Word.ws English Dictionary

playing the devil with

playing the devil with is the present participle and gerund of play the devil with.

Meaning of play the devil with

Verb

play the devil with (third-person singular simple present plays the devil with, present participle playing the devil with, simple past and past participle played the devil with)

  1. (colloquial, idiomatic) To cause great trouble or distress to.
    • There's a silly young fool; but perhaps it's not entirely his fault. The last six months of the war played the devil with many an unformed character.1937, Rupert Penny, The Talkative Policeman, page 166

Questions about playing the devil with

What is playing the devil with the present participle and gerund of?
Playing the devil with is the present participle and gerund of play the devil with.

Words near playing the devil with in the dictionary

  1. playing the ball, not the man
  2. playing the board
  3. playing the cat and banjo with
  4. playing the clitar
  5. playing the deuce with
  6. playing the devil with
  7. playing the dickens with
  8. playing the field
  9. playing the fool
  10. playing the game
  11. playing the giddy goat

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: playing the devil with (page history and authors); play the devil with (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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