Spiritual hardening is perhaps the most misunderstood and consequently abused concept in soteriology, perhaps even in all of theology. The common understanding is that God hardens people arbitrarily so that they can’t understand and submit to the Gospel of redemption. The most popular case of hardening is probably that of Pharaoh beginning in Exodus chapter 7, where it says “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and … he will not listen to you.” And later we read, “Yet pharaoh’s heart became hard and he would not listen to them, just as the Lord had said.” Paul cites this affair in his letter to the Romans, chapter 9, where we read,
“It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: ‘I raised you up for the very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.’ Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.”
Paul goes on to point out that those who are hardened are incapable of resisting this process and therefore become objects of his wrath. These passages and others have led many, notably John Calvin, to conclude that God picks some for salvation and others for hardening and reprobation on an arbitrary basis. Thus the genesis of the concept of double predestination and the conclusions of the Synod of Dort in 1618-19. Ever since that Synod, virtually all of Protestant Christianity has accepted this notion that the minority are destined for eternal bliss, while the majority are consigned to eternal punishment; the former to show God’s mercy, and the latter to show his justice. The only dissenting voice has been that of Jacobus Arminius and his followers, the Remonstrants, who were declared heterodox at Dort and either murdered, imprisoned, or extradited. As they say, winners write history.
To figure out if this is the true meaning of hardening, it is helpful to go back to how God redeems a sinful humanity in the first place, thereby placing hardening in its proper context. My contention is that to have a coherent, Biblical soteriology, you must go back before any ecumenical council and read the Scriptures anew. Paul makes a distinction, little noticed, between justification and salvation. He does this twice in Romans, once in chapter 5 and again in chapter 10. This distinction is assumed in all his other writings, but these are the two most explicit discussions. What he says is that we are justified or forgiven on the basis of Christ’s sacrificial death, and we are saved by his on-going life conferred in the person of the Spirit. Justification, therefore, is universal; he died “for the sins of the whole world.” Efforts on the part of those in the Reformed tradition to limit justification, eg/ “limited atonement,” are popular but nevertheless unscriptural. The blood of Christ knows no limits on its efficacy; there is nothing we can do by way of work or sacrament to help the Cross. As of Good Friday, all are forgiven; placed “in Christ” in a legal or forensic sense. Note that in the two NT visions of the last judgment, people are not confronted with the sins they committed, but rather examined on the basis of the good they either did or did not do. This is not to suggest anything along the lines of a crude universalism. There are two halves of redemption, and being “in Christ” is only half. There’s also the other half, “Christ in us,” that is related by Paul to salvation. This is the life he talks about, and having our names in the “book of life” that Revelation alludes to. There are two judgments, one on sin on Good Friday, and another on fruitlessness at the last judgment. Thus we see there are two problems we have, guilt and powerlessness, two solutions, Christ’s death and on-going life, two titles for Jesus, Savior and Lord, two historic events affording us redemption, Good Friday and Pentecost, and even two sacraments, baptism and Eucharist. Leaving the last point aside, we should see that it’s entirely possible, in fact common, for people to be justified but subject to judgment and loss on the last day because they were unwilling to play host to the Holy Spirit and thereby bear fruit pleasing to God. The parables of Jesus often mention that it is possible to be invited to the wedding feast or whatever, and still be found lacking and failing to please God.
So if you can accept this scenario, just what is God looking for by way of response to his gracious forgiveness procured for us by Jesus? Clearly he’s not looking for works; this is the whole argument of Paul’s letter to the Romans. The Law cannot confer righteousness, this has to come “from God.” So if not works, what then? If blaspheming the Holy Spirit is the only unforgivable sin, what is its opposite? The testimony of all of Scripture, especially in the NT, is that we are to recognize God’s authority to exercise control over our lives, cede our will, and become obedient to the will of Jesus, who is not only Savior but also Lord. We are asked not to do something positive, but to stop doing something: rebelling and going our own way. A good metaphor from the Bible is the story of King David in 2 Samuel 23, where he longed for a drink from the well near the gate of Bethlehem, controlled at that time by the Philistines. When the three mighty men broke through the lines, got the water, and presented it to David, he refused to drink it. “Far be it from me, O Lord, to do this! … Is it not the blood of the men who went at the risk of their lives?” David had the right to drink the water, but recognizing that procuring it involved great sacrifice, he didn’t take advantage of his right. So too, all of us who are bequeathed a free will are nevertheless presented with the blood of Christ, by which he earned the right to be our Lord, and are asked, in effect, “Will you exercise your right to be your own Lord, or will you recognize the sacrifice of Jesus, and cede your will to him, and pour your will out on the ground as David did the water of Bethlehem?”
