Magic in Folk Islam with Dr. Warren Larson. In this lecture Larson presents the magic of Folk Islam, its reality in the Bible, the magic in the Qur’an and Hadith, and how it manifests.
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Lecture 38, rights and practices and magic. So in, some sense, you know, we’re talking about magic all the way through, because that’s what it is. It’s magical stuff. Magic and sorcery and those kind of things, there is some repetition here, but I don’t apologize for that because, we’re just coming at things from a different angle as I see it, whether we’re looking at the beings or the objects or, the rituals, whatever we are doing. But, again, referring to Zweimer and animism effective animism, influence of animism on Islam or another, source here is Bromeli who edited you can find this stuff in the, you know, in the references at the end of the class notes, the Magic Magician International Standard Bible Encyclopedia as well.
Wanted to make some reference, first of all, to the, the bible. We I’ve noted before that, the last unit, which missiological implications in the class notes we’re not doing. The reason we’re not doing is is because it’s strictly scripture, that whole section, but we’re looking at scripture all the way through. And, and in this at this time, we wanted to make just a brief reference of some old testament stuff and new testament stuff, and there are so many passages. I you know, the the the Bible is it’s not full of it, but it’s full of references to to what was going on.
In other words, going on amongst the Jews and, often there are prohibitions in the old testament against adopting the, the, divination and sorcery of the neighbors, those around. For instance, look at Leviticus 19 and verse 26. Do not eat blood meat with blood in it, and do not practice divination or sorcery. Do not cut the hair at the sides of your head or clip the edges of your beard. Now this kind of stuff, you know, cutting your hair in a certain way, must have had something to do with this.
And then verse 31 of that same chapter, do not turn to mediums or seek out spiritists, for you will be defiled by them. And then, 2nd Kings 9 and verse, well, 22. Jehu here is talking. How can there be peace, Jehu replies replied, as long as all the idolatry and witch craft of your mother, Jezebel. You know, Jezebel was not just a someone who murdered, but she was very much into this kind of stuff.
And then Isaiah 57 verse 3, just choice verses here. You know, you can trace this. I think sometimes we miss it because we’re not, you know, we’re not used to this and we read these things. We we somehow don’t see the the extent to which, these practices were going on. It says 57, verse 3, Isaiah preaches against it.
He says: but you come here, you sons of the sorceress, you offspring of adulterers and prostitutes. Wow. Now, the book of mysteries compiled about the 6th or 7th century AD, Aramaic incantation bowls from the Jews in Babylon. See the bowls factor. So, understanding the words demons, phantoms, wild goat, demonic beings, as we’ve talked about Lilith, the demoness of the night, and there are other verses here, lots of them where Isaiah, you know, is is preaching against it.
Let me just mention, one verse here, Isaiah 34 verse 14. He says desert creatures meet with hyenas hyenas, and wild ghosts will beat, bleat to each other. There, the night creatures will also repose and find for themselves places of rest. Now, I don’t wanna get into the too much into the biblical, position because that’s not the purpose of the course, but the New Testament, too, makes several references to sorcery, and, Revelation is, is mentions it all the time. I mean, this is one of the things that that makes God so mad is the propensity to sorcery, for instance, Revelation 21:8.
We’ve looked at this before, but the cowardly, unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, all and, I mean, we can see that, but then it says all those who practice magic arts. Okay. And then 2215 as well, which is really you’re getting close to the end of the book here, aren’t you? Very close. And it says that, again, it talks about the those who practice magic arts.
Wow. You know? It’s all part of it. You know? There’s not just immorality and murder and stuff like that.
But, thinking too of the fact and what a what a shame it is when you think about it that, Jesus was accused. Or accused of what? Well, they made all kinds of accusations against him, and some of them were terrible. You know, verse 22 of chapter 3 in Mark, and the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, he is possessed by Beelzebub, by the prince of demons. He’s driving out demons.
Now what what worse thing could they have said? They’re accusing our Lord of demon possession. This is terrible. Beelzebub was the prince of the demons, and Jesus is accused of this. I mean, this is the worst thing that that people could have said about him, and they did it face to face.
In John 8 and 48, the Jews answered him, Aren’t we right in saying you are a Samaritan and demon possessed? I’m not possessed by demons, Jesus said Jesus, but I honor my Father, and you dishonor me, I’ll say. And then verse 52, the Jews said, now we know who you are demon possessed. Abraham died, and so did the prophets. Yet you say that if anyone keeps your word, he will never taste death.
