Bible Studies Part 6

In Scotland the Bible-supported superst.i.tion raged worse than in England. The clergy there had, as part of their duty, to question their parishioners as to their knowledge of witches. Boxes were placed in the churches to receive the accusations, and when a woman had fallen under suspicion the minister from the pulpit denounced her by name, exhorted his parishioners to give evidence against her, and prohibited any one from sheltering her.* A traveller casually notices having seen nine women burning together in Leith, in 1664.

"Scotch witchcraft," says Lecky, "was but the result of Scotch Puritanism, and it faithfully reflected the character of its parent."**

On the Continent it was as bad. Catholics and Protestants could unite in one thing--the extirpation of witches and infidels. Papal bulls were issued against witchcraft as well as heresy. Luther said: "I would have no compa.s.sion on these witches--I would burn them all."*** In Catholic Italy a thousand persons were executed in a single year in the province of Como.

* See The Darker Superst.i.tions of Scotland, by Sir John Graham Dalyell, chap. xviii. Glasgow, 1835.

** History of the Rise and Influence of Rationalism in Europe, vol. i., p. 144.

*** Colloquia de Fascinationibus.

In one province of Protestant Sweden 2,500 witches were burnt in 1670.

Stories of the horrid tortures which accompanied witch-finding, stories that will fill the eyes with tears and the heart with raging fire against the brutal superst.i.tion which provoked such barbarities, may be found in Dalyell, Lecky, Michelet, and the voluminous literature of the subject. And all these tortures and executions were sanctioned and defended from the Bible. The more pious the people the more firm their conviction of the reality of witchcraft. Sir Matthew Hale, in hanging two men in 1664, took the opportunity of declaring that the reality of witchcraft was unquestionable; "for first, the Scripture had affirmed so much; and, secondly, the wisdom of all nations had provided laws against such persons."

Witch belief and witch persecutions have existed from the most savage times down to the rise and spread of medical science, but nothing is more striking in history than the fact of the great European outburst against witchcraft following upon the Reformation and the translations of G.o.d's Holy Word, This was no mere coincidence, but a necessary consequence. "It was not until after the Reformation that there was any systematic hunting out of witches," says J. R. Lowell.*

* Among my Books, p. 128. Macmillan, 1870.

If the Bible teaches not witchcraft, then it teaches nothing.

Science and scepticism having made Christians ashamed of this biblical doctrine, as usual they have sought a new interpretation. They say it is a mistranslation; that _poisoners_ are meant, and not _witches_. Now, in the first place, poisoners were really dealt with by the command, "Thou shalt not kill." In the second place, not a single Hebrew scholar of repute would venture to so render the word of our text. Its root, translated "witch," is given by Gesenius as "to use enchantment."

Fuerst, Parkhurst, Frey, Newman, Buxtorf, in short, all Hebrew lexicographers, agree. Not one suggests that "poisoner" could be considered an equivalent. The derivatives of this word are translated with this meaning wherever they occur. Thus Exodus vii. 11, "the wise men and the sorcerers." Deuteronomy xviii., 10,11, "There shalt not be found among you anyone that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard or a necromancer." 2 Kings ix. 22, "her witchcrafts." 2 Chronicles x.x.xiii. 6, Manesseh "used enchantments, and used witchcraft, and dealt with a familiar spirit and with wizards."

Isaiah xlvii. 9 and 12, "thy sorceries." Jeremiah xxvii. 9, "your sorcerers." Daniel ii. 2, "the magicians, and the astrologers, and the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans." Micah v. 12, "And I will cut off witchcrafts, and thou shalt have no soothsayers." Nahum iii. 4, "witchcrafts." Malachi iii. 5, "I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers." The only pretence for this rendering of _poisoner_ is the fact that Josephus (_Antiquities_, bk. iv., ch. viii., sec. 34) gives a law against keeping poisons. As there is no such law in the Pentateuch, Whiston tried to kill two difficulties with one note, by saying that what we render a _witch_ meant a poisoner. The Septuagint has also been appealed to, but Sir Charles Lee Brenton, in his translation of the Septuagint, has not thought proper to render our text other than, "Ye shall not save the lives of sorcerers."

But apart from texts (of which I have only given those in which occurs one word out of the many implying the belief), the _thing_ itself is woven into the structure of the Bible. Not only do the Egyptian enchanters work miracles and the witch of Endor raise Samuel, but the power of evil spirits over men is the occasion of most of the miracles of Jesus. The very doctrine of the inspiration of the Bible, so cherished by Protestant Christians, is but a part of that doctrine of men being possessed by spirits, good and evil, which is the substratum of belief in witchcraft.

