Where’s the Line Between Science and Witchcraft?

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Where’s the Line Between Science and Witchcraft?

July 31, 2025

Questions about what qualifies as witchcraft, where the line is between witchcraft and science manipulating nature to accomplish things, whether the devil is omnipresent, and whether a demon can possess a location and affect the people at that location.

* What specifically qualifies as witchcraft, and where’s the line between witchcraft and science manipulating nature to accomplish things?

* Is the devil omnipresent?

* Can a demon possess a location and thereby affect the people who are at that location?

Transcript

Welcome, you are listening to Amy Hall and Greg Koukl on Stand to Reason's hashtag S-T-R-S-C-Podcast. And Greg, today, we're actually, we're going to continue a little bit along the lines of how we ended the last show. It was so long.

Alright, everybody got a bonus, so hopefully they liked that. Alright. Today, here's a question from Naele, and here's a question.

What specifically qualifies as witchcraft? Hypothetically, what would Dr. Frankenstein be classified as if he's trying to bring someone back from the dead or create new life? Where's the line between science and witchcraft? If it is intent, then what is the difference between the intent of which is trying to bring someone back to life using plant chemistry? And a group of scientists or doctors trying to do the same thing with using adrenaline to restart a heart or IVF to usher in new life? I think the important distinction here is not the issue of bringing someone back to life. Actually, that's not what's happening in Shelley's Frankenstein. Frankenstein, they were creating a life out of body parts, alright, and investing these combination of body parts with the Elon Vitale, the life force, you know.

And I think that whole piece by Shelley was about the dangers of industrialism and something like that, another issue. But notice there was no appeal to any dark hidden powers. The occult means hidden.

And what the occult is as a category is when you're seeking to draw on powers that are hidden, that are occult powers, dark powers, and characteristically biblically these powers, these hidden powers are not from God. They are demonic, alright. In the case of Frankenstein, this is more of a scientific enterprise, really.

Let's get a bunch of body parts together and see if we can shock it into being a living human, you know. And I've seen there was some other illustration that was given there about what doctors or scientists trying to create life or bring something back to life. I think this isn't occult because you're dealing with natural forces there, that's the attempt.

All of those are attempts to employ or draw upon natural forces that result in a kind of a resurrection of sorts. Now, the occult is much different. It's an appeal to some outside force, some hidden force, some dark force that will assist people in accomplishing a certain end.

You know, when Samuel, rather Saul, after Samuel had died, wanted to conjure Samuel, he went to the Witch of Endor to exercise occult powers to draw Samuel back from the dead, which was punishable by death. And he was the king who was trying to get this done. And it didn't go well for him, by the way, but in that particular case, it was a strange case where God allowed Samuel to return and deliver a judgment on Saul for what he had just done.

So I think that's the distinction. When you're trying to, maybe the simplest way of putting it, you're trying to draw on natural forces, that would be the scientific enterprise. And I even see Frankenstein in that category.

If you're trying to draw natural forces and harness them to create life, to extend life, to resuscitate life, that's not witchcraft. Witchcraft is an appeal to occultic forces, hidden forces that are not part of the metaphysically natural realm. It's basically turning to another power besides God in an attempt to manipulate the forces of the world or the spirits or whatever it is in order to give yourself power.

So it's a way of, it's basically idolatry too, because you are turning away from God and you're trying to gain that power for yourself by doing certain rituals or whatever it is. So yeah, I agree. In fact, if you are a scientist, the fact that you are depending on these natural laws and order in the universe, that actually depends on God.

Being the creator, and that's why the Christian worldview is what gave rise to science is because it was based on the idea that God created the world and the world is orderly and we can use what's in the world for good, but you're right, there's no call on any sort of spiritual force. However, I will also say, Lewis would say, and I can't remember now what the essay was, but he said that science and magic are twins. He actually saw ways that science and magic do, that people use them in a similar way, as a way to seek power, as a way to manipulate people.

I think he was talking more about scientism, so in that case, if it's scientism, the material world is the ultimate in the world and we're going to use those powers in the world to gain power for ourselves and manipulate other people. That's the similarity that Lewis saw. In fact, we mentioned in the last show about that hideous strength, and I think his view on that came out.

