And Jehovah said to Moses, Go in unto Pharaoh; for I have hardened his heart, and the heart of his bondmen, that I might do these my signs in their midst,
Exodus 10 opens with God sending Moses back into Pharaoh's palace. The reason He gives is startling: the king's stubbornness is part of God's own plan. So two questions follow. Is God to blame for Pharaoh's refusal? And why would God want a refusal that costs Egypt so much?
Exodus uses two different Hebrew words for hardening. The order they come in settles much of the difficulty.
"And I will harden Pharaoh's heart." God had already said this in chapter 4:21. Eighteen times we read of the hardening of Pharaoh's heart. But the Hebrew uses different words here, and they mark an important distinction. One means to "make firm" or "strong." The other means "to make stubborn." These two words mark Pharaoh's hardening of his own heart, and God's hardening after Pharaoh kept on in his wicked way. Scripture says five times that Pharaoh hardened his heart. Only then did God begin His hardening and make Pharaoh's heart stubborn. Pharaoh hardened himself, then God hardened him. Pharaoh had his opportunities. As he refused and stayed in unbelief, God made him stubborn. God never hardens first, and He never forces anyone to be an unbeliever. There is a solemn warning here. Thousands harden their hearts now.
By the time God says "I have hardened his heart," Pharaoh has a long record behind him. Commentators count the hardenings differently, but they agree on the order. You can check it chapter by chapter.
It is true that God hardened Pharaoh's heart. But He did so only after Pharaoh had shown extreme and unbelievable arrogance by saying, "Who is the LORD, that I should obey his voice…?" (Ex. 5:2). And only after Pharaoh had hardened his own heart again and again. In fact, the Spirit uses two different words in the original language, and states no less than seven times that Pharaoh hardened his heart (Ex. 7:13, 14, 22; 8:15, 19, 32; 9:7) before saying that God hardened the heart of Pharaoh (Ex. 9:12).
The hardening is a judgment, not a manufacture of evil. Writers press this point because the same principle runs through the rest of Scripture.
God never made any man bad. But He may, and in some cases does, give people up to the results of their own folly and evil. That is, He hardens in judgment those who make light of His grace and reject it… Pharaoh was wicked, and he grew more wicked the more patience God showed him. In the end the One he had despised blinded him in judgment and made him an example. All are responsible. Sin destroys the ability to obey God, not the responsibility to obey Him.
God tells Moses to walk back in precisely because Pharaoh will say no again. The stubbornness does not frustrate God's purpose; it serves it.
Pharaoh could not brush God's command aside by refusing to obey for ever. A creature resisting its Creator! Human will overcoming the Divine will! That could not be… Egypt's stubbornness would only display the glory of God more fully.
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The stated aim reaches past the palace to Israel's family table. The signs were meant to be watched, then retold.
Again the Lord reminds Moses that He Himself had hardened Pharaoh's heart and the hearts of his servants. He did this so that He might show His signs before them in public. He did it too so that His great works of power might have a very real effect on Israel's own generation and on the generations to come. Then they would realize that it was indeed the living Lord of glory who was dealing with them.
The story travelled, and not only among Israelites. Centuries later the Philistines' own priests pointed back to Pharaoh. Their verdict: the fault was his.
The Philistines give us another striking witness against Pharaoh. The ark of God was with them, and they wanted rid of it… So they send for the priests and diviners. These men tell the people to "give glory to the God of Israel… Why then do you harden your hearts, as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened their hearts? When He had worked wonders among them, did they not let the people go, and they departed?" Here is a witness three hundred and fifty years later to the fact of the Exodus. It is also an admission from the priests of a foreign nation that Pharaoh had acted wrongly. Israel's natural enemies drew the conclusion… that the king met a just judgment, since he had hardened his heart against the God of Israel.
- Refusal first. Again and again Pharaoh hardens his own heart. Only after that does Scripture say God hardened it. The order of the record answers the objection.
- Hardening second. Two Hebrew words mark the difference. The king "makes firm" his own heart. God then "makes stubborn" the man who keeps refusing.