Even yet this belief is not entirely extinct in England; and Dr. Buckley says that in America a majority of the citizens believe in witchcraft.

The modern Roman Catholic priest is cautioned in the rubric concerning the examination of a possessed patient "not to believe the demon if he profess to be the soul of some saint or deceased person, or a good angel." As late as 1773 the divines of the a.s.sociated Presbytery pa.s.sed a resolution declaring their belief in witchcraft, and deploring the scepticism that was general. In the Church Catechism, explained by the Rev. John Lewis, minister of Margate in Kent--a work which went through many editions, and received the sanction of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge--a copy of which lies before me, published in 1813, reads (p. 18): "Q. What is meant by renouncing the Devil?--A.

The refusing of all familiarity and contracts with the Devil, whereof witches, conjurors, and such as resort to them are guilty."

Let it never be forgotten that this belief which has not only been the cause of the deaths of tens of thousands of innocent women, but has sent far more into the worst convulsions of madness and despair, is the evident and unmistakable teaching of the Bible.

SAUL'S SPIRITUALIST STANCE AT ENDOR.

"Our own time has revived a group of beliefs and practices which have their roots deep in the very stratum of early philosophy, where witchcraft makes its first appearance. This group of beliefs and practices const.i.tutes what is now commonly known as Spiritualism."--Dr.

E. B. Tylor, "Primitive Culture" vol. i., p. 128.

The oldest portion of the Old Testament scriptures are imbedded in the Book of Judges and the Books of Samuel. Few indeed of these narratives throw more light on the early belief of the Jews than the story of Saul and the witch of Endor. It is hardly necessary to recount the story, which is told with a vigor and simplicity showing its antiquity and genuineness. Saul, who had incurred Samuel's enmity by refusing to slay the king Agag, after the death of the prophet, found troubles come upon him. Alarmed at the strength of his enemies, the Philistines, he "inquired of the Lord." But the Lord was not at home. At any rate, he "answered him not, neither by dreams, nor by Urim, nor by prophets."

The legitimate modes of learning one's fortune being thus shut up, Saul sought in disguise and by night a woman who had an _ob_. or familiar spirit. Now Saul had done his best to suppress witchcraft, having "put away those who had familiar spirits, and the wizards out of the land."

So when he said to the witch, "I pray thee divine unto me by the familiar spirit and bring him up whom I shall name unto thee," the woman was afraid, and asked if he laid a snare for her. Saul swore hard and fast he would not hurt her, and it is evident from his question he believed in her powers of necromancy by the aid of the familiar spirit.

This alone shows that the Jews, like all uncivilised people, and many who call themselves civilised, believed in ghosts and the possibility of their return, but, as we shall see, it does not imply that they believed in future rewards and punishments. Saul's expectations were not disappointed. He asked to see Samuel, and _up_ Samuel came. He asked what she saw, and she said _Elohirn_, or as we have it, "G.o.ds ascending out of the earth." In this fact that the same word in Hebrew is used for _ghosts_ and for _G.o.ds_, we have the most important light upon the origin of all theology.

The modern Christian of course believes that Samuel as a holy prophet dwells in heaven above, and may wonder, if he thinks of the narrative at all, why he should be recalled from his abode of bliss and placed under the magic control of this weird, not to say scandalous, female. But Samuel came up, not down from heaven, in accordance, of course, with the old belief that Sheol, or the underworld, was beneath the earth.

Christian commentators have resorted to a deal of shuffling and wriggling to escape the difficulties of this story, and its endors.e.m.e.nt of the superst.i.tion of witchcraft. The _Speakers' Commentary_ suggests that the Witch of Endor was a female ventriloquist, but, disingenuously, does not explain that ventriloquists in ancient times were really supposed to have a spirit rumbling or talking inside their bodies.

As Dr. E. B. Tylor says in that great storehouse of savage beliefs, _Primitive Culture_, "To this day in China one may get an oracular response from a spirit apparently talking out of a medium's stomach, for a fee of about twopence-halfpenny."

