Was Pharaoh under the sovereign control of God?

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shnarkle

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Did God raise up Pharaoh for the wrong purpose, or was magnifying his own glory a sufficient purpose for raising up Pharaoh? (Romans 9:17)

How is is possible for Pharaoh to have repented and allowed Israel to depart in peace, if he was raised up for this purpose?

God actively hardened Pharaoh's heart that he might judge e.g. "lay his hand upon" Egypt. Could Pharaoh have overcome God's hardening of his heart? How?

Quote:
The king's heart is in the hands of the LORD, as the rivers of water, he turns it whithersoever he will Proverbs 21:1


There is no question that Pharaoh hardened his own heart as is indicated in Ex. 8:15,32. Pharaoh is a responsible moral agent, but this doesn't answer the question of whether or not it was possible for Pharaoh to soften his own heart and repent despite God's will?

If Pharoah had repented of his sins and turned Israel free, how could God's word have been fulfilled?

Is it possible for sinful or even righteous man to thwart God's declared intent?

If he did this to Pharaoh, why wouldn't he do it to the rest of rebellious humanity?
 

Ernest T. Bass

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Romans 9:17 "For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth."

God's raised Pharaoh up for a twofold purpose:
1) show His power in Pharaoh
2) magnify His name throughout all the earth

The verse does not say God raised Pharaoh up to violate Pharaoh's free will and cause Pharaoh to disobey.

If Pharaoh had chosen to obey God and let the people go then God would have shown His power over this great king and God's name would have been magnified.

Yet Pharaoh chose to disobey God and God used Pharaoh's disobedient to show His power over Pharaoh and magnify His name.

So God would have been able to use Pharaoh's own free will choice (obey or disobey) to accomplish His twofold will in Romans 9:17. So there was no need, no reason for God to override and violate Pharaoh's free will when God could accomplish His will using which ever choice (obey or disobey) Pharaoh made.

Furthermore, if men are born with a totally depraved nature as Calvinism claims, then Pharaoh would have had this corrupt nature and would have 'naturally' chosen to disobey God without God having to cause him to disobey.

Proverbs 21:1 "The king's heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will."
Proverbs 21:2 "Every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but the LORD pondereth the hearts."

Proverbs 21:1 does not mean God controls ever aspect of the king, but the king has free will to make choices but those choices have to reside within the boundaries of God where God can use His permissive will to allow or not allow the kings choices to happen or not.

If God has predetermined everything a king does, what would God now be 'turning'? Why would God need to ponder/judge the king's heart if God alone is determining all the king does, verse 2? The fact God judges men's hearts (Proverbs 16:2; Proverbs 21:2; etc) shows man has free will and God ponders/weighs/judges those free will decisions.

Since King Solomon wrote the passage he most likely is talking about himself. At the time he wrote Proverbs 21 he was an obedient man doing God's will and in that sense God controlled his heart. In Proverbs 21 Solomon also writes about the wicked who have committed themselves to do wrong and in that sense God is not making them do evil. At the end of Solomon's life he turned from God to idolatry and died that way. Did God cause Solomon against his will to do evil and most likely be lost? No, he sought his own ways not what God made him do.
 

shnarkle

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[QUOTE
[/QUOTE]

Paul is not suggesting that people don't have free will. He's pointing out that free will isn't enough. He's pointing out the obvious. Anyone who has struggled with trying to stay on a diet, stay away from sweets, drugs, etc. knows that will power isn't enough to succeed.

Paul's argument isn't necessarily saying that God predestines people for wrath or mercy, but that in order for God to foreknow anything it must be predestined. This is logically consistent. For some reason people prefer to cite Calvin when it is Paul who uses these terms "foreknow" and "predestinate" to begin with.

The elephant in the room is the fact that while we can all admit a time when we came to know Christ, we seem to forget that prior to that we had no knowledge of Christ whatsoever. It can only come through revelation, and that can only come when one is ready to receive it.
 

Ernest T. Bass

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shnarkle said:
Paul is not suggesting that people don't have free will. He's pointing out that free will isn't enough. He's pointing out the obvious. Anyone who has struggled with trying to stay on a diet, stay away from sweets, drugs, etc. knows that will power isn't enough to succeed.

Paul's argument isn't necessarily saying that God predestines people for wrath or mercy, but that in order for God to foreknow anything it must be predestined. This is logically consistent. For some reason people prefer to cite Calvin when it is Paul who uses these terms "foreknow" and "predestinate" to begin with.

The elephant in the room is the fact that while we can all admit a time when we came to know Christ, we seem to forget that prior to that we had no knowledge of Christ whatsoever. It can only come through revelation, and that can only come when one is ready to receive it.

Foreknowledge does not necessitate predestination. If such were true, then that makes God, not man, culpable for all the evil that takes place.

