³¹不可偏向 那些交鬼的 和行巫术的 ；不可求问 他们，以致被他们玷污了 。我是耶和华 ―你们的神 。

³¹ ¶ Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I am the LORD your God.

³¹ Verse 31. Regard not them that have familiar spirits] The

Hebrew word oboth probably signifies a kind of

engastromuthoi or ventriloquists, or such as the Pythoness

mentioned Ac 16:16,18; persons who, while under the

influence of their demon, became greatly inflated, as the Hebrew

word implies, and gave answers in a sort of phrensy. See a case

of this kind in Virgil, AEneid, l. vi., ver. 46, &c.:-

"----Deus ecce, Deus! cui talla fanti

Ante fores, subito non vultus, non color unus,

Non comptae mansere comae; sed pectus anhelum,

Et rabie fera corda tument; majorque videri,

Nec mortale sonans, afflata est numine quando

Jam propiore Dei."



-------------------Invoke the skies,

I feel the god, the rushing god, she cries.

While yet she spoke, enlarged her features grew,

Her colour changed, her locks dishevelled flew.

The heavenly tumult reigns in every part,

Pants in her breast, and swells her rising heart:

Still swelling to the sight, the priestess glowed,

And heaved impatient of the incumbent god.

PITT.

Neither seek after wizards] yiddeonim, the wise or

knowing ones, from yada, to know or understand;

called wizard in Scotland, wise or cunning man in England; and

hence also the wise woman, the white witch. Not only all real

dealers with familiar spirits, or necromantic or magical

superstitions, are here forbidden, but also all pretenders to

the knowledge of futurity, fortune-tellers, astrologers, &c.,

&c. To attempt to know what God has not thought proper to

reveal, is a sin against his wisdom, providence, and goodness.

In mercy, great mercy, God has hidden the knowledge of futurity

from man, and given him hope-the expectation of future good, in

its place. See Clarke on Ex 22:18.