Some make out, because Saul at first asked the woman what she saw, that, as at many modern seances, it was only the medium, who saw the ghost, and Saul only knew who it was through her, else why should he have asked her what form Samuel had?--which elicited the not very detailed reply of "an old man cometh up; and he is covered with a mantle"--that is, we suppose, with the ghost of a mantle. She did the seeing and he the hearing. But it says "Saul perceived it was Samuel," and prostrated himself, which he would hardly have done at a description. Indeed, the whole narrative is inconsistent with the modern theory of imposture on the part of the witch. Had this been the explanation, the writer should have said so plainly. He should have said her terror was pretended, that the apparition was unreal, and that Saul trembled at the woman's words, whereas it is plainly declared that "he was sore afraid because of the words of Samuel." Moreover, and this is decisive, the spirit utters a prophecy--not an encouraging, but a gloomy one--which was exactly fulfilled.

All this shows the writer was saturated in supernaturalism. He never uses an expression indicating a shadow of a ghost of a doubt of the ghost. He might easily have said the whole thing was deceit. He does not, for he believed in witchcraft like the priests who ordered "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." One little circ.u.mstance shows his sympathy. Samuel says: "Why hast thou disquieted me to bring me up?"

This is quite in consonance with savage belief that spirits should not be disturbed. Here was Samuel quietly buried in Ramah, some fifty miles off, taking his comfortable nap, may be for millenniums in Sheol, when the old woman's incantations bustle him out of his grave and transport him to Endor. No wonder he felt disquieted and prophesied vengeance to Saul and to his sons, "because thou obeyedst not the voice of the Lord nor executedest his fierce wrath upon Amalek."

Matthew Henry and other commentators think that the person who presented himself to Saul was not Samuel, but Satan a.s.suming his appearance. Those who believe in Satan, and that he can transform himself into an angel of light (2 Cor. xi. 14), cannot refuse to credit the possibility of this.

Folks with that comfortable belief can credit anything. To sensible people it is scarcely necessary to say there is nothing about Satan in the narrative, nor any conceivable reason why he should be credited with a true prophecy. The words uttered are declared to be the words of Samuel.*

* The seventeenth verse stupidly reads, "The Lord hath done to him as he spake by me." The LXX and Vulgate more sensibly reads to thee.

Much is said of Saul's wickedness, but the only wickedness attributed to him is his mercy in not executing G.o.d's fierce wrath. If it was wicked to seek the old woman, it is curious G.o.d should grant the object he was seeking, by raising up one of his own holy servants. Why did the Lord employ such an agency? It looks very much like sanctioning necromancy.

And further, if a spirit returned from the dead to tell Saul he should die and go to Sheol--where Samuel was, for he says "to-morrow shalt thou and thy sons be _with me_"--why should not spirits now return to tell us we are immortal? If the witch of Endor could raise spirits, why not Lottie Fowler or Mr. Eglinton? Such are the arguments of the spiritists.

We venture to think they cannot be answered by the orthodox. To us, however, the fact that the beliefs of the spiritists find their countenance in the beliefs of savages like the early Jews is their sufficient refutation. Spiritism, as Dr. Tylor says, is but a revival of old savage animism.

SACRIFICES.

No sacrifice to heaven, no help from heaven; That runs through all the faiths of all the world.

--Tennyson--Harold.

The origin and meaning of sacrifices const.i.tute a central problem of ancient religion. It links indeed the stronghold of orthodox Christianity--its doctrine of the Atonement--with the most barbarous customs of primitive savages. When we hear of the Lamb slain for sinners, the very phrase takes us back to the time when sins were formally placed upon the heads of unconscious animals that they might be held accursed instead of man; and to the yet older notion of human sacrifice as a most acceptable offering to the G.o.ds.

Sacrifices were primarily meals offered to the spirits of the dead. It is not hard to understand how they arose. The Hindoos who placed upon the grave of an English officer the brandy and cheroots which he loved in life in order to propitiate his spirit ill.u.s.trated a prominent aspect. Just as men were appeased with gifts, usually of substances which minister to life, so were spirits supposed to be, and the general form which the offering took was something in the shape of what the Americans call a square meal. The Romans never sat down to eat without placing a portion aside for the Lares and Penates. Professor Smith, in his _Lectures on the Religion of the Semites_, gives abundant evidence that the early sacrifices of the Semitic people were animals offered at a meal partaken by the worshippers. The sacrifice, he holds, was originally a nourishing of the common life of the kindred and their G.o.d by a common meal. The primary communion with deity was communion of food. This may not be very poetical, but it is natural and true. Eating and drinking together were primarily signs of fraternity. Only to his own kin did early man own duty, and his G.o.d was always of his own kin.

