“[the Egyptians]…whose hearts He turned to hate His own
people,
To treat His servants deceitfully…”
--Psalm
105:25
Psalm 105 is a brief
history of ancient Israel, with several verses on the exile and Exodus
story. And in it we come again upon this
idea of God making someone obstinate or hateful –for some purpose known only to
God. In this image from the Psalm we see God paradoxically turning the hearts of Pharaoh and the Egyptians against His own beloved people. In some unspoken way this turning of the enemy's heart to obstinacy and hate and deceit is presented as necessary for the fulfillment of God's plan; it seems somehow essential for the
building up of Israel. God makes
Pharaoh’s heart hard and obstinate, against Pharaoh’s own good and the good of the Egyptians. And God does this (it seems) so that Israel’s
ultimate victory can somehow be recognized as even more astonishing; more miraculous. Israel overcomes her foes who are powerful,
obstinately bad, persisting in evil, and who far outnumber her –but
who, in the end, are defeated through God’s miraculous intercession.
But I am left pondering: How is the
hardening of Pharaoh’s heart necessary to God’s plan? Even if this is just a myth (or hyperbole),
why did the ancient story teller feel it necessary to put it in these terms?
What lesson was God imparting by having His scribes write His story in this
way? If (for instance) God’s hardening
of Pharaoh’s heart is a metaphor –then what is it a metaphor of? And what
lesson (or insight) was it supposed to teach? What psychological (or spiritual)
insight was it intended to reveal?
1.
That God is willful and can do whatever He
likes? Even make our hearts hard and
turn our ways to deceit? Sin? -OR
2.
That God’s plan, the work of a loving God, may
even be found in the hardened heart and deceitful ways of our foe…
And, in the end, the key question is: What does a loving God
accomplish by changing the hearts of Pharaoh, the Egyptians, all of Israel’s
foes “so that they hate His own people?” What is it that He accomplishes through
this hardened heart that He couldn’t accomplish otherwise? Why didn’t He change
their hearts so that they loved His people?
What part does this hardening of the heart play in God’s plan? How does it reveal His loving presence? Those are the questions, the paradox, I am
pondering these days.
Next I want to spend a little time considering this passage, this image, through the lens of the four-fold method; seeking in it the four levels of reading: literal, allegorical, moral & anagogical.
