In today’s world, witchcraft has been replaced by “spirituality”, a very trendy way of connecting with your spirit. It is widely promoted by movies, music, celebrities and health gurus. It’s part of the culture and viewed as integral part of achieving success through manifestation and astrology. It’s important to say that this is just a covering to hide the truth and the true meaning of those practices.
Witchcraft is the practice of using powers in order to control people or events. This is a way of control and manipulation that involves spells, divination and sorcery and similar. Witchcraft has been an integral part of Pagan practices. The Bible is very clear on divination and sorcery being evil where we see that in Exodus 22:18 “ You shall not tolerate sorceress”,
“ There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, or one who practices witchcraft, or a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spirits, or one who calls up the dead.” Deuteronomy 18:10-12
“A man or a woman who is a medium, or who has a familiar spirits, shall surely be put to death.” Leviticus 20:27
In the Bible we see the story of King Solomon, who was devoted to God and serving God, however through having many different wives and concubines who were pagan and practicing divination, he also became enmeshed in pagan worship. He allowed his wives to turn him to false gods and therefore he lost his position with God. King Solomon’s practices have been linked with magic and sorcery and has been attributed to a book with incantations for summoning demons.
Moreover, witchcraft was not only the use of sorcery but also mental manipulation. In 1 Samuel 15: 23 we read: “For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry.”
God was very serious about any type of rebellion, manipulation, controlling events, divination and magic. Basically anything that would give you a false sense of power, because He knows this would quickly turn into spiritual pride that I am as good as God and then I am god. That wouldn’t happen straight away after using one spell, however with time and experience, this would give false sense of superiority. Why false? Because behind all those witchcraft practices are demons. God asked us to not use witchcraft, sorceries and divination for a reason. It wasn’t to take away the fun but more it was out of love and protection. He knows that we are not able to see those spirits behind, we don’t understand spiritual realities and even if we receive something we have been trying to manifest, we are not aware of the consequences of that “cooperation” with the spirits.
In the Old Testament, Israelites were often falling into idolatry and practicing some sort of pagan rituals that very much angered God. Once Israelites were practicing those rituals, they were going into an agreement with the spirits behind those practices. With that they were essentially diminishing all the blessings that God wanted to give them. We see that in the story of Saul. Saul was concerned about the final outcome of Israel’s battle against the Philistines.
“When Saul saw the army of the Philistines, he was afraid, and his heart trembled greatly. And when Saul inquired of the Lord, the Lord did not answer him, either by dreams or by Urim or by the prophets. Then Saul said to his servants, “Find me a woman who is a medium, that I may go to her and inquire of her.” 1 Samuel 28:5
Saul didn’t fully trust God and wanted to rebel against God to quench his need of knowing the future and need of control. He went to see a witch at En Dor and she had a vision of the spirit of Samuel. When the vision came, these words came from the spirit:
“Now Samuel said to Saul, “Why have you disturbed me by bringing me up?” And Saul answered, “I am deeply distressed; for the Philistines make war against me, and God has departed from me and does not answer me anymore, neither by prophets nor by dreams. Therefore I have called you, that you may reveal to me what I should do.” Then Samuel said: “So why do you ask me, seeing the Lord has departed from you and has become your enemy? And the Lord has done for Himself as He spoke by me. For the Lord has torn the kingdom out of your hand and given it to your neighbor, David. Because you did not obey the voice of the Lord nor execute His fierce wrath upon Amalek, therefore the Lord has done this thing to you this day. Moreover the Lord will also deliver Israel with you into the hand of the Philistines. And tomorrow you and your sons will be with me. The Lord will also deliver the army of Israel into the hand of the Philistines.” Samuel 28: 15-20
We can see that God can and will bring punishment to any type of disobedience especially through working with different spirits. God is calling us to trust Him and Him only, even in the times of silence, however people usually have this need of control and quick results. This conditional agreement with God – I will trust you if you show me or tell me now. However, ” Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1. We are called to have faith regardless. This however does not satisfy people and we see many forms of forecasting practices like astrology, wicca, magic, divination, sorcery.
Modern Witchcraft
Wicca is the largest of the modern Pagan, or Neo-Pagan, religions. Its followers, who are called Wiccans, typically identify as witches and draw inspiration largely from the pre-Christian religions of Europe. Influenced by earlier forms of Western esotericism, Wicca publicly emerged in England during the 1950s. At that time most Wiccans were members of initiatory groups called covens, although by the early 21st century most followers were instead operating solitarily. Today the number of Wiccans is probably in the low hundreds of thousands, the majority residing in English-speaking Western countries. Followers often use the pentagram, or five-pointed star, as the main symbol of their religion. Many view Wicca as an empowerment, magic and control over your destiny. You are the creator of your life, your destiny, your body. You create your own rules. Essentially saying that you are your own god.
