Pharaoh

Pharaoh is the title borne by the kings of ancient Egypt, derived from the Egyptian per-aa, "great house" — originally the royal palace, and by extension its occupant. In Egyptian religion the pharaoh was held to be divine, the incarnate son of the sun-god and guarantor of cosmic order, so that in Scripture he stands as the supreme representative of human power that claims a glory belonging to God alone. Most of the pharaohs of the Bible appear without their personal names, identified only by the events in which they touch the story of God's people.

Several distinct pharaohs cross the patriarchal and Mosaic narratives. The pharaoh of Abram's day took Sarai into his house and was struck with plagues until he sent them away (Genesis 12:15–17). The pharaoh of Joseph's day, troubled by dreams none could interpret, raised the imprisoned Hebrew to be vizier over all Egypt and welcomed Jacob's family to Goshen (Genesis 41:39–41; Genesis 47:5–6). Generations later "there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph" and enslaved the multiplying Israelites, ordering their sons drowned (Exodus 1:8–11, 22).

The pharaoh of the Exodus is the most theologically weighty. To Moses' demand in the LORD's name he answered with the defiant question, "Who is the LORD, that I should obey his voice? I do not know the LORD" (Exodus 5:2). Through ten plagues — by which the LORD executed judgment "on all the gods of Egypt" (Exodus 12:12) — his resistance was broken only when the death of the firstborn struck his own house, and his pursuing army was drowned in the sea (Exodus 14:27–28). Scripture describes the hardening of his heart from two sides: Pharaoh hardened his own heart (Exodus 8:15), and the LORD hardened it (Exodus 9:12), holding together human guilt and divine sovereignty.

Later, named pharaohs deal with Israel's monarchy: Shishak plundered the temple under Rehoboam (1 Kings 14:25–26), Neco killed good king Josiah at Megiddo (2 Kings 23:29), and Hophra was the broken "reed" on whom Judah vainly leaned, against whom Jeremiah and Ezekiel prophesied (Jeremiah 44:30; Ezekiel 29:2–3). Throughout, Pharaoh becomes Scripture's archetype of the proud ruler who sets himself against the living God. Paul gives the definitive theological reading, citing the LORD's word to Pharaoh: "For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth" (Romans 9:17). So the deliverance from Pharaoh became the great paradigm of redemption, and his downfall a perpetual witness that no earthly power, however godlike its pretensions, can stand against the King of all the earth.