In fact, you have the people who thought they were using science and it turns out that they were actually doing something occult. So he did see kind of a kinship or at least the way people are using science, not inherently. Inherently, I don't think there's anything at all about science.

You're trying to learn natural forces, what are the inherent forces of nature, as it were, and harnessing them for some end. But they are, in a sense, the visible forces, the understandable forces, the non-personal forces, as opposed to the invisible occultic personal forces that one is drawing on to manipulate something in the natural realm. So his concern was about scientism and people who, they think science gives meaning because, of course, you can't get any meaning from science.

So if you have someone who uses science to either create meaning or to impose meaning on others, that this was all a problem for him. There's actually a book called The Magicians Twin. I think it might be essays, but John West is the editor.

It explores this idea. So if you're interested in seeing what Lewis said about that, I think there's even a documentary on YouTube, just look up The Magicians Twin and see what you find there. But I think that is all a misuse of science.

I don't think inherently it has any parallel to witchcraft. It's interesting, this connection that you said Lewis has found between science and magic. I'm not sure how that all plays out, but it reminded me that I many times will make the reference with audiences.

I'm talking about the Christian worldview, especially when I'm talking about the story of reality, which is an accounting of the Christian worldview from Genesis to Revelation. It's kind of a big picture look how the world began, how it ends, and everything important that happens in between. But one of the things that I mentioned is that even at the very beginning, the introduction to any story is meant to tell you what kind of world the story takes place in and who the main characters are, et cetera.

But I mentioned many times that we live in a magical world. Now, I'm not referring to occultic magic. I'm talking about the world of things that are beyond that which is accessible to the five senses.

We don't just live in a materialistic empirical realm. We live in a realm that has a lot of things that exist in our active and make a difference in life that are not available to the five senses. They are available to us by different sensory apparatus that our mind has.

Reflection, intuition, that kind of thing. But aesthetic insights and moral insights that we have that has nothing to do with the five senses. So, when I think what happens is even as Christians, we forget that we live in a magical world.

So, when somebody like Richard Dawkins scoffs at Christians who think that Jesus made water out of wine, made wine out of water, just think a lot of people have done that to reverse. Anyway, he scoffs because he thinks, gee, that's ridiculous. Well, it's only ridiculous and I developed this idea of the story of reality.

If the world is a certain way in which this is not consistent with the way the world is, it all depends on what kind of world we live in. And the scripture characterizes a world that is a magical world. And all I mean there is it goes beyond the physical realm.

We're not limited to the physical realm. There are forces and powers and persons that inhabit this realm. And it makes it so interesting and the possibilities so significant that it's fair to call it a magical realm.

But these are, this is not hidden occult forces. These are the forces that are available that we're aware of in many cases or God makes us aware because God has made a world in a particular way. That's more than just molecules in motion.

Let's go to a question from Jessica. Is the devil omnipresent? In other words, is he everywhere at the same time? No. Next.

Well, omnipresent is a non-communicable attribute of God. God is personally present everywhere. There is no place that we could go away from this spirit.

What does that sound, 139 or something like that? Famously that passage goes on and on about that and other verses as well. But God is the only creature that is like that. It's a divine quality.

It's a perfection. The devil doesn't have that. He's contingent.

He's created. He's limited. Now he's very bright.

He knows a lot of stuff and he's got a lot of minions running around. And I don't know much about their communication together. Scripture doesn't give us that insight.

But they do create lots of problems, especially for human beings. And the influence of the devil is going to be very pervasive, ubiquitous, all over. I mean, it feels like omnipresence, but it isn't of the person.

The influence is there. And we struggle with our fallenness that the story calls the flesh, but that's not the only enemy. We also have the world and the devil.

And they are very handy to take advantage of our fleshly tendencies. But these are all things that happen temporally and happen with the aid or the influence of limited individuals, like demons or the devil. It's interesting when you think about that and the passion account, it actually says there if I'm not mistaken that the devil entered Judas at a certain time.

