Kommentar zu Schemot 9:34

ויוסף לחטוא, up until now he had not been a deliberate sinner, not having acknowledged that what he had been doing had been sinful. Now, after having acknowledged this, reneging constituted a deliberately committed sin. This is why the Torah now describes Pharaoh as a deliberate sinner.

וירא פרעה כי חדל המטר, Pharaoh saw that the rain had stopped, etc. The Torah mentions this to show that Pharaoh's repentance already evaporated; he continued to sin almost immediately. When the Torah reports him as ויוסף לחטא, "he continued to sin," this does not refer to his continuing on his previous path; it means that Pharaoh added additional sins to the ones he had committed already. He now made a commitment not to release the Israelites under any terms and conditions.

וירא פרעה כי חדל המטר והברד והקולות, “when Pharaoh saw that the rain, the hail, and the thunder had ceased, etc.” Note that in the previous verse the Torah had described the cessation of the plague as occurring in a different sequence of steps, i.e. 1) thunder, 2) hail; 3) rain. The latter was described as being arrested in mid-air. The sound of Moses’ prayer resulted in the sound of thunder ceasing, the spreading out of his hands resulted in the hail and rain stopping to fall. Pharaoh’s perception of the sequence of these events was different, however. He first noticed that the rain and the hail had stopped. Only later did he realize that also the thunder had ceased.

ויוסף לחטא, “he continued to sin.” When the wicked experience troubles they are temporarily humbled; as soon as their troubles disappear they continue on as previously. When the Torah (verse 27) wrote that Pharaoh had exclaimed: “and Hashem is the righteous One,” this was an example of such a short-lived repentance. The very arrogance of the wicked is the cause of their eventual downfall. The pride which had originally caused Pharaoh to say: “who is Hashem that I should listen to His instructions” was the reason that ultimately he perished in the Sea of Reeds. We find a parallel with Nebuchadnezzar the King of Babylon who had said (Daniel 4,27) “Is this not the great Babylon which I have built up into a royal house with my powerful strength and for the glorification of my splendor?“ It did not take long for him to be humbled as we read in verse 29 of the same chapter that a heavenly voice announced that he would be driven from mankind and would have to live amongst the wild beasts. The righteous, on the other hand, do not display arrogance but humble themselves. They attain whatever glory and prominence they achieve as a result of their very humility. This is what Solomon said in Proverb 29,23: ”the pride of a man will humiliate him, but the humble in spirit will retain honor.”

כי חדל המטר, “for the rain had ceased;” seeing that Moses had only promised that the hail and the thunder would cease, Pharaoh said to himself that now he had proof that Moses was only a charlatan. Hence he continued to sin.

ויוסף לחטוא, “he continued to sin.” All this in spite of the fact that he had publicly acknowledged that G’d was righteous and that he and his people were the wicked ones.

ויכבד לבו הוא ועבדיו, “both he and his servants hardened their hearts,” arguing that the G-d of the Hebrews will not bring on the same plague a second time. הוא ועבדיו, we do not find this expression anywhere else in the Bible. The only reason that it has been used here is, that the Torah had written in verse 30: אתה ועבדיך, “you and your servants,” so that here it had to match that expression when reporting on how correct Moses had been when he had said that Pharaoh and his servants were still not in awe of the Lord. It was especially important to contrast this with Pharaoh’s previous statement in verse 27: חטאתי הפעם, “this time 1 have sinned.” It is the usual way of confirmed sinners if due to extreme distress they have been forced to pay lip service to a confession, that as soon as the emergency has passed they revert to their accustomed attitudes. We know from their own words that they had felt hard pressed, when the Torah referred to such people by writing that they took their beast indoors to escape the plague. (Verse 20) Now that relief had come, they reverted to “business as usual.”

ויכבד לבו, “his heart became strong;” in spite of the fright that he had experienced during the progress of the plague of hail.

הוא ועבדיו, “as well as his servants.” The Torah mentions his servants as they had a tradition that Moses would impose 10 plagues, and hail had been the seventh plague. We had pointed out earlier that the plague of hail contained elements of four plagues (hail, fire, thunder and rain) so that the Egyptians clung to the illusion that they had weathered the last of the plagues. This was also the reason why, when Moses threatened an additional plague, the servants finally lost their cool, and challenged Pharaoh, asking rebelliously, for how long he would allow Moses to become the snare that would ruin them. They had realized that these plagues would continue endlessly until Pharaoh would release the people of Israel. Alternatively, seeing that Moses had said that both Pharaoh and his servants had yet to humble themselves in true penitence, they reacted by making Moses’ statement a self-fulfilling prophecy and they stiffened their attitude.