A biblical look at occultism
It's no secret that I am a pretty witchy woman. My gothic aesthetic echoes this, as do many of my more esoteric interests, and even my own mother keeps needing reassurance that I am not, in fact, becoming an actual witch. I openly confess that, were I not raised under the teachings of the Bible and Christianity, I absolutely believe I would most likely have grown up to be a practicing witch, probably of the Wiccan variety. Fortunately (at the expense of the wild romantic fantasies of my childlike heart), the church I was raised in placed a heavy emphasis on apologetics and critical thinking, on understanding why I should believe the Bible is factually true, rather than clinging to blind faith when actual evidence exists for me to stand on instead. This, combined with my love for science, has fostered too great a sense of skepticism to allow me to take any kind of magical practice seriously. I want to be able to believe in it for the same reasons I want dragons and unicorns and mermaids to exist, but even I cannot suspend my disbelief long or well enough to stop myself from wondering how practitioners know that these things work, and analyzing the supernatural under a scientific lens: how did people figure this stuff out? Can we measure it somehow? How are some of these things so consistent across cultures, and others so disparate? I suppose I ought to take some comfort in the fact that my fascination with the occult tends to be predominately of an intellectual and analytical nature.
I've heard some talk around the Internet about so-called "Christian witches", and how such a thing could be possible (or not, depending on who you ask), and decided to do some digging of my own to see what the Bible really has to say about it. It's fairly common knowledge that the English language has changed much since the King James Version was authorized, and that, while transcription of Scripture has been damn near perfect over the centuries, translations into other languages (such as English) has not. For example, the word "witch" didn't exist when the Bible was written, nor had it been in any kind of common use in English until just a few years before the KJV was published at the turn of the 17th century.
To muddy the waters further, most of the treatises given to one side or the other of this question of whether or not it was possible for someone to be a "Christian witch" used either very vague, or very ignorant reasoning, and little, if any, actual knowledge was to be gained. Some who supported the idea were off-the-deep-end nuts, jabbering on and on, talking in vague and meandering circles until I was completely lost as to what point, if any, they were trying to make. Others just pointed at the good old King James and said, more or less, "look right there, says witchcraft is bad, there you have it, end of discussion!" One Youtuber made some very good points in favor of the idea (not that I agreed with her entirely), but she defined her "witchcraft" quite differently from the typical stereotype of spellcraft and hexes and deals with demons, so some definition of terms was required.
There are a few different areas of interest I wanted to pursue in my research, the first, of course, being traditional (generally pagan and of a religious nature, but occasionally secular or atheistic) witchcraft or Wicca, consisting of rituals and incantations and spell and potion crafting, usually involving worship of various Old Gods/Goddesses, and nearly universally venerating the inherent magic of nature and spirit. Second, you have Eastern philosophies regarding chakras, auras, and vibrations, ideas which tend to tie in seamlessly with my third concept in question, that of the power of healing crystals, the one idea being that certain minerals vibrate at certain frequencies, and can have different subtle effects on the human body, interacting with out own electromagnetic frequencies in various ways, which makes sense to me; the other ascribing more metaphysical/supernatural properties such as warding off evil spirits or energy, being capable of being "charged" with energy through meditation or spellcraft, etc., which seems like nonsense. Lastly, you get the weird, culty metaphysical stuff like the aforementioned Law of Attraction nonsense which has a tendency to permeate the philosophies of practicioners of all three previous concepts.
In light of the fact that the King James Version is disproportionately popular among those who like to hit people over the head with scriptures out of malice and spiteful condemnation, I opted to stick with this translation for my studies. Newer translations often use more updated (read: accurate) wording as well, and I didn't want to miss a common reference because of a difference in wording, when I know the KJV and NKJV use the keywords I was searching for, and end up with incomplete research and open myself to accusations of cherrypicking and other biased research practices in order to reach one conclusion or another.
Let's start in reverse order to maintain the suspense, shall we?
