Various forms of witchcraft and divination are mentioned in the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh or Old Testament), which are expressly forbidden.
Various forms of witchcraft and divination are mentioned in the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh or Old Testament), which are expressly forbidden.
Laws prohibiting various forms of witchcraft and divination can be found in the books of Exodus, Leviticus and Deuteronomy. These include the following (as translated in the Revised JPS, 2023 :
The forms of divination mentioned in Deuteronomy 17 are portrayed as foreign; this is the only part of the Hebrew Bible to make such a claim. [5] According to Ann Jeffers, the presence of laws forbidding necromancy proves that it was practiced throughout Israel's history. [6]
The exact difference between the three forbidden forms of necromancy mentioned in Deuteronomy 18:11 is a matter of uncertainty; yiddeʿoni ("wizard") is always used together with ov "consulter with familiar spirits," [7] and its semantic similarity to doresh el hametim ("necromancer", or "one who directs inquiries to the dead") raises the question of why all three are mentioned in the same verse.[ citation needed ] The Jewish tractate Sanhedrin makes the distinction that a doresh el hametim was a person who would sleep in a cemetery after having starved himself, in order to become possessed. [8]
A prophetic passage in the Book of Micah states that witchcraft and soothsaying will be eliminated in the Messianic Age (Micah 5:12).
