Why does God make some people’s hearts hard?

This is an interesting question which is usually asked in the context of the Old Testament uses of the phrase (for instance, when God “hardened the heart” of Pharaoh).

In the first place, the Israelites actually had a different understanding of the word “heart” than we do today. The Jewish people thought that the heart was actually where all thinking occurred. In other words, they thought that the function of the heart was what we now know to be the brain. So when God “hardened the heart” of Pharaoh, what is meant is that he hardened his mind. In other words, he made Pharaoh set in his ways, stubborn, and obstinate. That is slightly different in connotation than a “hardened heart”–which sounds more like God made Pharaoh’s response cold, emotionless, or cruel. That may have also happened, but the phrase “hardened his heart” is meant to mean “became obstinate.”

Many people also wonder why God made Pharaoh so stubborn in the Exodus story. It’s not because God wanted to teach the Egyptians a lesson–actually, God wanted to teach the Hebrews a lesson. The Hebrews had lived as slaves under Egypt for more than 400 years! For many of them, the true God of their forefathers was only a distant memory from centuries ago (that’s why God revealed his Name to Moses and told him to say to the Hebrews that he was the God of their ancestors). The only gods that many of the Hebrews may have known were the pagan gods of Egypt. So when God leads the Hebrews out of Egypt by the ten plagues, he does it to manifest his power and his glory. Think about the targets of the ten plagues: the Nile, the sun, agriculture, etc. These were things sacred to the Egyptians. So when God strikes them with plagues, he is saying to the Hebrews (as well as to the Egyptians): “The Egyptian gods are not in charge of the Nile, the sun, the land, etc. I am the God in charge.” That was so that the Hebrews would know that God was truly the Lord of everything and so that they would believe in his Name. God made Pharaoh stubborn so that he could continue to show his wonders to the Hebrews and they would truly know the power and Lordship of God–the one, true God.

What about other cases of God “hardening the hearts” of people? Sinners and “the wicked” in particular are spoken of as being “hard of heart” (stubborn, arrogant, obstinate, set in their ways). Usually, God does not make them that way, but even if he does, it is always to accomplish a greater purpose. We see that most clearly in the case of Pharaoh, but there are other cases as well. The theme is usually that God permits the arrogant to continue in their stubborn ways, so that when they fall and are humbled, they will turn to the Lord. Some continue in their sinful ways, but many are also led to conversion. Their falls make them open to receive God’s mercy and grace. It’s impossible to say why God chooses to lead some souls to him in this way and not others–but we can trust the fact that God always desires to lead all souls to his own Heart. He never desires a soul to be lost. He may lead us through trials or permit us to stumble along the way, but he is always faithful.