Practical Aspects Bearing on Demonology

by Robert Garrison

1. The question of whether divining up the dead is real or pretended, or whether demonology, fortune telling, wizards, and the like should even be believed or taught against today, must be considered in light of how the Lord God viewed them.
   1. Deut 18:9-14. God instructed the Israelites not to "imitate" such practices. In order to imitate them, suggests the practices were real. The reason the practices were unnecessary for the health of the Jewish nation, is because in vs 13, the Lord said the Jews could remain "blameless" and complete without them (NAS), ("perfect" KJV, i.e. mature). Being true to God had the full assurance that Jehovah would protect and provide.
   2. Ex.22:18. The penalty for a sorceress was death.
      • Would God institute a divine law demanding capital punishment for a pretended power?
      • Wouldn't the pretense be self evident?
      • Were all pretenders of truth dealt with as harshly?
      • While the answers are no, the sin of relying on strange gods, even pretended, is the same. God is renounced and a power other than His is invoked.
   3. In Lev.19:31, God forbid the Jews to seek out mediums and spiritists to preclude their defilement.

      Lev.20:6 legislated the penalty for such a sin.

      Lev.20:27 enacted how the penalty was to be inflicted.

2. Impostors of these mysterious arts did exist. But consider, if there were impostors, there must have been true workers of them, other than God's workers for good.
   1. The Egyptian sorcerers Jannes and Jambres duplicated the miraculous signs wrought by Moses using their magic and secret arts. Some believe these to have been slight of hand artists or snake charmers. Pharaoh certainly believed them and his subsequent actions were affected. Ex.7:11 and 2 Tim.3:8. In the latter case, Paul likened demonology to "those who oppose the truth". Therefore whether some employ real sorcery or merely practice intentional deception of the truth, the result is the same.
   2. The witch of Endor is a classic case of necromancy. Did she conjure up Samuel or someone who impersonated him? Consider I Sam.28:3-19:
      1. Saul knew it was Samuel. vs 14
      2. The woman saw it was Samuel. vs 12
      3. The woman was surprised vs 12 (She saw something she never dreamed of seeing, i.e. a "god" or "divine being" coming up out of the earth).

         Question? If the righteous are with Abraham, as Jesus indicated in the story of the rich man and Lazarus, how are they called up? Verse 15 portrays Samuel as having found the sweet rest of which Jesus would later promise.

         Several positions exist among the Jewish Rabbis concerning the destination of the soul:

         • One school contends "the soul tarries 12 months while the body molds".
         • Another says it remains in the area for 4 days after 3 days of mourning, for a total of 7 days. This waiting period is to see if the body may resume life.

         The more ancient Hebrews held that in death:

         • The soul continued in a state of self conscious existence.
         • It was capable of feeling and expressing grief and sorrow.
         • It retained memory of transactions of which it had taken part. (Certainly a day of judgment adds credibility to that thought.)
         • It was in a state of rest and had no wish to be summoned to fret over the affairs of life again, (as in this case).
      4. At this point, Saul was devoid of God. Pitifully, and in sheer desperation, he sought the very person he had legislated the death penalty against to bring his close friend to him for advice. This whole picture is the personification of hopelessness. And yet Saul got the advice he sought!
   3. In Acts 16:16-22, Paul was followed by a young slave girl who had enriched her masters by having a "spirit of divination" (i.e. fortune telling in order to foresee or foretell future events). Eventually her efforts irritated Paul and he turned and exorcised the spirit from her "in the name of Jesus Christ". And "it came out of her at that very moment". This action brought swift retaliation from public officials who beat and jailed Paul and his party.

      While the practice was believed, the root of it exposed her masters' motives who "saw their hope of profit gone". vs 19

   4. In Acts 13:6 Elymas, a Jewish magician, a false prophet (or sorcerer), opposed Paul and tried to turn a public official away from the truth. Disgusted, Paul labeled him a "fraud, full of deceit", "an enemy of righteousness" and finally a "son of the devil" and he struck the man blind. Strong discipline for imitation powers?

3. It is important to remember that the word "necromancy" means association between the spirits of dead and living men. The necromancer predicted the future after being inspired by the dead. Therefore, to condemn it -- acknowledges it.
   1. The key to the necromancer's art or power is dependent upon making and finding a familiar spirit or demon with super human knowledge.
   2. The necromancer must be receptive and seek after demons.
   3. The demons therefore are not unwanted.

