Eve’s Threefold Temptation
“And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat.” There was the threefold temptation. “She saw that the tree was good for food”; her desire to enjoy things was incited, and she faced the question of satisfying in an unlawful way that desire for enjoyment. She saw that the fruit was “a delight to the eyes”: her desire to get the attractive thing she saw was incited, and she faced the question of whether she should satisfy that desire in a way that God had forbidden. Finally she saw that the tree was “to be desired to make one wise.” Satan had told her that she and her husband would be as God if they ate the fruit. Her desire to accomplish things took the form of reaching out after equality with God.
Now turn for a moment to the analysis of sin and temptation that the Holy Spirit gives in 1 John 2:16: “For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the vainglory of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.” Here is an inclusive statement of all that is in the world. The apostle is stating here the only three ways in which it is possible for a man to sin. Note that they are the three points at which Eve failed.
When the desire to enjoy things goes beyond the bounds set by God it becomes “the lust of the flesh.” The lawful desire to get things, when it turns into sin, becomes “the lust of the eyes.” When the desire to do things leads a man away from God, it becomes “the vainglory [or the pride] of life.”
Dr. Kyle points out in his study of temptation that Eve fell at every point of her nature, and sinned in “the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the vainglory of life.” He notes also that the lust of the eyes and the pride of life had no immediate outlet of expression for Adam and Eve, situated as they were in the midst of a world that was all theirs, and so the sin found immediate expression in some form of the lust of the flesh. Yet man had yielded and sinned at all three points.