פרשת וארא - האם פועלים כשפים?

(11) Then Pharaoh, for his part, summoned the sages and the sorcerers; and the Egyptian magician-priests, in turn, did the same with their spells:

Rabbi Aivu bar Nagri says that Rabbi Ḥiyya bar Abba says that in the verse: “And the magicians of Egypt did in that manner with their secret arts [belateihem]” (Exodus 7:22), these words are describing acts of employing demons, which are invisible, and their actions are therefore hidden [balat]. With regard to the similar term “belahateihem” (Exodus 7:11), these are acts of sorcery, which sorcerers perform themselves, without using demons. And likewise it says: “And the flaming [lahat] sword that turned every way” (Genesis 3:24), referring to a sword that revolves by itself.

(1) He prohibited us from doing actions chosen by astrology. And that is that one say, "This day is good for deed x and proper for its doing"; or "This day is foreboding regarding doing deed y, and we should distance ourselves from doing it." And that is His, may He be exalted, saying, "Let no one be found among you who [...] is an augur" (Deuteronomy 18:10). And this prohibition has already been repeated: He said, "you shall not practice augury (Leviticus 19:26)." And the language of the Sifra (Sifra, Kedoshim, Chapter 6:2) is, "'You shall not practice augury (teonenenu)' - these are those who assign a time (onah)." For the expression is rooted in [the term], onah - meaning to say, "Let no one be found among you who [...] is an augur" - who says, "Time x is good, and time y is bad." And one who transgresses this negative commandment is liable for lashes - meaning the one who proclaims these times, not the one who asks about them. However the asking is also forbidden, in addition to it being something that lacks truth. And one who calculates his action to [be at] a certain time with the intention that it be successful or that the action benefit him is to be lashed [as well], because he did an action. And included in this prohibition is also the forbidding of the acts of magicians. And the language of the Sages (Sanhedrin 65b) is, "An augur - these are those who fool the eyes." And this is a large category of machination connected to sleight of hand to the point that it appears to people that one is doing things, though there is no truth to them, such as we always see: They take a rope and place it into the corner of their garments and take it out as a snake; one throws a ring into the air and then takes it out from the mouth of one of those standing before him; and actions similar to this from the magic acts famous among the masses. Each one of these acts is forbidden; and one who does this is called one who fools the eyes. And it is a type of magic, so he is lashed. Moreover, he deceives people; and the damage that comes out of this is great. For showing the actualization of things that are impossible as [if they were] possible - when with fools, women and children - is very bad. It damages their intellect and brings them to believe that the impossible can actually be. And understand this. (See Parashat Shoftim; Mishneh Torah, Foreign Worship and Customs of the Nations 11.)

All the above matters are falsehood and lies with which the original idolaters deceived the gentile nations in order to lead them after them. It is not fitting for the Jews who are wise sages to be drawn into such emptiness, nor to consider that they have any value as [implied by Numbers 23:23]: "No black magic can be found among Jacob, or occult arts within Israel." Similarly, [Deuteronomy 18:14] states: "These nations which you are driving out listen to astrologers and diviners. This is not [what God... has granted] you."Whoever believes in [occult arts] of this nature and, in his heart, thinks that they are true and words of wisdom, but are forbidden by the Torah, is foolish and feebleminded. He is considered like women and children who have underdeveloped intellects.The masters of wisdom and those of perfect knowledge know with clear proof that all these crafts which the Torah forbade are not reflections of wisdom, but rather, emptiness and vanity which attracted the feebleminded and caused them to abandon all the paths of truth. For these reasons, when the Torah warned against all these empty matters, it advised [Deuteronomy 18:13]: "Be of perfect faith with God, your Lord."

(1) THE precepts of the second class are those which we have enumerated in the section “On idolatry.” It is doubtless that they all tend to save man from the error of idolatry and the evil practices connected with it; e.g., observing the times, enchantment, witchcraft, incantation, consulting with familiar spirits, and the like. When you read the books which I mentioned to you. you will find that witchcraft, which will be described to you, is part of the customs of the Sabeans, Kasdim, Chaldeans, and to a higher degree of the Egyptians and Canaanites. They caused others to believe, or they themselves believed, that by means of these arts they would perform wonderful things in reference to an individual person, or to the inhabitants of a whole country, although no analogy and no reasoning can discover any relation between these performances of the witches and the promised result. Thus they are careful to collect certain plants at a particular time, and to take a definite number of certain objects. There are many things comprised by witchcraft; they may be divided into three classes: first, witchcraft connected with objects in Nature, viz., plants, animals, or minerals. Secondly, witchcraft dependent for its performance on a certain time; and thirdly, witchcraft dependent on the performance of certain acts of man, such as dancing, clapping, laughing, jumping with one leg, lying on the ground with the face upward, burning a thing, fumigating with a certain material, or speaking intelligible or unintelligible words. These are the various kinds of witchcraft.

