The Witch of Endor

Endor (village)

Endor was a Canaanite city which is listed in the Book of Joshua as one of the cities with its dependencies that the Israelites failed to dispossess. It is located between the Hill of Moreh and Mount Tabor in the Jezreel Valley....

, sometimes called the Medium

Mediumship

Mediumship is described as a form of communication with spirits. It is a practice in religious beliefs such as Spiritualism, Spiritism, Espiritismo, Candomblé, Voodoo and Umbanda.- Concept :...

 of Endor, was a woman who called up the ghost

Ghost

In traditional belief and fiction, a ghost is the soul or spirit of a deceased person or animal that can appear, in visible form or other manifestation, to the living. Descriptions of the apparition of ghosts vary widely from an invisible presence to translucent or barely visible wispy shapes, to...

 of the recently deceased prophet

Prophet

In religion, a prophet, from the Greek word προφήτης profitis meaning "foreteller", is an individual who is claimed to have been contacted by the supernatural or the divine, and serves as an intermediary with humanity, delivering this newfound knowledge from the supernatural entity to other people...

 Samuel, at the demand of King Saul

Saul the King

According to the Bible, Saul was the first king of the united Kingdom of Israel. He was anointed by the prophet Samuel and reigned from Gibeah. He commited suicide to avoid arrest in the battle against the Philistines at Mount Gilboa, during which three of his sons were also killed...

 of the Kingdom of Israel in the First Book of Samuel

Books of Samuel

The Books of Samuel in the Jewish bible are part of the Former Prophets, , a theological history of the Israelites affirming and explaining the Torah under the guidance of the prophets.Samuel begins by telling how the prophet Samuel is chosen by...

, chapter . The witch is absent from the version of that event recounted in the deuterocanonical

Deuterocanonical books

Deuterocanonical books is a term used since the sixteenth century in the Catholic Church and Eastern Christianity to describe certain books and passages of the Christian Old Testament that are not part of the Hebrew Bible. The term is used in contrast to the protocanonical books, which are...

 Book of Sirach

Sirach

The Book of the All-Virtuous Wisdom of Jesus ben Sira , commonly called the Wisdom of Sirach or simply Sirach, and also known as Ecclesiasticus or Siracides , is a work from the early 2nd century B.C. written by the Jewish scribe Jesus ben Sirach of Jerusalem...

 (46:19–20).

Story

After Samuel's death and burial with due mourning ceremonies in Ramah

Ramathaim-Zophim

Ramathaim-Zophim , also called Ramah and Ramatha in the Douay-Rheims, is a town that has been identified with the modern Neby Samwil , about 4 or 5 miles north-west of Jerusalem...

, Saul had driven all necromancers and magicians from Israel. Then, in a bitter irony, Saul sought out a witch, anonymously and in disguise, only after he received no answer from God from dream

Dream

Dreams are successions of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that occur involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep. The content and purpose of dreams are not definitively understood, though they have been a topic of scientific speculation, philosophical intrigue and religious...

s, prophets, or the Urim and Thummim

Urim and Thummim

In ancient Israelite religion and culture, Urim and Thummim is a phrase from the Hebrew Scriptures or Torah associated with the Hoshen , divination in general, and cleromancy in particular...

 as to his best course of action against the assembled forces of the Philistines

Philistines

Philistines , Pleshet or Peleset, were a people who occupied the southern coast of Canaan at the beginning of the Iron Age . According to the Bible, they ruled the five city-states of Gaza, Askelon, Ashdod, Ekron and Gath, from the Wadi Gaza in the south to the Yarqon River in the north, but with...

. Following the orders of the king, the woman summons the ghost of Samuel from the abode of the dead, to give him advice. This, however, is not given. After complaining of being awakened from his long sleep, the prophet's ghost berates him for disobeying God, and predicts Saul's downfall, with his whole army, in battle the next day, and adds that Saul and his sons will join him, then, in the abode of the dead. Saul is shocked and afraid, and the next day the army is defeated and Saul commits suicide after being wounded.

The woman is described as "a woman with an ob" (אוֹב, a wineskin) in Hebrew, which may be a reference to ventriloquism, and claims to see "elohim

Elohim

Elohim is a grammatically singular or plural noun for "god" or "gods" in both modern and ancient Hebrew language. When used with singular verbs and adjectives elohim is usually singular, "god" or especially, the God. When used with plural verbs and adjectives elohim is usually plural, "gods" or...

 arising" (plural verb) from the ground.