So that's a spatial kind of characterization. Although I want to be careful, I use the term because an immaterial being cannot be spatially present. But he can have an influence in a physical place.

It's called. It's called an ill local impact or something like that. I get these terms mixed up, but in any event.

But there's no indication, obviously, that the devil is omnipresent. And so there's since that's a character of divinity, that's only God has that, not the devil. Yeah, so another verse that comes to mind is when the devil is tempting Jesus and then it says he left him until an opportune time.

So he is localized in some way. But I guess if you have all of the things working under you, they probably report back. I would assume there's some sort of he probably knows a lot of what's going on.

We have to check with John Cleese. Oh, yeah, that's from the last episode. If anyone doesn't get that.

Go back to the last episode. Who actually was the reader for screw tape letters that deals with this kind of thing is. Yeah, so definitely not omnipresent.

Do you think Greg, do you think he is aware of everything that's going on or no? No, that would be that would essentially be omniscient. I guess not in an omniscient way, but in a way where he's being reported to in some way or, I guess, how can we know that? There does seem to be a kind of an organization. He seems to be the head of them all.

Then there are kind of first lieutenants and second lieutenants kind of thing in the hierarchy. Doesn't use those language that language, but we see some indication of an order or organization to that. So that's all I feel comfortable committing to just because of the Bible doesn't speak that much about it.

We probably don't need to know that and speculation can get us into trouble, but I think that's safe. Okay, then let's go to a question from Jesse. We see many instances in scripture where people are demon possessed.

Can a demon possess a location and therefore affect the people who are at that location? Well, the devil is referred to the classical understanding of this text out of Ezekiel as the Prince of Tyre. So there is a leader of a region called Tyre, T-Y-R-E. So it intimates that there is a headship managing or controlling that area.

And I think there may be some good theological and biblical arguments kind of cashing that notion out, regional spirits that control regions. And they individually have a specific demonic influence in that region, all right? And I think that the, oh no, I'm trying to download the name. She knew the guy wrote about the Nephilim, not Nephilim, but the Elohim.

Brian Kadama? No, Brian, he wrote about them. He wrote the Nephilim, but the unseen realm. Oh, Michael Heiser.

Michael Heiser. Sorry, Michael. He's very forgiving right now because he's in heaven.

So, but where he's written about this too, I think explains some of these details here. The role of demons in the world and even the territorial sense. I'm just going from kind of a vague memory of his book, The Unseen Realm.

And I probably should read it again. So there may be biblical support for that. No omnipresence but regions where it seems like demons have a significant influence.

They're assigned to those areas. And I think that's part of his theology as well. I don't think I would describe it or characterize it as being a place is possessed.

Because I think only people, I think that could only happen with people, but they're localized. No matter what, they're going to be in a specific place. I don't know if they stay in one place all the time.

I don't know about that. Just for clarification, being in a physical place doesn't mean they're sitting on your shoulder like in some novels or sitting on the, you know, on the break front or whatever, you know, because they are immaterial beings and so they don't have a physical location. But they have ill, there's different terms for this, but they can have a local influence that's similar to your soul.

Your soul is immaterial. It's not in your body like a P is in a pod, but at the same time is unified with your body in an intimate fashion and in the same way you have these demons that manifest themselves in intimate ways in physical environments such that one could say that the demons went into the pigs, even though, you know, they're non-physical so they don't have a physical location inside the pigs somehow. But it's the best way to describe it in materialistic terms that people could understand.

Well, thank you so much. We appreciate hearing from you. Send us your question on X with the hashtag STR.

Ask or if you go to our website, just look for our podcast page. You could find the navigation bar at the top of every page and just look for a hashtag STR. Ask and right there on the left at the top, you'll find a link to submit your question.

And we would love to hear from you. Just make sure the question's not too long. Maybe two sentences, maybe three.

If your sentences are short, just try to keep it fairly short. And we will consider it for the show. We really appreciate hearing from you.

We couldn't do the show without you, so we hope to hear your question. This is Amy Hall and Greg Cocle for Stand to Reason.