God hardens hearts?

[Ben_Bet_Beh]

Could someone explain this passage to me? It appears harsh to me. Perhaps the context of what is going on would be helpful. Thanks!

And I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they shall go in after them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, his chariots, and his horsemen. (Exodus 14:17)

 

[stevekehl]

A great question BBB. The context is crucial to understanding how a loving and merciful God would harden hearts to their own destruction. The Jews had been living in Egypt for four hundred years, but Egyptians still worshipped their own gods, enslaved and mistreated the Jews, and Pharoah openly mocked God. The Egyptians had plenty of time to come to faith in the true God, but rejected Him, even in the face of miraculous plagues. The Bible says that some Egyptians left with the Jews, I presume they had adopted the Judaic faith, the rest continued their rejection of God; allowing the Jews to leave grudgingly and not out of obedience to God’s command. I believe God gave them a hard heart to match their hard heads. God, in his wisdom, knew that Pharoah and his hosts would never worship Him and all would eventually die. Therefore, God used their death’s to ensure the Jews would be forever free of the Egyptians. This is a complex concept and I hope I have explained it clearly, if you are smart enough to develop this question I think you are smart enough to understand my explanation. God Bless.

 

[Dave_Noonan]

Could someone explain this passage to me? It appears harsh to me. Perhaps the context of what is going on would be helpful. Thanks!

And I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they shall go in after them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, his chariots, and his horsemen. (Exodus 14:17)

In the context of the story, this is the Egyptians’ punishment for enslaving the Israelites.

 

[Sailor_Kenshin]

This passage still troubles me. It seems to violate both free will AND the fact that we’re always told ‘God loves everybody.’

A lot of what I hear by explanation seems an attempt to justify and rationalize. Sorry.

 

[CHRISTINE77]

I don’t know that it is that difficult to understand. When you turn away against God’s will, you get more stubborn and resolute not to do the right thing. For example, even if you know in your heart that you should forgive someone and mend fences, somehow your own will will not allow you to do it, because your heart is hardened.

Does God harden your heart? Yes, I think so, to show you the error of your evil ways eventually.

This is what I think it means when God hardened Pharoah’s heart. Even though he knew he should let the Israelites go, he wouldn’t. He was too proud and stubborn. Unfortunately he brought terrible misfortune to his own people in the process.

 

[Jim_Baur]

God is the same for Moses and Pharaoh–Love.

God’s beauty and love melted Moses’ heart.

God’s beauty and love detested Pharaoh or hardened Pharaoh’s heart.

Analogy: I can take asprin, but my son gets really sick when he takes an it. It is the same being, but different reactions.

Example: I have a friend who thinks love is stupid, and thinks that being mean is good.

 

[Sailor_Kenshin]

I still don’t understand how that does not violate free will and how it shows that God loves everyone.

Or are those two teachings false? Do we have free will if someone forces us? Does God NOT love everyone?

 

[CHRISTINE77]

I still don’t understand how that does not violate free will and how it shows that God loves everyone.

Or are those two teachings false? Do we have free will if someone forces us? Does God NOT love everyone?

In the case of Mose, God was definitely on his side.

 

[Jim_Baur]

God is the same; He never changes.

Moses loves goodness, kindness, and compassion.

Pharaoh hates goodness, kindness and compassion.

There is a piece of literature called Nanny McPhee. It was made into a movie.

The nanny was ugly looking to the children at the beginning of the story. The children were bad little boys and girls.

At the conclusion of the story, the nanny was beautiful.

The children were now good little boys and girls.

The nanny did not change, the children matured and saw the true nanny.

 

[Sailor_Kenshin]

God ‘takes sides?’

I give up trying to understand. Thanks for the attempt.

 

[CHRISTINE77]

God ‘takes sides?’

I give up trying to understand. Thanks for the attempt.

God was the God of the Israelites in the Old Testament. He was ultimately always on their side, unless he was punishing them for their trangressions. Pharoah worshipped his Egyptian gods. God promised the his people that he would lead them into the land of milk and honey.

