ACTS 5:3-4

Q: Isn't it true that the question in verse 3 (“Why has Satan filled your heart?”) is fully explained by its parallel in verse 4 (“You have contrived this deed in your heart”)? And wouldn't that indicate that the other references to “Satan” in the Bible merely refer to the human heart, not some supernatural being?

I agree that these two questions are meant to be seen in parallel with each other. And actually, these verses occur within the larger literary frame shown below:

A. Why has Satan filled your heart

    B. to lie to the Holy Spirit

            C. While it remained unsold,

                D. did it not remain your own

            C'. After it was sold

               D'. were not the proceeds at your disposal

A'. How is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart

    B'. you did not lie to us, but to God

However, just because the phrases are placed in poetic parallelism to one another, does not mean that each pair says exactly the same thing. This is rarely the case in Hebrew poetry or in the exalted prose of this passage. Thus, B and B' say practically the same thing, but B' expands the concept somewhat by bringing in the Second Person of the Trinity. This is quite common in Hebrew poetry where the second line adds to the first so that both lines need to be taken together to get the whole picture. We see even more of a departure from strict parallelism in CD vs. C'D'. A similar concept is being presented in each pair, but C'D' moves forward in time to explain how the same principle applies even there.

So the question is, does the pair AA' act more like BB' in describing basically the same thing, but with B' clarifying or expanding on the idea of B? Or is AA' closer to CD-C'D', in which case A describes the first phase of the temptation (an external force suggesting the action) followed by A' (Ananias acting on this suggestion due to the evil inclination of his heart). In either case, but especially in the latter, it is unjustified to reduce these verses to the simple equation: Satan = evil human inclinations.

And that equation certainly can't extrapolated to reduce all references to Satan in the Bible to evil

 human inclinations only. Attempts to do that would fail especially in the case of the opening lines of

 the Book of Job. Whose evil inclinations are being referred to in that case? God's?