IDOLATRY AND THE ANTIDOTES

(Idolatry and witchcraft)

IDOLATRY and witchcraft are not a problem these days, you might think, so no point lingering long here. But you'd be wrong. Okay, we no longer fall down before carved statues of imagined deities, or offer our children as sacrifices to them—at least not in my part of Surrey—but you'd be wrong to believe that we are no longer troubled by the ugly sisters of idolatry and witchcraft.

Another mistake that believers are apt to make is to suppose that idolatry comes in a different form today. The usual view is that idolatry is anything that takes the place of God in a person's life. But that's not the whole truth. Something that takes the place of God in someone's life is not necessarily their idol. The point I'm trying to make is that not everything that takes God's place is worshipped. Often, what it amounts to is ignoring God, not worshipping something else. It only becomes idolatry when the thing which has replaced God is assumed to have a controlling influence in a person's life, when it's seen as somehow guiding and protecting and giving meaning to life for them. To be idol worship the attachment has not only to supplant God but also to take on the role of God.

The man who collects match-box labels for a hobby, however fanatical he may be, is not indulging in a twentieth century version of idol worship! If, because of his hobby, he neglects his spiritual welfare, then he'd be well advised to spend time on that rather than on cutting and sticking his trophies, on admiring them, swapping them, going to auctions and clubs, and reading the monthly journal of the match-box label collectors. But that's not idol worship. Unless he is very strange indeed, and relies on his collection of labels to provide the meaning of life, and to guide and protect him through life. That's not idolatry, that's insanity!

An idol is not simply what we substitute for God;it's what we substitute for Him as a creative force in the universe and a guiding light in our lives. Which is precisely why idolatry and witchcraft are linked. Although different, they go hand in hand.

Galatians 5 is not the only place idolatry and witchcraft are brought together. It happens in Deuteronomy 18:10-11, 2 Chronicles 33:6-7, and Micah 5:12-14. But the verse that throws most light on the connection between the two is 1 Samuel 15:23:

"For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, he hath also rejected thee from being king."

To understand this verse it helps to re-interpret some of the key words:

rebellion (meri) equals bitterness;

witchcraft (gerer) is more particularly divination in this case;

stubbornness (patser) means to press or urge, be insistent, and

idolatry is the Hebrew teraphim, meaning household gods (probably small carvings or castings in human form).

In the light of the above information we can re-cast the verse like this: "For your bitterness is as the sin of divination, and your insistence on your own way is as if you were using household gods."

To put the words into their context, this was the prophet Samuel speaking to Saul, king of Israel. Saul's failure to carry out a command of God was likened to witchcraft and idolatry. God had told Saul to destroy all the livestock of the Amalekites once he had defeated them in battle. But Saul couldn't resist the best of the sheep and cattle. He was happy to have God's help to defeat the Amalekites, but he didn't want to follow through with his part of the agreement. He kept the best livestock. At the back of his mind were thoughts something like this, "I could do with all these excellent animals. I'll be better provided for if I keep them. It's a shame to waste them. And my soldiers and their families will be pleased with me if I share with them "

Saul rejected God in two ways: he rebelled (was bitter), and he was stubborn. Saul was bitter at being challenged by God's prophet over keeping the best of the sheep and oxen. He blamed his soldiers for taking and keeping them, though he definitely played a key part in it, and then he argued that they had taken the good livestock in order to offer some of it to God as sacrifices. Saul reasoned it was okay to disobey God so long as you appeased Him with sacrifices. It was a cynical attitude, and it showed that Saul's approach to God was no different, in essence, from the approach of the heathen to an idol. He had superstition, not faith in God.

Saul's stubbornness was his headstrong attitude, insist-ing he was right even in the face of what God had said. This was an iniquity akin to idolatry. God was saying, in effect, through his prophet, "If you're going to decide for yourself what to do, disregarding my Word, you might as well have gone to some teraphim and enquired of them."

One seriously wonders if Saul had actually consulted teraphim on this and possibly other matters. It would be in keeping with his superstitious nature. It's worth noting that in 1 Sam.15:23 the phrase "...is as..." occurs both times in italics signifying that it's not in the original Hebrew text. So perhaps his sin was not "as" divination and using teraphim, but actually these things!

Saul denied the power of God in his life and looked elsewhere for guidance: to teraphim, or to his own counsel.

