Leviticus 19:31

Regard not them that have familiar spirits,.... The word used signifies "bottles", and that sort of diviners here intended go by this name, either because what they sat on when they divined was in

Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I am the LORD your God.

Them that have familiar spirits; that have entered into covenant with the devil, by whose help they foretell many things to come, and acquaint men with secret things. See ,7,9 . Wizards; another name expressing the same thing for substance, to wit, persons in league with the devil, with some difference only in the manner of their operation,

Leviticus 19:31 Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I [am] the LORD your God.Ver. 31. I am the Lord your God.] What need you then run to the devil for direction? Is it because there is no God in Israel? Every one that consults with Satan, worships him, though he bow not: neither doth that evil spirit desire any other reverence than to be sought unto.

(31) Regard not.—Better, Turn ye not unto, as the Authorised Version renders this very phrase in Leviticus 19:4. Them that have familiar spirits.—This phrase represents the single word oboth in the original, and the translators of our Authorised Version by adopting it implied that those who practised this craft were supposed to be attended by an invisible spirit who was subject to their call to supply them with supernatural information. According to the authorities during the second Temple it denotes one who has a spirit speaking from under his arm-holes, or chest, with a hollow voice, as if it came out of a bottle, which is the meaning of ob in Job 32:19. They identified it with the spirit of Python, by which the ancient Chaldee Version renders it. Neither seek after wizards.—The expression “wizard,” which in old English denotes “wise man,” “sage,” is almost the exact equivalent of the word in the original. These cunning men pretended to tell people their fortunes, where their lost property was to be found, &c. According to ancient tradition, these wizards took in their mouth a bone of a certain bird called yaduâ, burned incense, thus producing fumes which sent them off into an ecstacy, and then foretold future events. Hence their name, yidonee, as it is in the original. It occurs eleven times in the Bible, and always together with the word translated “familiar spirit.”

Verse 31. Regard not them that have familiar spirits] The Hebrew word oboth probably signifies a kind of engastromuthoi or ventriloquists, or such as the Pythoness mentioned Leviticus 16:16; Leviticus 16:18; persons who, while under the influence of their demon, became greatly inflated, as the Hebrew word implies, and gave answers in a sort of phrensy. See a case of this kind in Virgil, AEneid, l. vi., ver. 46, c.: - "----Deus ecce, Deus! cui talla fanti Ante fores, subito non vultus, non color unus, Non comptae mansere comae sed pectus anhelum, Et rabie fera corda tument; majorque videri, Nec mortale sonans, afflata est numine quando Jam propiore Dei." -------------------Invoke the skies, I feel the god, the rushing god, she cries. While yet she spoke, enlarged her features grew, Her colour changed, her locks dishevelled flew. The heavenly tumult reigns in every part, Pants in her breast, and swells her rising heart: Still swelling to the sight, the priestess glowed, And heaved impatient of the incumbent god. PITT. Neither seek after wizards] ידענים yiddeonim, the wise or knowing ones, from ידע yada, to know or understand; called wizard in Scotland, wise or cunning man in England; and hence also the wise woman, the white witch. Not only all real dealers with familiar spirits, or necromantic or magical superstitions, are here forbidden, but also all pretenders to the knowledge of futurity, fortune-tellers, astrologers, &c., &c. To attempt to know what God has not thought proper to reveal, is a sin against his wisdom, providence, and goodness. In mercy, great mercy, God has hidden the knowledge of futurity from man, and given him hope - the expectation of future good, in its place. See Clarke on Exodus 22:18.

31. familiar spirits … wizards] Cp. ch. Leviticus 20:6; Leviticus 20:27. For the difference between the two see Driver on Deuteronomy 18:11. The former expression (’τb) may be rendered ghost. Its oracles were uttered in a twittering voice, which, through ventriloquism, appeared to rise from the ground. Accordingly the LXX. mostly renders the word by ἐγγαστρίμυθοι, ventriloquists. See the narrative of the witch of Endor (1 Samuel 28). The latter of the two appellations, lit. knowing (but Rob.-Sm. Journal of Philology, xiii. 273 ff.; xiv. 113 ff., prefers acquaintance), may fitly be rendered familiar spirit. The distinction between the two modes of divination will then be that ‘those who divine by the former profess (1 Samuel 28:11) to call up any ghost; those who divine by the latter consult only the particular spirit which is their familiar’ (Driver as above).

The devotion of faith, which would manifest itself in obedience to the commandment to keep God’s Sabbaths and to reverence His sanctuary Leviticus 19:30, is the true preservative against the

31. Familiar spirits — The Hebrew oboth signifies skins used for bottles, Job 32:19. Its secondary meaning is the hollow belly of conjurers, supposed to be inflated by the spirit.