1 Samuel 23:7-13
David and his men were in the city of Keilah and David knew Saul was plotting against him. David prayed to God asking God if Saul would come to that city for him, God told David that Saul would. David then asks God if the men of that city would deliver him into the hands of Saul, and God said that they would. Therefore David takes his men and leaves that city. When Saul was told David and his men left the city, Saul changed his plans and did not go to that city. Here is a case where God foreknew what would happen, yet what God foreknew did not come to pass, what God foreknew was not predestined to happen.


No verse says God predestined Pharaoh to disobey. God foreknew Pharaoh would choose to disobey but it was still Pharaoh's choice and God used Pharaoh's own choice to accomplish His will per Romans 9:17.

As I pointed out in another thread, Calvinists have created themselves a dilemma:

"In Spite of All of the Foregoing Statements, We Have to Come to the Point Where We Confess That We Do Not Understand How It Is That God Can Ordain That We Carry Out Evil Deeds and Yet Hold Us Accountable for Them and Not be Blamed Himself: We can affirm that all of these things are true, because Scripture teaches them. But Scripture does not tell us exactly how God brings this situation about or how it can be that God holds us accountable for what he ordains to come to pass. Here Scripture is silent, and we have to agree with Berkhof that ultimately “the problem of God’s relation to sin remains a mystery" (Wayne Grudem - Systematic Theology, p.331.)

Calvinists have never shown that "Scripture teaches them".

Pharaoh could not rightly, justly be held accountable for what was forced upon him through predetermination.
 
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shnarkle

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Foreknowledge does not necessitate predestination. If such were true, then that makes God, not man, culpable for all the evil that takes place.

No, you're not getting the point of the argument. Paul isn't pointing out that God has predetermined people for wrath or mercy. Paul is simply pointing out a logical fact. If I know that my dog is going to dig a hole two minutes after he is tossed a bone, and that he will then bury it, this in no way denies that my dog is doing this of his own free will. I can't know this with 100% accuracy unless it is predestined. Here again, this doesn't negate the dog's free will. If I also know that two seconds before he is going to begin digging, a squirrel will dart out from the side of his dog house, I know that he will not commence digging, but will instead give chase to the squirrel instead. Here again, no one is being denied their free will. This doesn't negate the fact that God is omniscient, and God's omniscience cannot be relied upon if any number of factors are unknown. It is to contradict the meaning of omniscience.

God insures that his will is carried out. It is only our assumptions that free will cannot exist along side predestination that causes confusion.

Again, you can't fly to the moon. You weren't designed to fly at all, but this doesn't impinge upon the fact that you still have free will. It is the same with Paul's argument. The carnal mind is emnity against God, and can never please God. Does this mean that the carnal mind has no free will? Nope. It just means that it is useless for attaining salvation.

God's promises are by faith, "and that not of yourselves". It's not your or my faith that saves anyone. It's completely out of our hands as far as the will of the carnal mind goes.

The bible points out that "the whole world is deceived", and deceived people cannot choose to do the right thing for the right reasons.

This is something I've pointed out in other threads in the past that we are deluded if we think that there is anything we can do to sustain ourselves. It is only by the providence of God that anyone is able to do anything in the first place. Christ points out that apart from him we can do nothing. Yet we continue to work for Mammon rather than for God. Our actions betray our so-called beliefs, and spotlight that we can only make feeble attempts to believe what we have no ability to see.

Thus it must be by revelation from God that anyone can begin to see the truth, and THEN believe. The bible is the testimony of witnesses, not those who just believe what they've been told.
 

Ernest T. Bass

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No, you're not getting the point of the argument. Paul isn't pointing out that God has predetermined people for wrath or mercy. Paul is simply pointing out a logical fact. If I know that my dog is going to dig a hole two minutes after he is tossed a bone, and that he will then bury it, this in no way denies that my dog is doing this of his own free will. I can't know this with 100% accuracy unless it is predestined. Here again, this doesn't negate the dog's free will. If I also know that two seconds before he is going to begin digging, a squirrel will dart out from the side of his dog house, I know that he will not commence digging, but will instead give chase to the squirrel instead. Here again, no one is being denied their free will. This doesn't negate the fact that God is omniscient, and God's omniscience cannot be relied upon if any number of factors are unknown. It is to contradict the meaning of omniscience.

God insures that his will is carried out. It is only our assumptions that free will cannot exist along side predestination that causes confusion.

Again, you can't fly to the moon. You weren't designed to fly at all, but this doesn't impinge upon the fact that you still have free will. It is the same with Paul's argument. The carnal mind is emnity against God, and can never please God. Does this mean that the carnal mind has no free will? Nope. It just means that it is useless for attaining salvation.

God's promises are by faith, "and that not of yourselves". It's not your or my faith that saves anyone. It's completely out of our hands as far as the will of the carnal mind goes.