"Good vibes", Law of Attraction, manifestion of will, and all these other metaphysical concepts just seem like wishful thinking to me at best; at worst, it's a sadly quite effective tool for charlatans to prey on weak-minded people for profit. Think of prosperity gospel or faith healer televangelist types, as well as nearly every cult leader ever: "you have the power to bend the universe to your will, so if you're sick or poor, it's your own fault for not having enough faith; donate to my "ministry" and God will honor your piety and give you more faith to get out of your predicament", and so on. Apart from the fact that these ideas are easily dismissed by science and common sense, the Bible does have a good bit to say about these false prophets, often referring to them in the KJV as wizards. Simon the Sorcerer of Acts 8 was one such cult leader, using sleight of hand and perhaps some real sorcery to convince people that he was some great man they should follow. The Greek word used for his sorcery was mageuo, meaning to be a magician, to practice magical arts, implying that he either used the more mundane smoke-and-mirrors effect to bewitch his followers, or perhaps some sort of spiritual/demonic influence, though the latter is less likely not to have been specifically mentioned. It does not appear that he worked with potions, either, unlike many cult leaders of more recent years.
Regarding the science (or pseudoscience, depending on what you believe) behind the purported healing/balancing properties of different stones and crystals, the Bible is silent, even though the practice of using minerals for medicinal purposes dates back to the ancient Sumerians. Clearly there's no spiritual issue here, which may be because I have yet to see any reference to their use in magical rituals or idol worship in ancient times. Score one for being free to collect pretty stones! Whether or not they actually do anything besides look pretty doesn't matter much to me, as I would expect any effects to be fairly negligible in magnitude anyway, if not purely placebo (which is still a thing). I've just always loved pretty rocks, and it's nice to know my appreciation of geology isn't damning.
In respect to Eastern philosophies concerning the body's energy centers, or chakras, electromagnetic auras, and using meditation, psychological methods, and physical exercises like yoga to keep the body in balance, apart from the religious aspects that are sometimes intertwined with these practices (just as we Christians tend to intertwine our religious beliefs in with otherwise mundane daily activities): again, not a peep from the scriptures. Seeing as there is also some scientific evidence to support their ideas of different vibrations in the body affecting or being affected by illnesses both physical and mental (and also spiritual), and even of people giving off an invisible aura that reflects their current state of health in these three aspects, this is not surprising. I actually just watched a Buzzfeed video on Youtube where people had their chakras and electromagnetic auras analyzed by a machine that read the electromagnetic energies from their hands, among other things, and nothing stood out as being at all fishy or mystical to my skeptical eye, which only encourages my interest in studying these ideas, especially having been reassured that they are, indeed, harmless. I'm probably never getting into yoga, though. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Now to the main event: witchcraft. The Bible is pretty clear, when you look at the words used in the original language, in context with surrounding scriptures, on what's fair play and what is not, but it's not always apparent with less reliable English translations like the King James if you don't dig a little deeper.
First things first in terms of context: the Mosaic law was delivered to the nation of Israel as the law of the land, and does not always apply to modern Gentile Christians. Many practices outlawed for the Hebrews are generally considered to be perfectly kosher (ha) today, like tattooing (apart from weird ritualistic gotta-do-it-to-get-your-homeboy-into-heaven stuff going on), grooming your hair and beard, going to church on your period, and wearing wool and linen in the same garment, so I had to do my due diligence and look at the reasons why certain things were put into law, and whether or not the concept is even still relevant in modern Western society.
Digging further past general context clues and into specific words used in the original text, I noticed three things consistently pop up, to the exclusion of everything else involved in modern witchery:
There are some interesting implications regarding the reasons for these practices being banned, when you think about it too (beyond the obvious Commandments to worship only the Lord, and not to murder people, of course). For one, messing around with spirits is a terrible idea. I have met very few people who don't shudder at the idea of even touching a Ouija board, and these include both erstwhile skeptics as well as those otherwise trusting of the spirits of nature, etc. Do you want demons? Because that's how you get demons.