4. There are two subjects of which God tells us little and man longs to know more in detail: 1) insight into the spirit world; and, 2) our own destiny.
   1. The obvious possibilities of the origin of demons seems to be either:
      1. They are evil angels who have this designation because of special powers.
      2. They are a race of spirits unto themselves.
      3. They are spirits of dead people.
   2. The Bible reveals that man and angels were created. But there is no mention of the creation of demons despite their numerous appearances in Biblical history. And since all of God's creation was "good", demons must have been in another spirit or human form before becoming evil.

5. Ghosts or spirits in the unseen world, whose horizons are enlarged, are always depicted as peculiarly "intelligent". As previously mentioned, the very term "demon" is derived from a root word meaning "knowing one".

6. Forbidden future knowledge sought by man, by unlawful means, has always been obnoxious and an abomination to God.
   1. But as children, when we are told we cannot have, we desire.
   2. It seems as if denial motivates curiosity.
   3. Denial always implies possibility.

7. Does any spirit of man, dead or alive, have the power to foresee or foretell the future? Does anyone know the future except God?
   1. Whatever was revealed by prophets was revealed in part (I Cor 13:9).
   2. Only God knows all future.
   3. However, angels and demons certainly know a lot more than man.
      1. Testifying concerning Jesus in Heb 2:7, He is depicted as "being a little lower than the angels". It is implied that whatever powers Jesus had in the flesh, angels had, at least in like fashion and a little more.
      2. It was angels who came to comfort and coach Jesus during His most trying moments. In order to accomplish that, they had to bring knowledge of which He was not yet privy.
      3. Satan, in Job 1:10, expressed supernatural insight into why Job might be faithful to God. His challenge prompted God to afflict Job beyond all reasonable expectations. The process of his affliction was known by the spirit world well in advance of Job's understanding taking Satan's requests at face value.

8. But what of the laws of probability or laws-of chance?
   1. First, consider if someone with a photographic memory lived during Cain, Noah, or Abraham's time and death had not overtaken him, his knowledge (based on cause and effect) to predict the future would still be a speck by comparison with the knowledge of God.
   2. There are 5 references to "chance" in O.T. scripture which deal with random happenings of life which have little or no effect upon knowledge of the future. Deut. 22:6; 1 Cor.15:37; Eccl.9:9-11; I Sam.6:9; and 2 Sam.1:6.
   3. The word "chance" was used once by Jesus in Lk.10:31. Elsewhere He might have termed it "ironically" or "irony". It apparently served His purpose to express it so casually and yet it was in the purpose of God. Such opportunities always seem coincidental to men who neglect them. But we might also say it is often the test moment of a man's character and his life.
   4. Chance relies on numerical probabilities and can never be associated in the same context with the "Providence of God" which is design oriented. Providential chance then, essentially means "Time and Circumstance".

9. The powers of knowing in the disembodied state (spirit realm), must be precious thoughts. Paul's spirit was translated to Paradise in 2 Cor 12:4. He said, he "heard inexpressible words, which a man is not permitted to speak". Sometimes information creates more questions than it answers. Consider:
   1. If the words were "inexpressible" (Webster defines this as "incapable of being explained, interpreted or accounted for"), why was Paul NOT PERMITTED to repeat them? How could he, even if he had wanted to do so?
   2. If they were inexpressible, either they couldn't be understood or they could be understood but could not be repeated. Regardless, they served their purpose by overwhelming Paul with their magnitude and importance.
   3. If they were important, the rich man and Lazarus who were in the Hadean world, heard them or were aware of them. Is it any wonder those "at rest" in the grave are content not to be called upon by the living? Someone has speculated that "these (words) may have been quiet, indistinguishable child like whispers of ecstatic language". The fact that men speculate indicates that God might have felt that any attempt to explain them would be futile and only lead to more speculations.
   4. Another question. If Paul was forbidden to speak them, it must have been possible for them to be spoken?
      1. Paul obeyed.
      2. A wicked demon might not obey. In fact, a wicked demon might either capitalize on them, or not want to express them because they would not serve his evil purposes. Demons were prone to speak irresponsibly. Mk.1:25
      3. Another consideration concerning the rich man and Lazarus is that the gulf was fixed between those two. It doesn't say between them and the living.
      4. If it was impossible and the situation was as serious as the rich man now perceived, why would the rich man ask for Lazarus to return to warn his brothers?
      5. Abraham certainly never said that it could not be done. Lk-16:31 He merely said, "it wouldn't do any good".