On the Witch of Endor, against Origen 1–9

I have always admired the conspicuous zeal of your godly way of life, Eutropius, most distinguished herald of orthodoxy; and, amazed in many ways at the mark of your piety, I have marvelled not least, and indeed most of all, at this point: that, wishing to investigate precisely, you want to know what opinion I hold concerning the woman with a divining spirit whose story is told in the first book of Kingdoms. For you say you are not satisfied with what Origen published on this subject. Indeed I know of many others too who still find fault with what he so readily laid down; many are stung in their souls and are distressed beyond measure; but sometimes some are led on by what he wrote, assenting too easily to the reputation that had gone before him, and attending to the names rather than to the facts, as they ought. So that I may not seem to bring a lawsuit on my own, I think it not out of place to yoke his whole exposition together with this dictation of my letter, and to make the truth clear through both: so that no one may think we slander him, led to hold some opinion or other, nor again that the opinions of the two sides are open to dispute. For they think that, by setting them side by side, lovers of learning examine what view each side holds and choose the better opinion of the two. For a racehorse is not judged excellent by itself, running gracefully, not even if, very light as though winged, it shows off its movements; nor again an athlete who can run very fast in the stadium, nor anyone else, whether wrestling supply, or fighting the pancratium most roughly, or boxing, or beating the air with blows at nothing; but the combatants must stand against their opponents in close fight, so that from the two the superior may be discerned. Therefore Origen's work must be set first, and the opposing view must be examined with care in its own place.

Come, then, let us look at the very letter of the narrative, as far as we can, to see where we must begin. When Saul was governing the multitude of the people excellently, he removed all the ventriloquists, it says, and those called by the name of “knowers”, as most hateful destroyers. But when, having turned to the worst, he was bitterly driven by the wicked demon, he went back to the apparitions of their divination, building up again what he had pulled down a little before, and convicting himself as a transgressor by this very thing. For when the neighbouring peoples, with one-minded zeal, proclaimed the start of a war, gathered in the greatest possible numbers, drew up their phalanxes against him, and, having trained their weapons, marched out vigorously to battle, Saul, seeing their fortified camp with his own eyes, was, to sum it up, beside himself with terror, as the divine Scripture declares; and after this, it says, he inquired through the Lord, longing of course to know what to do. But the Lord did not answer him at all because of his iniquities, neither by dreams nor by the prophets. Indeed, the Deity gave no oracle at all to a man who had done lawless things. What does he do after this, stripped of help from on high? Instead of rather appeasing God with supplication and perseverance, he leaps away and increases the practices of apostasy. He commanded his servants to seek a woman who was a ventriloquist, so that he might go to her and inquire as at an oracle. And when the worst of his servants at once informed him of … the frenzied woman, Saul, without a thought, disguised himself and changed the garments he wore and went off at a run, leaving the army; and when he came to her by night with two men, he made his request to her, saying: “Divine for me by the ventriloquist spirit; bring up for me,” he says, “whomever I tell you.” So if Saul begged to divine through the ventriloquist, would anyone say her utterances were true? Is there anyone who does not know that he was driven by the demon with savage passions, having turned aside to incurable divinations and to the devilish workings of fables? For what? Is not God more trustworthy, who put the words into Balaam's mouth and allowed Moses to write expressly in Numbers: “For there is no augury in Jacob …”? Since such things have been forbidden, as loathsome abominations and causes of the most hateful idolatry, how could the witness be reliable who tried to use them most unholily? But we shall take this up again a little later and speak of it more fully; now we must return to the narrative of the text.