The Old Testament is basically a book about Jewish people and their relationship to God. If you didn’t worship him back then, (and probably now) you were in big trouble. Whenever the Jews started worshipping idols, which they did frequently, bad things happened to them. Likewise, other tribes who worshipped idols fell to the Jews when God was helping the Jews. Haven’t you read the Old Testament?

 

[Ben_Bet_Beh]

God ‘takes sides?’

I give up trying to understand. Thanks for the attempt.

God doesn’t take sides. In the case of Moses, Moses took God’s side.

Please don’t stop trying to understand. I ask these questions with the hope of understanding. If I fail to understand, I keep trying to understand. Even if I do understand, I still try to deepen my understanding. It’s a lifetime process.

 

[Jim_Baur]

Here is another example of how one person can cause two different reactions in two different people.

My daughter started her first day of high school.

The history teacher gave them the list of work and the dates the work is due.

My daughter was joyful to have all of the work and the due dates.

Other students were mad, some were scared, and some did not care.

God reveals Himself–some love Him, some hate Him.

Moses decided to loved God and love God’s plans.

Pharaoh decided to hate God and God’s plans.

 

[ryanoneil]

Could someone explain this passage to me? It appears harsh to me. Perhaps the context of what is going on would be helpful. Thanks!

And I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they shall go in after them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, his chariots, and his horsemen. (Exodus 14:17)

God hardening unbelievers hearts IS a punishment for their sin of unbelief. He allowed them to choose not to believe and did not send extraordinary grace to change their unbelief. Pharoah’s unfaithfulness led to the death of his people in the Red Sea. Sinners were punished and God’s glory was manifested (they were not able to stop God’s plan to free his people).

 

[bogeydogg]

This passage still troubles me. It seems to violate both free will AND the fact that we’re always told ‘God loves everybody.’

A lot of what I hear by explanation seems an attempt to justify and rationalize. Sorry.

It is true that God loves all men in a general way. However as Salvation is open to all but not given to all it can be said that there are some God loves in a special way in which He does not love others. For example you can read Paul’s treatise on this in Romans 9; 10-24.

Concerning free will you are assuming that the actions of the Egyptians would somehow have been different had God not hardened them. God does not need to make men sin rather we sin because we LOOOOOOOOVE to do it. Some have argued that this hardening is not even a direct action by God, but rather a removal of His restraint on our sinful Nature. (Romans 1) by which we pursue of our own free will our total destruction with great zeal once God has given us over to our debased minds. There is no violation of our volition only the removal of restraint. (<-- I can’t decide if its good or bad that I did not do that on purpose)

To assume that this hardening restricts the actions of men instead of giving them sway is to wander into the Calvinist heresy and makes God the author of evil.

One more thing, I think we worry far too much about our free will and far to little about God’s.

God Bless

 

[chosen_people]

Could someone explain this passage to me? It appears harsh to me. Perhaps the context of what is going on would be helpful. Thanks!

And I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they shall go in after them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, his chariots, and his horsemen. (Exodus 14:17)

If God has hardened Pharaoh’s heart then He has denied Pharaoh his free will. Without free will, how can Pharaoh be responsible for his sins against the Jewish nation? Without free will, what are the purpose of the plagues? If they are to change Pharaoh’s attitudes and make him release the nation of Israel from slavery, then why harden his heart to prevent this from happening? If God has hardened Pharaoh’s heart, then the plagues become not a source for bringing about the release of the Jews from slavery but an unavoidable preordained punishment of the Egyptian people.

If we study the Jewish sages on this subject, I believe we can see three different approaches. I personally define these three approaches as the weak argument, the strong argument and the interesting argument.

The weak argument: According to this approach when we speak of God hardening Pharaoh’s heart it in no way implies that God has denied Pharaoh his free will. On the contrary, this passage emphasizes Pharaoh’s free will. When we speak of God hardening Pharaoh’s heart we are merely saying that God was the source of the plagues as He is the source of all things. Pharaoh hardened his heart to God’s plagues and refused to let the children of Israel go. So when we speak of God hardening Pharaoh’s heart, what we are really saying is that Pharaoh hardened his heart to the plagues brought by God.

