In his play 'Lady Windermere’s Fan' Oscar Wilde has Lord Darlington boldly assert: ‘I can resist anything except temptation.’ While that may raise the odd smile, real-life temptation is no laughing matter.
In his conversation with Eve, Satan distorts what God
had said about not eating the forbidden fruit. He argues that, by
commanding Adam and Eve not to eat the fruit from the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, God is withholding benefits that would
otherwise be theirs and stopping them from becoming more like God
himself. In effect, Satan is calling God a liar. Contradicting what Eve
has been told, he tells her: ‘You will not certainly die’ (Genesis 3:4
New International Version).
The story goes on to say that when Eve ‘saw that the
fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also
desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it’ (3:6).
The sad thing about Eve is that instead of taking
herself away from what is tempting her, she hovers around it. We tend to
do the same. Instead of turning our minds to other things, we continue
to mull over the possibilities and remain enticed by forbidden fruit.
When we want to do something that we should not, we
often look for ways in which to justify ourselves and make wrong seem
acceptable. Little wonder Satan is depicted as a snake, for we know how,
in our minds, he can slither around any obstacle to get us to do what
he wants.
Wrong things are not necessarily always bad things.
That fruit wasn’t poisonous. It ‘was pleasing to the eye’. What
temptation isn’t attractive? It always offers pleasure of some sort. It
is always desirable in some way.
But, as Eve discovered, the pleasure or promised
benefit of giving in to temptation is short-lived. It leaves us with a
bitter taste in our mouths.
Photo credit: War Cry pictures