The prophecy of Samuel's "ghost" is largely a verbatim repeat of the public words of Samuel when he was alive, in 1 Samuel 15. The exception is the prediction that Saul will die "tomorrow." However, if the events of chapters 28-31 are given in chronological order, then allowing time for the movements of David's troops from Jezreel to Ziklag

Ziklag

Ziklag is the Biblical name of a town that was located in the Negev region in the south of what was the Kingdom of Judah.-Identification:The exact location of Ziklag has not been identified with any certainty....

 implies that Saul did not die for another three or four days after the seance at Endor. As such, the only information added by the seance was incorrect in a literal sense.

Interpretations

Judaism

In the Septuagint (2C BCE) the woman is described as a "ventriloquist", possibly reflecting the consistent view of the Alexandrian translators concerning "demons... which exist not". However Josephus

Josephus

Titus Flavius Josephus , also called Joseph ben Matityahu , was a 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian and hagiographer of priestly and royal ancestry who recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the 1st century AD and the First Jewish–Roman War, which resulted in the Destruction of...

 (1st C) appears to find the story completetely credible (Antiquities of the Jews

Antiquities of the Jews

Antiquities of the Jews is a twenty volume historiographical work composed by the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus in the thirteenth year of the reign of Roman emperor Flavius Domitian which was around 93 or 94 AD. Antiquities of the Jews contains an account of history of the Jewish people,...

6,14).

The Yalkut Shimoni

Yalkut Shimoni

The Yalkut Shimoni or simply Yalkut is an aggadic compilation on the books of the Hebrew Bible. From such older haggadot as were accessible to him, the author collected various interpretations and explanations of Biblical passages, and arranged these according to the sequence of those portions of...

 (11th C) identifies the anonymous witch as the mother of Abner. and based upon the witch's claim to have seen something, and Saul having heard a disembodied voice, also infers that necromancers are able to see the spirits of the dead but are unable to hear their speech, while the person for whom the person was summoned hears the voice but fails to see anything.

Christianity

The Church Fathers

Church Fathers

The Church Fathers, Early Church Fathers, Christian Fathers, or Fathers of the Church were early and influential theologians, eminent Christian teachers and great bishops. Their scholarly works were used as a precedent for centuries to come...

 and some modern Christian writers have debated the theological

Theology

Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

 issues raised by this text, however. Taking certain biblical text out of context, the story of King Saul and the Witch of Endor would appear to affirm that it is possible for humans to summon the spirits of the dead by magic

Magic (paranormal)

Magic is the claimed art of manipulating aspects of reality either by supernatural means or through knowledge of occult laws unknown to science. It is in contrast to science, in that science does not accept anything not subject to either direct or indirect observation, and subject to logical...

. The modern Christian author Hank Hanegraaff

Hank Hanegraaff

Hendrik "Hank" Hanegraaff also known as the Bible Answer Man is an American author, radio talk-show host and advocate of evangelical Christianity. He was born in the Netherlands and raised in the United States since childhood. He is married with 12 children...

 argues that although it is impossible for humans to summon the dead, Samuel did appear before Saul and the witch by a sovereign act of God. Hanegraaff interprets the passage to mean that the witch was surprised by these events.

Medieval glosses to the Bible

Glosses to the Bible

Biblical scholars use the word glossa or gloss, in connexion with glosses of Biblical texts. A gloss meant an explanation of a purely verbal difficulty of the text, to the exclusion of explanations required by doctrinal, ritual, historical, and other obscurities...

 suggested that what the witch actually summoned was not the ghost of Samuel, but a demon

Demon

call - 1347 531 7769 for more infoIn Ancient Near Eastern religions as well as in the Abrahamic traditions, including ancient and medieval Christian demonology, a demon is considered an "unclean spirit" which may cause demonic possession, to be addressed with an act of exorcism...

 taking his shape. Martin Luther

Martin Luther

Martin Luther was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation. He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517...

, who believed that the dead were unconscious, read that it was "the Devil's ghost", whereas John Calvin

John Calvin

John Calvin was an influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530...

, who did believe in the immortal soul, read that "it was not the real Samuel, but a spectre."

