starting with Moses leaving for Egypt gives us the explanation for Pharaoh's heart being hardened: it is the work of God. When Pharaoh is later said to harden his heart, we are supposed to interpret it through this same lens: it is the fulfillment of God's purpose. This is supported by what we read the first time Pharaoh is said to harden his heart:

Exodus 8:15 But when Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, he hardened his heart and would not listen to them, as the LORD had said.​

This refrain--as the LORD had said--is repeated several times throughout the narrative to emphasize the work of God in fulfilling his plan (his plan to harden Pharaoh's heart).

For another thing, a Psalm reflecting back on the entire incident explains the general animosity of the Egyptians to Israelites as being the work of God:

Psalm 105:25 He turned their hearts to hate his people, to deal craftily with his servants.​

But, like I said, I don't think the fact that God is the ultimate explanation for the hardening of Pharaoh's heart rules out the personal hardening of Pharaoh. We can say that Pharaoh hardened his own heart, because God had purposed that he would do so. In other words, ultimately, Pharaoh's own choice to harden his heart would be explained by God's purposes.
 
yeah, God already knew the ending result to the Pharaoh's decision. God gave him a chance and he did not free them, so then it was purposely harden. God knows all friend, and He is the Shepherd of His flock.
 
Exodus 9:12
But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart and he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said to Moses.

Romans 9:
14What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15For he says to Moses,

“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,
and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”f
16It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. 17For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”g
18Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.

19One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?” 20But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’”h 21Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?

According to scripture which I find unwise to debate...Pharaoh was created by God, for God's purpose.
Even though we have been given free will, God expects us to do his will, his not ours. His ways, not the worlds.
We were CREATED by God and for God, it is best to know, understand and humbly accept with a glad heart the purpose we were created for.
And in accordance to God's will and purpose for us we should be wise to also follow this scripture written in Phillipians 2:14
Do everything without complaining or arguing,
Amen
 
In these verses, the scriptures say that God hardened Pharoah's heart:

Exodus 4:21 - 21And the LORD said to Moses, "When you go back to Egypt, see that you do before Pharaoh all the miracles that I have put in your power. But I will harden his heart, so that he will not let the people go; Ex 7:3 - But I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and though I multiply my miraculous signs and wonders in Egypt; Exodus 9:12 - But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart and he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said to Moses; Exodus 10:1 - Then the LORD said to Moses, "Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these miraculous signs of mine among them; Exodus 10:20 - But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let the Israelites go; Exodus 10:27 - But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he was not willing to let them go; Exodus 11:10 - Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharaoh, but the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let the Israelites go out of his country; Exodus 14:4 - And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and he will pursue them. But I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD." So the Israelites did this; Exodus 14:8 - The LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, so that he pursued the Israelites, who were marching out boldly; and Exodus 14:17 - I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them. And I will gain glory through Pharaoh and all his army, through his chariots and his horsemen.

These verses indicate that there were also times when Pharoah's heart was clearly hardened of his own accord, and, of course, God knew that from the beginning:

Exodus 7:13 - Yet Pharaoh's heart became hard and he would not listen to them, just as the LORD had said; Exodus 7:14 - Then the LORD said to Moses, "Pharaoh's heart is unyielding; he refuses to let the people go; Exodus 7:22 - But the Egyptian magicians did the same things by their secret arts, and Pharaoh's heart became hard; he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said; Exodus 8:15 - But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said; Exodus 8:19 - The magicians said to Pharaoh, "This is the finger of God." But Pharaoh's heart was hard and he would not listen, just as the LORD had said; Exodus 8:32 - But this time also Pharaoh hardened his heart and would not let the people go; Exodus 9:7 - Pharaoh sent men to investigate and found that not even one of the animals of the Israelites had died. Yet his heart was unyielding and he would not let the people go; Exodus 9:34 - When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again: He and his officials hardened their hearts; Exodus 9:35 - So Pharaoh's heart was hard and he would not let the Israelites go, just as the LORD had said through Moses; and Exodus 13:15 - When Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us go, the LORD killed every firstborn in Egypt, both man and animal. This is why I sacrifice to the LORD the first male offspring of every womb and redeem each of my firstborn sons.'


These are my findings from my study:
1. I Samuel says: "But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance but the Lord looketh on the heart". The condition of Pharoah's heart was no surprise to God.
2. MidniteWelder has already quoted the next scripture I referenced in Romans regarding God's creation of noble and ignoble vessels for His purposes, so I won't repeat it here.
3. Exodus 9:34 answered more questions for me than any. It says that Pharoah sinned by hardening his heart. Our God is a holy, righteous God who does not force us to sin. HOWEVER, He DOES use evil for good (Romans 8:28 - And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.)

