The history of Edom throughout Scripture is one of much interest, as exhibiting the ways of God with a people akin to Israel, but with fortunes more and more diverging from the chosen people of God. In this history we see thoroughly maintained the principle of moral responsibility which God never abandons, but holds inviolably true and sacred. This is equally applicable to the enemies of God and to His friends. The sovereign wisdom of God needs neither to learn anything from man on the one hand, nor grounds on man’s part in order to decide His will on the other. He exercised His own mind and purpose, even before the birth of the children of Isaac. It was so ordered that the character of the flesh should be manifest, not merely where there was wickedness in the family, but where there was faith. Isaac stands out as remarkable for piety in the retired calm of a godly household, as decidedly as Abraham does for a stronger and more self-renouncing communion with God. Abraham’s faith was exercised in a field more varied and conspicuous. There was more of a public testimony in the man whom God called His friend. As Isaac was more retiring, so also was he apt to yield overmuch when tried. He was the chosen heir, to the setting aside of the bondmaid’s son Ishmael. In Isaac’s family it was between the twin sons Jacob and Esau of the same father and mother, that God afresh exercised His sovereignty. It is impossible to find greater closeness in point of circumstance! This therefore makes it all the more striking when we find God even before their birth pronouncing on the ultimate and distinct destiny of the two sons. If God had not been pleased to choose, it is evident that the two could not have exactly the same place. Was God then to abolish His title? Or to leave it to man with only Satan to influence? It was most fitting then that He should choose which was to have the superior place. They could not both be invested with first-born rights; one must be chosen for the better place. The order either of flesh or of God’s choice must prevail. Which is most right? Assuredly God, whatever may be His grace, always maintains His own sovereignty. He chose therefore Jacob the younger, and not Esau, for this could only have given importance to man in the flesh — man as he is in his fallen condition without God. Impossible that He should make light of the fall or of its consequences: He therefore chooses and acts.
The Judgment Which Follows
At the same time it is remarkable that, while the first book of the Bible points out the choice of God from the beginning, He does not pronounce morally on Esau in a full, complete way until the last book of the Old Testament. It is only in Malachi that he says, “I hated Esau.” Never does Scripture represent God as saying before the child was born and had manifested his iniquity and proud malice, “Esau have I hated.” There is where the mind of man is so false. It is not meant, however, that God’s choice was determined by the character of the individuals. This would make man the ruler rather than God. It is not so; God’s choice flows out of His own wisdom and nature. It suits and is worthy of Himself, but the reprobation of any man and of every unbeliever is never a question of the sovereignty of God. It is the choice of God to do good where and how He pleases; it is never the purpose of His will to hate any man. There is no such doctrine in the Bible. God’s election is a most clear and scriptural truth. But the consequence that men draw from election, namely, the reprobation of the non-elect, is a mere reproduction of fatalism. It is the unfounded deduction of man’s reasoning in divine things. But man’s reasoning in the things of God, not being based on the divine revelations of His mind in His Word, is essentially and invariably false. It is impossible for man to reason justly in the abstract as to the will of God. The only safe ground for man is to adhere to the simple exposition of God’s declarations, and this for the very simple reason that a man can only reason from his own mind, which is far indeed from being God’s mind. Reasoning means deduction according to the necessary laws of the human mind. Here, however, the groundwork being the will of God, in order to reason aright one must reason from what God is and says. The danger is of inferring from what man is and from what man feels. Such is the essential difference between what is trustworthy and what is worthless in questions of the kind. Man must submit to being judged by God and His Word, and not seek to judge for Him. No man is competent to think or speak in His stead. But we may and ought to learn what He has told us of Himself and His ways in His Word.
The Hardening of Heart
There is no serious difficulty as to what is said in Scripture concerning the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart. It can be readily shown that such a judicial dealing on God’s part is unquestionably righteous. Scripture lets us see the proud, cruel and blaspheming character of Pharaoh before the hardening; nor does it speak of the Lord hardening his heart till he had fully committed himself to self-will and contempt of God. The infliction of hardening came from God because of the rebellious opposition to His demands and authority. God may deal with a man today in this manner, but He never hardens him in the first instance that he should not believe. But after he has heard and refused to believe, God seals him up in an obdurate state. In no instance, however, is this the first act of God, but rather the last, judicial and retributive, when man has slighted an adequate and faithful testimony.
W. Kelly, adapted