The strong argument: God indeed hardened Pharaoh’s heart, but this did not deny Pharaoh his free will, but allowed Pharaoh to have free will. Had God not done this, then Pharaoh would not have been acting from free will but merely under the coercion of the plagues. By God hardening Pharaoh’s heart, He gave Pharaoh the ability and strength to freely exercise his free will in deciding how to react to the plagues.

As an aside, it should also be noted that the plagues cannot be seen as some sort of arbitrary act against Pharaoh in which the Egyptian people suffered. The plagues allowed for the punishment and contrition of the Egyptian people which would allow repentance and forgiveness for the cruel and sinful acts of the Egyptians against the nation of Israel while in Egypt.

The interesting argument: According to this argument, there comes a time when God has given a person so many chances to repent and the person has rejected so many of these chances, that God is no longer willing to forgive (take for example Sodom and Gomorrah). According to this argument, after the first five plagues God was no longer willing to give Pharaoh any additional chances for forgiveness and that is why at that point God hardened Pharaoh’s heart.

 

[Sailor_Kenshin]

God was the God of the Israelites in the Old Testament. He was ultimately always on their side, unless he was punishing them for their trangressions. Pharoah worshipped his Egyptian gods. God promised the his people that he would lead them into the land of milk and honey.

The Old Testament is basically a book about Jewish people and their relationship to God. If you didn’t worship him back then, (and probably now) you were in big trouble. Whenever the Jews started worshipping idols, which they did frequently, bad things happened to them. Likewise, other tribes who worshipped idols fell to the Jews when God was helping the Jews. Haven’t you read the Old Testament?

Didn’t SOLOMAN also worship strange gods at one point?

And what ABOUT Pharaoh? Did God love him?

If God loves everyone, He had to love Pharaoh too. I cannot reconcile this.

There can’t be two Gods: OT and NT. There has to be one. My poor intellect can’t deal with this.

 

[CHRISTINE77]

Didn’t SOLOMAN also worship strange gods at one point?

And what ABOUT Pharaoh? Did God love him?

If God loves everyone, He had to love Pharaoh too. I cannot reconcile this.

There can’t be two Gods: OT and NT. There has to be one. My poor intellect can’t deal with this.

Actually Jews were always turning away from God in the Old Testament and worshipping idols. God did not like this and punished them for it. Back then, idols were a big thing in the world. Most people worshipped them.

There aren’t two Gods. Jesus is going to come back and harvest the wheat from the chaff. God loves everyone, but if you don’t worship him and obey his laws, there’s going to be Hell to pay for it!

Now God will forgive people if they are contrite and ask for his mercy. In that way God is very merciful. All he asks in return for his mercy is our complete devotion to him.

 

[ryanoneil]

I pretty much agree with bogeydog and chosen people. Pharaoh had free will. Think of it this way. God was drawing Pharaoh to release his people before the plagues. If he had no ability to comply, God’s warning him would have been pointless and deceptive (and God is not that way). He had the freewill choice of following that but he refused to go along with it. So God left him to his sin. That is what hardening his heart means. God didn’t force him to do anything against his will, but made him suffer the consequences.

 

[noobio]

Didn’t SOLOMAN also worship strange gods at one point?.

Yes, he did.

1 King 11:1-3

1 King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter—Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. 2 They were from nations about which the LORD had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.” Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. 3 He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. 4 As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been. 5 He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. 6 So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the LORD; he did not follow the LORD completely, as David his father had done

And what ABOUT Pharaoh? Did God love him?

If God loves everyone, He had to love Pharaoh too. I cannot reconcile this.
.

God loves everyone, including Pharaoh.

There can’t be two Gods: OT and NT. There has to be one. My poor intellect can’t deal with this.

There is only one God, the God of the Old Testement, is also the same God revealed in the New Testement.