My purpose in posing the question was not contentious in nature. :) It was merely a reminder that we need to guard our hearts and constantly question our motives and the things that influence us, either from within or without. For me, this verse is pretty scary: Exodus 7:14 - Then the LORD said to Moses, "Pharaoh's heart is unyielding..." How long will God strive with a heart like that???

Psalm 34:18 - The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.

James 4:16 - But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble."

Proverbs 4:23 - “Above all else, guard your heart for it is the wellspring of life.”

No matter what we do or don't do, or how we are influence or not, may we never lose our first love:

Revelation 2

To the Church in Ephesus

1 “To the angel of the church in Ephesus write:

These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven golden lampstands. 2 I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. 3 You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary.
4 Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. 5 Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. 6 But you have this in your favor: You hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. 7 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.
 
And grrrrrrrr @ the 5 minute editting thingie that wouldn't let me fix my typos (i.e. - "influence" s/b "influenced")

Lord, guard my heart against grrrrrring @ the server :)
 
I'm sure no one wants to argue and so on and so forth... But I do want to be careful that we don't try to soften a portion of Scripture just because we find it hard to swallow. Craig Blomberg, in his book Jesus and the Gospels, points out an Isaiah passage that Jewish interpreters found hard to believe and so they "regularly tried to tone [it] down" by giving it a funny spin... a spin that is contradicted in the New Testament's use of the passage. We should be careful that we don't do the same.

Exodus 4:21 is clear enough that God didn't just look into the future and see that Pharaoh would harden his heart, but that God determined that he would harden Pharaoh's heart.

Only 8:15, 8:32, and 9:34 actually mention Pharaoh hardening his own heart. The other passages say his heart was hardened, but don't specify that he did the hardening.

And the refrain "as the Lord had said" is repeated in most of these passages. But what does "as the Lord had said" refer to? His statement to Moses that "I will harden his heart" in 4:21 and "I will harden Pharaoh’s heart" in 7:3-4.

To me anyway, it looks clear that when we see "as the Lord had said" the narrator is expecting us to draw the conclusion that God is fulfilling his purpose that he revealed to Moses to "harden Pharaoh's heart."

And since the refrain is found even in a passage where Pharaoh is said to harden his own heart (e.g. 8:15), it seems reasonable to me to conclude that even Pharaoh's hardening of his own heart is not something that is taking place outside of God's purpose to do the hardening. This is why I said I don't think it's either/or. God can harden Pharaoh's heart and Pharaoh can still be a morally responsible agent who sins in hardening his heart.

I'm sure that raises a lot of philosophical questions in people's minds (how can Pharaoh be morally responsible for an action God determined?)... And I think there are good answers to those questions, but I don't think anyone would really want to get into that.
 
Credo_ut_Intelligam said:
I'm sure no one wants to argue and so on and so forth... But I do want to be careful that we don't try to soften a portion of Scripture just because we find it hard to swallow. Craig Blomberg, in his book Jesus and the Gospels, points out an Isaiah passage that Jewish interpreters found hard to believe and so they "regularly tried to tone [it] down" by giving it a funny spin... a spin that is contradicted in the New Testament's use of the passage. We should be careful that we don't do the same.
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Click to expand...

Amen Brother we should never take just what we like from GODS word just to makes us feel warm and fuzzy and discount any portion thereof just because we may not like it or have a difficulty accepting any portions of :)
 
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You'll get no argument from me on that either, Credo. :) God's Word stands on its own. Absolutely.

God hardened Pharoah's heart. He told Moses that He was going to do it before Moses and Aaron even headed to Egypt and said a word to Pharoah. He also knew what Pharoah would do on his own. He knew Pharoah's heart from the beginning. The fact that some vessels are chosen for ignoble purposes is indeed hard to swallow at times, but it is what it is, right?

But my purpose in posing my initial question to Stilly (the reason this thread came about) was not really about that.

Thanks for your thoughts. Greatly appreciated. It's not a subject very many people are willing to tackle. :)
 
I should really have more caffiene before I read this stuff too .........zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
 
"I'm sure that raises a lot of philosophical questions in people's minds (how can Pharaoh be morally responsible for an action God determined?)... And I think there are good answers to those questions, but I don't think anyone would really want to get into that."

I would be interested in reading your thoughts whether we would agree or not. :) That's healthy stuff. The scriptures are rich and thought provoking intentionally. Sometimes we can learn much more than the obvious, which was more my point.

The scriptures on the subject do make it clear and simple, as DanuckInUSA well said. LOL

Sometimes I wonder whether it's wise to dig further or whether it's running over the dead horse with a truck :) But, I do enjoy hearing other viewpoints than my own. No growth without that seems to me..
 
