Commenting on passages in the Old Testament that speak of Yahweh “hardening” people’s hearts (e.g., Pharaoh [Exo 7:3]), Gregory Boyd offered the following response to those who would read into such texts a form of determinism and/or Reformed theology:
One common defense against the charge that Yahweh was behaving immorally when he hardened Pharaoh's heart is that Pharaoh is said to have hardened his own heart five times, in response to the first five plagues, before Yahweh is portrayed as hardening his heart after the sixth plague. On this basis, some argue that God's hardening of Pharaoh's heart did not cause Pharaoh to sin but was rather done in response to Pharaoh's sin . . Complimenting this perspective, some have distinguished between an "effective" and a "permissive" hardness of heart. In this view, Yahweh hardened Pharaoh's heart merely in the sense that he allowed Pharaoh to repeatedly harden his own heart against him . . . In this case, the author's statement that Yahweh hardened Pharaoh's heart need only meant that Yahweh's actions were the occasion for Pharaoh's heart becoming hard, and this could be applied to the other examples of God hardening hearts as well. One could even perhaps argue that it was Yahweh's merciful patience in giving Pharaoh repeated opportunities to save himself and his nation that increasingly solidified Pharaoh [sic] heart.
Another argument that some employ centers on the fact that the Piel form of the Hebrew word "to harden" (chazaq), which is what is used when God is said to harden Pharaoh's heart, has the connotation of strengthening something. Some have therefore argued that once Yahweh saw there was no point trying to get Pharaoh to soften his heart toward him and repent, he decided to weave Pharaoh's hardness of heart into his sovereign plan by actually helping Pharaoh do what he really wanted to do, thereby allowing his hardness of heart to run its full self-destructive course. This may only imply that Yahweh buttressed Pharaoh's courage or that Yahweh's repeated attempts at persuading Pharaoh caused Pharaoh to become increasingly resolved in his stance against him . . . However, while this consideration has some merit as applied to Pharaoh as well as to the kings who fought Joshua in Joshua 11, it is more difficult to apply it to the king of Heshbon, for the narrative of his destruction uses qashah rather than chazaq and specifically says Yahweh made his heart "obstinate" (amats; Deut 2:30)
Another possible consideration that may have some application to these portraits concerns the fact that when ancient Israelites speak of God as somehow behind events, this need not imply that God determined those events. This language may simply reflect the ancient Israelite conception of God as a sovereign ANE king who rules over, and who is in solidarity with, the whole creation, which is viewed as his kingdom. This way of speaking was simply an ancient Israelite way of expressing the conviction that all that comes to pass does so under the supervision of the one true Creator God, and even things that are against his will are nevertheless used by him to ultimately further his will. (Gregory A. Boyd, Crucifixion of the Warrior God: Interpreting the Old Testament’s Violent Portraits of God in Light of the Cross, volume 2: The Cruciform Thesis [Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 2017], 1268-69, 1269-70)