- Signs third. God sends Moses back in knowing the answer will be no. The refusal opens the way for God to show more signs in public.
- Story fourth. The purpose runs down the generations. Israel's children and grandchildren would hear what God did in Egypt, and would know the living Lord was dealing with them.
- Verdict last. The account travelled so far that even Israel's enemies drew the same conclusion. Pharaoh hardened his heart, and his judgment was just.
and that thou mightest tell in the ears of thy son and thy son's son what I have wrought in Egypt, and my signs which I have done among them; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
God speaks to Moses before the eighth plague. He explains why He has let the struggle with Pharaoh run so long. What happens in Egypt will become a story that children and grandchildren hear. The verse ties three things together: a hardened king, signs done in Egypt, and a people who come to know the LORD.
The reason God gives for the state of Pharaoh's heart is not secrecy but display. One writer connects the hardening directly to the two audiences named in the verse — those watching then, and those who would only hear about it later.
Again the Lord reminds Moses that He Himself had hardened Pharaoh's heart and the hearts of his servants. He did this so that He might show His signs openly before them. He did it also so that God's great works of power might have a very real effect on Israel's present generation and on the generations to come. Then they would realize that it was indeed the living Lord of glory who was dealing with them (vv. 1-2).
Where does the hardening fall in the sequence? One writer places it after Pharaoh has already set himself against God.
God had dealt graciously with Pharaoh. He gave him chance after chance to agree to what He asked. Pharaoh still hardened his heart, and showed his deep-rooted hatred and hostility to God and His people. Now this proud enemy comes under the hardening God sends in judgment… Unbelief never begins as the result of that hardening. But let there be no doubt that there is such a thing as hardening.
Another writer traces the blinding back to testimony that Pharaoh had already scorned.
God never made Pharaoh, or anyone else, wicked. They were wicked already, and they had plenty of urgent testimony. By God's judgment that testimony served only to blind the king. From the first he asked with scorn, "Who is the LORD, that I should obey his voice and let Israel go? I do not know the LORD, and moreover, I will not let Israel go."
Pharaoh's refusal does not block God's purpose. It gives Him the occasion for more of it.
Generations not yet born should hear of the works of the Lord, and of how He stepped in for Israel. They should know that He is the Lord. Egyptian stubbornness would only serve to display the glory of God further.
The verse calls these events signs, not just punishments. One writer points first to what they exposed in Egypt, and then to what God meant them to teach Israel.
The plagues were signs as well as judgments. God sent them to prove who Jehovah was. Egypt once knew enough of God to keep it from idolatry. But it "did not see fit to acknowledge God," and so it had sunk into the worst idolatry. Above all, God sent the plagues to teach Israel that Jehovah alone is God.
Son and grandson are only the start of a line that keeps going. Another writer sets out that pattern and what the telling should produce.
God had "established a testimony" for the fathers to pass on to the children, and for the children to pass on to their children. He did it so that they might set their hope in God, walk in obedience, and not forget His works. In this way they would escape the stubbornness of earlier generations. Those generations did not set their affections on God, and their spirits were not steadfast with God.
What Israel owed its children, Christian families owe theirs.
And Christians may well tell their children what God has done. We should ground our little ones in the great truths of God's word. We should plant the facts of redemption, resurrection, and ascension in their minds and memories.
Another writer adds that the children's interest follows the parents' own.
One thing is sure: what deeply affects the parents will make an impression on the children… The story must pass from generation to generation. And how it warms the hearts of parents to see the eager way the children listen to it.
- Refusal. Pharaoh hardened his own heart first. God's hardening in judgment came only after Pharaoh had refused His testimony again and again. God never made any man wicked.
- Purpose. That refusal did not block God. Egyptian stubbornness only served to display God's glory further.
- Signs. The plagues were not just judgments on Egypt. Above all, God sent them to teach Israel that Jehovah alone is God.
- Telling. God established a testimony to pass from fathers to children, and from those children to theirs. The next generation would then set their hope in God and not forget His works.
- Knowing. The chain ends where the verse ends: they may know He is the LORD. So Christians today should ground their own children in redemption, resurrection, and ascension.