Who do you think you are? That’s a terrible, accusation, isn’t it? And when, remember that when Jesus is before, Herod, You know, Herod is a wicked a wicked guy, and he he he he he gets worse and worse, and as he disobeys the Lord and, then at the end, Jesus won’t even talk to him because he has sort of, you know, he’s, I guess, hardened his heart so much. But in Mark, I guess, 6 in verses 14 through 16, when Herod heard this, he he said: John, the man I beheaded has been raised from the dead. For Herod himself had given orders to have John arrested.
But, you know, Herod is hoping to see some magic. When his his worldview must have been, you know, much been very much full of this, the world view of of his day. This is what he’s into, and you have all of this kind of stuff too, verse after verse in the New Testament as well. And it grieves us, doesn’t it, that Jesus was accused of these things? Now let’s talk about Islam.
Let’s talk about the Islamic roots. And, we’ve noted that it is condemned, But then we also have seen time and time again that it still thrives. It still flourishes despite the the the seeming condemnation. Samuel Zweimer says this. In no monotheistic religion are magic and sorcery so firmly entrenched as Islam.
Well, you know, he’s talking several monotheistic religions here. In the case of this religion based on the teaching of the Quran, you see, so, Zwemer is is really backing up what what you would we’ve been saying all along. In the practice of the prophet, the book itself has magical power superstitions obtained in Arabia before Islam perpetuated by it. No orthodox Muslim doubts it. In other words, that’s see, that’s how they, spelled Muslim before, you know, a 100 years ago, Muslim.
And, I think they some do still today. It’s not just African, but, men are able to call forth the power of demons and jinn by means of magic, wizards, wizards, and witches. Boy, Zweimer hit it on the nail, didn’t he, on the head? He really, spoke clearly and, decisively on on, the Islam and and the the the prevalence of magic. Magic, what is it?
It’s a form in some cases, a pretended form of religious deviance. What I mean by that is that there’s so much deceit and fake stuff. Through supernatural powers, things are done in ways that are not normally sanctioned by by religion. So you have white black magic. What black magic?
White magic, of course, is good. Black magic is when you do harm. Magic is coercive. Often, it’s manipulative and it could be, as we’ve noted before, it could be protective, something you do to protect, but it also could be something you do, taking the offensive. And, witch or witchcraft is, the word for witch witchcraft in Arabic is sehr.
It is the the innate spiritual power like the evil eye, and we’ve showed these. This this is a great picture here. This thing presumably run hung around the neck to protect against the evil eye, something like, you know, this Starbucks that, I showed you before even in Turkey. You know, Turkey, despite its the fact that it’s a secular country, is very much into this stuff. What is a sorcerer?
Well, we’re on page 38 of the class notes. A specialist who has learned from the master, practitioner. And it’s a craft to controlling or using supernatural powers for personal or in the interest of the clientele. It is certainly antisocial. I have, taken out some stuff out of the class notes here in reference to, well, in particular, magic sorcery among the Seung Hai Seung Hai in, in, I guess, it’s Nejair, Paul Stoller and Cheryl Oakes in Sorcery’s Shadow, published by the University of Chicago.
This guy is an anthropologist, Paul Stoller, and I read that book years ago. He was quite I was quite surprised at some of the things he did. He actually learned, from some sorcerer in Niger where he was doing his anthropology. He thought, you know, the best thing to do if you wanna get into this was to become 1, so he did and he, you know, didn’t seem to be too much harm until he ran into someone, sorcerer, who had more power than he did and then he almost lost his life and he got out of there. Obviously, a non Christian, a secular guy and, would you know, I mean, no Christian should get involved in that kind of stuff because we know we know from the Bible that it’s prohibited and there is great danger in it.
He did do some he did do some amazing things. I mean, he he had the power. He learned the power and, obviously, Satan was using him. He it was a craft that he learned, but what a dangerous thing to be fooling around with. God help us not to get mixed up in anything.
Here are some definitions and, of sorcery distinctions, magic and miracles. We know that, early Christians were accused of magic by the pagans. In fact, that’s one of the things that they accused them of, and I think often, why they, were persecuted for because of false you know, people isn’t it funny that people, they practice things themselves and then they accuse others of the very things that they’re guilty of and, look at them through their own eyes. Oftentimes, Christians have been accused, demonized because of the wickedness and the practices of the people that are accusing them. So, what is divination?
Divination is an attempt to understand, interpret the messages from, the gods or, you know, through spiritual powers. Sorcery is mostly about influencing people and events for personal reasons and some of those definitions I get out of the International Study Standard Bible of Education, I guess, that’s what it stands for, ISBE. And then you have VUDU, which is more African based, protective rights, sorcery based, and, you know, in West Indies and so on.