Mortalist denominations such as Seventh-day Adventists

Seventh-day Adventist Church

The Seventh-day Adventist Church is a Protestant Christian denomination distinguished by its observance of Saturday, the original seventh day of the Judeo-Christian week, as the Sabbath, and by its emphasis on the imminent second coming of Jesus Christ...

 generally teach that the story is but one example of ancient witchcraft or sorcery in the bible, which is founded on an unholy belief that people can communicate with the dead. Adventists believe that the bible teaches repeatedly, but most specifically in Ecclessiastes 9:5,6, "For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in any thing that is done under the sun." Seventh-day Adventists believe that communication with the dead is a form of magic, divination, sorcery, necromancy, and spiritualism which are all condemned in scripture. Adventists assert that since the scriptures teach that the dead know not anything, Saul was not communicating with the prophet Samuel, but with Satan.

The story can be seen as a satire on Saul. Once Saul was the righteous king who upheld God's law

Religious law

In some religions, law can be thought of as the ordering principle of reality; knowledge as revealed by a God defining and governing all human affairs. Law, in the religious sense, also includes codes of ethics and morality which are upheld and required by the God...

 by his sword; having fallen from God's favour due to a lack of obedience, he chose to participate in forbidden rituals. The spirit representing Samuel gives Saul no counsel, but only preys on Saul's fears and predicts Saul's doom.

In popular culture

The witch appears in oratorios

Oratórios

Oratórios is a Brazilian municipality located in the state of Minas Gerais. The city belongs to the mesoregion of Zona da Mata and to the microregion of Ponte Nova.-See also:* List of municipalities in Minas Gerais...

: Mors Saulis et Jonathae (c.1682) by Charpentier

Marc-Antoine Charpentier

Marc-Antoine Charpentier, , was a French composer of the Baroque era.Exceptionally prolific and versatile, he produced compositions of the highest quality in several genres...

, In Guilty Night (Saul and the Witch of Endor) (1691) by Henry Purcell

Henry Purcell

Henry Purcell – 21 November 1695), was an English organist and Baroque composer of secular and sacred music. Although Purcell incorporated Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, his legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music...

, and Saul

Saul (Handel)

Saul is an oratorio in three acts written by George Frideric Handel with a libretto by Charles Jennens. Taken from the 1st Book of Samuel, the story of Saul focuses on the first king of Israel’s relationship with his eventual successor, David; one which turns from admiration to envy and hatred,...

(1738) by Handel

HANDEL

HANDEL was the code-name for the UK's National Attack Warning System in the Cold War. It consisted of a small console consisting of two microphones, lights and gauges. The reason behind this was to provide a back-up if anything failed....

 on the death of Saul.

A year after the death of his son at Loos, Rudyard Kipling

Rudyard Kipling

Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...

 wrote a poem called En-Dor (1916), about communicating with the dead

Séance

A séance is an attempt to communicate with spirits. The word "séance" comes from the French word for "seat," "session" or "sitting," from the Old French "seoir," "to sit." In French, the word's meaning is quite general: one may, for example, speak of "une séance de cinéma"...

. It concludes,
A British cutter with the name The Witch of Endor is commandeered by Captain Horatio Hornblower during his escape from France in Flying Colours (1938), a novel by C.S. Forester set in the Napoleonic Wars

Napoleonic Wars

The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...

.

The poet Howard Nemerov

Howard Nemerov

Howard Nemerov was an American poet. He was twice appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 1963 to 1964, and again from 1988 to 1990. He received the National Book Award, Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, and Bollingen Prize for The Collected Poems of Howard Nemerov...

 wrote a one act drama entitled "Endor" (1961) in which Saul visits the Witch of Endor.

A Halloween fortune-telling game called "The Witch of Endor", was made by the Naumkeag Games Co. of Salem Mass, in the 1920s.

The mother of the witch Samantha on the TV sitcom Bewitched

Bewitched

Bewitched is an American situation comedy originally broadcast for eight seasons on ABC from 1964 to 1972, starring Elizabeth Montgomery, Dick York and Dick Sargent , Agnes Moorehead, and David White. The show is about a witch who marries a mortal and tries to lead the life of a typical suburban...

 was named Endora.

In the book series The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel

The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel

The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel will be a series of six fantasy novels written by Irish author Michael Scott when complete. Completion is due to be in 2012. The first book in the series, The Alchemyst was released in 2007, the sequels are scheduled to follow at the rate of one per year,...

, the Witch of Endor is a secondary character.

External links

• Medium of Endor: From the Jewish Encyclopedia
  Jewish Encyclopedia
  The Jewish Encyclopedia is an encyclopedia originally published in New York between 1901 and 1906 by Funk and Wagnalls. It contained over 15,000 articles in 12 volumes on the history and then-current state of Judaism and the Jews as of 1901...