Bible Study Exodus 3-5

This last week Andy, Kelly, Tom, and I were discussing the verses in the Bible that say God harden their or Pharaoh's heart. These verses have always bothered me because they seem to be saying that God made their hearts be hard... that just doesn't fit in with a God who is love, full of mercy and grace, and has given us "free will". Our conclusion was that although we believe in the infallibility of God's word as written in the original text the translations that we read may not be as accurate.

So today I am reading Exodus 3-5 and came across one of the verse that talks about God hardening.

Exodus 4:21: God said to Moses, “When you get back to Egypt be prepared: All the wonders that I will do through, you 'll do before Pharaoh. But I will make him stubborn so that he will refuse to let the people go. (as paraphrased in The Message)

For those of you that prefer the King James translation: And the Lord said unto Moses, When thou goest to return into Egypt, see that thou do all those wonders before Pharaoh, which I have put in thine hand: but I will harden his heart, that he shall not let the people go.

I looked up these words in The New Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible:

harden #2388 chazaq (chaw-zak) it comes from the root word that means to fasten, seize, bind, restrain...It means to aid, amend, control, harden, make strong...

the entry below it was #2389 chazaq (chaw-zawk) it comes from the chazaq #2388 it is usually used in a bad senseand it means: to harden, inpudent, stiff hearted

They look the same as I have typed them, but that is because I can't put the ^ above the letters. In #2388 there is an ^ over the first a and in #2389 there is an ^ over both a's.

so that #834 'ashar (aw-shar') means: after, so that, which, until...

Maybe a better paraphrase of the verse would be: God said to Moses, “When you get back to Egypt, be prepared: All the wonders that I do through you, you'll do before Pharaoh. But I will strengthen the resolve of his hard heart and he will refuse to let them go.

I think that God was telling Moses that he needed to know and be prepared for that even though he was going to do all these miracles before Pharaoh that he wasn't going to let the Israelites go. God wasn't saying that He was making Pharaoh's heart hard, but that He was going to give him the strength to follow his hard heart even after seeing the miracles.

This paraphrase seems consistent with the God I know. A God that gives free will to everyone so that they can decide whether to choose for believe in God or to reject Him. His desire is for everyone to believe, but He will not make anyone believe—or disbelieve. II Peter 3:9 says:

The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.

Look forward to any comments with your thoughts. Love you, MB