Leviticus 19:31

_REGARD NOT THEM THAT HAVE FAMILIAR SPIRITS, NEITHER SEEK AFTER WIZARDS, TO BE DEFILED BY THEM: I AM THE LORD YOUR GOD._ Regard not them that have familiar spirits, х_ HAA'OBOT_ (H178); Septuagint, engastrimuthous] - ventriloquists (Leviticus 20:7; Deuteronomy 18:11; 1 Samuel 28:3; 1 Samuel 28:7): The witch of Endor is called "mistress of ob" (2 Kings 21:6; 2 Chronicles 33:6;...

Verse 31. _REGARD NOT THEM THAT HAVE FAMILIAR SPIRITS_] The Hebrew word _oboth_ probably signifies a kind of _engastromuthoi_ or _ventriloquists_, or such as the Pythoness mentioned Leviticus 16:16; Leviticus 16:18; persons who, while under the _influence of their demon_, became greatly _inflated_, as the Hebrew word implies, and gave answers in a sort of phrensy. See a case of this kind in Virgil, AEneid, l. vi., ver. 46, c.: - "----Deus ecce, Deus! cui talla fanti Ante fores, subito non vultus, non color unus, Non comptae mansere comae sed _pectus anhelum_, Et rabie fera _corda tument; majorque videri_,

The devotion of faith, which would manifest itself in obedience to the commandment to keep God’s Sabbaths and to reverence His sanctuary Leviticus 19:30, is the true preservative against the superstition which is forbidden in this verse. The people whose God was Yahweh were not to indulge those wayward feelings of their human nature which are gratified in magical arts and pretensions. Compare Isaiah 8:19. FAMILIAR SPIRITS - literally, “bottles”. This application of the word is supposed to have been suggested by the tricks of ventriloquists, within whose bodies (as vessels or bottles) it was fancied that spirits used to speak. In other cases, the word is used for the familiar spirit which a man pretended to employ in order to consult, or to

EXPOSITION From the prohibition of moral uncleanness exhibiting itself in the form of incest and licentiousness, the legislator proceeds to a series of laws and commandments against other kinds of immorality, inculcating piety, righteousness, and kindness. Leviticus 19:1 may be regarded as an extension of the previous chapter in this direction, after which the subject of Leviticus 18:1, is again taken up in Leviticus 20:1. The precepts now given are not arranged systematically, though, as Keil has remarked, "while_ _grouped together rather according to a loose association of ideas than according to any logical arrangement, they are all linked together by the common purpose expressed in th

REGARD NOT THEM THAT HAVE FAMILIAR SPIRITS,.... The word used signifies "bottles", and that sort of diviners here intended go by this name, either because what they sat on when they divined was in the form of a bottle, or they divined by one, or they were swelled and inflated as bottles when they delivered out their answers, or spoke as out of a bottle or hollow place; hence they are called masters or mistresses of the bottle: they seem to be the same with the ventriloquists, and so the Septuagint version here calls them; such whose voice seemed to come out of their bellies, and even the lower parts of them; and such was the Pythian prophetess at Delphos, and very probably the maid in the times of the apostles, who had a spirit of divination, or of Python, Acts 16:16; and so the words may be rendered here, "look not to the Python" n, or those who have the spirit of Python; so Jarchi

2. DIFFERENT DUTIES CHAPTER 19 _ 1. Honoring parents and fearing God (Leviticus 19:1)_ 2. The care of the poor (Leviticus 19:9) 3. Against stealing and lying (Leviticus 19:11) 4. Against oppression (Leviticus 19:13) 5. Against unrighteousness in judgment (Leviticus 19:15) 6. Thou shalt love thy neighbor (Leviticus 19:17) 7. Different commands and prohibitions ...

MISCELLANEOUS PRECEPTS, all found elsewhere, except the last. Most of the forbidden actions have some magical significance, _e.g._ cutting the hair in a special fashion, or maiming oneself (originally, to delude the dangerous spirits of the dead while they are still near, at or after a funeral, or perhaps as a respectful offering to them, see p. 110). Leviticus 19:29 probably refers to the licentious cults of nature and other pagan deities. For Leviticus 19:31, _cf_. 1 Samuel 28:8 ff., Deuteronomy 18:11; Isaiah 8:19. Note that w

FAMILIAR SPIRITS. These are evil spirits personating dead human beings, and attaching themselves only to "mediums" and those who give up their will to them.. dread reality is provided against by these enactments. Compare Leviticus 20:27; Deuteronomy 18:10; 1 Chronicles 10:13.Isaiah 8:19. The Hebrew _'ob,_ borrowed from an Akkadian word, _ubi_. a charm, used of one who was mistress of the spell, or spirit. Isaiah 29:4. See Acts 16:16, wher

Miscellaneous precepts in reference to the various circumstances of every-day life....

REGARD NOT THEM THAT HAVE FAMILIAR SPIRITS— The word האבת _haobot,_ rendered _familiar spirits,_ signifies _conjurers, pythos;_ persons, says Parkhurst, who pretended to give prophetic answers, when inspired and inflated by the light and air. Virgil has described a prophetess of this kind, AEneid 6 ver. 46, &c. ——Ait, Deus, &c. "The virgin cries, the god, behold the god! And straight her visage and her colour change; Her hair's dishevell'd, and her _heaving_ breast, And _lab'ring_ heart, are _swoll'n_ with sacred rage: _Larger_ she seems, her voice no mortal sound, As the _inspiring_ god near and more near Seizes her soul."—— This shews what the heathens meant when they spoke of their diviners being? _pleni deo,_ full of the god: and it is evident from Acts 16:18 that the devil was sometimes permitted to take advantage of these p