Why did God harden Pharaoh’s heart?

If God attempts to make anything clear in the book of Exodus, it’s that Pharaoh’s heart hardened. Many times.

I began to make my way through Bible Project’s Biblical Storyline plan on the Bible app at the start of the new year. The plan’s description reads: “Read the entire Bible in its ancient literary order (The TaNak order).” As I pressed through Genesis, the extensive genealogies and into Exodus, a persistent question popped into my mind.

For those that are not familiar, the Book of Exodus deals with the deliverance of God’s people, the Israelites, from slavery and the clutches of Pharaoh. In order to urge Pharaoh to free the Israelites/his primary source of free labor, God cast a variety of plagues upon Egypt.

Biblical References to the Hardening of Hearts

In Plagues 1-5, Pharaoh hardened his own heart, or his heart was hardened from some other source. In Plagues 6-10, the language suggests that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart four different times.

1. “But the Egyptian magicians did the same things by their secret arts, and Pharaoh’s heart became hard: He would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said.”
   Exodus 7:22
2. “But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said.”
   Exodus 8:15
3. “the magicians said to Pharaoh, ‘This is the finger of God.’ But Pharaoh’s heart was hard and he would not listen, just as the Lord had said.”
   Exodus 8:19
4. “But this time also Pharaoh hardened his heart and would not let the people go.”
   Exodus 8:32
5. “Pharaoh investigated and found that not even one of the animals of the Israelites had died. Yet his heart was unyielding and he would not let the people go.”
   Exodus 9:7
6. “But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart and he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said to Moses.”
   Exodus 9:12
7. “When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again: He and his officials hardened their hearts.”
   Exodus 9:34
8. “Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these signs of mine among them.'”
   Exodus 10:1
9. “But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he was not willing to let them go.”
   Exodus 10:27
10. “Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharoah, but the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he would not let the Israelites go out of his country.”
    Exodus 11:10

All biblical quotes are from the NIV translation.

Hebrew Translation

Growing up in a Christian household, I’d heard this story numerous times. I’d heard about the stubbornness of Pharaoh. I’d watched “The Prince of Egypt,” sang “deliver us to the Promised Land” at the top of my lungs, and stared at the screen in frustration and bewilderment as Pharaoh, once again, refused to let God’s people go.

I’d thought: fool, Moses told you what was going to happen, and you refused anyway!!

Recently, however, going back through the story of Exodus as an adult, I paid more attention to the subject of the verb. God hardened Pharaoh’s heart. The autonomy of Pharaoh suddenly became a question. I thought God gave us all free will, and I struggled to reconcile this point with the nature of God and the exact words of the Bible.

But what are the exact words?

*Caveat: My translation is derived from this tool.

Looking at the exact words requires a return to the untranslated Hebrew text. The Hebrew word translated back from “and he hardened” in phonetic English transcription is “hazaq” which more literally means “strengthened”. Furthermore, the Hebrew word used for “heart” is “lev”. Some translations of this that I found take “lev” to mean “conscience”. Even the word “heart” in English is often construed to talk about someone’s sentiment. let me posit another translation of the text:

Pharoah already held his stubborn sentiment. God merely reinforced what was already there. Before God hardened Pharaoh’s heart, before the Plague on the livestock (Plague 5), Exodus 9:7 reads, “Yet his heart was unyielding and he would not let the people go.”

But still, why?

That did not completely resolve my questions. I still wondered why God would reinforce an already existing sentiment when the consequences for those involved, the loss of the firstborn primarily, were so severe.

After reflecting on that, I believe God wanted to turn around the evil of Pharoah into something good. The Bible makes it quite clear that the strengthening of Pharoah’s will allowed God to reveal Himself to the world. Exodus 9:14 reads, “or this time I will send the full force of my plagues against you and against your officials and your people, so you may know that there is no one like me in all the earth.” Exodus 10:1, as quoted above, also notes God’s reasoning. Other biblical scholars posited that the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart was about punishment for previous sins (Maimonides), a necessary demonstration of God’s power (Martin Luther), or showing the world how hard Pharaoh’s heart was (St. Augustine).

What can we take away from this?

God will not let evil stand forever. Sin left unchecked festers, pools, and seeps into a person and what they interact with. As Pharaoh chose to allow evil into his heart, so can any human. Similarly, as Moses chose to follow God’s instructions, so can we.

This has been my interpretation of a key concept in Exodus. Send me a message here or leave a comment if you have further thoughts or a difference in interpretation.