And the Lord Hardened Pharaoh’s Heart

Pharaoh Drowned in the Red Sea

Thinking about Trump, I keep coming back to that passage in the Bible describing what happened during the Ten Plagues of Egypt: “And the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart”. At first that seems strange — why would the Lord do that?

The answer is that as Pharaoh’s heart hardened, he undertook more and more extreme actions. That was his undoing when he pursued the Israelites fleeing slavery in Egypt. He and his chariots were drowned in the Red Sea.

So it is with Trump. Egged on by his base and by his Greek chorus at Fox News, his behavior has become more and more outrageous and ultimately self-destructive. His current quarrel with Twitter is escalating and cannot end well for him. Jack Dorsey, the chief of Twitter, cannot and will not reverse his actions in labelling Trump’s tweets as false. Trump might forsake Twitter for some other outlook such as Facebook (which might follow Twitter’s lead), but that will restrict his audience. Like Pharaoh, he will ultimately overreach and be destroyed.