(2) In some cases all these various performances are required. Thus the witches sometimes order: take a leaf of a certain plant, when the moon is seen in a certain degree [of the Zodiac] in the east point or in one of the other cardinal points [of the horizon], also a certain quantity of the horn, the sweat, the hair and the blood of a certain animal when the sun is, e.g., in the middle of the sky, or in some other definite place; and a portion of a certain mineral or minerals, melted at a certain conjunction of sun and moon, and at a definite position of the stars; speak then, and say certain words, and fumigate with those leaves or similar ones to that molten image, and such and such a thing will happen. In other instances of witchcraft it is assumed that one of the above performances suffices. In most cases the condition is added that women must perform these actions. Thus it is stated in reference to the means of obtaining rain, that ten virgins dressed with diadems and red garments should dance, push each other, moving backwards and forwards, and make signs to the sun: the result of this long process was believed [by the idolaters] to be a downpour of rain.

(3) It is further stated that if four women lay on their back, with their feet spread and lifted up, said certain words and did certain things whilst in this disgraceful position, hail would discontinue coming down in that place. The number of these stupid and mad things is great; in all of them without exception women are required to be the agent. Witchcraft is intimately connected with astrology; those that practise it assign each plant, animal, or mineral to a certain star, and believe that the above processes of witchcraft are different forms of worship offered to that star, which is pleased with that act, word, or offering of incense, and fulfils their wishes.

AND THEY ALSO, THE MAGICIANS OF EGYPT, DID IN LIKE MANNER ‘B’LAHATEIHEM’ (WITH THEIR SECRET ARTS). Our Rabbis have said that these are deeds of sorcerers who perform their arts through angels of destruction, the word b’lahateihem being derived from the expressions: eish loheit (flaming fire); the flame ‘t’laheit’ (burned up) the wicked. The purport [of the saying of the Sages] is that these deeds of sorcery are done by means of “the flaming ones,” angels of a fire that burns in man, and he does not know that the fire burns in him and pays no attention to it. It is similar in sense to the expression, “And the Eternal opened the eyes of the young man of Elisha, and behold there were horses of fire and chariots of fire.” Perhaps these are identical with the angels that dwell in the atmosphere of the spheres of the [four] elements, which are called sarim (lords). I will explain this theme again [in the Book of Leviticus 17:7] with the help of the Rock.But the word b’lateihem, [mentioned further in 8:3 — And the magicians did in like manner ‘b’lateihem’] — is explained [by the Rabbis] as meaning sheidim (demons) — the word being derived from the Hebrew word lat (secret): Speak with David ‘balat’ (secretly) — since the demons come quietly inasmuch as they are ethereal bodies whose presence is not felt. This is why Scripture states [in Verse 11 before us] that Pharaoh called for the wise men and the sorcerers, for the wise men who knew [the art of] incanting and assembling the demons were the leaders and elders of the Egyptians.The term chartumei mitzrayim (the magicians of Egypt) includes both of them, [i.e., the wise men and the sorcerers]. We do not know the root of the word chartumei. Now Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra says that it is either an Egyptian or Chaldean word since we find it only mentioned in their accounts. The more likely explanation is that of Rashi, who said that it is an Aramaic compound-word: char tami (those who excite themselves by means of the bones [of the dead]). It is known that the greater part of this craft is one with the bones of dead persons or the bones of animals, just as they mentioned in the case of the yid’oni.

(1) And this is the context within which they (OBM) expounded (Chullin 7b) on the verse “that God-YHV”H is the God-Elohi”m, there is none other than Him” (D’varim 4:39): “Rabbee Chaneena stated: even sorceries.” For the entire context for acts of sorcery is drawn from the powers of impurity of the impure Vehicle, and that is the matter of the wisdom of sorcery about which the members of the Sanhedrin were required to have intimate knowledge, namely: 1. the wisdom relating to the names of impurity, and 2. the knowledge of the contexts of the powers of the impure Vehicle, and 3. their names by which the masters of sorcery perform acts, and 4. other various contexts, as when they bind the powers of impurity using the aspect of good within it, to infuse within it a vitality to perform supernatural acts opposite to the order of the natural powers and guiding powers. Refer to the Etz Chayyim, Sha-ar Kleepaht Noga, at the beginning of chapter 4 [for more detail].

