Witchcraft & Wicca

Passages on this topic

From Nave’s Topical Bible (1896), a historical reference index. The groupings are Nave’s; the verses are shown in the text used across this site.

Witchcraft

Law concerning

• Exodus 22:18 You must not allow a sorceress to live.
• Leviticus 19:31 You must not turn to mediums or spiritists; do not seek them out, or you will be defiled by them. I am the LORD your God.
• Leviticus 20:6 Whoever turns to mediums or spiritists to prostitute himself with them, I will also set My face against that person and cut him off from his people.
• Leviticus 20:27 A man or a woman who is a medium or spiritist must surely be put to death. They shall be stoned; their blood is upon them.’”

The Witch of Endor

• 1 Samuel 28:7–25 Then Saul said to his servants, “Find me a woman who is a medium, so I can go and consult her.” “There is a medium at Endor,” his servants replied. So Saul disguised himself by putting on different clothes, and he set out with two of his men. They came to the woman at night, and Saul said, “Consult…

Witches destroyed

• 1 Samuel 28:3 Now by this time Samuel had died, and all Israel had mourned for him and buried him in Ramah, his own city. And Saul had removed the mediums and spiritists from the land.
• 1 Samuel 28:9 But the woman replied, “Surely you know what Saul has done, how he has killed the mediums and spiritists in the land. Why have you set a trap to get me killed?”

See Sorcery

Sorcery

(Divination by an alleged assistance of evil spirits)

Forbidden

• Leviticus 19:26–28 You must not eat anything with blood still in it. You must not practice divination or sorcery. You must not cut off the hair at the sides of your head or clip off the edges of your beard. You must not make any cuts in your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the LORD.
• Leviticus 19:31 You must not turn to mediums or spiritists; do not seek them out, or you will be defiled by them. I am the LORD your God.
• Leviticus 20:6 Whoever turns to mediums or spiritists to prostitute himself with them, I will also set My face against that person and cut him off from his people.
• Deuteronomy 18:9–14 When you enter the land that the LORD your God is giving you, do not imitate the detestable ways of the nations there. Let no one be found among you who sacrifices his son or daughter in the fire, practices divination or conjury, interprets omens, practices sorcery, casts spells, consults a medium…

Denounced

• Isaiah 8:19 When men tell you to consult mediums and spiritists who whisper and mutter, shouldn’t a people consult their God instead? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living?
• Malachi 3:5 “Then I will draw near to you for judgment. And I will be a swift witness against sorcerers and adulterers and perjurers, against oppressors of the widowed and fatherless, and against those who defraud laborers of their wages and deny justice to the foreigner but do not fear Me,” says the LORD of H…

Practiced

By the Egyptians

• Isaiah 19:3 Then the spirit of the Egyptians will be emptied out from among them, and I will frustrate their plans, so that they will resort to idols and spirits of the dead, to mediums and spiritists.
• Isaiah 19:11–12 The princes of Zoan are mere fools; Pharaoh’s wise counselors give senseless advice. How can you say to Pharaoh, “I am one of the wise, a son of eastern kings”? Where are your wise men now? Let them tell you and reveal what the LORD of Hosts has planned against Egypt.

By the magicians

• Exodus 7:11 But Pharaoh called the wise men and sorcerers and magicians of Egypt, and they also did the same things by their magic arts.
• Exodus 7:22 But the magicians of Egypt did the same things by their magic arts. So Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said.
• Exodus 8:7 But the magicians did the same thing by their magic arts, and they also brought frogs up onto the land of Egypt.
• Exodus 8:18 The magicians tried to produce gnats using their magic arts, but they could not. And the gnats remained on man and beast.

By Balaam

• Numbers 22:6 So please come now and put a curse on this people, because they are too mighty for me. Perhaps I may be able to defeat them and drive them out of the land; for I know that those you bless are blessed, and those you curse are cursed.”
• Numbers 23:23 For there is no spell against Jacob and no divination against Israel. It will now be said of Jacob and Israel, ‘What great things God has done!’
• Numbers 22 Then the Israelites traveled on and camped in the plains of Moab near the Jordan, across from Jericho. Now Balak son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites, and Moab was terrified of the people because they were numerous. Indeed, Moab dreaded the Israelites. So the Moabites said to… (whole chapter)
• Numbers 23 Then Balaam said to Balak, “Build for me seven altars here, and prepare for me seven bulls and seven rams.” So Balak did as Balaam had instructed, and Balak and Balaam offered a bull and a ram on each altar. “Stay here by your burnt offering while I am gone,” Balaam said to Balak. “Perhaps the LORD… (whole chapter)

By Jezebel

• 2 Kings 9:22 When Joram saw Jehu, he asked, “Have you come in peace, Jehu?” “How can there be peace,” he replied, “as long as the idolatry and witchcraft of your mother Jezebel abound?”

