What shall we say then? Unrighteousness with God? ("Is there" supplied in the Authorized Version somewhat weakens the force of the expression.) God forbid! For to Moses he saith, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. The argument (thus introduced by γὰρ) requires two understood premisses—that God cannot possibly be unrighteous, and that what he himself said to Moses must be true. These premisses assumed, the apostle reasons thus: "What I have said of God's way of dealing with men does not imply unrighteousness in him; for it agrees with what he said of himself to Moses." The quotation is from Exodus 33:19. Moses had besought the LORD to show him his glory, as a token that he and the people had found grace in his sight (Exodus 33:16, Exodus 33:18). The LORD, in answer to his prayer, makes "all his goodness pass before him," in token that such grace had been found; but declares, in the words quoted, that all such grace accorded was not due to any claim on the part of man, but to his own good pleasure.
In the verses that follow (17, 18) it is further shown, by the same kind of argument, that, as God declares himself to accept whom he will, so he also declares himself to reject whom he will; and hence, as his power is absolute, so is his justice unimpeachable, in himself determining the objects of his reprobation no less than the objects of his mercy. This appears from what he is recorded (Exodus 9:16) to have said through Moses to Pharaoh.
For the Scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose (rather, for this very purpose) did I raise thee up, that I might show in thee my power, and that my Name might be declared throughout all the earth. The conclusion follows: So then he hath mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth. The passage quoted in Romans 9:17, taken (as it is intended to be) in conjunction with the whole history as given in Exodus—and especially with the passages in which God himself is said to have hardened Pharaoh's heart, so that he would not let the children of Israel go—shows that not only the deliverance of Israel, but also the obduration of Pharaoh, was due to the determination of God that it should be so, in accordance with his own righteous purpose, which cannot be called in question by man. The particular declaration of Exodus 9:16 appears to be selected for quotation because of its relevancy to the case in hand, which it is intended to illustrate; viz. the present rejection of the majority of the Jews from gospel privileges. How this is will appear below. Now, this whole passage has been used in support of Calvinistic views of the original absolute reprobation of individuals irrespectively of their deserts. Calvin himself draws this conclusion from it, very decidedly, thus: "Neque enim praevideri ruinam impiorum a Domino Paulus tradit, sed ejus consilio et voluntate ordinari; quemadmodum et Solomon docet (Proverbs 16:4) non mode praecognitum fuisse impiorum interitum, sed impios ipsos fuisse destinato creates, ut perirent" ('In Epist. Pauli ad Romans,' on Romans 9:18). It is, therefore, important to consider carefully both the original meaning of the verse, quoted from Exodus, and the apostle's application of it. First, with reference to Pharaoh himself, what is meant by "I raised thee up ( ἐξήγειρα)"? Not "created thee;" nor excitavi te, i.e. "stirred thee up" to resist my will, that I might exhibit my power in confounding thee. Whether or not St. Paul's ἐξήγειρα would bear this sense, it is quite inadmissible in the LXX. (from which, in this expression, he varies), and also in the Hebrew, of which the proper rendering is, "I made thee to stand." The LXX. has ἕνεκεν τούτου διετηρήθης, meaning that Pharaoh had been kept alive instead of being at once cut off, that God's power might be displayed in him. St. Paul's rendering, which is closer to the Hebrew than the LXX., seems to mean, "raised thee to thy present position of power and greatness" (or possibly, as Meyer explains, "caused thee to emerge," i.e. in history: "Thy whole historical appearance has been brought about by me, in order that," etc.). Thus the expression cannot mean, either that God had brought Pharaoh originally into existence for the sole purpose of destroying him, or that he had from the first irresistibly incited him to obduracy in order to condemn him, and so destroy him. The Lord says in effect to him, "Thou art now great and powerful; but it is! that made thee so, or still keep thee so: and this, not that thou mayest accomplish thine own will, but subserve mine, and that my power to work out my own purposes of mercy or of judgment may be the more notably displayed." For how is God's purpose in so raising Pharaoh up defined? "That I might show in thee my power, and that my Name might be declared throughout all the earth;" i.e., as is evident from the history, by the deliverance of Israel in spite of Pharaoh's opposition through the judgments sent on him and his people to that end. There is plainly nothing in the original history to imply Pharaoh's individual reprobation with regard to his own eternal salvation, but only his discomfiture in his opposition to the Divine purpose of mercy to Israel. But still, with a view to such execution of his purposes, God himself is said to have hardened Pharaoh's heart; and it is to this that the apostle draws special attention in conclusion, as denoting that which it is his design to show. It is thus certainly declared that this hardening was from God. But even so, it is nowhere said that God had made Pharaoh's heart hard from the first, so that he had been all along incapable of acting otherwise than he did. The inference rather is that, after wilful resistance to appeals, final obduracy was sent on him as a judgment. And it is further to be observed that in some verses in Exodus (Exodus 8:15, Exodus 8:19, Exodus 8:32; Exodus 9:34) Pharaoh is said to have hardened his own heart, with the addition, in Exodus 9:34, of "he sinned yet more;" while in others (Exodus 7:14, Exodus 7:22; Exodus 9:7, Exodus 9:35) it is only said generally that "his heart was hardened." The two forms of expression seem to denote two aspects of final obduracy in man—according to one as being self-induced, according to the other as judicial. Thus also in I Kings 22. the Lend himself is said to have sent the lying spirit into the heart of Ahab's prophets, in order that he might rush to his ruin, though it was obviously due to his own sins that he was thus finally doomed. A striking instance of the two aspects of human obduracy is found in Isaiah 6:9, etc., and the reference to the passage by our Lord in Matthew 13:15. In Isaiah it is, "Make the heart of this people fat," etc.; but in our Lord's reference, "For this people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes have they closed;" as if the closing had been their own doing. The following lines express a like conception of judicial blindness-
"For when we in our viciousness grow hard
(O misery on't !), the wise gods seal our eyes,
In our own filth drop our clear judgments, make us
Adore our errors, laugh at us while we strut
To our confusion."
We may compare also the Latin saying, Quem Deus vult, perdere prius dementat, which by no means implies that the divinely dementated persons have not deserved destruction. Such, then, seems the view to be taken of what is said about Pharaoh himself. But the important thing to be kept in view for a proper understanding of the drift of the passage is that, though Pharaoh was himself an individual, his case is adduced in no connection with the question of individual predestination, but in illustration of the principle on which nations, or races of men, are elected to or rejected from the enjoyment of Divine favour. This is the real subject of the whole chapter; and hence to build on this part of it a doctrine of individual election or reprobation is to bring into it what is not there. The drift of the passage before us is this: Moses and the Israelites of old illustrate the position of the faithful remnant of the Jews together with all Christian believers now. Pharaoh illustrates the position of the obdurate majority of the Jewish nation now. As he, in setting himself against the Divine purpose, and relying on his own strength, was unable to thwart God's design of mercy to his chosen, and was himself hardened and rejected, so the Jews as a nation now. And as then, so now, both the election and the rejection are to be referred entirely to the will of God, having mercy on whom he will and hardening whom he will, his justice in doing both being nevertheless unimpeachable.