Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Exodus 7:3
And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt.
3. And I (emph.) will harden, &c.] cf. Exo 4:21 (E). Harden ( ), as Psa 95:8; but used only here of the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart.
my signs and my portents ] alluding, probably, partly to ‘portents’ (see on Exo 4:21) performed as credentials (cf. v. 9), partly to the less severe plagues (cf. Exo 11:10, in P).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Wonders – A word used only of portents performed to prove a divine interposition; they were the credentials of Gods messengers.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Exo 7:3-4
I will harden Pharaohs heart, and multiply My signs and My wonders.
The struggle between Gods will and Pharaohs
The text brings before us the two great results which God forewarned Moses would rise from the struggle between His will and Pharaohs. On the one hand, the tyranny was to be gradually overthrown by the sublime manifestations of the power of the Lord; on the other, the heart of Pharaoh himself was to be gradually hardened in the conflict with the Lord.
I. Why was the overthrow of Pharaohs tyranny through the miracles of Moses so gradual? Why did not God, by one overwhelming miracle, crush for ever the power of the king?
1. It was not Gods purpose to terrify Pharaoh into submission. He treats men as voluntary creatures, and endeavours, by appealing to all that is highest in their natures, to lead them into submission.
2. In his determination to keep Israel in slavery, Pharaoh had two supports–his confidence in his own power, and the flatteries of the magicians. Through both these sources the miracles appealed to the very heart of the man.
3. The miracles appealed to Pharaoh through the noblest thing he had left–his own sense of religion. When the sacred river became blood, and the light turned to darkness, and the lightning gleamed before him, he must have felt that the hidden God of nature was speaking to him. Not until he had been warned and appealed to in the most powerful manner did the final judgment come.
II. We are told that the heart of Pharaoh was hardened by the miracles which overthrew his purpose. What does this mean? One of the most terrible facts in the world is the battle between Gods will and mans. In Pharaoh we see an iron will manifesting itself in tremendous resistance, the results of which were the hardening and the overthrow. There are three possible explanations of the hardening of Pharaohs heart.
1. It may be attributed entirely to the Divine sovereignty. But this explanation is opposed to the letter of Scripture. We read that Pharaoh hardened his heart.
2. We may attribute it wholly to Pharaoh himself. But the Bible says distinctly, The Lord hardened Pharaohs heart.
3. We may combine the two statements, and thus we shall get at the truth. It is true that the Lord hardened Pharaoh, and true also that Pharaoh hardened himself. (E. L. Hull, B. A.)
Hardening of conscience
It is a very terrible thing to let conscience begin to grow hard, for it soon chills into northern iron and steel. It is like the freezing of a pond. The first film of ice is scarcely perceptible; keep the water stirring and you will prevent the frost from hardening it; but once let it film over and remain quiet, the glaze thickens over the surface, and it thickens still, and at last it is so firm that a waggon might be drawn over the solid ice. So with conscience, it films over gradually, until at last it becomes hard and unfeeling, and is not crushed even with ponderous loads of iniquity. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Seven characteristics of Pharaoh
I. Ignorant (Exo 5:2).
II. Disobedient (Exo 5:2).
III. Unbelieving (Exo 5:9).
IV. Foolish (Exo 8:10).
V. Hardened (Exo 8:15).
VI. Privileged (Exo 9:1).
VII. Lost (Exo 14:26-28). (C. Inglis.)
Judicial hardness of heart inflicted by God
I. I shall give some general observations from the story; for in the story of Pharaoh we have the exact platform of a hard heart.
1. Between the hard heart and God there is an actual contest who shall have the better. The parties contesting are God and Pharaoh.
2. The sin that hardened Pharaoh, and put him upon this contest, was covetousness and interest of State.
3. This contest on Pharaohs part is managed with slightings and contempt of God; on Gods part, with mercy and condescension.
4. The first plague on Pharaohs heart is delusion. Moses worketh miracles, turneth Aarons rod into a serpent, rivers into blood, bringeth frogs, and the magicians still do the same; God permitteth these magical impostures, to leave Pharaoh in his wilful error.
5. God was not wanting to give Pharaoh sufficient means of conviction. The magicians turned their rods into serpents, but Aarons rod swallowed up their rods (Exo 7:12); which showeth Gods super-eminent power.
6. Observe, in one of the plagues Israel might have stolen away, whether Pharaoh would or no (Exo 10:22-23): but God had more miracles to be done. When He hath to do with a hard heart, He will not steal out of the field, but go away with honour and triumph. This was to be a public instance, and for intimation to the world (1Sa 6:6). The Philistines took warning by it, and it will be our condemnation if we do not.
7. In all these plagues I observe that Pharaoh now and then had his devout pangs. In a hard heart there may be some relentings, but no true repentance.
8. In process of time his hardness turns into rage and downright malice (Exo 10:28). Men first slight the truth, and then are hardened against it, and then come to persecute it. A river, when it hath been long kept up, swelleth and beareth down the bank and rampire; so do wicked men rage when their consciences cannot withstand the light, and their hearts will not yield to it.
9. At length Pharaoh is willing to let them go. After much ado God may get something from a hard heart; but it is no sooner given but retracted; like fire struck out of a flint, it is hardly got, and quickly gone (Hos 6:4).
10. The last news that we hear of hardening Pharaohs heart was a little before his destruction (Exo 14:8). Hardness of heart will not leave us till it hath wrought our full and final destruction. Never any were hardened but to their own ruin.
II. How God hardens.
1. Negatively.
(1) God infuseth no hardness and sin as he infuseth grace. All influences from heaven are sweet and good, not sour. Evil cannot come from the Father of lights. God enforceth no man to do evil.
(2) God doth not excite the inward propension to sin; that is Satans work.
2. Affirmatively.
(1) By desertion, taking away the restraints of grace, whereby He lets them loose to their own hearts (Psa 81:12). Man, in regard to his inclinations to sin, is like a greyhound held by a slip or collar; when the hare is in sight, take away the slip, and the greyhound runneth violently after the hare, according to his inbred disposition. Men are held in by the restraints of grace, which, when removed, they are left to their own swing, and run into all excess of riot.
(2) By tradition. He delivereth them up to the power of Satan, who worketh upon the corrupt nature of man, and hardeneth it; he stirreth him up as the executioner of Gods curse; as the evil spirit had leave to seduce Ahab (1Ki 22:21-22).
(3) There is an active providence which deposeth and propoundeth such objects as, meeting with a wicked heart, maketh it more hard. God maketh the best things the wicked enjoy to turn to the fall and destruction of those that have them. In what a sad case are wicked men left by God! Mercies corrupt them, and corrections enrage them; as unsavoury herbs, the more they are pounded, the more they stink. As all things work together for good to them that love God, so all things work for the worst to the wicked and impenitent. Providences and ordinances; we read of them that wrest the scriptures to their own destruction (2Pe 3:16). Some are condemned to worldly happiness; by ease and abundance of prosperity they are entangled: The prosperity of fools shall destroy them (Pro 1:32); as brute creatures, when in good plight, grow fierce and man-keen. If we will find the sin, God will find the occasion. (T. Manton, D. D.)
