[Avodah] The Talmud’s Many Demons

[Rafi Hecht]

Nice article! Some points:

1. If you look in the Talmud some more, you will see instances of demonry
all over the place. One of my personal favorites is where R' Acha
(Kiddushin 29b) was in the study hall when a scary demon appeared to him in
the form of a seven-headed serpent while he was praying. Each time he bowed
one of the heads fell off (which leads one to believe that it was the
Shmoneh Esrei where one bows a total of 7 times).
2. When Gd created the universe he had to create an equal amount of evil to
balance the good. Hence idol-worship and demons.
3. The Sefer Yetzirah (Aryeh Kaplan's edition) mentions that after the
episode with Cain and Abel (Kayin and Hevel), Adam and Eve separated from
each other for 130 years. During that time Adam bonded with Lilith to
create the demons of the world. Clearly there was a necessity to maintain
such a balance especially when "right and wrong" were not clearly defined
since to Cain, killing was perfectly all right (when it was never done
before in recorded history).
4. The Israelites were all prophets after the revelation on Mt. Sinai.
Still, they worshipped idols, as was evident during the episode of Baal
Peor. Also, during the first Temple when they had everything and were on a
high level of holiness, they still worshipped idols and this was one of the
three causes for the first Temple to be destroyed. Clearly, there was
something to be said.
5. Chanoch (Enos) was taken away relatively early (he died at 205 when
everyone was living beyond 900 years of age). One of the reasons was
because he inadvertently introduced idolatry/witchcraft by teaching that if
one worships an agent of Gd (such as the sun, a tree, etc.) with the intent
on focusing on the objects' creator than it's as if one worships Gd. People
soon forgot the "intent" bit and worshipped the objects as entities in and
of their own.
6. The Talmud mentions how the Rabbis prayed for the urge of idol-worship
to be taken away from the Jewish people. As a direct consequence, when the
urge for idol-worship went away, so did prophecy from normal beings (and
went to fools and children).
7. Even today in certain South American and African countries there are
clear instances of real magic and witchcraft. Don't understimate the
unknown.


Best Regards,

Rafi Hecht
*rhecht at gmail.com* <rhecht at gmail.com>
416-276-6925
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On Tue, Aug 14, 2012 at 1:48 PM, Prof. Levine <llevine at stevens.edu> wrote:

>  From http://tinyurl.com/9vwk7t9
>
> *Sages in a superstitious age accepted the existence of invisible devils
> and the use of magic to render them visible*Here is a *baraita*attributed to Abba Benjamin: “If the eye would be granted permission to
> see, no creature would be able to stand in the face of the demons that
> surround it.” We are all, apparently, constantly beset by invisible devils,
> and the rabbis of the Gemara go on to expand on the proposition: “Abaye
> said: They are more numerous than us, and they stand about us like a ditch
> around a mound.” “Rav Huna said: Each one of us has a thousand to his left
> and ten thousand to his right.”
>
> The idea that we see only a fragment of reality, that our senses are not
> designed to perceive everything that is, has a surprisingly modern ring to
> it. Abba Benjamin’s dictum <Snip> Taken as metaphor, the idea that we are
> surrounded by invisible powers is not hard to accept.
>
> The problem is that the rabbis did not intend it as a metaphor. This
> becomes clear from the ensuing discussion of the effects of demons and the
> ways of making them visible. The evil these demons work is not metaphysical
> or catastrophic; it is trivial and bothersome, making them seem more like
> naughty sprites than devils. When your knees become tired, when your
> clothes wear out from rubbing, when you feel squeezed in the crowd at a
> public lecture­this is all, according to Rava, the work of demons. And
> there are magical ways of making demons show themselves. All you have to do
> is find a black female cat who is the firstborn daughter of a firstborn
> mother, burn her placenta to ashes, grind the ashes, and put some of them
> in your eye, and you will be able to see the demons. Be sure, however, to
> place the remainder of the ashes in a sealed iron tube, lest the demons
> steal it from you.
>
> See the above URL for more.
> ------------------------------
> Rabbi A. Miller spent years giving shiurim that went through all of Shas.
> He was not deterred by topics that some might feel should not be discussed
> in public due to their "delicate" nature.  However, there were times when
> he did skip some topics.  He would say, "I cannot teach what I do not
> understand, so now turn the page to ......"   IIRC some of the topics that
> he skipped were the Gemara's discussion of Zugos and discussions like the
> one referred to about demons.
>
> YL
>
>
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