Jullianna said:
"I'm sure that raises a lot of philosophical questions in people's minds (how can Pharaoh be morally responsible for an action God determined?)... And I think there are good answers to those questions, but I don't think anyone would really want to get into that."

I would be interested in reading your thoughts whether we would agree or not. :) That's healthy stuff. The scriptures are rich and thought provoking intentionally. Sometimes we can learn much more than the obvious, which was more my point.

The scriptures on the subject do make it clear and simple, as DanuckInUSA well said. LOL

Sometimes I wonder whether it's wise to dig further or whether it's running over the dead horse with a truck :) But, I do enjoy hearing other viewpoints than my own. No growth without that seems to me..
Click to expand...

Well I guess the simplest way to demonstrate that Pharaoh's action can be fixed by God (such that the person cannot do otherwise) does not take away his moral responsibility is to give an illustration. But I'm going to be lazy and just quote an example provided by John Martin Fischer in his book "My Way: Essays on Moral Responsibility" (Oxford, 2006):

Let us suppose, then, ... [that you are flying a plane and] a neurosurgeon has secretly implanted a chip in your brain, by which she can monitor your brain activities. If everything goes as she wants, she does not intervene, and let us imagine that she wants you to go to the west, just as you actually guide the plane. But, for her own reasons (which may be nefarious or nice), if you were about to choose to steer the plane in any other direction, she would use a remote-control device to cause the chip to stimulate your brain in such a way as to induce a choice to guide the plan to the west in the exact same way you actually choose to guide the plane (and to ensure that you do in fact act in accordance with that choice, just as you actually do). As things actually play out, you choose to steer the plane to the west, but in virtue of the presence of the chip and the neurosurgeon monitoring your brain, you could not have even chosen to do otherwise (or have done otherwise)" (emphasis mine; 9)​

In this example, Fischer says that it seems pretty clear that you chose to guide the plan to the west and that this was an action for which you can be morally responsible, even though the event was "fixed" so to speak, because you could not have done otherwise.

To help sort out cases of fixation which render us free of blameworthiness or praiseworthiness from those which maintain our culpability, Fischer distinguishes between two types of control: regulative control and guidance control. Regulative control would require alternative possibilities, such that the choice or action is not fixed. Guidance control, according to Fischer, has two elements:

"reasons-sensitivity of the appropriate sort and mechanism ownership. That is, the mechanism that issues in the behavior must (in an appropriate sense) be the agent's own mechanism... one's mechanism becomes one's own in virtue of one's having certain beliefs about one's own agency and its effects in the world, that is, in virtue of seeing oneself in a certain way... an individual becomes morally responsible in part at least by taking responsibility; he makes his mechanism his own by taking responsibility for acting from that kind of mechanism." (emphasis original; 18).​

I've chosen this example from Fischer because I think it fits nicely with the Pharaoh narrative. In stating that God purposes to harden Pharaoh's heart, it's clear that Pharaoh lacks regulative control. But in stating that Pharaoh hardens his heart, the narrative makes it clear that he still has guidance control. So he lacks that sort of control which could thwart God's purposes, but he still has that sort of control which renders him culpable for his actions.
 
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I'm sorry to arrive so late to this thread... I had noticed it earlier and wanted to reply but wanted to read what other people had posted first.

I just wanted to add that I am currently reading The Apologetics Study Bible and found a very interesting verse and footnote:

Deut. 2:30--"But Sihon king of Heshbon would not let us travel through his land, for the Lord your God made his spirit stubborn and his heart obstinate in order to hand him over to you, as has now taken place."

I know this has been discussed a bit already so I'm sorry for rehashing similar ideas in a different way, but at my Lutheran grade school, the pastors taught us that a person has a choice of whether or not they will open or harden their heart. If they continue to harden it, they may come to a point of no return, and then God will start to harden it Himself.

The footnote in this Bible makes an interesting observation: "The pharaoh of exodus illustrated the same process. He first hardened himself against the Lord (Ex. 7:13, 22, 8:15, 19) then, WHEN ALL HOPE OF CHANGING HIS MIND WAS GONE, the Lord hardened it for His own purpose. (Ex. 9:12, 10:27.)"

I used to think, "Oh, how terrible that God would 'make a person think a certain way'", but I've come to learn it as that the person choose his own way himself and gets to a point where God knows he will never change, so God uses the path the person HAS ALREADY CHOSEN FOR HIMSELF for His own purposes.

Very much like Saul, I think... the person may "seem" like they are trying to do right on the surface, but in the heart... their mind is set on their own ways and promotion.

Makes me very afraid of my own times of choosing not to listen or to rebel...
 
God knows us better than we know ourselves. So if anyone knows how to change or mould us it would be God.
 
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