A hardened heart
God hardened Pharaohs heart by submitting to him those truths, arguments, and evidences which he ought to have accepted, but the rejection of which recoiled upon himself, and hardened the heart they did not convince. Everybody knows, in the present day, that if you listen, Sunday after Sunday, to great truths, and, Sunday after Sunday, reject them, you grow in your capacity of repulsion and ability to reject them, and the more hardened you become; and thus, the preaching of the gospel that was meant to melt, will be the occasion of hardening your heart–not because God hates you, but because you reject the gospel. The sun itself melts some substances, whilst, from the nature of the substances, it hardens others. You must not think that God stands in the way of your salvation. There is nothing between the greatest sinner and instant salvation, but his own unwillingness to lean on the Saviour, and be saved. (J. Cumming, D. D.)
The punishment of unbelief
The gospel is the savour of life unto life, and of death unto death, as one and the same savour is to some creatures refreshing, to others poisonous. But that the gospel is unto death, is not a part of its original intention, but a consequence of perverse unbelief; but when this takes place, that it is unto death comes as a punishment from God. Thus the expression hardening presupposes an earlier condition, when the heart was susceptible, but which ceased in consequence of the misuse, of Divine revelations and gifts. As Pharaoh hardens himself, so God hardens him at the same time. (Otto Von Gerlach, D. D.)
Heart-hardening
1. Both the expressions employed and the facts themselves lead to the conclusion, that hardening can only take place where there is a conflict between human freedom and Divine grace.
2. Again, it follows from the notion of hardening, that it can only result from a conscious and obstinate resistance to the will of God. It cannot take place where there is either ignorance or error. So long as a man has not been fully convinced that he is resisting the power and will of God, there remains a possibility that as soon as the conviction of this is brought home to his mind, his heart may be changed, and so long as there is still a possibility of his conversion, he cannot be said to be really hardened. The commencement of hardening is really hardening itself, for it contains the whole process of hardening potentially within itself. This furnishes us with two new criteria of hardening;
(1) before it commences, there is already in existence a certain moral condition, which only needs to be called into activity to become positive hardness; and
(2) as soon as it has actually entered upon the very first stage, the completion of the hardening may be regarded as certain. In what relation, then, does God stand to the hardening of the heart? Certainly His part is not limited to mere permission. Hengstenberg has proved that this is utterly inadmissible on doctrinal grounds; and an impartial examination of the Scriptural record will show that it is exegeti-cally inadmissible here. No. God desires the hardening, and, therefore, self-hardening is always at the same time hardening through God. The moral condition, which we have pointed out as the pre-requisite of hardening the soil from which it springs, is a mans own fault, the result of the free determination of his own will. But it is not without the co-operation of God that this moral condition becomes actual hardness. Up to a certain point the will of God operates on a man in the form of mercy drawing to himself, He desires his salvation; but henceforth the mercy is changed into judicial wrath, and desires his condemnation. The will of God (as the will of the Creator), when contrasted with the will of man (as the will of the creature), is from the outset irresistible and overpowering. But yet the wilt of man is able to resist the will of God, since God has created him for freedom, self-control, and responsibility; and thus when the human will has taken an ungodly direction and persists in it, the Divine will necessarily gives way. Hence, the human will is at the same time dependent on the Divine will, and independent of it. The solution of this contradiction is to be found in the fact, that the will of God is not an inflexibly rigid thing, but something living, and that it maintains a different bearing towards a mans obedience, from that which it assumes towards his stubborn resistance. In itself it never changes, whatever the circumstances may be; but in relation to a creature, endowed with freedom, the manifestation of this will differs according to the different attitudes assumed by the freedom of the creature. In itself it is exactly the same will which blesses the obedient and condemns the impenitent–there has been no change in its nature, but only in its operations–just as the heat of the sun which causes one tree to bloom is precisely the same as that by which another is withered. As there are two states of the human will–obedience and disobedience–so are there two corresponding states of the Divine will, mercy and wrath, and the twofold effects of these are a blessing and a curse. (J. H. Kurtz, D. D.)
Lessons
1. First and foremost, we learn the insufficiency of even the most astounding miracles to subdue the rebellious will, to change the heart, or to subject a man unto God. Our blessed Lord Himself has said of a somewhat analogous case, that men would not believe even though one rose from the dead. And His statement has been only too amply verified in the history of the world since His own resurrection. Religion is matter of the heart, and no intellectual conviction, without the agency of the Holy Spirit, affects the inmost springs of our lives.
2. A more terrible exhibition of the daring of human pride, the confidence of worldly power, and the deceitfulness of sin, than that presented by the history of this Pharaoh can scarcely be conceived. And yet the lesson seems to have been overlooked by too many! Not only sacred history, but possibly our own experience, may furnish instances of similar tendencies; and in the depths of his own soul each believer must have felt his danger in this respect, for the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.
3. Lastly, resistance to God must assuredly end in fearful judgment. Each conviction suppressed, each admonition stifled, each loving offer rejected, tends towards increasing spiritual insensibility, and that in which it ends. It is wisdom and safety to watch for the blessed influences of Gods Spirit, and to throw open our hearts to the sunlight of His grace. (A. Edersheim, D. D.)
Providence penal
In accordance with a vow a Hindu once bandaged up his eyes so tightly that not a single ray of light could enter them. So he continued for years. At last, when his vow was completed, he threw off his bandage, but only to find that through disuse he had completely lost his sight. In one sense, he had deprived himself of sight; in another, God had deprived him of it. So it was with Pharaohs spiritual sight. Then comes the warning of consequences. It is very pleasant to go floating down the river toward the rapids. The current is so gentle that one can easily regain the bank. But remain in that current, in spite of all warnings, just one moment too long, and you and your boat will go over the falls. (S. S. Times.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 3. I will harden Pharaoh’s heart] I will permit his stubbornness and obstinacy still to remain, that I may have the greater opportunity to multiply my wonders in the land, that the Egyptians may know that I only am Jehovah, the self-existent God. See Clarke on Ex 4:21.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
3. I will harden Pharaoh’sheartThis would be the result. But the divine messagewould be the occasion, not the cause of the king’simpenitent obduracy.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart,….
[See comments on Ex 4:21]
and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt; work one miracle and wonderful sign after another, until they are all wrought intended to be wrought; and which he had given Moses power to do, and until the end should be answered and obtained, the letting go of the children of Israel.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
3. And I will harden. As the expression is somewhat harsh, many commentators, as I have before said, take pains to soften it. Hence it is that some take the words in connection, “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart by multiplying my signs;” as if God were pointing out the external cause of his obstinacy. But Moses has already declared, and will hereafter repeat it, that the king’s mind was hardened by God in other ways besides His working miracles. As to the meaning of the words, I have no doubt that, by the first clause, God armed the heart of His servant with firmness, to resist boldly the perversity of the tyrant; and then reminds him that he has the remedy in his hand. Thus, then, I think this passage must be translated, “I indeed will harden Pharaoh’s heart, but I will multiply my signs;” as though He had said, his hardness will be no obstacle to you, for the miracles will be sufficient to overcome it. In the same sense, He adds immediately afterwards, “Although Pharaoh should not hear you, still I will lay on my hand;” for thus, in my opinion, the conjunctions should be resolved adversatively I do not altogether reject the interpretation of others; “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, that I may multiply my signs;” and, “He (78) will not hearken unto you, that I may lay on my hand.” And, in fact, God willed that Pharaoh should pertinaciously resist Moses, in order that the deliverance of the people might be more conspicuous. There is, however, no need of discussing at length the manner in which God hardens reprobates, as often as this expression occurs. Let us hold fast to what I have already observed, that they are but poor speculators who refer it to a mere bare permission; because if God, by blinding their minds, or hardening their hearts, inflicts deserved punishment upon the reprobate, He not only permits them to do what they themselves please, but actually executes a judgment which He knows to be just. Whence also it follows, that He not only withdraws the grace of His Spirit, but delivers to Satan those whom he knows to be deserving of blindness of mind and obstinacy of heart. Meanwhile, I admit that the blame of either evil rests with the men themselves, who willfully blind themselves, and with a willfulness which is like madness, are driven, or rather rush, into sin. I have also briefly shewn what foul calumniators are they, who for the sake of awakening ill-will against us, pretend that God is thus made to be the author of sin; since it would be an act of too great absurdity to estimate His secret and incomprehensible judgments by the little measure of our own apprehension. The opponents of this doctrine foolishly and inconsiderately mix together two different things, since the hardness of heart is the sin of man, but the hardening of the heart is the judgment of God. He again propounds in this place His great judgments, in order that the Israelites may expect with anxious and attentive minds His magnificent and wonderful mode of operation.