Regarding divination practices, God made it pretty clear He wanted His people to look to Him for guidance. He sent prophets to satisfy the needs of His people to know the meaning of current events and the coming of future ones that would otherwise drive them to seek answers elsewhere (and end up summoning a demon instead). He wants us to trust Him, and to rely on Him for help in our time
Now, back to the one girl on Youtube who made a decent case for Christian witches not being paradoxical for a moment. I have come across a growing number of witches listing off tips that "you might be a witch if...", and I fit a good deal of the criteria myself, which is why I have some understanding of where she was coming from, and some motivation for getting to the truth of the matter for myself. The idea being that some people are just naturally "witches" in a metaphorical sense, and many of them just eventually start practicing witchcraft once they realize and embrance this. But simply possessing greater than average empathy, romantic notions of "seeing the magic in nature", being drawn to the occult, or to the supernatural in general does not make me -- or her -- a witch, strictly speaking.
Not all practicing witches worship any god/goddess/dieties at all -- some merely believe in the power/magic of the Universe, Law of Attraction, and things like that -- so religious beliefs don't necessarily factor in. Pretty much all of them perform spells or rituals, however, which is squarely in the realm of things which are not okay for Christians to practice. Believing in the power of natural remedies of various kinds does not make one a witch, but calling upon the power/spirits of the natural/supernatural world to do your bidding or help you out in some way, however delves into both idolatry and spirit dealing territory, which is very much forbidden. Some people perform similar rituals, but pray to God rather than something else, however, and this might be okay, depending on what these rituals actually entail. Smudging the room of a sick person with white sage and annointing them with specially mixed essential oils and giving them an herbal tincture to help alleviate their sickness while praying over them is not necessarily super helpful (though it can be), but it's not a terrible or unbiblical thing to do (and of course, the prayer is effective). Rituals are similar habits or ways of doing things, and everybody has them, however mundane. For people like me who tend to be very easily distracted when attempting to pray or meditate on scripture, however, a little ritual can be a very good thing, to keep me mindful and focused, not to mention just downright pleasant.
It doesn't take a witch to appreciate the wonder of God's creation or the focus and comfort a little formality and ritual can bring, and I don't think it's fair to throw the baby out with the bath water and declare that everything witches and other heathens practice or believe is evil and profane, nor that it is somehow wrong to do business with them or otherwise identify or associate with them, any more than with any other non-Christian. Provided we keep our focus on the Creator and not the creation rather than trying to do things in our own power (or call upon spirits to lend us theirs), everything else boils down to aethestic differences in the end, in my humble opinion. God didn't create billions of people just to have us all be the same, and it's not fair to each other to rush to conclusions without taking our time to learn the truth behind our perceptions. If our initial conclusions were correct and our neighbor is in the wrong, we gain the ability to gently correct them; if our initial conclusions were wrong, we prevent a needless conflict and hurt feelings before we cause them by being so quick to criticize. Understanding doesn't have to mean agreement, but mercy and grace don't have to be a lost art, either.
I remain,
Not a Witch
I've heard some talk around the Internet about so-called "Christian witches", and how such a thing could be possible (or not, depending on who you ask), and decided to do some digging of my own to see what the Bible really has to say about it. It's fairly common knowledge that the English language has changed much since the King James Version was authorized, and that, while transcription of Scripture has been damn near perfect over the centuries, translations into other languages (such as English) has not. For example, the word "witch" didn't exist when the Bible was written, nor had it been in any kind of common use in English until just a few years before the KJV was published at the turn of the 17th century.
To muddy the waters further, most of the treatises given to one side or the other of this question of whether or not it was possible for someone to be a "Christian witch" used either very vague, or very ignorant reasoning, and little, if any, actual knowledge was to be gained. Some who supported the idea were off-the-deep-end nuts, jabbering on and on, talking in vague and meandering circles until I was completely lost as to what point, if any, they were trying to make. Others just pointed at the good old King James and said, more or less, "look right there, says witchcraft is bad, there you have it, end of discussion!" One Youtuber made some very good points in favor of the idea (not that I agreed with her entirely), but she defined her "witchcraft" quite differently from the typical stereotype of spellcraft and hexes and deals with demons, so some definition of terms was required.