Viewed in the context of this rational, orthodox and thoroughly Biblical plan of redemption, where does hardening fit in? Is hardening a cause or a consequence of “blaspheming the Holy Spirit,” the only unforgivable sin? Indeed, according to Arminius, it is a consequence, not a cause. In his work A Brief Analysis of the Ninth Chapter of St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, he points out that that Jacob and Esau are types, those that seek justification either by faith or by works, respectively.[1] And God hardens those types or groups of people who persist in sin.[2] Returning to our model of redemption mentioned above, this makes perfect sense. To persist in sin after God’s invitation to repentance is to “blaspheme the Holy Spirit,” to so provoke him to anger that he withdraws from the heart of the obdurate, leaving them, in Calvin’s words, “totally depraved.” We see, therefore, that hardening is not a positive imposition on the sinner, but rather the negative withdrawal of the Holy Spirit, our only source of power for doing good. Grace must be defined as nothing less than this “Christ in us,” God’s willingness to dwell in us making us once again spiritual creatures, and capable of something besides works of sin.
Armed with this insight, let us return to Romans 9. Ishmael, Esau and Pharaoh are therefore types. As Paul says in Galatians 4, “These things may be taken figuratively”.[3] Ishmael represents those who use human ingenuity to “help” God, ignoring his promises and substituting a short cut of their own device. Esau represents those who favor their physical appetites, literally, over God-ordained responsibility, while Pharaoh represents those who worship amiss. In his case, he thought himself a god and said, “Who is the Lord that I should obey him?”[4] Collectively they represent the avenues of temptation faced by all people, whether in mind, body or spirit. We see that God was hardening these men, not arbitrarily, but because they had already evinced attitudes and behavior that God had, in his eternal counsels, already deemed worthy of rejection and reprobation. This is the true meaning of choice and election. God has determined that he chooses or elects to salvation those who love him and please him rather than those who hate him and disobey him. Again, types or classes of people, not individuals. And they are hardened after the fact, not before.
These insights do much to restore the reputation of God, long sullied by the double predestination of Reformed theology. Predestination is salvaged as well, for it is not the arbitrary edict that some individuals go to heaven and some to hell, but is in keeping with the entire verse in Romans 8, “he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son,”[5] Predestination has nothing to do with God’s decree regarding salvation, but rather his decree that those who serve Jesus has Lord should receive sanctifying grace in this life to make them resemble Him more closely.
Calvin was right about many things, but not all things. He was right that apart from the ministry of the Holy Spirit, we cannot do anything right. We can know it, as Paul points out in Romans 7, we just can’t do it. So what becomes paramount to all people is this one thing: are we willing to receive both justification and power vicariously from Jesus Christ, or are we not? If we are, we will be fitting hosts to the ministry of the Holy Spirit, and we will love other Christians and bear fruit for eternity. If we are not, we will so grieve the Holy Spirit that he will be able to do nothing through us and will depart. This is the meaning of hardening: whatever grace we might be endowed with at birth, a conscience to know what is right, will be gradually withdrawn if we ignore the commands Jesus issues as Lord. That conscience will eventually be “seared as with a hot iron,” and we will lose the ability to know right from wrong, let alone choose aright.[6] The process of hardening is thus slow but inexorable to the spiritual obtuse. It is done by God for two reasons: first to show the impenitent sinner what life will be like without God, both in this life and the life to come. Secondly, to show the watching world what life looks like without the aid and blessing of the Holy Spirit. Believers and unbelievers alike should look with horror upon the life lived without grace. God always redeems something from his children, even if it is only that they serve as a bad example to others.
[1] The Works of James Arminius. Volume 3, pp 493,4.
[2] Ibid, p. 506.
[3] Verse 24.
[4] Exodus 5:2.
[5] Verse 29.
[6] 1 Timothy 4:2.