(78) It is thus translated in A. V.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
CRITICAL NOTES.
Exo. 7:3. I will harden Pharaohs heart.]Elsewhere also is the act of hardening Pharaohs heart attributed to Jehovah, as in Exo. 4:21; Exo. 9:12; Exo. 10:1; Exo. 10:23; Exo. 10:27; Exo. 11:1; Exo. 19:4; Exo. 19:8; so that although Pharaoh is in several places said to have hardened his own hearte.g., in Exo. 8:15; Exo. 8:32; Exo. 9:34; yet we cannot well deny the existence of a difficulty. The ground of the difficulty consists in the glorious truth of the absolute holiness of God, in virtue of which he so exclusively loves what is right and good, and so sincerely and intensely hates all evil, that he separates himself from sin, wholly, everywhere, always; frowns upon it, forbids it, denounces it; is not the author of it, and never can be. His highest praise, with those who are nearest to Him and know Him best, is that He is holythrice holy. Hence the difficulty created by any statement, coming to us as authoritative, which seems to attribute the causation of sin to HIM. Our best way out of the difficulty, as it presents itself in this account of Pharaoh, may be said to depend upon the settlement of a single questionWas the hardening process essentially sinful on Pharaohs part? If not, Jehovah may have positively and directly caused it; if it was, then only in an accommodated, and, in fact, a figurative, sense, can Jehovah have effected it. 1) We can conceive of a hardening of heart which involves no sin in its subjectas when a surgeon hardens his heart against such an influx of feeling as would unfit him for his stern but righteous and even benevolent duties. Was the hardening of Pharaohs heart of this nature! Did it consist solely in such an accession of firmness, of courage, aswithout being in itself badallowed him to act out to the full the badness that was otherwise in him, such as his despotic cruelty, his self glorification, etc.? If we could thus conclude, the difficulty would be at an end. We could then say: The badness was Pharaohs own; but the courage to act it outa quality morally indifferentwas directly given him by God for ends high and holy, which he would secure through means of the fully developed wickedness of this wicked king. Something may be said in favour of this solution. a.) As truly as life is from God, so truly are health, strength, courage from him. b.) Many evil purposes fail of accomplishment solely through failure of life, of health, of physical courage to go through with them. A man may in heart be a murderer, and yet simply because he turns coward he may not take away life. Had Pharaoh thus failed, Israel would have more easily escaped, and the power of God been less signally displayed. But God was not minded that the king should so fail, and, therefore, gave him courage to work out all the evil that was in him. c.) The Hebrew terms employed to express the hardening of Pharaohs heart denote, primarily, physical qualities: as ch-zaq, hold fast, be firm, (strong, 2Sa. 10:11, strengthened, Jdg. 3:12, be of good courage, 2Sa. 10:12); k-bhdh, heavy, (1Sa. 4:18; 1Sa. 5:11; Exo. 17:12; slow, Exo. 4:10); q-shah, dry, hard, harsh, (roughly, Gen. 44:7; Gen. 44:30, sorrowful, 1Sa. 1:15). These considerations appear to us to have so much weight that they ought in no case to be overlooked, even although they may need to be supplemented. Nevertheless, we are free to confess an absence of entire confidence in them. Were firmness of heart, in the sense of courage all, no more might require to be said; but it would be rather venturous to affirm that, in biblical style, either heaviness or harshness of HEART can be taken as free from moral evil. Hence it may be well to ask
(2.) Whether the divine causation may not to some extent have been indirect and figurativeamounting to permission and occasion, rather than positive cause? And, in point of fact, this cannot be denied. The respite which Jehovah gave to the Egyptian king became an OCCASION of the further hardening of the heart of the latter. (See ch. Exo. 8:15; Exo. 9:34). Here we get a glimpse into the divine procedure much fitted to satisfy. Having struck a blow, Jehovah pauses, he does so again and again. Is this unworthy of him? Yet Pharaoh makes these divine pauses an occasion of deeper sin. We cannot blame God for this; and yet had blow followed blow in quicker succession Pharaoh might have sooner yielded. Just here then Jehovah shews His holy freedom. He does as it pleases Him; never pleasing to do wrong, yet pleasing, for reasons which as yet we may not always comprehend, to permit the human wrong that He may overrule it for His own glory and His peoples weal. We conclude then that only thus did God harden Pharaohs heart: He gave him the physical courage to do his worst; and He gave himnot the disposition butthe permission, the opportunity, the occasion, in the process of reaching his worst, to turn good into evil, and add sin to sin. This Is what God DID; this In clear foresight of how Pharaoh would act, is what God MEANT TO DO; this is what God, for Moses guidance FORETOLD a His intention.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Exo. 7:3-7
MORAL OBSTINACY; OR, PHARAOH THE TYPE OF AN IMPENITENT SINNER
I. That the impenitent, like Pharaoh, reject the Divine command. Moses and Aaron had made known to the Egyptian king the will and command of God in reference to the freedom of Israel. But he refused to comply with that command. In this respect he is a type of the impenitent sinner. God has revealed his will to men in His book. He has commanded men everywhere to repent, and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. This the sinner refuses to do. He continues in sin. Heeds not the law of God.
1. Pharaoh rejected the Divine command with contempt. He inquired, Who is the Lord that I should obey Him? So many impenitent sinners contemptuously reject the Divine claim to their life and service. They intimate that they have no wish to enter upon the gloom of a religious life. They declare themselves happier amid the sport and passion of the world. They are in good social position, and do not wish to think of anything beyond the present. They treat the messengers of God who come to teach them better, with scorn, and reject all their offers of salvation. How often have we treated the spirit of God with contempt.
2. Pharaoh rejected the Divine command in a spirit of proud self-sufficiency. He thought of himself as the King of Egypt, as having at command vast resources of men and money, of luxury and pleasure. He imagined himself able to defy Jehovah, and that no one would be able to injure him. And, in this respect, Pharaoh is a type of many impenitent sinners. They pride themselves on their fancied security. They think that their temporal prosperity will shield them from future terror. Pride haughtily dismisses the conviction of the Holy Spirit.
