The Devil Made You Do It

The Devil Made You Do It?

When I Trick Myself: How Self-Deception Breeds Sin

The Bible’s first confession, made after the first sin, already hints at our inner self-denial: “The serpent deceived me” (Genesis 3:13, CJB). The Hebrew verb הִשִּׁיאַנִי (hishî’anî, root נ־ש־א) captures the move—“he made me be deceived”—but the sechel is that my next move is either blame or ownership. Sin hardens when I choose blame.

The Tanakh warns that the most dangerous lies are the ones we tell ourselves. Job cautions, “Let him not deceive himself by trusting in emptiness” (Job 15:31). The line points to being led astray from the inside (נִתְעָה, nit‘āh, “is deceived/led off-course”). Sechel: false hope's fog judgment, and sin grows best in that fog.

Moses likewise commands, “Watch yourselves, so your heart not be deceived” (Deuteronomy 11:16, CJB). The phrase יִפְתֶּה לְבַבְכֶם from פתה “entice/deceive”) pictures my own heart sweet-talking me toward disloyal desires; sechel: before actions stray, the heart has already been sold.

The prophets diagnose how inner delusion powers outward disobedience. Isaiah depicts the idol-maker whose “deceived heart has turned him aside” so he never asks, “Isn’t there a lie in my right hand?” (Isaiah 44:20). The verb הִשִּׁיאָהוּ (hishî’āhu, “has deceived him”) nails it: self-talk makes folly feel like faithfulness. Later, Isaiah says to arrogant Babylon, “Your wisdom and knowledge have deluded you” (Isaiah 47:10). The Hebrew word שֹׁבְבָתֵךְ (shōvvatēkh, “has turned you astray”) illustrates how pride weaponizes intelligence against truth; sechel, or intelligence without humility, becomes a factory of excuses.

Jeremiah goes to the engine room: “The heart is deceitful above all and mortally sick” (Jeremiah 17:9). The keyword עָקֹב (ʿaqov, “crooked, deceitful”) reminds me that temptation isn’t only pressure from outside—it’s engineering from inside. Hence Jeremiah’s direct order: “Don’t deceive yourselves” (Jeremiah 37:9); the Hebrew תַּשִּׁיאוּ (tashî’u, hifil of נ־ש־א) warns that my own inner narrative can coach me into the fall I fear. Obadiah compresses the whole dynamic into one verdict: “The pride of your heart has deceived you” (Obadiah 1:3). The form הִשִּׁיאֶךָ (hishî’ekha, “has deceived you”) names pride as the forger of permission slips; sechel: pride edits the facts until sin looks safe, even deserved.

The New Covenant Jewish writers keep the lens on inner delusion. “Let no one delude himself,” Paul urges (1 Corinthians 3:18); the point is not about clever strangers but about the ego flattering itself into folly. He gets even plainer: “If someone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he fools himself” (Galatians 6:3, CJB). Sechel: comparison and self-importance anesthetize conviction.

On conduct, he writes, “Don’t delude yourselves” about patterns that shut people out of the Kingdom (1 Corinthians 6:9); renaming a habit cannot change its harvest. James ties the knife to daily practice: “Don’t deceive yourselves—be doers of the Word, and not hearers only” (James 1:22). Information without obedience is just plain delusion. Finally, John confesses the antidote to inner spin: “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). Sechel: denial fertilizes sin; plain confession uproots it.

Bottom line: Scripture locates the birthplace of many sins in self-deception—a heart that entices (יִפְתֶּה), a mind that turns itself aside (שֹׁבְבָתֵךְ), a pride that whispers permissions (הִשִּׁיאֶךָ). The way out is beautifully simple and bracing: let the Word expose the spin, tell the truth about what we’re doing, and act on that truth today. That’s how the lie inside stops steering the life outside. No, most likely, the devil didn't make me and you sin.