(2) As a result that the Creator, Master of All (blessed be He) determined that the context of their powers be higher than the natural powers that are drawn from the astronomical entities and the guiding powers, because of that it is in their power to do actions even opposite to the natural powers of the “astronomical entities and guiding powers” assigned to them at the time of creation. As is well known, the Creator (blessed be He) set within each power and world the power and ability to govern and direct the power and world below it, to anywhere it will have the spirit-Ruakh… .

(3) And what they stated there—“that they contradict the heavenly retinue”—they intended to convey that the Creator permanently put into effect that the ability of the powers of impurity would be to subvert only the arrangement of powers of the retinue comprising the “astronomical entities and guiding powers”, but not that they should have the power to affect (heaven forefend) any of the holy actions of the powers of the holy Vehicle.

(4) And it’s truly the opposite situation, that when they are coerced using the names of the powers of holiness, specifically in that moment all of their activities are completely nullified, as is written in Tikkoon 18: “Those who know about the kleepote perform a coercion using the names and essential names for the Holy One (blessed be He) aimed at those kleepote and nullify the decree.” Refer to the Etz Chayyim, in the chapter mentioned above [for more details]. [This is so] because the power is not their own (heaven forefend), for there is no light other than His (blessed be He), Master of all the powers. And also that, truthfully, everything is permeated with just His simple essential unity (blessed be He), and nothing other than Him has any real power in any way, not the powers of impurity and not any power nor any world or creation in any way,. This is the meaning of what they stated: “There is none other than Him, even sorcery”.

(5) And this is what the Talmud relates there about this: “…how there was a certain woman who sought to collect the dirt [surreptitiously] from under Rabbee Chaneena’s feet. He said to her: ‘Collect—your effort will not succeed, for it is written “There is nothing but Him”’”.

(6) The text then makes an attempt to refute this assertion: “But Rabbee Yokhanan stated: ‘Why are they called sorceries? Because they contradict the heavenly retinue’—Rabbee Chaneena was different [from the norm], for he had a great degree of merit.” Certainly, he (Rabbee Chaneena) did not consider himself as having a great degree of merit by virtue of his Torah and his many good acts, with the result that because of them he was comfortable that acts of sorcery would have no effect on him. Rather the situation is as I described above, that in any case, in truth, the powers of the impure Vehicle don’t have any power of their own (heaven forbid). It’s rather that He (blessed be He) designated that their powers are above the natural powers of the astronomical entities and guiding powers, so that because of this it’s within their abilities to act, even also to change the natural order of the guiding powers. But without Him they are nil and nothingness.

(7) And for that reason even in the case of Rabbee Chaneena, it’s not that he relied on the merit of the holiness of his Torah or his [long history of] positive behaviors, but only that he intimately knew and measured in his soul-Neffesh, that this reliability was established in his heart/mind as being true: that other than Him (blessed be He) there is absolutely no other power at all. And he attached himself via the purity of his thoughts to the Master of All Powers, unique Lord who fills all worlds, and no other power here has any control, nor real power at all. For that reason, that his heart/mind was rightly certain about this—that actions of sorcery that drew on the powers of the impure Vehicle would have no control over him—this is why he stated: “Your effort will not succeed, for it is written ‘There is nothing but Him’”.

(8) And truthfully, this is a great matter and a wondrous treasure that takes him out of the realm of any other judgments and the desires of others, so that they can’t control him, nor make any impression at all. When a person fixes it in his heart/mind to state, that after all: • God-YHV”H is the true God-Elohi”m and there is no other power in the universe nor in all the worlds at all other than Him, and • Everything is filled only with His (blessed be His name) simple unity, and • He, in his heart/mind, completely nullifies all others, and does not attend to any power or will in the universe, and harnesses and adheres the purity of his thoughts only to the unique Lord (blessed is He), then He will make it happen for him, that in any case all of the powers and desires that are in the universe will be nullified from upon him, so that they are not able to affect him in any way at all.