II. That the impenitent, like Pharaoh, though rejecting the Divine commands become obstinate in disposition. We find throughout this narrative that the longer Pharaoh resisted the Divine command, the more determined became his resistance. And so is it with the impenitent sinner. He rejects the command of the scriptures, the ministry of the pulpit, the solicitations of friends, and the strivings of the Divine Spirit, and every time he does so, he becomes more obdurate in soul. He gets less susceptible of heavenly influence, until ultimately he is given up to the hardness of his heart. This is a terrible condition to be in.
1. An obstinate disposition is opposed to the good of the soul itself. It prevents the shining of heavenly light upon the soul. It renders cold the emotions that once were fervent. It destroys all the vitality of the moral nature. Obstinacy will ruin the soul eternally.
2. An obstinate disposition is antagonistic to the purposes of redemption. The object of redemption, of the Church and all its agencies, is the salvation of the souls of men. This is frustrated by moral obstinacy. Men say that they have not the power to be saved. The hinderance is not in any heavenly decree, it is in their own unwillingness to give up sin.
3. An obstinate disposition is insensible to all the appeals of heaven.
III. That the impenitent, like Pharaoh, obstinate in disposition, invite the Divine anger.
1. This anger is manifested in the exhibition of Divine power. That I may lay my hand upon Egypt. When God lays his hand upon a nation who can predict the result. The plagues of Egypt are but the sequel of this. The hand that created and upholds the world, can inflict terrible woe upon the impenitent.
2. This anger is manifested by causing the tyrant to liberate his slaves. Pharaoh now loses all his profitable slaves. This would be a terrible blow to his covetous spirit. He would have to acknowledge Jehovah as conqueror. The impenitent have ultimately to give up their wicked pleasures.
3. This anger is manifested by the destruction of the king and his army. Pharaoh and his hosts were drowned in the raging billows of the Red Sea. So the finally impenitent will be lost in the eternal fires of hell. LESSONS:
1. That God sends many ministries to invite us to obey his commands.
2. That our truest wisdom and safety consist in a penitent condition of soul.
3. That the final doom of impenitence is the abiding wrath of God.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Exo. 7:3. A hardened heart:
1. Permitted by God.
2. Effected by sin.
3. Cruel to the slave.
4. Unmoved by signs.
5. Smitten by heaven.
God instructs Moses and Aaron as to what they shall do; but He adds, I will harden Pharaohs heart. I explained to you on a former occasion, that God is often said in Scripture to do things directly, when the context shows that He did them indirectly. To be the occasion of a thing, is totally distinct from being the cause of a thing. I build an hospital for the cure of the sick; but in the course of its erection, a scaffolding gives way, and a workman is killed. The hospital was not the cause, but the occasion of that death Jesus came into the World, not to send peace, but a sword. He came directly to send peace; but He came indirectly and incidentally to send war. The gospel is not the cause of war, but the occasion of it. And so when God said, I will harden Pharaohs heart, it implied, I will show such signs, and bring to his conscience such motives that if he is not moved, melted, and subdued, the reaction of that influence will end in his being hardened more and more. Nothing can be so absurd as to say that God showed to Pharaoh reasons for repentance, which He prevented him by physical power from accepting.Dr. Cumming.
Signs:
1. Multipled.
2. Penal.
3. Rejected.
Exo. 7:4. But Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you:
1. Because he is proud, and will reject a lowly shepherd.
2. Because he is cruel, and will not free the slave.
3. Because he is obstinate, and will not yield to Spiritual influence.
God knows those who will not hearken to His word:
1. To tell His servants about them.
2. To send judgments upon them.
3. To entice them by loving discipline.
My people:
1. Because God knows them.
2. Because He saves them.
3. Because He redeems them.
4. Because He guards their welfare.
My people:
1. Therefore He will hear their prayers.
2. Therefore He will relieve their sorrows.
3. Therefore He will free their souls.
4. Therefore He will vindicate their rights.
A KNOWLEDGE OF GOD
Exo. 7:5. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I stretch forth mine hand upon Egypt.
I. That the worst of men will one day have to recognize the reality of the Divine Existence.And the Egyptians shall know, &c.
1. Men of bad moral character shall know this. Men whose lives are now spent in utter disregard of the Divine Being shall one day awake to the fact of His awful existence. This awakening will be the end of their pleasure; the commencement of a new and unalterable life. In hell the wicked will know that God is the Lord.
2. Men of sceptical dispositions shall know this. Some men profess to disbelieve in the existence of God. They call it a philosophical absurdity. They say in their hearts that there is not. The wish is father to the thought. In another life the sceptic will know that God is the Lord.
II. That they will be brought to a recognition of the Divine Existence by severe judgments.
1. Some men will listen to the voice of reason. The Egyptians would not. They would not learn the reality of the Divine existence from the mouth of Moses. They would not be gently led to behold the Great Parent of the universe. They are like men to-day. They will not give heed to the messengers that proclaim the Being of God. They reject them. They neglect the Bible. They interpret nature on atheistic principles.
2. Such will learn the existence of God by judgment. Some men will never learn anything while life goes well with them; they will only study heavenly themes when they are in sorrow and perplexity. They will one day be visited with overwhelming judgments, which will demonstrate the existence, and moral government of God, but which will be no time for repentance.
III. That the existence of God is a guarantee for the safety of the good. And bring the children from among them. As truly as God exists shall all good men be finally brought out from moral and temporal bondage into the Canaan of peace and quiet.
OBEDIENCE TO GOD
Exo. 7:6.
I. It must be rendered by the servants of God. Moses and Aaron. All men who are called to moral service by God must obey Him:
1. Because He gives them their commands.
2. Became He gives them the power to do so.
3. Because He rewards obedience.
II. It must be co-extensive with their mission.
1. It must be entire.
2. It must be cheerful.
3. It must be holy.
III. It will render their mission effective.
1. Because it will lead to the best mode of service.
2. Because God will delight to honour it. The Divine commands:
1. Rightfully given.
2. To be faithfully executed.
3. To be diligently obeyed. To be supremely regarded.
Exo. 7:7. The bearing of a mans age upon his work.
We are here informed that Moses was at this time eighty years of age, and that Aaron was eighty-three. Their ages would have an important bearing toward the work of these two men.
I. Their ages would indicate that they were not likely to be misled by the enthusiasm of youth. The Israelites would probably not have placed much confidence in the statement of a very young man had he gone to them with the message of their freedom. They would have doubted his word. They would have imagined him a wild dreamer, or a mistaken enthusiast. Hence the maturer years of Moses and Aaron would prevent such an interpretation being put upon their prophecy. The world is slow to take young men into its confidence. It soon smiles at their visions, and laughs at their enthusiastic hopes.
II. Their ages would be likely to command the respect of those with whom they had to do. Had they been more youthful they would have awakened the merriment of Pharaoh. Egypts king would not have given up his slaves at the request of two boys. Heaven is always judicious in the selection of its messengers. The Church ought to be likewise. It should look even for incidental qualifications, as well as the primary and the moral. Youthhood would not have had much influence with the slaves of Israel. The world wants men of tried energy and long experience to achieve its moral emancipation; men in whom hot passion has calmed into a settled force.