The bible points out that "the whole world is deceived", and deceived people cannot choose to do the right thing for the right reasons.

This is something I've pointed out in other threads in the past that we are deluded if we think that there is anything we can do to sustain ourselves. It is only by the providence of God that anyone is able to do anything in the first place. Christ points out that apart from him we can do nothing. Yet we continue to work for Mammon rather than for God. Our actions betray our so-called beliefs, and spotlight that we can only make feeble attempts to believe what we have no ability to see.

Thus it must be by revelation from God that anyone can begin to see the truth, and THEN believe. The bible is the testimony of witnesses, not those who just believe what they've been told.


But you have not proven that foreknowledge demands predetermination. Simply because God foreknows what will happen does NOT mean He predetermined it to happen.

I gave you one example from 1 Samuel 23. Another is in Jonah 3, where God (thru Jonah) said Nineveh would be destroyed in 40 days. Yet Nineveh was not destroyed in 40 days as God said. Does this mean God lied? No. God foreknew Nineveh would for a certainty be destroy in 40 days IF Nineveh did not repent. Yet Nineveh did repent and therefore God "repented" of what He said he would do to Nineveh, Johan 3:10. Here God reacted, changed His course of action due to a free will choice made by Nineveh. If God has all ready predetermined all that happens then there would never be a need for God to 'repent'. Even though God foreknew Nineveh would be destroyed in 40 days, it not being destroyed in 40 days means what God foreknew was not predetermined, was not set in stone to happen.

One person explains it this way; you have past knowledge of events and people during the civil war yet your past knowledge of that war does not mean you predetermined that war to happen. Foreknowledge works the same way but in the other direction...one's knowledge of future events does not mean he has predetermined those events to happen no more than his past knowledge of events means he predetermined those to happen.

God does carry His will out but NOT by causation thru predetermination but by control. God brings about His will through His decretive will, His permissive will and/or His preceptive will. Since God is omniscient and has foreknowledge He foreknows what choices men will make when men are put in certain circumstances. And God uses men's free will choices to bring about His will thereby God cannot be held culpable for a free will choice of man. God therefore has the final say so in all that happens without violating man's free will.

Ephesians 2:8 the 'gift' refers to salvation, not faith. God does not determine for men which men will or will not have faith for such would make God a respecter of persons.

God's word is His revelation to men and men can read that revelatory word and understand what it says, Ephesians 3:3-4. And faith comes by hearing that revelatory word, Romans 10:17. So faith is not something God capriciously, unconditionally gives to one man over another.
 

shnarkle

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But you have not proven that foreknowledge demands predetermination. Simply because God foreknows what will happen does NOT mean He predetermined it to happen.

I never claimed God predestined anything. I simply pointed out the logic of Paul's argument requres that whatever foreknowledge God has, must be predestined, else he is not omniscient. This is a simple and irrefutable argument from Paul. It is logically consistent. If you think Paul is somehow contradicting the scripture he was so familiar with as a Pharisee, I suspect you haven't grasped his argument.
 

Ernest T. Bass

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I never claimed God predestined anything. I simply pointed out the logic of Paul's argument requres that whatever foreknowledge God has, must be predestined, else he is not omniscient. This is a simple and irrefutable argument from Paul. It is logically consistent. If you think Paul is somehow contradicting the scripture he was so familiar with as a Pharisee, I suspect you haven't grasped his argument.
But Paul never said foreknowledge always demands predetermination. There are some things God foreknew and predetermined to happen, as the crucifixion of Christ, but not all things.
 
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Enoch111

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If God predetermines ALL that happens then God certainly would be culpable for the sins man commits.
Therefore Reformed Theology DODGES this issues instead of facing it head on and admitting that they have produced a false doctrine. Foreknowledge is not the same as predetermination or predestination.
 
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shnarkle

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But Paul never said foreknowledge always demands predetermination.
He doesn't have to. It's a Given.

There are some things God foreknew and predetermined to happen, as the crucifixion of Christ, but not all things.

Your god is not omniscient then. Fair enough. You have a god that doesn't know everything. If that makes you feel better about your god, so be it. I hav no qualms with those who prefer a god of their own imagination. The biblical God is different though.

" Romans 8:28 28And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. "
" Romans 8:29 29For whom he did foreknow,he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, "

To point out that God didn't call all to love God isn't saying much in the way of negating God's foreknowledge and predestination.
 
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shnarkle

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If God predetermines ALL that happens then God certainly would be culpable for the sins man commits.
The gospel writer doesn't say, "Behold the lamb of God" for nothing. God provides the sacrifice. God provides the way to reconcile humanity. God does take responsibility.
 