So when the woman saw the senseless Saul, she pretended not to know the ruler, and said, as he himself would know better, how much Saul had done to those skilled in these terrible arts, how he had destroyed the ventriloquists and the soothsayers from the land; and for this reason, she said, her soul was being snared by him to death. But when, pledging with an oath, he assured her that she would suffer nothing harmful, the wickedness took courage again, and the woman answers, of course, more boldly: “Whom,” she says, “shall I bring up for you?” Of what sort and what kind was this ill-starred old woman, that she should promise to bring up Samuel from the dead? Indeed, if one must speak setting aside his dignity, she could not bring up not only a prophet's soul, but not even the soul of any ordinary person at all, no, not even of an ant. For demons do not have authority over spirits and souls; God, who rules over all alike, has it; so that it must be granted to the divine nature alone to summon souls from Hades and call them back again. But the clever Origen, wishing to graft instruments of idolatry and inventions of necromancy onto the choir of the church, falsifies the divine text. For when Scripture itself cries out openly, “The woman said: Whom shall I bring up for you?”, he, turning it to the opposite, said that it was the person of the Holy Spirit that said these words. Then he was carried so far astray that he does not blush to ascribe to the Holy Spirit the words of the possessed woman; and blaspheming such things with a barer tongue, he refers the whole thing to the Holy Spirit, trying to win over his hearers with a show of trustworthiness. The woman asked, then, as I said, as though she had the authority to summon the dead, “Whom shall I bring up for you?”; and when the inquirer said that Samuel should be brought up, it goes on: “And the woman saw Samuel,” it says, “and cried out with a loud voice, and said to the ruler: Why have you deceived me? And you are Saul.” When the king said to her, “Do not fear,” and added, “What have you seen?”, the pythoness answered in turn: “I have seen gods coming up from the earth.” And when he finally asked, “What did you perceive?”, at once she replied: “A man standing upright, coming up from the earth; and he is wrapped in a double cloak.” What, then, does the divine Scripture declare after this? “And he knew that this was Samuel, and he bowed with his face to the ground and did obeisance to him.” It appears, then, that nowhere at all did the sense of the divine text say that Samuel was brought up through the ventriloquist; but she herself first, through the demon that raved in her, declares that she must bring him up; then, boasting that she sees gods coming up, she gave by deceit the signs of the man as a snare; and the crazed Saul, from what he heard, recognized that this was Samuel himself.

… as to one who had accurately attained a true apprehension of knowledge, or to a demon boasting and promising to summon the souls of the righteous from Hades, let us judge among ourselves how full of blasphemy it would be to think these and such things, most excellent Eutropius. For Origen, it seems, has strayed far from the truth, although our Master Jesus Christ said expressly of the devil: “And he does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks the lie, he speaks from his own, for he is a liar and its father.” What then do you say, Origen? For I must ask you whether what the Saviour said is true, or whether you will retort the opposite. If the Lord's words are true, as is customary, then the demon lied in his boldness; if you lay down that the demon's words are free of falsehood, you attempt to make out the Lord a liar. Do you see into what absurdity the rule you lay down has fallen? For although demons are sometimes forced to tell the truth when racked by torments, they would not willingly say anything without falsehood. And if anyone lays down off-hand that this one must bring up even the righteous from Hades, how would it not be clear that he brings in the lie in exchange by deceit, wishing to throw someone headlong? “Yes,” he says, “but it was not the demon who said this, but the narrative voice of the writer; and the writer of the words is believed to be the Holy Spirit, not a man.” Then does he not notice how he shows things contrary to the sense of the narrative? Those who have dealt at leisure with every kind of literature know better that the narrative voice of the writer reported what the ventriloquist seemed to do or say to Saul, who was consulting her. Indeed, the writer, relating her story and setting out her words word for word, said: “And the woman said: Whom shall I bring up for you?” Who is so simple as to pretend not to understand that these are not the writer's words but those of the demon-possessed woman? And indeed, if one must speak as a lover of truth, the narrative said only this, that “the woman saw Samuel”; and it wrote this as speaking to those who knew it was speaking of a possessed woman. For there is no disputing that a demon brings up no one's soul, since, when commanded by godly men, it is driven out, burned, scourged, and flees, abandoning its dwelling; but the crazed woman saw what suited her, the shape of an imagined vision. For the beast is accustomed to change its forms; and, to speak with the holy Paul, I would say: “For Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.” It is no great thing, then, if in his discussion he set down this passage too, thinking by it to rule out those who bring in the truth against him, but, seeming to refute it with lack of art rather than with art …

“And why,” he says, “is it not said, ‘The woman saw a demon which pretended to be Samuel’? But it has been written,” he says, besides this, “‘He knew that it was Samuel.’” Then he goes on again: “If it was not Samuel, it ought to have been written: ‘And he thought it was Samuel’; but now it is written”—and no one knew what was not—“‘He knew, then, that it was Samuel. He fell on his face to the ground and did obeisance to him.’” But so that I may not be drawn aside to his other examples, I will put my question here, from what he himself wrote, and then go on to his other examples. Tell me, before God, what do you say, Origen: did the woman bring up Samuel with his body, or wrapped in the shape of a shadowy outline? If she brought him up bodiless, then she did not raise Samuel, but the appearance of a spirit; for Samuel the man is the one composed of soul and body, who has a proportioned blend of both. But if she brought up the man himself with his body, how did Saul not see him? For if he had seen him with his own eyes, he would not have questioned the woman as though he could not see, saying in so many words, “What have you seen?” So if he was invisible, he was beyond doubt bodiless; but if he appeared in a shape, why did the pythoness say the opposite, that she had seen a man standing upright, coming up out of the earth, wrapped in a double cloak according to his former custom? So the very facts fight against your words, Origen. Saul, seeing nothing at all, asked as one speaking of an invisible phantom, saying, “What have you seen?”; she, on the contrary, cried out as one who had seen a man himself: “See, one standing upright coming up out of the earth”; and to persuade him that he himself was a man, she gives him a sign as well, adding: “And he is wrapped in a double cloak.” Why then, you advocate of unlawful divination, if he was a man, did Saul not see him? Unless you would say that he was blind in his bodily eye too, just as indeed in the eye of his understanding …