There are a few different areas of interest I wanted to pursue in my research, the first, of course, being traditional (generally pagan and of a religious nature, but occasionally secular or atheistic) witchcraft or Wicca, consisting of rituals and incantations and spell and potion crafting, usually involving worship of various Old Gods/Goddesses, and nearly universally venerating the inherent magic of nature and spirit. Second, you have Eastern philosophies regarding chakras, auras, and vibrations, ideas which tend to tie in seamlessly with my third concept in question, that of the power of healing crystals, the one idea being that certain minerals vibrate at certain frequencies, and can have different subtle effects on the human body, interacting with out own electromagnetic frequencies in various ways, which makes sense to me; the other ascribing more metaphysical/supernatural properties such as warding off evil spirits or energy, being capable of being "charged" with energy through meditation or spellcraft, etc., which seems like nonsense. Lastly, you get the weird, culty metaphysical stuff like the aforementioned Law of Attraction nonsense which has a tendency to permeate the philosophies of practicioners of all three previous concepts.
In light of the fact that the King James Version is disproportionately popular among those who like to hit people over the head with scriptures out of malice and spiteful condemnation, I opted to stick with this translation for my studies. Newer translations often use more updated (read: accurate) wording as well, and I didn't want to miss a common reference because of a difference in wording, when I know the KJV and NKJV use the keywords I was searching for, and end up with incomplete research and open myself to accusations of cherrypicking and other biased research practices in order to reach one conclusion or another.
Let's start in reverse order to maintain the suspense, shall we?
"Good vibes", Law of Attraction, manifestion of will, and all these other metaphysical concepts just seem like wishful thinking to me at best; at worst, it's a sadly quite effective tool for charlatans to prey on weak-minded people for profit. Think of prosperity gospel or faith healer televangelist types, as well as nearly every cult leader ever: "you have the power to bend the universe to your will, so if you're sick or poor, it's your own fault for not having enough faith; donate to my "ministry" and God will honor your piety and give you more faith to get out of your predicament", and so on. Apart from the fact that these ideas are easily dismissed by science and common sense, the Bible does have a good bit to say about these false prophets, often referring to them in the KJV as wizards. Simon the Sorcerer of Acts 8 was one such cult leader, using sleight of hand and perhaps some real sorcery to convince people that he was some great man they should follow. The Greek word used for his sorcery was mageuo, meaning to be a magician, to practice magical arts, implying that he either used the more mundane smoke-and-mirrors effect to bewitch his followers, or perhaps some sort of spiritual/demonic influence, though the latter is less likely not to have been specifically mentioned. It does not appear that he worked with potions, either, unlike many cult leaders of more recent years.
Regarding the science (or pseudoscience, depending on what you believe) behind the purported healing/balancing properties of different stones and crystals, the Bible is silent, even though the practice of using minerals for medicinal purposes dates back to the ancient Sumerians. Clearly there's no spiritual issue here, which may be because I have yet to see any reference to their use in magical rituals or idol worship in ancient times. Score one for being free to collect pretty stones! Whether or not they actually do anything besides look pretty doesn't matter much to me, as I would expect any effects to be fairly negligible in magnitude anyway, if not purely placebo (which is still a thing). I've just always loved pretty rocks, and it's nice to know my appreciation of geology isn't damning.
In respect to Eastern philosophies concerning the body's energy centers, or chakras, electromagnetic auras, and using meditation, psychological methods, and physical exercises like yoga to keep the body in balance, apart from the religious aspects that are sometimes intertwined with these practices (just as we Christians tend to intertwine our religious beliefs in with otherwise mundane daily activities): again, not a peep from the scriptures. Seeing as there is also some scientific evidence to support their ideas of different vibrations in the body affecting or being affected by illnesses both physical and mental (and also spiritual), and even of people giving off an invisible aura that reflects their current state of health in these three aspects, this is not surprising. I actually just watched a Buzzfeed video on Youtube where people had their chakras and electromagnetic auras analyzed by a machine that read the electromagnetic energies from their hands, among other things, and nothing stood out as being at all fishy or mystical to my skeptical eye, which only encourages my interest in studying these ideas, especially having been reassured that they are, indeed, harmless. I'm probably never getting into yoga, though. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Now to the main event: witchcraft. The Bible is pretty clear, when you look at the words used in the original language, in context with surrounding scriptures, on what's fair play and what is not, but it's not always apparent with less reliable English translations like the King James if you don't dig a little deeper.