III. Their ages would be an incentive to fidelity, as they had spent the younger part of life, and would be forcefully reminded of the future. After men pass the meridian of life, they begin to regard life as a stern and solemn reality, if they have any pious sentiment within them at all. The past has gone like a dream. The brief future is before them. They wish it to be characterized by fidelity.
At this time, we are told, Moses was eighty years of age, and Aaron eighty-three. This was not old age. Moses lived to be one hundred and twenty. He was, therefore, now just at the close of the meridian of life. I mentioned also before, that there is no evidence in the Bible that mans life has been shortened since Moses death; and that, as far as we can gather from Divine interposition, one hundred and twenty is the proper age of man. The 90th Psalm describes an abnormal state of life in the wilderness. There Moses himself complains that their life was shortened to threescore and ten, by the existing severity and pressure of their circumstances, not by the ordinance of God. And it remains a problem, whether, if men were not less oppressed by anxious cares and thoughts, ambition, vainglory, and pride, and wrath, they would not live to a much greater age; and whether it be not true, that in proportion as Christianity gains in its sanctifying influence on the soul, the whole social and physical system will but be correspondingly elevated and ameliorated also.Dr. Cumming.
ILLUSTRATIONS
BY THE
REV. WM. ADAMSON
Insensibility! Exo. 7:3. As hard as a stone, says the adage.Yet the hardest stones submit to be smoothed and rounded under the soft friction of water. Ask the myriads of stones on the seashore what has become of all their angles, once so sharp, and of the roughness and uncouthness of their whole appearance.Water wrought with us, and none resisted.The very stones cry out against the obstinate disposition, which is insensible to all the appeals of heaven.
You may as well bid the mountain pines
To wag their high tops, and make no noise,
When they are fretted by the gusts of heaven,
As seek to soften that sinners heart.
Shakespeare.
Hardened Heart! Exo. 7:3. A scholar once inquired of his teacher whether it was not wicked to punish Pharaoh and Judas for what God knew they would do. A bright thought struck the perplexed teacher: When you were born, your papa looked at you and loved you, but he knew that bye and bye you would sin, and have to be punished: he did not make you naughty, but he knew that you would be.God did not make Pharaoh sin, but he had to punish him for it. From righteous retribution for obdurate impenitence there is no escape.
Aye! when thou hast drained a swallows milk, and
Seen rocks bear olive nuts, the sand pomegranates yield:
A harder task to try thy vaunted force remains
To shield a wicked man from retributions pains.Oriental.
Remorse! Exo. 7:4. In the early part of this century Pomare reigned as king in the islands of Tahiti and Eimeo. Many of his subjects were enraged at his recognition of Christ. Among them was a man called Upufara, who was regarded as the chief of the kings foes. He had often heard of the true God, but would not believe in him. One night he had a dream, in which he saw an immense oven with a very great fire, and in the midst of it a large fish, twisting itself in agony, and trying to get out, yet though in the fire, not consumed but still living. Such will be the guilty conscience,the fires of remorse will scorch it and make it writhe in pang and anguish, without destroying its sensitiveness. In another life, and to his cost, the sceptic will know that God is the Lord, as scorched within
The fury round his torrid temples flaps
Her fiery wings, and breathes upon his lips
And parched tongue the withered blasts of hell
Pollah.
Visitations! Exo. 7:5. A man was confined in a cell with seven windows, and the only furniture a pallet of straw. Each morning he found a loaf of bread and a jug of water by his side. He was relieved from the fear of starvation; but when his eyes sought the windows, he counted one less. The fearful truth flashed upon him that the floor and wall of his cell were being pressed together slowly and surely, and that he would be crushed to death. The sinner like Pharaoh is inclosed in the earth-cell of impenitency, and the hour approaches when his last hope will be crushed and mangled in the ever-narrowing entombment. He will then learn how real is the moral government of Godonly too late to repent
As when a fire has raged, the smokes that rise
In useless lamentations drape the skies.
Alger.
Obedient Service! Exo. 7:6. In evil times it fares best with them that are most careful about duty, least concerned about safety. Many a general, whilst discharging his duty in the battle, has borne a charmed life. Moses was preserved whilst pursuing the path of Providence. The author of From Dawn to Dark in Italy, contrasts the constant harassing perils of Montalto, a timid, compromising Lutheran, with the freedom from persecution of Old Clarice, a fruitseller at Naples. The one was continually in tumult and dangerthe other kept on the even course of her Christian profession in the very jaws of the lion for thirty years. Many a hunted Protestant found shelter in her house excavated from the precipitous rock. Many a wave of bitter papal persecution Swept over Naples, but old Clarice, who never sheltered herself beneath any compliances, seemed to prosper in her very fearlessness. The bold policy is not always the worst, and Moses was no loser by the unflinching courage with which he confronted Pharaoh in obedience to the Divine command. Luther lived, whilst-some who temporized were lost. And of John Knox who lived to a good old age, it was said, Here lies one who never feared the face of man.
So we would bravely live for Thee,
And Thy bold and faithful servants, Saviour,
we would henceforth be.
Havegal.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
(3) I will harden Pharaohs heart.See the comment on Exo. 4:21.
My signs and my wonders.Signs (othoth) were miracles done as credentials, to prove a mission (Exo. 4:8-9; Exo. 4:30). Wonders (mphth) were miracles generally; niphleoth, also translated wonders (Exo. 3:20), were miracles, wrought in the way of punishment. These last are called also shphtiin, judgments. (See Exo. 7:4.)
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
3. And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart At this stage of history Pharaoh had so far resisted the truth that God’s judgments but increased his obstinacy, and made him plunge into deeper and deeper rebellion . This result is foreseen and predicted, that Moses may be prepared for it . Pharaoh’s sin and its judicial consequences were to be the means of setting forth the attributes of Jehovah before the heathen. See on Exo 4:21.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
DISCOURSE: 70
GOD HARDENING PHARAOHS HEART
Exo 7:3. I will harden Pharaohs heart.
AS there are in the works of creation many things which exceed the narrow limits of human understanding, so are there many things incomprehensible to us both in the works of providence and of grace. It is not however necessary that, because we cannot fully comprehend these mysteries, we should never fix our attention at all upon them: as far as they are revealed, the consideration of them is highly proper: only, where we are so liable to err, our steps must be proportionably cautious, and our inquiries be conducted with the greater humility. In particular, the deepest reverence becomes us, while we contemplate the subject before us. We ought not, on the one hand, to indulge a proud and captious spirit that shall banish the subject altogether, nor, on the other hand, to make our assertions upon it with a bold, unhallowed confidence. Desirous of avoiding either extreme, we shall endeavour to explain and vindicate the conduct of God, as it is stated in the text.
I.
To explain it
We are not to imagine that God infused any evil principle into the heart of Pharaoh: this God never did, nor ever will do, to any of his creatures [Note: Jam 1:13.]. What he did, may be comprehended in three particulars
1.
He left Pharaoh to the influence of his own corruptions
[Pharaoh was a proud and haughty monarch: and, while he exercised a most arbitrary and oppressive power over his subjects, he disdained to respect the authority of Jehovah, who was King of kings, and Lord of lords.
God, if he had seen fit, might have prevented him from manifesting these corruptions. He might have struck him dead upon the spot; or intimidated him by a dream or vision; or have converted him, as he did the persecuting Saul, in the midst of all his malignant projects: but he left him to himself, precisely as he does other men when they commit iniquity; and suffered him to manifest all the evil dispositions of his heart.