Jehovah was, as we are often told, the G.o.d of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

He was their father and their king. When Ruth said to Naomi, "Thy people shall be my people, and thy G.o.d my G.o.d," the exclamation showed that taking up new kindred involved a change of worship. Professor Smith says: "It cannot be too strongly insisted on that the idea of kinship between G.o.ds and men was originally taken in a purely physical sense."

The modern Christian's explanations of biblical anthropomorphisms may be dismissed as unfounded a.s.sumptions. The story in Genesis of the sons of G.o.d going with the daughters of men is one of the remnants of early myths unexplained by later editors.

The Bible G.o.d, as any careful reader will perceive, was very partial to roast meat. One of the earliest items recorded of him is that he had no respect for Cain and his offering of vegetables, while to Abel who brought him the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat thereof, he had respect. He much prefered mutton to turnips. When Noah offered a sacrifice, we are told "He smelt a sweet savor" (Gen. vii. 21). But the Lord was by no means content with the smell. On his altars huge hecatombs of animals were continually being slaughtered, and the choicest portions set aside as the Lord's. The Lord G.o.d seems to have been extremely fond of fat, especially that about the rump. As the richest part of the animal, it was reserved with "the two kidneys and the fat that is upon them" especially for the Lord (Lev. iii. 9-11). Let it be noticed that the Lord G.o.d required no sacrifices except of eatable animals, oxen, rams, goats, lambs, and kids. Fishes he had no regard for, and of birds only turtle doves and pigeons were his favorite dishes. Wine and oil he took to wash them down, but never mentioned water. Like his ministers, he lived on the fat of the land,* claiming as his own the firstlings of the flock. From his claim to the first born, it appears that Jahveh was originally given to "long pig," but in the case of Abraham's son, he took a ram instead. He was, however, so partial to blood that he interdicted the sacred fluid to his worshippers, but demanded that it should be poured out upon his altar (Deut. xii.) Even the early Christians made it a fundamental rule of the Church that disciples should abstain from blood, and from things strangled (Acts xv. 20). The blood was supposed to be especially the Lord's.

* To "eat the fat" seems, as in Neh. viii. 10, to have been a biblical expression for good living.

Let not the serious reader suppose we are jesting. Hear what Prof.

Robertson Smith says.

"All sacrifices laid upon the altar were taken by the ancients as being literally the food of the G.o.ds. The Homeric deities 'feast on hecatombs,' nay particular Greek G.o.ds have special epithets designating them as the goat-eater, the ram-eater, the bull-eater, even 'cannibal,'

with allusion to human sacrifices. Among the Hebrews the conception that Jehovah eats the flesh of bulls and drinks the blood of goats, against which the author of Psalm 1. protests so strongly, was never eliminated from the ancient technical language of the priestly ritual, in which the sacrifices are called _lechem Elohim_, 'the food of the deity.'"*

* Religion of the Semites, p. 207.

Our translators of the pa.s.sages where this phrase occurs (Lev. xxi. 8, 17, 21, 22; Num. xxviii. 2) have done their best to conceal the meaning, but like the phrase "wine which cheereth G.o.d and man" (Judges ix. 13), it takes us back to the time when G.o.ds were supposed, like men, to eat, drink, and be refreshed.

It was a fundamental rule of the Jewish faith that no one should appear before the Lord empty handed (Exodus xxiii. 15.) Not to take him an offering was as improper as in the East it still is to approach a chief or great man without some present. A sacrifice was as imperative as it now is to put something in the church plate. When G.o.d made a call on Abraham, with Eastern hospitality the patriarch procured water to wash his feet and killed a calf for the entertainment of his visitor. The Lord G.o.d was not a vegetarian but a stout kreophagist. In Numbers (xxix.

13) he orders as a sacrifice "of a sweet savor unto the Lord, thirteen young bullocks, two rams and fourteen lambs of the first year."

From the frequent mention of the "sweet savor," it seems likely that the original idea of the G.o.d partaking of the food, developed into that of his taking only the essence of the food. As G.o.d got less anthropomorphic he lost his teeth and had, poor spirit, to be content with the smell of the good things offered up to him. We gather from Lev. vii. 6 that the kidneys, fat and other delicacies really fell to the lot of the priests, and some people have found a sufficient reason for the sacrifices to G.o.d in the fact that the priests liked mutton.