SPEAKING WITH SPIRITS was strictly forbidden by God. This might seem to be a quaint and antiquated notion, but the fact that we encounter the prohibition three times in our reading today indicates that this was a serious issue in ancient Canaan.
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IT’S ANOTHER weird section of scripture this week, which, as you know by now, means it’s important.
In the middle of rules pertaining to sacrifices, God gave this to Moses:
Continue readingSo they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to goat demons, after whom they whore.
Leviticus 17:7, ESV
Filed under Bible Study, Old Testament
FEEDING THE dead was an integral part of the world in which Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob lived.
We’ve previously discussed Abraham’s distress at not having an heir to provide for him in the afterlife; this week, we explain why Jacob’s father-in-law, Laban, was so upset about losing his teraphim, the small idols that represented dead ancestors who had to be summoned to a meal every month with a necromancy ritual called kispum.
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