By the Ninevites

• Nahum 3:4–5 because of the many harlotries of the harlot, the seductive mistress of sorcery, who betrays nations by her prostitution and clans by her witchcraft. “Behold, I am against you,” declares the LORD of Hosts. “I will lift your skirts over your face. I will show your nakedness to the nations and your s…

By the Babylonians

• Isaiah 47:9–13 These two things will overtake you in a moment, in a single day: loss of children, and widowhood. They will come upon you in full measure, in spite of your many sorceries and the potency of your spells. You were secure in your wickedness; you said, ‘No one sees me.’ Your wisdom and knowledge led yo…
• Ezekiel 21:21–22 For the king of Babylon stands at the fork in the road, at the junction of the two roads, to seek an omen: He shakes the arrows, he consults the idols, he examines the liver. In his right hand appears the portent for Jerusalem, where he is to set up battering rams, to call for the slaughter, to lif…
• Daniel 2:2 So the king gave orders to summon the magicians, enchanters, sorcerers, and astrologers to explain his dreams. When they came and stood before the king,
• Daniel 2:10 The astrologers answered the king, “No one on earth can do what the king requests! No king, however great and powerful, has ever asked anything like this of any magician, enchanter, or astrologer.
• Daniel 2:27 Daniel answered the king, “No wise man, enchanter, medium, or magician can explain to the king the mystery of which he inquires.

By Belshazzar

• Daniel 5:7 The king called out for the enchanters, astrologers, and diviners to be brought in, and he said to these wise men of Babylon, “Whoever reads this inscription and tells me its interpretation will be clothed in purple and have a gold chain placed around his neck, and he will be made the third highest…
• Daniel 5:15 Now the wise men and enchanters were brought before me to read this inscription and interpret it for me, but they could not give its interpretation.

By Simon the Sorcerer (Magus)

• Acts 8:9 Prior to that time, a man named Simon had practiced sorcery in the city and astounded the people of Samaria. He claimed to be someone great,
• Acts 11 The apostles and brothers throughout Judea soon heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God. So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcised believers took issue with him and said, “You visited uncircumcised men and ate with them.” But Peter began and explained to them the whole s… (whole chapter)

By Elymas (Bar-Jesus)

• Acts 13:8 But Elymas the sorcerer (for that is what his name means) opposed them and tried to turn the proconsul from the faith.

By the girl at Philippi

• Acts 16:16 One day as we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl with a spirit of divination, who earned a large income for her masters by fortune-telling.

By charlatan Jews

• Acts 19:13 Now there were some itinerant Jewish exorcists who tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those with evil spirits. They would say, “I command you by Jesus, whom Paul proclaims.”

By sons of Sceva

• Acts 19:14–15 Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this. But one day the evil spirit responded, “Jesus I know, and I know about Paul, but who are you?”

By astrologers

• Jeremiah 10:2 This is what the LORD says: “Do not learn the ways of the nations or be terrified by the signs in the heavens, though the nations themselves are terrified by them.
• Micah 3:6–7 Therefore night will come over you without visions, and darkness without divination. The sun will set on these prophets, and the daylight will turn black over them. Then the seers will be ashamed and the diviners will be disgraced. They will all cover their mouths because there is no answer from Go…

By false prophets

• Jeremiah 14:14 “The prophets are prophesying lies in My name,” replied the LORD. “I did not send them or appoint them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a false vision, a worthless divination, the futility and delusion of their own minds.
• Jeremiah 27:9 But as for you, do not listen to your prophets, your diviners, your interpreters of dreams, your mediums, or your sorcerers who declare, ‘You will not serve the king of Babylon.’
• Jeremiah 29:8–9 For this is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: “Do not be deceived by the prophets and diviners among you, and do not listen to the dreams you elicit from them. For they are falsely prophesying to you in My name; I have not sent them, declares the LORD.”
• Ezekiel 13:6–9 They see false visions and speak lying divinations. They claim, ‘Thus declares the LORD,’ when the LORD did not send them; yet they wait for the fulfillment of their message. Haven’t you seen a false vision and spoken a lying divination when you proclaim, ‘Thus declares the LORD,’ even though I hav…
• Ezekiel 22:28 Her prophets whitewash these deeds by false visions and lying divinations, saying, ‘This is what the Lord GOD says,’ when the LORD has not spoken.
• Matthew 24:24 For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive even the elect, if that were possible.

