Mediumship
What does the Bible say about mediumship?
From a recent email:
In regards to your section on ‘mediumship’, since you say you are in touch with Jesus of Nazareth, I thought you might be interested in some things his Father had to say about mediums…
Leviticus 19:31 “Do not turn to mediums or wizards; do not seek them out, to be defiled by them: I am the Lord your God.”
Leviticus 20:6-7 “If a person turns to mediums and wizards, playing the harlot after them, I will set my face against that person, and will cut him off from among his people. 7 Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy; for I am the Lord your God.”
II Kings 21:6 “And he (Manasseh) burned his son as an offering, and practiced soothsaying and augury, and dealt with mediums and with wizards. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.”
Isaiah 8:19 “And when they say to you, ‘Consult the mediums and the wizards who chirp and mutter,’ should not a people consult their God? Should they consult the dead on behalf of the living?”
Geoff … I can tell that you are a sincere seeker of truth, so please consider these words of Paul the apostle…
II Corinthians 11:3-4 “But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. 4 For if some one comes and preaches another Jesus than the one we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or if you accept a different gospel from the one you accepted, you submit to it readily enough.”
Please make sure you have the right Jesus! Your eternal salvation depends on it!!
Jeremiah 29:12-14 “Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me; when you seek me with all your heart, 14 I will be found by you, says the Lord”
My Reply.
Well, this is serious question. It is obviously important to make sure you know who you are talking to. But first to address these Bible quotes.
Firstly, there are a large number from the Old Testament. It is intriguing how orthodox Christians often quote the Old Testament, yet typically they will tell you the Laws of Moses are no longer valid, and they do not keep the Sabbath, abstain from pork, practice circumcision etc. Of course we have, in the New Testament Galatians
(3:13)…“Christ brought us freedom from the curse of the Law.”
But, to return to the Old Testament, the quote above from Leviticus 19:31 is intriguingly not what I find in my Bible, one handed down by my father. Here I find:
“Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I am the Lord your God.”
It would seem to me that this version of the Bible has substituted the word familiar spirits for mediums? I find the same situation in Lev 20:6, and II Kings 21:6, and Isaiah 8:19. In every case, this Bible quoted now uses the word “medium” instead of “familiar spirit” The question is, what is the meaning of a familiar spirit, if indeed we are still interested in observing this Old Testament prohibition, since generally Christians don’t bother - just try Lev 20:23 or Lev 20:27.
It appears “a consulter with familiar spirits” (Isaiah 8:19) would appear to be a mistranslation of the original Hebrew text, as is every other instance where “familiar spirit” or “spirits” is used. According to Rev. Donald J. Bretherton, B.D., in Life, Death and Psychical Research, this whole phrase is represented in the original Hebrew by only two words…“Shoel Ob.” The word “Shoel” is derived from “Sha’al” which means “consult” or “ask” and so the whole passage translates as “one who asketh an Ob.” “Ob” itself cannot possibly be translated as “familiar spirit” as the root idea of the word is “something hollow”, its original usage was in referring to any inanimate object of this nature such as an empty bottle, or even a hole in the ground. Therefore, it should go without saying, that when folks substitute the words “familiar spirit” with “spirit medium” etc, as they often do, then they are merely extending the original mistranslation to further fantastic lengths.
What we would suggest, is reading this quotation from the New Testament carefully:
“Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God. ” I. John 4:1-2.
This to our mind is in fact a recipe for HOW to approach spirits, and discover if they are of God.
But we really have a far simpler answer to give the searching soul. If our messages are to be believed, there exists a Divine Essence we call Divine Love. If you pray to God for this to come into your soul, you will feel its presence, and over time your life will change. Each of us has tried this, and found it to be true. There is no other source of this information. Not a single Christian denomination other than ours teaches this. And you can discover it’s validity for yourself. Since this is true, we have very little concern about the identity of the spirits who communicated. We also note with interest this news article:
One of the most competent theologians of the Vatican, Father Gino Concetti, writing in the “Osservatore Romano”, the daily paper of the Holy See, says that:
“According to the modern catechism the Church has decided not to forbid anymore to dialogue with the deceased … this is as a sequel of new discoveries within the domain of the paranormal.” (November 1995)
I do however think that it would be appropriate if orthodox Christrians would carefully consider the OBVIOUS meaning in this quotation
“Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God.” I. John Ch 4, 1-2.
