Laws prohibiting various forms of witchcraft and divination can be found in the books of Exodus, Leviticus and Deuteronomy. These include the following (as translated in the Revised JPS, 2023 :
Exodus 22:18 – You shall not tolerate a sorceress.[1]
Leviticus 19:26 – You shall not eat anything with its blood. You shall not practice divination or soothsaying.[2]
Leviticus 20:27 – A man or a woman who has a ghost or a familiar spirit shall be put to death; they shall be pelted with stones—and the bloodguilt is theirs.[3]
Deuteronomy 18:10-11 – Let no one be found among you who consigns a son or daughter to the fire, or who is an augur, a soothsayer, a diviner, a sorcerer, one who casts spells, or one who consults ghosts or familiar spirits, or one who inquires of the dead.[4]
The forms of divination mentioned in Deuteronomy 17 are portrayed as being of foreign origin; this is the only part of the Hebrew Bible to make such a claim.[5] According to Ann Jeffers, the presence of laws forbidding necromancy proves that it was practiced throughout Israel's history.[6]
The exact difference between the three forbidden forms of necromancy mentioned in Deuteronomy 18:11 is a matter of uncertainty; yidde'oni ("wizard") is always used together with ob ("consulter with familiar spirits"),[7] and its semantic similarity to doresh el ha-metim ("necromancer", or "one who directs inquiries to the dead") raises the question of why all three are mentioned in the same verse.[citation needed] The Jewish tractate Sanhedrin makes the distinction that a doresh el ha-metim was a person who would sleep in a cemetery after having starved himself, in order to become possessed.[8]
A prophetic passage in the Book of Micah states that witchcraft and soothsaying will be eliminated in the Messianic Age (Micah 5:12).
Instances in Biblical narrative
In the Book of Exodus, Egyptian magicians replicate several of the signs delivered to the Pharaoh by Moses and Aaron.
In 1 Samuel 28, Saul enlists the Witch of Endor to summon the spirit of the deceased prophet Samuel, who rebukes him for using witchcraft.
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