To cease

• Ezekiel 12:23–24 Therefore tell them that this is what the Lord GOD says: ‘I will put an end to this proverb, and in Israel they will no longer recite it.’ But say to them: ‘The days are at hand when every vision will be fulfilled. For there will be no more false visions or flattering divinations within the house o…
• Ezekiel 13:23 therefore you will no longer see false visions or practice divination. I will deliver My people from your hands. Then you will know that I am the LORD.”
• Micah 5:12 I will cut the sorceries from your hand, and you will have no fortune-tellers.

Messages of, false

• Ezekiel 21:29 while they offer false visions for you and lying divinations about you— to be placed on the necks of the wicked who are slain, whose day has come, the time of their final punishment.
• Zechariah 10:2 For idols speak deceit and diviners see illusions; they tell false dreams and offer empty comfort. Therefore the people wander like sheep, oppressed for lack of a shepherd.
• 2 Thessalonians 2:9 The coming of the lawless one will be accompanied by the working of Satan, with every kind of power, sign, and false wonder,

Diviners will be confounded

• Micah 3:7 Then the seers will be ashamed and the diviners will be disgraced. They will all cover their mouths because there is no answer from God.”

Belongs to the works of the flesh

• Galatians 5:20 idolatry and sorcery; hatred, discord, jealousy, and rage; rivalries, divisions, factions,

Wickedness of

• 1 Samuel 15:23 For rebellion is like the sin of divination, and arrogance is like the wickedness of idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, He has rejected you as king.”

Vainness of

• Isaiah 44:25 who foils the signs of false prophets and makes fools of diviners, who confounds the wise and turns their knowledge into nonsense,

Punishment for

• Exodus 22:18 You must not allow a sorceress to live.
• Leviticus 20:27 A man or a woman who is a medium or spiritist must surely be put to death. They shall be stoned; their blood is upon them.’”
• Deuteronomy 13:5 Such a prophet or dreamer must be put to death, because he has advocated rebellion against the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of slavery; he has tried to turn you from the way in which the LORD your God has commanded you to walk. So you must…

Divining by familiar spirits (mediums or spiritists)

• Leviticus 20:27 A man or a woman who is a medium or spiritist must surely be put to death. They shall be stoned; their blood is upon them.’”
• 1 Chronicles 10:13 So Saul died for his unfaithfulness to the LORD, because he did not keep the word of the LORD and even consulted a medium for guidance,
• 2 Chronicles 33:6 He sacrificed his sons in the fire in the Valley of Ben-hinnom. He practiced sorcery, divination, and witchcraft, and consulted mediums and spiritists. He did great evil in the sight of the LORD, provoking Him to anger.
• Isaiah 8:19 When men tell you to consult mediums and spiritists who whisper and mutter, shouldn’t a people consult their God instead? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living?
• Isaiah 19:3 Then the spirit of the Egyptians will be emptied out from among them, and I will frustrate their plans, so that they will resort to idols and spirits of the dead, to mediums and spiritists.
• Isaiah 29:4 You will be brought low, you will speak from the ground, and out of the dust your words will be muffled. Your voice will be like a spirit from the ground; your speech will whisper out of the dust.

By entrails

• Ezekiel 21:21 For the king of Babylon stands at the fork in the road, at the junction of the two roads, to seek an omen: He shakes the arrows, he consults the idols, he examines the liver.

By images

• 2 Kings 23:24 Furthermore, Josiah removed the mediums and spiritists, the household gods and idols, and all the abominations that were seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem. He did this to carry out the words of the law written in the book that Hilkiah the priest had found in the house of the LORD.
• Ezekiel 21:21 For the king of Babylon stands at the fork in the road, at the junction of the two roads, to seek an omen: He shakes the arrows, he consults the idols, he examines the liver.

By rods

• Hosea 4:12 My people consult their wooden idols, and their divining rods inform them. For a spirit of prostitution leads them astray and they have played the harlot against their God.

Saul consulted the Witch of Endor

• 1 Samuel 28:7–25 Then Saul said to his servants, “Find me a woman who is a medium, so I can go and consult her.” “There is a medium at Endor,” his servants replied. So Saul disguised himself by putting on different clothes, and he set out with two of his men. They came to the woman at night, and Saul said, “Consult…

Books of, destroyed

• Acts 19:19 And a number of those who had practiced magic arts brought their books and burned them in front of everyone. When the value of the books was calculated, the total came to fifty thousand drachmas.