This is no other conduct than what God has pursued from the beginning. When men have obstinately rebelled against the light, he has given them up to follow their own hearts lusts [Note: Rom 1:24; Rom 1:26; Rom 1:28; Psa 81:11-12; 2Th 2:10-12.]: and we have reason to expect that he will deal thus with us, if we continue to resist his will [Note: Gen 6:3; Lev 26:27-28; Pro 1:24-30.].]
2.
He suffered such events to concur as should give scope for the exercise of those corruptions
[He raised Pharaoh to the throne of Egypt, and thereby invested him with power to oppress [Note: Rom 9:17.]. By multiplying the Jews, he made their services of great importance to the Egyptian empire. The labours of six hundred thousand slaves could not easily be dispensed with; and therefore the temptation to retain them in bondage was exceeding great. Besides, the request made of going to serve their God in the wilderness must appear to him frivolous and absurd; for, why should they not be content to serve him in the land? Moreover, the success of his magicians in imitating the miracles of Moses, would seem to justify the idea, that Moses was no more than a magician, only perhaps of a more intelligent order than those employed by him. The frequent and speedy removal of the judgments that were inflicted on him, would yet further tend to harden him, by making him think light of those judgments. Thus the unreasonableness of his opposition would be hid from him; and he would persist in his rebellion without compunction or fear.]
3.
He gave Satan permission to exert his influence over him
[Satan is a powerful being; and, when the restraints which God has imposed upon him are withdrawn, can do great things. He cannot indeed force any man to sin against his will: but he can bring him into such circumstances, as shall have a strong tendency to ensnare his soul. We know from the history of Job, how great things he can effect for the distressing of a most eminent saint: much more therefore may we suppose him to prevail over one, who is his blind and willing vassal [Note: 2Co 4:4; 2Ti 2:26.]. We do not indeed know, from any express declarations, that Satan interfered in this work of hardening Pharaoh: but, when we recollect how he instigated David to number the people; how he prevailed on Peter to deny, and Judas to betray, his Lord; how he filled the hearts of Ananias and Sapphira that they might lie unto God; and finally, how expressly we are told that he works in all the children of disobedience; we can have no doubt respecting his agency in the heart of Pharaoh.
Thus, as far as respects a withholding of that grace which might have softened Pharaohs heart, and a giving him an opportunity to shew his malignant dispositions, and a permitting of Satan to exert his influence, God hardened Pharaohs heart: but as being a perfectly free agent, Pharaoh hardened his own heart: and this is repeatedly affirmed in the subsequent parts of this history.]
When once we have learned what was the true nature of Gods agency, and how far it was concerned in the hardening of Pharaohs heart, we shall beat no loss,
II.
To vindicate it
We must never forget that Gods ways and thoughts are infinitely above ours; and that, whether we approve of them or not, he will never give account of them to us: yet, constituted as we are, we feel a satisfaction in being able to discern their suitableness to the divine character. Of the dispensation then which we are considering, we may say,
1.
It was righteous, as it respected the individual himself
[It was perfectly righteous that Pharaoh should be left to himself. What injury would God have done, if he had acted towards the whole human race precisely as he did towards the fallen angels? What reason can be assigned why man, who had imitated their wickedness, should not be a partaker of their punishment? If then none had any claim upon God for the exercise of his grace, how much less could Pharaoh have a title to it, after having so proudly defied God, and so obstinately withstood his most express commands? If there was any thing unjust in abandoning Pharaoh to the corrupt affections of his heart, all other sinners in the universe have reason to make the same complaint, that God is unrighteous in his dealings with them. In that case, God could not, consistently with his own justice, permit sin at all: he must impose an irresistible restraint on all, and cease to deal with us as persons in a state of probation.
Again, it was righteous in God to suffer such a concurrence of circumstances as should give scope for the exercise of his corruptions. God is no more bound to destroy mans free agency by his providence, than he is by his grace. Was it unrighteous in him to let Cain have an opportunity of executing his murderous project against his brother Abel? or has he been unjust, as often as he has permitted others to accomplish their wicked purposes? Doubtless he has interposed, by his providence, to prevent the execution of many evils that have been conceived in our minds [Note: Hos 2:6.]: but he is not bound to do so for any one; nor could he do it universally, without changing the nature of his government, and the whole course of the world.
Moreover, it was righteous to give Satan liberty to exert his influence over Pharaoh. Pharaoh chose to believe the agents of Satan rather than the servants of the Most High God; and to obey their counsels rather than his. Why then should God continue to restrain Satan, when Pharaoh desired nothing so much as to yield to his temptations? When Ahab sent for all his lying prophets to counsel him and to foster his delusions, God permitted Satan to be a lying spirit in the mouth of all those prophets, that they might all concur in the same fatal advice [Note: 1Ki 22:21-23.]. Was this unjust? Was it not agreeable to Ahabs own wish; and was not the contrary counsel of the Lords prophet rejected by him with disdain? Pharaoh wished to be deceived; and God permitted it to be according to his own hearts desire.
On the whole then, if men are to be left to their own free agency, instead of being dealt with as mere machines; and if God have ordered the general course of his providence agreeably to this rule, resisting the proud while he gives grace to the humble; then was he fully justified in suffering this impious monarch to harden his already proud and obdurate heart [Note: Compare Deu 2:30 and Jos 11:20.].]
2.
It was merciful, as it respected the universe at large
[We form erroneous conceptions of the divine government, because we view it on too contracted a scale. God, in his dealings with mankind, consults, not the benefit of an individual merely, but the good of the whole. Now this conduct towards Pharaoh was calculated exceedingly to promote the welfare of all succeeding generations. It has given us lessons of instruction that are of the greatest value.
It has shewn us the extreme depravity of the human heart. Who would have conceived that a man, warned as Pharaoh was by so many tremendous plagues, should continue, to the last, to set himself against the God of heaven and earth? But in him we see what men will do, when their pride, their passions, and their interests have gained an ascendant over them: they will defy God to his face; and, if softened for a moment by the severity of his judgments, they will soon, like metal from the furnace, return to their wonted hardness.
It has shewn us our need of divine grace. Widely as men differ from each other in their constitutional frame both of body and mind, they all agree in this, that they have a carnal mind, which is enmity against God; and which neither is, nor can be, subject to his law [Note: Rom 8:7.]. We may all see in Pharaoh a striking portrait of ourselves: and if one be enabled to mortify the evils of his heart, whilst others continue in bondage to their lusts, he must say, By the grace of God I am what I am. If we have no more grace than Pharaoh in our hearts, we shall have no more holiness in our lives.
It has shewn us the danger of fighting against God [Note: Isa 45:9.]. Fools make a mock at sin, and puff at the threatened judgments of God. But let any one see in Pharaoh the danger of being given over to a reprobate mind: let any one see in what our hardness of heart may issue: and he will tremble lest God should say respecting him, He is joined to idols; let him alone.
It has shewn us the obligations we lie under to God for the long-suffering he has already exercised towards us. We read the history of Pharaoh: happy is it for us, that we have not been left, like him, to be a warning to others. No tongue can utter the thanks that are due to him on this account. If we know any thing of our own hearts, we shall be ready to think ourselves the greatest monuments of mercy that ever were rescued from perdition.