But perhaps, caught easily, you will say: “The very vehicle of the soul took on a human shape at that hour, so that, appearing, it might declare the future by prophetic disclosure, as sometimes in sleep spirits and souls appear to men in every way, showing human features, and indeed wearing various and many-coloured garments and bearing the marks of scars or blows or bruises, and of strokes or wounds.” If, then, you lay down that only a soul was brought up, and not a man with his body (for the text does not grant you that, even if you wish it), do you not perceive that you are pronouncing things that fight with themselves? Someone will retort this against you: Why did the woman not say, “I saw a prophetic soul,” but on the contrary, “a man standing upright”? For in the way you put it, why, you say, is it not said, “The woman saw a demon which pretended to be Samuel”? To this argument I in turn would reply: Why, if a soul was brought up, did she not say she had seen a soul, if that was the case, but on the contrary a man, and an upright one, which is the mark of bodily vigour? For the maddened woman did not say she saw a bent and stooping old man, but an upright one, erect, straightened, ever youthful for war in the outpourings of wickedness; and enticing the senseless man by deceit, she persuaded him by a sign that the one coming up from the earth was a man, and showed him wrapped in a cloak. Why then (someone might say), if a man was emerging with his body, would Saul not have seen him, but wants to learn from another what he is like, as though struck with blindness? So the facts themselves cry out that it was not a man, but, it seems, some unseen shadow; for otherwise it would not have been invisible. And if you think, Origen, that the soul of Samuel was there, why was the apparition seen wrapped in a double cloak? It is shown by a clear sign that all garments and coverings of clothing suit bodies rather than souls. For I do not think you will say, joking with pretence, that the double cloak remained in the tomb for so many years until that day, so that the prophet's soul might wear it and not go about naked; and yet one might say, as no one seems not to know, that the saints have incorruptible garments from heaven, shining with gleaming radiance, not woven clothes of varied colours. But if you lay down that what was seen was the soul of Samuel, and say that the garment was seen in a spiritual sense, so that the manner of his priestly ministry might be made plain (both of these being proper to intelligible things), it follows that the maddened woman reported nothing sound and nothing true. For she spoke of things other than what was, applying the names of sensible things and pointing to intelligible things. So, calling it an upright man, and its covering a woven, hand-made garment, though invisible, she brought in the opposite …

Tell me then, most excellent dogmatist, how did Saul know that this was Samuel himself, when he saw not even a fragment of a shadow, let alone the form of a man? But you do not blush to have said: “It ought to have been written, ‘And he thought it was Samuel’; but now it is written, ‘Saul knew.’” Then you keep saying, up and down, that the demon-driven man knew, having heard it from a demon-possessed woman; but that he saw nothing at all, you hide the text in silence, nowhere giving the refutation, thinking to deceive simple people and to raise an invention of divination like a fortress against everyone. For the knowledge of the demon-driven man was worthy of the proclamation of her who supplied him with the words. But you might say that he knew by knowledge and understanding, without seeing, and did not merely suppose. Yet every man who receives a thing by hearing rather than by sight supposes and thinks, not knowing the certainty, especially if he hears it from a person possessed by a demon; for only the words of God are confirmed for exact apprehension and firmness of faith. Indeed, if the psalmist said of men, “I said in my ecstasy: Every man is a liar,” how much more if someone tells of a frenzied woman? Then you say that “no one knew what was not”, as though talking straight to boys. Tell me then, how did he know what was, if he himself did not see it, but asked; seeing not the upright man, not the ephod he wore, not the high-priestly robe, but seeing nothing from anywhere, he was fanned up by empty words, just as you too with light talk give wings to the unstable? But the historian, putting first the name “ventriloquist”, first showed what kind the person was, a frenzied one; and then in this way he described her as having seen the vision, as befits those who think rightly about understanding; for no one would suppose that a person out of her wits sees what she ought. In the same way he said that the senseless Saul “knew”, as would be fitting to think of a madman, who for so many cycles of years was bitterly driven by the demon.

