Do We Think With Our Heart?

I need your help to refute a charge an atheist has brought against the Bible. He claims the Bible says we “think with our hearts.” He claims approximately 920 verses say that we think with our hearts. Is he right? Does the Bible claim we think with our hearts? Isn’t it our soul that guides our actions?

Q. I need your help to refute a charge an atheist has brought against the Bible. He claims the Bible says we “think with our hearts.” He claims approximately 920 verses say that we think with our hearts. Is he right? Does the Bible claim we think with our hearts? Isn’t it our soul that guides our actions?

A. In the Hebrew culture, as in many others, the heart symbolizes the seat of emotion. Thinking with our heart means thinking emotionally, based on our feelings. It’s not to be taken literally, any more than being heartbroken over a failed love affair means that the organ in our chest no longer works.

When Jeremiah 17:9 says that man’s heart is incurably wicked, it means that when we act on our feelings, we will almost invariably do something that’s opposed to God’s will for us. The hardest skill we must learn as believers is to listen to the guidance of the Holy Spirit and make “contrary to feelings” choices, deciding to act out of love instead of self-interest, jealously, revenge, etc.