Now these lessons are invaluable: and every one that reads the history of this unhappy monarch, must see them written in it as with the pen of a diamond.]
Address
[We are told to remember Lots wife: and it will be well also to remember Pharaoh. Let none of us trifle with our convictions, or follow carnal policy in preference to the commands of God Let the messages of God be received with reverence, and obeyed with cheerfulness Let us be afraid of hardening our own hearts, lest God should give us over to final obduracy [Note: Job 9:4.]. If God withdraw from us, Satan will quickly come [Note: 1Sa 16:14.]: and if we are left to Satans agency, better were it for us that we had never been born. Seek of God the influences of the Holy Ghost, who will take away the heart of stone, and give you an heart of flesh.]
Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)
See the observations on Exo 4:21 . See Exo 7:13 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Exo 7:3 And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt.
Ver. 3. And I will harden. ] See Trapp on “ Exo 4:21 “ The Dutch have a proverb, Quem Deus excaecaturus est, huic primum oculos claudit. When God will blind a man, he first closeth up his eyes.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
harden. See note on Exo 4:2.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
And I: Exo 4:21, Exo 4:29
multiply: Exo 4:7, Exo 9:16, Exo 11:9, Deu 4:34, Deu 7:19, Neh 9:10, Psa 78:43-51, Psa 105:27-36, Psa 135:9, Isa 51:9, Jer 32:20, Jer 32:21, Mic 7:15, Joh 4:48, Act 2:22, Act 7:36, Rom 15:19
Reciprocal: Exo 3:20 – smite Exo 7:22 – as the Exo 14:3 – Pharaoh Exo 14:4 – harden Exo 14:17 – I will 2Sa 24:1 – moved Isa 6:10 – the heart Joh 12:40 – hardened
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
CHAPTER VII.
THE HARDENING OF PHARAOH’S HEART.
Exo 7:3-13.
When Moses received his commission, at the bush, words were spoken which are now repeated with more emphasis, and which have to be considered carefully. For probably no statement of Scripture has excited fiercer criticism, more exultation of enemies and perplexity of friends, than that the Lord said, “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he shall not let the people go,” and that in consequence of this Divine act Pharaoh sinned and suffered. Just because the words are startling, it is unjust to quote them without careful examination of the context, both in the prediction and the fulfilment. When all is weighed, compared, and harmonised, it will at last be possible to draw a just conclusion. And although it may happen long before then, that the objector will charge us with special pleading, yet he will be the special pleader himself, if he seeks to hurry us, by prejudice or passion, to give a verdict which is based upon less than all the evidence, patiently weighed.
Let us in the first place find out how soon this dreadful process began; when was it that God fulfilled His threat, and hardened, in any sense whatever, the heart of Pharaoh? Did He step in at the beginning, and render the unhappy king incapable of weighing the remonstrances which He then performed the cruel mockery of addressing to him? Were these as insincere and futile as if one bade the avalanche to pause which his own act had started down the icy slopes? Was Pharaoh as little responsible for his pursuit of Israel as his horses were–being, like them, the blind agents of a superior force? We do not find it so. In the fifth chapter, when a demand is made, without any sustaining miracle, simply appealing to the conscience of the ruler, there is no mention of any such process, despite the insults with which Pharaoh then assails both the messengers and Jehovah Himself, Whom he knows not. In the seventh chapter there is clear evidence that the process is yet unaccomplished; for, speaking of an act still future, it declares, “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and multiply My signs and My wonders in the land of Egypt” (Exo 7:3). And this terrible act is not connected with the remonstrances and warnings of God, but entirely with the increasing pressure of the miracles.
The exact period is marked when the hand of doom closed upon the tyrant. It is not where the Authorised Version places it. When the magicians imitated the earlier signs of Moses, “his heart was strong,” but the original does not bear out the assertion that at this time the Lord made it so by any judicial act of His (Exo 7:13). That only comes with the sixth plague; and the course of events may be traced, fairly well, by the help of the margin of the Revised Version.
After the plague of blood “Pharaoh’s heart was strong” (“hardened”), and this is distinctly ascribed to his own action, because “he set his heart even to this” (Exo 7:22-23).
After the second plague, it was still he himself who “made his heart heavy” (Exo 8:15).
After the third plague the magicians warned him that the very finger of some god was upon him indeed: their rivalry, which hitherto might have been somewhat of a palliation for his obstinacy, was now ended; but yet “his heart was strong” (Exo 8:19).
Again, after the fourth plague he “made his heart heavy”; and it “was heavy” after the fifth plague, (Exo 8:32, Exo 9:7).
Only thenceforward comes the judicial infatuation upon him who has resolutely infatuated himself hitherto.
But when five warnings and penalties have spent their force in vain, when personal agony is inflicted in the plague of boils, and the magicians in particular cannot stand before him through their pain, would it have been proof of virtuous contrition if he had yielded then? If he had needed evidence, it was given to him long before. Submission now would have meant prudence, not penitence; and it was against prudence, not penitence, that he was hardened. Because he had resisted evidence, experience, and even the testimony of his own magicians, he was therefore stiffened against the grudging and unworthy concessions which must otherwise have been wrested from him, as a wild beast will turn and fly from fire. He was henceforth himself to become an evidence and a portent; and so “The Lord made strong the heart of Pharaoh, and he hearkened not unto them” (Exo 9:12). It was an awful doom, but it is not open to the attacks so often made upon it. It only means that for him the last five plagues were not disciplinary, but wholly penal.
Nay, it stops short of asserting even this: they might still have appealed to his reason; they were only not allowed to crush him by the agency of terror. Not once is it asserted that God hardened his heart against any nobler impulse than alarm, and desire to evade danger and death. We see clearly this meaning in the phrase, when it is applied to his army entering the Red Sea: “I will make strong the hearts of the Egyptians, and they shall go in” (Exo 14:17). It needed no greater moral turpitude to pursue the Hebrews over the sands than on the shore, but it certainly required more hardihood. But the unpursued departure which the good-will of Egypt refused, their common sense was not allowed to grant. Callousness was followed by infatuation, as even the pagans felt that whom God wills to ruin He first drives mad.
This explanation implies that to harden Pharaoh’s heart was to inspire him, not with wickedness, but with nerve.
And as far as the original language helps us at all, it decidedly supports this view. Three different expressions have been unhappily rendered by the same English word, to harden; but they may be discriminated throughout the narrative in Exodus, by the margin of the Revised Version.
One word, which commonly appears without any marginal explanation, is the same which is employed elsewhere about “the cause which is too hard for” minor judges (Deu 1:17, cf. Deu 15:18, etc.). Now, this word is found (Exo 7:13) in the second threat that “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart,” and in the account which was to be given to posterity of how “Pharaoh hardened himself to let us go” (Exo 13:15). And it is said likewise of Sihon, king of Heshbon, that he “would not let us pass by him, for the Lord thy God hardened his spirit and made his heart strong” (Deu 2:30). But since it does not occur anywhere in all the narrative of what God actually did with Pharaoh, it is only just to interpret this phrase in the prediction by what we read elsewhere of the manner of its fulfilment.