You don't have to set up an idol in your back garden or buy yourself a broomstick to practise idolatry and witch-craft. All you need to do is rely on something other than God for your prosperity and your physical and emotional needs.

"Covetousness, which is idolatry"

When Paul wrote to the Colossian believers, he linked idolatry with covetousness. This is a little misleading. It's easy to get the impression from what he says that covetousness is a form of idolatry. It is, but only in a limited sense. Simply wanting something very badly—covetous-ness—is not necessarily to make an idol of it. We don't generally worship the things we want, or rely on them to guide our destiny.

Context, context, context!—to rework a well-known estate agents' dictum. If you look at the whole verse you'll see that it all relates to sexual sin with the apparent exception of "covetousness, which is idolatry".

"Mortify your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry" (Col.3:5).

The fact that five out of six of the sins mentioned are sexual in nature is a powerful hint that the sixth one is also. It's unlikely that it would be totally unrelated to the rest of the list. Sure enough, when you check out that word covetousness (pleonexia) you find that Paul does use it in other places for coveting a woman you have no right to. Linking this covetousness to idolatry, Paul must have had in mind the practice common in his day of consorting with temple prostitutes. (See 7 Short Epistles p.35 by H. A. Whittaker.) The sexual act was a part of the idol worship of the day. Therefore a strong desire for, and the likely subsequent association with the temple girls was idolatry.

Therefore Paul could say, "covetousness, which is idolatry." This doesn't mean that covetousness is always idolatry, or that idolatry is always covetousness; it means only that one particular form of covetousness is idolatry. And it's clear enough from the context that's what Paul had in mind.

The New Age

The word for witchcraft in the New Testament is pharmakeia, and it relates to charms and medicines. As you might guess, our word pharmacy comes from this word, but don't let that stop you going to the chemist. Pharmakeia apparently refers to the chants and incantations which were said over the medicines rather than the potions themselves. There was much superstition surrounding medicine in the past, even as there is today in some parts of the world where witch-doctors and medicine men still ply their trade. Where people are gullible and desperate enough—or, sad to say, poor enough—such men will generally be around to assume power over them.

In England the practice of witchcraft was forbidden by law for centuries—until quite recently, in fact. The Witchcraft Act was repealed in 1951. Nowadays you can practise as a witch, and even advertise your enchantments in the columns of the daily newspapers. No-one will burn you at the stake.

But it's not blatant witchcraft with its covens and pentangles that has flourished since the 1950s (though that certainly is on the increase); it's the more subtle forms that have become popular. The so-called New Age movement is little more than a thinly disguised promotion of idolatry and witchcraft. Which may sound like the over-the-top rantings of a red-eyed Christian fundamentalist, but you can't escape the fact that the New Age movement promotes a replacement of the God of the Bible with a depersonalised 'Universal Force'—an occult force—and encourages us to find the 'god within ourselves'. If that's not idolatry and witchcraft then I don't know what is. Many New Age followers are quite happy to call themselves pagans.

A lot of different beliefs and phenomena come under the umbrella of the term New Age. The movement is supposed to be a symptom of a new age of enlightenment, of personal and planetary transformation. It's a nice idea, and I'd be the last to pour cold water on such high-flying aspirations, but the New Age is nothing other than old age superstition in a new dress, and the so-called age of enlightenment is a return to the dark ages. It's just the bad old works of the flesh that have been around since Adam.

It's so easy for anyone these days to get caught up in New Age practices unwittingly. New Age covers a whole smorgasbord of one-time fringe activities which are becoming ever more popular and acceptable. Here are a few you may have come across: nature worship ("hug a tree" say some New Agers, "and get in tune with the vibrations of the life force"); spirit channelling (supposed messages from the dead to guide the living); past life regression (the idea that we can go back to supposed former lives); U.F.O.s (the belief that aliens will rescue a suicidal earth); astrology (guidance from the stars); tarot cards and the I-Ching, pendulum dowsing, and other such popular methods of divination; crystal healing and many other alternative health treatments (some of these treatments are good and work, but you have to beware the philosophy that sometimes goes with them as part of the package); graphology (character analysis from handwriting).... The list goes on. It also covers aspects of the paranormal—things which in general any stage magician worth his salt can duplicate.

Maybe you think you'd never get caught up in anything like that. Not for a moment! A prominent believer once dallied briefly with the pseudo-science of phrenology, the reading of your character from the bumps on your head. And if Robert Roberts could take even a passing interest in such things, then who could boast that they never have, and never would?