Witchcraft and witches were largely prosecuted and ostracized from the society for centuries, however in today’s culture it managed to come back in a different packaging through movies, music, celebrities and healing practices. It has become trendy and part of the culture. No one is surprised if you say that you have been trying to “manifest something into your existence” or that you used tarot card reading practices to check what the future holds. People are filling their houses with crystals, spiritual objects, buying books on spiritual practices, palm reading, tarot reading, chakras and healing. It is so modernized that if you go to a health practitioner, they ask you if you would like to use acupuncture or encourage you to use yoga.
All those practices come from an ancient times, where different regions used them to evoke gods and communicate with gods. Yoga essentially means to be yoked and yoga poses are a form of physical worship to those gods allowing them to be worshiped through your body. Similarly acupuncture, it’s a form of divination used in ancient China as a form of medicine to remove blockages in the flow of qi or vital energy. In the city where I live, we can find all those practices innocently incorporated into all forms of physical activities and medical practices. If you don’t know roots of some practices, you can be easily fooled without even realizing! This is what happened to me with both of those practices, where I wanted to work on my health and without even knowing, I was damaging my spirit! This isn’t something new as Bible tells us in 4 Hosea 6 : “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.” This is very true, ignorance and lack of knowledge leads us to many, many spiritual implications.
Witchcraft and Wicca has become popular again with the likes of Hollywood movies, Halloween practices, Halloween parties and costumes, witchcraft made into board games for parties, in movies where we can see real witchcraft practices and spells and music concerts with musicians like Taylor Swift, Lana Del Rey, Beyonce, Doja Cat, Sam Smitch and many more… It is actually scary how widespread and common it has become. It is even viewed as an empowerment for women and a form of taking your life into your own hands! That behavior leads to destruction as you are openly opposing any plans God has for you as you believe you know better! Jeremiah 29 : 11 tells us:
“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.”
I can reassure you that whatever God has planned for you, it is much better to whatever you think you would create. We are not able to see the future, we are not able to see the whole picture or know the thoughts people around us have towards us. I have always been a big believer of – Rejection is just God’s protection. And this was the case in my life on many occasions. Over time I have learnt that if I am not getting something I want, there is a reason for it and with time God will always show me. And I would always be grateful that it didn’t work out and I have been protected.
What about New Age?
New Age is a range of spiritual or religious practices and beliefs which rapidly grew in Western society during the early 1970s. The New Age places strong emphasis on the idea that the individual and their own experiences are the primary source of authority on spiritual matters. New Age religiosity is typified by its eclecticism. Generally believing that there is no one true way to pursue spirituality, New Agers develop their own worldview “by combining bits and pieces to form their own individual mix”, seeking what Drury called “a spirituality without borders or confining dogmas”.
Fundamentally speaking, it’s like taking one big pot, and throwing anything and everything you like to create one big soup. A little bit of this, a little bit of that and there are no rules. The only rule is that there are no rules and many ways to get to the Divine source. New Age seems to be avoiding using the word God but mainly Divine and the Universe. The big part of it’s practices is manifestation, which essentially is you can create your reality and manifest anything to your reality using different energies through different practices.
After reading book “The Secret”, I really felt like I found one big secret of the universe – that you can manifest anything! And after practicing and actually manifesting things or experiences into my life, I accredited it to the work of manifestation.
The big difference between gifts from the God and gifts from Satan – with God you have to wait for it and if it’s not in God’s will, you will not get it. With Satan – it’s all yours and instantly, just like McDonalds or microwaved dish. As we live in a fast paced and hungry environment, filled with emphasis on one’s success and achievements, people look for short cuts, so I am not surprised this can be tempting. And it tempted me too. I didn’t see anything bad with trying to manifest positive experiences and achievements into my life, but as it is with Satan, the contract has a small print that he forgot to mention to you…there will be consequences!
Anything that is against God leads to one way and when we live this life, we don’t think about the end or where our soul ends up. But tomorrow is not promised and that is why God asks us to have nothing to do with this world and it’s practices.
“Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.” James 4:4
The deception these days is so big that it blinded everyone’s eyes to discern what is good and what is bad. On the surface, everything seems harmless, like it’s just for fun, like it’s just art, like it’s just entertainment. However, with time and by allowing those unclean spirits and demons to influence our lives and minds, we now have a mental health epidemic and young people are struggling with their minds and thoughts… Yes, I am the one who believes that mental health issues are a result of opening doors to different spirits and demons. But that would be a topic for another post.
By Dagmara Z.