When I ask orthodox Christians about this passage, they try to assert that the “spirit” here is the “Holy Spirit” even though the context makes it very clear that this is a recipe for HOW to deal with spirits when channeling. Which also means early Christians did practise mediumship. Not to mention that Jesus himself “consulted with spirits”, namely the spirit of Moses and the spirit of Elijah during the transfiguration. See Matthew 17:1–9, Mark 9:2-8, Luke 9:28–36.
A little more insight into the Old Testament and its apparent prohibition on consulting spirits is taken from a book called “The Life Elysian” which can be downloaded as a pdf. This was recorded by Robert James Lees, and is a book of communications with spirit, indeed a book entirely dictated by a spirit describing his experiences in heaven. Now this very question was asked and answered in that book, and I found the answer interesting, and a bit different to the other answers on this page. As a bit of background, the spirit who delivered the content of this book, made a study of a number of things so that he could be properly educated before attempting to write his book on heaven. His name is Aphraar. He is speaking to a spirit called Rhamya, who is far more experienced in the matter of interpreting the Bible.
“Now, it is no part of my purpose to ask you to believe that all dreams are divine communications - I simply affirm that sleep is a convenient and natural agent to be so employed, and also I wish you to see in the records I have named the origin of the prophetic gift in which we are now interested. Here is to be found another link, this time uniting the natural and spiritual conditions and available for the further carrying on of an unbroken system of evolution. From this crude beginning the prophetic stream may be clearly traced onward as the divinely appointed channel of revelation. ‘If there be a prophet among you’, God is recorded to have said, ‘I, the Lord, will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream’ (Num. xii. 6). A little later we find the prophet to be a man upon whom, in a normal condition, the Spirit of the Lord descends and changes him ‘into another man’ (I Sam. x. 6), compelling him to speak not his own words, but as the Spirit shall give him utterance. Here, then, we find the divine and living way by which God has ordained to make His revelations to man, and in this prophetic line we shall presently find the Christ of God”
“Pardon my interrupting, but is not this descent of the Spirit upon the prophet that which I have seen in Cushna’s overshadowing of our own psychic?”
“Precisely; and if you have watched Cushna’s control you will understand far better than by any explanation I might give.”
“I have not only watched,” I replied, “but have been permitted to send a message back to earth. But before you go further will you allow me to ask for information respecting one injunction which raises a difficulty in my mind respecting this open communion, to which you are so clearly bringing me?”
“What is it?”
“I refer to the command in Deuteronomy forbidding consultation with familiar spirits as an abomination to the Lord.”
“The inquiry is most opportune, and we will at once consider it. The prohibition is an enactment of the priests, and as such, being of purely human origin, has no valid force when directed against a natural phenomenon. It does not deny, but rather admits the genuineness of the communion, or there would be no reason to forbid it. It is not the only time in the history of religion where priests have used the power of the state in a futile attempt to crush the truth. The effort to put an end to this direct intercourse with spiritual powers was a vital necessity to the existence of the priest. Whenever priest and prophet clashed it was always the latter who proved to be superior, and the former were only able to maintain themselves by the support of the throne. So pronounced had this fact become that the Temple authorities in Jerusalem were at length driven to an acceptance of the prophetic principle, and once a year the High Priest was supposed to directly consult God by means of Urim and Thummim. But though the form of consultation was observed, its spirit was absent, and there is no record of any priestly success. I must not, however, leave this subject without pointing out that by the possibility of this communion being due to a natural law, access is given alike to high and low intelligences to engage therein, the law of God, in this as in every other instance, being without respect of persons. This the prophets have seen and recognized from the first, and advisedly laid down this rule concerning the intercourse: ‘When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him’ (Deut. xviii. 22). Such a law bears on its face evidence of its emanation from the truth; it does not insist on acceptance, immediate and unconditional, because declared even by inspired lips, but with all the charity of reason seeks acceptance when its verity has been established. It is the spiritual law at one with the natural - ‘By their fruits ye shall know them’. Its law works both ways, therefore in your intercourse with earth let it be known without equivocation that whoever approaches this intercourse will attract to themselves souls who are in close sympathy with the lives they are living. What they who seek the communion are, they who respond to the call will be. Those who are good will attract the good, and the curious, the deceiver, the hypocrite, the impure, the vicious and immoral will bring themselves into association with characters who are in harmony with their own natures. This law is inexorable, and there is no evading it. Therefore let all who would enter into the enjoyment of this divine privilege approach it with clean hands and pure hearts, for only such have power to ascend the hill of the Lord, where those are to be met with who know and are able to declare the secrets of the kingdom.”
“I thank you for your caution,” I answered; “I have been with Ladas through the sphere of his work, where I have seen this law of attraction in active operation, so I am not likely to forget.”