But that this is how things stand, the facts themselves cry out clearly. And so that I may establish the like from another example too, let us bring forward the story of the prophet Elijah, when they agreed that the side of each should be tested in a sacrifice, that no one should apply fire, but that the coming of fire should be brought on by prayers, so that the God who could hear all might send fire in flame from heaven out of the boasted height, and from this the authority of the stronger might be discerned and the better be plain to all. When he ordered those men to perform first, they chose a bullock and cut it in pieces as an offering of the one called Baal, and achieved nothing at all, but even cut themselves according to their custom with knives and lances, it says, until their blood poured out. Then, after this, the narrative voice of the writer adds: “And they prophesied until evening.” Since, then, the text does not say whether they prophesied truly or falsely, would anyone say from this that they were true prophets? For according to Origen's pronouncement it ought to have said, “They prophesied, as they thought, in appearance, saying nothing true” (since it is not lawful for foreknowledge to dwell among them), and not, in unqualified and plain words, “And they prophesied until evening.” So one may see consistently from the same narrative of the text that this befits them; for if the writer of both is the same, he leads the mind alike from both. But just as here, putting first the name of the idolaters, he showed by implication that one must take them to be false prophets lacking foreknowledge, so there too, putting first persons possessed by demons and the dramas of unlawful divination, he indicated by silence what the sane should think about the senseless.

But if I were to bring forward such witnesses, time would perhaps fail me as I spoke; so, setting out one more image as an example, I begin. In the text of Exodus, then, we learn how the Lord himself commanded Moses and Aaron to throw the rod on the ground before Pharaoh, so that, changing its shape before their eyes, it might strike the Egyptians with a fearful sign. When this happened wondrously, the ruler in his folly summoned together the wise men and the sorcerers of Egypt: “And the enchanters of the Egyptians also did likewise with their sorceries,” it says, “and each threw down his rod, and they became serpents; and the rod of Aaron swallowed up their rods.” It is further reported that the enchanters of the Egyptians made blood and frogs likewise. Since, then, the narrative voice does not here distinguish the ranks of each side either, but said that the enchanters too did likewise, would you say from this that what was done by the sorcerers is like what came about through Moses? Not at all, one would say; it would not even be lawful to say that works of curious and magical art are made equal to heavenly signs. Whatever was done through Moses displayed the truth from the deeds; whatever was contrived by the enchanters made the eyes imagine an appearance; for the lie brought its own complete refutation from its impotence. Otherwise how did the one rod suddenly swallow up those many? Nor is it lawful to think that they could make living rods out of lifeless ones all at once; for those able to animate dead wood would perhaps be better than us; and perhaps Moses would have done nothing marvellous if he worked things like these. And how is it not right to show their impotence from the very account of Scripture? For if God, punishing the Egyptians, commanded all the streams of the waters to be changed into blood as a penalty, and if they, tormented by such plagues, changed the channels likewise into the appearance of blood, contriving to increase the suffering, for what reason do they ask and beg, pressed by thirst, that the waters throughout all Egypt be cleansed of the bloody mixture? Or again, seeing suddenly frogs without number, why, while begging to be rid of their swarms, did they fashion others, unless they cared nothing for those that appeared in shadow and the form of fancy, but were terribly harmed by those shown in reality? For no one would choose to add another countless multitude to an enemy multitude, instead of enlisting newly recruited bodyguards as allies; nor to rouse fever upon fever while longing to be rid of the first; nor does one scourged by the force of unbearable blows bring other blows upon himself while pleading with pure longing, embassy, and prayer to be released from them; nor does one whose house is burning, instead of instruments for quenching, pour on oil, raising the flame to measureless height and increasing the disaster as it burns, tastelessly watering fire with fire. So by the very things the sorcerers were eager to do, by these they thought they had to show themselves plainly. It is easy to see from this that even now the jugglers in the theatres do many more and greater things than these; and yet, though these men were plainly caught by an improvised power, nonetheless the narrative voice writes: “And the enchanters of the Egyptians did likewise with their sorceries.” It ought, then, as the dogmatist Origen has legislated, to have said: “The enchanters of the Egyptians did those things,” but not to say “likewise”, lest some should suppose that they set out from a like power. For if they were able to do things like those of Moses' company, they could likewise have warded off their opponents by equal means, so that the contests on each side would be evenly matched; but if not, then the workings of lifeless fancy are evident. Just so here too, the writer, putting first the name “enchanters” and the practices of sorcery, shows that one must not dispute at all that each of these magical things was done by the magicians through curious art; and such too are the dramas recorded in this narrative. For by naming her a ventriloquist, and then exposing the inventions of divination and showing that the one divining was the person of a demoniac, he made it plain by itself that these things are to be understood by us in this way.