Ernest T. Bass

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Therefore Reformed Theology DODGES this issues instead of facing it head on and admitting that they have produced a false doctrine. Foreknowledge is not the same as predetermination or predestination.
I have posted this before, but Calvinists have created themselves a conundrum;

"In Spite of All of the Foregoing Statements, We Have to Come to the Point Where We Confess That We Do Not Understand How It Is That God Can Ordain That We Carry Out Evil Deeds and Yet Hold Us Accountable for Them and Not be Blamed Himself: We can affirm that all of these things are true, because Scripture teaches them. But Scripture does not tell us exactly how God brings this situation about or how it can be that God holds us accountable for what he ordains to come to pass. Here Scripture is silent, and we have to agree with Berkhof that ultimately “the problem of God’s relation to sin remains a mystery" (Wayne Grudem - Systematic Theology, p.331.)
 

Stranger

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Did God raise up Pharaoh for the wrong purpose, or was magnifying his own glory a sufficient purpose for raising up Pharaoh? (Romans 9:17)

How is is possible for Pharaoh to have repented and allowed Israel to depart in peace, if he was raised up for this purpose?

God actively hardened Pharaoh's heart that he might judge e.g. "lay his hand upon" Egypt. Could Pharaoh have overcome God's hardening of his heart? How?

Quote:
The king's heart is in the hands of the LORD, as the rivers of water, he turns it whithersoever he will Proverbs 21:1


There is no question that Pharaoh hardened his own heart as is indicated in Ex. 8:15,32. Pharaoh is a responsible moral agent, but this doesn't answer the question of whether or not it was possible for Pharaoh to soften his own heart and repent despite God's will?

If Pharoah had repented of his sins and turned Israel free, how could God's word have been fulfilled?

Is it possible for sinful or even righteous man to thwart God's declared intent?

If he did this to Pharaoh, why wouldn't he do it to the rest of rebellious humanity?

No, God raised up Pharaoh for the right purpose, His purpose.

It wasn't possible.

No, Pharaoh could not overcome God's hardening of his heart.

'If' is a stupid question. That is not what occurred. Because God's word would be fulfilled.

No it is not possible for man to thwart God's intent.

God deals with man in accordance to who they are. Are they His or not.

Stranger
 

Ernest T. Bass

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He doesn't have to. It's a Given.

I gave you two examples where what God foreknew did NOT come to happen. Also, if God has predetermined all that happens why would He ever need to 'repent" Jonah 3:10?

So you have not yet proved that foreknowledge always requires predetermination.


shnarkle said:
Your god is not omniscient then. Fair enough. You have a god that doesn't know everything. If that makes you feel better about your god, so be it. I hav no qualms with those who prefer a god of their own imagination. The biblical God is different though.

" Romans 8:28 28And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. "
" Romans 8:29 29For whom he did foreknow,he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, "

To point out that God didn't call all to love God isn't saying much in the way of negating God's foreknowledge and predestination.

I have never said God is not omniscient but on the contrary I have said God foreknows the choices men make and God can use MAN'S free will choices to accomplish HIs own will as He did with Pharaoh, Judas, etc,. Thus God accomplishes His will and is NOT culpable for the choices man makes whereas Calvinism does make God culpable.

God can providentially see that "all things work together for them that love God" but the Bible does not explain how providence works.
 
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Ernest T. Bass

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The gospel writer doesn't say, "Behold the lamb of God" for nothing. God provides the sacrifice. God provides the way to reconcile humanity. God does take responsibility.

Yes, God provided Christ as the perfect sacrifice for man but how does this prove foreknowledge always demands predetermination?
 

shnarkle

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I gave you two examples where what God foreknew did NOT come to happen. Also, if God has predetermined all that happens why would He ever need to 'repent" Jonah 3:10?

So you have not yet proved that foreknowledge always requires predetermination.

You have to prove that the story of Jonah, which no observant Jew views as anything other than a parable, proves your point. You have to prove that the story of Jonah is literal reality.


the Bible does not explain how providence works.

Of course it does. The term is synonymous with foreknowledge, foresight, etc. Now you know.

"9For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate"

There is nothing in Paul's argument to suggest that those God doesn't foreknow, or predestinate, are somehow conformed to the image of Christ. Your claim basically boils down to this idea that God predestines some things, but not all things. Well, you still have to defend your position with regards to those he has predestined. Those who aren't predestined for damnation, are all willingly damning themselves.

As C.S. Lewis pointed out, the gates of hell are locked from the inside.
 

shnarkle

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Yes, God provided Christ as the perfect sacrifice for man but how does this prove foreknowledge always demands predetermination?
It logically follows. If it isn't predestined, then it can't be foreknown. How can you know what's going to happen if it could just as easily not happen at all? You're letting your ideas of God get in the way of Paul's argument. It's a logical air tight argument. Paul simply points out that it is a Given that God is just.