First things first in terms of context: the Mosaic law was delivered to the nation of Israel as the law of the land, and does not always apply to modern Gentile Christians. Many practices outlawed for the Hebrews are generally considered to be perfectly kosher (ha) today, like tattooing (apart from weird ritualistic gotta-do-it-to-get-your-homeboy-into-heaven stuff going on), grooming your hair and beard, going to church on your period, and wearing wool and linen in the same garment, so I had to do my due diligence and look at the reasons why certain things were put into law, and whether or not the concept is even still relevant in modern Western society.
Digging further past general context clues and into specific words used in the original text, I noticed three things consistently pop up, to the exclusion of everything else involved in modern witchery:
- Idolatry is still not okay.
- Don't mess around with spirits or spellcraft.
- Don't murder your children.
There are some interesting implications regarding the reasons for these practices being banned, when you think about it too (beyond the obvious Commandments to worship only the Lord, and not to murder people, of course). For one, messing around with spirits is a terrible idea. I have met very few people who don't shudder at the idea of even touching a Ouija board, and these include both erstwhile skeptics as well as those otherwise trusting of the spirits of nature, etc. Do you want demons? Because that's how you get demons.
Regarding divination practices, God made it pretty clear He wanted His people to look to Him for guidance. He sent prophets to satisfy the needs of His people to know the meaning of current events and the coming of future ones that would otherwise drive them to seek answers elsewhere (and end up summoning a demon instead). He wants us to trust Him, and to rely on Him for help in our time
Now, back to the one girl on Youtube who made a decent case for Christian witches not being paradoxical for a moment. I have come across a growing number of witches listing off tips that "you might be a witch if...", and I fit a good deal of the criteria myself, which is why I have some understanding of where she was coming from, and some motivation for getting to the truth of the matter for myself. The idea being that some people are just naturally "witches" in a metaphorical sense, and many of them just eventually start practicing witchcraft once they realize and embrance this. But simply possessing greater than average empathy, romantic notions of "seeing the magic in nature", being drawn to the occult, or to the supernatural in general does not make me -- or her -- a witch, strictly speaking.
Not all practicing witches worship any god/goddess/dieties at all -- some merely believe in the power/magic of the Universe, Law of Attraction, and things like that -- so religious beliefs don't necessarily factor in. Pretty much all of them perform spells or rituals, however, which is squarely in the realm of things which are not okay for Christians to practice. Believing in the power of natural remedies of various kinds does not make one a witch, but calling upon the power/spirits of the natural/supernatural world to do your bidding or help you out in some way, however delves into both idolatry and spirit dealing territory, which is very much forbidden. Some people perform similar rituals, but pray to God rather than something else, however, and this might be okay, depending on what these rituals actually entail. Smudging the room of a sick person with white sage and annointing them with specially mixed essential oils and giving them an herbal tincture to help alleviate their sickness while praying over them is not necessarily super helpful (though it can be), but it's not a terrible or unbiblical thing to do (and of course, the prayer is effective). Rituals are similar habits or ways of doing things, and everybody has them, however mundane. For people like me who tend to be very easily distracted when attempting to pray or meditate on scripture, however, a little ritual can be a very good thing, to keep me mindful and focused, not to mention just downright pleasant.
It doesn't take a witch to appreciate the wonder of God's creation or the focus and comfort a little formality and ritual can bring, and I don't think it's fair to throw the baby out with the bath water and declare that everything witches and other heathens practice or believe is evil and profane, nor that it is somehow wrong to do business with them or otherwise identify or associate with them, any more than with any other non-Christian. Provided we keep our focus on the Creator and not the creation rather than trying to do things in our own power (or call upon spirits to lend us theirs), everything else boils down to aethestic differences in the end, in my humble opinion. God didn't create billions of people just to have us all be the same, and it's not fair to each other to rush to conclusions without taking our time to learn the truth behind our perceptions. If our initial conclusions were correct and our neighbor is in the wrong, we gain the ability to gently correct them; if our initial conclusions were wrong, we prevent a needless conflict and hurt feelings before we cause them by being so quick to criticize. Understanding doesn't have to mean agreement, but mercy and grace don't have to be a lost art, either.
I remain,
Not a Witch
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