Am I right in saying that you know your star sign? Are you Capricorn or Leo? Sagittarius or Virgo? So, why do you know? And what use is it to you? Do you believe at some level that this star sign fixes or determines your character? Or that the stars have some influence on your future? A look at the daily horoscope in a newspaper isn't really a harmless bit of fun. Not for someone who thinks of himself as a believer it isn't. Have you noticed how many people who treat it as harmless fun also seem to be hooked on it?

I've asked daily horoscope readers to keep a record of how often it's right. They prefer not to. They turn a blind eye to the fact that it's wrong most days, or so general as to be worthless. For an example, I looked at my stars in a newspaper (I'm a Cancerian, by the way!), and I was given this gem, that I should "make plans like there's no tomorrow"! If there's no tomorrow—what plans can I make?!

Some years ago I worked with a girl who regularly popped into my office at lunch-time to borrow my midday edition of a London newspaper to check her stars for that day. She often said how accurate they were and what a good astrologer the writer was. One day I happened to notice in the small print at the head of the astrology column the words "your star forecast for tomorrow." When I told her she'd been reading it for the wrong day all this time she didn't seem at all put out.

People will believe what they want regardless of the facts. In fact, since the star signs were first allocated to their particular times of the year, owing to an astronomical phenomenon called the 'precession of the equinoxes', the star signs have all moved up a month. Nobody seems to notice that we all now have the wrong star sign! (Isaac Asimov: Introduction to The Stars in Their Courses).

A selective memory is a great asset when it comes to New Age phenomena. With things like astrology you have to remember the few amazing! moments when it's correct and shut out all the boring moments when it isn't. It's very subjective. I recall being told by a work colleague that I had a remarkable resemblance to his son, not so much in looks but in general build, mannerisms and the things I liked and disliked. When we discovered that his son and I were born only one day apart in the same year—wow! It's so easy to build something on that, and forget all the people you could muster born at the same time who are very different.

Have you ever noticed how subjective Ufology is? In case you haven't heard it, that's the term for the study of flying saucers. I speak with authority here, having witnessed four U.F.O.s in my life so far. They were definitely unidentified flying objects, because I couldn't identify them. But it's rather "a giant step for mankind" to say these things are piloted by alien beings. What I find most curious is that when you look at early drawings and photographs from the 1950s, the flying saucers look like antiques, whereas the ones pictured now are far more modern and sophisticated. This is what I mean by subjective. I don't believe that real aliens would have fashions in spacecraft that move with our times!

Having said all that, I do, however, believe that someone not from our world will one day arrive to rescue this doomed planet. But he will be no alien. He was born here, grew up here, and he won't need a flying machine of any description to bring him back here. I'm talking of Jesus, of course. The Truth is actually more breathtaking than any of the fables men dream up. We have already had a communication from a higher intelligence beyond the stars. It's called the Bible.

Society is riddled with subtle forms of witchcraft and idolatry. There are hundreds of little, seemingly innocuous ways of leaving God out of the picture and relying on superstitious beliefs and charms to guide and help through life. Believers need to stay awake to what these things are.

The Antidotes

The antidotes from the fruit of the Spirit that will counteract idolatry and witchcraft are without hesitation joy and faith.

Joy—because, as we found when dealing with that aspect of the fruit, the joy of the fruit is the joy of knowing you're on the right road and that your expectations will soon be fulfilled. When you have this kind of joy, you have no desire to look down other roads, or to put your trust in anyone or anything other than God to fulfil your expectations. When you're truly happy about what you have, you don't want or need anything else. In the face of day-to-day problems and decisions, you don't cross your fingers and trust to luck, or clutch a rabbit's severed foot, or consult the daily horoscope column, or whatever; you turn to God. You pray, and you know that the providence of God is working for you.

Faith—because faith underpins that joy. By faith we see providence in our lives. We see the kingdom of God here on earth in our mind's eye, and we know that we have a part in it, in God's mercy. We believe firmly in God and in our salvation. We know these things are so. And from this rock-like standpoint, all superstition, idolatry and witchcraft is absolutely out of the question. It's twaddle, but it's dangerous twaddle. And to make sure we don't inadvertently get sucked into it, we need to do what we can to promote joy and faith through delight and meditation in the Word.