When God Repents

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Now and then in the Bible, God “repents.” In the Jonah story, for instance, we read that when God saw how the people of Nineveh had turned from their evil ways, God “repented” (KJV) of the calamity he had planned to bring on them (Jonah 3:10). This curious theological statement leads to the larger question of God’s sovereignty and human freedom.

In creating humankind in the divine image, with an independent will and freedom like God’s own creative freedom, God risked the potential chaos that results from human violence evident in wars, exploitation, environmental ruin and other forms of disorder.^a The major limitation to God’s sovereignty is this fundamentally unpredictable and uncontrollable human freedom.

In various ways the biblical narratives present us with a paradox: God’s absolute power does not crush human freedom but respects it. One would think that human beings, standing before the earthquake, wind and fire of God’s holy power, would be overwhelmed with terror and paralyzed with fear (cf. Exodus 19:18–19). Yet just the opposite happens, according to the Exodus-Sinai story: The awesome display of God’s sovereignty is a summons to action and covenant responsibility (Exodus 20:15–16).

Furthermore, God may “repent” in response to human action or fervent prayer. In the narrative about the establishment of monarchy in Israel, we are told that God repented of his decision to make Saul king (1 Samuel 15:10–35). The Hebrew verb (nicham) does not have a simple English equivalent; depending on the context, it may mean “regret,” “relent,” “be sorry,” “change one’s mind.” The metaphorical language, of course, reflects our experience of the exercise of human freedom. God’s freedom, however, is not to be confused with the equivocation that we associate with human beings, especially some politicians! Echoing a statement made in the oracles of Balaam (Numbers 23:19), the narrator says:

The Glory of Israel does not deceive or change His mind,

for He is not human that He should change His mind.”

1 Samuel 15:29 (JPSV)

God’s will is flexible, depending on the human situation at the time, but God has integrity, God is faithful.

The paradox of divine sovereignty and human freedom is beautifully illustrated in the parable of Jeremiah (Jeremiah 18:1–12), in which God is likened to a potter. Just as a potter may rework a damaged clay vessel on his wheel, so God may reconsider his decision to destroy a nation—as long as the nation has turned from evil. The point of the parable is not the divine Potter’s absolute power to shape passive clay, as in the evangelical hymn:

Have thine own way, Lord,
Mold me and make me after Thy will, While I am waiting, yielded and still.

On the contrary, the clay has a mind of its own, so to speak. God’s action is conditioned by human response. If God threatens a severe judgment and a people then “turns from its evil,” God will change his mind (“repent”) about the planned evil. And if a word of promise is given and a people then resolutely does evil, God will “repent” of the good planned. The future is open and full of surprising possibility. It all depends on how people react.

The same paradox is evident in the intercessory prayers of leaders who, like Moses (Exodus 32:11–14), appeal to God to remove impending punishment.¹ Sometimes, in response to these prayers, God “changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people” (Exodus 32:14) or at least postponed or mitigated the punishment (cf. Amos 7:1–6). God’s will is not an inexorable fate or an unalterable necessity. God is free to show mercy upon whomever God wills to show mercy (Exodus 33:19) and to modify actions in the face of changed circumstances.

God’s “repentance” is not only an expression of divine freedom but also of divine compassion. The God of Scripture is not the apathetic deity of some ancient Greek philosophy, who is removed from the human world and untouched by human suffering. Rather, God is present in the world, reacting with anger or moved by compassion. In his great book, The Prophets, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel maintains that the dominant theme of Israelite prophecy is the divine pathos, the compassion of God.² This is what Jonah found to be true in his distressingly successful preaching for repentance. Echoing the ancient creedal 044statement in Exodus 34:6–7, he says:

That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from [repent of] punishing.

Jonah 4:2 (NRSV)

Because human freedom is unpredictable, God’s actions are sometimes experimental. This is brought out especially in the primeval history. The storyteller says that the Lord God determined it was not good that the man should be alone, so God decided to “make him a helper as a partner.” God then brought various creatures to “the man” (ha-’adam) to see what he would name them, “but for the man there was not found a helper as his partner” (Genesis 2:18–19). Only then does God create woman. Even the creation of human beings, at one point, seemed to have been a mistake; “The Lord saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth…And the Lord was sorry [‘repented’] that he had made humankind on the earth” (Genesis 6:6). Moreover, the flood did not eliminate wickedness on the earth, for the inclination of the human heart continued to be evil, and God nevertheless resolved not to inflict such a catastrophe ever again (Genesis 8:21).

The prophets of Israel used various rhetorical strategies to elicit the repentance of the people. Depending on the circumstances, the prophetic appeal was couched in threat of divine judgment, promise of salvation, wisdom argumentation, consolation. Apparently God’s word is not the same in every situation; prophetic speech, therefore, has to be versatile and adaptable.

God’s sovereignty is not an arbitrary exercise of power. “God’s power is absolute,” as David Blumenthal remarks, “but God cannot use it absolutely.”³ Divine power does not overpower but empower. When the people are bound in covenant relationship, surrendering to the will of God and obeying God’s laws, they find the freedom to act responsibly.

Now and then in the Bible, God “repents.” In the Jonah story, for instance, we read that when God saw how the people of Nineveh had turned from their evil ways, God “repented” (KJV) of the calamity he had planned to bring on them (Jonah 3:10). This curious theological statement leads to the larger question of God’s sovereignty and human freedom. In creating humankind in the divine image, with an independent will and freedom like God’s own creative freedom, God risked the potential chaos that results from human violence evident in wars, exploitation, environmental ruin and other forms of […]