The second word is explained in the margin as meaning to make strong. Already God had employed it when He said “I will make strong his heart” (Exo 4:21), and this is the term used of the first fulfilment of the menace, after the sixth plague (Exo 9:12). God is not said to interfere again after the seventh, which had few special terrors for Pharaoh himself; but from henceforth the expression “to make strong” alternates with the phrase “to make heavy.” “Go in unto Pharaoh, for I have made heavy his heart and the heart of his servants, that I might show these My signs in the midst of them” (Exo 10:1).
It may be safely assumed that these two expressions cover between them all that is asserted of the judicial action of God in preventing a recoil of Pharaoh from his calamities. Now, the strengthening of a heart, however punitive and disastrous when a man’s will is evil (just as the strengthening of his arm is disastrous then), has in itself no immorality inherent. It is a thing as often good as bad,–as when Israel and Joshua are exhorted to “Be strong and of a good courage” (Deu 31:6-7, Deu 31:23), and when the angel laid his hand upon Daniel and said, “Be strong, yea, be strong” (Dan 10:19). In these passages the phrase is identical with that which describes the process by which Pharaoh was prevented from cowering under the tremendous blows he had provoked.
The other expression is to make heavy or dull. Thus “the eyes of Israel were heavy with age” (Gen 48:10), and as we speak of a weight of honour, equally with the heaviness of a dull man, so we are twice commanded, “Make heavy (honour) thy father and thy mother”; and the Lord declares, “I will make Myself heavy (get Me honour) upon Pharaoh” (Deu 5:16, Exo 20:12, Exo 14:4, Exo 14:17-18). In these latter references it will be observed that the making “strong” the heart of Pharaoh, and the making “Myself heavy” are so connected as almost to show a design of indicating how far is either expression from conveying the notion of immorality, infused into a human heart by God. For one of the two phrases which have been thus interpreted is still applied to Pharaoh; but the other (and the more sinister, as we should think, when thus applied) is appropriated by God to Himself: He makes Himself heavy.
It is also a curious and significant coincidence that the same word was used of the burdens that were made heavy when first they claimed their freedom, which is now used of the treatment of the heart of their oppressor (Exo 5:9).
It appears, then, that the Lord is never said to debauch Pharaoh’s heart, but only to strengthen it against prudence and to make it dull; that the words used do not express the infusion of evil passion, but the animation of a resolute courage, and the overclouding of a natural discernment; and, above all, that every one of the three words, to make hard, to make strong, and to make heavy, is employed to express Pharaoh’s own treatment of himself, before it is applied to any work of God, as actually taking place already.
Nevertheless, there is a solemn warning for all time, in the assertion that what he at first chose, the vengeance of God afterward chose for him. For indeed the same process, working more slowly but on identical lines, is constantly seen in the hardening effect of vicious habit. The gambler did not mean to stake all his fortune upon one chance, when first he timidly laid down a paltry stake; nor has he changed his mind since then as to the imprudence of such a hazard. The drunkard, the murderer himself, is a man who at first did evil as far as he dared, and afterwards dared to do evil which he would once have shuddered at.
Let no man assume that prudence will always save him from ruinous excess, if respect for righteousness cannot withhold him from those first compliances which sap the will, destroy the restraint of self-respect, wear away the horror of great wickedness by familiarity with the same guilt in its lesser phases, and, above all, forfeit the enlightenment and calmness of judgment which come from the Holy Spirit of God, Who is the Spirit of wisdom and of counsel, and makes men to be of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord.
Let no man think that the fear of damnation will bring him to the mercy-seat at last, if the burden and gloom of being “condemned already” cannot now bend his will. “Even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up unto a reprobate mind” (Rom 1:28). “I gave them My statutes and showed them My judgments, which if a man do, he shall even live in them…. I gave them statutes that were not good, and judgments wherein they should not live” (Eze 20:11, Exo 20:25).
This is the inevitable law, the law of a confused and darkened judgment, a heart made heavy and ears shut, a conscience seared, an infatuated will kicking against the pricks, and heaping to itself wrath against the day of wrath. Wilful sin is always a challenge to God, and it is avenged by the obscuring of the lamp of God in the soul. Now, a part of His guiding light is prudence; and it is possible that men who will not be warned by the fear of injury to their conscience, such as they suppose that Pharaoh suffered, may be sobered by the danger of such derangement of their intellectual efficiency as really befel him.
In this sense men are, at last, impelled blindly to their fate (and this is a judicial act of God, although it comes in the course of nature), but first they launch themselves upon the slope which grows steeper at every downward step, until arrest is impossible.
On the other hand, every act of obedience helps to release the will from its entanglement, and to clear the judgment which has grown dull, anointing the eyes with eye-salve that they may see. Not in vain is the assertion of the bondage of the sinner and the glorious liberty of the children of God.
A second time, then, Moses presented himself before Pharaoh with his demands; and, as he had been forewarned, he was now challenged to give a sign in proof of his commission from a god.
And the demand was treated as reasonable; a sign was given, and a menacing one. The peaceable rod of the shepherd, a fit symbol of the meek man who bore it, became a serpent[10] before the king, as Moses was to become destructive to his realm. But when the wise men of Egypt and the enchanters were called, they did likewise; and although a marvel was added which incontestably declared the superior power of the Deity Whom Aaron represented, yet their rivalry sufficed to make strong the heart of Pharaoh, and he would not let the people go. The issue was now knit: the result would be more signal than if the quarrel were decided at one blow, and upon all the gods of Egypt the Lord would exercise vengeance.
What are we to think of the authentification of a religion by a sign? Beyond doubt, Jesus recognised this aspect of His own miracles, when He said, “If I had not done among them the works that none other man did, they had not had sin” (Joh 15:24). And yet there is reason in the objection that no amount of marvel ought to deflect by one hair’s breadth our judgment of right and wrong, and the true appeal of a religion must be to our moral sense.
No miracle can prove that immoral teaching is sacred. But it can prove that it is supernatural. And this is precisely what Scripture always proclaims. In the New Testament, we are bidden to take heed, because a day will come, when false prophets shall work great signs and wonders, to deceive, if possible, even the elect (Mar 13:22). In the Old Testament, a prophet may seduce the people to worship other gods, by giving them a sign or a wonder which shall come to pass, but they must surely stone him: they must believe that his sign is only a temptation; and above whatever power enabled him to work it, they must recognise Jehovah proving them, and know that the supernatural has come to them in judgment, not in revelation (Deu 13:1-5).
Now, this is the true function of the miraculous. At the most, it cannot coerce the conscience, but only challenge it to consider and to judge.
A teacher of the purest morality may be only a human teacher still; nor is the Christian bound to follow into the desert every clamorous innovator, or to seek in the secret chamber every one who whispers a private doctrine to a few. We are entitled to expect that one who is commissioned directly from above will bear special credentials with him; but when these are exhibited, we must still judge whether the document they attest is forged. And this may explain to us why the magicians were allowed for awhile to perplex the judgment of Pharaoh whether by fraud, as we may well suppose, or by infernal help. It was enough that Moses should set his claims upon a level with those which Pharaoh reverenced: the king was then bound to weigh their relative merits in other and wholly different scales.
FOOTNOTES:
[10] It is true that the word means any large reptile, as when “God created great whales”; but doubtless our English version is correct. It was certainly a serpent which he had recently fled from, and then taken by the tail (iv. 4). And unless we suppose the magicians to have wrought a genuine miracle, no other creature can be suggested, equally convenient for their sleight of hand.